“You weren’t weak,” I refuted. “God, someday I hope you can stop berating yourself.”
“You would’ve gotten through without me, but I’m so glad that you didn’t.” Linc lowered his head until his mouth nearly touched mine.
“Me too,” I whispered against his lips then closed the gap.
I tangled my hands in his hair and kissed him with every ounce of passion I possessed. I released the heartache, the loneliness of time spent apart, and reveled in the joy of our reunion. I ignored the nagging little voice in my head that questioned how long it would last. Linc had a life somewhere else, and Chicago would always be my home. But then he ran his hands slowly over my bare skin as if touching it for the first time, and I forgot to be afraid.
The second time we made love, it was slower, and we both catalogued the changes in each other using our hands, teeth, lips, and tongues. I trailed my lips over Linc’s strong pecs and down the line that bisected his cut abs. Linc nibbled and bit along the hard muscles I developed in my legs from years of running. I placed my nose in the juncture of Linc’s thighs where his natural, masculine smell was the strongest and breathed him in. His tongue got up close and personal with my ass like he said it would. I fucking loved every minute of it.
“I have so much to learn and do,” Linc whispered gravelly after I came hard with his tongue in my ass. I could hear just how close he was to coming too. “Right now, I want one of my favorite things,” he said, flopping to his back on the bed beside where I was still on my hands and knees. I suspected he wanted me to blow him, and I was all for it. “I’m going to get you hard again, and then you’re going to ride me, Rush.” That sounded even better.
He pulled me on top of his chest and ran his hands all over my back, gripping my ass while he made love to my mouth. I was sure that I couldn’t get it up again so soon, but I was wrong. The feel of his hard-on pressed against my stomach and the thorough way he continued to finger my ass had me rebounding quicker than I dreamed possible. I sheathed his cock in latex, smeared on the lube, and mounted Lincoln in the center of my bed. I had one thought in mind when I began to move: I was going to give him the ride of his life.
It took more control and restraint than I knew I had, but it was worth it to draw out his pleasure like he’d done for me all those years ago. We came together, loud and long, then lay in a tangle of sweaty limbs for quite some time.
Linc went to the bathroom to discard the condom and brought back a warm washcloth for me. I was too spent to move, so he lovingly cared for me. I was fast asleep before he climbed back between the sheets. My brain returned to reality a few hours later, but I was too tired to open my eyes or even move. I was convinced I’d dreamt the whole thing, and that I’d come down with some strange virus as an explanation for my fatigue until my leg bumped into his hairier one. I opened my eyes to find Linc sitting up in bed beside me as he looked through my treasure box in the dim light cast by the bedside table lamp.
He wore a sappy smile on his face as a few sentimental tears tracked down his handsome face to disappear in his beard. As if he felt my stare, Linc turned and looked at me. He reached into the box and pulled out the boutonniere we had exchanged at the end of our one and only prom dance.
“I have yours too,” he said, voice thick with emotion. “I’ve absolutely hated dancing since then.”
“Me too.”
“Life is too short to hate dancing,” Linc told me.
“We were just waiting to dance with the right person again,” I said sitting up. I pulled my music up on my phone and hit shuffle. The song that popped up made me laugh. “Pillowtalk.”
“Can I have this dance, Rush?”
“As many as you want.”
The dance was totally different than the one we shared on prom night, and not just because we were both naked. Twenty-six years ago, we thought we were saying goodbye, and the look in our eyes was one of misery and heartbreak. As we spun around in my bedroom, our expressions showed our delight in our rediscovery. We didn’t say goodbye all those years ago, we said until I see you again. My heart pinched in my chest knowing that soon Linc would return to California. I couldn’t help but wonder how long I’d have to wait before he held me in his arms again and turned me in awkward circles in the middle of my bedroom wearing nothing but a look of adoration.
