SOL CORAZON
WAITING FOR JAKE
By Sol Corazon
Sometimes I get so fuckin’ lonely. I think I’m schizophrenic. I probably should be on some type of medication. On one hand, I’ve always had this crazy belief that there was someone special out there. My own person. Someone just for me. Way beyond soul mate. Someone who could understand me. Accept me. On the other hand, I think that if I ever really found it, I’d run like the wind in the opposite direction.
I’ve had bits and pieces of it but never the whole fuckin’ enchilada. And it’s all me. It’s my fault that I never get what I think I want. I let guys get so close and then no closer. Go so far and no further.
I find someone to love me and if they show any signs of caring, I push them away. Find something wrong with them. There’s always a reason why it can’t work. The sad thing is that the reasons are ALWAYS legit. I’m constantly drawn to someone like me, emotionally unavailable and totally fucked up.
Whenever I find someone who might be capable of some type of relationship, I give it a bit of a chance, get scared and make a quick getaway. Then it’s a frenzy of bar hopping on the prowl for a for a quick fuck, late night booty calls with guys I meet on the net or hanging out at the baths looking for trouble. Then I go into hibernation.
I know the drill. I’m so predictable it’s a joke. It’s hilarious. I have to laugh at myself or I’d cry.
This time, I promised myself that I’d stay in hibernation until I got my shit together. Only, that was nothing new either. I’d promise myself that I’d get to know myself, figure out why I keep doing the same shit over and over again. Promise myself I’d wait for the right guy.
Or that I’d at least be open to meeting the right guy. The normal way. Make friends first. Get to know him. Instead of following my usual M.O. of meeting someone, having mind-blowing sex and then deciding that I could create some kind of meaningful relationship with him because we’d connected on a physical level.
The hibernation would last until I’d get so horny that I’d tell myself, that after I got some relief, I’d go back into hibernation and start the waiting game again. Have you ever been so horny that you felt like your cock could cut through steel? Or rock? Have you ever been so horny that your balls felt like they would explode?
Have you ever been so starved for touch that your skin ached? So lonely that you felt like the last person on earth no matter where you were or what you were doing? See why I think I’m crazy?
I made yet another promise to myself six months ago and I’m keeping it. Six months of hibernation and then not starting a relationship until I had known the person for at least a month. Hey, I know a month is not long but most of my relationships started when they should have ended: the morning after. I’m the only guy I know who can turn a trick into a boyfriend. Every single relationship I’ve been in should have ended the next morning after I stripped the bed and threw the sheets into the washer.
Grace had called and tried to coax me out of hibernation. She thought I was crazy and would tell me so repeatedly, “Jake, you do this every six months without fail. Why don’t you just give up the fight, baby, and go with the flow? You’re never gonna change. Just accept yourself the way you are. Maybe deep down you really don’t want a relationship.”
Her words hit to the heart of a very secret fear. She knew me probably better than anyone else in the world. Grace is always the one person that, no matter what, I don’t hide from. On days when I can’t deal, on those days when I don’t want to talk to ANYBODY, Grace is the one person who gets in.
She told me that I am the person for her too. When she starts PMSing, I’m the go to man. I’m the one who listens to her bitch and complain. The one who gets her the chocolate ice cream or the blueberry yogurt and Doritos or the chili dogs with mustard from 7-11. One time, I swear to God, she ate those bad boys for breakfast, lunch and dinner, for about a week and a half.
Maybe I didn’t deserve to have someone of my very own. Maybe it was never gonna happen. When coaxing me out of my cave with that rather disheartening pep talk didn’t work, Grace tried to lure me out of hibernation by reminding me that Luke was coming to town with his band. I’m really ambivalent about seeing Luke again. We had really been tight in high school and college. Since his band hit it big, we had been in contact sporadically over the years.
The three of us became friends by default. We attended a private Catholic high school located in the suburbs of Maryland. The three of us took being outcasts to a whole new level. I was three to four years younger than the other kids in my class because I had skipped several grades. It could’ve been worse but my parents drew the line and wouldn’t let them accelerate me any further. I was also a lot smaller than the rest of the students.
Grace was not like the other girls. She had bright red hair, freckles, emerald green eyes and a body that blossomed years before the other girls. She was direct, to the point, didn’t gossip and didn’t play games. The girls hated her. The guys loved her ‘til they found out they weren’t getting any tuna.
Luke was wearing all black long before anyone else at that school thought to do it. He wore his hair longer than was allowed, no matter how much they nagged him about it. He wore as much jewelry as he could get away with and was always the tallest boy in the class.
He was in his own little world. He had big dreams and spent most of his time plotting to make them come true. He could have been a really popular guy in school if he had given a shit.
I’ve never really figured out why he chose to hang out with Grace and me. You could tell he intrigued the other kids. They were always trying to get to know him better. Always trying to include him in stuff while Grace and I stood on the sidelines. For some reason, he stayed on the sidelines with us when things could have been different for him.
Luke never went through the awkward adolescent stage that most boys go through. His ivory skin always remained smooth and creamy. His chestnut brown hair was thick and wavy. He was tall and slender but wasn’t clumsy and awkward like most teenage boys. He moved deliberately, like he had all the time in the world. He was just chill like that. Cool and easy.
It’s probably obvious that I idolized him. He was different from anyone else I had ever known. Why he took a weird little kid like me under his wing, I’ll never know.
I wore glasses then. My glasses were always lopsided and half broken from me sitting on them, stepping on them or leaving them somewhere so someone else could sit on them or step on them. I was too lazy to be bothered with contacts. I also hated it when people talked about my eyes; cat eyes they would say when I took my glasses off. I wore my hair in braids. I did not like to wear it out. It’s wild and crazy when I let it loose.
I am biracial. Maybe I should say tri-racial. Heinz 57, I’ve heard it called. A little bit of everything. My mother is black and Mexican and my father looks white but like everybody else in his family he is a little bit of everything too. I have mocha brown skin and hazel eyes.
When I was growing up, I didn’t fit in anywhere. In school, I was excluded because I was so smart. I was the one who always fucked up the grading curve. I was also excluded not so much by the color of my skin but more so because of where I came from.
Where I lived, I was different because I read all of the time and kept mostly to myself. I couldn’t help it. I had this insatiable curiosity about the world around me.
Whenever I had a question about anything my mother would faithfully direct me to the set of encyclopedias that she and my father had scrimped and saved to purchase. I ended up reading each one from cover to cover. I was the only kid in my family that really enjoyed school. The rest of my family took a lot of pride in that.
When I got to college, I was still the youngest and still very short. Having Grace and Luke there with me was my only salvation. Sometimes I think that’s why they decided to go the school I decided upon. Probably not. I never had the courage to ask either one of them. Even though most of me knows it’s not true, sometimes I think that I’m just someone they know, not someone they truly care about.
The three of us hooked up in the computer club in high school. I’ve never been a group person but the equipment that they had at the school was state of the art and I couldn’t resist playing with the latest toys. After we met in the club, we just kinda gravitated together whenever we saw each other.
