by Marcel Miska
“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath. He reached out cautiously to circle Fabio; as soon as Julian’s hot hand was around him, Fabio’s head lolled back, eyes slammed shut. He couldn’t have helped the groan he let out even if he wanted to. “Fuck, Fab,” Julian murmured against the skin of his throat. “Fuck, you’re so gorgeous like this”. His hand moved faster in long strokes, with a polish to the head of Fabio’s cock every few pulls. Fabio could feel his toes curling and his breathing picking up along with that telltale pulling at the inside of his navel that told him orgasm wasn’t too far off.
He chased Julian’s mouth as he felt the heat boiling over inside him. “I’m gonna… I’m gonna come,” he panted against Julian’s lips.
“Do it, come for me, Fab,” and it wasn’t like it was an order Fabio was capable of disobeying. The orgasm hit him hard and fast. Tense all over, he spilled over Julian’s hand in hot, white spurts. The aftershocks ebbed and flowed, leaving him feeling like he was floating in Julian’s arms as the other boy kissed him softly and reverently. Julian leaned back and gave him an unsure smile
“That was—” Fabio started, out of breath. “That was incredible”. Julian’s smile widened at the praise and Fabio was struck by an idea. “Let me return the favor,” he said, sliding down Julian’s body and tugging down his shorts as he went. “I’ve been told I’m great at… oral arguments”.
Chapter 9
A few months later saw Fabio adjusting to his final year of high school, interspersed with his trysts with Julian. Those months had been a blur of cooling days and happiness, with Julian being all the warmth Fabio could ever want, even in a place like McKinley.
They spent the early days of autumn running hand in hand through the tall wheat fields of The Plain together, making plans for the future.
“We should just go,” Fabio said, looking out over the bleached grass waving in the fields below. “Anywhere but here”.
“Won’t you miss your family?” Fabio knew that the Kanes weren’t exactly tolerant of the “homosexual lifestyle”, but still, it was difficult for him to imagine leaving his own family behind just like that. But maybe that was because he didn’t have any family. Not anymore. No one but Julian, but Julian was all the family he needed now.
“I mean, of course,” Julian replied, arm around Fabio’s shoulders, stroking his fingers up and down his bicep. “But… I love you. I want this, us. If my family can’t understand that, then they’re too negative to be in my life. Besides,” he looked down at Fabio, the smattering of freckles across the bridge of his nose caramel in the warm light of oncoming fall. “We can just move together, somewhere like California. We can have our life there and I can come back to visit and they never need to know”.
Living that kind of double life was precarious at best; the idea sat heavy and leaden in the pit of Fabio’s stomach. But it wasn’t his family, and it wasn’t his decision. He would support Julian in whatever he wanted to do, and be there for him if it all fell apart.
They were in love. What could go wrong?
Everything, as it had turned out. One night, in early spring, Fabio had gotten a tearful, furtive phone call from Julian. The last time they’d been over at the Kanes, unbeknownst to them, Christian had seen them kissing. That was all that it had taken for everything to fall apart around them.
Fabio tapped his pencil on the desk, letting the eraser bounce it back up into his hand, as he remembered that horrible conversation, that horrible evening. How Julian told him he’d walked in that evening only to find his parents, grim-faced and thin-lipped, waiting for him in the living room. Christian had been seated beside them, looking pale and more than a little shaken. Susan and Walter had dismissed Christian, waited for him to pass by Julian with a look of apology and sympathy to rip Julian apart for carrying on “like that” in such a disgusting manner with a boy. They’d berated him for hours about how unnatural and blasphemous it was. Julian’s voice had cracked relaying the story, telling Fabio how his parents were forbidding him from seeing Fabio. It was the portentous knock on Fabio’s own door that night that was effectively the nail in their coffin.
Ron had made a scene, of course, and informed Fabio in a tone that brooked no argument that he’d spoken with the Kanes and they all felt that it was for the best if Julian and Fabio were no longer in classes together. That threat had come to pass, and that’s how Fabio had ended up here, in General level English, with a sweet but dim girl named Ava as his book report partner. All to keep him away from Julian.
