Bernie and the Bear Chapter 8
WARNING: If it is illegal for you to be reading these stories or you find them disgusting or immoral, please refrain from reading further. Must be 18+ to read! Any characters, places, or people depicted in this story is entirely in the fantasy and imagination of the writer and are in no way meant to portray anyone in real life. Any people, places, or actions depicted in this story that reflect real life events or situations is entirely by accident or coincidence.
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Chapter Eight
Ignition
We were two days out from Christmas; December 23rd. I was in the kitchen helping mom get breakfast when I overheard (okay, fine, I was eavesdropping) dad asking James about what his family usually did for the holidays. I missed some of it but I heard him say they usually had a bonfire Christmas Eve where the whole extended family would be over and they'd all sit around the fire until after midnight.
"Wow! Daddy, let's do that!" JJ said.
"We have that big pile of limbs that we picked up out of the yard..." dad said thinking aloud, "Can't burn that where it is, though, it's too close to the house."
"Me and Teddy and James can hook the trailer on the 4-wheeler and move it out to the big field" JJ gushed.
"Excuse me?!" I said from the kitchen.
"Sounds like a plan!" James said. Apparently, I'd been outvoted.
And that's how, on a day with the high temperature of 30 degrees, I was bundled up moving deadfall from one pile to another. JJ decided the pile wasn't big enough after we'd moved it over so he insisted that we comb the woods around the field for more. We finally quit around 1 o'clock. We had a circle of wood about 6 feet in diameter and it was stacked as tall or taller.
Back at the house, dad had made lunch; his `famous' venison chili. It was about the only way I'd eat deer-meat; I hated the gamey taste but the spices and the way he mixed it with other meat made it edible. To go with it, mom had made a big pan of cheese cornbread. After a meal of this heavy fare, we were kind of sleepy. Mom and dad had some old movie on the television to nap by, JJ went back to his room to play a game. James and I looked at each other as if we were both thinking similar thoughts and got up and slipped out to the garage apartment. On the way up the stairs, he asked I'd ever heard that old song `Afternoon Delight', I said no. He started singing it to me with a surprisingly good singing voice.
"Gonna find my baby, gonna hold him tight, gonna grab some afternoon delight" he sang.
"I'm not positive, but I'll be that's not the correct words to that song" I said.
"Well, I did do a little modification due to the situation" he said, pleased with himself at rhyming.
"There's a line somewhere in there about rubbin' sticks and stones together and makin' sparks ignite, too" he said, "I'll have to share some of my playlists with you."
"Sounds good. I especially the part of rubbing sticks and stones together" I told him.
"How's the inventory?" he asked.
"Still half a box" I said, but his song had actually put other ideas in my head.
I turned on the heater and hung my heavy Carhartt coat on the hook by the door. I unbuttoned the flannel shirt and draped it over the chair and laid my undershirt on top of it. I unbuttoned my jeans and kicked them off and laid them on top of the pile. All this time, James was mimicking my actions; when we were done, we got on the bed in nothing but our underwear. This time he initiated things by holding my head and gently running his tongue around the edge my earlobe; something he knew would drive me crazy. I wet a finger and very lightly circled one of his nipples, then blew on it. It stood up hard enough to break glass. I pinched it just a little and watched as the lump in his boxer briefs became more defined. My turn. He shifted his oral action to the back of my neck, right at the hairline; in particular, the short hair that had grown back since my last haircut. He barely ran across it with his tongue and chills ran down my back.
We'd both worked up a good sweat working outside earlier. I moved down and forced him to raise his right arm and I buried my nose in the musky pit of hair and inhaled it. It didn't do much for him, but it made my dick go solid and I rubbed my crotch against his leg. That was the trigger he was waiting for I guess because when I looked at his midsection again, there was a definite tent there. I took the opportunity to get the waistband and he lifted while I pulled the underwear off him and down his legs. He wasn't going to let himself be the only naked man in the room so mine came off and joined my pile of clothes across the room.
I had this strange urge to have as much of me in contact with him as possible. I rolled him over onto his stomach and laid on top of his hairy back with my cock riding the upper part of his crevice. I started to massage his neck and shoulders and my hands travelled down his back all the way onto his meaty ass. After a while I turned him back over and lowered myself on top of him until our dicks were lying beside each other. I started softly fucking back and forth beside him in his bush; his own dick was roughly sliding almost up to my navel as he bucked his hips. We locked fingers of both hands and grinded against each other until we were becoming a mess from the precum. The room was beginning to smell like some combination of a locker room and the set of a porn video. I felt my cum rising; my balls were pulled up nearly to the base of my cock now.
