Welcome once more.
Wednesday night, squash night. I wonder if Micah will come. I haven't seen him in class yet, but maybe I just didn't notice him. Although it's hard to believe that his face wouldn't have leaped out at me, with the tension in my stomach acting like a radar that pulses more strongly the closer I get to anything connected with him.
My stomach's no good at telling the future, though, so I don't know if he'll be here tonight. I just concentrate on stretching and looking like I'm calm. Also on keeping my shorts up. I've lost a few kilos.
Kevin comes over. I seem to be playing him more often than most of the others, at least for warming up, but I still don't know him that well. Maybe I should make more of an effort to get to know him.
"So what've you just come from?"
"Business law. Man, it's fuckin dull, but it'll be worth it when I've got my six-figure salary at PwC." And he's off, blathering on in the same vein while he's tying up his shoes. Why did I ask such a lame question anyway? I feel like I've lost all of my ability to interact normally with people. I hope Kevin and I go back to our usual rhythm of unspeaking but comfortable squash playing.
So I just mmm and nod, and go onto the court. After a couple of games I catch sight of Jack out of the corner of my eye, and wave to him.
Next Wednesday night, and I still haven't seen Micah, in class or anywhere. He must be getting behind, unless he has someone getting the notes for him. Not that it's anything to do with me anymore.
But tonight he does show up, my eyes and my stomach telling me simultaneously. He looks briefly over at me, and then away. I don't know how I can play, but I'm not going to chicken out. So I'm out onto the court with Wai, and we're playing two minutes later, after a warmup that he probably found a bit too rushed.
It was definitely too rushed for me, because I'm losing 15-6, 15-4. When did I last play this badly? Every point I'm thinking about Micah, what he did, what will happen at the end of the evening's games. I try to pull myself together. I no longer seem to have any finesse -- not that that was ever my strong suit -- so I compensate by just forcing myself to go in harder for all of the shots. I end up winning one game 15-13, but losing the next 15-9.
Jack's standing at the top of the court. I wonder how many games he's seen, and I grimace to him as I leave the court. After a couple of words with Wai -- he says I mustn't have been having a good night tonight -- I go over to Jack.
"I hope you didn't see too many of the games. That's about the worst I've played since I started."
"Just the last couple. I thought you were fine."
"You do know the rules, right? You don't get bonus points for missing the ball or running into the wall."
"Want to have a drink, then? Have an excuse for such poor coordination?" That's a little close to the bone, given how badly I played, but he's just kidding.
I see Micah over Jack's shoulder. He's looking at us. It would be the easiest way, to just go with Jack, and avoid any possible confrontation. I really do want a drink as well. But maybe I should grab the bull by the horns, go over and start the process of making things normal.
But I don't have a choice, because Micah decides right then to leave. Running after him is going too far, I think.
"So that would be him, then," says Jack.
"Yep. That drink is sounding especially good now."
There's only one actual pub around here, so that's where we go. Lots of white collars here from the tech park, but what can you do. I could be one one day. We pick an outside table, and Jack goes to get the beer.
"Hope VB is OK," he says as he comes up behind me. He has a whole jug of it, so it had better be.
"Yep."
I don't normally drink that much beer -- I'm reminded as I look around that I don't want a beer gut -- but tonight I'll make an exception. Especially cause it'll be good to just sit around with Jack and talk. And talk he does, constantly. It's nice. Maybe he can feel I'd just like that tonight, a bit uncharacteristically for me. I tell him some stuff, not deep, just about school, my part-time job and what's it's like moving people, mostly the funny and weird stuff you find out about people when you're packing their things.
"Hmm. I'd wondered where you got those arms from." We're sitting together, facing out onto the road. He reaches out and squeezes a bicep, mostly in that way that guys who go to the gym demonstrate an aesthetic appreciation of each other's bodies, but not entirely.
Jack himself is looking even better than usual, and that's pretty good. I know even through the beer goggles that it's partly the drink, partly the rest of my life. But damn his neck looks biteable at the moment.
The jug's almost empty, so I go to get another one.
When I get back, Jack says, "So you really liked this guy from squash?"
"Yeah. But I'll get over it soon. Maybe by the end of this jug."
