The Jascian's Toy - Chapter 15
The Jascian's Toy copyright 2005 Rowan McBride
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This story may not be reproduced in whole or in part without author's permission.
This story is a work of fiction, and any resemblance to persons, living or dead (or undead), or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. They are a product of the author's imagination, or used fictitiously.
The following story contains erotic homosexual situations. If it is illegal for you to read this please leave now.
Thank you for reading The Jascian's Toy.
- Fifteen -
Gavin didn't say anything on the way home. He was silent as we entered the apartment, as he gently set me down on the bedroom floor.
"Well?" I asked finally, staring up at him when he began to walk away.
He glanced down at me. "Well, what?"
"Are we going to talk about what happened at the court today?"
His eyes sparked--tight, bright flickers of electric blue. "Yes, we are."
That caught me off-guard. And now I knew why I hadn't tried to break our silence over the ride home. I had no idea what to say. "Okay," I fumbled. "So...wh--"
"What's in a milkshake?"
I blinked, then frowned. "Say again?"
"What is in a `large fucking shake'?"
Suddenly it occurred to me that we were angry over two completely different things. "Milk," I said carefully, trying to figure out what kind of ground I was standing on here, "ice-cream."
"And?"
"That's pretty much it. You can add fruit or cookies or brownie bits or whatever, but a shake's a shake."
"What's so special about an Earth milkshake?"
His voice was getting calmer while his eyes only got brighter. Probably not a good sign. "There's nothing special about it. That's my point."
"We have milk and ice-cream here, you know. If you missed it so god-damned much, I could have gotten one for you. You didn't have to go talking about it with your little Earther buddy."
Slowly but surely we were edging into the source of my anger. "The milkshake isn't special, Gavin. Neither are the fries. Or the burgers. It's where I used to get them. It's where Jack used to get them. Earth." I stepped forward. "The portal to which you apparently own."
A muscle ticked at his jaw. "My parents are the ones who run the Aravis portal. You have no idea the trouble I got into for hacking it that time."
"Aravis portal? How many are there?"
He glanced away.
"Gavin?"
"Thirteen. Scattered across the world."
Made sense. One portal and two people couldn't possibly serve the needs of all the Alphas. "Is the...Aravis portal close?"
He refused to answer, refused to even look at me.
"Please," I whispered.
Gavin blew out a hard breath. "It's not my portal, Blake. Does it even matter where it is or who owns it in the face of that fact?"
Oh, this was killing me. "Of course it matters. I would have wanted to know that your parents had a way home--"
"This is your home!" yelled Gavin, his bright eyes locking on to me.
I stopped short, unsure what to say. Truthfully, I had been thinking of this place as home. But that was before I'd started to imagine Gavin with a mate.
"This is your home," he said again, softly this time, his voice holding a note of pleading I'd never heard before.
Imagining Gavin with another Alpha... Whatever we had now would pale in comparison. "There was a night, not long ago, when you told me you were once so concerned for me..."
Gavin shook his head. "Don't."
"...that you figured out how to hack the system the way you did when you were ten."
The lights in his eyes lost their sharpness, turning fluid as they floated through his irises. "Don't ask it, Blake."
This time I was the one to look away. "Smart guy like you. I bet you still have the code. I bet you could easily send--"
Gavin dropped to his knees. "Blake, I can't let you go. I c-can't."
The movement barely registered with me. My body was cool, calm. My thoughts were straightforward and clinical. "Would it be like before? Would I go to sleep and open my eyes in my own bed?" I paused, then waved off my own question. "No, of course I wouldn't. You packed away my bed. And by now my house has been cleared out." My voice dropped as I resisted the urge to look at him. "Where would I open my eyes?"
"Don't do this. " He braced his palms on each side of my body. "Say you can't imagine life without me. That you need me as much as I need you. Please."
"I realize without me you couldn't go into government," I told him as I stared at the cords of muscle bunching under his forearms, "but you're an Alpha. There must be other..."
Warm water splashed against my shoulder, nearly knocking me off balance. My hand went to my soaked shirt. "Where did..." Without thinking I touched my fingertips to my tongue. It was salty.
A tear? From my Alpha?
I glanced up at him. "You're crying."
He shuddered. And more tears fell. "Y-Yeah."
I was just a toy. Nothing more. "This isn't a life or death situation, Gavin. I'm not broken."
His fists clenched against the carpet. "I'm losing you. There's nothing I can do to drag you back to me."