Ava, as it had turned out, was a blessing in disguise. Fabio often got dirty looks from other students; if they weren’t disgusted, they were looked filled with pity, which was almost as bad in Fabio’s book. It brought him back to the memory of those first few months after his mother had died. He thought he’d gotten past the stage where all people could do was pity him. He supposed he had; they’d graduated to pity and revulsion. Ava, though, was kind and a romantic at heart, and she was instrumental in the little alone time Fabio and Julian could scrape together. He and Ava had an English project due at the end of the semester and she would cover for him, tell his foster parents he was with her when he would really use the time to sneak off to see Julian.
Ron, Kathy, and Julian’s parents barely gave them any free, unsupervised time for fear that they’d go and sin together. Julian had been let go from the hardware store (no surprise there) and Fabio had to pick up the slack. It was only through the benediction of St. Ava the Simple they could see each other at all.
Fabio glanced over at Ava, who shot him a nice smile while the teacher prattled on about ancient Greece. Fabio couldn’t help but have an internal laugh at that one; if only these rural folk knew just how gay ancient Greece had been, they probably wouldn’t be so quick to include so many myths and plays in the high school curriculum.
Fabio let his mind wander to the last time he saw Julian at their usual meeting place at The Plain.
They’d kissed by the lengthening light of evening, holding hands and watching the angry pink-orange sun slip closer and closer to the horizon. They’d made love in that warm glow of late spring, enjoying the extra light the season offered. These days, Julian knew all the right buttons to push to leave Fabio a quivering mess in his arms.
Their spot was a high, grassy knoll concealed by a copse of low trees, well above the normal footpath where they could stay hidden but still enjoy the view of the valley laid out before them. Julian kissed him, nipping and sucking that spot behind Fabio’s ear that drove him wild. Fabio’s fingers scrabbled helplessly across his lover’s back while Julian leaned above him, one arm pillowing Fabio’s head from the ground, the other working his cock up into a fervor.
Julian reached behind him for the small pack Fabio always brought, filled with any supplies they might need: condoms and lube for the more fun part of their activities, wet wipes, cologne, and breath mints to sell the illusion. Fabio could hear the cap of the lube snick open and a moment later, he felt a cool fingertip brushing his entrance.
He moaned when Julian pushed inside, digit automatically finding the small bundle of nerves that made Fabio’s body sing. Julian shimmied down his body and took first just the head of Fabio’s dick into his mouth, swirling his tongue around the tip in teasing, feather-light licks. With a particularly hard dig at Fabio’s prostate, Julian took the whole member into his mouth, wetting it as he went to ease its passage to the back of his throat.
Julian was an expert pianist at Fabio’s piano; he settled the tip of Fabio’s cock in at the entrance to his throat and swallowed, all while crooking his finger just so inside the other boy. Within moments, Fabio was writhing on the ground, biting his hand to muffle his cries of ecstasy. Julian accepted his load with practiced ease before sliding his finger out and petting down Fabio’s thighs.
Fabio felt boneless, but fair was fair; he spread his legs, inviting his lover between them. Julian was there in moments, cock already hard and wet, pressing inside him. The stretch w
as delicious. Fabio always felt like Julian touched, lit up, and filled all the empty spaces inside him, made him whole, more than the sum of their parts. Fabio felt like a lion being tamed by a gladiator in an arena; he liked the captivity.
Slowly, Julian worked up a pace. His thrusts were long and deep, just the way the both of them liked, and gradually his hips pumped faster and faster until Fabio’s cock was tingling with arousal once again.
“Fuck, Fab. You feel so good. So tight. Fuck, I love you,” Julian chanted, a string of nonsense as he worked himself up to the edge, peppering Fabio’s face and neck with short, hot kisses. Fabio clamped down rhythmically, milking Julian on the deepest part of his stroke. “Fuck, baby, fuck I’m gonna come”.
“Do it. Come for me, Julian,” Fabio murmured, echoing that first time so long ago. Julian’s body stiffened above his and he froze, but Fabio could feel him pumping inside him, spilling himself and marking Fabio as his and his alone.
