Gimme Pride

Chapter 1

Gimme Pride

By J. Tomas

“I thought you came to help me out,” Shawna Reid complains as she digs another handful of hangers out of a shipping crate. Sexy swimsuits dangle from the hangers—Speedos in bright Spandex, colorful one-pieces with revealing cut-outs, cropped and shredded T-shirts that can serve as cover-ups on the beach or at the pool. Shawna tosses the hangers to her brother, Chip, and glares at him as if the look alone can put him to work. “I only brought you because—”

“I know, I know.” Eight years her junior, Chip’s still in high school, and this is his first Pride event ever. He was always too young before—his mother didn’t even want him going this year, if she had her way, but Shawna rented a vendor booth she needed help with and she managed to talk some sense into the parentals. It’s a Pride event, not an all-out orgy. Most everyone here is dressed in jeans and T-shirts…except the drag queens, who look absolutely fabulous all dolled up. There’s no exposed flesh, no in-your-face queerness, not here.

Except, well, for Chip. He wears a pair of cherry red Speedos so tight, they look painted on. Nothing else. And damn, but he’s rocking them today.

Shawna runs an online store of sexy clothing—intimates, lingerie, swimwear. She started it after college with a couple of handmade designs and quickly realized most of her clientele were gay. She’s cool with that—she was the first person Chip came out to when he turned thirteen and thought it about time to admit to his family he was seeing the boy next door, especially since he needed his mother to drive them to the mall for a date. That was a while ago—when he was what, a freshman? He’s not even interested in that kid any more.

When Shawna started getting requests for men’s sizes in lacy teddies and rainbow-colored boyshorts, she shifted her attention from traditional marketing and began focusing on Pride events around the state. Richmond’s own Virginia Pride is the first one she agreed to take Chip to, on the sole condition he help her out at the booth.

How could he say no to an offer like that?

Only “helping out” isn’t exactly how he wants to spend his day. Pride is hopping—he’s out at school, sure, and he’s seen Queer as Folk so often, he can recite most of the episodes by heart, but this is the first time he’s ever been up close and personal to so many openly gay people in one place. He never knew Richmond had so many queers! He knows he’s staring, but he can’t help it. The couples holding hands are so darn cute, and then there are lesbian mothers with baby carriages, college students walking their dogs, transmen and -women able to embrace their true selves in public for once…it’s like a feast and he doesn’t know what to take in next. The vendor booths run the gamut from banks to insurance companies, local eateries to artists. Rainbows are everywhere, and Chip even saw a bookseller earlier as he helped Shawna lug in her items. Gay books, here, in Richmond! He’s definitely checking that out.

If Shawna ever gives him a chance to look around.

He hangs the swimsuits on an empty clothing rack and stands back, hands on his hips, to survey the growing crowd. He doesn’t get a chance to breathe, though, before Shawna’s foisting more clothes into his hands. “Help me out here, will you?” she snaps.

“I am,” Chip bites back.

Regardless of how fun Pride will be, he has a feeling it’s going to be a long day.