Second Chance

Second Chance Chapter 9 - Second Date

I woke in the morning with my body tangled with Julio's. Our legs were entwined, and he was holding me with one arm, with his head resting against me. I moved to get up, but he grabbed me and pulled me firmly to him.

"No," he mumbled seemingly in his sleep. "Stay."

"I have to pee," I said.

"Come right back," he mumbled.

He released me, and I crawled out of bed and went out into the central room and into the bathroom. I peed and stepped back into the living room. The tentativeness of the place, its unfinished quality made me smile for some reason. It made Julio seem so young, like he was just starting out on adult life.

I went back into his room and crawled in the bed, and he pulled me to him and held me. He was so warm and smooth and welcoming. His chest pressed against my back. His crotch pressed up against my ass, and I could feel his cock wake up and grow hard through his briefs. He moved his hips slightly, so that his cock rubbed up and down my crack. I pushed back against him as he continued to grind into me.

"I would love to be inside you right now," he whispered. "But I can be patient like I said I would. I can wait."

He sighed.

"But it's so hard not to jump you right here and now."

I reached around with one hand and squeezed his cock. "That's not all that's hard," I said.

"See what you do to me," he said.

I rolled over so that I was facing him.

"Good morning, handsome," he said.

I just smiled and looked into his eyes. I took my hand and gently ran it across his cheek. With my finger, I traced his forehead and his nose and his chin. Then I ran my hand along his arm and then down his chest.

"You like what you see?" he asked.

"I do," I responded. "Very much."

He reached his hand down to feel my cock through my briefs. It was now achingly hard.

"Hmmmm," was all he said, then removed his hand.

"Shall we get up?" he asked.

"Not yet," I said, and I snuggled up into him, my face burrowing into his neck. He wrapped his arms around me and hugged me tightly.

"You are SO sexy," he whispered in my ear. I doubted him, but I loved to hear it. He smiled at me and ran his finger through my short beard, then traced my mustache.

"SO sexy," he repeated.

We just lay there for a while, then I pulled away from him a bit.

"Okay," I said.

"Okay," he repeated.

We slipped out of the bed.

"I have coffee but not much else," he told me.

"Let's just go out for breakfast." A thought hit me. "Oh! Let's go to Ann Sathers! It's one of my favorite places in Chicago, and it's not far from here."

"If it's one of YOUR favorite places, then I'm happy to go," he said.

As I gathered my clothes from the night before, I asked him, "What were you planning to do today?"

"I was probably going to go furniture shopping. I need a dresser." He indicated the suitcases in his room as he reached in his closet for clothes to wear, then he went and grabbed a pair of briefs out of one of the suitcases. "And a nightstand and a couple of tables for the living room. And a kitchen table and chairs. Lots of things."

He stood up with clean clothes in hand.    "But I'd rather spend the day with you," he added.

"I'd be happy to go shopping with you," I said. "I didn't have any big plans for the day."

"Really?" He seemed pleased. "I was just thinking of going to some used furniture places."

"There's a couple of places on the North Side here that I know of. There's a few places that sell refurbished furniture, but I don't think that's what you're really wanting. They tend to be pricier than new furniture. There's a few thrift shops, though, that might be good. But let's get breakfast first."

The main thrift shop I wanted us to go to was up in Andersonville, a gay-friendly neighborhood north of mine. There was an Ann Sathers Restaurant up there, but it was not that close to where I wanted us to go shopping, and I liked the restaurant on Belmont better anyway. Plus, we could walk to it from his apartment.

We both showered, separately, although the idea of showering together certainly passed my mind. Julio put on the clean clothes he'd picked out, a clean pair of jeans, a T-shirt, and a hoodie, and I put on my clothes from the night before. He offered me some of his clothes, but there was no way they would fit into any of his clothes, since he was both thinner and several inches taller than me. In the end, I left my dress jacket at his place and borrowed a zip-up hoodie that was big, but by leaving it unzipped, it didn't seem to completely swallow me.

