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Part IV
I arrived home in total depression. The night had ended up turning into a total disaster, and I couldn't think of any way to fix things. I had seen a side of James that had been totally hidden from sight the whole time we had been together and I didn't know how to deal with it.
I had been home for about fifteen minutes and was still sitting in the same spot on my couch that I had been on since I walked in. Just then, a furious pounding sounded on the door to my apartment. I just ignored it since I didn't want to talk to anybody.
"Dave! I know you're in there! Let me in goddammit, or I swear I'll call Todd to come knock it down!" I couldn't help but chuckle through my depression. For all of Barry's fury, he would never do something really physical like breaking something down on his own, unless he was supremely pissed; he would always call Todd to do it for him.
The pounding resumed with a vengeance. I sighed, knowing that Barry would never give up as long as he had any indication that I was here. I got up and walked to the door, just unlocking it and opening it enough for Barry to get in before I went back to my spot on the couch.
The hurricane known as Barry blew in right behind me. "All right, dish. I want to know exactly what just happened."
"What do you mean?" I asked, trying to bluff him.
Barry grabbed my chin and turned my head to him. "Come off it, Dave. I know you, and I know what you and Todd talked about tonight. I put two and two together and got Dave and James in a fight, and the remainder is you getting depressed."
I blinked. "How the hell did you know all that?"
One of the corners of Barry's mouth quirked. "I'm a lawyer, Dave, and a damn good one. I know people, and I especially know the two of you."
I sighed again and sank further into the couch. Barry rolled his eyes. "God, I hate it when you do that whole `I want to feel bad so I am going to sit here and sigh' bit. Do you know how irritating that is? Jeez, don't make me get involved in this again."
I looked at my friend. "What do you mean, `again'?"
Barry shook his head. "Dave, as smart as you are, sometimes you are really dense. Could you not see the setup a mile away? For two weeks I listened to you sigh and I watched the young cutie drool over you. You sat at the bar and whined to Todd, and James would sit and drool in the corner. Todd and I finally decided to put you two together. It was perfect, or would have been, had you let well enough alone."
That was it. I'd had it. I jumped up off the couch and turned to face my friend. "Let well enough alone?" I yelled, my voice getting louder with every word. "I sat there for a month pouring my heart out to this guy and never once got anything in return except a shoulder presented to me to cry on. Please forgive me for wanting to give something back and maybe get a little in return."
"Todd should never have told you all of that. James didn't want you to know that yet."
I rolled my eyes. "Exactly when was he going to tell me anything really deep about himself? Tomorrow? Next week? When we'd been married thirty years? When?"
"Look Dave, we all go through things, but they affect us differently. James has been through stuff that he hasn't resolved for himself, and he doesn't feel comfortable enough with you yet."
I shook my head. "Relationships are give and take, Barry. You should know that."
"Yes, I know," he acknowledged. "But you also have to give space, Dave. James likes you, and he likes being with you. He was happy with that. Eventually he would have gotten to the point where he would have felt the time was right."
I took a deep breath. I looked Barry in the eyes, and asked, "How do you know how he reacted, anyway? Have you talked to him? Has Todd?"
Barry looked down for a minute. "No, I haven't. Neither has Todd. I just figured that he wouldn't react well to being confronted. Todd told me you ran out all excited and I figured you went over there, all flushed and exuberant, and it really rubbed James the wrong way."
I sat back down on the couch and stared at my shoes. "Do you think I've really fucked it up?"
Barry chuckled. "I seriously doubt it. James is too easygoing at heart to stay mad, and you are too obsessive to let this go."
"I'm obsessive, huh? Need I remind you of the time you wanted to get Todd a `special present' for your anniversary?" I asked, with a big grin starting to form despite my down state of mind.
"Ugh," Barry groaned. "Don't even remind me of that. I don't even want to think of that little old lady."
I broke out into laughter. Barry smiled at me. "Seriously, Dave, don't worry. It will blow over in time."
I nodded. "Okay, I think I am going to go to bed. Thanks for coming over."
"No problem. I'll see myself out."
A week passed. For the first three days, I was content to go through my routine and not worry about my relationship with James and let things go. By the fourth day after our fight, I was starting to get a little worried. I had heard nothing at all from him, and so I decided to call. I got his machine, so I left a message. Then the next day, nothing. I called again, left another message. Next day, same result. So Friday night, I got fed up with sitting in my apartment all night waiting for him to call. I got dressed and went out.
I decided I was going to go to this bar called Fling, but I was going to drop by the bar to see my friends before I went. When I went out, I always stopped there first, out of courtesy. I walked in and immediately noticed Todd behind the bar. His usual fan club was there, but somewhat dispersed because the crowd destroyer known as Barry was sitting right in front of him. I walked up to the bar. "Hey guys. Anything good going on tonight?"
