April 23, 2026. Rock Springs, Wyoming. A man on a scissor lift paints a scene onto the brick facade of a derelict warehouse next to the tracks.
Recognizing this artist's work, I cheerfully holler up, "Hey, are you 'Abandonado?'"
"Who wants to know?" he calls down defensively. "You're not a cop, are you? You have to tell me if you are."
"Look at me." I'm in a Rockies t-shirt and jeans. "Do you think undercover cops are patrolling the streets of Rock Springs?"
"With rail cops, you never know. This could be railroad property."
"I'm not a cop, but fair point." Having art-bombed a few rail buildings myself, I am well aware of the bizarre nineteenth-century Federal law that makes railroad police the only fully deputized private-company employees in America. They can jail you for simple trespassing. And slap a $6000 fine on top of it. Guess how I fucking know.
"So you know my work?" he queries.
"Seen a couple of your murals on South Dakota rezzes, and those new ones cheering up rugged corners of Rawlins. I'm sure this one will be great too, given the source material here. Pilot Butte, the historic downtown, the wild horse herd ..."
"And Flaming Gorge," he says, sweeping his arm across his emerging image of the colorful nearby gorge, one of the planet's most scenic. "Any other suggestions?" he asks, with possible sarcasm.
I sigh. "No. I'm not here to give you notes or anything. I'm concepting and scouting locations for my own work. See, I've been doing these little heart murals ..." A new project of mine is putting up heart-shaped mini-murals in small towns, each five to fifteen feet high and featuring the name of the place, plus an outline of something it is known for - a notable geographical feature, historic building, local wildlife or flora, ranch scenes, what have you. Each image is distinctive, and each locale gets four to eight of the same color (usually not pink, red or purple). I preprint the designs onto rigid panels or rolled-up polymer sheets that I can quickly adhere to various surfaces. With planning and preparation, I've learned to sneak my white work van in and out of town in an hour or two, reducing my chance of getting arrested for trespassing or vandalism. Which, like I hinted, has happened.
"Wait, you're fucking Heartstrong?" He lowers the lift. "A fellow guerrilla art-bomber! I love what you do, man," he enthuses, offering his hand. "Manuel Jiménez. Abandonado. Call me Manny. Or Man, if you're into the whole brevity thing."
"Joe Barnes. Yeah, Heartstrong, if you're into the whole pseudonym thing."
He chuckles. "You're like fucking Cupid, shooting those art-hearts into scruffy little towns. Reminds people of the beauty and the heritage under their noses. I've even seen people wearing t-shirts with your designs on them." More slyly, he asks, "You making good money off that merch?"
"None. I drop them off at a store on my way out of town, along with the digital on a thumb drive so they can make more. Keeps the merch dollars local."
"Brother, you and I seem to have the same idea. Skip the trendy, touristy places that already have strong artist communities, and lift up the towns, or rough parts of town, that could use more pride. And art."
"And love!" I counter. "Most people see 'I Heart Three Forks' or 'I Heart Pinedale,' or wherever, on the surface of my work, but I really chose the heart theme so I could use love to counter all the hate spreading around."
"Awesome! I had no idea your intent was that subversive."
"And yours isn't?"
He returns a knowing smirk.
"I have to admit," I continue, "another motivation is that I get a massive art boner whenever I see some real-deal rancher climbing out of a bale-bed pickup wearing mud-splattered cowboy boots ... and a t-shirt with a heart on it. That's when you know you're making a difference."
"Hahaha! I can relate. Listen, if you ever want to pick a town and do a collab together, hit me up."
"I'd be into that. I love how you make the local features pop in your work, the way you tweak shapes and use light and color. There's fucking passion in what you put on a wall, and people feel it. Adding your flair to these heart bombs, maybe on a bigger wall, we could do something amazing."
< = = = = = = = = >
July 17, 2026. Olathe, Colorado. At the Olathe Drive-In Cinema. Watching the Friday show from Manny's van.
