RHV

by DHP

  TO LOVE, HONOR, AND TRUST

  DIANA SHERIDAN

  HALLOWEEN MIXER the poster proclaimed. COME IN COSTUME. Since the event was being sponsored by Surfspray Together, the town of Surfspray’s most active gay organization, Wyatt knew, even though the poster didn’t say it in so many words, that the event was for gays. Technically Wyatt was bi, but he preferred to take his pleasures and meet his mates among the male half of the world, and right now he was mate-less. His last boyfriend, Jon, had accepted a job in Montana, and when Wyatt had found it impractical to go with him, they had had a tearful but final farewell that left Wyatt once again searching for love.

  Maybe he would find it at the mixer.

  Understandably, there was a run on costumes in the nearest costume shop, located in the town of Wynneford, but Wyatt was short of neither ingenuity nor cash, and he visited Tanya, a local seamstress, commissioning her to create a snake costume for him. Two slits in the upper body would allow him to slide his arms out for eating and drinking purposes, and for paying his admission at the door. When he didn’t need to use his hands, he could withdraw his arms inside the costume to look more authentic.

  The night of the mixer, Wyatt observed that most of the attendees had opted for more traditional costumes—Frankenstein monsters, werewolves, ghouls and the like. One other attendee, however, had thought along the same lines as Wyatt had and opted for dressing as a more prosaic creature—a black widow spider. Eight hairy legs made of wire wrapped in black crepe paper and a red hourglass-shaped marking on his stomach left no doubt as to what he was supposed to be. It was quite a clever costume, and Wyatt mentally applauded its wearer’s ingenuity.

  He worked his way through the crowd to make the spider’s acquaintance.

  The wearer of the remarkable costume turned out to be a fellow named Cooper. The two men fell into an easy conversation and soon retreated to a corner, oblivious to the other partiers, the music, and even the food and drinks. By evening’s end they knew they were going to be seeing a lot more of each other.

  Two days later, they got together for their first date. Wyatt had booked a table for two for seven o’clock at Down by the Shore, but they agreed to meet at five-thirty at Questions for drinks first. Wyatt got there just past five twenty-two only to find Cooper already there and playing darts with one of the regulars. Wyatt recognized Matt, a skilled dartsman, from his frequent visits to the establishment.

  “I’m losing,” Cooper groaned with mock despair.

  Matt snickered in exaggerated melodrama-villain style and twirled an imaginary moustache. Then he threw another dart and scored a perfect bullseye.

  The game was over soon enough. “You owe me a beer, man,” Matt declared. Cooper bought a beer for Matt and steered Wyatt to a table. Cooper ordered an ale for himself, and Wyatt requested a scotch on the rocks. Over drinks, they got to know each other better, continuing the process they had begun the evening of the mixer.

  “It’s remarkable how much we have in common,” Cooper observed.

  Wyatt nodded in agreement and began enumerating their shared interests: “Bicycling, archery, nature photography, surfboarding, bluegrass music, 1930s movies—”

  “And we both dislike sushi, rap, hard rock, TV sitcoms, celebrity magazines…” Cooper put in.

  “The perfect couple,” Wyatt said with a laugh. And indeed it seemed they were.

  The waiter brought them their drinks. “To a bright future for us,” Cooper said.

  “I’ll drink to that,” Wyatt agreed. “Now, tell me candidly—what are your faults?”

  “I have a quick temper,” Cooper admitted, “although I get over it quickly, too. And I’m not as trusting as I should be. What about you?”

  “If anything I’m too trusting. I’ve been hurt in matters of the heart, and I’ve been burned in business dealings, too. And I’m just a wee bit vain about my looks.”

  “You should be,” Cooper said. “If I had killer blue eyes and black hair like you, a face that belongs on a movie screen, and a flawless physique, I’d be vain too.”

  “You have nothing to be ashamed of,” said Wyatt, flashing a thumbs-up at Cooper and admiring his reddish-brown, wavy hair, sparkling green eyes, suntanned skin, and broad smile. “And I prefer my guys to have a swimmer’s build, like yours, instead of being overly muscled.”

  “Flattery will get you everywhere,” Cooper said with a wink and took a long pull of his ale.

  “Will it get me into your bed tonight?” Wyatt asked.