Luke has always been music crazy. His taste in music was so eclectic it was insane. I’ve always loved hip-hop, salsa and R&B. Grace, well, Grace has no taste in music as far as I’m concerned. She is one of those people who are indifferent to music. I’ve never understood that because the girl can dance her ass off.
Luke taught himself to play the guitar on a toy guitar he had received as a birthday present when he was a little kid. His parents started taking him seriously when he was around ten years old and by the time I met him, he had been taking lessons and playing for years. He was a natural musician. He could listen to a song on the radio and play it back almost perfectly.
After being in a couple of bands that broke up when we were in high school, Luke met the guys in his current band when we were in college. He responded to an ad in a neighborhood weekly. They started playing around town and slowly and steadily hit it pretty big.
Grace and I started our own business while we were in college. We’re computer consultants for several major corporations and do a lot of troubleshooting for several local businesses. Anyway, I’m not sure I really want to see Luke.
We email back and forth and talk on the phone every now and then but it’s been awhile since we’ve seen each other. Whenever Lynx had an appearance in Maryland over the past couple of years, I had been out of town on business. I guess if we had really wanted to hook up we would have.
A lot of things have changed in both of our lives and we really don’t know each other anymore. I’m not sure he even knows I’m gay. I’m pretty certain Grace hasn’t told him. I had come onto him when I was younger with disastrous results. He probably thought it was a phase I was going through.
I know it won’t matter because Luke is either gay or bisexual. But being out to him would still be strange. Other than Grace, the friends I have now are people that I have met as an adult and although I don’t make grand pronouncements, I have never hidden the fact that I’m gay either.
Truth be told, I’m scared to see him. We don’t have that much in common, not really. I’m not sure we have anything left to rebuild a friendship upon. I’m a street rat.
I’m the first person in my family to get a scholarship to a decent high school and then to go on to college. I’m the first person in my family to have a really good job and make pretty good money. I’m not rich but I do okay.
*************************************
The phone has been ringing off and on all day. I get caught up in work and usually just don’t answer. This time I do, because, according to the Caller ID, it’s Grace again. “Beautiful Grace, what can I do for you?” There was silence on the other end.
“Don’t try to sweet talk me,” she said sharply. “I know you. I know you. I know you.”
I sighed. “I am not up to going out, Grace. And I haven’t heard from Luke in months. He probably could care less whether he sees me or not.”
“Well, guess what? I HAVE talked to him. He DOES want to see you. And you ARE going with me tonight. If you’d bother to check your email every now and then you might realize that he’s been trying to get in touch with you for a while.”
I flushed. I knew she was right. I have a tendency to become incommunicado when I am in hibernation. Sometimes I don’t answer the phone or check my email for weeks.
“Okay, Grace,” I said softly, giving in. I knew she wasn’t going to let up if I didn’t.
“You know I hate big crowds,” I complained.
“I know you do,” she said. “I’ll be with you and Luke got us special passes. We’re gonna be right up front. I’ll pick you up at 8.”
I made a face at the phone.
“Stop it,” she growled. I jumped.
“I know you, Jakie. And I know what you’re doing. Stop it. Go get ready, cuz you are slow as shit and you know I hate waiting.”
At 8pm, I was showered but not dressed. I answered the door with a towel around my waist. Grace eyed me up and down then scowled at me. “Dammit, I knew your little ass wasn’t gonna be ready.” She snatched the towel from around my waist and popped my butt with it.
She chased me through the apartment giggling like a little girl. God, she could be such a little kid at times. That’s why I needed her around.
She sat on the edge of my bed and kept me company while I dressed. Black jeans, purple t-shirt, a pair of butter Tims and I was done. I like to dress casually and comfortably.
Grace as always, was lovely, in a long, olive green, print, dress, with a slit up the sides, revealing her long, shapely legs. She had a lush, curvy body and if I had been into women, I would have been all over her.
I doubt that she would’ve been all over me, though. Grace was an only child and to her I was the little brother she had never had. She was very protective of me.
When I was finished dressing, she surveyed me with an approving smile and said, “You are so cute.”
“Monkeys are cute too,” I said. She popped me in the ass with the towel.
In her car, on the way to the show, Grace put on Lynx’s latest CD. She handed a package to me. “From Luke. He sent it to me, just in case.”
That’s another thing I neglect when I’m in hibernation. My mail. I hate checking for mail. I try to remember to do it at least once a week but sometimes I forget. Occasionally, stuff gets sent back because I don’t pick it up or because it’s been sitting in my mailbox for so long. Maybe Grace is right. Living like a hermit is getting old.
It was summer and still light out. The air was warm and heavy with humidity. The traffic on the way to the concert was terrible. I had heard the concert was sold out. They’d even had to add another show.
At least the show was being held at an open-air concert park. I hate being confined in spaces with large crowds. As much as I love music, I rarely attend concerts for that very reason.
The opening act had already started. They were pretty good but for some reason I couldn’t get into their music. I was restless and my stomach was tied up in knots.
Lynx came out with very little fanfare. One thing Luke had always been adamant about was that, ‘It has to be about the music.’ When things first started falling into place for the band, he said that if it ever stopped ‘being about the music’, he was gone. So far, it seems like everybody in the band is on the same vibe. They all keep a pretty low profile.
All of the rustling noises and chatter that had been audible during the break as the other band departed the stage and the crew started setting up for Lynx stopped and there was an eerie hush as the band took the stage.
There was a sweet trill of a flute piping out a sound that made me think of a gentle spring breeze. The drummer joined in, setting a slow, easy rhythm. I heard several chords from the guitar Luke was playing and then his voice. Everything else faded to the background as he started to sing.
I remember when it was just us
used to be about the trust
and love we shared
I remember when you really cared
now I’ve lost you
crystal eyes that unlock my soul
whispers of love left unheard
only you can make me whole
never been able to find
anything like the touch of
your mind
you walked away
didn’t let me say
your crystal eyes unlock my soul
whispers of love left unheard
only you can make me whole
every moment haunted
by the essence of you
this need, this desire
my body, my soul afire
‘cuz your crystal eyes unlock my soul
I remember when…
His voice was deep, slightly husky. He had the kind of voice that could tear your heart out, the kind that could find your hidden pain and wrap itself around it. Now I remembered, really remembered, why I didn’t want to come. Why I didn’t want to see Luke again. He looked so good. Tall, lithe, virile grace, midnight blue eyes blazing with life. His hair fell in thick, glossy, chestnut waves across his shoulders and down his back.
As always, he was dressed in black. Black t-shirt, black jeans and black boots. His left eyebrow was pierced and I could see a multitude of tiny gold hoops hanging from both ears. As his fingers flew over the guitar strings, I could make out a glint of silver on the little finger of his left hand that was identical to the one on my little finger and on Grace’s too. My heart contracted in my chest. He still had it. He still wore it.
