The Beginning (Starting Over)

by Matthew J. Metzger

  He didn’t stop, that time. Drove all the way into that tight body like he’d die if he didn’t. Gabriel’s head bowed momentarily before he snapped it back up, and Aled decided to forgive the rule-breaking on the basis of the ecstatic moan he made instead.

  “Oh God, harder. Harder! Fuck me harder!”

  He did. The yowl was definitely one of pain, but then Gabriel shoved a hand below the counter and began to jack himself.

  “Fuck, I’m so close. I’m so close. Squeeze my tit. Fuck.”

  Aled ripped the cup down, yanking on the nipple ring before seizing the entire breast and holding it still while the other bounced with the force of his thrusts.

  Then Gabriel surprised him.

  Gabriel, who didn’t like anal and usually got off later, got off.

  It hit him like a freight train, and the spasm nearly knocked them both from the counter. The pressure was incredible, and Aled’s climax was both inevitable and hard-won. He ground up into Gabriel’s hips as the world wavered around the edges—then released the phone and saved the footage.

  “Fuck,” he panted. “Fuck.”

  Gabriel slipped from his dick in a messy rush and sat down hard on the floor.

  “Game over,” Aled panted.

  “What? No! Can’t we—”

  “Sorry,” Aled whispered, sliding down to sit on the tiles beside him. Gabriel instantly climbed into his naked lap, kissing his jaw hopefully. “Sorry, sweetheart. Another time. It’s a red for me.”

  “You okay?” Gabriel whispered.

  “Yeah. Fuck yeah. Just done.”

  Gabriel dashed their noses together, and Aled opened one eye to smile at him.

  “Best game ever,” Gabriel whispered.

  “Yeah?”

  “Hello, wanting to carry on here?”

  Aled laughed.

  “You sure you’re okay?” Gabriel whispered, carding his fingers through Aled’s hair. “Need a cuddle or anything?”

  “Yes please, but I am sure, too,” Aled murmured, sighing when Gabriel twisted sideways and kissed his ear, the hopeful lap-straddling turning into a cuddle against the side of the bath, like they were dozing on the sofa at home. “I just think another round might kill my dick. And I had a bit of a twinge when you just walked in here without a fight, so best stop now before the doubts show up.”

  “Okay,” Gabriel said. “Think I’ll go full cuddle mode anyway. That was the hottest game we’ve ever played—I am so keeping that suit and I may go and make up an entire backstory for us when we play it.”

  Aled tipped his head back against the bath with a smile, stroking Gabriel’s bare thigh. He needed a piss. Gabriel was leaking cum and probably a fair amount of blood. They were going to check out fast before the hotel could discover the ruined bed.

  “If I got that at every conference, they’d never keep me in the office,” he murmured.

  “Need a secretary at Tom’s hotel chain?”

  Aled laughed. “Oh please, like you’re not already going to take advantage of your mate’s hotels.”

  “Pot, kettle.”

  “True.”

  “Get a list of them. We’ll cross them off. Like bingo.”

  Aled squeezed, kissed the top of Gabriel’s head, then patted his thigh and let go. “Come on. Nature calls. Then a sex-free shower.”

  “Can I join you anyway?”

  “Bringing some kisses?”

  “Yep.”

  “Join away.”

  He did insist on getting the first aid kit on Gabriel’s abused bits first, but then was followed into the shower by warm kisses and unbridled affection. Aled wasn’t sure if it was aftercare or just Gabriel riding a high, but he didn’t really care. It was nice. It smothered the flicker of doubt like a shield on a candle flame, and neatly partitioned the sex game off from the rest of his life. It had been fun. No safewords used. And Gabriel was cuddling up like they were on a honeymoon.

  “Thanks,” he whispered into ink-black hair.

  “Welcome.”

  “Let’s see if we can’t have a little fun after my last day at work.”

  “Ooh, yes.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Once they had the offer, things went fast.

  Gabriel didn’t know the first thing about moving house or chains or mortgage agreements, and he didn’t have to. All he knew was that Aled came home from work one day, said they had a moving date, and that was the end of it.

