My Adventure With Dean
Chapter Two
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I feel slightly unsteady. A sense of things not being entirely real.
I tell myself it's worry about tomorrow - my first marathon. I've got everything prepared. All I have to do is wake up, find the start, run 26 miles, and then meet up with my best friend's husband and celebrate.
Oh, yeah...My best friend's husband.
That could explain the unreal feeling.
I've asked him to go out and grab us a couple of cans of beer, even though this won't help my performance tomorrow. I need to think.
Earlier, we found a pasta place around the corner from the hotel. I ordered something bland but filling. The waitress, assuming we were together, very sweetly offered us a cosy booth, with a semi-circular seat. We sat adjacent to each other, half facing.
Our legs touched.
I felt myself starting to panic, excused myself: went to the bathroom, splashed some water on my face, became aware of the inner voice telling me I was being ridiculous.
I have known Dean for 6 years. We have been good friends for 4-5 of these. During the period where socialising was forbidden, I had been part of him and Danny's 'bubble'. We had spent time together, when it seemed the world was ending. I had drank, danced, laughed, and made it through that time of infectious diseases and isolation with this guy. What on Earth was happening now?
It must be the heightened emotion. Danny and I selected this race because of the date - 2 years to the day since Carl finally left. This was to mark how far I had come. But it's impossible not to think of the past. I was aware of a mix of Carl-related emotions that remained: relief, sadness, shame. And joy, that things were different now.
And yet, I was still hiding in the toilet.
More water... I drew myself up to my full height - something I'd been practicing in recent months. I looked myself in the eye, smiled at myself. Nope. Smiled at myself again. Studied myself in the mirror.
I could see some definition in my chest, emphasised by the shirt, which tapered nicely at the sides. Initially I had been confused when people began to look at me. When I told Danny, she laughed: 'For God's sake, Nick, they're looking at you for a reason...and it's not a bad one! You're a catch, dear...a real catch - and don't ever let anyone tell you otherwise.'
Thanks Danny. But how would you feel if I tried to catch your husband?
When I re-entered the restaurant, I could see the waitress laughing with Dean, leaning her pelvis towards him slightly, touching her hair. As I reached the table they looked at me and smiled, before she spoke:
'I hope tomorrow goes well for you. My boyfriend is doing it too, but it sounds like you'll be way in front of him.' I muttered some thanks as she threw a glance at Dean over her shoulder, and headed for the kitchen.
I forced a smile: 'You have an admirer...You told her about tomorrow.'
A look of surprise. He seemed aware of the undertone: 'Michaela? No, she's just being kind. She asked if I was doing the race. Then she asked if my boyfriend was.' He grinned 'I told her you were, and that I imagined you would do rather well.'
Michaela returned to our table, bearing a bowl of olives, touching my shoulder, letting her hand rest there: 'Your meal will be along shortly, guys. If you want anything else, let me know. We've got a special desert for marathon runners. It's on the house. I'll bring two spoons.' She flashed her eyes at Dean again, then at me, and vanished into the restaurant.
I looked at him as he grabbed a cocktail stick, skewering an olive: 'so...you...told her that your boyfriend was doing the race?'
That grin again 'Sure, why not?'
'....but....aren't you bothered by that?'
'Really, Nick? How long have we been friends? If she thinks I'm with you, then I'm very flattered. You know me nearly...' Something enters his mind, and he decides not to say it... 'You know me better than pretty much anybody else in my life. I love it when people think we're together.'
I tried to assmiliate what he was telling me. He had flirted with me for years, in a mild, harmless way. I loved it, he clearly enjoyed it, Danny seemed secure enough in their relationship not to worry.
Once, in the days not long after Carl, me and Dean had gone out to drown our shared sorrows: he was in a lot of pain from the soccer injury. I was just in a lot of pain.
Seeking a place that served late on a week night, we had ended up in a horrible bar in the gay district: chrome, statues, testosterone-fuelled techno. He found himself a seat on one of the faux-Roman plinths that were meant to make the place look classy. I stood, looking around us, cracking some joke about it being an arena, full of lions waiting to pounce. At that point, he grabbed me around the waist, pulled me into his lap, exclaimed 'Nick, protect me from the gay boys!' and planted a kiss on my cheek. I had laughed, blushed, and moved to stand up, when he said 'You can just stay there if you like, Nick'.