Some native Olathian who got rich in Denver has resurrected the town's long-dead drive-in theater and hired us to repaint the back of the screen. For decades, a gigantic "Welcome to Olathe" mural had greeted motorists coming into town, but lately it had begun to fade into a peeling eyesore. We've spent more than a week overpainting a truly spectacular new design that highlights the agricultural heritage - especially the famous sweet corn - of this broad valley fenced by snow-capped Rockies. Unexpectedly, we're finding that the vibrant colors we've chosen absolutely glow in the high-UV conditions of twilight. At that time of day, which on weekend nights coincides with moviegoers' cars and trucks filing in, it's a beacon visible literally a mile away.
Manny and I have really seemed to enjoy getting to know each other this week. He was born to a Dakota mother and a Mexican Indigenous father in the buttes-and-badlands country of western South Dakota, but spent most of his childhood moving about the Plains as the family pursued farm and ranch work everywhere from Montana to west Texas. His parents died when he was a teenager, leading him to adopt the "Abandonado" art handle. Sadly, he's been abandonado again. Last year, his wife María died in a freak accident. Insurance and worker-compensation payouts have left him without income worries, but what price heartbreak?
I'm in a similar financial position, for different reasons. After growing up in Great Falls, Montana, on the western edge of the Plains, I went to Denver for art school and subsequently landed a graphic design job there with an advertising firm that later went public. Having cashed in, I now work freelance, when I feel like it.
We've been given free admission to the drive-in on this Friday night, and an announcement at the beginning of the show recognizing our work. During the first film, numerous locals stop by our van on the way to the snack bar, congratulating and thanking us for a job so well done. That feels really, really good.
Most of the crowd leaves before the second feature, a psychological thriller with some intense sex scenes. Manny squirms a bit in his seat, and given his recent loss, I suspect the erotic themes are making him uncomfortable.
"Hey, back when we met in Rock Springs, you mentioned getting art boners," he confides. "I get those too."
Playfully, I reply, "Yeah, I thought I saw a little ... uh, protrusion some of the time you were painting."
"Little?" he contests. "Only looks that way when I'm up in the cherry-picker."
"So ... not so much 'art boner' as 'cherry-pecker?'"
"Maybe," he says, chuckling. "But it's an art boner again tonight, with all these locals coming by and praising our work."
"No shit. I might have one too." And maybe not just for art, I'm suddenly aware. And why not? After spending the week with Manuel, I like him.
"I think it's been almost exactly a year since the last time María took care of an art boner for me," he recalls.
I look at him. "You ready to have someone new take care of it?"
He looks back. "I'd gladly return the favor."
Fortunately, sitting high in the back of the lot, neither Manuel's shaft nor my stroking is visible from outside the van. "That feels so good," he sighs. "Thank you."
Knowing I'm the first to touch him since María, I try to be extra gentle in my caresses and in wiping him clean afterward. He returns the favor just as tenderly, looking me in the eye and quietly insisting I tell him how good it feels while he tugs me to climax.
< = = = = = = = = >
August 16. A campground in a canyon near Havre, Montana. A fresh late-summer breeze rustles the tall cottonwoods far above our heads.
"Hell, this isn't just art-bombing, at this rate it's carpet-bombing," Manny suggests over our campfire, recalling the seven quiet towns we "heartbombed" today. But in between those art attacks, we've been mesmerized by hours of endless wheatfields as we sailed peaceably along US Highway 2, and the lonely, distant islands of the Sweetgrass and Bridger ranges floated by almost imperceptibly. Besides US-2, this is the route of Amtrak's scenic Empire Builder, which I rode many times as a kid and is still close to my own heart. I've been planning this passion project on my own for years, but Manuel's reconceptions are proving far more entrancing than the designs I'd previously sketched out.
He observes social media posts trickling in from train passengers who've seen the new hearts gracing East Glacier. "That's good, and bad. We better move quick tomorrow to stay ahead of the cops. Damn, I feel like a Wild West outlaw! But instead of robbing banks and stagecoaches - and killing Indians like me - I'm spreading illicit art and love across the heartland."
"Not everyone would call this the heartland."
"Midwesterners don't own that! I've lived all over these plains, and they're the land of my heart."
"Mine too. It's a big-hearted land, even if it doesn't always get enough love."
"I know that feeling," he says plaintively, eyes pasted to mine.
"Me too." I say, stepping closer. We haven't talked about what happened in Olathe, but I sure have spent time thinking about it. Having not had any deep relationships the last few years, I'm opening my mind to the other half of the population.
