Reality settles over me. We’ve both just come, we’ve shared our first orgasm together.
You have another man’s jizz all over you, you dirty fucking whore.
CALVIN freezes, the air between us burns ice cold, I look at him, and he looks petrified. This is it.
“Get it off me,” he growls in disgust. He pulls back off the bed, he’s not looking at me, no, he’s looking at the remnants of our…my blood runs cold. “Get it off me. It’s so fucking dirty, so fucking wrong,” he cries out, his voice is different, like a man possessed. His demons are winning.
I scramble off the bed and walk up to him, grabbing his shoulders. “Calvin?”
“It’s wrong, it’s fuck, get it off me, goddammit, fucking get it off of me.” He pulls away from me, his eyes finally meeting mine. “Get the fuck away from me,” he growls at me and I want to run from the room, but it’s not him, it’s not him…get away from him…shower.
I don’t know how I manage to do it, but I get my feet to move, moving away from him, doing as he’s asked me to. Fuck! I knew there wasn’t going to be anything good to come out of this encounter, he warned me, but I’ll be fucking dammed if I knew it would be something like this. I take a deep breath as I turn on the light and reach into the shower, pulling the handle. The shower immediately starts running and warming. I know this isn’t him, this isn’t my Calvin out there. This is the product of what he’s been through, but goddammit, this fucking stings.
I fight the urge to cry, to let this envelope me too. He needs me, he needs me to be strong. I pull a pair of boxers off of the shelf in the bathroom and pull them on. He doesn’t need to see me naked, not right now. I step out of the bathroom and the petrified look is still on his face but now he’s pacing back and forth across my bedroom. “Calvin, come on.” I wave him toward me, but he isn’t hearing me.
He’s mumbling something but I can’t make it out. He looks down at his chest, disgust washes over his face and he tries to touch it, to brush it off, but he always stops himself. “It’s not right, it’s not, you don’t let another man come all over you…” I’m finally able to make out his musings, but I do my best to block him out. Each time he mumbles about disgust it hurts just a little more.
“Calvin, come on, the shower’s ready.”
He looks at me briefly, but it’s like the wheel is turning but the hamster fell off. I walk up to him, behind him as he walks away from me, and I touch his shoulder. There is something in him that shifts. I can see some of the tension leaving his body with my touch, a calming effect of sorts. “Come on Cal, the shower’s ready,” I whisper through heavy emotion, through the unshed tears I want to spill all over the place. I can’t do it though, I have to be strong. I have to be here to pull him back.
I turn him and he follows my lead, toward the bathroom. “Come on, Cal, we’ll get it off of you. We’ll wash it away.” I take a deep breath. The pain is almost too much to bear, but I’ve got to do this, I’ve got to show him that he’s alright, that what’s happened isn’t disgusting but something far more amazing than that. I help him into the walk-in and he steps under the spray, putting his whole body under it.
There is a combination of things that happen. One, the proof of our orgasms slides down his body, two, he shivers, snapping out of whatever trance he was in, and three, he completely crashes. His entire body goes slack, and he starts to fall, but I’m faster. I wrap my arms tightly around him as we both slide to the floor. Full body shaking sobs rip through him as he cries out in agony. He doesn’t fight me, no, he turns into me, snuggling in and burying his face in my chest.
I turn us around so that the water is sliding down my back and I could shield him from the spray. Holding him while he cries brings out every emotion I’d suppressed when this all started. Tears streak down my cheeks but they’re no longer for the selfish reasons I’d had before. My heart breaks for him. Sure, seeing him throw up was one thing, but this, this is pure agony, both on his end and mine.
I gently stroke his back, running my hand through his hair and holding him close to me while he continues to work through it in his head. I don’t say anything. Sometimes the best things are left unsaid and I take my own piece of selfish comfort in knowing that I’m helping calm him down. His crying is softening, he’s even started to sniffle a couple of times, but then he just snuggles into me harder than before.
