by Kris Ripper
“I’m not great at talking.” Good opening, cleverly designed to manage expectations. He cleared his throat—into the pick-up—then continued. “I only have a few things to say. Some of you may have noticed that there are two artists featured here tonight, but I’m the only jerk making a speech.”
Scattered laughter.
“And that’s true. The man who inspired this series died in 1991, before some of you were even born. I didn’t know that when I first started working on this. And maybe if I had, it would have discouraged me. At the time I started working on Dusk, I had a whole lot of questions for the man who’d made The Longest Day.” Chad paused, forehead creasing. “I still have so many questions for him. I don’t know if there’s some world after this one for people like me, but if there is, I really hope I can buy Rick Hazletine a drink.”
Suddenly my friends were on either side of me, holding my hands. I was crying. And I wasn’t the only one.
“One of my kids asked me why I was so obsessed with this guy. I’m an old man. I usually vote Republican—though sure as hell not always.” More scattered laughter. “I didn’t have a gay friend who taught me to get in touch with my inner sensitive metrosexual, or whatever. And I’ve cracked my fair share of the kinds of jokes most of you would probably have the management escort me out of here for if you overheard them. I’ve lived a very different life than Hazletine did. He lived a very different life than I have.”
A longer pause, but not too long. There was a strange absence of shuffling feet and murmurs. This was Chad as I’d never seen him before: honest, a little bit raw. His audience seemed to see that. And respect it.
“But art isn’t about individual experiences. At least, good art isn’t. It’s about transcending the individuality of experience, creating in all the spaces in between. That’s why it’s so powerful, why art allows us to touch things we will never live. It’s better than experience; art is the lens through which we view life. When I first started looking at Hazeltine’s work, I felt like I was seeing through his eyes. This series is my attempt to show you what his work looks like through mine.”
They applauded for him. I applauded for him. And when Alex put an arm around me I leaned in, still clapping but also crying.
The work itself seemed to be a hit. Red dots were showing up on a number of labels, including the one for Dusk, and Dawn had a green dot, meaning it was on hold. Hazeltine’s work wasn’t for sale, obviously, but someone (probably Myrrh Macintosh) had done up narratives for almost all of it, so by spreading his work out and enticing people to linger at it, Chad’s stuff was getting more exposure, too.
I’d more or less given up on seeing Myrrh when I almost ran into her coming to see me.
She hugged me. Hard. Then she stepped back and straightened my tie. “You look smart, Justin.”
“Thank you. You look very debonair. I like the scarf.”
Myrrh—fifty-five at the very least—twirled in her black suit, pink and orange scarf flying out around her. “Thank you, young man. And thank you for everything you did to get us here today. Rick would have loved this.”
“It was all Chad. I just did the research.”
“You should be proud of your work.” She leaned in, as if about to impart great wisdom. “I know from herding artists, and you have the knack for it. Anyway, I just wanted to see you before I left.”
“Would you—may I introduce you to my partners?” It came much more smoothly that time. Partners. Potentially vague, except she still had that spark in her eye that made me think she wasn’t missing the nuances of the word.
“I would be honored.”
They were easy to find; they’d made their way outside earlier, but the chill in the air was keeping most people in the gallery. I did introductions again, but faltered when I came to who Myrrh was. Hazeltine’s friend? My colleague? Some random human for whom I felt a non-neutral affinity?
“I was Rick’s partner, I guess you could say,” she explained, twinkling at them. “In so many ways. Mostly business.”
Jamie raised one expressive eyebrow. “I sense a wealth of stories there. It’s lovely to meet you.”
“Many stories I’m afraid I’m far too old to tell tonight. I’m so pleased to meet you. And I must say, I think you’re both very lucky to have this bright young man. He’s quite a gem.”
They smiled and executed another one of those somewhat ridiculous simultaneous cheek kisses that I enjoyed far more than I’d ever admit.
“We know,” Alex said.
“Good.” She flipped the tail of her scarf at us. “Have a good night!”