And opening my heart as well. Manuel and I kiss, tenderly. "I need this so bad," he gasps, his half-full longneck falling to the ground.
"So do I," I exhale, surprised at the sudden need overwashing me as we climb into his van. The one eye of his uncut wonder stares me in the face. I peel back the wrinkly foreskin, unwrapping a present that seems to me as good as what he's getting.
We share a wet, tender cumkiss after he shudders into my mouth, and then he returns all the favors. We fall asleep contentedly in his double vanbed, knowing we need to hit the highway early tomorrow.
< = = = = = = = = >
August 17. In the crumpled Missouri breaklands thirty miles west of the Montana-North Dakota border. My phone rings.
"Hey, where're you at, exactly?"
The caller is Shelley Beebe, known to the public as rising-star sculptor "Jelley Bee."
I respond that we're rolling into Culbertson, our final planned "bombsite."
"I'm in Williston right now," which is less than an hour ahead in the next state, "and word is you pissed off some absentee muckety-muck building owner in Glasgow."
"Fuck!" I mutter. "I knew we shouldn't have hit Glasgow."
"He's giving the local Sheriff heartburn and demanding 'justice.'" She says that last word sarcastically, clearly sympathetic with our guerrilla perspective. "So hit the gas and get your ass out of Montana until it blows over. And while you're at it, come check out my new installation!"
We both flatten our vans' accelerators, not easing off until the badlands-themed "Welcome to North Dakota" sign looms into view. Flashing lights appear in the rear distance, remarkable since we're doing over ninety ourselves, but we coast into freedom before they catch up. Thankfully, they kill their lights and turn around at the state line.
We have no difficulty finding Shelley, or Jelley Bee, at the Williston park where she and two assistants are making two concrete plinths. Her yellow-streaked black hair looks like a big bumblebee, almost as eye-catching as her gleaming steel sculptures. She grew up near Cheyenne, where her rancher dad had built a notable roadside sculpture garden, taught her everything he knew ... and then sent her to art school. She works with polished steel plate to produce works with rippled surfaces that look almost like mercury, or T-1000's "mimetic polyalloy", or ... well, silver jelly, hence the pseudonym.
Shelley rolls up the cargo door of a big truck nearby. "Behold, Derrick and the Roughneck." Inside is an eight-foot statue of an oilfield worker. His muscles, bulging veins, hardhat, work boots, and flaccid penis (it is a nude) ripple and shine like they were molded from soft liquid metal. Shelley's other piece is the same height, a scale model of an oil pumpjack. It's like the dozens we've seen cranking away along the highway into town, but not like them: instead of the usual straight lines, simple curves, rusty bolts, and dull flat planes of this machinery are wavy, artistic, muscular-looking shapes and shimmering surfaces.
We're too stunned to speak at first. These are masterpieces. Manny finally articulates a response. "Jesus, Jel. This is ... this is a whole new level for you. Folks all over ND oil country are going to be as speechless as ... well, as we are. The new way you've rendered the familiar, it's like molten magic."
She's appreciative but humble, turning the subject back to our next plans.
"We're doing a big historical mural on the butte above Lake Sakakawea, for the tribes there. We're also going to run some free workshops, so more of their own can do these projects."
"Do you think they'd want a metalworker to teach some classes too? I'm done here in two days."
< = = = = = = = = >
August 25. New Town, North Dakota. Lake Sakakawea and our new blufftop mural shine as if lit ablaze by the setting sun.
It's been heartwarming to work and teach amongst the three tribes that call this reservation home. Some of Shelley's students have even managed to learn and replicate her metal techniques on works of their own ideation.
Already in a flirty mood with our time here winding down, Shelley drops her bikini as she slips into the hotel spa. "Let's get natural!" she teases. "Or are you guys hiding your 'art boners?' I overheard you talking about that."
"Haha, maybe artist boners tonight, Mamacita," provokes Manuel. This is the first I've seen him act remotely flirtatious towards a woman. I'm proud of him. I also can't blame him. Despite Manny's and my feelings for each other, Shelley seems mighty alluring right now.
"Speaking of which, and I hope you don't mind my ... um, probing, but is your relationship more than professional?"
"You could say ..." I slowly suggest, "we haven't kept our art boners to ourselves."