Todd grinned. "Well, well, so he lives! I was beginning to wonder if you would ever emerge into the daylight again."
I smiled at Todd and looked at Barry. "Well, I figured if I stayed locked up any longer, somebody would decide to butt in again and then I would end up with green hair or something."
Barry slugged me in the shoulder. "Don't start with me, buddy boy. It's been a bad day."
We sat there talking for a while, dividing our time between Barry's bitch of a case and laughing at Todd trying to avoid this one dude who was flirting like crazy. Then over Barry's shoulder, I saw James walking in, as beautiful as ever.
Barry noticed my sharp intake of breath and turned to follow my gaze. James looked at me for a second, then walked over to a table. Barry jabbed me in the ribs. "Go talk to him," he whispered.
I walked over to James' table. "Hey," I said quietly.
He looked up. "Hey."
I shuffled my feet a bit, then asked, "May I sit down?"
James gestured to a chair. "It's a free country," he said.
We sat there, staring at each other for what seemed like hours. The silence hovered like a cloud over us, and I honestly thought it was pushing me into the chair. Maybe it was the vodka I had been drinking before; I didn't know for sure. All I knew was that I had about a million words in my head that I wanted to tell him, and I couldn't force my mouth to say them.
Finally, I managed to choke something out. "I'm sorry, you know?"
James nodded. "Yeah, I know. It isn't a big deal."
I frowned. "Yeah, it is a big deal. I didn't know I was going somewhere that tricky." I would have if you had told me something, I thought.
"Well, it's done. We can't do anything about it now."
I was starting to get a little heated again. "James, what is it? You're closed up, man. Talk to me."
James raised his head and looked me in the eyes. "What do you want me to say?"
I was getting desperate. "Something. Anything. Tell me the latest weather forecast. Anything, just don't shut me out anymore," I pleaded.
James swallowed. "Look Dave, it's not that. It's just I don't want to tread on this right now. Not yet."
My mouth was grimly set. "All right, then. When?"
James looked around the room, then back at me. "I don't know, Dave. Sooner. Later. I don't know. I don't even know how I feel right now. Sometimes I can understand how you felt and why you did what you did, but other times I feel like my guts were ripped out. I have to figure this out."
Damn, I thought. I totally missed how much I had affected him. "I just want to help, James."
He looked me right in the eyes. "You really want to help, Dave?"
I nodded.
"Then stop pushing me. Let it come out on its own." With that he got up and walked out of the bar. I looked over at Todd and Barry. They had expressions of concern and worry. I was just that much more confused. I still was unclear where all of this was coming from despite Todd's revelations, but I was starting to understand his defensiveness. I guess I was having a hard time reconciling the light, carefree young man I met with the heavy-hearted man I just saw.
I was lying on my bed, tossing around in a fitful attempt to sleep. Finally I sat up. Sleep hadn't come easily in the time since James and I had our argument. I walked into the bathroom to get some water. As I gulped it down, I heard a light knock at the door. I checked the clock. Who on earth would it be at this hour, I thought, noticing it read 1:30 AM.
I pulled on a pair of pants and walked to the door. I opened it, and my breath caught. There stood James, wet from the rain that had started about the time I went to bed, and beautiful as ever. I stood back and motioned him in. He stood and looked at the room for a minute, then he turned to me. We stared at each other for a minute, then James walked up to me and kissed me. Not a gentle kiss, which was his usual style, but a hard, passionate kiss. The kiss was full of hunger and emotion. I returned it eagerly, and soon we were stripping ourselves of our clothes.
Right there in the front hallway of my apartment, without paying any heed to the noise we were making and whether the neighbors or my roommate could hear, we started making love. I ran my tongue all over his soft neck and then I latched my lips onto the spot right where it joined his shoulder. I sucked hard, and James let out a loud moan. It would leave a hickey, but we were too far gone to think about it.
I kissed my way down his chest and sucked hard on each his nipples, getting even more turned on by the little whimpers and cries coming from his throat. Then I went straight for his cock, his beautiful cock. He had a thick, huge dick that I sucked right into my mouth, hard. James' back arched off the floor and he cried out in pleasure. I deep throated him a few times before licking further down to his tight pucker. He tasted clean and sweet, and soon I was tongue fucking him with all the effort I had.
James pushed me off and he leaned over me, sweaty and panting. He didn't even try any preliminaries, but went straight for my hard 7 incher. I don't think I've ever been that hard in my life. James was slobbering all over my meat, taking it in his throat, licking all over. Finally I couldn't take any more and I picked him up and shoved him against the wall. I milked my cock, generating some precum that I rubbed over his hole, making him moan louder. His hard prick was leaving wet tracks all over the wall from where the wet head touched as his hips gyrated in his horny pleasure. I licked some fingers and stretched him out, then without any warning I shoved my prick right in his tight heat.
