This story is a work of complete fiction. Any resemblance to living persons or the departed, to reality is a coincidence. This story eventually includes descriptions of sex between adult males. If you are a minor, if this material is illegal where you live, or if this material offends you, please don't read it. Please donate to Nifty. Find the donation button on the Nifty web site to help you to pay your share of their expenses to provide these entertaining stories for you. Remember that authors depend on feedback for improvement and encouragement. All rights reserved.
This One Might Be Different: Different-Chapter 3
The drive to 'Shady Acres' took a couple of hours during which Greg and I didn't talk much. It was like turning a page to another chapter. One tends to concentrate on the turn, not the story at that juncture.
We arrived after driving through forested hills at a large complex of modern buildings with a sign identifying the ranch. We parked outside what resembled a ranch house on steroids with a covered porch all around. We were met by a housekeeper who introduced himself and invited us in. He offered tea or coffee or something colder/stronger. He brought in a platter of sandwiches and other refreshments.
"Mr. Markham will be with you shortly, gentlemen."
Mr. Liam Markham turned out to be a good-looking 40 something who filled out his clothes well. He introduced himself as the owner of the ranch and said he had placed the advertisement for a physician and/or family/partner.
"We have a very large ranch with a lot of employees, most all gay as am I and my two partners. Our neighbor, our architect, is also and our goal is to build a gay resort, the first such major facility in Oregon."
"We have planned a clinic and small surgery center to serve our employees and guests. We expect, at full capacity, the equivalent of a small town of like-minded people and we want to serve their medical needs. We have a helicopter on site that acts as our ambulance for major trauma. The clinic will see-outpatients and perform minor people repairs as needed. We will add a physician's assistant or another family doc or surgeon perhaps within the year as you recommend for vacation and weekend relief."
"Would you like to see the plans for the clinic?"
We told him we would. He welcomed input into the design of the clinic. We gave him some ideas his architect hadn't allowed for. At one p.m. a footman entered and announced lunch. We dined with Liam in a splendid room and ate perfectly grilled salmon on saffron rice, asparagus tips blanced then broiled with a drizzle of olive oil, and crème brûlée for dessert.
We toured the ranch and its facilities after that, thanked him for the visit and arranged to follow up within a day or two. We then left for home and Christopher.
"If we did move to Shady Acres," said Greg, "what would I do for a living?"
I told him I wasn't moving there unless they gave him work too. I had told Greg everything about me except the size of my trust. My net worth overwhelmed me. I had no wish to create a barrier between Greg and I. My plan had been to bring it up when the time was right because perhaps if I kept that out of our equation our relationship could sail along better. I thought wrong. Greg had wanted in...into my life entirely. The fact that I had withheld from him didn't go over well.
The omission had been intentional on my part and it wasn't any great wonder that Greg began to wonder what else I had omitted to tell him about anything. We lived through it, he adjusted, and I learned to be transparent, but it was rocky for a while.
When I told him my net worth was 423 million dollars and growing, he threw up...barely made it to the bathroom in time. He didn't speak to me for a couple of days, wouldn't look at me, cried off and on, went on long runs in the neighborhood (not a normal Greg thing at all). Worse, he insisted on buying his own fast food and paying half the electricity bill.
Much later he told me he felt like he had overreacted (he might have) and his visceral reaction was that I didn't need him except for his high-school maligned cock which he didn't feel was a good trade for that amount of money. Then I overreacted and told him I wasn't buying his cock.
I told him he gave it to me for free and I gave him my ass for free. We got past the money versus sex thing and slept and ate and life went on and we both loved Christopher...one morning we woke up, realized we'd both been brutalized by ourselves, not each other, and decided that an attitude change would be easier than continuing this, our first near-deliberate misunderstanding.
I told him that the trust wasn't transferable (it wasn't) and I couldn't give him half so he was going to have to suck it up and enjoy our money alongside of me for the rest of our natural lives and would he, by the way, marry me since I loved the hell out of him and he adored my ass (on every level I knew about).
He was the father of my adopted son, we were co-dads, we loved each other to distraction emotionally and physically, we had our moments like everybody does, I wanted to share my wealth with him and together change the world...he, the mountain however, would have to come to me. He did.
"Let's see what work Liam might have for me."
A couple of days later we returned to Shady Acres and dived into the subject with Liam who understood the problem. His dads were a couple who had grappled with the same issues. Liam offered to fund a tech firm making some of the basic units for quantum computers and asked Greg to supervise the assembly staff. Although much of that work was automated and robots did much of the process, some humans were needed and needed supervision.
The job appealed to Greg, a techie at heart. We met Theresa, now retired, our new next-door neighbor lady who had her own construction company, all-women. We also met Liam's partners, John and Mason. We learned a lot more about the ranch operations and the involvement with the Institute for the Study and Prevention of Homophobic Violence in Virginia. During that discussion, Liam told us a little about the Schuyler fortune and its involvement with the Institute.
We received a 3-year contract later that week. We signed it, closed my practice in Hillsboro, put our home up for sale and called the moving van the next week. I found a senior resident at the University to take over my practice and made arrangements for patients to transfer if they wished.