The next morning, I woke up alone in Rush’s bed. I had reached for him before my eyes were fully open, but my hands found cool sheets where I expected to find a warm body. I groaned as I sat up, feeling the results of last night in every muscle in my body. I might’ve vigorously fucked like a teenager, but my body reminded me that those years were long past gone. I didn’t panic that Rush wasn’t in bed with me because I could sense his presence. A quick glance at his bedside clock showed that it was almost ten o’clock. I hadn’t slept that late in… I couldn’t tell you.
I grabbed my borrowed sweats off the floor and pulled them up to my hips. I felt a sexy little smile tug at my lips when I recalled how much Rush liked it when his sweats rode low on my hips, showing off the V-shaped cut of my pelvic muscles. He especially loved to trace it with his tongue. I told my brain to knock it off because it was going to be impossible to piss with a hard-on. The longer it took me to piss, the longer it would take me to find my guy. My nose detected bacon, and not that turkey shit that Phee forced me to eat for the last two decades.
Rush had set out a new, unopened toothbrush on the counter for me to use. I appreciated his thoughtfulness, but couldn’t stop myself from wondering how often he did this? Was there a drawer full of spare toothbrushes for his overnight guests? I was beyond curious, but I didn’t want to get caught rifling through his vanity drawers. Besides, some things a person didn’t need to know. It didn’t matter anyway, because I was back and there would be no revolving door of men. Whoa! Slow it down there, Linc. It was just one night.
It didn’t matter that I wanted it to be so much more, because I didn’t get to unilaterally decide our future. Hell, I’d already done that once when I ran off to Columbus. Maybe this time we take a breath and take things one day at a time. All I knew for certain was that I was staying for the rest of the week. I would work remotely if I needed to, but I wasn’t going anywhere until I had more time with Rush.
I found him in the kitchen, cooking bacon at the stove. Music played softly from a Bose speaker on the counter, and it wasn’t until I got closer that I realized it was one of his favorite Madonna songs from our younger days. I let my eyes roam over his lean, sexy body and mourned that he wasn’t naked. I couldn’t blame the guy for putting a layer of clothes between him and sizzling grease. Unaware that I had entered, he started to dance at the stove as he turned the bacon while Brutus watched from a safe distance.
It was the dog who noticed me first and greeted me with a welcoming woof before he ran to me for an ear scratching. Rush looked over his shoulder and smiled at me.
“Good morning,” Rush said cheerfully.
“Good morning. Have you been up long?”
Rush ran his eyes down the length of my body, lingering at my V playing peekaboo with him. “Which part of me specifically are you inquiring about, Linc?”
“Um, all of you,” I suggested.
“Well, my cock was wide awake before my brain or the rest of my body because it knew you were in the same bed.”
Rush turned back around and shut off the stove before he slid the pan over to a cool burner. My long legs ate up the gap between us. I wrapped my arms around his waist and pulled him tight against my chest while he transferred crisp bacon strips to a paper towel-lined plate to drain.
“What did you do with your morning wood, Rush?” I didn’t recognize my own voice. I’d never heard it so deep and gravelly.
“Well, I wanted to rub it all over you. Maybe paint your torso with cum to mark my territory, but I let you sleep while I tried to tame my eager cock with a long run with Brutus followed by a cool shower. Neither helped much.”
I palmed h
is erection through his sweats, and he pushed his ass into my groin. Jesus, I couldn’t think about anything but coming all over his tight ass. I pulled him away from the stove and guided him to the kitchen island.
“Hands on the counter and don’t move them.”
“Officer, am I under arrest?”
“Fuck yes,” I growled in his ear as I continued to tease him through the cotton, loving the damp spot spreading on the front of his sweats that matched the one on mine. “You’re too fucking sexy to be walking the streets. It’s surely a crime.”
Rush snorted and opened his mouth to speak, but his words died in his throat when I yanked his sweats to his knees. I stepped back and pulled his hips toward me to pop his ass out even more. I lowered my sweats to my thighs, slicked my cock with spit, and pushed my erection between his plump ass cheeks. I gripped both cheeks and squeezed them around my cock as I slid it up and down his crack.