Afterward, Julian had gathered Fabio to his chest. Fabio laid his ear against Julian’s flushed chest and spoke the words that had been rattling around in his own ribcage for weeks.
“I want us to be free, baby”. The words hung in the air for a heavy moment, ringing true but making something in his chest clench.
Julian tipped his chin down to speak low and comforting in Fabio’s ear. “We will be, Fab, I promise. It’ll be different after graduation. You’ll see. Remember that hardware store customer… Mr. Belzer? His son lives in Santa Barbara. Wouldn’t that be nice? A nice, warm, liberal place. That’s where we can start our life together, leave McKinley and all this shit behind”.
Fabio leaned up on one elbow, meeting Julian’s eyes. “You’re ready for that? Ready to leave for good?”
“After the shit my parents pulled? They don’t deserve me in their lives,” Julian nodded once, decisively. “Fuck them. I want to start over in a better place. With you”.
“Let’s do it, then,” Fabio had responded with a grin. “Let’s move to Santa Barbara after graduation”.
Chapter 10
It was two weeks before graduation that Walter Kane fucked everything up for them, again.
Coming home late from work one night, he was t-boned by a drunk driver. The doctor said he’d died on impact, but that was poor consolation to his friends and family.
The one benefit – for Fabio, at least – was that the whole town goes into shock. It was enough of a blow that one of their two hundred residents had died in such a flashy fashion that no one was paying attention to his movements anymore. Susan was constantly over at the LaPortes’, being waited on by Kathy while she screamed her way through spirals of grief. It was almost enough to make Fabio feel for her, but then he’d remember the hard set of her mouth any time she’d catch a glimpse of him over the fence separating their properties, like he’d had the audacity to queerify her boy and he stopped feeling so bad.
Julian, however, was another story. Fabio was worried about how silent Julian was, how he’d just float through the day unseeing, barely responding to the well-meaning questions and comments directed his way.
“Baby,” Fabio prompted quietly, laying out next to Julian on his bed. Susan was over at the LaPorte house and to be honest, he didn’t think any of them had the energy for a knock-down drag-out fight when it came to this. Not anymore.
“Baby,” he started again, watching Julian flip listlessly through his history textbook. “Talk to me”.
Julian just blinked down at the pages, not giving any indication he’d heard Fabio. Fabio sighed gently and rubbed the flat of his hand across Julian’s shoulder blades. “This is the worst thing that has ever happened to you. I know. I’ve been there”. And my mother actually loved me for who I am, he didn’t add. “The pain never completely goes away, but it will eventually get better. And hey,” he added, punctuating it with a light clap of Julian’s shoulder. “Getting a fresh start in Santa Barbara is just what you need”.
Julian’s fingers froze in the middle of turning a page; it slipped from them and slid noiselessly back into place. Fabio could feel the tension thrumming through his boyfriend’s shoulders, could feel the soft gasp of an inhale.
“Fab…” Julian started, voice flat and broken. Fabio went cold at the emotionless tone. “Fab, I… I can’t”. Fabio felt like the wind was knocked out of him and he could hardly breathe. His own body is stiff with tension now.
“What are you talking about?”
Julian’s eyes slide shut, the action heavy with grief. “My mom… my mom hasn’t held a job in almost twenty years. They… they married pretty young, she didn’t have much of a career before she had me”.
“Okay…” Fabio didn’t see where this was going.
“She doesn’t have any marketable skills, nothing beyond being a secretary. I have to work while she finds a job, probably even after”. He sighed again, heavier, and cradled his head in his hand. “I’ve already talked to Kenny down at Bishop’s – I’ve got a job as a mechanic all lined up for after graduation”.
All Fabio could hear was a rushing white noise as he tried to process Julian’s words. He could feel the anger and betrayal bubbling up inside him, but it was all tamped down, tempered, by a once-familiar ache in his chest surfacing once again.
“What are you saying?” Fabio felts like he was repeating himself, but he needs to hear Julian say it. He needs to hear the words.
“I…” There are tears at the ragged edges of Julian’s voice now. “I can’t go with you to Santa Barbara. I have to stay here”.
The rage finally hit Fabio, so hard he thought his vision was tinged red. “You’re actually going to stay here. With these people?”