Oh God. He was so beautiful my heart ached. I was suffused with such a powerful rush of feeling that my eyes stung with unshed tears. I still loved him. I tried to fight it. Tried to hide it from myself and I had succeeded for a very long time. I was never going to stop loving him, wanting him or needing him.
Grace grabbed my hand in her excitement, “There he is, God, he looks so good, I’m so happy to see him.”
I smiled at her happiness. Somehow, I was gonna get through this. After all, I had to face him sooner or later. Obviously, it was gonna be sooner. There was no way I could get away tonight and make it seem as though nothing was wrong.
I listened to the rest of the show in a daze. All of my senses were raw and heightened by the music, being out in the open beneath the stars and thoughts of being with Luke again.
When we went backstage we were treated like royalty. An assistant was waiting to escort us to Luke’s dressing room. There was a small table full of refreshments.
“Damn, he’s got a good memory,” Grace said as she spied a bowl full of caramel corn. I agreed with her as I snagged a Snickers bar and an ice cold can of Coke.
When Luke entered the room, time stood still for me. I was so thankful for Grace’s customary exuberance. As she made a big fuss over Luke, I was able to attain a degree of composure. They hugged, kissed and laughed at each other.
Luke walked over to me and looked down at me, “Little One, you came. I’m so glad.”
He cradled my face in his hands and gazed at me intently for a few moments and then there was nothing in my world but Luke. All I could see was him. I came back to earth as he hugged me tightly, apologizing for being so sweaty and smelly. Little did he know that I didn’t care. I would have licked him dry if I could.
He released me and my heart started beating again. I was shaking a little with the rush of adrenaline from being so close to him after so long. I didn’t want to let him go. I don’t know where I found the self-control to do so. He left us to take a quick shower.
I surfaced again to find Grace looking at me sympathetically. Please don’t, please don’t, I thought. If she said anything, verbalized those sympathies in any way, I was going to fall apart. I clamped my trembling lips together and took a deep breath. “Nice concert,” I said desperately, wiping my clammy hands on my pants.
Taking her cue from me, Grace smiled at me lovingly and said, “Yeah it was. You know what? I’m gonna go take a look around. Maybe talk to some of the other guys.”
“I’ll go with you,” I said moving to follow her.
“No,” she said firmly. “You stay here. I think it would be nice for you and Luke to spend some time together before we go out for a bite. You forget, I saw him last month when I flew out to one of their shows. You didn’t want to go, remember?”
I nodded. Yeah. I remember. Did she have any idea of what this was doing to me? We had never discussed my feelings for Luke. I am not the world’s greatest communicator. But somehow I had always figured she knew. Grace was so empathic sometimes I felt she could read my mind. That’s why we made such good business partners.
I watched in silence as she left the room. I felt silly for wanting her to stay and act as a buffer between Luke and me. I’m such a drama queen and I am blowing this whole thing way out of proportion. This really is just a meeting between three old friends. As usual, I’m making too much of this.
Luke entered the room and my efforts to psyche myself out fell apart with a resounding crash. He was wet and naked. He had a towel thrown over his shoulders. I watched as he walked over to the small closet, grabbed a pair of pants and a shirt, dropped them across a chair and started toweling himself off.
“Throw me a Snickers bar, will you? I am fuckin’ starving.” I finally blinked. I scooped up a Snickers bar and walked over to him. When I handed it to him he asked me to dry his back.
Dream or nightmare? I wasn’t sure as I slowly toweled him off, trying to make it last. My mouth went dry as I ran the towel across his broad, muscled back. He had a small, tight, rounded ass. I wanted to taste it. I wanted to taste him all over. I wanted to lick him centimeter by centimeter. I wanted his flesh in my mouth. I wanted…
He ate the candy bar as I toweled him off. I moved down to his legs, barely managing to stifle a groan. I wanted to drop the towel and run my hands across his body. I wanted. I wanted. I was going crazy. I quickly adjusted my painfully hard cock in my pants, thankful that his back was to me.
He finished the candy bar and retrieved the towel. “Thanks, Little One. I won’t be long. Just gonna throw some clothes on. Where’s Grace?”
“Out looking around,” I said quietly. I started when I felt him turn me around.
“I’m so glad to see you. I’ve missed you.” Still naked, he embraced me again. If he did that again, I was not going to be responsible for my actions.
Grace entered the room, accompanied by a couple of guys in the band. “Hey, I’m gonna grab a bite to eat with the guys and meet up with you slow pokes later, kay?”
Getting dressed as he spoke, Luke said, “Yeah, we’ll be along shortly.” After they left, Luke looked at me and said, “You know what I REALLY want to do?”
“What?” I asked warily.
“I want to get some good ‘ol Maryland seafood. And then I want to go somewhere and play. Let’s go to Ed’s, I try to make it there every time I come home. You cool with that?”
After I nodded my head yes, he grabbed his keys and said, “Let’s go.”
*****************************************
Ed met us at the door just as we entered his after hours nightclub. Luke had called him to let him know we were coming. It was still relatively early and the place was almost empty.
Luke got up on stage and sat on a chair he had snagged from one of the tables in front of the small platform that we referred to as “the stage”. It was nothing like the venue we had just departed from but Luke never forgot that Ed was one of the first club owners who were willing to give the band a chance. He started playing the song Lynx had opened the show with. Only this time he was playing an acoustic guitar and was unaccompanied.
The sound was totally different. The beat was slower and his voice was harsher. I sat at the table directly in front of him and as he gazed into my eyes while he was singing, I was reminded of many nights like this where he would play for me and ask my opinion of his songs. He had a look on his face that I couldn’t interpret.
He sang to me, staring into my eyes intently, his blue eyes dark and smoky. I felt myself break out into a sweat. Mesmerized against my will, I couldn’t look away, even though I tried. My heart was pounding in my chest and my mouth was dry. I attempted to moisten my lips with my tongue.
A flicker of emotion crossed his face. Finally, he looked down at his hands as he transitioned into another song. I released the breath I was holding and leaned back in the chair. I rolled my shoulders. God, I hadn’t realized I was so tense.
He started playing a song that I thought of as “our song” because it was one of the first songs he had ever written for his current band and he had agonized over it for weeks. He’d play bits and pieces of it to me until it was finished. Being around him like this was bringing back so many memories.
Painful memories that I didn’t want to relive again. Like the night I had finally realized and accepted that I was gay. It had been sneaking up on me for a while. I was always such a bookworm and so much into school that no one ever really said anything to me about girls.
The girls I went to school with were so much older than I that it was pretty obvious that there were no happenings there. When I started college, girls my age were just beginning to enter high school and my family started teasing me about how I was gonna get so much play because I was a “college man”. My brothers were all players and it was assumed that I would be too.
Only it didn’t work out that way. My excuse was always that I was too busy with school or something else. After a while the furor died down and it was business as usual.
Right around the middle of our first semester at school, this guy started hanging around Luke. Steve. I hated that bastard. I mean I really hated him and I couldn’t figure out why. He was pretty quiet, not noisy and hyper like me.