And, knowing I could blame the booze, I did just that. I leaned into him, and let him hold me there, on his lap, for the rest of the night. A couple of times, he kissed my head, in the protective way he does. Once, I kissed his lips, in a less protective way. I would struggle to remember what we drank, what we talked about that evening. I do remember him holding me, and the envious stares from some of the other guys.
Neither of us had spoken about it directly since. On a couple of occasions, when I've been low, or overwhelmed, he has held me like this again, on his lap, in the way a friend might. In the way that most friends might not. My best friend's husband. My very best friend.
My best friend's husband, who likes to hold me. And who kisses me, when I need it, in a protective, or affectionate way.
Like a friend might. Like most friends don't.
And now, apparently, he was enjoying the fact that the waitress thought we were a couple.
I tried choose my words with care:
'Well, thank you. Yes, I think I do know you well. And... I'm also very flattered that she thinks I'm with you.' And then, knowing I probably shouldn't: 'You're an extremely attractive man.'
He smiles when he blushes: he dropped his head towards the table, casting his eyes up at me - 'Thankyou'. A pause, and then: 'Just...thank you.' He put his hand on my knee, gripping it in a 'male bonding' type of way. He kept it there, in something bearing less resemblance to male bonding. I'm not sure how long we sat there, smiling at each other. The moment was broken by Michaela returning with two bowls of pasta.
And, with that, I felt reality returning. We both had obligations. He had a child. I had... well, I had a garden - one that he had helped me plant. We needed to remember how things were:
'How's Danny actually doing, Dean?'
Straight away, I wished I hadn't. A range of expressions. Sadness, embarassment, maybe some anger? I felt something inside lurch, at what he might be about to tell me. Things had to be okay here. They had been the people that gave me hope. Hope for relationships, hope for myself.
But also...part of me fantasised that things weren't okay, and facing that part would have meant naming some uncomfortable truths.
'We still get along very well. I think we always will, but...we've made some changes. It has been difficult.' He stopped, and stared at his linguine: 'Look, Nick, I do want to talk about this, but if its okay, can we do this tomorrow, or the night after?'
A huge wave of relief, I was happy to leave the topic there. We ate, talked of anything, everything, but the important things. Michaela arrived with our desert. Some concoction of chocolate brownies, ice cream and forest fruits. And, sticking out of the top, two wafer coils. He plucked his from the ice cream, rolling it between thumb and forefinger:
'I've never really liked these. Do you want mine, Nick?'. Dipping it in ice cream, he leaned in, holding it up to my mouth. This was more like it, the kind of stupid thing we'd always done. I laughed, he laughed, I crunched it hard, all the way down to his finger.
And then, I grabbed his hand, and pressed my lips against the back of his palm.
Again, that sense of unreality, I am not actually here doing this, someone else is here with Dean, kissing his fingers. And that someone else felt their panic subside as, instead of snatching his hand away, Dean moved each finger in turn across my lips, finally sliding the very tip of his thumb in between them whilst he held my gaze.
We didn't say much for the rest of the meal. We moved closer, allowing our legs to touch fully under the table. He returned his hand to my leg, I did nothing to stop him. We didn't discuss what we were doing, or what it meant. As we waited for the bill, I took his hand across the table, and held it, finally running my hands across those blonde hairs on the back of it, over his wristwatch, to the cuff of his shirt.
And then we came back here. And now he's out, buying beer, and I have absolutely no idea how to proceed.
It seems strange to be returning to the room so early. The sky still holds much of the light of day. York gets boisterous on a Saturday night, full of people from the countryside pouring in for a night of debauchery. Thankfully, we're a short walk from the centre. I can see trees, rather than buildings, but I can still hear shouting, singing in the street outside. I hope he's okay out there.
I notice my hands trembling. It doesn't feel like fear.
I walk over to the mirror, to get a sense of how I might look to him. Tuck in the stomach, push the pelvis up - an old habit, so much less necessary than it once was. Perhaps there are men in their late 30s with perfect six packs, but I've never had the misfortune to meet one. As it is, though, I look like I've taken care of myself. And I have. Ove the last two years. I've looked after me. Or, I'm learning to. And I've had people like Danny and Dean beside me.