Ann Sathers was an institution in the community, a nod to the fact that Chicago had once been the second largest Swedish city in the world, after Stockholm. It was a breakfast place that served mostly typical breakfast food -- eggs Benedict and omelettes. But they had Swedish pancakes with lingonberries, and every meal came with rich, gooey cinnamon rolls that were, frankly, the main reason to visit. The restaurant in Lakeview was huge, with a couple of large dining rooms, though even so, there was always a wait on weekend mornings.

We left Julio's apartment, walked to the end of the block, and turned south on Halstead. This was the heart of the gayborhood. We passed Hydrate and Roscoe's Tavern and Steamworks, where Tom had had so much fun the weekend before. We passed the Scarlet Bar, a bar that I had never even been to. We turned onto Belmont, and I was surprised to see a new branch of Brown Elephant, the vintage store where I was planning to take Julio in Andersonville.

"This is the place I was going to take you!" I told him excitedly. "Well, this must be a branch of it. We can stop by here after breakfast."

We got to Ann Sathers and were told that it would be a fifteen minute wait. We stood around outside with a group of other folk, waiting for my name to be called. It was a slightly chilly morning, but sunny and not at all unpleasant.

We were called after about twenty minutes. We went inside, were handed menus and led to a table. The place was noisy and lively. The crowd was a cross-section of Chicago -- young gay guys who lived in the neighborhood, older couples who look like they'd been coming to Ann Sathers for decades, big-bellied working class guys. This was the kind of place where all of Chicago met -- though it was a much whiter crowd than you would have found on the South Side or the West Side.

"This is fun," Julio said, looking around.

"Very Chicago," I said.

A waitress brought us coffee, and we ordered our meals and talked about nothing in particular. Julio asked me what kinds of movies I liked, and I admitted to an affection for foreign films and sentimental shows, particularly with kids    -- Whale Rider, My Life as a Dog, Au Revoir les Enfants.

"I love movies that give me a window into a new culture" I told him. "There's so much darkness in the world that I love movies that warm my heart. Put in a cute kid, and I'm a sucker for it, like Cinema Paradiso."

Julio had not seen most of these films, so I promised him that we would have a movie marathon weekend sometime. He told me that he liked science fiction and fantasy best. He said that his evangelical parents viewed movies with suspicion, so he would sneak off and see movies like Harry Potter, which his parents thought was satanic. When he got to the US, he caught up on all of the Star Wars movies, which were his favorites.

I ordered a ham and cheese omelet, and Julio ordered two fried eggs. Both of the meals came with cinnamon rolls on the side. The rolls came out warm and covered in melting frosting. Everything was delicious.

After we had gorged ourselves, Julio and I walked back up the block to check out the Brown Elephant. It was a thrift store that raised money for Howard Brown Health, the clinic that served the gay community, specializing in HIV care. The store had lots of used clothing, but there was also a section of housewares and furniture. We looked through and saw a side table that Julio liked, but we decided that we would go to the other location first and could come back if we didn't find anything there.

I called an Uber. Even though the other shop was a number of blocks inland from Lake Michigans, like the one we were leaving, the car took us out to Lakeshore Drive and up along the lake, before turning in on Foster Avenue. Lake Shore Drive was the only real expressway on the North Side of Chicago, and it was almost always faster to get to it to go north or south, rather than following the regular streets, with all of their traffic and stoplights. While much of the interior of Lakeview, Uptown, and Andersonville looked similar, with three- or four-story apartment buildings, the eastern edge of each, lining Lakeshore Drive, was filled with high-rise buildings, twenty and thirty stories high. I knew a handful of people who lived in them, and the views were incredible. But I preferred the character of the older low-rise buildings like the one my condo was in and like Julio's apartment.

