Mitch dropped his head into his hands and made a groaning sound. "Why do people keep asking me about that?"
Probably because he'd been on one date with a woman in the past three years, and because he'd never actually given anyone who asked him about his sexuality a straight answer, including Rick. And there was his stunt with Wylie's brother, and the additions to the state domestic partnership bill he got pushed through the city council (If you were a public employee in NYC these days, the health insurance and family leave rights granted people in a domestic partnership were somewhat more... robust.. than the ones the state granted).
Display any interest in or sympathy for gay rights, and in the absence of conspicuous evidence of heterosexuality, your own sexual orientation would become suspect. Rick had learned that a long time ago. Don't make waves, don't draw attention to yourself. If anyone brings up fags or don't ask don't tell, make sure to mention your ex-wife.
He'd been good at it before he went into the army. He was damn near perfect at it, now. It helped that nobody ever suspected big, tattoed, ex-military, ex-NYPD guys with buzz cuts of being anything other than painfully straight.
Mitch was suprisingly good at keeping secrets, but painfully bad at lying, which might be why he always dodged the "Mayor Hundred, is it true that you're gay?" question. He hadn't displayed an real interest in either men or women in all the time Rick had known him, though, so Rick's working hypothesis now was that Mitch was asexual. Maybe he always had been, or maybe the explosion that had given him his powers had done something to him, or the powers themselves had.
Maybe if Rick were a robot or a computer or something, he'd have been able to get Mitch's attention.
"Because you keep pulling stuff like this," Wylie said bluntly. "I owe you for what you did for my brother, but don't you think this is pushing it? We could dig up some other vital civic event being held somewhere in the five burroughs on the same date, and you could go to that."
"I'm going," Mitch said flatly. "End of story. Now, what did the teachers' union want from me again?"
"Total dominion over the entire city budget," Rick muttered. No one was listening to him, which was probably for the best. He stored his suggestion that they stick the head of the teacher's union and the head of the transit workers union in a steel cage and have them fight barehanded for who got the largest number of ridiculous concessions from the city up to mention to Mitch in the car later. Wylie had a deap-seated loathing of the teacher's union that was equaled only by his conviction that school vouchers violated seperation of church and state and that charter schools sucked public funds away from public school and just perpetuated the problem under the guise of helping a few select children, and it was better not to give him an excuse to start venting.
"You think it's a mistake, too," Mitch said, hours later, while Rick drove him home - the cage match comment had gotten him a smile, just as he'd known it would.
"Would it make the slightest bit of difference if I said yes?"
Mitch's lips twitched. "No," he said.
"Didn't think so. Anyway, if you start picking and choosing which parades you're going to go to now, you might decide not to go to the Mermaid Parade, and watching all those girls dance around in nothing but gauze and body paint was going to be my reward to myself if I manage to keep you alive and intact until June." Guys in body paint, too, but he didn't say that, of course.
The Germans were still out there, with God knew what designs on the inside of Mitch's head, and then there were the crazies, the people Mitch's abilities seemed to attract like flies, just as many of them now as there had even been when he'd still been the Great Machine. Except now Mitch didn't have a jetpack, and he didn't have a helmet or costume that doubled as body armor, and he didn't have any weapons other than his voice. He just had Rick. And Kremlin, whether either of them wanted to admit it or not, but Kremlin was as much a hindrance as a help these days.
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Ex Machina ficlet, part 2
Date: 2009-04-30 07:34 pm (UTC)Probably because he'd been on one date with a woman in the past three years, and because he'd never actually given anyone who asked him about his sexuality a straight answer, including Rick. And there was his stunt with Wylie's brother, and the additions to the state domestic partnership bill he got pushed through the city council (If you were a public employee in NYC these days, the health insurance and family leave rights granted people in a domestic partnership were somewhat more... robust.. than the ones the state granted).
Display any interest in or sympathy for gay rights, and in the absence of conspicuous evidence of heterosexuality, your own sexual orientation would become suspect. Rick had learned that a long time ago. Don't make waves, don't draw attention to yourself. If anyone brings up fags or don't ask don't tell, make sure to mention your ex-wife.
He'd been good at it before he went into the army. He was damn near perfect at it, now. It helped that nobody ever suspected big, tattoed, ex-military, ex-NYPD guys with buzz cuts of being anything other than painfully straight.
Mitch was suprisingly good at keeping secrets, but painfully bad at lying, which might be why he always dodged the "Mayor Hundred, is it true that you're gay?" question. He hadn't displayed an real interest in either men or women in all the time Rick had known him, though, so Rick's working hypothesis now was that Mitch was asexual. Maybe he always had been, or maybe the explosion that had given him his powers had done something to him, or the powers themselves had.
Maybe if Rick were a robot or a computer or something, he'd have been able to get Mitch's attention.
"Because you keep pulling stuff like this," Wylie said bluntly. "I owe you for what you did for my brother, but don't you think this is pushing it? We could dig up some other vital civic event being held somewhere in the five burroughs on the same date, and you could go to that."
"I'm going," Mitch said flatly. "End of story. Now, what did the teachers' union want from me again?"
"Total dominion over the entire city budget," Rick muttered. No one was listening to him, which was probably for the best. He stored his suggestion that they stick the head of the teacher's union and the head of the transit workers union in a steel cage and have them fight barehanded for who got the largest number of ridiculous concessions from the city up to mention to Mitch in the car later. Wylie had a deap-seated loathing of the teacher's union that was equaled only by his conviction that school vouchers violated seperation of church and state and that charter schools sucked public funds away from public school and just perpetuated the problem under the guise of helping a few select children, and it was better not to give him an excuse to start venting.
"You think it's a mistake, too," Mitch said, hours later, while Rick drove him home - the cage match comment had gotten him a smile, just as he'd known it would.
"Would it make the slightest bit of difference if I said yes?"
Mitch's lips twitched. "No," he said.
"Didn't think so. Anyway, if you start picking and choosing which parades you're going to go to now, you might decide not to go to the Mermaid Parade, and watching all those girls dance around in nothing but gauze and body paint was going to be my reward to myself if I manage to keep you alive and intact until June." Guys in body paint, too, but he didn't say that, of course.
The Germans were still out there, with God knew what designs on the inside of Mitch's head, and then there were the crazies, the people Mitch's abilities seemed to attract like flies, just as many of them now as there had even been when he'd still been the Great Machine. Except now Mitch didn't have a jetpack, and he didn't have a helmet or costume that doubled as body armor, and he didn't have any weapons other than his voice. He just had Rick. And Kremlin, whether either of them wanted to admit it or not, but Kremlin was as much a hindrance as a help these days.
cont'd again