Ambush

The following fictional story deals with sex among males. If you are offended by such material, are too young, or reside in an area where it is not allowed, depart. Though not observed in this story, care enough about yourself and humankind to practice safe sex.

The author retains all rights. No reproductions or links to other sites are allowed without the author's consent.

EBradley33@Excite.com

Chapter 18 Illusions and Innocence Destroyed

After I'd retreated to my bedroom, I fell into bed, pulling the covers over my head. I wanted to be comatose. I must have dozed, for I jerked awake when I heard the daters telling Kenny good-bye as they were leaving to take Melanie home. Kenny came to my door, knocking softly. "Evan, please open the door." I just couldn't. I would have behaved badly--badly by my standards anyway. After a bit, he moved on down the hall.

I must have had another catnap, for I heard a car in the drive. Not long after that, a car door slammed, and Jeremy entered the front door. He came to my door immediately, listening. He knocked lightly, waiting a while. He tried to turn the doorknob. When it wouldn't turn, he moved off to his bedroom. I could hear murmurs from the bedroom before sleep overtook me.

Kitchen noises awakened me, telling me the guys were preparing their breakfast. I pulled the pillow over my head and fell asleep again.

A ringing phone awakened me. I wasn't going to answer it. I heard a voice murmuring to the phone, but sleep overtook me.

I was awakened by the phone ringing again, but I continued to lie in bed. I wasn't getting up, hoping that I'd go back to sleep again. It was a "weasel" escape, but I didn't care. I heard someone answer the phone. Shortly, Jeremy came into the kitchen.

"It was Susan again, wanting to know if Evan had come out of his bedroom. She's worried that he will be mad at her for not telling him about Tim and the boyfriend." So it WAS a boyfriend. I guess Jeremy didn't realize that I could hear him even though the door was closed.

"Why is she so worried?"

"Haven't you noticed that Evan and Susan almost read each other's mind? All they have to do is look at each other and they communicate more than you and I could in five minutes of talking. Kinda strange but nice too."

"I knew they were close. We saw it that day when Evan started crying before class. When Susan went to Evan's desk after class and put her hand over Evan's and said something to him, I knew they must be really good friends. . . . . Did she say what we should do?" Kenny asked.

"She wondered if she and Troy should come over to talk about getting Evan out of his bedroom. I told her we ought to wait a while. Evan needs time to deal with what he heard."

"Did Melanie realize that she had spilled the beans?" asked Kenny.

"She knew something was wrong. She asked about it when we took her home, but Susan just glossed it over. I think it worked."

"What are we going to do, Jeremy?"

"What Evan would do: give him time and space. Let him know that we are in his corner, that all he has to do is ask and we are there for him. I don't know what else can be done right now."

"Have you noticed that the same thing that happened to me is happening to Evan?"

"Yah. Do you think that will put you in a good position to help him?"

Kenny snickered. "Evan Halsey allowing anyone to help him?"

Jeremy laughed too. "Yeah, I know what you mean. I guess that's the problem with expecting that he will ask for help. He won't. He'll suffer in silence."

"I know what he's lying in there thinking. He's trying to figure out what caused Tim to reject him for the blond guy. Doesn't that guy have a name?"

Jeremy just shrugged his shoulders. "Once she hears about it, maybe from LaKeisha, LaRonda will know it before sunrise the next day." They chuckled. She would!

Kenny continued, "By now Evan has thought of a long list of personal defects that he thinks made Tim turn off. I can figure out what he has decided many of them are. He thinks that he was a little something on the side for Tim. Evan thinks he came up short in what Tim wanted in a lover--youth and good looks. He can't see how to make himself better. He doesn't even think he'll try. It makes no difference anyway; no one will be interested in him."

"That sounds like a description of you too, Kenny, after you and Robert parted," Jeremy observed astutely.

"We didn't part. He dumped me," Kenny remonstrated. "Now you know how I know what Evan is feeling."

