Hiding the Moon

by Amy Lane

  “I don’t mind,” Ernie said guilelessly, looking at him through the glass.

  “I’m sure you don’t,” Burton muttered, grabbing the washcloth and squirting some soap on it. He’d managed his face, neck, and chest before Ernie spit and put his hand on the shower door handle. “Hey, what’re you—”

  The door slid open and Ernie stepped in, naked, pale body glowing like the moon.

  Burton swallowed hard. Ernie was lean—almost skinny—but his chest and arms had some definition, probably from working at the bakery. His thighs and calves were wiry—he walked lots and danced all night, so of course they were—and his stomach was flat, almost concave.

  His little pink nipples were fascinating, and for a moment Burton stared at them, the only bit of color in that lean body besides that thatch of dark pubic hair at the end of the happy trail below.

  Ernie held out his hand for the washrag, and Burton passed it to him in a daze. Ernie took a step forward, then another one, close enough to catch the shower spray, close enough for their bodies to touch if either one of them took so much as a deep breath.

  “Did you finish?” Ernie asked, the water spiking his dark lashes around his eyes like points in a star.

  “No,” Burton said, voice dry. “Uh… pits, crevices—”

  “Mm… lift your arms.”

  Burton did. The washrag was wielded firmly—it didn’t tickle under each arm, but it did scrub, and Ernie turned him so his back was to Ernie’s front.

  “I’m going to get real personal,” Ernie said softly in his ear. He was taller than he seemed, only an inch or two shorter than Burton himself, who was over six feet. “You are built like a tank, but all you gotta do to stop me is tell me no.”

  No. I don’t do this. I don’t do this with strangers. I’ve never done this with a man before. You and me need to talk—

  “I’ll tell you everything when we’re done,” Ernie murmured, lips skimming Burton’s shoulders. “But Lee, I think you need this now. I mean, it’s practically the only skill I have.”

  The washrag moved low over Burton’s stomach, and Burton took a breath to tell him that wasn’t true.

  Then it drifted to his cock, and Burton lost the wind to tell him anything at all.

  “Spread your legs a little,” Ernie whispered. “I’m going to get your… ah, yeah.”

  Personal wasn’t even the word for it. The washrag moved between his legs, spending a lavish, soapy moment on each ball, and then… oh Lord, the crease of Burton’s ass. Burton made a whimpering sound.

  “You want me to stop?”

  Yes, because I like this and I shouldn’t and—

  Burton put his hands flat against the wall and leaned forward, spreading his legs. It was like his brain was saying all the things it should be but his body was on a whole other mission.

  Ernie reached over him and grabbed the showerhead, then hosed off all Burton’s vulnerable bits. For a moment Burton watched as the soap went down the drain and wondered if his inhibitions went with it.

  “Your turn,” Ernie said, sounding happy. Well, of course. Ernie was just fine with sex, just fine with being gay. Ernie went to clubs and trusted that only the nice people would feel him up, put their hands on him, take him home to those tangles of bodies where the sex protected his fragile mind.

  Burton felt a moment of hostility as he took the washrag, thinking it wasn’t fair that Ernie should know all these things about showers and bodies and how what they were doing was going to end. But when he turned around, Ernie had assumed the same position Burton had, and his bitterness washed away too.

  He was totally and completely vulnerable.

  And Burton had just made himself that way for Ernie, and Ernie had done nothing but wash him, gently and firmly.

  Burton took a deep breath and began to soap his back. Ernie let out a happy sigh and wiggled his shoulders, helping Burton out. Then Burton worked his way to Ernie’s pits and took his cues from Ernie’s own ministration, being firm so he didn’t tickle. Flanks, hips, backside—but not too personal—and the back of the thighs followed, and then he paused.

  “Chickening out?” Ernie taunted softly.

  Burton moved closer so he could wrap his arms around the boy’s (man’s!) chest and soap that. His front to Ernie’s back, his groin pressed against Ernie’s bottom.

  His cock swelled, and he pretended it wasn’t happening.

  Instead he kept his movements to the washrag, but he could tell by the way Ernie shivered that he liked the roughness over his nipples.

  Just keep going… and then what? You’re going to wash each other and this is going to end?