Manny chuckles at that. Then, to Shelley, more boldly: "And how about our relationship with you?"
"Well, I don't wanna be left out of the fun!" she fake-pouts, her boobs skimming the tub's surface as she crosses to sit between us, thighs touching. "Be advised, this welder is used to handling two rods at once," she quips as she grasps both of our shafts, her lips meeting Manny's. While they kiss and he squeezes one breast, I suck the other. "Mmm, I need both your art boners inside me tonight." Erect penises and nipples bulge the thin pool towels we wrap around ourselves as we head upstairs for a night of triple delight, in which Shelley absorbs both rods at once, in multiple ways, and Manny tastes his first woman since María.
< = = = = = = = = >
September 27. Gillette, Wyoming, the self-described "Energy capital of the world." Manny and I sure have plenty of energy.
We've arrived at our motel in the afternoon, allowing plenty of time to catch up in more than an artistic way, having not seen each other except for one enchanted weekend together in Thermopolis. Tomorrow we'll start firing our forbidden "heartillery" across eastern Wyoming, the corner of South Dakota, and the top of Nebraska.
As he spoons me, one arm wrapped around my chest, I suggest, "Speaking of deeper ..." and grind my posterior against his slick, softened willie. "Have you ever..."
It twitches against me. "No, but it sounds nice. Have you?"
"Not since college. But I'd like you to."
He fully rehardens at the suggestion. I lift a leg so he can rub against my back hole. God, that feels good.
"God, that feels good," he echoes my thought out loud, enjoying the warmth of the hollow.
I apply some lube, coaching him through the process as the wedge of his cocktip pries my door open. Soon after that, he's flooding my foyer with semen. We flop to the side, his discharged nozzle still half-inside me.
"That was as nice as doing Shelley." After a moment, he whispers, "Or ... maybe ... even María. Thanks for that, Joe. This really is helping me heal."
< = = = = = = = = >
September 30. Near Edgemont, South Dakota, just south of the Black Hills. The aspens lining our campground are starting to go yellow.
We've spent two days doing a paid gig. Enamored of our work, a business owner, lamenting that his town "doesn't get enough love" in comparison to nearby touristy Hot Springs, pays us to spiff up a dilapidated building with a locally themed mural.
The nearby campground is empty except for us. Rather than using separate shower rooms to wash off the day's paint, we slip into one together. I clink some quarters into the shower, and we gleefully rub our soapy bodies and cocks together under the hot water.
Manuel turns his backside to me. "I want to feel you between my cheeks," he implores, already rocking his hips. I comply, thrusting in and out of his slickened ass-cleft and rubbing the underside of his balls on each stroke, while I reach around to stroke his slippery prick. At one point, he has me stop so I can gently press myself against his hole for a few seconds before resuming the machinations.
My other soapy hand roaming across his chest and belly, my lips on his shoulders, I start getting excited. "Manny, I'm gonna cum this way. Is that how you want it?"
"No!" he exclaims, stopping the action. "Make love to me." He starts pushing back against my dick, grunting and straining as it worms in.
"Ugggh!" he cries in what might be pain. "Don't stop!" Then suddenly, with a palpable pop, my glans has crowded through the hatch, now sinking into his depths.
"Fuck, that's it, man! Ohhh! You weren't kidding."
"Here I cum!" I paint his insides. White, unlike most of what we spray on our murals.
"Don't pull out yet!" he demands, brushing my hand away and stroking himself to climax. "Fuck, that's amazing." He spins around, my dong flopping out of him, and pulls me into a heartfelt, minutes-long kiss. "You're such a good lover."
"That's the perfect word, because that's what I felt when I came inside you. I love you, Man."
"I think I love you too. And not just because that's some of the best sex I've ever had."
We gently cleanse each other one more time, finishing off our entire roll of quarters.
< = = = = = = = = >
October 2. Valentine, Nebraska, the Heart City. Frost decorates the north side of buildings where the emaciating Fall sun can't reach.
"I was born less than an hour from here, but never realized what an artistic gold mine this is," enthuses Manuel as we walk Valentine's small downtown discussing the possibilities. "Feels like it was built just for us."