James cried out in lust as I launched right into a hard driving fuck. We were like two rutting animals, writhing and lurching against each other in our need. Every bit of pent-up feeling was let out as we coupled right there against the wall. Soon, James'' whimpers turned into loud moans and cries. Then he arched his back and went rigid and blasted a huge load all over the wall. Shortly after that I shot a tremendous load in his tight ass.
We collapsed to the floor in utter exhaustion. I couldn't believe the intensity of it, and I was still panting. I ran a hand through the sweat on my chest, wondering why it was so sticky and thick. I also heard a peculiar buzzing.
My eyes opened wide and I sat straight up in bed. I looked over at my alarm clock which was furiously buzzing away. I shut it off and looked down at myself. My chest was covered in cum and the sheets were sticking to me. I shook my head. That was the fourth time this week that I had woke up after having some kind of sex dream about James. Ever since that night in the bar, I had dreamed about him, but the dreams were getting more and more erotic. I got out of bed and wadded up the sheets. Damn, I was out of clean sheets. Laundry time was coming early this week, I thought as I walked into the shower.
After I was clean, I dressed and walked into the kitchen to eat my breakfast, which consisted of Froot Loops and toast. I glanced at the calendar, noticing that I had five days before my first TA meeting of the semester. Jeez, I thought. The summer has flown by.
I looked at the calendar again. Five days. Five days before my life would become about a hundred times busier and about a thousand times more complicated. That first TA meeting was just the start. The week after that we would be gearing up for the start of the semester, then classes would start. I knew James had a teaching assistantship as well, and he would be equally busy.
I was starting to feel a little bit panicked. James and I were still on the rocks and once classes started, it would be all but impossible to get back on track, since I was a TA for two classes and also finishing up my thesis. I made a resolution then and there that I would find some way to get the situation fixed before that first meeting.
As I sat there, determinedly shoveling cereal in my mouth, my roommate walked in. Matt and I were in different programs. I was in history; he was in political science. We met when the department of social sciences had a group TA meeting during the summer before we started grad school and had a mutual love of music and so we decided to room together. We had lived together for three years now. Matt was straight and had a steady girlfriend, but he knew I was gay and we got along really well. Other than Barry and Todd, he was my best friend.
Matt just stood there, watching me eat. Finally it got on my nerves and I looked at him. "What?" I asked along a mouthful of cereal.
Matt shook his head. "Just amazed, dude. You're packing cereal away like a squirrel packs nuts. What's got you so tense?"
I thought about it as I chewed, then I realized something. I must have looked pretty ridiculous the way I was shoveling the Froot Loops into my mouth. I laughed, and replied, "Just trying to get my food eaten before you stalked your skinny pale ass in here."
Matt just stared. Sometimes, the boy had a worse sense of humor than even me. "What the hell are you talking about?"
I thought about making a reference to the fact that he was only wearing a pair of gray boxer-briefs and I was avoiding nauseating sights, but decided to let the poor boy be. He hadn't had his coffee yet. Matt completely ignored me and went over and poured some coffee in an outrageously huge coffee mug. I shook my head. "Matt, when are you going to realize that drinking coffee like that doesn't help you at all?"
He just looked at me over his cup. Coherent thought wasn't quite there yet. "Huh?" he grunted.
I grinned. "IVs work much better."
He rolled his eyes and took a big gulp. I could see the caffeine had hit his brain when his eyes had cleared their fog and he sat up straight. "So what's going on? Why are you being the human cereal shovel?"
I groaned. "Your humor sucks in the morning. Drink some more coffee."
"Fuck you."
"You wish," I laughed. I got up to clean out my cereal bowl. "Actually, I am determined this morning."
"To do what?"
"I am going to fix this thing with James before the semester starts."
He looked up. "You know, sometimes you have a real obsessive side, Dave."
I sat back down. "Yeah, I know," I replied. "But I just can't sit and relax until this is fixed." I looked at my roommate. "Matt, he's the one, I'm sure of it."
Matt sighed and thinned his lips in thought. "Yeah, that may be," he began. "But if you want my opinion..."
"Which I do," I broke in.
"Well, I think you should leave well enough alone. If James wants to be with you, then he will be." With that, Matt let out a huge yawn, scratched his balls, and stood up. "One thing is true here. You've been a totally different person since this thing started with you two, and it's been nice to see. I think a little more of the Dave on the inside has been coming through your shell." Matt yawned again. "Now I'm going back to bed."
A few hours later, I found myself sitting in a park looking over the lake. There were people boating, eating picnics, and the occasional couple necking in the grass. It made my heart hurt watching it. Things had been going so well, and I had fucked it all up. I wallowed in my self-pity for about another hour before I felt the coolness of a shadow. I looked up.