I couldn’t look away from the sexy fucking picture we made. “Christ. I can’t wait to be inside this sweet ass again.” I almost growled that he and his ass were mine, but I caught myself just in time. “Want you so goddamned much, Rush.” I rutted against his fine ass, feeling the telltale signs of a pending orgasm. “Stroke your cock, baby. Come with me.”
Rush cried out as he wrapped his hand around his dick and began stroking it in fast, jerky motions. He was right there with me, I could hear it in the way his breath hitched in his throat and feel it in the way his body tightened.
I painted his ass with my spunk at the same time he sprayed his island cabinet. Rush collapsed against the counter, and I leaned against his back, careful not to put my full weight on him.
“I haven’t been this horny since ninety-three,” Rush said between pants. I snickered because we had found a way to fuck like rabbits our senior year of high school. “Fuck! Charlie horse,” he cried out, stretching his calf. “This sure used to be easier when we were kids.”
“I know what you mean,” I said, massaging my lower back. “I thought I was in great shape, but my body is feeling our marathon sex everywhere today.”
“Let me put the bacon in the microwave so that Brutus doesn’t eat the B in our BLTs while we get cleaned up.”
As I ran soapy hands all over Rush’s body, I mentally calculated if I could stay longer than a week. I hardly ever took time off from work and felt I was overdue for some personal time. I just didn’t want to leave Phee shorthanded.
“What are you thinking about, Lincoln?” Rush asked after I’d gone silent for several minutes. He turned to face me, and I saw worry etched in the lines around his eyes and mouth.
I ran my thumb over the deep V in his brow to smooth the lines. “I’m wondering how long I can manage to stay in Chicago without upsetting everyone’s lives.”
His relieved smile melted my heart, and I wondered how long before Rush would stop bracing himself for me to deliver bad news. “So, you’re saying that you want to hang around here a little longer?”
“Is that okay with you?” It was my turn to brace myself for rejection.
“Better than okay,” he said with a smile. “Best news I’ve had in… twenty-six years.”
Later that afternoon, my knees bounced anxiously while I waited for my kids to arrive at my hotel room. They were stunned to hear that I’d made another surprise visit, but accepted that I decided to swing by to see them since I was in the general region. I had no intention of misleading them, but I also didn’t want them imagining the worst-case scenarios like they had when Phee and I dropped by to tell them we were getting a divorce.
It worked too because neither of them assumed I was dying from cancer, but they both looked at me in silent speculation after I greeted them with hearty hugs. I kind of held on like I might not get another chance.
Kennedy finally broke the silence when she tipped her head to the side and said, “You look different.”
“Different how?” I asked, hoping they couldn’t tell I’d spent the night having the best sex of my life.
“You look like Mom after she met Jackson,” Holden said.
Kennedy gasped then gave her brother an incredulous look. “Wow, you’re a rude little dumbass.”
“I just meant he looks happy,” Holden said defensively.
“You implied that Daddy couldn’t get the job done for mom,” Kennedy informed him.
Holden grimaced and looked at me with apology in his eyes. “I guess that did sound really bad. I’m sorry, Dad.”
“Don’t be,” I told him. I thought about what Rush had said about coming out and how you didn’t just do it once. I knew he was right, because I’d already done it twice, but this time was the scariest. The thought of my kids rejecting me made my stomach churn and my pulse race. I looked into the eyes of my most precious gifts and prayed that they would be open-minded. “You’re right, son. Like Mom, I’ve finally found my happiness.”
“That’s great,” Kennedy said with a warm smile. “You deserve to be happy, Daddy. Have we met her?”
“This is the part where you need to sit down,” I told them. I kept my voice teasing and light, instead of dark and mysterious. I couldn’t expect them to accept me as a gay man if I led with a tone that indicated it was something bad. I blew out a nervous breath once they sat beside each other on the sofa and said, “This isn’t about a specific person that I’m seeing; it’s about me being honest about who I am and what I want out of life.” The silence in the room was deafening as they just looked at me through unblinking eyes. “There’s only a few people who know what I’m about to tell you, Mom and Grandma are two of them.” I opened my mouth to say more, but my breath seized in my throat. Fuck, this was harder than I thought it would be.