  “I have an ironclad rule against sex on the first date,” Cooper answered, dashing Wyatt’s hopes, “but I’m free tomorrow night if you’re available, and that would be our second date.”

  “You’re on!” said Wyatt joyfully.

  By the time they had finished their drinks and gotten into their respective cars for the short drive to the seafood restaurant, Wyatt felt as if he had known Cooper for a long time. And by the time dinner was over—broiled swordfish for Cooper, and a fish stew for Wyatt—they had mutually agreed that they seemed to be at the start of a momentous relationship.

  Skipping drinks the next night, they met at Rosie’s Roost, a local wing joint, where Cooper quickly spilled blue cheese sauce on his shirt.

  “It’s a good thing our plans for the rest of the evening don’t involve clothing,” Wyatt said with a laugh. Cooper chuckled.

  When the waitress asked if the two of them wanted dessert, Wyatt said, “Yes, but not here, thank you.” They had agreed to go to Gooey Goodies if they had any room left after devouring a large platter of wings each.

  At the dessert specialty restaurant, Wyatt ordered a slice of mocha polka, a layer cake that was one of Gooey Goodies’s specialties, and Cooper ordered a napoleon and a root beer float.

  “You do have a sweet tooth,” Wyatt observed. Cooper tore one end off the wrapper of his straw, put the straw into his mouth, blew into it, and shot the wrapper right into Wyatt’s face. “Go back to kindergarten!” Wyatt said, laughing.

  “Yes, I have a sweet tooth. That’s why I like you,” Cooper riposted.

  “Well, thank you for the compliment. And since it’s mutual, let’s start filling up each other’s appointment calendar. What are you doing this weekend?”

  “Flying up to Massachusetts,” Cooper answered. Wyatt lifted an inquisitive eyebrow. “My college roommate is getting married. He and his partner are going to make it legal. Maybe someday soon this backward, benighted state of ours will let gays tie the knot legally too. Howard was the best man at my misguided wedding. God that seems like another lifetime. Anyhow it’s my turn to stand up for him.”

  “You were married?” Wyatt was only mildly surprised.

  “Yes. To a woman. That was over ten years ago. I hadn’t even come out of the closet to myself yet. I was still trying to live as a straight.”

  “There’s another thing we have in common,” Wyatt observed. “I was married to Johanna almost fifteen years ago.”

  “You hadn’t yet realized you were gay either?” Cooper asked.

  Wyatt was about to say, “Actually I’m bi,” and to explain that the mistake he’d made was in falling in love with the wrong person, not necessarily the wrong gender. But just then the waitress arrived at their table to ask if they wanted some coffee or anything else. Cooper asked for the check and then said he was eager to get home. “Yes, it is our second date,” Wyatt said pointedly, and the moment for elaborating on his failed marriage or his sexual preferences had passed.

  While they waited for the waitress to return with their check, Cooper said, “Howard and his partner are having a rather conventional wedding. They did write their own vows, though. None of this, ‘Love, honor, and obey’ crap.”

  “I don’t think anyone says that anymore,” Wyatt observed. “What’s their preferred wording?”

  “‘To love, honor, and trust,’” Cooper said.

  “I like that!” Wyatt said. “Trust is so important.”
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  “To me, too!” Cooper said, impetuously grabbing Wyatt’s hand and squeezing it.

  They hastily finished their desserts and paid the bill, and then Wyatt followed Cooper back to his house.

  “Want anything? Coffee? Water?” Cooper offered.

  “Just you,” Wyatt answered.

  They sat on the sofa and began to kiss and touch each other, making intermittent conversation when their mouths weren’t otherwise occupied. “What prompted you to open a women’s clothing store?” Cooper asked Wyatt, who had already told him all about Fashion Palace, the retail outlet he owned.

  “My dad owns a ladies’ clothing emporium back home,” Wyatt answered, “and my mother worked there, too. I was kinda raised in that shop. Before I was old enough to go to school, my mom would take me to work with her. They had a back room fitted out as a playroom for me. By the time I was fourteen I was waiting on customers after school.”

  “Well, at least I don’t have to worry about your flirting with your customers,” Cooper said with a chuckle. “Wrong gender. Now, if you owned a men’s clothing store….”