“With my mother,” Julian replied, a note of defiance in his tone.
“Yeah, your mother. Your mother who forbade you to see me and called you a disgusting faggot. Right, that mother”. He shook his head. “Julian, you don’t owe her anything, not after how she treated you! How your dad treated you!” As soon as he mentioned Walter Kane, he knew he’d said the wrong thing. Instead of getting angry, though, Julian’s eyes went bad to the cloudy-eyed stare of a dead fish he’d been sporting for the past week.
“I just can’t, Fab. My loyalty has to be to my family. Especially Christian. Who knows what would happen to him? Family is sticking with each other even when the going gets tough. Especially when the going gets tough”. Julian couldn’t meet his eyes, and that, more than anything, broke Fabio’s heart.
“They betrayed you, Julian. You sought their understanding and they didn’t accept you for who you are”. A thought struck him. “You know… you know that I can’t stay here, right? This place… it’s too toxic. I have to leave for my own sanity”. He could handle McKinley when he knew there was an end in sight, but without that light at the end of the tunnel, McKinley was a death sentence even without the whole town knowing about their dirty laundry.
“I’m sorry,” Julian said quietly, barely there. Fabio could feel his heart slowly, painfully, ripping apart at the seams. His chest throbbed with it, and he walked out the door.
That night, he almost ripped up the train tickets he’d bought for them to Santa Barbara. Instead, he took a deep breath and set them on the corner of his desk and started packing his bags. Graduation was in a few days, but all his actual requirements were out of the way and fuck if he was going to walk with these people he barely knew, a good number of whom turned on him and Julian when word got out. Fuck them. Fuck this whole town.
Chapter 11
Weak, pre-dawn light washed watery and surreal over the LaPorte house. Fabio had called the earliest taxi he could; part to catch the early train to Santa Barbara from Duluth, part of spare himself the painful absences when he drove away from this place for good.
The cab driver popped the trunk and hefted the heavier of Fabio’s two bags into the trunk. Fabio bit his lips and followed, finding a spot for his backpack next his roller bag. He looked up at the house that had been the closest thing he’
d had to home these past eight months; the windows were dark and everything was bathed in that thin light that made it feel like he was walking in a dream.
Of course Ron and Kathy hadn’t seen fit to see him off, but then he hadn’t expected them to. Ron had begged off on an early delivery and Kathy had stayed the night at the Kane house with Susan, looking at funeral arrangements.
Fabio looked one last time over to the Kanes, wondering what he’d feel looking at it now, in this watercolor dream light, after everything and his heart nearly stopped.
On the other side of the fence stood Julian, washed out in the coming dawn, gray and distant. He looked like a specter on the other side of the fence; he might as well have been a world apart. Fabio’s heart rattled around his ribcage like a bird in an attic. Hot, no air.
What little oxygen left in his lungs was knocked out of him by a sudden impact with his side. Fabio looked down in surprise to see the top of Christian’s head, his thin arms around Fabio’s waist.
“Bye, Fab,” Christian muttered into the space under Fabio’s arm. The little boy looked up at him and Fabio felt any residual anger he’d been holding onto slide away, slithering into the shrinking shadows of morning. He placed his hand on the back to Christian’s head and managed a wan smile.
“Bye, Christian”. Later, Fabio wouldn’t have been able to say what made him reach into his pocket, but his fingers found the extra ticket – the one meant to be Julian’s – and handed it to Christian. Christian hesitantly took the little piece of paper and Fabio smiled, knowing it was the right thing. “Give this to Julian. He can do whatever he wants with it, but I don’t need it”. A sliver of hope still burned in Fabio’s chest, but the larger part of him was more realistic. Even if Julian ripped it up, though, it wasn’t Fabio’s burden to carry any longer.
Christian stared the ticket and Fabio stepped back. His eyes tracked to the pale boy on the other side of the fence. As if they could go anywhere else. With a weak, half smile, Fabio raised his hand by way of goodbye. Julian was still and unmoving and Fabio couldn’t bear to see his golden boy sapped of life and will for another second. With a swallow he turned to the cab, meeting the cabbie’s bland gaze.