He was always really nice to me. I hated him anyway. He was kinda cute, if you like the type. Short brown hair, brown eyes, a little taller than me, not much though, and slender like me.
He and Luke grew to be good friends. They’d hang out together. I couldn’t go when they went to bars and stuff like that because I was too young, which pissed me off to no end. Luke always included me whenever he could.
One night we were headed out to get a pizza, Grace wasn’t with us, I don’t recall where she was, probably working. All of a sudden, Steve said he had forgotten something. He walked back to Luke’s room and when he got there, he called out, “Luke, c’mere for a sec.”
Luke had rolled his eyes and said, “Be right back. Wait here.”
I waited. And waited. Finally, I walked back to Luke’s room. I had a feeling of dread as I walked down the hall. You know, like in scary movies where the person hears a noise and walks towards it, knowing that they should be running like hell in the opposite direction but for some insane reason they walk towards the nightmare instead of away.
Luke’s bedroom door was closed. I slowly turned the knob and pushed the door open, just a little, so I could see what was going on. Steve was on his knees in front of Luke, licking and sucking on Luke’s cock like it was an all day sucker. Steve’s pants were bunched up around his knees. I could see his slim, white buttocks and his small hand rapidly fisting his cock as he moved his mouth up and down on Luke’s penis.
I was so quiet that I know there was no way Luke could have heard me. He should have been engrossed in the blowjob he was getting. Instead, his closed eyes opened and zeroed right in on me. He looked at me and for a crazy second it was as if I was the one pleasuring him. As if I was the one who had his cock in my mouth.
My mouth actually watered, I wanted it so bad. He bit his lip and I could see his hands tense on the back of Steve’s head. I knew he was about to cum and I ground my teeth together to keep myself from whimpering out loud. I wanted it. I wanted to swallow his sweet load. It was mine. He belonged to me.
All of a sudden, it was like he realized what he was doing and that I was actually there watching. His eyes narrowed and he mouthed angrily, “Get out.” Steve was so into sucking Luke’s cock that he didn’t even notice that I was there.
God, my young heart was such a mess. I hated the fact that I was so turned on by seeing Luke’s cock in someone else’s mouth. I was scared by the fact that I needed it to be me.
I felt a bitter sense of betrayal that he was with someone else. That this was a part of him that I had no idea existed. I closed the door as quietly as I had opened it and I left. I caught the bus home and played hooky for the next couple of days.
I guess my hibernating started then. I didn’t answer the phone and didn’t check my email. I couldn’t face Luke. Although he used the flat of his hand judiciously, Luke had popped me upside my head a million times over the years for doing something stupid or acting like an asshole.
I was a spoiled brat. Luke was the only person in my life who let me know when I was being an asshole. But this was different. I couldn’t see any way to salvage our friendship. I knew he had to be furious with me.
The only person I could talk to was Grace. She didn’t know what was going on; she just knew things weren’t right between Luke and me. Every day she’d say, “talk to him, talk to him.”
I finally got my shit together, and when I returned to school, I went straight to Luke. I met him outside of one of his classes and apologized to him for violating his privacy. I told him I knew better.
I didn’t tell him that I had spent the past couple of days hiding in my room, crying and pretending to my family that I was okay and just busy with schoolwork. Instead, I was being really busy being miserable, licking my wounds and coming to grips with the fact that I was gay.
I had a couple of cousins who were gay. It wasn’t really talked about; it was something that just didn’t matter. I think for me, it wasn’t about whether or not the family was gonna accept me.
It was just, I was already different in so many ways. In families of color, especially those like mine where there are so many genes in the mix, what the kids look like is a toss of the dice. I was a chocolate, cat eyed, small guy with wild ass hair in a family of honey brown, tall, big boned, brown eyed, silken haired, Beautiful Ones.
And me, being the youngest and smallest, of course it was also always about proving I could be the ruffest, tuffest little muthafucka around. Until I realized that if that was gonna be where I was coming from, I would be proving myself over and over again for the rest of my life. I mean it wasn’t like extra inches were gonna appear out of nowhere. So, I got over myself.
Then there were the books. My addiction. From the time I discovered the written word at age four, I have been an inveterate reader. I read everything I could get my hands on. When I was in first grade, I was reading my older brothers’ and sisters’ books. And doing their homework.
I would say stuff and they would look at me in amazement. How the fuck do you know that? I would reply, “I read it in a book.” That became a family catch phrase along with, “Did you read that in a book too?” Guess you have to be there. When one of us says it, it’s fucking hilarious.
When I was younger, though, all of those things were just one more way I was different from everyone else. One more thing that made me feel like I really didn’t belong. So coming to the realization that I was gay really fucked with me.
I also had a sense of relief. Finally, I knew why I hated Steve so much and why I had started feeling this sick, excited feeling whenever I was around Luke. And why I was always so happy to see him and so disappointed when I couldn’t spend time with him. All of these feelings had been existing beneath the surface of everything else occurring in my life. It had been so weird being in college at such a young age and adjusting to that change, that I had been unaware of these other feelings until they surfaced and bit me on the ass.
I was crazy for rehashing this shit over and over, sitting here now listening to Luke’s voice wrap itself around my heart and soul again. I didn’t want to think about it but I couldn’t stop. Pictures of the past were flickering through my mind like pages of a photo album as I listened to him play. His eyes were closed and he was lost in the music.
Believe it or not, Luke and I were able to salvage our friendship after that. But I also saw how Luke really thought of me as a kid brother. It was okay coming from Grace but it really galled me coming from Luke. I wanted him to see me as an equal, as a lover.
After a while it didn’t matter. I’m lying. It did matter. It was like a toothache. The pain is always there but you can distract yourself from it. Up to a point.
Once I accepted the fact that I was gay, and that I was never gonna be able to be with Luke, I was like a kid in a candy store. I kept it on the down low but I was insatiable. I’d see a guy and I would start wondering what he was like. What did he smell like, taste like. I’d watch a guy move and wonder if he could fuck like he moved. I was out of control.
In some circles, I was known as Rabbit. I didn’t give a shit. I am not sure Luke heard about it. One day he pulled me up, gave me a carton of condoms and told me to make sure I was playing safe. I’m still not sure what that was about and at the time I was scared to ask him.
While I drifted off, the club was filling up. I could tell Luke was getting tired. I went over to Ed and let him know that Luke and I needed to be going. Ed gracefully went up to the mike, thanked Luke and we quickly left before anyone could approach him.
“Thanks, Little One,” Luke said gratefully.
“I had selfish motives,” I said with a smile, “so don’t thank me. If I know you even a little anymore, I know that you would’ve played all night, tired or not.”
“I really haven’t changed, Jake,” Luke said quietly. “I’m still me. Just Luke.”
I didn’t want him to be Just Luke. I wanted him to be a rich, famous asshole that I could hate or at least strongly dislike. I wanted him to be someone that I could distance myself from. Because, try as hard as I could to force it into submission, my heart would just not let go of the feelings that I had for Luke.
