A borrowed truck. A first date with no destination. Three failed hookup spots, a Walmart parking lot, a boat ramp full of drunken rednecks, an angry father, and one universe that seems absolutely determined not to let two men have sex.

Ricky starts as a late-night attempt to end a dry spell and turns into something much stranger: a story about borrowed confidence, drugs, bad timing, missed chances, and the version of another person we can carry around long after the actual relationship has disappeared.

Years later, Ricky suddenly appears online again. This time there’s a car, there’s gas, there’s money—and finally, there’s nowhere else they need to be.

Except neither of them is quite the person who showed up that first night.

Funny, messy, explicit, and unexpectedly tender, “Ricky” is about the date that n ...