by A. J. Truman
“Beyond wasted.”
“Right.” Gideon returned to his bedroom.
Mac couldn’t believe what just transpired. It was the classic “I was so drunk” straight guy excuse, like something out of a movie. And if it were any other guy, he would’ve taken it. He would’ve been hurt and confused, but he would’ve kept his mouth closed.
But not with Gideon.
He kicked the bedroom door open. Gideon burst off his bed in surprise.
“Bullshit,” Mac yelled. “Total, complete, abject bullshit.”
“We were drunk.”
“Bullshit! Bullshit on every straight guy who uses that excuse and expects the gay guy to accept it. We don’t. We’re not stupid!”
“Well, bullshit on you for making me speak first.”
“Don’t use the ‘I was so drunk’ excuse, Gideon.”
“I was!”
“No guy in the history of existence is so drunk that he doesn’t realize that he’s jerking off another dude. If you were so drunk you didn’t know what was happening last night, then you would’ve been too drunk to get it up. And we both know that is not true.”
“Okay!” Gideon said. He slammed his door shut, as if he were afraid of the zero-percent chance that someone could hear them. “We fooled around. People fool around when they’re drunk and it’s late at night.”
“Was this the first time you…with another guy?”
Gideon looked down. Mac could see the fragile guy behind the brave face.
“Yeah.”
“Look, last night…happened. Let’s not pretend it didn’t.”
“Fine. I just don’t want to analyze it.” Gideon sat on his bed, staring out the window.
An experience like this was meant for nothing but analyzing. Lines were crossed. New ground was broken. But Mac knew when to stop pushing, or else he’d push Gideon away. Even though they were just supposed to be roommates, he knew there was a friendship on the line here.
“You know we can’t ignore it,” Mac said. “I, I liked it.”
He thought he saw Gideon’s lips quirk up in a quick smile in the window’s reflection.
“I liked it, too.”
Mac took a tentative step toward the bed. Gideon turned to him.
“I still think girls are hot.”
“Okay.”
“I mean it. I enjoy having sex with girls. I’m not gay,” he said to himself as much as to Mac.
Even if he wasn’t convinced, it still stung to hear Gideon say that. In his head, he thought this conversation might go differently. Gideon is your friend. Don’t ruin it.
“I’m not gay. But fuck, that was really cool. It was new and…I don’t know.”
“You’re curious.” Mac took another step. He was barely an inch from the bed. “Curious is okay.”
“It is?”
“Lots of people are curious. I mean, that’s how I figured out I was gay.”
“I’m not—”
Mac held up a hand. “I know. Just because someone is curious doesn’t mean he’s gay.”
“It’s like taking geology classes,” Gideon said.
Mac scrunched his brow, unable to grasp the metaphor.
“I think geology is interesting, and so I took a class in it. Doesn’t mean I’m going to major in it.”
“Nothing says you can’t take another geology class.”
Mac didn’t realize what he’d just proposed until he heard it aloud.
“Really?”
But Mac considered it more. “If it gets weird for either of us, we’ll say something. We’re friends. I’m not going to bullshit you and put on a brave face.”
“Same here.” Gideon also considered it. “I kinda do want to explore.”
Mac shrugged his shoulders. “We both liked it. Nothing wrong with trying it again.”
“And this is just sex. Our friendship and roommateship stays same as it ever was.”
“Yep.”
Some voice deep inside Mac was trying to object, trying to shout from the rooftops that this would only end in disaster, that as much as he tried to rationalize this exploration, Mac was ultimately ill-equipped to handle being a fuckbuddy.
Sadly, it was overruled.
Mac sat on the bed. He held out his hand, and Gideon shook it.
“Geology class.”
“Geology class,” Mac repeated. The two words got his cock hard. “Is class back in session?”
“Now?”
Mac peeked at Gideon’s tightening boxers. This would be his most extensive social experiment to date.
“Well, I don’t usually do morning classes, but I’ll make an exception since I’m feeling studious today.” Gideon leaned over and consumed Mac in a lust-filled kiss.