Luke, the reason for all my late night creeping. The reason I just couldn’t let go and love someone. The reason I try to cover up and say: ‘there’s no way I could be monogamous, I love my freedom too much. I’m a slut, and a very good one. One man is not enough for me.’ The truth is…that I would give all of that up in a fucking heartbeat if I ever had the chance to be with Luke.
Only Luke had made it quite clear that he didn’t want me, that he didn’t see me that way. One thing I give him a lot of credit for. He definitely is expert at letting you down easy. I guess someone who looks like him has to be.
Why did I let Grace talk me into this? This was not a good idea. In a moment I’ll be raw and bleeding at his feet. One look and all my defenses were gone, up in smoke.
I could smell him. We were in his rental on the way to his hotel room. Even that rental car smell couldn’t conceal the scent that was uniquely his. I would recognize it anywhere. It was an instant aphrodisiac.
Every time my hardon would subside, his scent would waft towards me and I’d get hard again. He didn’t smell like anything in particular. Just Luke. It was a smell that was hardwired into my brain just like everything else about him. His smell and everything else about him intoxicated me. I was drunk on him.
My hands itched to tug his hair out of the band he’d pulled it back into when it was wet and he was fresh out of the shower. I replayed him coming towards me naked and wet. His body was lean and tight.
He didn’t have bulky muscles; they were taut and clearly defined. He had a patch of silky, dark brown hair down the center of his chest that thinned as it grew towards his groin. His cock was thick and long, the balls firm and round within his sac. His penis was beautiful. He was cut and the head was a pale rosy pink.
I kept fighting the memory and it kept fighting back, appearing in my mind’s eye when I least expected it. I wanted to devour him, swallow him whole and then do it all over again. I wanted to spend hours tracing every surface of his skin with my tongue. I leaned my head back and closed my eyes, cursing myself.
“You ok? You’re awfully quiet.” He put a calming hand on my leg, which I had been moving back and forth restlessly. “Still hyper though,” he said with a quiet chuckle.
“Just thinking,” I said.
“About?” Luke asked.
“Work stuff,” I replied.
“Stop that shit, I haven’t seen you in forever, I’m kidnapping you. You need to come out from behind that desk and have a little fun. I have a couple of songs I want you to listen to.”
I groaned playfully, just like I used to, pretending that it was the last thing in the world I wanted to do.
He smacked my leg. “Little fucker, you’ve always been a brat.”
I laughed.
***************************************
When we arrived at his hotel room, the minute the door closed he started taking his clothes off. He stripped down to gray cotton boxers then threw his head back and exhaled noisily. “NOW, we can just chill.” He grabbed a couple of bottled waters, plopped down on the sofa and sprawled across it.
I looked at the pile of clothes he had left in the middle of the room. “You’re right,” I said. “You haven’t changed. You’re still a fuckin’ slob.”
With a silly smile across his face he watched me fold his clothes and take them to the bedroom at the far end of the suite. “You haven’t either, brat. You’re still picking up after me. Don’t know why you do that.”
“Somebody has to,” I muttered.
“Sit down,” he patted a space next to him on the couch. “Tell me everything you’ve been doing since the last time I saw you.”
I must have looked at him like I thought he was crazy.
He raised his eyebrows. “What?” he asked. “We’ve got all night. Talk to me.”
I sat down on the couch gingerly. The last time I had seen him, Grace had bulldozed us both into meeting at a bar in downtown Boston one evening when I was there for a quick business trip and Lynx had been there doing a series of shows. It had been awkward but brief thanks to the fact that I had purposely arrived only 15 minutes before I had to leave for the airport.
I am lucky enough to have a job I enjoy doing and I also enjoy talking about it. I told him about some of the projects Grace and I were working on. Even though I was nervous when I first started talking, his obvious interest made it easier. I went on and on and on until finally I realized how much I had been monopolizing the conversation and I stopped.
“Sorry,” I said. “I’m probably boring you.”
“No, you’re not.” When I looked at him skeptically he said, “No, really.” He leaned forward and tugged on one of my braids. “We go way back,” he said quietly. “When I look at you, I realize how many of my good memories have you in them.
To see you like this, I mean, I know it sounds goofy. But, I knew you when you were a bratty little kid. A smart-ass motor mouth. And to see the man you’ve become, it’s just incredible. I like hearing about what you are doing. You, Grace and me, after all this time for us to be so tight, it’s a good thing man, a really good thing.”
I lowered my eyes, not wanting him to see how much his words affected me. Anxiously, I tried to think of something to say that would lighten the mood. I was falling apart inside.
I wanted him, couldn’t have him. I loved him. He loved me but not in the way I needed. I couldn’t stand to be around him knowing that I couldn’t love him the way every part of me was telling me to.
And I was angry. Why couldn’t he love me? Oh shit, now I’m whining. Next thing you know I’ll be crying about how unfair life is. I need a switch to turn my fucking brain off.
I looked at him finally. “I can’t do this, Luke. I can’t do this,” I repeated. I jumped up. He looked at me, blue eyes startled and confused, probably trying to figure out what kind of trip I was on.
To him it must have looked like I started freaking out all of a sudden for no apparent reason. What he didn’t know was that I had been walking the line between sanity and insanity since I first laid eyes on him again after all this time. Spending time with him had pushed my starved heart over the edge.
“Look, I gotta go,” I said, getting up and backing out of the room as I spoke.
He jumped up, “Wait, Jake.”
He tried to run after me but I had a head start and made it to the door before he was halfway across the room.
I heard him calling, “Dammit, Jakie, come back here.”
As I made my way down the stairs, wiping my wet face on my shirtsleeves like a little kid, I realized that I didn’t have a ride home. I didn’t have my cell phone or any money either. I hate carrying things in my pockets and since I thought Grace and I were going to be together all evening, all of my stuff was in her purse. Shit.
I started walking, fueled by heartache and adrenaline. I’m such an asshole. Jesus. I just fucking did a meltdown in front of one of my best friends. He probably thinks I’m psycho.
The worst of it was that there was a part of me that hoped he would come after me. There was a part of me that hoped that we could all live happily ever after like a 1950’s comedy. I’ve been watching too much cable; I can’t seem to leave the classic movie channel alone.
I heard footsteps pounding behind me. My heart rate accelerated. I had no thought of safety when I went running out of the hotel. I like to think I’m tuff but I don’t usually walk down the streets of downtown Baltimore in the middle of night by myself. I kept walking. No sense in stopping. No point in running.
“Jake,” a voice said breathlessly.
My stomach dropped down to my toes. I turned around.
“Jake, what’s wrong?” Luke asked. He grasped my shoulders and stared down at me, eyes full of concern.
“Nothing,” I said.
In frustrated tones, he said, “Then what the fuck was that all about back in the hotel?”
I looked up at him. “Figure it out yourself. Why couldn’t you just let me go?” I asked desperately.