"I was kinda hung up on a guy once. It lasted for weeks, almost. I tried to forget it by going home with guys at bars. Even a redhead once, although I'm not normally into redheads, because I thought it'd be good to try something different to get my mind off things. Didn't work though. Well, not at first anyway. But then at a dance party, suddenly, I was making out with this guy, and I realised it was all OK. It wasn't just the Es either. I went home with him, and everything was fine the next day. A good root can solve a lot of problems, I always say." He looks directly at me. "But I bet you're a romantic."
"Why do you think that?" I spill some of my beer as I put my glass down too heavily. Be calm, it's not like it was an insult.
He just shrugs his shoulders and smiles.
"I've never given anyone flowers or anything." I look at him, then away for maybe half a minute. "But yeah, you're probably right."
He shakes his head in mock sadness. "Such a waste. I don't think a therapeutic fuck would work for you the same way it does for me. But if you ever do want a no-strings-attached ..."
And so, funnily, he's actually lessened the sexual tension by talking about it. It's pretty companionable until the end of the third jug, when I decide I should go home.
"So you still owe me a jug then," Jack says smiling.
"Yep. Whenever you're up for it."
"I'm always up for it."
Incorrigible. I smile to myself on the bus home.
The next morning I don't feel bad at all, at least not from the beer. I make a sandwich, pack my notebooks and go out the door.
When I do, I almost fall over Micah. He looks like he was dozing until I opened the door.
"Hi."
"Hi."
"Can I come in?"
While I'm thinking about it -- do I want him in my home, or should we go somewhere else? -- he says, "I'm not drunk this time." Then he pauses. "Um, it's not inconvenient, is it, I mean, there's not someone else in there, I know the place is small so it might be ..."
"No, come in."
He comes in and sits on the bed. I put down my backpack and sit on one of the chairs. He looks at his knee.
"All I want is to say I'm sorry. What I did was ... I don't know how to say it."
"Say it was really shitty."
"OK. It was really shitty. Especially with the girl. I didn't even like her that much, and now I feel bad about doing that to her too. But not as bad as about you. I don't know what else to say."
"Say you're a prick."
"I'm a prick. I couldn't ... I wanted to be able to have the same life I had before, see myself the same way, and it didn't matter if it hurt you. I mean, it did matter, but I just told myself that it was more important that ..."
"Say you're a coward."
"I'm --"
"No, don't say it." It's like I'm holding a knife and stabbing it into him. Part of me wants to lash out and keep wounding, a strong part, but he's already down and bleeding. I don't want it to be the way things will be between us, that I'll make him do anything when he's down. That'd be fatal to any kind of friendship. Mom, that time, called me Gideon the Unforgiving, and I guess there's truth to it, but ... I go over and sit on the bed, not near him, one leg over the edge and the other under it. My eyes are a bit blurry.
"Look," I say, looking at his knee too. "I've changed my mind about not being friends. It'll be difficult, I tried it once before and it didn't work, but maybe it will this time. I really like hanging around with you, there was really something -- ... anyway, I know that the way I live my life isn't for everyone, but you don't want your friends to all be the same anyway."
He's silent for a long time, and then we happen to look up from his knee at the same time. His eyes are kind of wet too.
He clears his throat. "I know, after everything, you don't want to ... you don't want for things to be the way they were. But I already told my mum about everything, not that it was you, but she's probably guessed, she's good at that. I hope you're not angry about that."
He did? I wasn't expecting he'd do that. It took guts; if it'd been earlier ... if ... I smile, more than a bit rueful. "I can't be angry about everything, although I guess I give it a good try." Then I reach out and touch his cheekbone, push a strand of his floppy hair behind his ear.
"Hug?"
He nods.
It's an awkward hug, sitting on the bed like that, so we end up lying down. I brush a couple more hairs from his cheek.
"What did your mum say?"
He rolls over onto his back, head still against me. "Not much. She was pretty quiet, really. It was probably a shock. I'd always been so ..."
"Perfect."
"Yeah, they thought so. And I liked that they did. She asked if I still liked girls, and I said I did."
He looks at me with his mismatched eyes, hesitant, but I don't care about that, never have. To want me and noone else, that's all there is to care about. Just in general, though; it's obviously not the case here. Who ever says that anyway? "I think the hippy in her will come out on top. She's cool about everything."
I feel his fingers on my hip. I look down, and my T-shirt's ridden up. He keeps playing with my skin, making me shiver. Then he moves in to kiss me.
