Fuck, thought Jason. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. FUCK. It was two hours later. Jason was inconsolably playing basketball in the gym, trying to sink double-pointers but missing half of them because his mind was miles away from ordinary. School had ended and he was alone, again.
The cops had wanted to know everything that had happened from the moment Jason first saw Fredo to the moment when Officer Turnbull had stepped onto the scene and found a man lying facedown in a high school hallway, bound with gym shorts. They'd wanted to take Jason to the hospital and check for possible broken ribs or lung damage, but once he'd gotten his wind back he had felt perfectly fine. The bleeding had been abated by the school nurse, after which Jason was issued a scratchy old striped flannel shirt from the school lost and found and sent to the school psychiatrist to see if he wanted to talk about anything. He'd pleasantly declined, and then stoically left. Class had been over and the school empty for almost an hour; it was well after 4 o'clock. They hadn't been able to find Fredo. So Jason, bored, alone, and aching slightly, had gone to the gym to work out his aggression on the basketball court, and though he didn't want to admit it he also wanted to run the chance of running into a friend he could talk to. No one was there; Sean wasn't there. He'd missed everyone. The events of the weekend had paled like the sky when he compared them to the events of the day, and Jason decided that the whole world was going a little too crazy for him. New feelings were jumping out of him lately, something that had very little to do with his head, but a lot with his heart and his penis. He didn't know if he liked it, although some of them were very nice . . . he resolutely cut off that train of thought and fully intended to spend some quality time on the bench press, or at McDonald's, or playing video games with his buddies, but didn't really have the energy. As it was, he just decided to work it out on his own.
He was in a pair of gym shorts he found in the locker room, but hadn't found anything to fit his broad shoulders without being uncomfortably tight, and so went without. Running around the gym with the golden light of the fading day shining in the clerestory windows of the two-floored court, he was feebly bouncing the basketball off the backboard and sinking almost nothing. His lean and tawny upper half was shimmering slightly with the sweat from his exertion, and as he ran and dribbled, and jumped to dunk a shot, his short, downy brown chest hairs began sticking to his body. His thick brown hair hung over his forehead still, but he did nothing to push it back as the light from the sunset cut through the breezy gym and highlighted his handsome square face and body with gold.
After an hour, he threw a particularly bad shot and watched it run around the rim of the basket before flying off across the gym. He was too tired to get it, and just stood there with hands on hips, swearing at the fucking ball for all it was worth, panting and sweating in the growing darkness. "Fuck," he said, "you fucker. Fuck you. Fuck you for not doing what you're supposed to; fuck you for not going in; fuck you for not working out! You goddamn fucking ball –" A noise interrupted his mounting tirade and came out of the storey-tall stack of bleachers behind him. Jason stopped in mid-cuss and turned around, wiping his stubbly square face. "Hello?"
"Hey." The voice was familiar and deep, but timid today. The familiar blonde hair, the familiar tan, the familiar tall defined build; Sean was sitting there. Without realizing, Jason straightened up and rubbed his chest, looking both embarrassed and relieved. They smiled at each other.
William Renault Montgomery was starting to get hungry. The pains in his stomach were an alien sensation, and he wasn't too comfortable with the stinging in his esophagus that came every time he went a few days without food. It's funny, he thought, I remember, back when I was . . . well . . . alive, I suppose . . . if I didn't eat, I would become weak. All I become now . . . is hungry. I supposed some qualities have returned in spades, and some will take a while. Or perhaps I'm not really . . . well, alive . . . right now. He had found lately that he was prone to this sort of thinking, although speculating about his current state frightened him. The courageous man was scared that the extent of his condition might be more than he could handle.
But whatever his disabilities were, they didn't extend to his reserves of strength, which seemed supernaturally endless. He'd now been walking along the disused tracks for the majority of the afternoon, and had just come around a bend on an old bridge that spanned a particularly narrow pass between two ancient grain elevators, and smiled as he saw exactly what he was hoping for.
He was on the edge of a huge peninsula that extended into the frigid waters of Lake Erie; this was the connection that South Buffalo had made with the great shipping tracts to the East and the West, and the entire leg of land was encrusted with ancient grain elevators, factories, brick piers, foundations, slips, inlets, and the mouth of the Buffalo river, which ran like a maze through the south of the great city and offered numerous other industries access to the waters of the lake. It had been these factories that had made men, all kinds of men, very rich about a century before, and as William looked at each one he found his memory was being gradually jarred by the faded painted names on the brick remains of the industrial waste. He hadn't ever heard the term "rust belt," but if he had he would have known immediately what it meant; this entire area; this entire peninsula, was almost entirely devoid of human activity, and completely devoid of industry.
His friends, or at least the people he had known, were all long dead and so were their legacies.