"I'm gonna cum!!" James growled; his breath in my ear. I turned my head and we kissed as he went rigid and his cock started pumping between us. About three strokes in his cummy mess and I exploded too, adding to it. I rubbed my hand through the big pool of cum and licked my fingers, then fed him some. Then another kiss, before I rolled over to the side; our dicks still standing straight up even after the massive orgasm we just had. I couldn't stand it, I got up and went down on him, cleaning all the cum off that thick tube. His erection wasn't subsiding so I kept sucking and focusing on the head. A few minutes later he jerked again and shot a small load into my mouth which got mine back to full mast. James was worn out now, so I took some more of our cum and jacked off using it for lube. He sleepily reached down and stuck him cream covered thumb in my mouth and I sucked on it until I shot my small second load. Both of us were blissfully exhausted and drifted off to sleep.
I woke up about an hour later; hearing footsteps on the stairs. We were still bare-assed naked laying facing each other with our foreheads touching. I jumped and pulled the blankets up over us just in time. The door opened and JJ walked in. My back was to him but I could hear him stop and make an uh-oh sound then quickly turn around and beat a hasty retreat. James' body was shaking with laughter.
"What's so funny?" I asked.
"The look on junior's face" he said with the giggles, "especially when I winked at him."
"You didn't!" I said. He just laughed which started me up.
"So, I guess we forgot to lock the door..." I said still chuckling.
"Good thing you heard him coming and pulled the covers up, otherwise he might have really been traumatized" he said, then broke into another fit of mirth.
I got up and headed to the shower; the dried cum was kind of itchy. I was getting the water warm when James came in and kissed me on the back of the neck and wrapped his big bear arms around me.
"I really do love you" he said.
"You know what? I love you too" I said, leaning my head back onto his shoulder and kissing the side of his face.
"C'mon, let's get presentable before dinner" I pulled him into the shower and we washed all the delicious smell and other evidence of our `afternoon delight' away.
Afterward, we got dressed and went over the house and barged into JJ's room. He was playing his PS5 again and when we came in his face went red.
"Sorry about a while ago..." JJ said, "I thought people usually did that stuff at night."
I laughed and said "Nope, whenever the mood hits you." I started to sit on the bed beside him and saw what looked suspiciously like a cum rag up by his pillow.
"Hey, you might want to put that back in its hiding place" I said poking him in the ribs. He looked where I was pointing and turned deep red again as he scrambled to grab the piece of cloth and stuff it under the mattress. He came back and tried to get back into his game like nothing ever happened until James spoke up.
"I thought people usually did that stuff at night" he barely got it out before we both broke into another laughing fit. JJ looked mad for a second, then started laughing along.
"Wait" I whispered, "did seeing us cause you to come do that?"
"No. Well, in a way. I was thinking about what y'all were doing but I was thinking about me and this girl Emily from school doing that" he said. "So, no. No gay. I'm not following in those footsteps bro. No offense."
"That's okay. I'm just being nosey. What's Emily look like?" I asked. "Is she one of those girls with a huge rack?"
"Nah, that's kind of medium. She's just really pretty, blue eyes and dark blonde hair. And she's really smart and blah blah blah" he lost me somewhere in the description when it started sounding like he was describing our mother. That made my train of thought derail into thinking about James and his similarities to our father. Damn, do we all just look for somebody like our parents? Thankfully James was still paying attention and making conversation.
"Cool!" I interjected, I hoped it was a good place for it.
"Hey, guys, dinner!" mom yelled from the other room. JJ shut the game down and we all went in to eat.
All through dinner I kept thinking about my observation. I would look back and forth between James and dad; their mannerisms, the way they combed their hair, the stubble on their faces, the hair around the collars. It wasn't that the two were carbon copies; it was more like core similarities. I mean, I could look at dad objectively and understand why mom liked him. I kind of zoned out for a while thinking about all this stuff.
"Something wrong with your food, Teddy?" Mom asked.
"Huh?...Oh, no mom, just thinking about stuff" I said. I realized I didn't even know what was on my plate. She had made one of my favorites – breakfast for dinner, starring those thin little breakfast pork chops. Once I got my head out of my ass, I cleaned my plate pretty quick.
Mom said since she cooked, somebody else was doing dish duty. Dad started picking up the dirty dishes and taking them to the kitchen. James joined in to help him. Damn, stop it! I told myself. Mom went in the den and found another old movie; "It Happened One Night" with Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert. All of us except JJ settled in to watch it. He didn't like anything in black and white so he went to play the Play Station. Halfway through the movie I felt James' arm slide around me and I instinctively nestled into him. Something made me look over and there were mom and dad; his arm was around her and she was pressed into him like a mirror image of us.
Needless to say, after our vigorous `afternoon delight', we went straight to sleep. I lay on my right side and reached over to turn out the light. Just as I was settling in, I felt him start turning toward me and press his furry body up against mine. Being loved was the best feeling in the world.