  So Gabriel handed in his notice at work, texted Suze about whether she’d had any luck finding him something new, and got ready to go.

  The nerves were building, but there was a thick layer of excitement, too. Once, he would have been too terrified to move an inch without a new job in place. Once, the idea of being unemployed and relying on just Aled’s income had been scary beyond belief.

  Now, he just crossed his fingers it wouldn’t last too long and carried on researching cycling routes and spying on Cornish Grindr on his lunch breaks.

  And so the weeks rolled by, until—

  Until the end.

  Gabriel’s last day of work was a Wednesday.

  They’d booked the moving van for Friday, and Gabriel had opted to stay and help Aled move rather than go down to Nailsea and help Chris. Chris had far less stuff, and Aled had a dodgy back. It only made sense.

  And so his last day at the gym was a Wednesday.

  It was an early shift too, from seven until three. Gabriel usually wasn’t too keen on the early shift, but at least it meant his leaving party was cake and a bit of a fuss at lunchtime instead of stopping them from dragging him to a pub. His colleagues were nice and all, but they really didn’t understand alcoholism.

  But he wasn’t expecting Aled to walk in just after two.

  Whenever Aled came to the gym, they mutually ignored one another. Gabriel liked this job too much to risk it by screwing on the premises. Oh, he’d fucked in Aled’s car in the car park after work occasionally, but that was off-shift and in a vehicle with blacked-out windows. He’d never done it in the building, and he and Aled—at most—gave a bland nod of recognition when they saw each other inside.

  As far as Gabriel’s colleagues knew, he had nothing to do with the ginger guy who used the pool three times a week.

  They exchanged nods as always, but Gabriel’s slight suspicion that Aled was up to something escalated when he walked up the stairs. The pool was downstairs. Nothing Aled ever bothered using was upstairs. And sure enough, seconds later, Gabriel’s phone vibrated in his pocket.

  Aled: Upstairs toilet.

  Gabriel’s pulse quickened. Called it. Aled was going to break the rules on his last day in the building. What a bastard.

  But then…why not? He glanced around. The gym was quiet. The rush wouldn’t start until after four. And the toilets—for obvious reasons—didn’t have any cameras in them. If they were quick…

  He slid his phone back into his pocket, checked his radio and hefted his bucket up.

  “Going to get the loos wiped down before the rush,” he said to Emily. “Give me a buzz if you need anything up front.”

  “Sure thing, sweetie.”

  He meandered up the stairs like nothing was amiss. The upstairs toilets were tucked away towards the back of the building, two small bathrooms opposite the yoga studio that were little more than small tiled squares with a toilet, a sink, a permanently broken hand-dryer and some disability aids so the gym could claim to be accessible. Despite them being upstairs and the only lift in the building breaking down every other day.

  Aled was waiting outside the yoga studio with a sports bag at his feet, and texting on his phone. He ignored Gabriel, so Gabriel ignored him in return. Dropping the closed for cleaning sign outside the men’s room door, he rapped his knuckles on the wood, just in case anyone was preening, and walked in with the bucket and mop to start cleaning. His phone buzzed as he closed the door behind him, and his throat went dry.

  It wasn’t his first time in a public toilet, but it would
be his first time in this public toilet.

  Aled: Continuation of the conference game.

  Oh, fuck yes!

  Aled: Boss finds secretary’s second job.

  Aled: Colour?

  He had to ask?

  Me: Green green green green green!

  That had been the best game they’d ever played, bar none, and Gabriel was wet just at the thought of it. His hands shook as he squeezed out the mop and started cleaning the floor. What was Aled going to do? Fuck his face and come on his T-shirt so Gabriel had to get the spunk off before leaving the toilets and make up some story about splashing himself with the tap? Or make another sex video? Or threaten to? After all, Gabriel was in his work uniform this time. And—

  The door opened and closed, and the lock clicked.

  “Well, well, well.”

  Gabriel straightened up and stiffened at the predatory smile on Aled’s face.

  “I thought it was you,” Aled murmured, looking him up and down in a manner that made Gabriel’s cheeks flush. “Second job?”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “Getting laid,” Aled drawled. “Is this why you only do part-time at the office?”