But the peninsula served another purpose too; it formed the northern border of the huge bowl shaped bay that stretched about 10 miles from the industrial southern region of Buffalo. The relatively flat land of the area was uncharacteristically surrounded by a series of low hills that bordered the water and shielded it from the elements; that protection made the apex of the curve of the bay the perfect place for a small city. In William's time, Cape City had been nothing more than a fortified carriage stop with a few hotels and a few good bars on the water; there was a park there where he and Jeremy had gone once to speculate on some land, although they'd later bought a tract much, much lower; below Cape City and on the outskirts of the southern edge of the bay. Now William saw that the edge of the bay was completely built up; there was hardly a spot on the center of the curve that wasn't encrusted with houses and businesses, and even up on the hills there were little patches of clearings with huge houses overlooking the city and down onto the water. Cape City had grown up, and William was astonished.
He began walking again, slowly; enjoying the uninterrupted view that he had up on the tracks, out on the peninsula. Although, he realized, he was walking slowly for another reason; it wasn't too much farther to the point where the trees became thick and the tracks started ascending the slope of one of the low hills while running perilously close to the water's edge. That was the point that William, though he'd already revisited, didn't want to see. In his mind's eye William was still picturing the life behind him, in the bustling factories of old, and the sleepy little pit stop of Cape City barely a speck on the forested beach of Lake Erie. And in between the two; just beyond the southern border of Buffalo and just over the hill and out of sight of the factories, was where that high jutting point was; the place where Jeremy had committed suicide.
William was walking less jauntily now, and he was not singing. The sky was darkening more with clouds and his view of the wide bay was getting hazier and hazier as he gradually fought the hard route and followed the curve of the peninsula back behind the built up bustle of the city, and beyond that were elevated railroads tracks, and beyond that grey strips of bizarre road elevated in the air, and beyond that the low forested hills on the other side of the Buffalo river.
The man still had a lot of walking to do to reach the only place in Buffalo that he knew to associate with Jeremy. Once I get there, he decided, maybe Ill go on though. Jeremy always did like the Cape . . . maybe he'll be there. Maybe Ill see what happened to my land. I do not, after all, have much need to return to my home. William took a deep breath, straightened his long coat, and resumed the arduous walk on the uneven, missing tracks.
"Dude!" Jason couldn't help himself, it suddenly occurred to him to be ashamed, but that was beat out by his extreme, extreme pleasure. "Sean! Where've you been, man?!"
"Eh, around." They sat in silence for a moment, and Jason suddenly felt that he was smiling too much. Sean was being quiet, and serious, and seemed a little nervous.
"I was gonna –"
"Actually, I was with –"
The two young men stopped talking at the same time. They looked at each other for another moment until Jason's smile really did fade, and he wiped his face again and then gestured to Sean.
"Oh," Sean started, "well . . . I been around all day. Kinda hanging out with some people." He nervously stopped and wrung his hands.
"Oh yeah," Jason probed, looking curious.
"Yeah . . . well . . . I kinda been with someone all day. Someone that really wants to talk to you . . . and they . . . well, uh –" Sean stammered over a few words, and then took a deep breath. He's really, really fucking nervous, Jason realized. Who's someone that wants to be with me? Oh fuck, Jason futilely thought, nervously looking Sean right in the face, please let it be you. Jason started – he didn't know why he thought that, but more than that, he was scared and a little grossed out that it tugged at his cock to have such an intensely sexual thought. Especially after what had just happened during the weekend.
Sean did nothing but blink once, and then looked away from Jason as he composed his thoughts. Sean looked very odd for a second, like he'd just realized something, but apparently shook it off and when Sean looked back at Jason he just looked a little more confused, and more nervous than ever.
"Hey – dude, Jase – um . . ." Sean started, stammering and looking at his feet.
"Yeah," Jason said, absentmindedly scratching his chest.
"Uh – hey look, maybe that can wait. Um – you wanna play some horse or something?" Jason was a little taken aback, but nodded after a second. "Okay," Sean said, "cool." He spoke with the nervous finality of someone that had just weaseled out of saying something difficult, and as Jason jogged across the gym to retrieve his bastard ball, Sean dropped his backpack and stepped down the bleachers to the maple floor. He pulled off his polo shirt and his white undershirt came mostly with it, giving Jason a glimpse of the incredibly well defined stomach and chest, and the strong line of hair that ran up the center of Sean's flat stomach until it stopped and branched out around the base of his round pectorals. Sean threw the polo up on his stuff and pulled the whit tee shirt back down, then waited for Jason to get all the way back over.
"So man, what you been up to today," Jason said, taking the ball and wheeling away from Sean, running and throwing at the basket. He almost scored. Sean caught on, and with one of his old characteristic grins, ran up and grabbed the rebound out from under Jason's waiting arm.
"Told ya. Hung out all day," Sean said, blocking Jason at the two point line and then spinning and shooting a smooth, controlled shot that went seamlessly through the hoop. "Nothing much. You?" Jason waited for the ball and then stood calmly at the three point line.
"The same. School. Dude – you know Mr. Broad? The music teacher? He got fucking taken away in a cop car," Jason made his move and ducked under Sean's outstretched arm, dribbled the ball under the basket and lost control at the last second. He went and grabbed it then shot it to Sean. "He almost took out a student."