Movers did the packing, thankfully. Mary and Albert came to watch Christopher and made sure we all ate. Mary was in seventh heaven; Albert was too, although he tried to ensure nobody knew it. He failed.
He loved to bounce, lift and carry Christopher around. Albert didn't think anyone else knew how he felt about Christopher, but the rest of us saw through that. 'Besotted' began to describe the relationship which was bilateral between grandfather and grandson.
We arrived at Shady Acres and were astonished to see the clinic almost framed in. Liam had his neighbor's crew working two shifts and those women were driven by something or someone to get the job done. I suspected Theresa might have been the driving force...or money...or both.
Liam told us that the list of clinic equipment and supplies would arrive 14 days 'from today' providing the impetus to get the clinic finished quickly.
A runway for the private jet was already in place; a small tower and a runway lighting system was being added. A hangar was also being built by another construction outfit that specialized in jet hangars.
Acre after green acre of young, still green hay and then wheat stretched off into the distance. Workers were tending livestock; others worked on huge combines under shelter in the distance, preparing them for use in the fall.
A delivery truck was parked at the rear of the ranch house. Fresh and frozen food supplies were being unloaded. Another similar delivery truck was parked near the crew quarter's kitchen.
We walked over to the clinic and found Liam in conference with Theresa. They brightened up when they saw Christopher who was to be the youngest resident of the ranch for a while. Greg introduced Mary and Albert to Liam and Theresa.
"Would you like to see your temporary quarters, guys?"
We followed Liam to three all-terrain vehicles and were driven to a large A-frame home at the back of the property near the edge of the forest.
A moving truck had pulled up and we recognized our furniture and belongings being whisked inside by a crowd of movers and ranch workers. Greg scooted inside to direct placement of the furniture.
Liam and I walked around the house while another crowd of workers carried supplies and groceries to the kitchen. Greg grinned and asked them to just place the cold items in the fridge and frozen stuff in the freezer. He was all about leaving fruit out in a bowl.
We found a large garden space with a high deer fence around it, a chicken-wire fence providing access. The garden had been tilled, had an automatic watering drip system and sensors to detect ground moisture connected to the drip system and monitored by a fancy agricultural computer.
A large variety of fruit trees, berries and vegetables had been planted. I saw blueberry bushes, raspberries, marionberries and strawberries. There was a persimmon tree, several different kinds of apples, kiwis (including one of the new golden kiwis smuggled in from Australia per Liam), and a small vineyard with Concord grapes in several really long rows.
"We've been expecting someone to live here for several months so started the garden without knowing who might move in. We're all delighted that it's you and Greg. Will Mary and Albert succumb to temptation to move here and be closer in retirement to you all"?
"Even gay guys need a kind mother figure at times. Theresa told me today that she doesn't expect to live forever and if you guys don't invite Mary and Albert to live with you, she'll invite them to live next door and will them her house when she passes. Talk about long term planning!"
"We have openings on the security force for Albert part or full time if he wants to work at all. His police background would be welcome. Mary could be Christopher's grandmother and help out anywhere on the ranch or be your chief gardener or whatever she likes. We can work out their pay and benefits."
I told him that all sounded good to me. "It's probably a good thing to bring all that up with Greg and if he's on board, he can help to persuade them to consider moving closer."
Liam grinned. "Good thought. You know I've got an ulterior motive for asking Mary and Albert to move close by. My idea is that you guys might want to stay here longer if they are here. Just trying to be transparent with you."
"Thank you for that."
Greg was adamant that his parents move closer. He wasn't as sure that he wanted them in the house, however.
"Simon, when you and I fuck," Greg went on, "I want to vocally express myself and from past experience, so do you. I don't want to make love to you thinking, even in the background, that we are providing entertainment for the rents."
I couldn't have agreed more. To cement the pact, we sprinted up the stairs to the bedroom, tore off each other's clothes and Greg's monster slid into my ass and nearly made a new man out of me. During sex with Greg I felt fulfilled in a number of ways, loved, wanted, cherished and besides, my itches got scratched. What more could a man want?
Turned out a man could want a life partner.
Our wedding took place on the ranch with a pretty big crowd of well-dressed guys in the audience. Theresa herself had procured a minister's license for the occasion and wore a gorgeous yellow caftan, the only yellow thing around except for the bright round thing in the sky which no one stared at (as opposed to the caftan).
We exchanged vows by the river in a fabulous setting, favored by a sunny day (not exactly guaranteed in Oregon), and promised each other to be the best partners we could be, to love, cherish, and honor the other guy for as long as we both lived and meant every word.
Nobody promised to obey the other or endow the other with anything other than respect and our bodies.
I have to say that making love to one's husband is a level above making it with a lover. People say it's just a piece of paper. It's way more than that and the difference attracts people to marry.
Greg and I were already physically intimate, emotionally connected, and committed to each other's happiness. The addition was a message partly geared toward the rest of the world.
"This guy is special, he's my lifetime partner and we're together. We'll include ya in our work and play if we both decide to, but we are an 'us' now, a force with which to reckon."