I know what I’m doing.
Since Gideon wanted to explore, he was going to let him explore. That’s what friends were for.
Φ
The roommates enjoyed another session of geology class the next night, after Mac finished studying for an exam. Which he could now barely concentrate on.
“How’d you do?” Delia asked him after class.
“It was hard.”
“Really? It wasn’t that bad. It was on what she said it would be.”
Perhaps Delia was right, but Mac realized that he didn’t study last night. He merely stared at some pages while counting down the time in his head until he could put his hands on Gideon.
“You there, Mac?” She waved her hand in front of his face. “I’m sorry Gideon was a dick at Seth’s party. I probably should’ve cut him off.”
“It’s fine. I’m used to it.” Mac felt his cheeks heat up. “It was standard levels of Gideon prickishness.”
“Well, I hope things weren’t awkward when you got home. Did you two make up?”
“In a way.”
Mac’s phone buzzed with a call from his aunt. He and Delia parted ways. He sat on the steps of the library and answered.
“How’s my favorite nephew?”
“Favorite by default,” Mac said. He couldn’t help but smile when he spoke to her. There was something in her voice like lemonade on a hot summer day. “How are you doing, Aunt Rita?”
“I’m good. How’s school going? Is your roommate situation working out?”
“In a way.” Mac knew that joke had short legs.
“A good way, I hope.”
“No, it is. It’s a really nice place. Gideon’s a good guy.”
“I’m happy that you landed on your feet. Have you spoken to Davis at all?”
“Except for an awkward run-in, no.” And Mac realized that this was the first time he’d thought about Davis since running into him at Cherry Stem. Thoughts of Gideon had replaced him, almost a clean swap.
“I still can’t believe…” He could hear her shake her head. “I have to be honest. I was never a big fan of Davis. He didn’t seem like the greatest guy.”
“How so?” Aunt Rita had only met him a handful of times, but she had a way of reading people. She liked to say that she knew someone’s whole movie just by the trailer.
“Well, you’re a loyal guy. Very loyal. And I don’t think he appreciated you.”
“I like the way you think.”
Their conversation went into a valley of silence, and Mac got a nervous feeling. It wasn’t like their usual gaps in talking.
“Mac, do you have a minute to talk?”
Mac felt the concrete steps beneath him, to make sure he was sitting down. When people asked if you had time to talk, it was never a good sign. “We’re already talking, Aunt Rita. Is something wrong?”
“Well, I don’t know how to say this.”
Mac held the phone as close to his ear as he could, until Browerton disappeared around him, and he was back in their living room.
“What is it?” He asked.
“I…well, it seems I have a tumor.”
CHAPTER twelve
Gideon
Gideon stared at his blank notebook. He was never much o
f a note taker in class. He believed everything he needed to know could be found in the textbook or in the lecture slides. Only professors so in love with their own lecturing would fill an exam with questions taken solely from what they say in class.
And today? His notes were completely non-existent.
We’re just experimenting, Gideon told himself repeatedly. He reminded himself of his brilliant geology class metaphor. I’m not gay. Just curious. Curious George, getting his banana.
They’d been ignoring the tension for weeks, but at least now they were dealing with it head-on. They’d fool around a little. The newness would wear off. The itch would be sufficiently scratched. Then, it would be behind them, and they could go back to being roommates, and friends.
And here was the conclusion to where his mental gymnastics brought him: There was a difference between doing gay things and being gay. Being gay was a whole lifestyle. Gay friends, parades, activism, assholes calling you names. Doing gay things was isolated incidents. A kiss here, a hand job there. Isolated. Not part of a lifestyle. That was his story, and he was sticking to it.
It was perfect timing. They were in the middle of the days of atonement, the ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. This was the time to get in your last sins before getting them absolved on the latter holiday. And there was one sin he was dying to do tonight, something that had been tucked deep inside his brain. So he let himself take the rest of class to tune out his professor and imagine Mac exploding with orgasm all over his bed. In a few days, the chapter would end.