"Oh really," Sean asked, inquisitive. He planted his feet and judged the distance between him and the backboard. "Who?"
"Fredo Richiazzi."
"What!?" The ball flew off to the side and bounced away out of bounds. Jason, hands on hips, was staring incredulously at the slighter man. "Dude that's insane," Sean exclaimed.
"Yeah," Jason said, "yeah it is. You . . . you know him or something?" Sean kinda looked nervous again.
"No," he said, "not from anything besides, well . . . you know . . . this weekend." Jason flinched a little.
"Oh, yeah. Right." There was a pause.
"So I mean to –"
"I wanted to ask –" The two guys interrupted each other again and stopped talking. They looked each other in the face and this time, Jason was the nervous one.
"Dude," Jason started, "I'm so fucking sorry. I . . . I don't know what happened at the party." Sean looked vindicated for a second, but then he looked Jason in the face again and it evaporated.
"No dude," Sean said, "I don't think you understand. There's some crazy shit going on, and you don't get it, cause I haven't told you. See, what you need to know is that –"
A thought popped desperately and uncontrollably into Jason's head, and that was, you like me!
"Dude, what," Sean asked.
"What?"
"Oh," Sean said, "I guess . . . oh. Sorry. I thought you said something. But, no, shit, no, what you need to know is that there's someone that likes you. A lot."
Yeah, thought Jason, fucking Fredo Richiazzi. Jason sneered at the thought and then looked back at Sean, happened to catch his eye, and Sean had another moment in which he looked very odd.
"You don't," Sean started nervously, "you don't think its, like, Fredo or anything . . . do you?" Jason looked slightly taken aback, having just been thinking that.
"Um, no . . . I mean . . . what, that little fag," Jason asked, turning slowly on the thought and chasing the ball. His ears were straining for the response though.
"Well . . . yeah, kinda," said Sean, "I mean, I did just mention him . . . and you just thought about it . . . well, I mean, it kinda seemed like you just thought about it. I guess." Jason got the ball, turned, and walked back to the center court, giving Sean the eye. What did he mean, Jason had just been thinking about it? Weird shit was happening, Jason realized, and he didn't like it at all. It seemed like the more things he thought, the more things came true. Jason continued, "But no, man; its not Fredo. Look, there's someone that's really kinda hung up on you, and I kinda spent all day with them. With him. He just kinda needs to know if . . . if it could work out – dude, you got to realize there's some shit going around school about you, and before this guy comes up to ya, he and I both decided that you and I should . . . talk. Whaddya say?" Sean, despite his typical reckless masculine air, looked oddly endearing and had nothing but complete honesty beaming from his open eyes. It was clear he was nervous as hell; wringing his hands and standing much too duck-footed for a high school soccer star.
Jason suddenly realized with a hot rushing feeling what was going on. The memories of earlier rang in his head alongside the echo of that asshole that called him "FAG" in the hallway . . . they mingled with the all-too-present embarrassment of the party that came sweeping back into his stomach, and the whole mess suddenly culminated with tiny pricks of tears that Jason mentally slapped himself for, and blinked back. Everyone thought . . . everyone thought . . . everyone must think he was . . . what?! Jason felt so ashamed, and that amplified as he thought of Meghan bawling her eyes out in the hallway, and the rush of attraction he suddenly had for the handsome frame of this compassionate man standing in front of him. Jason felt like he wanted to just go to Sean and hug him, and cry on his shoulder, and yet Jason felt like that would be confirming the worst.
"Talk about . . . about what," Jason asked, turning and shooting a basket.
"Just . . . about . . . shit. You know," came the shaky reply from behind him. The ball totally missed the hoop and bounced off the backboard and away into the dusty distance of the gym. "I mean, you never talk about . . . anything . . . even when we were little. And after Saturday night . . . I just really think there might be more to you than I bthought." Jason put his head down, at a loss for a response, and just watched the ball out the tops of his eyes as it rolled to a stop. "Dude," Sean continued, "you keep a lot inside, and . . . and . . . and maybe you shouldn't. Maybe you – you know – don't have to. Cause maybe there's someone that would understand, I mean really get it, and maybe . . . maybe you could be happy with them. With, um . . . with him. You know?"
Jason blinked, and then looked up again. He was listening to this uncharacteristically small, nervous voice from behind him, but knew it came from a big strong blonde man. Realizing that these sweet, helpful words were coming from such an old buddy; such a competitive guy, touched Jason, deeply, on the part of his heart that sometimes felt almost too alone to stand it. But what is he talking about, Jason wondered, aware his eyes were damp. Jason opened his eyes with the sudden shock of recognition, and let the restrained tears make two jagged paths down the brown of his square face. Jason turned.
You, he thought imploringly, but unable to speak. The other man had taken a few steps forward while Jason was turned, and now they looked each other in the eyes. Is it you, Jason asked himself again.
Sean once again got that look as though he'd been struck with a thought, and then blinked, looked down, and looked back at Jason with an awkward expression.