  “Yes, s-sir. Y-you shouldn’t—”

  “Not anymore,” Aled said. “You’ll be starting full time at the office on Monday as my personal assistant.”

  “B-but—”

  Aled cocked his head, smirking. “Oh, I get it. You do want that nice video we made doing the rounds. Well—” He turned away, unlocking the door. “I can go down to the front desk right now and show them if you—”

  “No.”

  Aled paused.

  “Lock it,” Gabriel whispered.

  The lock clunked loudly.

  “What do you want?”

  “I want you to do your damn job,” Aled drawled. “And that’s not cleaning toilets. It’s meeting my every need.”

  Gabriel took a long, shuddering breath.

  “W-what do you need, sir?”

  “That’s not very polite. Try again.”

  “W-what—” He licked his lips. “How may I be of service, sir?”

  “Better,” Aled purred. “You can start by losing the trousers. There should never be clothes in my way when I want to fuck you.”

  Gabriel knew these games. They were all about anticipation. Aled wasn’t going to touch him. He wasn’t going to hit him or hurt him. Instead, he was going to sit back and blackmail his victim into doing all the hard work themselves—and then say they liked it, because if they hadn’t, they wouldn’t have done it.

  It was a complete mindfuck, and Gabriel loved it.

  He worked off his trainers, then stepped out of his trousers—and then his underwear when Aled raised his eyebrows. The bathroom was cold, and Gabriel shivered in just his polo shirt and socks. He ached for a kiss, but knew full well he wasn’t going to get one. Sex toys like him didn’t get kisses.

  And Aled said, “I’m not going to fuck you.”

  “W-what?”

  Was Gabriel going to have to fuck himself on Aled’s dick? Wank for him on camera? Suck him off on his knees on the hard, cold tiles?

  “Hands on the sink and bend over.”

  Gabriel bit his lip, but turned his back and did as he was told. Aled casually kicked his legs farther apart and Gabriel hiccupped a shaky breath. A toy. He was going to get fucked with a toy instead. Or even Aled’s hand, if he felt really sadistic. Would he really fist Gabriel at work? Would he—

  Gabriel barely stopped the shout from escaping when cold silicon touched his labia. Cold, dry, wide silicon. He knew what it was just from the touch.

  His favourite ribbed dildo. The one that he used to masturbate if nobody was home and he itched too much for a simple hand job to do the trick. The one that touched him in all the right places.

  The one that was just a shade too wide to be comfortable without lube.

  And, of course, Aled hadn’t bothered with that.

  “Fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck…” Gabriel whispered, fingers tightening on the rim of the sink until they turned white with the pressure.

  “Later.”

  It ached, but his dick swelled. It burned, but his blood did too. When it bottomed out and Aled’s chuckle was icy-cold and cruel in the freezing room, Gabriel realised he’d been wriggling to get it deeper, and blushed to the roots of his hair.

  “Don’t look so embarrassed,” Aled murmured, leaning in to kiss his ear as he twisted the dildo inside until Gabriel’s knees shook. “This is nothing compared to that little video.”

  “Please stop…”

  “No chance.”

  Aled abandoned him for a moment, and the sports bag he’d dumped by the door rustled. Gabriel dropped his head, gulping for air against the lust that was coursing through him. Jesus, he wanted to fuck. He wanted to tackle Aled to the floor and demand a blowjob at the very least.

  But then he heard metal clink, and his heart sank.

  Sure enough, the chilly confines of the chastity belt were locked into place, and Gabriel blinked back frustrated tears as Aled tightened the straps and secured it. The key was pressed to Gabriel’s lips for him to kiss, then vanished into Aled’s pocket.

  “Put your clothes back on. Disgusting little whore.”

  The insult scraped along the edges of Gabriel’s kink, and he shivered.

  “You finish your shift. You speak to nobody about this. And when you’re done, I’ll be waiting outside. You get in my car, and then what happens is up to you.”

  “Up—up to me?”

  He didn’t believe it. Of course he didn’t believe it. And when Aled smirked, Gabriel knew that he was right to be suspicious.