A period of silence ensued. Kenny started speaking again: "It would have been better for Evan if Tim had taken up with someone Evan's age instead of someone our age. I know he's thinking he's a loser because he's older than this new guy. There's no way he can win the youth game. That's why he's not opening the door. He's trying to figure out how to create the Evan who will come out here to behave as though his very person has not been rejected. But it could be worse: he may try to come out here as though Tim never existed."

"Yeah, that's big-scale denial. It will make him look silly, and it will only delay his getting over Tim," Jeremy observed.

Evan's done so much for me, means so much to me, that I feel guilty I'm not doing more for him."

"Ditto," Jeremy seconded. "Even more than that, I owe him a lot for what I did to him. So I'm thinking just as hard as you about what I can do. I hate it that this happened when he is recovering from the fall down the stairs. . . . I guess you know I shoved Evan down the stairs?"

"Yeah."

"I really wasn't intending to hurt him. I am still shocked that I did that. . . . Do many kids know?"

"Only a few. They know you didn't want to hurt Evan. You and Evan clicked so well in class that they knew you weren't out to harm him."

"He's changed my whole world, my future. I wish I could save him from all of this."

"I wonder if we could do that?"

"What do you mean?"

"I'm not certain. I need to think about it."

"After all the kids he's helped, it would be a shame if he behaved differently than he has been encouraging them to behave," Jeremy observed.

"Can you see Evan doing that?"

"Nah. He really cares for us, you know." Silence. "Why do you think he locked his door and won't open it?" Jeremy asked.

"Embarrassment. Hurt too," Kenny offered.

"Why embarrassment?"

"I'm not certain, but you know that Evan is a proud man. . . . If he ever sees this blond guy Tim is involved with, he'll probably beat himself up more because he'll think he will never look that good. It's hard to compete if you think you lack good looks. I'd probably still have Robert now if I had them."

"I can't believe what I am hearing," Jeremy exclaimed.

"Why? I'm not good-looking like you."

"Man, how you could think that? Don't you know how attractive you are?"

"Oh yeah, says the tall hunk who can command any date he wants among all the women in school--except for Susan, that is."

"Maybe that isn't what I want." I could hear his voice moving closer to Kenny as he spoke. "Maybe I want you." I didn't hear anything for a while. Then a faint noise as though a kiss were being broken off.

"Come on. Let's go to the bedroom." I heard them moving down the hall. Silence. They are so lucky! I felt myself falling asleep. .......... Later I awoke again. The house was quiet. I lay there staring at the ceiling. Jeremy and Kenny must still be making love, or they had gone somewhere. My bet was on the former. In a way, it was the best thing that could have happened to both of them. Jeremy needed to make some kind of overt contribution to someone's life. He also needed to lead, to be a top, to continue to develop the gains he had made in the past week. Kenny needed another protector, champion. I was happy for them, but once again, I felt that I had been left behind just as Tim had left me. I hadn't felt this lonely since the divorce.

Kenny knew so much that had already run through my head. Our similar situations made us of the same mind. But unlike Kenny, for me it wasn't that Tim was involved with someone else as Robert had been involved with Lisa. I knew that Kenny smarted that Robert now was passionate with Lisa, made love to her, celebrating how much better sex with her was than with Kenny, making Kenny a loser on yet another level. It was the curse that always attended rejection, I realized. I had been of a different mind when I was talking to Kenny--before it had happened to me. Good thing I wasn't talking to Kenny now.

"Would you open this perspective to Kenny now?" that inner voice asked? Immediately, Katherine Mansfield's short story "The First Ball" leapt to mind. A young damsel who has come of age is attending her first ball. As a strangely discordant note in the story, a middle-aged cynic dances with the young woman. While they dance, he rips away her innocent illusions about the excitement, beauty, and romance of her first adult social occasion. A nonphysical rape that leaves one enraged at the callous cruelty of the man! At the end of the story, the damsel's spirit is dead. I could never be so arrogant as to strip innocence away before nature and circumstance were ready to gently and benignly disclose an appropriate level of reality.