  His hand stalled out below Ernie’s navel, and for a moment he couldn’t breathe. Then Ernie grabbed his wrist and guided him, slowly, over his groin, between his thighs. He let go of Burton’s hand for a moment and propped his foot on the side of the shower and spoke into the sudden silence.

  “Everything, Lee. You can do it.”

  Burton closed his eyes against the wave of arousal that swept him, and his cock, already thick and hard, swelled to the point of aching. More than anything, he wanted to wash this guy’s crease, his asshole, the taint below his balls.

  His hands shook and he tried not to be rough, but Ernie grunted, not sounding put off at all.

  “My God, you want me,” he moaned breathily. “Now rinse.”

  Burton didn’t even ask why. Ernie leaned forward, legs spread, and Burton could see his hole, clean and pink, and fought the urge to lick absolutely everything he’d just dragged the washrag over.

  Everything.

  He used the showerhead to rinse away the suds and thought longingly of clean skin and not too much soap. He turned around and shut off the shower, almost disappointed when he realized Ernie had reached outside for a towel for each of them. Burton took the towel and wiped his face first, then started drying everything off, when Ernie stopped him.

  “What?” Burton whispered, cock aching, body confused and aroused, heart crying out for a thing it had never defined.

  “Now’s when you’re glad you brushed your teeth,” Ernie whispered back, and after touching each other privately, intimately, his mouth on Burton’s felt overdue, like they should have kissed the moment they met.

  Burton groaned, pushed harder, devouring him….

  Drinking him in like nectar.

  Ernie pulled his hips forward until their bodies were grinding together, only the towels between them. Burton dropped his towel and cupped Ernie’s lean behind, kneading and pulling, until Ernie broke away and moaned.

  “Are you ready?” he asked.

  “For what?” Obvious question. Obvious answer. But Burton had never felt less like the obvious was true.

  “To taste all the parts of me,” Ernie asked. “To know my body inside.”

  Weak. Burton’s knees went weak as he imagined thrusting inside Ernie’s pink and winking hole.

  “All of it,” he begged, no longer surprised when his mouth or his hands or his cock took over and ran the operation. “I want to know all of you.”

  Ernie bit his lip again, sucking it into his mouth.

  “I’ve been waiting my whole life for you to ask.”

  BURTON GOT back to the room in time to see Ernie pull back the covers, revealing the slightly rumpled sheets, before he grabbed something from the back pocket of his jeans and lay down.

  “What’s that?” Burton asked, his suspicion hitting him hard. No drugs. No X. None of that crap in his bed—“Oh.”

  His entire body washed hot. A condom and lubricant.

  “You just kept that in your pocket?” he asked. Ernie was stretching out luxuriously on the high-thread-count cotton sheets, his soft pink body almost too delicate to be real.

  “Sex keeps my brain safe,” Ernie said, a sad little smile on his face. “I don’t often get to have it with somebody I actually like.”

  “You don’t even know me,” Burton mumbled, embarrassed. Like he was a reward or somethi
ng. “And we’re not having—”

  “Sh.” Ernie stood and placed two fingers over Burton’s lips. “Don’t lie,” he whispered. “Not now. You promised.”

  Oh. It really had been a promise. Burton closed his eyes and licked Ernie’s fingers. Ernie moaned and shivered, tilting his head back like Burton’s mouth was a luxury, and Burton’s skin cried out for more. He sucked those fingers into his mouth all the way, tongue hard on his palate. Ernie sagged against him, their bodies soft from the shower, bare, clean, and warm.

  He opened his eyes when Ernie pulled his fingers out with a pop and darted a wicked glance up from under thick black lashes.

  “See?” Ernie said, voice as wicked as his eyes. “That wasn’t hard. Better things to do with your mouth than lie.” He punctuated this with a kiss along Burton’s shoulder, the glide of his lips down Burton’s collarbone, and tiny fingertip pucker-kisses down Burton’s other side. Burton slid his arms up Ernie’s biceps, feeling the hard little muscles under that soft moon-pale skin. Ernie kept teasing him, his shoulders, his collarbones, his chest, until his lips accidentally on purpose brushed Burton’s nipples.