Kennedy reached across the coffee table to hold my hand. “Do you remember that time I had a meltdown over getting a C on a midterm exam? Hell, it was so insignificant that I can’t remember what class it was.”
“Algebra II,” Holden supplied. “That tantrum was fucking epic, K.”
“Zip it, dweeb,” Kennedy said, but she grinned from ear to ear as she playfully elbowed her brother. “Anyway, once you talked me off the ledge, you sat me down and told me that you were going to love me no matter what my grades were, the occupation I chose, or who I loved. Do you remember that?” She sounded so fucking mature, and I had never been prouder of her.
“I do.”
“Alright, so it’s my turn because I can see that you’re really struggling with something. If I’m honest, I’ve seen it for a while now. There is nothing you can say or do that will make me love you less, Daddy.”
“What she said,” Holden contributed, hooking a thumb in his sister’s direction. He wasn’t one to get overly mushy, but I saw moments of sensitivity and vulnerability in him. I knew he was going to be an amazing partner when he found the right person to bring those traits out in him.
They smiled reassuringly at me, and I knew, it was now or never. “When I was ten years old, even younger if I’m honest, I fell in love with a boy.” They sat up a little straighter but didn’t say anything. I took that as a good sign and continued. “But being gay wasn’t accepted in eastern Tennessee during the height of the HIV and Aids epidemic in the eighties. I heard things like gay people deserved to get sick and die because they were going against God’s word. People called them perverts and pedophiles, and preachers liked to use them as evidence that the end of the world was looming. I was surrounded by a repressive religion that didn’t support anyone who didn’t look, believe, or love like the parishioners in our church did.”
“Did Grandma and Grandpa say those hideous things?” Kennedy wondered. Holden had remained silent, but I saw the same curiousness in his eyes.
“No, but they didn’t refute it, so I thought they believed the same things. Maybe I wasn’t being fair to them by keeping a secret this big,” I told my kids. “Now I’ll never know if your grandfather loved me or just the idea of me.” My dad wasn’t a demonstrative guy, other than to bitch, so I
didn’t know if he was even capable of love. I felt his loss strongly in that moment, as I tried to reconcile my past with my present, and hopefully my future. Rush’s smiling face from that morning appeared in my mind and the ache dissipated. “Anyway, I walked away from the boy I loved and started a brand-new life when I left for college. I convinced myself that, if I tried hard enough, I could bury that part of myself and live a “normal” life.” I even used air quotes to highlight the ridiculousness of that word.
“It’s a bullshit word,” Kennedy added, “unless it’s used to reference the results of medical tests.”
I was relieved that my daughter seemed okay with the news, but I really wished Holden would say something. He just looked at me with an unreadable expression on his face. “Son, are you angry?”
“No, I’m just surprised is all,” Holden said. “Dad, normal is overrated.”
I smiled and took my first easy breath since they arrived. “You both make excellent points, but I wasn’t brave enough, nor did I have enough faith in myself, to go against the norms I knew. So, I chose denial. I met your mom right away, and I was immediately smitten with her.”
“So, you’re saying that you’re bisexual?” Holden asked. Was he hopeful? Perhaps he thought this was just a phase or part of a midlife crisis.
“It doesn’t matter,” Kennedy snidely said. “Let the man talk.”
“To answer your question, Holden, no, I don’t consider myself bisexual even though I obviously had sex with a woman for more than two decades.” I prayed they wouldn’t ask me how I accomplished that because it wasn’t a conversation I wanted to have with my kids. Instead, I went with, “I loved your mother to the best of my ability, but I couldn’t give her what she truly needed because I’m gay.” There, I said it. Again. I’d keep repeating it until it was no longer necessary. God, I felt so relieved that I slumped back in the club chair I’d chosen.
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