"Sorry, did you say something?"
"No," said Jason reticently. Coming that close to voicing what he was thinking was a coming a little bit too close to the truth – wait, what was the truth? Maybe the whole thing is a mistake, Jason suddenly thought, maybe this is just me wanting something too much, and trying to make it happen. What the fuck ever happened to stay low – don't talk?? Jason started wordlessly stammering; shaking without moving. The way the light was illuminating Sean's handsome, concerned face; the way he was poised to get completely involved; the way the white undershirt caught under the developed edges of his pecs was all too much for Jason, and the tears came again. Despite his valiant tries to beat them away again, they slid fast and wet down his cheeks and Jason had to rub them off with the back of his hand as he backed away from Sean; from the whole situation.
"Dude? Jase? Come on, man, it's okay. It's okay – don't run – you always run – what's up? What do you need?" Sean said it all so imploringly, with his hands outstretched to catch the bigger man, that Jason finally let it go. Let it all go, just go. He gave up the pretense, he gave up the façade. The tears came thick and fast now; pouring down his tense face unabated and unwiped, and Jason finally, finally let himself go and gave into the urge that he'd felt; that he'd known about; that he'd recognized but not defined until this very moment – since the first day that Sean had become his friend and a beacon of hope that his family life had never proffered.
Wordlessly, Jason slid forward, eyeing Sean. They grew closer and closer; Sean's outstretched hands first catching Jason's arm, then shoulder, and then as Jason pressed forward to satisfy his most immediate need, Sean wrapped his arms around the bigger man and felt Jason's soft thick hair settle into place on his shoulder. After a moment, the throbbing tugs in Jason's defined abs let Sean know that he was giving away the sadness that had haunted his every move for his whole life; releasing it in tears that had never been allowed to flow.
Good, Sean thought, I guess he needs it. But he still doesn't know the whole story. Sean, completely unfamiliar with the psychology of tears and all too familiar with his own masculine hang-ups about such displays, took it all very compassionately, but stoically. Although after not too long began to feel a tug in his own stomach, and as some thoughts from his own past came floating into his head, started to tear up himself. He couldn't help but think of the way that he'd somehow grown into the robust young man that he was now from a scared and meager child, who spent too much time trying to be impressive and flashy; all for the attention of a father that was too manly to connect and a brother that had died too young . . . Sean somehow had always had the sense that his own life had been much fuller than Jason's, but where it had been empty it had been empty in the same size and shape. Both of them were missing the people they needed the most. He clutched Jason's back and suddenly felt sobs begin to well up in his throat because it was just too much to handle; what he suddenly realized was the bond between them; what he'd suddenly somehow learned from his best friend. Suddenly aware of their similarity, Sean roughly clutched the hard brown line of Jason's muscular back and cried onto the larger man's tawny shoulder.
The two men stood like that, just holding each other, just embracing, just feeling safe and warm, for some amount of time. Jason's tears came for some time; he simply let them slide down his own face and make tracks through his stubble; let them drip off his brown cleft chin. There was no noise aside from their deep, slow breathing; there was no wailing or crying now; these weren't tears of agony, but tears of regret. Sean could smell the faint whiff of sweat on Jason, and Jason knew that Sean was wearing some aftershave that didn't smell half as nice as the natural freshness of the blonde hair that his face was buried in. They were just standing, just comforting, just being there for one another, and Jason couldn't help but think that in spite of all the things he bad things he was, and good things he wasn't and would go back to being once this moment was over; he still, suddenly, inexplicably, felt removed from that damaged cycle and was very whole, and happy, and felt a little bit . . . a very little bit . . . like he needed Sean in a more permanent way in his heart and in his life.
Their tears came and went in silent waves, but it didn't matter for they each wanted nothing more but to let the other get it all out. Jason finally realized that he was rubbing Sean's back slowly and Sean was doing the same.
He felt vaguely bitter with the knowledge that no one really knew him, or how his life really was. But the majority of that hurt had been wiped away now; issued through the tears that still wet Sean's warm hair, and replaced with the warm, stingingly new sensation of togetherness that coursed through his embrace with Sean's warm, firm body. Another sob started to rack the blonde man, and Jason couldn't help but hold him tighter, arms squeezed around Sean's back; hand in his hair, and think: Don't, please don't – we're okay – we're okay now. Sean cried on; grabbing; reaching; thrusting; throbbing against Jason's forms with the intensity of the sobs that coursed through his narrower frame, and Jason thought that he could vaguely hear, as he squeezed his eyes and concentrated, the vaguest echo of Sean's voice asking Are we okay now? in his head.
Jason grabbed Sean for all he was worth, because it was the two of them now – it was the two of them bonded forever by the similarity of their minds and the strength of their mutual need. They sank to the floor, clutching each other, tortured and comforted, by all the strength and fury of their situation.
