Schoolteacher Julian Reynolds is disillusioned with the seedier side of gay life in New York City with its self-absorption, vanity, and preoccupation with sex. When his long-time relationship with his high school sweetheart ends, he returns to his hometown and vows to live a simple life free of the extremes of the gay lifestyle and romantic entanglements. With that end in mind, he rents the carriage house next door to a large Tudor-style home.<br><br>Tate Butler, a former student of Julian’s, lives in the big house with his mother. Tate is bitter and withdrawn after losing a leg while serving in the Marine Corps during the war in Afghanistan. Fearing rejection from his mother and blaming himself for his father’s death, Tate stays firmly in the closet and punishes himself by refusing to learn how to walk again.<br><br>Can Tate and Julian help heal each other’s pasts and forge a real and lasting future together? Or will the driveway that separates their houses prove too wide a gulf to cross?

The Marine Next Door

Julian could never quite relate. At first Julian tried to explain the changes in his lover as just a passing phase, but as time went on, it became clear that Virgil had found his niche. And that niche wasn’t Julian’s.


Maybe if he were younger he’d be more inclined to become part of it. But the reality was New York was not that different from Mayfair when it came to the gay community. And if the attitudes of shallowness and self-absorption of Mayfair annoyed him, those same traits were amplified in New York and became down right infuriating. Julian tried to discuss this with Virgil, but he became defensive, claiming that Julian was becoming a snob, was out of touch, even going so far as to accuse him of homophobia.


Chapter 3