Φ
Tonight was a night made for whiskey. Gideon pulled out his bottle of Jameson. He took a swig straight from the bottle before bringing it into the living room. Mac sat on the couch, hands folded in his lap.
Gideon nudged the shot glass over to Mac, whose muscles poked through the tight sleeves of his baby blue polo. During geology class, he was allowed to look.
He picked up his shot glass. Mac’s remained on the table. “Your Jameson is calling for you.”
“I don’t feel like drinking.” Mac lacked any enthusiasm for geology class.
“You feeling okay?” Gideon tried to keep the energy up. Their experimentation was a house of cards. It could topple in disaster at any moment.
“Yeah,” Mac said.
“We don’t have to do this.”
“No, it’s okay. I want to.”
“That was the least convincing answer in history.”
Mac rubbed his palms on his thighs. Gideon was just as nervous in that moment.
“Aunt Rita has a tumor.”
“Shit.”
“She told me today. It’s benign, but she’s still getting surgery to have it removed.”
“Fuck.” Gideon wished he had better words, but sometimes life knocked the wind out of you and all you had left were shit and fuck. “When’s the operation?”
“Next week. She waited to tell me because she didn’t want me to worry.”
“My mom did that, too.” Gideon hadn’t planned to spill any of this, ever. “I was the youngest, so I was the last to know about my dad’s cancer. They think they’re sparing your feelings, but the delay, the waiting, it was the worst part.”
He put his arm around Mac. He hated watching a friend go through this.“I can’t lose her,” Mac whispered. “If I lose her, then I’ll just have my parents.”
“You won’t. They call them benign for a reason. She’ll get the surgery. She will recover.”
“What happened with your dad?”
“Pancreatic. That shit is the worst. It’s hard to detect, and it’ll destroy you in months. It’s the go-big-or-go-home cancer, although nobody gets to go home.”
He nudged Mac’s shot glass closer. This was the absolute best time for a drink.
“I can’t drink alone,” Gideon said, the shot glass in his hand. “That would make me an alcoholic.”
Mac took the shot. Gideon dragged a finger down Mac’s ear, which was all it took to distract his roommate.
Their mouths met in a violent car wreck of need and tension. Mac traveled up to Gideon’s ear to nibble, and his stubble grazed Gideon’s cheek.
Gideon pulled himself away and poured them another shot.
“I’ll pass.”
“You sure?” Gideon held up his shot glass and jiggled it. “I’m drinking alone.”
“Then don’t drink,” Mac said, almost as a challenge.
But that wasn’t an option tonight. Gideon gulped the shot. Then poured himself one more. For Aunt Rita, for his dad.
Nope. Not thinking of my dad right now.
They nodded and looked at the TV, then looked at each other and nodded again. Lots of nodding. Not much else.
He shut off the lamp. Darkness blanketed the apartment, with thin streaks of outside lights peeking in from the blinds. Gideon liked the darkness. It made him brave. He needed some courage for what he wanted to do tonight.
Mac began to massage Gideon’s crotch through his shorts. His touch was firmer, more decisive than a woman’s. He knew the equipment.
Gideon explored Mac’s hot mouth with his tongue. Mac, in turn, massaged harder, turning his grip into a stroke. All of Gideon’s thoughts and notions slipped away, like he was shedding armor. Gideon unzipped his jeans and let his erection into the open. He shivered under Mac’s warm touch, and his heart raced as he pumped. He could barely make out anything in the dark, as he wanted it.
“I want to rim you,” Gideon said with heavy breaths. Hearing the words scared him, but he wanted them to be scared together.
Mac relinquished his grip, and it was like he had turned on the lights.
“You do?”
“Yeah, I’m curious. And I like going down on girls.”
“You do?” Mac asked with more incredulity.
“Yeah, it makes them happy.” Gideon never wanted to have an unhappy customer in bed. He went the extra mile to deliver a good time for his ex-girlfriends. He wanted to do the same for Mac. And if they were going to experiment, he wanted to actually experiment. “Geology class.”