  “Well, as a matter of fact,” Wyatt started, wanting to tell Cooper that in fact he was bi, even though he strongly preferred men. But Cooper brought his mouth to Wyatt’s, and with Cooper’s tongue intruding into Wyatt’s mouth and probing and darting and tongue-fucking within his oral confines, not only was Wyatt unable to speak but his brain grew hazy with lust and he quickly forgot what he’d wanted to say. All he wanted to say now was, “Where’s your bedroom?” But he kept that question to himself, letting Cooper set the pace.

  He did drop a hand into Cooper’s lap, though, finding and squeezing the hard protrusion that sprouted between Cooper’s legs.

  “Mmmm,” Cooper purred, seeking out Wyatt’s dick and gifting it with the same treatment. Then he stopped what he was doing and said, “Hey, let’s get you undressed—get upstairs and get some rubbers.” Cooper’s voice was hoarse with lust.

  Wyatt followed Cooper eagerly, stripping out of his clothes when they reached the bedroom and dropping them quickly onto the floor. Opening a night table drawer, Cooper deftly retrieved supplies and threw the condoms and lube on the bed, then shucked his clothes. The two men scrambled onto the bed, not even bothering to peel back the bedspread.

  Cooper’s compressing lips slid their tight, insistent way down and down and down Wyatt’s stiff shaft, and shivers took possession of Wyatt’s body. One series of shivers after another raced through his frame. When at last Cooper had Wyatt’s entire cock throbbing inside his suctioning mouth, he hefted Wyatt’s nutsac in his cupped palm and slowly tightened his grip.

  They were aching with their heavy load, and Wyatt quivered as Cooper rhythmically began to squeeze his balls while continuing to suck. He had a little quirk that added an extra fillip of pleasure; he would swivel his head around as he descended Wyatt’s column and retreated back up it. His lips rubbed Wyatt’s dick even more heavily as he used this little trick. Wyatt’s balls rushed toward an imminent eruption, although he didn’t want to get off yet.

  “How ’bout if I fuck you?” Wyatt gasped.

  “Go for it, dude,” Cooper offered, thrusting the lube and rubbers at Wyatt. Cooper got on his back with his legs up in the air to expose his hole to Wyatt’s gaze.

  Wyatt worked the lube into him first. He knew Cooper was no anal virgin, yet he still wanted to ease his way in to minimize any discomfort. His middle finger, with a large bead of lube on the tip, touched down at his rim and began to rub the grease into his wrinkled opening. Immediately Wyatt saw goosebumps rise on Cooper’s arms and legs.

  Crooking his finger, Wyatt slipped the first joint inside and spread the lube around the inner rim, then probed deeper while he was in there and fingered him some more just for the sheer pleasure of it.

  “Do it, man,” Cooper begged. “Fuck me. I’m ready!”

  Quickly smearing another dab of the lube over the rubbered tip of his dick, Wyatt positioned himself at the entryway and gave one determined lunge forward. He broke through his barriers without much resistance and plowed upward.

  “Yessssssss!” Cooper hissed. “Oh, do it!”

  Wyatt did it. Plunging in and out, he stuffed Cooper’s tunnel full of his cock burrowing deep with every inward thrust and pulling out each time till his tight-gripping sphincter caught Wyatt’s flange. At that point, the head of Wyatt’s cock was all that remained lodged in Cooper’s passage, but a second later he was jamming the full length back into him again.

  Cooper was an active partner, for sure. Rolling his hips up and down on the bed, he thrust against his partner. Each lunge helped capture Wyatt’s plunging dick and propel it ever deeper. But Wyatt upped the ante anyhow, grasping one of Cooper’s hard little pleasure nubbins between his thumb and the side of his forefinger, squeezing that nipple till Cooper groaned with need.

  “Oh, yeah!” he groaned his approval. And still Wyatt went on recklessly spearing in and out of his tight hole. Now Cooper returned the favor, reaching up to Wyatt’s nipples and grabbing one of them. But instead of squeezing it as Wyatt was doing to his, he skittered his thumb rapidly back and forth across the flat top. Shivers cascaded down Wyatt’s body.

  Suddenly the explosion in his balls that had seemed imminent back when Cooper was sucking Wyatt was threatening to erupt again. And this time Wyatt knew it was a threat that would be carried out. “Gonna come,” he seethed between clenched teeth.