"Well Evan, there's something to celebrate--you're not so far gone that you would behave despicably," that inner voice said. "Gee, thanks loads," I heard me reply mentally. "I just feel all better now." I could be snotty too.

But what about Tim? I had justified Jeremy's and my making love by reminding myself that Tim and I had not, at that point, decided on an exclusive relationship. I wasn't going to be a hypocrite now and move to a different standard for Tim. That left only a few possibilities. Tim was a trophy collector who reveled in being involved with as many lovers as possible? . . . . No, that wasn't Tim. So that left the most painful alternative. The young blond guy was both more attractive and younger than I, and if he were better in those ways, then he was probably better many other ways too, ways I didn't want to think about--better in bed, more lovable and loving, exciting, interesting--I didn't want to go down this road!

I was also suffering from the realization that the promise for happiness I felt Tim represented was totally gone. All the possibilities that put a sparkle in my eye, that made my heart beat faster, that made music sound better, that made me more attuned to people, that made me feel I had really turned my life around were gone with Tim. I had nothing to which I could look forward.

I rolled over. So why did Tim even get involved with me? I was so stupid and arrogant in thinking Tim was uninvolved. . . . That altercation in the lobby between him and me? . . . . I must have challenged him by walking away, and he couldn't let the challenge go unanswered. . . . That was it. It wasn't anything romantic. He was going to get the last word in, the winning gesture. Could even have had a sexual element to it--conquer through sex. I could see Tim's masculinity operating just that way. I remembered the pleasure I derived from giving Robert and even Kenny power over me during the ambushes. Now I realized that I had never given Tim such power, nor had he sought it. We seemed more competitors for power. There were mythic dynamics in my relationship with Robert and Kenny, but not, I suddenly realized, with Tim. I'd been asleep at the wheel, not recognizing all of these warnings. My only defense was that I thought our relationship so new that we would eventually reach those decision points. I realized that for Tim, there was no future for us. Just dalliance. His future lay with the blond boy. Tim rather reminded me of the cynical man at the ball.

Tim's behavior after the accident? . . . He was just sucked in by circumstance. So why the love-making in the hospital room? . . . . No, that wasn't love-making. That was sex-making. . . . He had every excuse in the world to do nothing but pay a duty call; he wasn't even obliged to do that. Was it just that sex in the hospital room was kinky enough that he wanted to try it? . . . . But he didn't get off, so what was he getting out of it? Maybe Tim was motivated more by the moment that I thought.

I remembered now all the meetings he had in the late afternoons or evenings during those times. Maybe many of those meetings were with his young Lothario. Oh, that might explain his shaving me and sucking me off in the hospital: he was going to see the blond boy, so it was a warm up.

So why come to my house and claim me in front of Jeremy? I had to think a while about that. . . . Of course--territoriality. I had told him Jeremy was moving in. Jeremy had confessed to Tim that we had had sex. Tim himself was turned on by youth--to wit, the young blond guy, so Jeremy could loom as a threat to what Tim regarded as his preserve. And if he was super competitive, he would want to demonstrate to Jeremy that he was the lead male who could counter him anytime. Tim was just reclaiming his territory. . . . . Something there didn't quite ring true, but I couldn't put my finger on it. I wondered if Jeremy turned Tim on. . . . So did the other night when we had "phony sex" rank as just a lark, something just unusual enough that it turned him on? Surely that was it. Between the blond and me, it was clear who really held Tim's heart.

What was Tim going to do if he got the job in the state capital? It must be a struggle to go off and leave the blond boy. That possibility had to be an unwelcome prospect. Unless in Tim's thinking it were only a youth issue. If it were, Tim could replace the blond boy easily in the state capital.

I heard a light knocking at my door. No. I wasn't ready yet to face anyone. It sounded again. Then nothing.

I'd been dumped by a wife for someone she thought was better. I'd been dumped demonstrably by a father for not meeting his standards. Now I'd been dumped by the first guy I'd been serious about after the divorce because I wasn't good enough. This was not a record encouraging one to hold up his head! I wished I could hibernate.