Christmas Eve
At breakfast, mom handed me a list and her car keys. She needed some last-minute stuff from Walmart, so the boys were chosen to fight the crowd to get her list for her. Me, James and JJ piled into the car drove the nearly ten miles to Walmart. James said that would give us a chance to resupply. We drove around in circles for ten minutes before finding a parking place. I looked over the list; it was mostly grocery stuff. We grabbed a buggy and split up. I went to get mom's groceries and JJ took off behind James; trying to see what he was resupplying.
Mom must be making some kind of Christmas desert; sugar, flour, coconut, candied cherries, chocolate chips, milk, eggs, etc. I was about done with the list when James and my red-faced kid brother appeared and plopped down a box of condoms in the cart. JJ gave me one of those looks.
"That's what you get for being nosey" I told him.
When we went to the registers, JJ kept trying to get James to take the condoms and go through another line. We just laughed at him.
"Nobody cares JJ" I said, then I leaned in to whisper to whisper in his ear, "everybody fucks" and his face shot bright red again. He went outside to wait for us. They were so busy, with it being Christmas Eve, the checkout lady was way too busy to even halfway look at what she was ringing up, so JJ would have been okay even if he'd stayed. I just had to remind James to get them out of mom's sacks. On the way home JJ was kind of quiet, then he popped his head up between the seats.
"Can I ask y'all something? How can you like another guy...you know, that way? Do y'all really like feeling hairy arms and chests and stuff rubbing on you when you're...you know...and smelling another guy, and all that. Isn't it weird?" he asked. It was the first time he'd felt brave enough or maybe comfortable enough to address anything with me about being gay so I was still trying to formulate an answer when James spoke up.
"To us, it would be weird to be doing something with somebody who's soft and smooth and smells like some kind of flowers" he said, then laughed to himself, "It would be like playing a game with no joystick." I snickered at that line; we did like our joysticks!
"Yeah, JJ, it's really the same except different" I said. "Think of it this way; some guys like girls with big boobs, some like red heads, some like black girls or Asians. We're just in the group that likes other guys."
"When did you decide you liked guys better?" he asked.
"I don't know" I said, "when did you decide you were going to have the hots for Emily?"
"I didn't really decide to do that, I just feel that way" he said.
"Yeah, me too" James and I said simultaneously.
"How many guys did you have sex with before you decided you liked girls better?" James asked him.
"I haven't done anything with any guys" he said "I just always knew I liked girls."
"It's the same with us" James told him "I can remember being attracted to other boys forever. My first crush was when I was six."
"How about you Teddy?" he asked. I thought about it for a second.
"I didn't have a real crush until I was about 13" I said, "do you remember when I used to hang out with Glenn Engels all the time?"
"Yeah, he was such turd. I didn't know why you liked him" JJ answered.
"Well, because he looked like he had a rolled-up pair of socks in the front of his pants" I said, James had a knowing smile on his face. "I was always hoping to catch a glimpse when he'd take a piss in the woods or something."
"Ew. Gross. So, you were going around staring at guys crotches in middle school?" JJ asked.
"Yeah, but not gross. It's the same as how you check out girl's chests all day when you're around them" I said. I could see in the rearview mirror that he was taking it all in.
We pulled into the driveway and that seemed to end the conversation. I popped the trunk and started picking up bags to take them into the house. The whole place smelled glorious already. We dumped the groceries on the counter; mom said she'd called all the cousins and let them know we were starting the bonfire at 8 o'clock. That would give them all time to finish dinner and get over. It was already after 2 and she was still working on several dishes. We went out and cranked up the four-wheeler and went back out to collect whatever more firewood we could find. JJ drove and me and James rode in the wagon. When JJ stopped at the gate I jumped out and opened it till he got in then jumped back on the wagon. We were throwing stray limbs we found onto the pile when we heard the sound of another ATV coming. When it got close enough, I could tell it was out cousin Dennis. He was 13, and looked like his dad; his mom was my dad's sister. Dennis' dad Ernest sold heavy equipment and he was a real desk jockey. He was about 5' 9" and probably weighed 300lbs.; Dennis was a chip off the old block; Ronald McDonald red hair and all.
"Hey guys! Have y'all seen Karl around here?" he asked us, cutting his eyes at James.
"No. You're the only other person we've seen yet" I said. JJ saw him staring at James and spoke up.
"That's James, he's a friend of Teddy's from college" JJ told him.
"Oh, hey" he said, and just like that his interest was gone.
Our family owned the land all around this big pasture, so Karl would probably be coming from the east if he was actually out this early. We listened for another motor but didn't hear anything. Dennis was impatient, and after a few minutes, he cranked up and took off again. He'd only been gone probably ten minutes when Karl came driving up on his dad's Gator loaded with chairs.