Culturally, Valentine is a traditional ranching town with a rather infamous Wild West frontier past. But it also boasts a burgeoning, and underdeveloped, recreational scene. The Cowboy Trail, a 200-mile biking and horseback route, ends here, with plans to eventually reach Nebraska's rugged Pine Ridge corner. On the edge of town, the trail crosses a dizzyingly high bridge over the Niobrara River, a designated Wild and Scenic waterway that carves a slash across most of Nebraska and boasts stupendously good rafting and paddling. Just two miles downriver, bison roam one of the state's only two federal Wilderness areas.
Valentine is also the crown jewel of the Sandhills, a vast jumble of towering grass-covered hills that form the largest sand-dune system in North America, two hundred miles across. Poor in soil but rich in wind and water, the serene Sandhills seem to feature little more than grass, windmills, and cattle. Also a recognized Dark Sky destination, a nearby lake hosts Nebraska's annual Star Party.
"Where to even fucking start?" I echo, admiring the iconic bank building with elaborate images of stampeding, cowboy-driven longhorns molded into its brick facade. "Just fuck me."
"Anytime, my little heartthrobs," trills a feminine voice from a car that we barely noticed rumbling up behind. We observe that some of the body panels of this car, an eyewateringly yellow Dodge Challenger Super Bee, have a subtle scalloped appearance, resembling the waves created by a sudden breeze on a pond, or a piece of fabric rippling in the wind. Only a sheetmetal virtuosa like Jelley Bee could pull off transforming an obscene conveyance like this into such a work of art.
"How'd you know we're here?" I ask.
"The whole fucking art world knows you're here," she declares as she swaggers over, flipping her hornet hair, "after yesterday's heartistic rampage from the Red Cloud Buttes to the Nenzel vineyards. Haven't you checked the socials? They're calling you the 'Valentine Vandals,' even though you haven't done anything in Valentine. Yet. I left home as soon as I saw you blowing up this morning."
"Wait, you came from home? It's not even ten o'clock! That's over three hundred miles of two-lane."
"Pffft. With zero cops."
"Ummm, guys," stammers Manny, "here's a cop now." Sure enough, one of Valentine's Finest is coming our way, alongside a woman who's pointing at us.
"Please come with me," directs the officer. He softens when he recognizes our nervous looks. "Oh, I'm sorry. Don't worry, no one's in trouble here. The mayor has requested your presence."
At City Hall, we enter a meeting room encircled by flipcharts, with several important-looking people seated around a large table covered in laptops and reports. The woman who pointed us out is with the Cherry County Culture Committee. She introduces us to the mayor and the heads of several other prominent local organizations.
"Coincidental to your arrival here, we happen to be launching a major new arts initiative today." The heads of the Chamber and the Visitors Council clear their throats. "And tourism, and economic development," she quickly corrects herself. "Before the NEA went mostly - as the men in the room like to say, tits up - last year, we managed to secure a major grant. Combined with new tourism money from the state, some city dollars, and matching funds from local businesses, we can go all-in on our 'Heart City' identity with major new pieces of public art, accompanied by a big ad buy next February. While people are celebrating Valentine's Day - which is around when they start thinking about summer vacations - we want Valentine to stick in their hearts and minds.
"You three won't be installing any art-hearts here today, but you could get the chance at something much bigger. Later this month, we're releasing an RFP for fourteen - representing Valentine's Day, of course - large commissioned works of public art. Murals, sculptures, welcome signs. Although we want to promote our active sports and arts on the one hand, it's important to continue playing up our cowboys-and-outlaws cultural heritage, which is where most of our hearts lie. If our downtown ends up dominated by expensive galleries, and our ranch pickups by 'We Ain't Quaint' bumper stickers, we will have failed. Given your collective record of striking that delicate balance between trendy and traditional, I urge you - in the strongest possible terms - to submit proposals."
Afterward, the same woman stops us in the hallway, speaking in a low voice. "This is in confidence, but some of us are quietly working on our first Valentine Pride event. Probably a low-key Pride Picnic in the park next summer. We'll announce it on Valentine's Day, hopefully with some ad dollars earmarked for a buy on Queer-friendly media. Please don't leak this, because I don't want to hear certain members of our community bellyaching, 'The gays are coming' all winter. I can handle them come Spring. I just figured as prominent artists, you might ... well, know people who'd want to be part of it."