  “You can kiss me like a lover and be treated like a high-class whore. Or you can put up a fight and I can break those pretty wrists in a pair of police-issue handcuffs and fuck you like the gutter trash you are. Up to you. But either way—”

  His hand lashed out. Gabriel’s jaw was seized in a painful grip, and the kiss he’d wanted was savage and sore.

  “You don’t work here anymore,” Aled hissed. “Understood?”

  Gabriel stared into cold eyes and swallowed back the hot rush of want.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chris arrived at the crack of dawn.

  Teen years stacking shelves and moving pallets in a warehouse hadn’t been entirely forgotten—with the aid of a furniture dolly pinched from the garage, he’d loaded up a hire van in the early hours and dropped his keys through the solicitors’ office door before four in the morning.

  Why not make use of the insomnia?

  He’d been born and raised in Somerset, yet the sight of its dark, low hills fading in the rear-view mirror did nothing. The sight of Cornwall rising before him under the grey pre-dawn light creeping across the sky, though—that brought a lump to his throat. When he left the arterial route and began to follow the sat nav through winding country lanes and high hedgerows, it felt a little like abandoning the route his entire life had been on and forging ahead with a new one.

  And it was fucking scary.

  He had never expected a chance meeting at a race to lead to this. He’d almost talked himself out of saying hello to the pretty cyclist with the dark eyes. Something had had him tongue-tied, even while his brain insisted that his sexuality made asking Gabriel out a terrible idea. That insistence had rung for years, and yet something about Gabriel had let him ignore it long enough to find out it had never been true.

  But it wasn’t supposed to have happened.

  And it wasn’t supposed to have led him here.

  Not Cornish country roads and a new home in the fields with a good friend and loving boyfriend just across the yard. Not—

  Not happiness, and Christ if that wasn’t a complex mix of pride and embarrassment at admitting that to himself.

  As he guided the hire van through the warren of roads to his new house, Noodle crying plaintively in the carrier on the passenger
seat, Chris wondered if anyone could possibly have predicted this. He’d been an awkward kid, a shit soldier, a lonely adult and he’d never deliberately made a friend in his life. But Gabriel had swept him away, and now here he was. Pulling up in thick fog to a closed gate ten yards back from a narrowing country lane that would become as familiar as the back of his own hand.

  He cut the engine and got out to open the gate.

  The sun was a pale disc on the very lip of the horizon, weak and feeble through the fog. The silence was both calming and unnerving. Hedges loomed darkly around the plot. The keys felt strange in his hand, and the bungalow was deafeningly silent when he unlocked the door.

  “Home sweet home,” he muttered.

  His voice echoed in the empty space, and he paced through each of the empty rooms, mentally mapping where his life would go. The master bedroom could be a gaming den. His bed could go under the window that peeked out at the yard. He could turn the bland beige and white into something better, something more personal, something more permanent.

  He paced back to the van and drove it through the silence until the back lined up perfectly with the front door.

  Then he sat back, cut the ignition and let the quiet claim him for just a moment longer.

  “Home sweet home,” he whispered once more—and it didn’t feel quite so strange.

  Rather than starting with the heavy furniture or settling the annoyed cat, Chris unlocked the back doors of the van and found a small shoebox of photographs. Start small. Start feeling like this was real.

  He lined them up on the bedroom windowsill—Mum, Tim, his passing out parade, Gabriel, Snowdonia at sunrise—then headed back to the van to retrieve his dismantled bed. Noodle cried from the carrier in the passenger seat, but Chris opted to let the cat be until he was done to-ing and fro-ing from the van. He could get himself set up, then sit back with Noodle in their new house and wait for the rest of the pieces to fall into place.

  Aled and Gabriel were setting off today, but likely wouldn’t arrive until the evening. Their moving van might not even make it until the next day. The provisional plan was that they’d show up with enough in the car for that first night, and if the removal van didn’t make it, then they’d set up a tent in the yard and they could spent their first night in Cornwall camping in their new garden, with a campfire under the stars and—Chris suspected—the first of many experiments as to which fast food joints in St Ives were any good.