It isn’t until the water starts to run cold and I feel him shiver against me that I finally find my voice. “Cal, we need to move or we’re going to freeze to death.” I try and succeed in keeping my voice light. It’s light enough that he pulls back, his eyes are fire engine red with tears still sliding down his cheeks when he looks at me. “Can you stand so I can get towels?” I ask as I rub my hands up and down his biceps and he shakes his head, but he slides off of my lap and onto the colder tile. He hisses when the cold registers and I stand up, turning off the shower and stepping out, grabbing one of my big towels from the shelves and taking it back into the shower. I wrap it around him and he unfurls enough to pull it around his front and huddle into it.
“Come on, let’s get you off the tile and into something warm and dry.”
“My clothes are downstairs, in my car.” His voice is shaky, his emotions are threatening to overcome him once again and I don’t want that to happen.
“I have a pair of sweats. They’re too small and I’ve never worn them.” I feel the need to tell him that and I don’t know why. Unsure of how he’d feel putting my previously worn clothes on.
“Worn or not, I’d still wear them,” he tells me softly.
I give him a sad smile and grab my own towel, wrapping it around my waist and drying off the now soaked boxers I was wearing when I got into the shower and I step into the walk-in closet to grab a pair of sweatpants for me and the smaller pair for Calvin, plus one of my t-shirts for him too.
I dry myself off quickly, avoiding truly thinking about what happened not that long ago. I can’t process it, let alone understand it until him and I talk about it. But that isn’t going to be tonight.
Once dressed, I go back into the bathroom and set the clothes on the counter. “I’ll let you do this alone…”
“No, stay, please?” His voice is barely a whisper.
“Of course.” I step back into the shower with him and crouch down before him. His eyes meet mine. They are worried and lined with sadness and fear. “Are you afraid of me?” I ask him gently.
He shakes his head. “I hurt you,” he mumbles.
My heart breaks again. “No, Calvin, you didn’t hurt me, not at all.”
He gives me quizzical look. “You’re not offended by what I said?”
My mouth quirks up in half a smile, confident of his answer. “Only if you meant it.”
He vehemently shakes his head. “No, I… I honestly don’t know what happened, what came over me.”
“I believe that. You were not yourself, you weren’t the Calvin I know,” I tell him with a cock of my head. “Come on, let’s get you dried off.” I hold out my hand and wait for him to take it. When he does I stand up, bringing him with me. I guess being taller and stronger has some advantages and he comes up willingly. I hold him steady, giving him a chance to check his balance before leading him from the shower. His entire body is shaking, though I’m not sure if it’s cold or adrenaline that’s crashing through him, my only goal is to get him dressed and warm.
I rub at his arms, helping him to warm up and dry off. He starts to help me enough that we can get the t-shirt on him. He’s practically swimming in it, and it’s kind of cute seeing him in my t-shirt. I can help but smirk. “What’s so fu..nn..ny?” he says through chattering teeth.
“Not funny. I just like you in my t-shirt,” I tell him and he gives me a smile before he bends down and dries off the rest of himself and pulls on the sweatpants. Once we’re done, I run a brush through my hair and tie it back.
“Leave it untied,” he tells me, “I like it when it’s down.”
&
nbsp; Seeing my Calvin return back to me warms my heart and heals the cracks. I undo the tie and throw it back in the bowl on the counter. I turn toward him and lean against the counter. “Your wish is my command,” I tease and he wraps his arms around my chest, holding onto me for dear life and I can’t help but wrap my arms around him too. Nothing sexual, nothing more than him needing me to hold him and I’m okay with that.
He pulls back after a moment. “Will you lay down with me?” he asks.
I smile. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” I tell him and he leads me from the bathroom and back up onto my bed.
“DO you want under or on top of the covers?” Eric asks from behind me.