I thought about Jack, and his brother. Jenny probably had people she missed too. And Sasori. I tried to imagine him alone and quiet in his little doll house...
"Blake."
"It's not right," I murmured. "Keeping us here."
"You still feel that way? After all this time?"
It felt like I was fading. A smile touched my mouth as I stared sightlessly at Gavin's fist. "I wonder if Tommy Smith took my advice with the marbles. That kid always got himself into the weirdest fixes."
Gavin's voice sounded far away. "You're not listening to me."
There was no reason to listen. The idea struck me as funny. "Maybe you're growing up. Natural for children and their toys to drift apart over time."
"I'm not parting from you. Ever."
"You will." On Earth, I'd had so many chances. A relationship would start hot and intense, then whisper into nothing. I'd always thought that was just the way life ran. But now I realized it was me--always too busy, always stepping back when things got too intimate. Now the universe was punishing me by making me understand exactly what that slow drift felt like. "Trust me on this."
The fist I was watching rose into in the air and my gaze instinctively followed its path. My head tilted to the side when Gavin pressed the heel of his hand against his chest. "What are you doing?"
"I don't know." With one hand still braced on the floor, he pushed harder against his pecs with the other. "It...It aches."
Something inside of me snapped, and suddenly I was in the here and now. "Pick me up," I said, lifting my arms. "Let me listen."
Instead of taking hold of my body, Gavin lowered his. I started toward his chest, but he pressed his cheek into the carpet and blocked my path. "Is this what heartbreak feels like?"
Heart...
Startled, I looked into his eyes. Shimmering with tears, glowing with emotion.
Those eyes squeezed shut. "A few seconds ago I was angry as fuck. Now I'm...this. Things were supposed to get easier once I got a toy. What the hell is wrong with me?"
That sense of being inanimate, of being disposable, slipped into the background. "Why were you angry? It can't have really been about milkshakes."
"Fuck, I don't know." His eyes squeezed tighter. "You and Kieric's toy are always so damned happy together. Laughing with each other. Talking about stuff I don't get because I'm not an Earther."
He'd been feeling left out. Despite myself, I barely managed to hold back a chuckle. "How is that different from your relationship with any of your friends?"
"Because." His brow furrowed. "Because..."
I was smiling now, but I kept the expression out of my voice. "Yes?"
"I hate that you talk about going back to Earth every chance you get. I hate that he promised you he'd never leave you behind. I hate that after six months of having you, I still can't make you happy."
This was where our anger intersected, and I gentled my voice. "I told you--I'm not unhappy."
A growl escaped him through clenched teeth.
I suppose if it had been me, I wouldn't have been satisfied with that response, either. Not after all this time. But the truth was the truth. "Is that why you didn't tell me about the portal?"
His eyes fluttered open. "I didn't want the first thing you asked of me to be the only thing you ever asked of me."
Of its own volition, my hand rose and caught a lock of his hair. Gavin was possessive. Volatile. None of today's revelations had surprised me. Not really. "You're still a kid in so many ways."
"I'm not--"
"Look at you." I caressed the bridge of his nose with my knuckles. "On your hands and knees. Bowing before a toy. What sense does that make?"
For the first time, he seemed to realize exactly what position he'd put himself into, and broke into a low, hollow chuckle as he stretched himself out. "Are you going to ask me to send you back to Earth?"
"No," I told him, staring down his long, hard body. My gaze rested on feet that seemed miles away from me at this angle. Not today.
Surprise flickered over his face. "Are you serious?"
Some people needed to learn things the hard away. God knew I was one of them. Gavin... He needed to see for himself. Meet someone of his own status, his own age, who could give him more than any toy could. Then he'd understand he'd been holding on to something insubstantial. Then I'd ask...
"Blake?"
I lowered my head, nipped at his mouth. His lips parted and warm breath cascaded over me as I trailed a line of kisses along his jaw. Soon, I felt his fingers at my back, tugging on my clothing, encouraging me to take them off. My shirt and slacks hit the floor and I lost myself in his eager touch.
Eventually, he'd begin to crave more than I could give him. We'd drift, and he would know what I know. The timing was going to be tricky. I'd have to wait for that single moment in between, the one moment where I existed both as object and friend. On that day, I'd do my damndest to convince him to send me and as many humans as I could take with me back to Earth.
But not today. Today, while he still treasured me, I pretended he was mine.
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