"Get over it!" I heard that interior voice say. "There's more life to live, and you aren't doing that lying here." In the deepest recesses of my mind I hurled an imprecation at that voice that was such a scathing put-down that I wouldn't even allow it in the forefront of my thought. The voice was silent after that. .......... I must have dozed again for the sound of the front door opening and quiet voices awakened me. The voices moved into the sunroom, where they became murmurs. It must be late afternoon, for the shadows outside my bedroom windows were deep. It felt as though lead ran in my veins. I had to move, so I sat up on the side of the bed by the bedroom windows, looking outside, wishing I were someplace else. Then I put my head in my hands. I really didn't want to think anything. I was tired of thought. Tired of feeling. Tired of analyzing when it did no good anyway, when it was going to change nothing. No wonder Kenny went to the dive looking for quick, immediate sex. I felt that desperation to cover over the hurt, to make it stop. I wanted so much to return to that sense of balance so integral to who I am. That balance was gone; I felt its absence intensely. Damn, I hoped I didn't have to sit around a long time waiting for that to return.

I heard rustling outside my bedroom windows. Must be a bird in the bushes there. Autumn had dried the leaves enough that it didn't take much to make them rustle. I glanced up. Jeremy looking in the window at me! I felt ridiculous. I let my head drop back into my hands. Jeremy tapped on the window. "Evan, are you okay? I looked up and shook my head that I was okay. "We're worried," his voice sounding muffled by the glass, rather as in a dream.

I just waved my hand like "It's okay. You can go away."

"We're fixing something for you to eat. Will you come out and eat something? Please . . . for us? Don't shut us out." Damn. He was good at cajoling. He was clever enough to know which of my buttons to push, the little rat.

"I'll grab a bath first," I said as I pointed to the bathroom and reached for my crutches. I arose and went to the bathroom. I decided I wouldn't shave. "A little act of rebellion?" that interior voice asked. Well, the voice was back and was not taking me seriously.

I bathed. I wished the house were empty so I didn't have to face anyone. I dressed. Made the bed. Then went to the door, putting my forehead against it. I really didn't want to leave the bedroom.

"Evan," the interior voice said, in a serious tone, "Don't go out there like death warmed over. Those kids are worried, they're reaching out, they want to help you. You've messed around in their lives enough with all your advice that it's time to allow them to give to you. If nothing else, it won't harm you, and it will help them. It could even start you toward re- establishing that sense of balance so important to you." Damned voice. I knew it was simply a self-monitoring function in my mind, but it was dead- on right. I still felt as though I were going to have to take it in hand one of these days. I unlocked the door and opened it. I crutched to the kitchen.

There were Susan and Troy with Jeremy and Kenny, standing around waiting. I smiled. "Hi guys. What's up?" I asked, running a glance over them, then the table, which was set for five.

"We made too much spaghetti. We need help getting rid of it," Jeremy said with a smile.

"I'm your man." There wasn't a collective sigh of relief, but I could sense an immediate drop in the tension level in the room. Kenny quickly walked over, hugging me. He whispered "We're brothers now, Evan. We've both been dumped. Let's help each other."

"Okay," I said softly so that only he could hear.

Kenny kissed me on the cheek. "And I like the rough whiskers," he added.

A line was forming. Susan was standing just behind Kenny. As he stepped away, she stepped up and hugged me hard. "You're not alone, Evan. Look, we're here. We'll always be here." She pulled back, reading me.

"My turn," Jeremy said, pulling me hard against him. "You're going to be okay, Evan. We're going to help you." He continued hugging me, rubbing his hand over my back.

"Wilder, will you quit hogging all the good stuff," Troy said as he shoved his arm between Jeremy and me.

"You remember what you just said, fella, who claims one of the most exciting women in the world. I'm going to start my moves any day now." Susan laughed. Kenny looked a little stricken. Jeremy saw it and winked at him. Kenny's face relaxed. Susan noticed, of course. Then she looked at me.

"Hey, Ev," Troy grinned, dimples flashing, you got men fighting over you." He too pulled me tightly against him, planting his big hand on my ass and pushing me against him. I could feel a mound in his crotch pushing against my lower stomach. He was semi-hard! Why?