“On top, for now,” I tell him as I climb up ahead of him and throw the pillow he was lying on back up with the rest and I lay down, kind of in the middle of the bed, but I’ve done that on purpose. I really need him close to me. I don’t know why, and I can’t explain it, but when he grabbed my shoulders in the middle of my tirade, I felt his comforting touch. I felt him pulling me back down from the ledge of panic I was riding.
It wasn’t until it all washed away that I lost it and he was there to catch me. Jesus, I’ve never cried so hard before in my life. Eric hasn’t climbed onto the bed yet and I turn toward him, reaching out for him. He looks afraid. “I need this. I need you,” I whisper, conveying to him that I want this, that I won’t let the darkness win again. I can’t. I can’t let it overcome what I feel for him and what I feel for us.
He’s careful as he climbs up, his hesitation is palpable and warranted and I’m not sure how to show him that I really do need this. I roll over, facing his side of the bed. “Lay down, please Eric,” I plead and he does, lying down on his back. When he’s settled, I awkwardly move his arm, find a place for mine and I lay down on him, putting my head in the crook of his shoulder and wrapping my other arm around his stomach, holding him to me.
His arm wraps around me, comforting me, chasing away the darkness as his hand comes to my back, holding me to him. “I’m not ready to talk about what happened,” I tell him.
“I didn’t expect you to be.” His hand rubs along my back, comforting me. The vibration of his voice tickles my ear as I snuggle in to him.
I never had a conscious thought about our orgasm. It was never something that I thought about. I’ve had cum on me before, well, my own cum, but still, there was absolutely no way to tell whose was whose, or that I actually saw any of it. The voice came from beyond, like it does often, carrying the tone of that fucked up doctor who drilled all that nonsense into my head. He prattled on and on constantly about how being gay is wrong, it goes against nature and it goes against God. The phrase he used to always refer to being with someone who was gay or had gay tendencies was to call them a whore, because only whores would willingly sleep with people of the same sex.
I can’t help but wonder now how that man slept at night, or even how he sleeps today. I suppose it’s easy to do if you’ve managed to convince yourself that what you’re preaching is truth.
Though I’d won the lawsuit against him, the money was paid out to a trustee who then pays me, so whether or not the man is alive is irrelevant and after today, I hope he’s dead because if he’s not, there is very little in this world that would stop me from killing him.
“Can I ask you something?” Eric asks, interrupting my musings.
“Anything.” I shift my head to look at him, his eyes are full of his own unshed tears and I want to wipe them away, but I stay put.
“Have you ever considered reprogramming?”
I lift my head. “Reprogramming?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know what else to call what you’ve been through, behavior training, I don’t know. I was just wondering if you’d ever considered that? Going back into intense therapy to reverse course?”
I shake my head. “One of the first doctors I’d had suggested the same thing, but unfortunately, it’s not like a ninety-day rehab. It took them over two years to make me think the way that I do, it would likely take that long or longer to undo the damage that was done. Why do you ask?” By the time I ask that question, my voice is barely above a whisper and full of curiosity more than anything.
He sighs. “I just thought that it might help you more because that…” His eyes look away from me, toward the ceiling and he blinks rapidly a few times. “I won’t lie, Cal, that was scary as hell.”
I prop myself up on my elbow, looking at him, searching his features for any sign that this is his way of telling me good-bye, his way of telling me that he can’t handle this, but I see none. I feel nothing but concern when his hand slides up and down my back again, his other hand intertwining in mine on his stomach. In a way, I can’t blame him if he wants to run away from me. “It gets easier,” I breathe. “Though I’ve never had a reaction like that before, with women, I’ve had the similar feelings of shame and disgust, feelings that are often washed away by a shower or two. Even still to this day, showering post-sex is a requirement. But I have never broken down like I did.”
He looks at me and asks somberly, “What happened?”
I look at our joined hands, resting along his stomach. “I felt ashamed of what happened, not between us, but the way I lost it. I was scared that you were going to go running in the opposite direction from me. Then when I realized you weren’t going anywhere, it all came crashing over me. All the hate, all the pain, all the unnecessary reprogramming, as you call it.” I give him a small smile, letting him know that I don’t disagree with his assessment of submersion therapy. “Everything that has ever been pent up inside me poured out of me in waves.”
