by Jan Irving
“Lots of practice with Papa.” Leif sighed, sitting back to watch Mal spoon in a little soup.
“I’m not used to….” Mal shrugged.
“You’ve never had a boyfriend?” Leif prodded, looking interested.
Mal felt that stretchy discomfort again, like he’d felt when the guys had shown up. He wasn’t the man he had been since he’d really let himself down. So who was he now? Someone who could be a boyfriend? He had no idea. He wanted new things in his life, but he didn’t know how to get there.
“No,” he said. “In some ways it would have been easier to go out tonight. Fall into pattern, you know?”
Leif’s eyes were bleak for a moment. “It’s what I expected you to do.” He shrugged. “Even though you are sick, you dope.”
“Staying here isn’t so bad,” Mal said, smiling a little. “I get you to take care of me.”
Leif chewed his lip, pushing his silver blond hair out of his solemn gray eyes. “I can’t stay.”
“No, of course not.”
“I want to, but….”
“Your father. I do understand,” Mal said. He reached out and brushed his hot, sausage-feeling fingers against Leif’s cool ones. “I’m used to going it alone anyway.”
Leif got up from the chair next to the bed and paced restlessly through Nan’s bedroom. His expression was tight and unhappy.
Mal said, extra gently, “It must be hard.”
Leif gave a rueful laugh. “I never know what to expect, except lately if he’s under any kind of pressure, like to make a decision, he overcompensates. Big time.”
“I heard about the volunteer firefighters on your front lawn.”
“Yeah.” Leif flushed. “That was the same night I met you.”
“Well, now you won’t forget it.” Mal pushed away the last of his soup in a sleepy gesture. Leif poured him some apple juice and left the jug on the table next to the bed.
“I wouldn’t forget,” Leif said. He put his hands in his pockets. “I’ll come by in the morning to see how you are.”
MAL had hot fever dreams, so hot that he twisted on the bed, dreaming of paddling a canoe through a rocky stream—it seemed no matter how hard he put his back into it, he could get nowhere.
He finally woke in the morning feeling dispirited. The dream seemed so much like his life now. What was he doing? He had never wanted to work construction. But it was a job, he guessed, while he figured out what to do. He had to pay the bills if he wanted to keep the cottage, and that was the only thing he was certain of.
And then there was Leif. Mal wasn’t sure what was happening between them. He worried about hurting the other man since he wasn’t sure who he was anymore. And Mal had never really dated anyone. What he had going with Leif felt kind of… old fashioned, like the town of Sylvan itself, sleepy and warm and unhurried.
He closed his eyes, too drained to worry about it, and next thing he knew, he heard the door creak open and Leif call out, boots stomping as he walked through the kitchen and dining room to Nan’s bedroom.
“Hey,” Leif said. He reached out and touched Mal’s forehead. “Wow, still pretty warm.”
“Yeah,” Mal croaked. He liked Leif’s hand on him, cool and caring. He wondered what it would be like if Leif had slept with him all night.
“I’ll get some ice to put in the apple juice.” Leif said, heading back into the kitchen. Mal watched him break some cubes out of the ice tray and put them in a plastic juice glass. When he returned, Mal took a sip, enjoying the chilly treat.
“I guess you haven’t had breakfast?” Leif sat on the corner of Nan’s double bed and opened a familiar paper bag, pulling out hot sandwiches. “I had to leave early so I’d have time to drop by. I haven’t eaten either.”
“I don’t want to screw up your day,” Mal said. He bit into the steaming breakfast. Heaven. His appetite was back. Best of all was watching Leif watch him, silver blond hair in his gray eyes, big and muscled, and seemingly crushed on Mal.
“You could never screw up my day,” Leif said. He cleared his throat. “So, I have an estimate for you on the roof.”
“Great. When can your guy get started?” Mal asked.
Leif put his sandwich down. “It’s a big commitment financially. You really are planning to live here?”
“Year ‘round, if I can figure out what to do with myself,” Mal said.
“There’s the university not so far from here,” Leif pointed out. “It’s a bit of a drive, but you might want to explore some options there.”
Mal’s eyes widened. He hadn’t thought of that at all, going back to school. “Maybe… fine arts,” he admitted shyly.
“Sounds good.”
“Sounds like I’d still need a job, you mean.” Mal smiled. “But it’s okay. I decided to take it slow, figuring out what I’m supposed to do next.”
“I wish I could have stayed over last night,” Leif said.
Mal nodded. “I was wondering what it would be like to wake up with you.”
“I have never stayed over at someone’s house.” Leif put away their paper trash in the bag. “And it’s unlikely I will have the time for a… romantic commitment any time soon.”
“You look a little down,” Mal noted.
Leif rubbed his chin. “I don’t know how to have any kind of life with Papa, and I’m not sure he’d accept anyone helping us. And I want him to be the man he was, so I can tell him who I am, and that at this stage of my life… I ache to be with someone. Sometimes I even think that one night when I’m not alone will be enough.”