I surveyed them, shivering without my jacket. “I’d like to stay a little longer. Is that all right?”
“You’re grand, you’re grand. Stay as long as you like.” Jamie brushed a kiss on the back of my hand. “You’re still coming home with us after, right?”
I’d thought this decision would feel heavy, momentous. It didn’t.
“Definitely. I’m gonna use that fancy foaming body wash and all the hot water when we get there.”
“Pizza will be ready by the time you get out.”
With our evening thus planned—and two additional non-cheek-located kisses—I returned to the party.
Chapter Thirty-One
WE ATE PIZZA by the glow of Brooklyn Nine-Nine and drank sparkling water in cute little cans. I kept my plate in my lap long after I was done because putting it on the table with their plates seemed like it would be marking the end of dinner and the beginning of something else.
Something new. Which I was undeniably drawn to and found terrifying. What had Hazeltine said? The future is always an illusion? I am the center of the spiral.
I would have said Alex was the center of the spiral. Or the two of them were. But sitting here in their apartment, knowing that they would be guided by anything I wanted, anything I needed, made me the origin point of our ammonite future.
I finally put my plate on the table. One of them, within seconds, had paused Hulu. Shit.
Eventually someone would have to speak. If I didn’t, they would. But that wasn’t quite right, not after everything else.
I slid to my knees on the rug, facing them, head bowed. They shifted closer, not touching. It should have been easier to speak now that I’d done this thing, started it, but my mind was so full of scraps, of scenes, of all the things we’d done, all the fantasies I’d had, the flotsam and jetsam of years—things I’d thrown away and things I’d tried not to want.
When it came down to it, the only certainty I had was fear that all this would crumble beneath my fingertips if I tried to touch it. Except even now, that certainty seemed less tangible. I imagined it burning away like green wood on a fire, smoking and choking me, but burning all the same.
I looked up. At Alex, then Jamie. “You said everything.”
“We meant it,” she agreed.
Alex held out a hand, which I took, squeezing it so he wouldn’t notice the tremble in mine.
“Will you still…play with other people? I mean…is that what you want?” It wasn’t my right to make demands. Or maybe it was. If not demands, at least to voice an opinion. “I’d rather you didn’t. At least, I don’t want to, and if the two of you were out there picking up people I’d probably be seething with jealousy.”
Alex’s thumb caressed my hand. “I kind of like your jealousy. But no. We hardly ever do anymore.”
“And we never will, if you don’t want us to. We would have always picked you over other people, if that had been an option.”
“So decision made.”
She gestured. “You should seal the deal with a kiss.”
Alex leaned forward and down to capture my lips, but I found myself arching up, meeting him and pushing for more, my hands gripping his forearms as if for stability. Or an outlet for the intensity I didn’t know how to express.
“Jus…” He kissed my jaw, all the way to my ear. “Can I take your shirt off?”
It was technicall
y his shirt, borrowed. So were the pajama pants I had on. Didn’t matter. I pulled off mine, then his for good measure, cupping his shoulder where I knew the damselfly was. “Bedroom. Please.”
Jamie clapped like a giddy schoolgirl. “Yay! Bedroom! You’re a genius!”
I couldn’t help laughing a little. “You’re like a kid on the way to Disneyland.”
“I’m way more excited than that.” She rose from the couch, towering over me, and cupped my cheek. “I’ve been thinking about that tipped flogger.”
“Will you hurt me?”
She shook her head just slightly. “Will you trust me?”
Trust her not to hurt me? I pressed into her palm. “I don’t want to let you down.”
“I don’t have any expectations you can disappoint, love. But before we get to the flogger, I want you to do something for me.”
I wanted to demand details, an exact plan. I forced myself to say, “Anything.”
Jamie’s eyes flashed and for a second I felt her fingernails dig into my skin, as if it was an involuntary contraction. “Do everything to Alex that you’ve always imagined doing. Don’t hold back.”
