To This Day Button Is A Bachelor

20260622

Prompt from “pridemonthprompts” 2025 list.

“Er, hi? Is this the, um, ‘Gay Animal Sanctuary’?”
Howard sighed. “Please tell me you’re here to ask about volunteering, not to read me a church screed.”
The young person looked quite taken aback. “Oh, no, no, it’s definitely the volunteering one! But, um, I needed to ask if, like, you have to be gay to volunteer here?”
“No, no, we’re happy to take any help at this point.” Howard gave them an uncertain, measuring look. “Mind if I ask how you identify?”
“Straight…”
Howard hastily choked back a laugh at their sheepish mumble. “Kid, you don’t have to sound apologetic about it!”
“W-well, I don’t know, I assume it’s not what you’re after…”
“As long as you’re cool with working next to a couple of gay guys, and you aren’t going to try conversion therapy on the animals, it really doesn’t matter to us how you identify.”
While their confusion at ‘conversion therapy’ was mildly exasperating, in this instance it was a good sign.
“My name’s Howard Howards - no, my parents don’t have a sick sense of humour, I do, and insisted on taking my husband’s name. He’s Tim Howards, I’ll introduce you two in a minute. We’re both ‘he/him’. How should we address you?”
“Er, I’m Larry. Larry Brown. And, um, I’m a he-him too?”
“Fair enough. Follow me, Larry, and I’ll show you around.” Howard set off, the youth trailing behind, and casually probed “So, if it wasn’t the hope of queer camaraderie, what led you here?”
“Um. I’m hoping to go into training to be a vet, and everyone says I should get as much experience working with animals as I can, and, um…” Larry’s voice dropped to a mumble again “…you’re the only animal sanctuary I can easily get to by bike.”
Howard nodded approvingly. “You’ve got goals and a sensible head on your shoulders. You’ll go far, kid, and I hope we can help with that.”
“Oh!” Larry brightened up. Then, buoyed by this encouragement, asked “Is it homophobic to ask how you got so many gay animals?”
“Nah, just shows you understand statistics. And, well, let me start at the beginning.” Howard fished his phone out and showed Larry the lock screen, which had a happy family of two men and two dogs. “The lab is Button, the collie’s Stewie. Button came to us first, award winning dog who fell from grace when he failed to act as a stud. Of course we had to adopt him. I mean, poor thing got fired for being gay!”
“Wow.”
“Then we started looking for another gay dog, trying to play matchmaker, and found Stewie. Button and him hit it off at first meeting, so we took Stewie home… and turns out they’re not each other’s type or something. Total platonic bros. So the search continued. And…” Howard gestured vaguely at the repurposed farm. “Somewhere along the way, probably at the point an animal rescue mailing list shared our story, things got out of hand.”
“Ohh. So, like, people send their gay animals here?”
“Yeah, we got a message asking if we’d like a pair of gay roosters, how could we say no, then it was six different gay dogs - plus one lesbian - and when we were contacted about a gay horse we realised we either needed to start turning people down or do this properly.”
Larry nodded, digesting this, then probed “So, um, you both love animals, right?”
“Hey, we’re not that bad at telling people no!”
“Cool, cool…”
“We shopped around, found this place on the market, and the old couple who were selling were tickled pink when they heard why we were buying a farm. Said they were happy to know their family legacy was going to a good cause. They introduced us to all our new neighbours, and put in a good word for us I suspect, because those folks have all been tremendous help. Which we needed - there was a real learning curve for some of these animals! But I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”
“Yeah, I saw you have swans?”
“We do, and they’re as cantankerous a trio of horny bastards as you’d expect. Well, I mean, assuming you know much about swans.”
“Um, some? I’ve been getting ‘junior zoologist’ since I was six and they cover swans quite often…”
“Since you were six? By our standards you’re practically overqualified! Don’t worry, you’ll be shadowing Doc - that’s our neighbour on the south side.” Howard waved down the lane. “He’s a retired vet and helps out here to keep his hand in. I’m sure he’ll be thrilled to hear he’s got an aspiring veterinarian to mentor!”
Larry lit up. “No way, serious??”
“Yep! He comes by a few times a week, normally Mondays and Thursdays, to check on everyone and play with the chickens. They’re his favourite critters and the one animal he can’t have on his farm, because his wife’s allergic. Now that’s love! She’s also lovely, and our go-to source for horse advice. Once she finds out you’re a vet-to-be she’ll have loads to talk your ear off about.”
“Awesome.”
“Heh.” Howard grinned. “Yeah, I think you three’ll get along great. For now, we just need to find Tim - oh, and you’ll have to pass the ‘sniff test’, I’m sure you understand.”
“Course.” Larry said casually. “My dad always says the hardest interview he ever had was with mum’s dog.”
“I can believe it.”
“Though, um…” Larry glanced down at his cargo pants. “I must confess, I brought a bunch of different critter treats with me…”
Howard laughed. “You’re, what, fourteen? And you already know how to bribe your way through tricky interviews. You’re really gonna go far, kid!”

Prompt was “Pet”.