The car dropped us at the other Brown Elephant. It was similar, but had a larger selection of furniture. Julio found a kitchen table and four chairs that he liked. They were vintage looking, probably from the 1960s, or at least styled to look like that, with a formica table top and chrome legs and chairs that were upholstered in a matching plastic fabric.

We then realized that it would be hard to get this home, but a helpful salesclerk suggested that the table came apart, and we could order an Uber van. He was a young gay guy, wearing retro clothes that he'd probably gotten at the store.

"This is a great find," he said and gave us a sparkling smile. "Very retro."

"So, do you want it?" I asked him. "I'm happy to help."

Julio shrugged. "I kind of do," he said.

He bought it, and the friendly clerk got some tools and helped us take it apart. Then we called an Uber X van and took the table, the legs, and the four chairs outside. The clerk put the screws for the table in a small bag and gave it to us.

"Don't lose these!" he said with a smile and a wink.

The van came, and we had to work with the driver to fit everything in. He had to put the back seat down, slide the table top in first, then pile the chairs on top. It worked, but the driver complained about how long it took.

"Extra time! Too much!" he said. He was East Asian, with pretty limited English.

"Good tip!" I told him, but he just scowled at me, so I'm not sure if he understood.

The drive down to Julio's apartment was quick on a Saturday afternoon. We unloaded the table and chairs, and the driver sped off as quickly as he could. (I thought, what's the point of driving a van for Uber if it isn't for things like this?) It took several trips to carry everything up to his apartment. By the time we got everything up, I felt a bit winded.

"I'm feeling my age," I said, as I sat down on the couch. "That's too many stairs for my knees."

Julio looked concerned. "Oh, I'm so sorry. I wasn't thinking. I could have carried everything. ..."

I laughed. "Don't worry, I'm just joking. My knees are fine. I just need to catch my breath after going up and down so many times."

Julio went and grabbed a plastic bottle of water out of the fridge and brought it to me.

"Here," he said, as he handed it over.

"Thanks," I replied.

He got another bottle of water for himself and then sat down on the couch next to me. We sat there for a while in silence, until I said, "Shall we get started on the table?"

"You don't have to help me," he said.

"I don't mind," I assured him.

We lay out the table top upside down on the floor. I held up each leg in turn, while he slipped in the bolts and tightened the nuts. He didn't have a wrench, so we couldn't tighten the nuts as much as we would have liked, but we could get them tight enough that the table would be solid.

"I bring a wrench when I come over again," I said.

When we were done, we flipped the table over, and I helped him move it to the place in the dining area he wanted. We then arranged the chairs around it.

"That looks good," I said.

"Little by little," he replied. "Starting to look like a home."

We stood there for a moment, surveying the room.

"You need some things on the walls," I said. "That's what really makes a place feel homey."

"Yes," he responded. "I haven't figured out what yet, though."

"Well," I finally said. "I suppose I should go home."

"But, we're still on for tonight, aren't we?" he asked.

"Um," I mumbled, "I guess we can be. You still want to go on a date?"

"You took me out last night. It's my turn to take you out tonight," he insisted. "You agreed."

"Okay," I said. "But I should go home and rest a bit. And get some clean clothes."

"Okay," he said. "Be back here at 6:30. Dress casually."

"What are we doing?" I asked.

"I'm surprising you," he told me.

"No hints?" I said.

He smiled mischievously. "No hints."

I was intrigued. "Okay," I said. "See you in a couple of hours."

I hesitated at the threshold, then I stepped back to him and gave him one long kiss. I looked him in the eyes and smiled, then headed out.

I saw that it was already after 3 in the afternoon, so I was going to call a car rather than taking the L, but then I decided that it was such a nice warm day that I should just walk.

Chicago's weather can be unpredictable. In the winter, the winds blowing in from the prairie or across the lake can make the city bitterly cold. In the summer, heat waves make their way up from Texas and make the city feel like a sauna. But there are many nice days, particularly in the spring and fall.