"We won't ruin your surprise," I assure her. Taking Manny's hand, I promise, "And we'd be thrilled to attend."
"As would I," chimes Shelley, her hand joining ours.
This seems to startle the arts woman briefly, but then a warm smile brightens her face. "That would be delightful."
Valentine being home to only half a dozen chain restaurants and zero chain hotels, we celebrate the day's developments by feasting on some hearty local eats in our locally-owned hotel.
"The two of you make a really good team," says Shelley. "And a great couple."
"Joe," Manny shares, "I'm going to miss being around you when we go back and work on our bids remotely from separate towns."
I feel a pang of heartache at the thought. "Me too. What would you say about teaming up on an even bigger project?"
"Like ... life? It's taken a long time to imagine that with someone other than María, but I could see that with you."
"So can I. You're my man, Man."
"Wait, did I just witness a proposal?" asks Shelley incredulously. "Without all the Patriarchy-coded, bended-knee bullshit? I mean, personally, I wouldn't want to be chained to anyone, but good for you. See, this is why women love Heated Rivalry. And gay porn."
After the laughter dies down, I clarify that neither of us was thinking quite that big. "Sorry to burst your bubble, Shel, but I think we're just talking about shacking together, not shackling together." I look to Manny for confirmation, and he nods.
"Of course, it would continue to be an open relationship," he assures her.
Manny and Shelley start kissing. I'm content to sit back and stroke myself slowly in the corner chair, letting my new housemate make love to a woman one-on-one. Only after they have collapsed into a sweaty, snuggling pile of contented flesh do Manuel and Shelley crawl over to my chair and lollipop my manhood together. Then I glide into her slickness from behind, grasping her tits, while Manuel crawls underneath to taste us both at the same time. Once reerected by Shelley's juicy mouth, he climbs out and mounts me, forming a chain of artists gloriously painting the bedspread.
< = = = = = = = = >
Epilogue
Mid-July 2027. Valentine City Park.
Jelley Bee won both sculpture bids, and her astonishing pieces now bookend Main Street.
One is a ten-foot Valentine-shaped heart, done in her typical shining, jelly-like style. It's encircled by a recessed red-painted gouge representing the Niobrara River, the cataract it carves and its furry lining of pines, also studded with rafts, kayaks and side-canyon waterfalls. A second red ring is for the Cowboy Trail, its cyclists and horse riders appearing as in fluid motion. The two rings intersect at a representation of the town's breathtaking trail bridge, looking almost like ribbons enwrapping a gift.
Her other piece, made of some variegated pinkish-purplish alloy, is perhaps even more masterful, a cross between a classically Valentine-shaped heart and a human one, complete with a protruding aorta. Its muscled surface shimmers and flows with embossments of local fauna and flora: bison, pronghorns, prairie chickens, fritillaries, yucca, prickly pear and prairie violets. At the center is a bricklike pattern of cowboys and cattle that directly evokes the bank building, and across the top are spangled several recognizable constellations of stars.
Abandonado + Heartstrong (as we now sign our work) have been very busy for our own part, with four winning bids: a downtown mural, two big Welcome billboards, and a park sign. In November, we left Colorado for Cheyenne, a better base given that more and more Plains towns are requesting our work. US-20 across Nebraska, formally known as the "Bridges to Buttes Byway," seems to be earning a second nickname, "Heart Highway."
Oh, and we now live twenty minutes from Shelley's sculpture-and-cattle ranch.
The first annual Valentine Pride in the Park takes place as planned. Manny and I consider ourselves to have outgrown conventional marriage, but Shelley officiates our commitment ceremony. That night, she officiates our consummation, too.
She also presents us with some special gifts: stainless-steel dildos perfectly replicating each of our respective penises, to remember each other by whenever we're apart. She's made one of each for herself, too, for her own collection.
< = = = = = = = = >
Copyright (c) 2026 by Joe71. All rights reserved. Reproduction, modification, transmission or AI ingestion of any part prohibited.
This is fiction. The author does not condone defacement of public or private property.
Every place mentioned in this story is real and deserving of love. However, except for the masterful Valentine bank building, which exists, all other buildings, artworks and characters depicted herein are fictional as imagined by the author. Any other similarities to actual works, buildings or individuals are coincidental.