Jeremy played the host, directing us to our places. Bless him: he was thoughtful enough not to put me at the head of the table. He took that place. Kenny asked for drink orders. As we were passing the spaghetti and sauce, nothing was said. I could tell that the silence would be a problem if it continued. At the moment, I didn't know what to say. They had been so focused on my situation all day that they had nothing else to talk about.

Troy took the lead: "Evan, I speak for all of us in expressing our gratitude for your joining us for dinner. Because we care a great deal about you, we've been worried. Would you tell us how you are feeling?"

I was pleasantly surprised that Troy had initiated the discussion. "Okay. I see Dr. Sorenson on Tuesday. I'm going to push to return to school."

"That's not what we're wondering about. How are you feeling about this news about Tim?" Trust Troy--get it out on the table since it was sitting there like a big boulder. Well, that was healthy, I supposed.

I sighed. Put down my fork. Took a sip of the merlot that had been poured for me. Looked up at them. Susan was studying me intently. Jeremy had no look on his face at all. Kenny was looking deep into my eyes, knowing the answer to Troy's question. Troy's face bespoke concern. "Bad. . . . I'd be less than honest if I said anything else."

"We know you understand that all of us except maybe Kenny knew about Tim's boyfriend," Susan said. [There was that reference to a boyfriend again. So it was that serious. It had to be because it came from Susan.] "We didn't say anything because we didn't know if it would last, we didn't know how to tell you, and we thought that you had enough to deal with at the moment."

It was time to ease their minds. "I realize now that you all knew about this blond guy. I saw the looks you gave each other whenever Tim was mentioned. I myself wouldn't know how to divulge such news to someone. I'd end up saying nothing about it. So if you think that I'm angry with you for not telling me, you can rest easy. I'm not." I made a point of looking at Susan during the last sentence. She smiled brightly.

"Evan, do you need someone to go with you during your appointment with Dr. Sorenson?" Susan asked.

"Thank you for asking, but I can manage. Jeremy, can you drive your car to school Tuesday?"

"Yeah, I haven't driven it in a few days. I better fire the old beast up to see if it can manage to return to life." His car sounded like me.

"We'll go in my car," Kenny said.

"Okay."

"Listen," I said as we all tied into the spaghetti, "while I have the troops here, maybe we should discuss Jeremy's gathering on Friday night. Have you brilliant ideas--legal and allowable ones, that is?" They smiled.

"I do have a request?" Jeremy looked at me.

"Shoot."

"You said you were having chaperones. Could Kate Williams be one?"

Troy whistled. "Boy, trot out the heavy guns! Ask the principal to be a chaperone! That'll make it a clean party."

"Well, it's not a party," I smiled. "Just a gathering of friends. I think Kate will be quite pleased to be asked. That's why, Jeremy, you should ask her tomorrow. It will mean more coming from you than from me."

Jeremy smiled. "Okay." I could tell he was going to enjoy the task.

"Why don't you ask Kathleen Burge too? She will be touched that you included her, Jeremy. You have always been special to her."

"Great idea. I'll ask John, her husband too." I assumed we all noticed that, whereas several days ago I would have mentioned Tim, it would never happen now.

"By the way," Jeremy added, "what's wrong with calling it a party?"

"If you call it a party but leave out some people who thought they should have been asked, you'll create hard feelings. And you're just weird enough that there are covens of those folks about." Jeremy stuck his tongue out at me while the others snickered. "A gathering of friends to see where you are living sounds rather impromptu, certainly nothing to cause offense."

"By the way, where are they erecting the tent for the overflow?" Jeremy asked.

To give him his reward for teasing me, I looked pained. "How many are you thinking about inviting? I need to know when I call the caterer."

"A caterer for an impromptu evening?" Jeremy asked. "I don't want you to go to that much trouble or expense, Evan." He was serious now.

"I'm using a caterer because I want to minimize trouble. I'm not quite up yet to doing all the kitchen work. And because it's your friends, I want it to be a special."