This Saturday at the end of September was one of those fall days where the weather felt almost like summer. We called it Indian Summer when it lasted for a few days. It was in the low 80s, with low humidity and a clear sky.

I walked straight up North Halsted to where it merged with Broadway and became North Clarendon before eventually turning west near Harry S Truman College. There were not a lot of interesting landmarks along this route, just a normal urban landscape of stores and restaurants and apartments until you come to Graceland Cemetery in the Buena Park area between Lakeview and Uptown. Since it was a warm day, there were lots of people out walking and many runners going by. I couldn't help but appreciate the younger shirtless men who passed me. Since it was late in the season, many looked very tan, unlike the first warm days in the spring, when runners would first remove their shirts and often looked pale after the long winter.

I noticed the different smells of the city, often scents coming from the various restaurants I passed -- deep frying, spices, meat cooking. Sometimes there was an acrid odor of old urine or rotting garbage, sometimes exhaust from a car or truck, but most of the smells were the pleasant odors of urban life.

My walk took me about 40 minutes, so I arrived home a little before 4. I immediately stripped out of yesterday's clothes, and it suddenly occurred to me that I had taken the infamous "walk of shame," coming home from a date in yesterday's clothes. I laughed out loud at the thought, after so many years. I climbed into my bed naked and soon fell fast asleep.

I woke, slightly disoriented, having slept longer than I intended. It was just after 5 p.m.    I got up and yawned broadly. I showered and then walked naked around my apartment tidying things a bit. Although I had lived alone for three years, I still rarely slept naked or hung out in my apartment naked. Usually I would at least wear a pair of underpants, but usually I'd wear pajama bottoms or loose shorts just to hang out.

But today, I felt different about life and about myself. Somehow, I felt like I was letting my inhibitions down. Honestly, I felt younger. and more energetic than I had in a while.

I laughed at my silliness, but it felt good to have someone showing such an interest in me. Of course, I knew that nothing serious could happen.    I was almost twice his age, so there was simply no way anything more than friendship could emerge. He was young and gorgeous, and I was -- well, I was still attractive for a man of 65, but anyone looking objectively would say that he was out of my league. Yet,even though I knew that nothing could ultimately come of our time together, it was invigorating to spend time with someone so young and interesting. Even just shopping for furniture together today had been a joy.

I was happy to have something shake up my life a bit. I realized that I had fallen into a rut. Not a bad rut, nothing destructive. But week-in, week-out, my life was pretty much the same. I ran and went to then gym, I made my breakfast, I went to work, and I came home alone. On weekends, I would take care of errands and housework on Saturdays and go to church on Sundays. And now Julio had come waltzing in and messed up my normal patterns.

Sure, I had friends and family, and I didn't just hide at home all of the time. I didn't generally feel lonely, but most of my life was spent on my own since Pablo's passing. I couldn't remember the last time that I'd slept at someone's home, other than on a visit to New York to see Tom.

I needed to get dressed for my date Julio. He had said to dress casually. I assumed that meant jeans and polo shirt rather than gym clothes. I picked out a pair of tight-fitting dark jeans and an off-white polo top. I tried them on and decided that they fit the bill.   

By now, it was after 6, so I decided to call an Uber, since the L tended to be slow on Saturday. I got to his apartment just a few minutes before 6:30. The car dropped me off right in front of Julio's complex. I rang his bell, and he buzzed the front door open. I climbed the steps up to the third floor to find him standing at his open door in jeans and tight-fitting T-shirt.

"Let's go," he said, full of excitement.

"Where're you taking me?" I asked.

"You'll see," he said with a mischievous smile.

He shut and locked the door behind him and led the way downstairs and outside. We cut up the cross street from Cornelia to Addison and turned left. We walked to Wrigley Field, and I wondered if we were going to a Cubs game, but the crowds were thin enough that it was clear there was no game today. Directly across the street from Wrigley, he stopped in front of a door.