Fredo Richiazzi was, as usual, in a foul mood. Humiliated, dirty, completely unable to figure out what the fuck was going on, he was still even feeling the discomfort of the semen that dried all over his underwear. He was sitting disconsolately in the corner of the hot whitewashed room that he shared with his brother; arduously deciphering cramped black writing in a book he was careful to keep completely hidden under a blanket on his bed.
Nothing had gone right that day. He had pored over the book since that night he got it back to the apartment; late; soaked; and exhilarated. The same night he killed that old asshole that didn't know – couldn't know how much Fredo needed this. Fredo had asked his mother for some of the harder words, but everything else he had worked out on his own in the dead of night or the rare times when Tony was at the factory in mid-afternoon. Besides – it apparently didn't matter if Fredo knew what the words meant so long as he spoke them correctly and felt the passion that it took to ignite them into reality. But what he'd spoken hadn't worked – it hadn't worked at all. All three times he'd tried to make something happen, something had gotten in the way. Actually, Fredo thought, someone had gotten in the way. Or at least, someone kept looking over – I guess that matters with this stuff. Dammit.
The skinny young man put down the book for a second and looked outside the small square window. It looked out against the peeling clapboard wall of the adjacent house, and was so close that he could've touched the neighbor's wall if he'd wanted. The only way to see daylight or any kind of view was to stick his head completely out the small window and then look down the crevice between the two buildings, and then, Fredo knew, there was a two foot sliver of light, and warmth, and let you see the low, disheveled, and condemned brick community center across Rte 5. Fredo's room was, in all ways, a claustrophobic place to be. He blinked as he pondered that and considered the grey clapboards that obstructed his view of the world. He blinked as he considered the grey walls of hatred and abuse that obstructed his view of the world. He blinked as he considered the solution to both those problems, and the fact that it was right here, under his blanket, and it was powerful but unreliable, and he still didn't have much of a technique at it.
But there must still be something, he thought. I don't know what that first thing did to Jason . . . but people started doing whatever he wanted after it hit him. Fredo remembered how he'd tried to find a spell after that which was a little more appropriate for his situation. Amore, amore, he'd chanted all through lunch, flipping through the book. I need something about amore . . . And finally he'd found it – something that seemed like it would work . . . and apparently misfortune had intervened again, and somehow that had missed Jason completely and gone directly to Mr. Broad somehow. And then the third one . . . Fredo had read the third one off as a child . . . that first and only page he'd ever seen until he'd dug the book up again.
That time when Fredo was small . . . his mother was being beaten, and his father was never anything but angry . . . Fredo looked from the window to the living room door, and remembered. He had been so small, and scared, when he crept back from his parent's closet that night . . . clutching the same book he was hiding now, under his sheets. His young eyes didn't know what to look for, but somehow, he had an instinct that what he needed was on the last page. It was the only page in the book with decorations; crudely drawn knives and daggers underlined the jaggedly drawn words. Disproportionate female forms leaned in from the corners of the pages, and an unmistakable skull was perched ceremoniously on the crown of the first black word. This, Fredo had immediately seen, and knew he would always remember, was a spell of death.
His father had gone a lot more quickly and cleanly than the police officer had – in fact his father had simply stopped moving. In his shame, Fredo had known he would have to rid himself of the book, and that's when he'd hid it carefully but unceremoniously in his father's shallow grave. And when I came back, Fredo pondered, blinking, I must have remember about that last page, because I opened right to it, and used it like Id known it all my life. Maybe I was fucking born to kill . . . But then why, Fredo wanted to know, didn't it work the last time he used it? The very last time, when he was trying to aim it at Mr. Broad, scrambling on the floor, and was distracted by Meghan fucking Williams instead? So what, he thought, is going to happen to her?
Fredo grunted, and went back to searching through the book. He knew somewhere in his mind that he couldn't keep on causing problems like there'd been today . . . and if Jason was controlling people, then who knows what that could lead to – especially if he still hated Fredo so much. Fredo needed to fix that, and soon. Tomorrow, in fact. He needed to get Jason back to normal, and then make him his. That was what needed to happen, and that was what needed to happen before any more teachers started going crazy about any more students in the hallways. And also, Fredo morosely thought (which pleased him), before any more dumb bitches get in the way. She got what she deserved, but fuck her for wasting my concentration. Fredo gave the book another look but realized his mind was wandering too much to really get any work done on it anyway. He chucked it back under his blanket and then lay back with his arms behind his head, deciding to just take a nap for a while. His right hand soon found the band on his sweatpants though, and before long he was moaning for Jason and thinking about the wet, suckling feeling of the handsome guy's mouth, and how all that was only, if everything went right, a day away.
Quickly and deeply, Jason's mouth was probing Sean's with the intense motion and knowledge of a long-time lover. The blonde man was on his back on the gym floor; hard, and smooth, and cool. The two of them were quickly, intensely, silently thrusting back and forth. Both of them were shirtless and shoeless, and Jason's bronzed back gleamed in the dimming light of the oncoming night that shone in through the clerestory windows. Throbbing and erect, the two guys were aching for love, aching for each other, aching to solidify the erotic satisfaction they'd gotten from hugging, and holding, and for once in their lives, understanding. Jason needed a deeper connection, and Sean, confused and slightly shamed at first, had finally given in to his emotions, and lay on his back on his discarded polo shirt, arms behind his head, loving Jason for the moment they were about to experience.