“Geology class.”
Those were the magic words.
They went to Mac’s bedroom and took off all their clothes. Gideon just loved the simple pleasure of being naked with Mac. It felt both innocent and dirty. Mac got on his hands and knees on his bed. Gideon slapped that tight ass, as pale and round as a full moon. Gideon’s cock was like a javelin spear.
I am about to stick my mouth on a guy’s ass. He was standing at the edge of a cliff, ready to jump into the water, staring over the edge.
I am just curious. And horny. Mostly horny.
The first thing Gideon experienced was the scent. It smelled like sex, like sweaty, salty, carnivorous sex. He didn’t expect it to turn him on so much. Lust dilated his pupils. The wrongness was exhilarating, and he wanted more of it. A lot more.
Gideon spat on Mac’s hole and tongued it again, tasting his sweaty, musky taste. Mac quivered under his fingers. Gideon slapped his ass hard, leaving a handprint.
Mac reacted to every touch, every flinch. He was an earthquake under Gideon’s fingers.
He slicked up his finger and entered Mac’s ass. He took his time, letting himself savor the moment and making Mac moan for more. Gideon gave his cock a few healthy strokes.
Gideon alternated between fingers and tongue, a tag team on Mac’s ass. He left no part ungraced by his touch. Mac lifted his ass in approval. Gideon’s fingers traveled over the scar on Mac’s back, ugly and red.
He kissed it, delicately, letting his lips linger for an extended moment.
Suddenly, this moment felt super quiet, and Gideon got freaked out for a second. He returned to the job at hand.
“Fuck!” Mac screamed when Gideon brushed his stubble against his opening. Gideon made sure to do it again. “Yes!”
Girls had moaned for Gideon. Some had even come for him when he went down on them. But it couldn’t hold a candle to this, to Mac groaning in absolute pleasu
re, to his whole, thick, muscular body under Gideon’s strict control. Watching Mac only made Gideon’s cock ache to be touched, but he wanted to see more first.
“Turn over,” Gideon said.
Mac got on his back. His dick spiked in the air. Gideon ran into the sun porch and fished out Big Bird from Mac’s pile of junk, but it wasn’t there.
“Where’s Big Bird?”
“Don’t fucking call it Big Bird.” Mac reached up and kissed Gideon, tasting himself so freely. Gideon liked his eagerness.
Mac opened the top drawer of his nightstand that Gideon had helped him buy off an adjunct professor. He lifted Big Bird into the air, just as a streak of moonlight caught it.
Gideon slapped it against his hand. He felt its heft in his grip.
“Is it cool if we use it?”
“Yeah.” Mac slapped Gideon’s ass, and it vibrated in his chest. Mac got into position, with his legs pulled to his chest.
Gideon spat into his hand and got the toy all slicked up. It was definitely bigger than his fingers. He couldn’t believe this was happening. Dreams literally were coming true.
Mac choked out a gasp when the toy made contact with his ass. Gideon was careful sliding it in. He wasn’t hearing any noises coming from his friend. He glanced up and Mac was squirming.
“Is this okay?”
“No,” Mac said. Gideon pulled it out. “Give me one second.”
He opened the top drawer again and tossed Gideon a bottle of something.
“What’s Astroglide?”
“It’s lube,” Mac said. “It’s like WD-40 for my ass. Put it on the dildo. It’ll make it slide in like you’re closing a drawer.”
Gideon was glad they could still joke. He poured a glob into his hand and slicked it over the sex toy.
“Yes. So much better!” Mac said.
Gideon pushed and pulled with ease. The dildo disappeared inside Mac. He watched Mac’s hole expand and his legs shift above his stomach. Mac breathed heavily, grabbing his legs even tighter. Gideon couldn’t take his eyes off Mac’s flushed face. There was something about seeing Mac losing himself in the moment that was better than Gideon’s times with women. Mac was the strong, silent type, and Gideon was ripping him out of his shell.
He began stroking Mac’s aching cock, sending Mac into the stratosphere.