"Here we are!" he announced.

The sign read Lucky Strike Social.

"We're going bowling," he said with such excitement that I had to laugh.

"Bowling?" I asked.

"I don't know how to bowl. I've only been once before. But I thought it would be fun."

We went inside. The places was like a carnival, dark but with bright flashing arcade games lighting up the room. We walked over to the bowling area, that was soft lit in blue light. He checked in for the lane he had reserved for us at 7, and they told us we'd have to wait just a few minutes.

"I hope you don't mind," he said. "I just thought this would be fun."

"It IS fun," I assured him. "I haven't been bowling in at least a decade."

We sat on a couple of stools at the bar and ordered beers. I surveyed the room. This was not the kind of place that I usually associated with bowling. The crowd was young and hip, not the older working-class crowd at traditional Chicago bowling alleys.

Our beers arrived, and just a little later, Julio's name was called so we checked in, got our shoes, and found our lane. We picked bowling balls and set them on the rack next to our lane. I fiddled with the controls a bit to set up our game, entered our names in the display, then pressed start.

"I'll go first," I said. I took my bowl and swung it as I stepped forward and released. It went fast down the lane but curved to the side. I ended up knocking down three pins on one side. My ball came back up the conveyor belt, and I threw again, knocking down three more.

"Your turn," I said to Julio.

He stepped up and picked up the ball with both hands.

"Now, how do I ...?" he asked.

I came and stood behind him and showed him how to put his fingers in, then I acted out how to release the ball. He tried, but the ball dropped hard off of his fingers and rolled straight into the gutter. The ball slowly made its way down the gutter, and we waited a long time for it to come back.

"So, maybe I shouldn't have exposed you to my lack of athletic ability so early," he joked.

He threw again, and his form was better this time, though the ball still hit the gutter just before it got to the pins.

We had an extraordinary amount of fun. I was only slightly better than Julio was at bowling. But no one at this bowling alley seemed to care. There was a couple of group of straight bros who took the game seriously, but mostly, this place was full of people just out having fun. There were several other groups of gay men nearby, camping it up loudly, and several groups of young people, mixed gay and straight, male and female. People were drinking and laughing, and also bowling, but rarely well.

During our first game, we ordered pizza, which was delivered just as we were finishing up. We bowled the last frames, then paused for a few minutes to eat. We then started another game, in which we were slightly better. Julio ended with a score of 92, but he was very happy, because he got a strike and two spares. I ended with 110, after following up a strike in the sixth frame with a spare.

"Woo Hoo!" Julio cried when he got his strike. "I've become a bowling master!" Of course, he followed the strike with a gutter ball and then knocked down two pins, so his strike didn't exactly raise his score too much. But we laughed and joked about our bad bowling and minor triumphs.

After our two games, Julio asked me, "Shall we go to the bar and get a drink? Or should we go back to my place to hang out a bit?" The second option was said with apparent innocence, but I read the innuendo underneath.

"I'd rather go back to your place," I told him.

He smiled broadly. "I was hoping you'd say that."

We put our own shoes back on then turned our bowling shoes back in and settled our bill. Then we walked out into the night and back toward his apartment. It was a warm night for late September. As we walked, Julio took my hand in his. It was soft and warm, and I leaned into him as we walked.

We got to his apartment too quickly and went up six flights of stairs to the third floor. He unlocked the door and led me inside, and as he was closing the door, he grabbed me and pulled me into a passionate kiss.

"I've been wanting to kiss you all night!" he declared. "You were so cute in those bowling shoes."

I didn't say anything in response but instead pulled him back into another kiss. We stood there right at the entrance to his apartment, kissing deeply for probably ten minutes before he broke off and led me back into his bedroom. There we kissed again, running our hands over one another's bodies. He ran his hand up inside my shirt and felt my furry chest then pinched first one nipple, then the other. He tugged on my shirt to pull it off, and so I helped him by raising my arms so that he could life it off my head. I did the same for him, pulling off his tight T-shirt and tossing it aside.