I dropped my gaze. “We don’t have nearly enough time in the rest of our lives for that.”
“Just make a start on it, then.”
“Okay. You don’t…you won’t feel…” Fucking awkward pauses of me trying to have feelings and express them like a mature adult. “You really want that?”
“Aw, Jus. How could I not want that, when I love the two of you so much? When you are both so fucking beautiful to me? Yes. For me, please. I’ll get mine later.”
And that was a promise, for sure.
“I consent, by the way,” Alex said. “In case anyone wondered.”
Cork and I smiled at each other. She patted his cheek before stepping away. “We really didn’t wonder. Bedroom, lads.”
He stood and held out his hand. Not like I needed help getting to my feet, but I took it anyway and let him pull me up, tow me along behind him.
The damselfly, right there. I stopped him just inside the doorway and kissed his shoulder. Just lips at first, licking traces of him off before going back for more. “This is my mark, you know. You’re stuck with me forever.”
“Uh, yeah. Obviously the point of getting that was that you’d never get rid of me, but let’s pretend it was your idea, Jus.”
I bit down on his skin—not over the ink, beside it—and he laughed. Which couldn’t be allowed to stand. I tugged on his one reliable patch of chest hair, pressing myself against his back, and he slapped my hand away. “Hey! If you accidentally yank those out they might never grow back!”
“Tragedy of desperate proportions,” I mumbled, then dragged my lips across his shoulders and let my hands drift over his belly. “Alex, god.”
“This whole time the only thing you ever thought of doing was kissing my back?”
I groaned, tugging him against my now very stifled dick. “Not the only thing.”
His trousers and shorts—butterflies today, because it was a special occasion—only took a minute to get off and I tumbled him to the bed, where he sprawled, one arm over his head, the other resting on his belly. Alex was built like a grown man who’d never lost his baby fat, and he had the hottest body I’d ever seen, all soft planes I longed to touch, to sink into. No movie star, no athlete, no musician came close.
I swallowed. “You have no idea what you do to me.”
“Some idea, maybe.” His hand drifted down, a teasing pull on his dick.
Jamie’s hands slid around me, resting at the waistband of my pants. “May I?”
“Can I make him come?”
“Mmm hmm. I hope you do.”
“Do you want to control it?”
“Oh, some other day, yes. Not tonight.”
And that idea—she wouldn’t be gentle, I knew; she’d make me gag and choke and I’d both hate and love every second of it—made me moan. “Cork, you asshole.”
She giggled and pushed my pants to my ankles.
“Yay,” Alex said softly, looking me up and down.
“Yay? Seriously?”
His gaze landed squarely on mine. “Yeah. Yay. What’re you gonna do now?”
Everything was beyond the scope of our evening. I decided a whole lot of focus was necessary. “Spread your legs.”
He grinned.
I loved everything about Alexander spread out naked before me. I pulled his legs to my shoulders and ran my hands up and down them, relishing his skin, the pull of muscle and fat beneath, his knobby knees and weirdly delicate ankle bones. The way he gasped when I strayed too close to his intensely ticklish feet. I dragged a fingernail down the inside of his thigh and he writhed.
I’d never skewed toward the kinds of sex that drew on long, teasing bouts of foreplay. I’d never had the opportunity I had now, to run my fingers over the hairs of a man’s flank and listen to his breaths speed up. Or to skim my hands over his belly and chest, flicking his nipples with my thumbs, holding him down with the smallest amount of pressure while he arched up.
God, I’d never felt anything like it. A rush, like power, but there was something more to it, some turbo charge that came from how many times I’d wanted to touch him, and how much he wanted me, and Jamie’s presence, watching every move. Like the three of us were balanced on the threshold between potential and kinetic energy, just about to tip from one to the other: from years of desire to action, intention.
“Jus.” Alex’s hands came down over mine on his chest. “I…” But he didn’t say anything, just looked at me.
“I know.” I turned my hands to hold his. “I love you.”