Their shorts came off cleanly and easily; hardly breaking their rhythm, and when Jason reached down and firmly grasped the bands of their boxer-briefs, Sean's intake of breath was the only visible sign. They were together now, writhing, naked, two tan young men in the prime of their life rolling on the floor, laughing and smiling as they kissed and playfully swatted each other; wrestled the other to the ground and then swatted him again; both vying for power; both displaying their competitiveness so gently that it was clear they wanted to win but not at the expense of the other losing. It wasn't a game to win anyway, because winning was an end; this was a game to prolong the moment.
Jason thought of the hundreds of times that they'd changed together and he'd sometimes thought of Sean this way, but never acted on it. And now, as he pinned Sean to the ground, he slid his hand down the virile muscles of the other man's chest which tensed and folded with the electric pleasure of his touch; slid his hand down the flat tan stomach and the line of blonde hairs that broadened just under his navel and surrounded a pleasantly thick, long, and incredibly engorged penis flanked by two medium balls.
Jason, with a brief thought of all the times he'd ever faked it with Meghan – because, he realized, that's what it was, faking it – shut his eyes, and firmly grasped the round member. He let out a low breath that was almost a moan, and just held it, enjoying the sensation of the throbbing and the trust that had been forged between the men. When he opened his eyes and looked down at Sean, their gaze was steady but surprisingly unsure – Jason was slightly afraid, which shone honestly though his brown eyes, and Sean was a little scared – nervous about letting another man do this to him, but too much in love with the man and the sensation to let that matter.
"Baby," Jason started as he suddenly remembered some of these same feelings and details from his night with . . . with . . . whoever that had been, "this won't hurt. It can't. I couldn't hurt you now."
"Jase – I think I love you," Sean said unexpectedly. They stared for a second into each other's eyes, both clearly scared by that outburst, but then realized how familiar and satisfied they felt like this, and let the power of Sean's words take over the abruptness of the moment, and each guy started to feel a pride and an adoration so strong in his chest that it almost hurt. Jason suddenly had the wild sensation to laugh, and cry, and run, and fight, and Sean clearly felt the same. They buried themselves in each other's mouths, and chests, and firm abs, and for a second were a flurry of excitement and fiercely happy men, before Sean relaxed on the ground and pulled Jason down on him, and they both knew they couldn't wait anymore.
It was bizarre, Jason thought, how they'd gotten to be this way in all of . . . a day? A weekend? But, he realized, maybe this had always been there. Maybe this was just what happened when you started to like someone more than you knew, and more than you could express, and more, much more, than you could control. He bared down on Sean enough to hold the man's hips up, and then slowly, slowly, put the head of this throbbing cock at the very center of Sean's red asshole. Sean's nervousness had vanished with the swelling of their contentedness, and afraid or not, all he showed was a love of Jason and an acceptance of his advance. Jason firmly guided his pelvis forward, seeing the lines of his stomach come out with his effort and make a natural contour that disappeared somewhere below his heavy balls. He felt a firm pressure against Sean, but, looking into his accepting eyes, pushed, and finally felt a little give.
Sean drew a sharp breath, and Jason immediately looked down. The slightly narrower man just nodded and grabbed Jason's hand and squeezed it, but clearly wanted Jason to go on. Jason drew his own breath, long and deep, afraid to hurt someone that loved him as much as Sean did, and started to see the angular head of his own thick shaft slip inside Sean's slowly expanding rosebud. After another moment of gentle pushing, Jason felt the familiar feeling of the thickest part of his penis sliding inside Sean's ass, and though he was grabbing Jason's hand and slightly frowning with pain and anticipation, eyes shut, Sean felt the elation of having Jason enter him; hard and warm; ready to do what men were built to do.
Sean loved the way that Jason had his head down, watching the joining of their groins; it let him view straight down the front of Jason's body; the lines of his pecs and abs picked out by the little lines of brown hair. These were muscles that Sean had helped Jason form over some long, rough nights in the weight room, just upstairs. Sometimes they'd talked about sex, sometimes Jason had wondered what Sean looked like and sounded like when he was fucking a girl, and sometimes Sean had wondered if he would compare to his big sexy buddy when he got into the sack – now they were finding out for themselves in a situation that they hadn't ever thought would happen.
Jason was slowly pushing his hips against Sean's, letting out low grunts and moans of exertion, trying to embed his swollen self as deeply in Sean as possible. Finally the slick brown skin of his penis totally disappeared, and their pelvises made contact. Jason simply remained there for a second, letting Sean get used to the sensation. They didn't kiss, or smile, or even open their eyes but rather put their faces together for a moment; Jason felt the smooth firm cheek and short hair under him, and Sean recognized the square jaw and stubble of Jason's hard face. He smelled slightly of dried sweat from his game earlier, but more than that was the sweetness of his thick hair and the musk of his body.