We kissed passionately again, our bare torsos brushing against one another as our tongues explored each other's mouths. I loved the feel of his smooth skin on mine. I felt the muscles of his back and his arms. He ran his hands down my back and then grabbed my ass and gave it a hard squeeze. He then tried to slide his hands down into my pants, so I undid the button at the top of my jeans and pulled down the zipper. He moved his hands under my pants and under my underwear to grab my bare ass and gripped it as he kissed me deeply. His finger moved toward my hole, and he caressed it. I couldn't help but moan into his mouth. At the same time, I put my hand on his crotch and squeezed his cock, which was large and very hard.

"I really want to be inside you, but I told you I would go slowly," he whispered to me. "Can I at least taste your manhood?" he asked, as he took his hands from my ass and felt my dick, which was as hard as it had been in ages. I felt a spot of pre-cum that had leaked out of the top and made a wet spot on my briefs.

"Taste my manhood? That sounds like it comes straight out of a porno," I laughed. "You can suck me only if I can suck you too," I said.

He roughly pulled my jeans and boxer briefs down to my knees in one move. Then he pulled me into another kiss so that my hard cock was smashed against his body.

He took a step back and looked me over, standing there with my pants down around my knees, my hard cock sticking straight ahead, with a pearl of pre-cum on its tip.

"Fuck!" he said. "I love a hot, fit daddy." He took a step to look at me from the side. "And you are SUCH a fucking hot daddy, Judah."

He stepped back closed to me and dropped to his knees. He leaned his head down and licked the pre-cum off of my cock. Then he carefully licked the head of my cock before engulfing it in his mouth. Then he moved his mouth slowly and steadily down the length of my cock until the head hit the back of his throat. It felt amazing.

"You taste so good," he sighed coming off my cock then diving back on.

He paused while I kicked off my shoes and used my foot to pull my pants off over my feet.

He went up and down on my cock a few times to where it hit the back of his throat, then on one more move down, he pushed, and my cock popped into his throat so that his nose was buried in my bush. He held it there for a moment as I felt the ecstasy of being deep-throated, then he pulled off and gasped for air. I had to reach back to grab the wall I was standing beside to steady myself. He did that a couple of more times, until I pulled him off.

"Stop!" I said. "My turn."

I pulled him up off of his knees and unbuttoned his jeans and pulled them down. He slipped off his trainers and then slipped off his pants and his underwear so that he was naked. Looking at him naked for the first time made me want to swoon. He had a curly bush but was otherwise smooth. He had abs, but not overdeveloped, and a solid chest and arms. His cock was impressive. It was long and thick, perhaps 9 inches, with a slight upward curve and a beautiful soft hood that covered the glans.

My mouth watering in anticipation, I got down on my knees to suck him.

"Wait," he said. "Let's go to the bed. It will be more comfortable."

He went and lay down on his back, with his cock sticking up into the air, and I followed and climbed beside him so that I could easily bend over and service him. I licked down his shaft and back up a few times, then I placed my lips around his cock and moved down slowly and then back up, taking his foreskin with me. I used my tongue to lick around inside the foreskin, then I used my mouth to go further down, until his cock hit the back of my throat and made me cough.

"You okay?" Julio asked.

"Better than okay," I told him. I went back to sucking him and did my best to give him pleasure. I went up and down his cock then stroked his cock while I sucked on his balls. That made him moan and lift his hips. I sucked him more, while I gently squeezed his balls with one hand and pinched a nipple with the other.

"Oh fuck, Judah!" he groaned.

His cock was magnificent. It wasn't just that it had been several years since I'd given a blow job. It was that his cock was particularly fine and attached to an amazing body.

"You could fuck me if you wanted," I whispered holding his cock in my hand and admiring it.

"No," he said. "It's too soon."