“Jake, tell me please. Just tell me.”
He very delicately wiped the tears from my eyes with the flat of his thumbs. He blotted my drenched cheeks with the sleeves of the sweatshirt he had thrown on. He touched me so gently that I barely felt it. He was close enough to me that I could feel his warm breath upon my face as he exhaled. He cradled my face between the palms of his hands.
“There was a time when you used to come to me when things bothered you,” he said sadly. “I’m really sorry that things between us have changed so much. You know that you can tell me anything.”
He leaned forward and kissed me softly on the lips. His lips were so sweet. It was a generous, kind act of friendship. My body had responded immediately and frantically to his proximity.
My cock was so hard that it was about to burst the confines of my pants. I was short-circuiting. I was hurting, I was turned on and I was scared I was gonna do something stupid.
I clenched my fists to keep from grabbing him and pulling his head down for another kiss. A real kiss. I wanted to taste him, feel his tongue in my mouth, and feel his lips against mine. I stared up at him, speechless.
He traced my eyebrows with a finger. “Your eyes are glowing in the dark,” he said with a smile. “Will you come with me? You don’t have to talk about whatever it is. I really just want to spend time with an old friend. Other than my family, Grace and you, I don’t have anybody in my life who knew me when and it really means a lot to me.”
We walked back to the hotel in silence. Both of us lost in our thoughts. I looked at him and asked, “What are YOU thinking about?”
He looked at me solemnly and said, “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”
I stopped dead in my tracks. “You know what? Even though I used to come to you, you never really came to me with your problems. And it’s the same way now. You say you treasure this, but what we really have is just something that used to be. Not something that means anything now.” As I was talking my voice was getting louder and louder until I was almost shouting by the time I finished.
“Chill, Little One,” Luke said mildly. “You haven’t changed much either. You’re still a hyper, noisy, brat. I was thinking about you. I was wondering what was wrong. I just didn’t want to bring it up again.”
Instead of saying I was sorry, I said, “If you call me Little One in front of anyone else other than Grace, I will kill you.”
He looked at me and burst out laughing.
It wasn’t malicious laughter; it was tender and amused but I wasn’t having it. I narrowed my eyes at him and catching him off guard, grabbed a handful of the sweatshirt he was wearing and pulled him towards me. When we were so close that a piece of paper couldn’t fit between us, I put my hands on the back of his head and forced his mouth onto mine.
I brushed my mouth across his back and forth for endless moments. When he tried to back away, I held on for dear life and wouldn’t let go. I licked his lips, savoring the taste of him. I pushed my tongue into his mouth and he groaned.
“Oh god,” he muttered desperately. He slanted his head and opened his mouth wider, sucking my tongue into the hot, sweet cavern. I had been so hard and so turned on for so long that it didn’t take much time for me to lose awareness of where we were.
My focal point, my north star, was Luke’s mouth. Nothing and no one existed except for the sensation of his mouth devouring mine. He was groaning over and over. He moved even closer into our embrace until I could feel his hard cock grinding against me.
I clutched at his shoulders to keep from sinking into the ground. I’m kissing Luke, I thought to myself with disbelief. Any moment I was going to wake from this dream like I had done a million times.
I felt his hands tugging my t-shirt out of my pants and then felt his calloused thumbs caressing my nipples. As searing tendrils of fire streaked through me, I tore my mouth away from his, threw my head back and groaned.
When he pinched my nipples between his fingers, I clenched my teeth to keep from screaming. I was so turned on I was gonna lose it. Right there, right in the middle of a dark city street, in the middle of the night.
I surfaced briefly. “Luke.”
He kept kissing me voraciously. Somehow I backed myself away from him. I couldn’t think when he touched me.
“Luke.”
He looked at me out of eyes so dark that they were black. His mouth was swollen and wet. He reached for me. “What?” He asked hoarsely.
“We need to get out of here,” I said, staying out of reach. If he touched me again, I was gonna let him fuck me right there.
He looked around and I saw reason slowly reappear. He blushed fiercely, a slowly blooming change of color. I knew that he had been as swept away as I had been.
I grabbed his hand. “Let’s go back to the hotel,” I said.
Every ten feet or so, he would stop me, gather me into his arms and give me another one of his soul shattering kisses until I was ready to bend over and let him do as he wished. I needed him inside of me NOW.
He had regained a semblance of control and he always stopped us before things got out of hand but by the time we arrived at the hotel, we both were lost. We had stopped speaking and were communicating through touch only. When we reached the hotel, Luke grasped my hand tightly as if he was afraid that I would have second thoughts. I stroked my thumb across the surface of his hand in reassurance.
We walked into the hotel, not daring to look at one another. Every time our eyes met we would disappear into a world of our own. When the doors of the elevator closed, Luke finally looked at me. Within seconds of our eyes meeting, his mouth was on mine. He parted my lips with his and kissed me as though he would never stop.
When we reached his floor, I was gasping for breath and struggling for control. My cock was so thick and swollen I could barely walk. Luke grabbed my hand again and led me to his suite.
I realized how much Luke had been holding back when we entered the suite. This time when he kissed me, he entangled his hands in my braids and held my head in place while he ravaged my mouth. He was rough and passionate, biting and sucking at my lips and then entwining his tongue with mine in a fiery dance.
I was drowning in emotion. My senses were saturated with the sensations evoked by Luke wanting me, kissing me, caressing me. I was crazed with desire.
I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t tell him how much I needed him. I could only feel. Hands shaking, I started tugging at his shirt, trying to get it off and running my hands over his chest and back, reveling in the feel of his silken skin under my hands.
He shrugged out of his shirt and released my lips long enough to get the rest of it over his head. He removed my arms from my t-shirt but left it dangling around my neck for a few moments, unwilling to take his mouth away from mine again so soon. Gently he scraped his rough, calloused hands across my nipples. I groaned harshly into his mouth. He feathered his lips across my neck then took my shirt off and tossed it to the side.
Luke trailed soft, velvet kisses down my neck, shoulder and chest while gently pinching and tugging on my nipples. My chest was rising and falling rapidly. My knees buckled when he started alternating between one side and the other lapping, nipping and biting.
“Luke…” I groaned. My voice clogged in my throat and I couldn’t get anything else out.
His lips returned to mine and I suddenly felt my feet leaving the ground as he scooped me up into his arms and carried me into his bedroom. I don’t remember the journey there. Luke kept his lips locked onto mine. I’m not sure how we made it without breaking our necks.
Luke stood me in the center of the room and slowly undressed me. When I stood naked before him, he scanned me slowly and said so hoarsely that his voice was unrecognizable, “You are so beautiful.”
I smiled at him but couldn’t think of anything to say. My mind was blank and I was feeling shy all of a sudden. I moved forward so that I could undress him in turn but he said, “No, I’ll do it. I want to see you. I’ve been waiting for this for a long time.”