Faces still together, Jason let out another low moan as he gently pulled himself almost entirely out again, and felt Sean trustingly grab his back and hold on. He pushed it back in again, slowly, taking his time, feeling the tight grasp of Sean all the way down from the sensitive head to the swollen base of his stimulated dick. Sean was still grasping his hand and his back, but was more comfortable now, and less nervous. It would take time, he knew, for this to really work, but he somehow trusted Jason to love him, not hurt him. And for the majority of the next hour, all they did was slowly, slowly make love. Jason kept sliding in, and then out, of Sean at a slow, very slow, but steady rate. He was testing the smaller man; freeing him; getting him used to the sensation, and the size, of Jason entering him.
Jason knew that Sean's rigid dick was slowly discharging a trickle of precum that fell onto the lines of his flat, tan stomach and gradually got rubbed into the meager hair on both their abs, and deep within Sean Jason's hard cock was doing the same; slowly lubricating the swollen, eager hole that Jason and Sean were enjoying so much.
Finally, both feeling completely full and toasty warm, Jason started taking slightly faster plunges into Sean. They were still holding hands; still enjoying the sensations with their eyes closed and their lips meeting sporadically in long, savory kisses. But now Sean felt the warm, hard muscles of Jason's chest and arms lengthen, contract and rub his own arms and chest with increasing heat, scent, and speed. He raised his legs and wrapped them around Jason's broad back, which gave the larger man the ability to push his warm hot penis deeper yet into Sean, which gave them both unexpected sensations that they immediately associated with love and each other.
Jason was going at a good rhythm now, meeting the eager pulse that Sean's hips were eagerly responding to him with. Their abs were flexing and their faces contorting with the effort they were putting into getting more and more into this; they sped up and breathed harder and harder, until they were both panting and moaning; needing exactly what they were getting but wanting more. Sean threw his arms down on the ground and clutched at the smooth hardwood floor of the gym; the sensation between his legs; coming and going; coming and going; was filling him up and pleasing him with the constant increasing pressure on his swollen prostate, like masturbating his rock-hard cock from the inside, but also torturing him with the little tweak of pain that came at the apex of every thrust. He took it all; enjoyed it all, and knew that no one but Jason would ever be able to do this for him again.
Jason kept rubbing his body along Sean's; up and down; up and down; and felt the lithe figure of the man below him respond to the all-over touch. Jason's cock was red and large now; fully engorged and contentedly loved by Sean's warm ass. Jason couldn't help the spasms that were shaking through his body; he felt with every stroke like he was going to come inside Sean, all over Sean, all over the floor. But he was simply being tortured with the unending feeling of sex; the constant idea that he was pumping into his lover with all the ferocity and love that he had, and because of that the intense feelings coursing through the entirety of his fantastic cock were making him shudder and moan, and breathe deep every time he rubbed his hard tawny body against the length of Sean's.
The two men were grunting and writhing on the floor. Sean's outstretched arms were grabbing and letting go the shirt on which he lay, and had he not had his eyes squeezed shut in utter concentration, pain, pleasure and warmth, he would have noticed that he eventually wrenched it out from under his back and lay on the floor; enjoying his impromptu love with Jason on the floor of the gym where they already spent too many hours a semester.
Muscles were bulging, faces were contorting, hands were grabbing hands and tan firm chests rubbed together as they accelerated their eager rhythm yet again. Sean managed to open his eyes for a second despite the intense indicative rushes that he was beginning to feel in the base of his balls, and managed to look up at the thick hair and brown face of the man that was fucking him like this. Jason's face was red, and slightly sweaty; Sean's was no better. They still were holding hands; the intensity of their grasp increasing and decreasing with every deep plunge; their other hands were either clutching at the floor or exploring each other's body. Sean felt Jason's hard nipples for a second, before reaching down and grabbing his firm round ass, grabbing it; pulling Jason deeper into his own firm butt.
Sean began to feel his balls cinch up a little, and then let go with the rhythm of Jason's constant pumping. The next cinch was a little stronger, and Sean began to feel the hot tract of liquid burning inside of him. A hot feeling began to bubble in the center of his hugely swollen prostate, which soon spread to his balls, engulfed his flexing stomach, and worked its way up through Sean's contracting body where he was completely unable to keep it from issuing from his mouth in a hot, throaty scream of utter consumption. Sean felt the hot streams of liquid come up the middle of his rock cock and slowly stimulate everything they touched. The middle of his wide shaft was completely engorged, feeling red and tender and sending erotic shots through his body; the boiling stream came up through his head and then finally dominated as it squirted out of the end of his penis, hitting the right of Jason's stomach with a ferocious burst that lasted longer than any orgasm Sean had ever had, and was immediately followed by another slow, hot burst of thick white cum that flew onto Jason's hot chest, followed by another thick gob than landed on his own chest, and then a last one that got lost between them as Jason suddenly clutched Sean and pulled them together.