  All the air left his body, and he whimpered. Oh God, so close… his nipples were tingling, and he wanted… he wanted….

  Ernie paused, breath brushing the sensitive nerve bundle, and stuck out a teasing tongue. Burton, naked and needy, blurted out his biggest fear.

  “I don’t know how to make love to a man.”

  Ernie’s low, breathy chuckle sent ripples of reaction across his skin. “Touch my face,” he whispered, lapping his nipple once.

  Burton looked down at him and moved a tentative hand from his arm to his cheek. Ernie smiled shyly and stuck his tongue out again. He licked harder, and Burton slid his fingers into that glossy dark hair and tightened them.

  Ernie clamped his lips over the nipple and sucked hard.

  Burton let out a moan and tried to keep his knees from buckling.

  “Mm….” More sucking, and then Ernie traced a line to the other nipple, his hand flattening on Burton’s abdomen as he went. He suckled on the other side while the air teased the first nipple and Burton cupped his skull through his hair.

  “But you’re… ah… ah God…. You’re… oh Jesus, Ernie… you’re doing all the work!”

  Ernie popped off the second nipple and grinned again. “You’re letting me touch you.”

  He was so beautiful.

  Burton cupped his cheek again as he stood up straight, then bent his head and touched Ernie’s lips with his own.

  Ernie’s mouth fell open, and he melted into Burton’s arms, that sinuous, boneless kind of melt that Burton had felt girls do. The kind that said Ernie trusted Burton to take care of him, to touch him kindly, to not hurt him. With a growl Burton took over the kiss, ravished his mouth, and backed him up to the bed, where he went willingly. He hit the mattress and scooted back, spreading his thighs wantonly, inviting Burton into the glow of him. Burton paused for a moment and took him in, and Ernie returned his stare.

  “You’re beautiful.”

  They both covered their mouths, and Burton stared at him with wide eyes. They’d both said it. Whispered holy words at the same time.

  Like a prayer.

  Burton had to touch him. Had to run his fingers over his neck, his ribs.

  He clamped his mouth over a pink nipple and sucked, gratified when Ernie arched his back and gasped. “Good,” Ernie urged. “So good.”

  The other one was just as delicious.

  Ernie’s body underneath his responded with abandon, undulating against him. His cock wobbled, a wild thing, streaking a damp trail against Burton’s hip, his stomach, his inner thigh. As Burton plied his tongue, Ernie gave a little cry and ground up against Burton’s groin. A hot spurt of precome spread between them.

  “What do you want to do?” Ernie whispered, grinding again.

  Burton collapsed against him, burying his face against Ernie’s throat, and tried hard to pull himself together. With a girl this would be the part where they fucked—Mother Nature’s lock and key—but this was a man, and the lock and key fit differently, and Burton needed the rules.

  “Everything,” he said, half laughing into the haven of Ernie’s hair and his shoulder. “Kid, I want to eat you alive.”

  “Then let’s start there.” Ernie kissed his forehead, a benediction of desire. “Go ahead, Lee. Touch it. Taste it. Do what you want done. No teeth, that’s all I ask.”

  He smelled so good! Burton sucked on his neck, then licked to his earlobe, sucked that into his mouth and nibbled.

  “That’s right,” Ernie hissed. “Just, you know, lower.”

  Down. Every inch of skin a salty, smooth, sweet, and naughty temptation. Burton paused at his happy trail, running his fingers through the surprisingly silky hair, then following it down, down, down….

  “Mm….”

  It was all the encouragement he needed to wrap his fingers around it, surprised at the width, the length.

  “Big,” he murmured, watching a shiny bit of fluid gather in the slit.

  It fascinated him.

  “Not as big as yours,” Ernie told him breathlessly, and Burton bucked against the bed, reminded that he needed release too.

  “But I’m a bulkier guy.” It was almost purple now as Burton stroked, and dripping, hot and… he stuck his tongue out and tasted.

  Good. So good.

  He shuddered and licked it some more.

  “Nungh….”

  In the back of his mind, Burton thought about teasing him, playing with his harp string, flirting his tongue along the edge of the bell. But not now. Not with Ernie bucking against his hand and his precome filling his senses with the bitter salt of desire.