I looked at him with surprise. He didn’t notice and didn’t elaborate upon his words. My mouth went dry as his body was slowly revealed. Seeing him naked before had been a sweet surprise. Seeing him naked now was making me crazy, knowing that soon I would be able to taste him, touch him.
He crossed over to me and started kissing me again. Long, languorous, sloppy, wet kisses that had me rubbing against him, trying to tell him without words what I wanted. I removed the clasp from his hair and the brown waves fell down over his back and shoulder. I buried my hands in the fragrant mass.
Luke led me over to the bed and I lay down on my back. He straddled me and started kissing his way down my body. When he began to lick the head of my cock, I arched my back and clenched my fists, trying to keep from grabbing the back of his head and pushing his mouth down until I was buried down his throat. My panting breaths were loud and noisy in the quiet of the room.
After awhile, I couldn’t tell exactly what he was doing. I couldn’t differentiate between the different, intensely pleasurable sensations I was experiencing. My cock enveloped in the hot, moist cavern of his mouth, his finger buried in my ass fucking in and out and then nothing but pure sensation. I writhed and twisted beneath his ministrations, mindless and aching with the need to have him inside of my body.
“Luke…” I stopped when he did something with his fingers and I was lost again. “Luke…” I resumed when I regained the power of speech. “I…”
He sucked the head of my cock strongly for a few heartbeats. My head fell back and I screamed hoarsely.
He moved up and over me and looked down. “Did you like that?” he asked.
I nodded slowly. I tried speech once again. “Luke. Please. I need you. I need you inside me.”
His nostrils flared. He grasped my chin and stared into my eyes.
“You sure?”
I nodded my head. He continued to look at me. “Yes,” I said clearly.
He brushed his lips across mine tenderly. He pressed quick, hot kisses all over my upper torso, leisurely moving down towards my tormented penis. He engulfed its entire length in one swallow while caressing my balls, tracing their surface delicately with the tips of his fingertips.
My toes curled and my entire body tensed. “Luke, stop,” I gasped.
He looked at me, eyes glazed with desire and a sensuous half smile on his face, “Why?” he asked.
“That…. makes…. me…. cum,” I choked out. I took a couple of deep, shaky breaths. “Let me suck you.”
He shook his head no. “This is my party and I’m not done tasting you yet.”
I tried to protest but he put his fingers across my lips in a gesture that obviously meant for me to be silent. He licked and kissed his way up and down my body until I was moaning uncontrollably, unable to keep silent, delirious with pleasure.
He nuzzled his way around my crotch, burying his nose in my pubic hairs licking my balls and the area beneath. He lifted my hips a little to gain access to my hole. I pulled back a little, shy again.
Luke was not gonna be denied access to any part of my body it seemed. He lifted my ass onto his mouth then teasingly licked and nipped all around my puckered anus. He sniffed deeply, “You smell good.”
He spread my legs so that I was totally open to him. Then he licked me there. A long, slow lick with the roughly textured flat of his tongue. “Oh god, oh god, oh god, Luuuuuke,” I groaned. I buried my hands in his hair.
“Mmmmm….” I could feel him murmur into my ass. He lightly and delicately licked at the lips of my anus for long minutes before he roughly thrust his tongue inside, fucking it in and out of my sensitive opening.
All of my awareness narrowed to that place in my body that was itching, burning, and aching so pleasurably that I was incoherent with need for him. I had not understood that my need and desire could deepen to the point that I would have gladly done anything and I mean anything to get him to fuck me.
There was a hunger and an emptiness inside of me that could not be assuaged until I had Luke’s cock buried deep inside of me. I scooted backwards trying to stop him. I could take no more.
I leaned back against the headboard of the bed, weak and breathless with lust. He rose to his knees, ivory skin gleaming in the dim light of the room. Eyes dark and glittering madly.
Impossibly, my cock hardened even further as I looked at him. He was so fine. His chest rose and fell rapidly and he licked his soft, pink lips. His cock was red, swollen, throbbing wildly and had a long stream of precum dangling from the tip. He looked at me and waited.
“Please fuck me Luke,” I begged. I couldn’t read his expression. A look of what might’ve have been relief crossed his face. Did he think I didn’t want him? Did he really think that I would want to stop NOW?
“I want to feel your cock inside of me Luke, I need you.”
He ran a hand through his hair, slid the same hand ever so slowly down his chest, fluffed his pubes and then grasped his cock. He stroked his cock deliberately, rubbing up and down with smooth, practiced motions. My eyes followed his every move.
His eyes had lightened, and there was a teasing glint in them as he asked, “You want this?”
I nodded and slid down onto my back. I raised my knees so that my feet were flat on the bed. I couldn’t play, I wanted him too much. If I touched my cock now, I thought I might cum. Involuntarily, my hips were rocking back and forth. I looked at him, trying to let my face express everything I couldn’t say with words.
Luke made a low sound of need as our eyes held then he reached beneath a pillow and grabbed lube and a condom. I was so ready that I would have taken him easily without the fingers he used to open me up. My hole was moist and eager. He brushed against my prostate and I grabbed his wrist, holding him there until the gush of pleasure subsided.
“Oh god, Luke,” I pleaded, “Give it to me, please.”
I released his wrist and he moved between my legs, replacing his fingers with the head of his cock. As he gradually entered me, it felt so good that tears sprang to my eyes. Luke’s eyes were locked on mine. His teeth were embedded in his bottom lip, eyes blazing midnight slits.
Ohhhhhhhhh. Nothing like this before. Nothing like this, not ever. Oh Luke. My heart shattered into slivers of nothing as Luke penetrated me. Staring into my eyes like he wanted to see into me, really see ME, Luke thrust in and out. Every stroke of his cock was like burning fire, like he was pouring himself into me, a little bit at a time.
Then he stopped. All the way inside of me, the tender skin of his balls up against my ass, he came to a complete stop. I could feel him. His skin against mine, warm and slick with sweat. Damp hair, clean and fresh with the scent of the shampoo he used, falling in a brown, wavy cloud around us.
His cock was embedded deep inside of me, throbbing with each beat of his heart. My ass clenched around his cock with each infinitesimal movement. Helplessly, I shuddered beneath him and my eyes slowly closed.
I was right on the edge and I think he was too. We could stay there forever and I would be content just to be with him but my body was no longer under my complete control and my hips started to rise and fall with the need to feel him thrusting against me.
Luke shivered. He lay fully on top of me and grasped my hips, holding them still. “No,” he whispered. “I want to stay like this forever. Don’t move.”
“I can’t help it,” I groaned. “It feels soooo good. I can’t stop it.” My muscles tightened around him and my hips moved again, resisting his hold.
Luke buried his face against my neck and said, “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You won’t hurt me,” I said. I wrapped my arms around his back and my legs around his waist. He started moving again, very gingerly.
I reached down and grabbed his hard, muscled ass cheeks and set the rhythm, rocking back and forth. He stopped treating me like I was a fragile piece of china and began to rock in sync with the rhythm I established.
“Oh God,” I gasped. “Luke, it feels so good. Please fuck me.”