Danny again - the thought of her knowing any of this makes my stomach clench. I think back to dinner, and wonder what 'we've made some changes' might mean. And then I remember Dean's hand, touching my bottom as we stood at the hotel reception desk, and for some reason I pull my trousers down at the back, turning my rear towards the mirror, wondering what it looks like, how it feels. How it would feel to have him touching it again, but slowly, deliberately. I run my hand over the hairs that I let grow back on it. Carl liked it smooth. I like my arse as I like it - soft hairs covering the buttocks, leading down to the crack.
Tensing, releasing, touching my hole, taking some pride in how toned the buttocks feel. Thinking of how it was to hold his hand-
Pulling my trousers up abruptly at the sound of the door handle, as he re-enters the room. I am not quite quick enough. His look is quizzical, but amused. He doesn't speak, offers me a can from that more attainable six pack - the one purchased from the shop at the end of the street. And then, like it was the most natural, everyday thing in the world, he stretches himself up and kisses my lips.
I'm too surprised to act, and when he pulls away, opens his beer, asks me how I'm feeling about tomorrow, and goes to lie down, I'm not sure if he's upset, uncertain, avoidant. I crack my can open, and watch him settle, as I head for my own bed. He untucks his shirt, takes his shoes off, flexing his toes.
I wonder how his toes might feel in my mouth? I put the thought away, drink the beer, flick on the TV.
There's a programme featuring other people watching television. They are discussing the things on their screen, that I can't see. I can feel myself starting to drift into a numb state. I remember Carl, flicking through channels, complaining about the lack of entertainment on the screen. Turn it off again. Drink the beer, focus on the taste.
Look over at Dean.
He has turned to face me, pillow under one arm: 'You okay, Nick?'
'Yeah, I think so. I mean...'
'... well...'
'Actually, I'm pretty confused, and worried. Is something happening here? I feel like it is, and I think I'd like it to be, no - I'd really like it to be, but...'
I'm not sure how to complete the sentence. Dean doesn't speak straight away. Instead, he shuffles back on his bed a little, and widens his arms, beckoning me over with his hand. I think about questioning this, and decide against it. Putting my beer on the table between us, I move to sit on the edge of his bed, my back touching his legs, lie down, and move my body into the curve of his. My head on his pillow. My back against his chest. My feet sliding between, over, along his calves. My arse against his crotch.
My arse against his crotch.
He reaches under my neck with one arm, holding me from below, moving his free hand down onto my stomach, shuffling closer. And I feel him. The hitherto unknown part of him, pressing into me. Any doubt as to whether he, too, is finding this an erotic experience evaporates.
I slide my left hand underneath his, so he is holding it, and move both to my face: kissing his fingers, the back of his palm, his wrist and fore-arm as I did in the restaurant. I hold his hand to my skin, feeling the warmth of his flesh, the coolness of the watch-strap, the hairs tickling my lips, and I kiss it again.
He moans gently, tensing his arms so his hold is a little tighter. I can feel his stubble against my hairline; gentle nibbles and licks around my collar bone, up to my ears. It tickles. It tingles. It sends rockets up and down my spine, into my groin, my heart, my thighs - the ones that I long to turn, and wrap around him. After a while he says 'do you want to put your head on my chest?'. It isn't really a question.
He rolls onto his back, and I turn to face him, snuggle into his armpit, his right hand on my hip, as I touch his pectoral muscles. I can feel the hair that sprouts there through his shirt, and slide my fingers between the buttons, undoing the second, the third, savouring this contact with him. His chest hair, a light brown, spreads from the edge of his pecs, becoming denser, to the thicket that sprouts in the centre. I bury my face in this, run my tongue up and down it, across his chest, to his nipples. Kiss one, suck it, then the other, and return my head to rest against his upper body. I slide my leg over his thighs and almost, not quite, over his crotch.
I try to slow my mind. Just stay here. Right now, I don't need to know whether he's done this before, or what this means to him, or make jokes about us rejecting a double bed. I certainly don't want to talk about his relationship. Occasionally, I yield to the urge to kiss and touch his chest again.
When I look up at him, he smiles, gently strokes the top of my head. No questions just now. I just want to be here, with him holding me. At times, there is the rush of thoughts. Frequently, there is the urge to climb astride his crotch and tear his clothes off. Underneath all this, there's a peace I haven't known in a long, long time.