  Not when he wanted so bad to feel it in the back of his throat.

  “Go ahead,” Ernie begged. “God, Lee, please, I’m dying—ahhhhhh!”

  It felt huge, filling his mouth, and he kept his lips over his teeth and let his mouth fill with spit, making himself a hot, wet cave for Ernie to thrust in.

  Ernie bucked, crying out, and Burton kept sucking, squeezing his base with every stroke.

  “My balls,” Ernie begged. “Just… tug… a little harder…. God yes! I’m coming—God, you need to—”

  Taste. Burton needed to taste him.

  He sucked harder, tugged harder, flirted his tongue when he pulled back, and Ernie kicked his feet into the mattress and came.

  Wet and thick, it filled Burton’s throat, and he swallowed.

  It wasn’t oysters like the porn said, but it wasn’t bitter, and he didn’t gag.

  He swallowed again, cock aching, as Ernie continued to spasm at the ministrations of his hand and his mouth.

  Finally Ernie went limp, his hands searching for purchase in the stubble of Burton’s head. Burton let himself be urged up to Ernie’s shoulder, where he rested his cheek for a moment and arched his own hips, desperate for release.

  “You shouldn’t swallow unless you know my history,” Ernie said weakly, sounding guilty.

  “We take PrEP,” Burton said without self-consciousness. “It’s part of our hygiene protocol.” He didn’t add because there was often blood loss on both sides, but Ernie’s little chuff of air told him he got it. “What is your history?” He propped himself up on his elbow and looked soberly at Ernie.

  “My history,” Ernie told him softly, skating his thumb over Burton’s cheekbone, “is that I’ve sucked a lot of dicks and bent over for a lot of guys, but I’ve never looked into eyes like yours and thought I wanted more.”

  Burton closed his eyes, and Ernie invaded his mouth with his thumb. A brief suck, a pop, and Ernie rubbed his lower lip.

  “You still hard?” Ernie asked.

  “God, yes.”

  “Good. Because I… I would really like you to fuck me. Not fair, I know. You just spent all that time making me come and I just want more.”

  Burton smiled, eyes still closed. “I want all of you.”
<
br />   “Good.”

  Something about Ernie’s voice, a break, a catch, something, made Burton open his eyes again. Ernie’s eyes were red-rimmed, like he was close to tears.

  “What?”

  “I won’t be able to go back to strangers,” Ernie said, sounding helpless. “Not after this.”

  A surge of possessiveness shook Burton to his toes. He pushed himself up and took Ernie’s mouth, hard, angry, needy. He pulled back and pinned Ernie with a glare.

  “Good,” he said, voice hoarse. It wasn’t fair of him—he knew that. He had to leave this boy and go back into the surf of undercover, and claiming him wasn’t kind. But Burton had held Ernie’s cock in his mouth, had tasted his spend, and was going to bury himself in the heaven of his body, and Burton didn’t want him to belong to strangers.

  Burton wanted Ernie to belong to him.

  “You’re going,” Ernie murmured.

  “But not yet.”

  Burton kissed down his chin, down his neck, knowing where he was going this time. Here, in this bed, their bodies bare and speaking the same language, he knew exactly what to do.

  The Problem with Homeschooling

  BURTON WAS still fascinated with his body—his cock, growing fat again as Burton kissed his inner thigh. His balls, furry and saggy and heavy and masculine, unmistakably so, when much of Ernie seemed delicate, almost ethereal.

  The mystery of his taint, his cleft, the hidden little pucker there.

  Ernie splayed his knees then, reached under his body, and grabbed his cheeks, spreading himself wide, giving Burton permission to touch, to explore while Ernie arched and moaned. Burton could have done that for hours—maybe—but as he played he found he was rippling his body, grinding up against the bed.

  He needed.

  “Lube,” he demanded, and Ernie fumbled with his hand, shoving the lube ampoule and the condom into grasp. Burton took the condom and rolled it on in a hurry and then squeezed the lubricant on his fingers.

  Gently, teasing, he thrust a finger inside, just to hear Ernie gasp. Oh, that was promising—that little choked cry. He thrust in again, and pulled out, and in and out, and then added another finger, fascinated by what he was doing.