I know, this will sound like the biggest crock of clichéd shit ever, but the sight of a shirtless James with the sun behind him was like seeing a haloed angel. I think my mouth must have opened five times before I finally croaked out a "hello." At least I think it was hello. My mind wasn't working too well, so it might have been anything that started with the letter "h."
He smiled a little smile. "Hey," he replied.
I looked back down at the ground and didn't say or do anything. What was wrong with me? Twenty seconds earlier I had been berating myself for letting something destroy my budding relationship with James, and now I felt this huge upwelling of pride. Was I really going to just sit there and let everything pass me by just because I was proud? God, I am so weak.
James shifted uncomfortably for a minute. It's a rare sight to see James Kennedy uncomfortable; he could seem at ease in a room full of nitro-glycerine during an earthquake. Finally he mumbled, "Mind if I sit?"
I gestured at the ground next to me. He eased himself down, and I noticed his roller blades. "So, been out blading, huh?" I asked. God, how much more inane can I get? Am I going to comment about the weather, too?
James nodded, and got this incredibly cute smile on his face. "Yeah, I figured I wouldn't have much time soon."
I nodded in silent agreement. "Anything good been going on?"
James shook his head. "Nah, nothing major."
We sat in total silence for about two minutes while acid ate a hole in my stomach. Why couldn't I bring myself to say something? Then, James finally made the first move. He turned to face me, and asked in his cute, boyish way, "Miss me?"
I looked at him. He had this hopeful look on his face that made me melt inside. I felt a wall break, and I burst into tears. Jeez, how weak have I become? I spent my whole life building a wall that nobody could get in, and then this yahoo comes in and breaches it in one night. Now it seems like all he has to do is snap his fingers and another piece comes down, like the Berlin Wall in 1989.
This time, though, there was no reassuring hug. He just sat there and watched me cry. Looking back, that was the right thing to do. I got it out of my system, and finally managed a smile. "Guess that answers your question, huh?"
James grinned. "Sort of."
I sighed and stared back at the ground again. "You know James, I really need to apologize to you for what I did."
He put his hand on my shoulder. "No, Dave, you don't. It took me a while, but the reasons why you did what you did finally sunk in. It wasnt a breach of trust I was angry about, far from it. I guess there really wasnt one. You were right. After all that you had shared with me, I guess you had a right to know something about me."
"No, don't say that," I said. "I should have been patient."
He smiled. "Well, it does go far beyond what we argued about." He took a deep breath and looked up into the azure sky. "I spent all my time breaking you down and trying to get to the real you behind all the walls, because I could see that person in your eyes. But there was another reason.
"I have always kind of been the type to help people, to be a Mr. Fix-it... mainly because it allows me to forget about my own problems, if only for a while. You know what I mean?" I nodded, and he went on. "I met you, and I became so immersed in helping you break down your barriers, and it pushed all the nasty stuff that kept coming back up for me out of my head. But you know what? It always comes back, Dave. It always comes back..." His voice trailed off, and he started in silence at some ducks on the edge of the lake.
I sat and let him think. I knew in my heart that this was critical. He needed to have his moment, on his own terms, and I just needed to sit back and listen for once. He looked at me and stared hard into my eyes. "Every time it goes away, I feel free for just a short time. But when it comes back, it hits even harder, and it's like it's all happening all over again, and I get really angry."
He made his way up to his feet. I stood next to him and we both looked at each other for a minute. "Dave would you come over to my place for dinner tonight?" he mumbled. "We need to talk about some stuff."
I touched his arm. "You bet," I replied.
I don't think I have ever been so nervous in my life as I was that night as I was dressing for dinner. Matt and his girlfriend Laura were sitting on the couch watching me get manic as my nerves got more jangled. As I ran to my room to change my shirt for the fifth time, they both dissolved into hysterics. I stopped and fixed an accusing glare on them. "You two are making fun of my misery."
They both nodded and wiped tears from their faces. I couldn't help it, and I started laughing too. "Damn, I must be a sight," I said. They nodded again, choking and hiccuping, which made us all laugh harder.
"You know, Dave, this doesn't have to be perfect," Laura said between giggles.
That sobered me up again. "Yeah, it does, Laura. This is a make-or-break night, for me anyway."
Matt and Laura just smiled. Matt followed me into my bedroom where I did a final hair check. He shut the door. "Man, just relax. Everything is going to be fine," he said.
"I hope so," I said, spraying on some cologne.
Matt put his hand on my shoulder. "Everything will be fine, man. Just wait and see," he repeated. Then he walked out. I went over to my bed and sat down, and just breathed for a minute. They were right, I just needed to sit and be for a minute and stop running around like a madman. About ten minutes later I stood up, took a deep breath, and walked out. Matt and Laura were not to be seen, but there were moans and giggles coming from Matt's room. I smiled. Maybe it's an omen, I thought. I walked out the door and began the trip to James' apartment, feeling simultaneously anxious and hopeful.
End of Part IV