I stop him. "I don't want to do anything that will make you feel ... constrained. I guess there's a lot you want to experience, and I don't want to stop you. But then we should just be friends."
"I don't want anything else. Only you."
I kiss him.
He takes a breath. "I'll never do anything like that to you again."
The kiss lasts even longer this time.
"Just so you know this isn't just me saying anything because I want to get off, we don't have to have sex."
"Ever?"
"Noooo, just now." He lowers his eyebrows in mock annoyance. That's the moment when things start to feel on the way to OK. Then he reaches down and feels my cock, which is pretty hard from all his skin-touching. "But maybe, uh, you could just fuck me, since you're so ready. I don't have to get off, though."
On the one hand, I like the mood now, don't want to lose any of it. On the other hand, ...
"Are you sure? It'll hurt."
"Much?"
"Maybe."
He pauses. "Yeah, do it." The expression on his face is stoic. I guess the whole penance idea comes from the Catholic school.
I slowly undo the button of his shorts and slide them off. He's wearing boxers again, and isn't quite hard. Probably thinking of what he's let himself in for. He takes off his shirt while I slip off the boxers, and then he lies back down on the bed again, while I reach over and grab the lube from the bedside table drawer. Then it's my turn to get undressed.
I start kissing him, mouth and face and neck and chest, and at first he's not too responsive, but he's slowly getting into it. I'm lying on top of him, moving slightly, and I can feel him getting harder.
Then I pick up the lube and squirt some onto my hand, warming it up on my stomach. As I go to put some on his hole he spreads his legs. His hardon has gone down a bit again, but he takes in a sharp breath as I slowly circle around his hole, and I keep circling while I'm kissing him again, stomach and legs. Then I slowly push a finger in, so slowly he doesn't even react. After a much longer time another finger, and this time he breathes sharply again, so I go back up to his mouth and kiss again.
"How do you want me?"
"Just as you are. Lift your legs a little, maybe." He does. I position my cock at the entrance, then look at him and smile. When he smiles back I go in.
It's just the head, but he takes a deeper breath than before, looking even more stoic. I wait, more kissing, then continue.
"I'm all the way in. In you."
A little of the stoicism gives way to another emotion, maybe surprise. I lower myself on top of him completely, touching as much skin as I can. It pulls me out of him a bit, but there's still enough in there. Then as I push back, I slide across his cock with my stomach, back and forward, still kissing him, wanting him to feel the pleasure I do. Then I hit the spot inside him, and he stiffens, all of him. In between kisses I smile at him, and the look of stoicism has disappeared, and he's lost in the feeling. In and out, each time stroking inside him, he looks at me, flushed, with half-lidded eyes, and starts to push back against me, harder and stronger.
For all that I want him to feel as good as I do, and have his pleasure last for hours, I'm only human and on top of the sexiest guy in the world, who's just smiled at me with the smile I've dropped all my guard for. And so just before I'm about to come, I reach a hand under and grasp his cock and give a few strokes, slick with lube.
It's not simultaneous. He comes first, neck muscles tightening, yelling out at the end. And then I do, looking at him.
I slip out of him shortly, then just hold him. He looks at me and smiles, again, I can't imagine being sick of that smile. The afterwards is the best time when you like the person you're with.
"Imagine what it'll be like when we have sex where you do want to get off."
We missed the rest of that day's classes, but we're in the next day. He stayed at my place again; when he rang his mum, she asked to speak to me. We didn't say anything much -- "How are things?" "Been a bit so-so, but pretty good now" -- but that wasn't the point, I guess.
We're out the front of the lecture theatre; Gaz is there again, maybe waiting for the lecture, if he actually goes to it; I don't know, since he mostly seems to use it as a meeting place to organise touch footy.
"So you're looking like you got a piece," he says to Micah.
"Yeah." Then Micah, after a hesitation, standing a bit behind me, puts his arms around my neck, and smiles at Gaz.
Gaz goes to laugh, then isn't so sure as Micah slips a hand under my shirt.
I wonder if I'm blushing visibly for the first time in my life.
And that's it; it seems the right place to finish. Since writing is such a time-consuming process for me, I need to get back to actual work :-). Anyway, thanks again to people who've emailed me (and also to anyone who hasn't emailed me but who liked the story anyway). Last comments to mark_410@hotmail.com.