  Then he began fucking Cooper with short, sharp strokes that didn’t carry him in all the way but pounded Cooper demandingly as Wyatt plunged in and out.

  “Me too!” Cooper warned.

  He actually got off first. Wyatt figured he must’ve clipped Cooper’s prostate a couple of times on the in-stroke, but suddenly Cooper stiffened, arched, quivered, and then he was shooting wads of cum. As Wyatt felt the warm, thick outpouring trickling down his body, his own balls lurched, and he came just as hard.

  They snuggled together on the bed. “You will stay the night, won’t you?” Cooper asked.

  “Of course,” Wyatt murmured.

  They spent Thanksgiving together, and Christmas too. Romance was really blossoming. They spoke of moving in together and maybe even flying to a state where gay marriage was legal and cementing their relationship legally. “I know we could drive to D.C. and get married there,” Cooper said, “but suppose we fly to Massachusetts so Howard can be my best man again? This time I’m getting it right. No mistakes.”

  “I won’t be making a mistake this time either,” Wyatt said.

  “You never did tell me when you realized you were gay,” Cooper said. “In all these months we’ve never discussed how you realized you had made a mistake in marrying a woman.”

  “Actually I’m bi,” Wyatt said calmly. “The mistake was in marrying the wrong woman—although I do prefer men.”

  They’d been snuggled on the couch, but now Cooper pulled back as if he’d touched a live wire. “What?” he exploded.

  “The mistake wasn’t that she was female,” Wyatt reiterated. “I was—I am—bi. But she was the wrong person, regardless of her gender.”

  “So one day you might leave me for a woman?” a wide-eyed Cooper exclaimed, recoiling even farther from Wyatt.

  “No. I’ll never leave you for anyone. I love you. I’ll never leave you for another man or a woman.”

  “How can I trust you? Trust is so important!”

  “Trust is important,” Wyatt agreed. “And you can trust me just the same as I trust you. I trust you not to leave me for another man or mess around behind my back, and you can absolutely, implicitly trust me for the same—not to leave you or mess around behind your back. Not with a man and not with a woman either.”

  But Cooper wasn’t having any of it. His trust had been shattered. He exploded, screamed, went off on Wyatt thunderously, and told him in no uncertain terms that they were finished. “You never told me you were bi! You led me on
to think you were gay! How can I trust you? You might run off with another man or a woman! No wonder you dressed like a snake for the Halloween mixer. You are a snake. You’re a sneak! A sneaky snake! You deceived me! I can’t trust you!” Although he calmed down quickly, he was resolute that they were finished as a couple.

  They each spent New Year’s Eve alone. Wyatt certainly didn’t feel like celebrating. This was the year he was supposed to have gotten married to Cooper. Instead he was spending the holiday by himself.

  In the bleakness of January, a customer—one of his regulars—came in with an odd request. Did Wyatt have any summer clothes put away somewhere? In a back room, in storage, anywhere where he could get to the items in her size? She was going on a cruise, she explained, and she needed summer weight clothing.

  He had cleared out most of his summer inventory in an end-of-season closeout sale back in August, but he did have a few things put away in the back. As Wyatt had been dealing with her for years, and they were friendly, he engaged her in chit-chat, asking details about the cruise. Then he asked casually, “Once you get these clothes, will you be all ready to go?” and her face clouded.

  “I’m not all set at work yet,” she replied.

  Wyatt knew Lila was a reporter on the local newspaper. “What’s the problem?” he asked. “Meaning no disrespect, but surely there are other writers who can report the news too.”

  Lila looked around the store to see if any other customers were within earshot, then leaned close to Wyatt and said in very hushed tones, “You know the ‘Ask the Advisor’ column?”

  Indeed Wyatt knew the anonymous advice column that ran alongside “Dear Abby” on page 2 of the features section but was locally originated, not nationally syndicated.

  “Keep it under your hat, but I’m the Advisor, and I’m not comfortable handing it over to just any of my co-workers while I’m gone.”

  Wyatt felt his eyes go wide. “You’re the Advisor? You give such wise advice. I‘ve always been your admirer. Except, of course, I never knew it was you.”