"What can we do?" asked Susan.

"Well, I haven't had much opportunity to clean the house. That's something else at which I've been limited."

"Oh, Evan," Troy rolled his head and eyes, "now you've done it. LaRonda will have a brigade here cleaning the place with a vengeance." He changed his voice to a falsetto, mimicking LaRonda: "Now Eh-h-h-h- h-h-vun, Honey, I just brought a few of my women in here to dust a little of this and sweep a little of that." We all roared. It was exactly what she would say. And we'd love her for it.

"Yeah," Kenny said, "you'd better keep out of her way or she'll dust you up."

"Ou-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-u, Evan. I'll bet your getting excited at the prospect of that!" Jeremy teased.

I knew he was doing it to jolly me up. So did the others.

"I'll talk to the girls tomorrow, Evan. We'll organize it and let you know when to be present but out of the way," Susan smiled. I knew that if Susan were involved, it would go swimmingly.

"Have you given any thought to whom you are asking?" I queried Jeremy.

"Yeah. LaRonda and Clifton, Jarod and Valerie, LaKeisha and Roland, Wendy Fielding and her date, Greg Dunwoodie and his whoever, Rosalie Rodriguez and her date, Paul Hartford and Beth Walker, Tony Francini and Angela Walker. Oh, Susan and Kenny. Those at least. Maybe a few more."

"Rat," Troy said, grinning from ear to ear, flashing those deadly dimples, "think you can get my woman to yourself, huh."

Jeremy winked at Kenny. "Oh, oh, oh," Jeremy aped surprise, "and you too of course, Troy, my man." I could see Susan looking again at Jeremy and Kenny. She intuited the replacement for Robert had been found. I hoped Jeremy knew. It would be a second blow to Kenny if he misunderstood Jeremy's advances today. Actually, I didn't even know if Jeremy was gay or bi. And I wouldn't raise the issue. Too much like applying labels, which I abhorred. But a gentle word to Jeremy might be in order. I'd noticed several times that evening the nearly worshipful looks in which Kenny was holding Jeremy.

"Wait a minute," I exclaimed. "Paul Hartford and Beth Walker? Tony Francini and Angela Walker? When did this happen?"

"They just started going with each other. They make nice couples," Kenny said.

"I've got to get back to school before the whole place changes," I said. They all shot looks among themselves. "There you guys go with the looks again. What do they mean?"

"We're worried, Evan, that you're not giving yourself enough time. We know you'll rush back to school at your first opportunity," Susan explained. "We just hope you'll be certain that your are ready."

"Don't kid a kidder," I smiled. "When I return, the vacation is over!" Laughter broke forth.

"He hasn't lost his ability to keep a step ahead of us," Troy observed.

We chatted on for another hour before they all made me go sit in the sunroom while they cleaned up the kitchen.

As I sat in the sunroom, listening to the babble from the kitchen, I realized that our shared meal and discussion did lift my spirits somewhat. I also knew I was blessed to have such friends. A short while later, Troy and Susan came out with their coats on, followed by Jeremy and Kenny. Troy and Susan took their leave, but not before giving me hugs.

Jeremy, Kenny, and I returned to the sunroom. "Well, I guess it's time to turn in," Kenny said, eying Jeremy.

"You guys may want to save some energy tonight for classes tomorrow," I pointed out.

Jeremy smiled. Kenny looked startled. "How did you know?" Kenny asked.

"Teachers and parents always know more than they let on."

"Ah-oh," Jeremy burst out, "that means Susan knows too." Now I smiled.

Kenny was like a fan at a tennis match, looking from one of us to the other, trying to catch up. "We haven't rejected you, Evan," Kenny said with concern.

"Okay, Kenny. All that hiding in bed wasn't in vain. I'll share a mistake I made with Tim so that you guys can avoid it. Tim and I never talked about our future because we were so newly together. I just assumed that we would have those discussions at the proper time."