Jason's deep voice was suddenly husky and needy, and as he clutched Sean and held them together, Sean eagerly reciprocated and their mouths met in an equally loving embrace. Sean's cock was still hard; still oozing the last of what seemed like gallons of his manly discharge all over their stomachs; lubricated their still rubbing bodies. Jason, though his mouth was connect to Sean's, was breathing heavily through his nose and his hot breath washed over Sean's face like a sunny wave. Jason began grunting too, and making a tortured face; tortured in the arms of passion, and he suddenly broke their kiss.
"Oh God," he gasped, "Oh God, oh God, oh Sean; oh Sean, oh Sean, oh Sean, Sean." His rhythm was faster than ever, and Sean could feel the intensity of his butt hole pleasuring the large, sexy beast of a man on him, which made Sean incredibly hard and brought another sensation of hot cum at the base of his prostate. They both started grunting and breathing hard, throbbing and pulsating with the beat of their love, ferociously feeling each other and grabbing hands, releasing hands, grabbing hair, pressing their faces together and then forcing them apart, and then grabbing their faces together again. A flurry of hot, tan, brown skin, hair, cock, cum, armpits, scents, eyes, mouths, stubble, and abs contracting with the flurry of excitement was all they knew for the next few minutes, and finally, when Jason finally grabbed the back of Sean's head again, and forced their lips together, Sean, trapped in the middle of another fiery orgasm, was vaguely aware that it was because Jason was throbbing and bouncing and ripping open Sean's ass with the manly cock that was about to begin shooting load after hot wet load into Sean's ass. Sean could feel his own dick contract, and then explode one last time with the intensity of that thought, and grabbed the back of Jason's head too, so they were both forcing their faces together, both enjoying the battle with their tongues, both grabbing the other's pecs, shoulders, arms, to keep a hold on the guy they didn't want to lose, all the while feeling the hot sticky mess growing between them as Sean broke their kiss again to let out one last fantastic guttural groan as he shot the last of his load, and Jason mirrored it with his own deep, husky, musky shudder and fuck, as he let go hot sticky mess after hot sticky mess into the hot wall of Sean's throbbing prostate and asshole.
There was nothing but the deep breathing of their exertion echoing in the huge space of the gym. They were still grabbing each other, hair damp, hands entwined, other hands holding an arm and a shoulder, faces together, breathing hotly into each other's ear. Jason's cock was still in Sean, though softening now, and Sean was on his back, spent, laying there breathing and reeling in the whole new realm of feelings that were washing over him, ignited by the passion of Jason's sex, but fueled by the warm afterglow that bathed the two men as they lay in their warm pile of arms, legs, cum, and clothes. Sean blinked a few times to clear his mind, and then looked at Jason. He grabbed the brown man by the back of the neck, and brought their lips together. Jason graciously removed himself from Sean's ass and started rubbing the sore hole, and took Sean amiably by the arm as he enjoyed the manifestation of their connection; their kiss. It was good, and it was deep, and it ended with Jason falling next to Sean, and wordlessly, with their arms under each other, they gently touched, and explored each other with their hands. Eventually they found their clothes again and scooted over enough to lay on them; enjoying the warmth of their makeshift blanket, the beauty of the stars through the clerestory windows, and the scents and presence of each other. Finally, after holding hands for a few minutes, and a furtive kiss from Jason on Sean's forehead, they fell asleep with Sean tucked into the curve of Jason's square body; happy; warm; loved; and oddly satisfied and whole, despite their unpredictable choice of lover.
Things were different. Everything was different. Everything was different, and worked differently, and half of it wasn't even anything William could recognize. He was standing at the edge of just another unfamiliar street after having spent an hour winding his way into Cape City on the unfamiliar thoroughfares that led from the railroad tracks, in the mounting darkness as well. Things were completely perplexing him; he'd seen once, on a trip to Europe, a model of a horseless carriage that had been put together by Mercedes for the World's Fair. He could understand after so many years that these were publicly available, but he couldn't understand how so many types of people could afford such a luxurious item, or what happened to the horses. The lights were all too clean, steady, and bright to be gas, and many of the people he'd happened to have seen were carrying shiny items around at the level of their ear, talking. William had no concept of what that was, except perhaps a watch? But to talk to? William shook his head. The other thing was that Cape City had become a small city; it had been his idea to follow the old route 5 down through Buffalo, through Cape City, and let it deliver him straight to where his land had been, right on the southern portion of the bay, by a village called Capeton. Perhaps there he would find Jeremy. Perhaps, but it was his only lead. However, now he was lost in the blocks of serpentine suburbs that had grown up in the meantime and very unhappily trying to navigate the cul-de-sacs and curving roads to what he presumed was the center of town. In truth he was heading in the right direction; after having been lost for a while in what he would have known to be a development called Gardens Acres had he read the dark signs, he'd taken a couple of correct turns that led out of the upscale hillside community, and was now walking almost directly in line with route 5, and not entirely coincidentally. The magic was at work again.