Mal reached out and cupped Leif’s cheek. “No, that’s not who you are.”
“If you offered yourself to me again, Mal, I would not be able to resist you,” Leif admitted. “But then you’d go off with your friends, and I’d feel….”
Mal took a deep breath. “Let’s just put a roof over the cottage. Nothing has happened. I haven’t hurt you.” Yet. Mal didn’t trust himself not to do that, and it made him afraid. He’d screwed up two good things in his life: losing a lot of time with Nan he wished he could make up now and his shot at Olympic gold. “We have the summer.”
Leif also took a deep breath. “Summer is a good time here,” he agreed. “So will you keep the same footprint of the cottage as it stands now?”
“I think so. I’d just like to work a few things into the existing space. I was also fantasizing about a washer and dryer in the storage room downstairs.”
“That’s a lot to do before winter comes in and freezes the ground,” Leif said. “You’d have to have that space properly insulated so that the pipes didn’t freeze.”
“Yep, I know. Probably I won’t get it all done this year, so I’ll have to do more next spring.”
“Next spring.” Leif looked a little heartened.
“I figure there will be plenty more nights for me to swim over to your place and fall asleep on some driftwood.” Mal stroked the back of Leif’s hand with his fingers. Leif’s hand trembled beneath his.
Chapter Seven
MAL healed slowly over the next week. The virus was surprisingly strong, so he felt wrung out, but the first morning he woke up with the roofing team taking down his old roof, shingle by shingle, he got into his swimming trunks and bathrobe to go outside and see the work. And, if he was honest with himself, he was hoping to see Leif, whom he hadn’t seen in days.
“Hey, Mal,” John Moreton called down from the roof. “Sorry if we woke you. Leif said you were under the weather.”
“No, I’m totally happy you’re here,” Mal said. “I’ve been really worried about the water coming in.”
“That could cause some problems,” John agreed. “But we’ll take care of it. We’re taking down that part of the roof now.”
“I, uh, thought Leif might be by,” Mal asked, feeling shy for some reason. Geez, Sylvan must be rubbing off on him.
John shook his head. “I think he’s probably spending all his free time at home. You know his dad.”
; “Yeah,” Mal said. “I know.” He shrugged. “Well, I’ll let you get back to work.”
As he walked down the slope and then back up to the raised highway on his way to the lake to swim and get washed off, Mal was thinking about Leif. He’d really like to see him again. At this rate, he’d have to be on the job again before he’d get a glimpse of his missing Viking, but he wasn’t quite ready for that, still shaky as he was from the flu.
The water felt cool and wonderful as he swam out, seeing sparrows dipping down to take a drink, feeling the serenity he always experienced here at the lake. He wondered what it would be like in wintertime to go ice skating on this same surface or to maybe rent a snowmobile. One thing was for sure, even if they got to the pipes this summer to winterize them, probably the walls and windows would be letting in a lot of the cold. It would take some time before he’d get the place snug.
Once he’d finished his swim, he decided to go into town and do something about the mound of laundry he had and finally pick up some food. He’d been living on Nan’s canned soups, and he wanted something fresh.
Leif still wasn’t at his cottage when he returned, and it made Mal feel a bit down. He wanted to see the other man, and to see himself through his eyes. He didn’t feel so bad about himself then. He felt like he might have some kind of future. So Mal added one more thing to his list. Maybe he’d swim over to Leif’s dock as soon as he was up to it again.
LEIF threw pebbles into the lake water from his dock, watching as they radiated out. He sighed, drawing up his knee while the other one dangled. It had been a hell of a week. He’d managed to ask John Moreton a couple of times in as casual a manner as possible how Mal was doing, but he hadn’t had the time to get out there. He was doing an emergency fix on an old farmhouse a new client had purchased that was on the verge of falling down. And his Papa…. He’d been more demanding than ever, as if he sensed that Leif’s attention was elsewhere.
Finally he’d decided it was better to leave it. By now Mal had probably moved on, was visiting those party-minded friends. It wasn’t as if they’d really done anything, though Leif thought about it all the time, imagining kissing Mal, imagining covering him.
When a familiar wet-seal head popped up next to the pier, Leif didn’t jump this time. Instead, his heart started pounding. Mal smiled at him and reached up, and Leif knelt, bracing himself and pulling the slighter man easily from the water. He stood over Leif, dripping, his body more tanned that it had been the last time he’d seen him, his nipples pointed, his swimming trunks tight around his body so that Leif wanted to drag his lips against the outline of Mal’s sex.
“You look like you want to eat me.” Mal’s voice was caressing as he reached out and tangled a damp, cool hand in Leif’s hair.
Leif bent close and pressed his face against Mal’s thigh. He couldn’t be offhand about this. He felt alive again for the first time in days. He parted his lips and tasted lake water and Mal. Mal laughed at the warm tongue touching him.