"Hey Teddy, I didn't know y'all were out here. Where are your chairs?" Karl said. James looked at him and then me. I laughed. Back in high school people always thought Karl and I were brothers. His dad and mine were twins and his mother even looked similar to mine so what else could genetics do? He was actually ten months and one school grade younger than me.
"We didn't even think about chairs. It is going to be too cold to sit on the ground. I guess we need to make another trip" I said.
"Help me unload ours and I'll come with you" he said. We unloaded the chairs and James's ice chest from his Gator. All the while I kept seeing James stealing glances at Karl.
"By the way, Karl, this is James. He's my boyfriend" I said. Karl had known I was gay since we were 11 and 12 respectively. "He's staring at you because you look so much like me" I said, delighting as I watched James' face turn bright red. Karl laughed.
"No, what you mean is you look so much like me" Karl said, "Sorry, James, but the looks are as far as it goes. I like girls, so no threesomes."
James went red again and me and Karl both laughed. "Y'all are mean" JJ said.
"No, we're not, we're just kidding with him" Karl said, "except for the part about no threesomes. That really ain't happening."
"Never say never" James said to him with a wink. It was Karl's turn to go red.
We rode back over to my house and got our chairs and asked dad if we needed to take an ice chest. He said he was going to bring a big thermos of hot chocolate and a bottle of Bailey's, so we took the chairs over and set them up. Dennis was back, so after we were done, Karl took off with him and we went back to wait for dinner.
We were all in JJ's room playing games when we heard commotion in the front of the house. I got up to see what was going on. It was Uncle Ricky, mom's brother. He and Jeanette had come over for dinner and the bonfire. They had two daughters Emma and Abby. Abby was the older of the two at 13, and she had some kind of weird cousin-crush on JJ. He couldn't stand her, so, of course, we all thought it was hilarious. At dinner she made sure she got the chair next to JJ. He kept scooting away until he got so close to me, I couldn't use my arm to eat and pushed him back toward her.
After dinner, we all piled into the old farm truck to go over. JJ thought he would outsmart Abby by riding the four-wheeler over, but was thwarted again when she ran over and jumped on behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist. He looked like he just gave up and took off for the field. Dad pulled out right behind him. Mom and Jeanette rode inside with him, the rest of us rode in the truck bed wrapped up in throw blankets. Dad parked the truck and we jumped down. Uncle Ernest and dad's twin Uncle Matt were already trying to get the fire going. Dad and Uncle Ricky went to help. We ended up making a little tunnel through the stack to the middle and JJ crawled in and started a fire with some kindling, then backed out real fast. It took a few minutes before the fire started rising, but in 10 or 15 minutes it had become a huge blaze. The heat felt really good since the temp was already down in the mid-30s and supposed to fall to about 28 according the TV weather.
"What made y'all think about doing a bonfire for Christmas?" Uncle Matt asked dad.
"We actually got the idea from Teddy's friend. His parents are out of the country and he said it was a tradition of theirs, so we decided to try it out" dad told him.
"Bonfires are an ancient tradition" Uncle Matt said. He was as much a history geek as I was. I could tell everybody was tuning out as he went on about solstice fires in Europe and the levee bonfire paths for Papa Noel but I loved it. Me and Uncle Matt used to talk for hours about history and bore everybody else to death. Dad took the opportunity to pour himself some hot chocolate and Bailey's Irish Cream, then passed it around. Farther around the circle I could Uncle Ernest and a few others digging in his ice chest for beer. Shortly thereafter somebody started singing `O Holy Night' and it spread around until the woods were full of music. The singing and fellowship continued until after midnight, we rang in Christmas Day. The fire was still going but it had died down to a manageable level. The dad's decided it was time to call it quits so they pulled out shovels and started throwing dirt on the remaining fire to douse it. Around 1:20 we finally broke up and went home. We decided we'd come back and get the chairs up tomorrow.
When we got back to the house, I thought how pretty it looked with the lighted Christmas tree in the window of the house and even the string of colored lights and pine branches we'd put up on the handrail leading up to the room over the garage. We said our goodnights and Merry Christmases and went upstairs. It was cold inside; we'd forgotten to turn the heater on before we left. I kicked it on and we sat on the bed until it started to warm up. The time wasn't wasted, we kissed the whole time and James said he'd had a great time. It was as good or better than the bonfires they had at home. By 2:00 it was starting to get warm so we undressed and got under the covers. We were way too tired to do anything tonight other than sleep. Tonight, started off with me as the big spoon. I wrapped my arm around James and something just clicked in my brain finally. I whispered into his ear "I love you" as we were falling asleep. Everything felt perfect. "I love you more. Merry Christmas" came a whisper back.
Lambodara 11/25/21
Christmas in Dixie, it's snowin' in the pines
Merry (early) Christmas from Dixie, to everyone tonight!