“A cathartic breakdown?” he asks.
I nod. “Though I can’t say that it was completely freeing. I feel different now. I feel like I’ve managed to finally break one of the shackles holding me down. That I’ve broken down that barrier inside of me that has prevented me from doing anything remotely close to what we did today. Though there are still several walls that need breaking down, I almost feel as though the first one was obliterated.” I give him a smile before I lay back down, pulling him against me, holding him there. “This, right now, like this, would in no way be possible if I hadn’t lost it in there.”
As the words flow from my lips, their conviction settles in my soul and in a metaphoric way, light breaks through the darkness. Beginning to split it into pieces. Pieces that need to shatter, but they are going to take some time. “I just need more time,” I tell him softly.
His hand strokes along my back. “I’ve got nowhere else I’d rather be.”
MY stomach growls and Calvin shifts for the first time in a long while. “We should get something to eat,” he says as he sits up.
“I don’t have anything in the house. I didn’t buy much, knowing we were leaving again.”
He shrugs. “So let’s go out.”
I frown. “Are you sure you’re up for that?” I ask. He looks unsure, but nods anyway. “We could order in.” I counter, “Or I can go run and get something.”
He smiles then offers, “How about we both go get something and come back here to eat?”
I smile too. “I like the sound of that.”
He leans down and gives me a gentle, chaste kiss and I can’t help but kiss him back. We haven’t talked for some time since I told him I’ve got nowhere better to be. He seemed to let that statement wash over him and I wonder if he spent the quiet time embracing it.
“Any ideas?” I ask him as we both climb off the bed.
“Burgers,” he says so matter of fact I wonder if he’d been thinking about it all day.
I chuckle as I walk into my closet, looking for a t-shirt to throw on and a pair of jeans. I abandon that idea when I realize the only clothes I have left in here are ones I either wouldn’t be caught dead in or they don’t fit. Remembering that I’d packed everything but what I’d planned on wearing tomorrow. I head back into the bedroom to see Calvin, naked, bending over to put his jeans back on. My steps falt
er as I stare. Jesus, he’s hot even from this angle. “Enjoying the view?” he teases.
“Always.” I smirk as he stands up, bringing his jeans with him and covering my view. “Though the jeans covered view is just as sexy.”
My seductive tone brings him up short and I watch as he shakes his head at me, but I get the impression that he’s blushing, and then his shoulders start shaking in silent laughter. Deciding not to dwell on it too much and put him back in a place of panic, I find my own jeans balled up on the floor and I shake them out, tossing them on the bed and then throwing off my sweatpants before really realizing I’ve got a semi going. Crap. I try to get my jeans on quickly, but I catch him watching me. Something about the look in his eyes turns my semi into full-on wood. I sigh as I try to stuff him into my jeans and Calvin laughs. “You laugh, but it’s all your fault,” I tease him and he laughs a little harder.
“Glad to know I’m not the only one,” he says through his chuckling.
I turn on him, giving him a seductive gaze. “Oh really?”
He tries to shrug it off like it’s nothing, but I can see the little playful twinkle in his eye. “I like that you look at me and I like it even more that I turn you on.” His face turns bright red as he blushes through our banter. I don’t approach him any further. He’s been through enough for one day. Though there is a sadness that creeps over me knowing that our exploits are more than likely limited to once a day. I will take what I can get. I give him a shake of my hips as I reach for my shirt. His face goes redder still and I can’t help but smile.
Once my shirt is on, I look at him and demand, “Come here, you.” He wraps his arms around me, squeezing me tight, and I return the gesture, holding him to me as if my life depends on it. I stroke my hand through his hair, reminding me that I need to brush mine, but not wanting to move.
Defining Us: The Calvin & Eric Story (69 Bottles) Page 16