Suddenly it hit me: I had expected Tim to prompt such discoveries when he felt comfortable because I was so ready and open for a relationship with him. "Don't make my mistake, thinking that stretches of time await or that the other guy is supposed to take the lead in opening such discussions. Share your expectations for each other and your relationship soon--before you get so far down the road that it hurts to change course. You both have been hurt enough, so don't hurt each other. And with that, I'm going to bed. Please turn off the lights."

I arose. They stared at me and then each other. I was almost to the doorway of the sunroom when Kenny ran up behind me, hugging me, making me teeter on my crutches. Jeremy quickly stepped in front of me to steady me. We stood like that for a few seconds.

"Hey, a sandwich," I exclaimed. We giggled, broke up the group hug, and went to our bedrooms.

In my bedroom, I slowly disrobed, went to the bathroom to prepare for bed, and then pulled back the spread and sheets. I wondered how I could be so tired after having spent hours in bed. I plopped in bed, pulling the covers up. Tomorrow I would get back to living. No more of this lying around feeling sorry for myself. But first I just wanted to sleep.

I had seemed to drift. All of a sudden I felt someone climbing into bed behind me. I turned my head to see who it was. Tim! What was he doing here? He had that superior grin on his face and that wolfish gleam in his eye. He was all predator! I turned my head away. Leaning up, he bit my shoulder. Then he moved up and licked my ear. I looked over at the windows. There was the blond boy looking in, his face betraying no emotion of any kind. He was damned good-looking.

"Like him?" Tim asked. "He's mine, a treasure. Really knows how to take a fuck. Really knows how to make a man happy." His compliments to the blond boy were backhanded reproaches to me for not measuring up.

I opened my mouth to tell him to get out, but the words wouldn't come out. He leaned up and bit my bottom lip. "You still want me, don't you? You still need me." His hand moved up over my ass and into my crotch, feeling for my hard cock. He grabbed it, slowly jerking it. I didn't want it too, but it felt good. "You shouldn't be mad at me," Tim whispered as though he cared. "I gave you a good ride."

The blond boy knocked on the window, motioning Tim to come over. He arose from the bed, the hair on his chest gleaming, his hard cock bobbing, the muscles in his long hairy legs and shapely ass quivering, making precum flow from my dick. Tim raised the window, and they whispered. "Okay," Tim said, closing the window. The blond boy shot me a glance, but I couldn't read it. Tim started dressing. The blond boy smiled.

"Where are you going?" I found myself suddenly able to ask. "Don't leave. . . . Please. . . . Please, don't leave. . . . Don't leave, Tim. . . . Not again." I heard myself pleading ever more desperately and loudly. Still, Tim continued to dress. The blond boy had disappeared from the window. Tim walked out the door.

I wanted to follow him, so I was trying to extricate myself from the sheets, in which I was suddenly ensnared. The harder I struggled, the more they seemed to hold me back.

"Evan . . . Wake up, Evan . . . Evan . . . It's okay, Evan." I awakened to Kenny holding my shoulders. "You're having a nightmare." I stared at him. Just a nightmare. "You're okay."

I sighed, flopping back in the bed. Jeremy wandered sleepily into the room, naked. I suddenly noticed that Kenny was nude as well.

"What's up?" he asked, looking at Kenny.

"Evan was having a nightmare. He was yelling for Tim not to leave him."

"I'm sorry, guys. I didn't mean to awaken you."

"Move over," Jeremy directed. I scooted over next to Kenny so that I was in the middle of the bed. Jeremy moved in on one side of me, and Kenny lay on the other. They rolled toward me, each throwing an arm and a leg over me. They smelled like they had had a sex romp.

"You guys smell good," I whispered. They giggled. "It was good," Kenny whispered back, "with the cocksman over there at the helm."

"Hey, a sandwich," Jeremy said. "You're safe now, Evan. You're not alone. We're here with you. Go to sleep. We won't leave you," he said with emphasis on the pronoun "we" and the verb "leave."

Their warm flesh was comforting. I was in actual contact with someone. I let out a sigh, drifting off, feeling them hold me and hold me down, anchoring me.

(To be continued.)