He used his hand to pull me off his cock and indicate that I should slide up the bed beside him. I lay down next to him, and he kissed me, gently stroking my face with his hands.

"I told you that I wasn't going to fuck you, I was going to make love to you" he said. "So, I have to wait until you've fallen in love with me."

He kissed me more, as his hands moved down my back and found my ass. "It will be hard to wait, because you have such a fine ass, but it will be worth it." His finger caressed my hole and made it twitch.

I sighed and kissed him as intensely as I could. He broke off the kiss and moved down the bed until he got to my cock. He started sucking me again, going up and down with his mouth, occasionally stroking with his hand as well, occasionally going all the way to swallow me into his throat. He quickly had me close to coming.

"I want to taste you," he said.

He used one hand to slide up and down my cock along with his mouth. He used his other hand to tease my hole. He licked his middle finger and pushed it against my hole and then slid in a couple of inches. That was enough to push me over the top.

"I'm cumming!!" I shouted. I bucked my hips up as I dissolved into an amazing orgasm. I shot one after another volley of cum into his mouth. It was the most amazing orgasm I'd had in years, and it left me breathless.

Julio climbed back up the bed and kissed me, so that I could taste my own load in his mouth.

"You taste so good," he said.

"That was amazing!" I panted, still out of breath. I lay there for just another moment before I slid down to do him.

"You don't have to worry about me," he assured me.

"I want to," I said. "It's been too long. And I want to make you feel good."

I started back on his cock, sucking, stroking, licking his balls, until I could feel that he was about to explode.

"Not yet," I said, as I backed off to let him come back from his near orgasm. "I want to savor this."

When I felt it was safe to do so without making him cum, I started sucking him again. He held my head and started pumping into me, then he let me go back to working on his tool.

"It's so good, Judah," he whimpered. I could tell that he was starting to build toward an orgasm, and this time I decided that I would allow it. His whole body stiffened, and he held my head still as he moved his cock to the middle of mouth. Then with a grunt, he unloaded. He shot again and again in my mouth. I swallowed once as he kept going, and then I held his cum in my mouth and savored it. This was the first time I'd tasted another man's cum in years. HIs cock slipped out of my mouth, and he collapsed on the bed.

I swallowed the rest of his load and scooted back up so that I was lying against him. He pulled me against him and we kissed.

"That was nice," I told him. "You know, it had been a long time for me..."

He smiled kindly at me. "I'm glad you waited for me."

I was going to correct him and say, no, it was just ... but, then, maybe he was right. Maybe I had been waiting. For him.

We lay there for quite a while. He traced my beard with his finger then traced my face, my body, my shoulders, my arms, my chest. He ran his fingers through the hair on my chest. After a while, we were both drifting off to sleep.

"I can't stay here tonight," I told him. "I have to usher at church tomorrow. So I need to go sleep at home and get up early."

"That's okay," he said. We got out of the bed and started to get dressed.

"When can I see you again?" he asked.

"Soon, I hope," I responded. "I imagine you're going to get busier at work, but if you're free one evening, maybe we could get dinner. If not, then next weekend."

"I'd like that," he smiled.

He walked me out to the door.

"So," he said before he opened it. "Is it okay to say that we are dating?"

I smiled at him. He looked so tentative and vulnerable.

"Is that what you want?" I asked.

"Yes, that is what I want. I want to say that I'm dating you."

"Okay," I told him. "Then I guess we're dating."

He smiled broadly and pulled me in for a deep kiss.

"I'll see you soon," he said.

I left his apartment and bounded down the stairs. I was feeling elated. Julio and I were officially dating, whatever that meant. I had not been looking for anything. I had not anticipated anything. But, he seemed to want me, and I really enjoyed hanging out with him. And the sex we'd just had sealed the deal for me. I felt awake and alive. We might not go anywhere in the end, but I was definitely going to enjoy the ride.

Let me know what you think of my story. Email me at nifty1dan@gmail.com.

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