“Yeah. I love you, too.”
“Now let go so I can get you off at your lady’s request.”
“Pretty sure she’s our lady.”
I pressed my cheek against his leg and began to kiss in the general direction of his dick, which I’d been ignoring. Since that was going well, I kept it up, kissing back up the other leg (he groaned), licking the smooth skin behind his knees, using my thumbs this time on the crease of each thigh until he was practically thrusting up with each stroke.
“Come on, Jus!”
Jamie murmured a low, “Ha. So impatient.”
In the spirit of messing with his head, I gave his dick a light tug, then ducked my head and took his balls in my mouth, swirling my tongue around them, sucking just a bit. Playing, more than anything. Because in this space I didn’t fear humiliation or mockery or even teasing. Whatever I did right now would be right.
So I did what I liked. I spent an extended period of time on his balls before shifting my attention north. He was panting when I finally sucked just the head of his dick in, my lips already slick, his dick dripping precome.
He almost jolted off the bed. Still out of sight, Jamie made a sound that might have been a muffled laugh.
Alex’s heels drummed on my back. “I’m so fucking close. Just, you know, seriously, I’m so fucking close.”
Foreplay is so damn hot.
I enjoyed ramping him up with an actual blowjob now that he was totally at my mercy. His dick bottomed out at the back of my throat and both of his hands landed urgently in my hair. “Do you—can I—I gotta come—”
I rolled my eyes, sucking a bit more enthusiastically, and he came with a cry. Nonverbal communication for the win. This time his heels dug into me harder, no longer pounding, just digging in for the duration until his entire body relaxed, legs falling to the sides, arms flopping over his head.
“Oh Jesus…Jus…oh my god…”
“I’ll second that.” Jamie knelt beside me. “Can I kiss you?”
“That’s a stupid question.” The kiss was deep (in the interests of sharing), and I slid my fingers into her hair.
“Mmm. We should do this all the time.”
“I’m at your service whenever you need Alex to pass out.”
She smiled, her usual smile with more than a hint of softness to it.
“You tired?”
“Exhausted.”
“We can do other things on other nights if you want to go to sleep.”
I poked her in the arm. Hard. “You promised me the tipped flogger.”
“I know, but…”
“Don’t back out now, Cork. Where do you want me?”
“Is against the dresser okay?”
“Obviously.”
I assumed the typical position, leaning, providing her with my body for marking, feeling a bit more alienated from myself in this moment, unable to see them. Was Alex lying on the bed still? Were his eyes even open? Jamie had gone into their gear. I breathed slowly until she came back and stood so close to me her breasts brushed my arm.
“Hey.”
I glanced over. “What’re you waiting for?”
“You, babe. Always you. I’m not doing this until you’re with me.”
“I’m right the fuck here, aren’t I?”
“I dunno, Jus. Are you?”
I took a few more slow breaths before meeting her eyes again. “Yeah. Sorry.” My eyes landed on what she was holding, this lightweight suede flogger. “That thing’s not gonna hurt me.”
“Shh, pet. Trust me.” She let the tails drift across my lower back. “Trust me, Justin.”
It should have been trite, maybe, but when I said, “I trust you,” I meant it.
An agonizingly long warmup, though it was a bit hypocritical for me to resent it after the torture I’d just put Alex through. The falls spread warmth across my skin and when it kept going I sort of sank into it. More than I usually did when something I knew would hurt (anticipated being hurt by) was on the menu. But Jamie seemed content to keep throwing the flogger, and it felt like my back almost expanded to take more of it, to feel more of it.
She stopped, or maybe just paused, and sensation rushed in: heat, a sweet sort of hum along my skin, and then…Jamie. Lips at the top of my spine. One hand curled possessively around my throat as she kissed and licked my vertebrae. My breaths were ragged and I couldn’t help pushing back at her, wanting more—more with the flogger, more with her lips, more with the hand at my throat that I couldn’t help but swallow against, testing the hold.