He lifted my legs onto his shoulders and straightened his arms so that a palm of each hand was next to my head. He stroked in and out slowly and steadily, studying my face carefully, monitoring my response. He built power and speed until he was slamming into me so hard that the sharp sound of his hips crashing into my ass was probably audible in the hotel corridor.
Luke’s mouth was open and several strands of his hair were plastered to his forehead. I could tell that he was still holding back. “Do it,” I pleaded.
His nostrils flared. “I’ve been wanting you for so long,” he said again, voice tight.
I shifted so that my legs were spread as far apart as they could get.
“Uuuungh,”Luke groaned as he sank just a little bit deeper. I used my sphincter muscles to tighten around him then kissed him with all of the passion and love I was feeling inside.
God, Luke went crazy. He just lost it. Every last remnant of control he had been struggling to hold onto disintegrated. He lowered his chest to mine and wrapped his arms around me. Burying his face in my neck, he groaned, “Oh Jakie, Oh Jakie,” over and over. His hips surged forward urgently and he fucked me with all of the strength of his muscular body.
I met his thrusts heatedly. I never wanted it to end but I had been on the edge for too long. Every muscle and bone in my body melted and poured out of the tip of my cock in molten, unbearably pleasurable bursts of my cream. My jaw clenched and I groaned long and loud.
Luke was not far behind me. He emitted a soft, agonized cry. His cock vibrated wildly within me as it spurted out steaming jets of his cum. He trembled violently in my arms and I could feel goose bumps rising on the skin of his back beneath my caressing hands.
He collapsed on me, exhausted. I loved his weight upon me. I felt safe and protected. After awhile, he mustered the energy to roll off of me and gather me into his arms. I kissed him on his cheek. Eyes closed, he responded with a tired smile.
I removed the condom from his spent penis and went to the bathroom. I returned with a hot, wet washcloth and wiped the both of us off. Luke was sleeping and snoring softly by the time I fixed the sheets and covers and laid down beside him. He awakened enough to be aware of my presence at his side because he pulled on me until I was laying on his chest. “Jakie,” he murmured.
***********************************
I lay there wide-eyed and unable to sleep. I felt…I wasn’t sure how I felt. I had never felt this way before. So many things running through my head.
Luke had said he’d wanted me for a long time. I found that hard to believe. He had never shown it in anyway. He’d basically told me I wasn’t his type, a really long time ago.
I felt so happy it scared me. Stupid, I know. There’s this line from a song, something Janet Jackson sings, ‘how empty of me, to be so full of you’, well, that’s how I felt. Like Luke had poured himself into me and now all of the pieces of me fit together into a whole. Feeling so deeply and recognizing how much of my happiness was tied into Luke’s presence in my life was frightening.
He hadn’t said anything about love. He hadn’t really said anything about anything. I hadn’t given him a chance. That was me who grabbed him and kissed him wasn’t it?
I couldn’t believe that he wanted me. If he did, he sure had a funny way of showing it. Way back when, I had let him know how much I loved him and wanted him. And he hadn’t wanted me. Maybe I was an itch he needed to scratch….the one that got away…can’t think of any more clichés but those will do.
There was no way I could do the morning after thing with Luke. I think it would kill me. I got up carefully and started looking for my scattered clothes as quietly as I could.
The sheets rustled and Luke rolled over and up onto an elbow, “Making a quick get away?” he asked.
I went hot, then cold. He’d pulled my card. I searched his face in an attempt to determine how he felt about me as I frantically tried to come up with an answer that would make some kind of sense. Several came to mind but I discarded them. I hadn’t had time to shore up my defenses and my unruly heart answered for me, briefly and honestly.
“It’s what I do,” I said flatly.
“Can you tell me why you’re leaving like this? Why you couldn’t stay and talk to me? Don’t we have at least a little of our old friendship left?”
“Luke, I’m tired. I don’t understand what just happened and I don’t want to do the morning after thing with you. Because of our friendship. I just can’t do it.”
“We made love. Good love,” Luke said.
“You told me you didn’t want me,” I said tremulously.
“I have NEVER said I didn’t want you,” Luke said intensely. “Where did you get a crazy idea like that from?”
He was sitting at the edge of the bed now. I was standing around five feet away, naked and clutching my jeans and my socks like someone was gonna rip them from my grasp.
“That time, after I saw you and Steve together,” I swallowed and continued. “You said something like I wasn’t for you.”
“Yeah, I did say you weren’t for me. And what was the rest of it?” Luke asked gravely.
I summoned the memory that had been emblazoned in my mind for years. I said slowly as I retrieved his words… “Because I was too young for you and I needed to find someone my own age. But you would always be my best friend.” My fourteen-year-old brain had shut down on that part. All I had consciously heard was that he didn’t want me.
He held out his hand. I could not get back into that bed again without knowing how he really felt about me. Once again, my unruly heart took control of my mouth. I looked at him and said, “Luke, I love you.”
My voice cracked. I could feel the pulse in my neck fluttering wildly. I was trembling violently. The air in the room was fraught with tension. Luke’s hand was still raised and open.
At my words, he exhaled noisily as if he had been holding his breath. His eyes hadn’t wavered from mine. The sun had come up and in the faint glow I could see a trickle of tears streaming from his eyes.
He said tenderly, “I know, Little One, and I love you too. More than I will ever be able to tell you but I am willing to spend the rest of my life trying to show you. Will you come to bed now?”
I crept towards his hand fearfully, like a starving wild animal being offered food. Scared, but too hungry to resist. He kept his eyes on mine as if that would give me the strength not to turn away. I placed my hand in his and he pulled me onto his lap with a sigh of relief.
“God, Jakie,” Luke said. “I would have gone after you. I would have found you. You aren’t getting away from me again.
Don’t you know the hardest thing I have ever done was telling you to find someone your own age after you had the guts to tell me you wanted me?”
I looked down. After everything the two of us had been through tonight, I was feeling very much like that fourteen-year-old boy right about now. Only this time, I had my happy ending. Luke lifted my chin with gentle fingers.
He wiped away my tears again. “I love you. I’ve been trying to figure out a way to get close to you again, but you wouldn’t cooperate. I was determined to get to you this time. I just didn’t know how to do it. Out of desperation, I had to go running to Grace for help.” He smiled slightly.
I smiled too, imagining that. Romantic Grace had probably jumped at the chance to bring the two of us together. Luke settled us in to the bed and tucked me into his arms.
Snuggling into him and getting comfortable, I sighed with happiness. He cuddled me closer and I felt like I was where I belonged, finally. I was too wired to sleep and I didn’t think Luke was going to be able to go right back to sleep again either.
“Well,” I said. “I did all the talking earlier. Why don’t you tell me what you’ve been doing for the past couple of years?”
Luke turned on his side, facing me. His dark eyes were soft with a love I could finally see. He lightly caressed the side of my face. “That’s an easy one. I’ve been waiting for you, Jakie.”
THE END