“Leif,” Mal said. He knelt beside Leif and Leif noticed belatedly that Mal had a plastic bag tied around one shoulder. “It’s something I wanted to treat you to,” Mal continued. “Since I know you can’t come out with me to dinner.”
“Not lately,” Leif rasped, unhappiness weighing him down like rocks pulled up from the lakebed. But then Mal stroked his cheek, and he felt a hundred times better, like he’d been catapulted out of his depression.
“I need a beach fire,” Mal directed. “Then you get your treat.”
“You’re my treat,” Leif countered. This time he wouldn’t hold back or be so damned shy. This time he would kiss and touch Mal and make love to him the way he’d dreamed of doing.
MAL seated a metal pot on the coals of their discreet beach fire. He could feel Leif’s eyes on him, and it made him feel sexy, made a pulse beat in his throat and his inner thighs and his sex. Anticipation simmered between them even as the water heated.
To draw out the moment, since it looked like Leif had moped around as much as Mal had the past few days, Mal busied himself with more of the supplies he’d bought over in plastic containers: Japanese green tea powder, a bamboo teaspoon, a scoop, and two tea bowls. He placed green tea into each cup and then opened a biscuit box, offering Leif a sweet.
Leif raised his eyebrows. “This is different.” He took the cookie and bit into it.
“I hope so,” Mal said, looking pleased at Leif’s curiosity. “It’s matcha tea. I wanted to bring you something I’d experienced while traveling in Japan.”
Leif watched as Mal used the scoop to pour out water into a black, lumpy-looking tea bowl. He then used a whisk and, when the tea was foamy, passed it to Leif with a slight bow. “Taste. It might seem a little bitter.”
Leif’s silver brows met as he sipped. “Tastes a bit like coffee.”
“Yeah, it has a kind of… authority. It’s not a mild tea,” Mal agreed. He mixed his own and took a biscuit for himself and then shifted so he was rubbing shoulders with Leif.
Leif’s heart started pounding again at the contact. He’d told Mal he was easy. Should he say something? Should he just kiss Mal?
Both men sipped, the firelight reflected in the water that hushed onto the beach in the wee hours. Leif’s gaze fell to Mal’s lips. As if he also felt the tension between them, Mal put aside his tea cup as Leif’s hit the sand with a dull thud. Leif took Mal’s mouth, making a sound of need, climbing on top of him.
“LEIF.” Mal pushed up so his cock rubbed wantonly against Leif. Leif was like a silver warrior gilded in the moonlight, and Mal had the fantasy he was a captive of a Viking, claimed by him. His muscles, his bigger body—he felt wonderful crushed into the sand. Mal pictured Leif pounding into him as Mal’s heels dug into his ass….
Leif’s hands moved over Mal’s hips, holding on tight as his tongue thrust inside Mal’s mouth, hungry, fevered. He was shaking. “Oh, God, Mal.”
Mal raised one leg and netted his man closer, like the merman Leif sometimes called him.
“Mal….” They rolled, and Leif peppered kisses against Mal’s neck, his hands smoothing over damp swimming trunks, and then he tugged them down, impatient to experience the real thing at last, and his hands were full of Mal’s ass, high, round, gut-wrenching to squeeze.
Mal was partially under Leif’s larger body, his eyes half closed, a sexy gleam in his eyes. His body was sleek as wet marble from the water, and he looked so perfect to Leif. Ever since Leif had pulled Mal from the lake, since Mal had stripped and sat on his lap, Leif had jerked off thinking of him.
Leif felt something rising up inside him, a pent-up feeling like bitter lava gripping him by the throat. He’d gone years without touching someone. “I’m going to—” Oh God. No, he couldn’t embarrass himself this way!
Mal’s wide blue eyes seemed to read Leif’s distress. “Shhh, it’s okay,” he murmured. “Leif, take it easy. Don’t be scared.”
But it wasn’t okay! Leif thrust against Mal, his muscles knotting painfully, his trembling hand reaching down, tugging aside his own swimming trunks. He shot on Mal’s stomach while Mal’s hands clenched in his shoulders. Oh, shit. What was that? It wasn’t even sex! He hadn’t made love to Mal the way he did in his fantasies. He’d just—
“It’s all right,” Mal said again, his voice stern, as if he was trying to reach Leif.
Leif sat up, turning away so Mal couldn’t see his face. “No,” he whispered. “No, it’s not.”
MAL put his arms around Leif from behind. He ached for him, even as he was shaken himself. He hadn’t been innocent sexually for a long time. He tried to remember how it felt so he’d know what to say.
“Will you please just fucking go?” Leif demanded, sounding like he was fighting tears. “I’m sure you’d get a much better performance from your friends.”
“Leif? Leif, where are you?” a voice called from the property above them.
Leif’s head went up. “Shit,” he swore. “It only needed this!”
Mal’s hands dropped as Leif pulled violently away from him.
“Leif?” A frail figure staggered into view on the grass. The elderly man’s eyes were fixed on Leif as if he were a compass to offer direction. “Leif, I was afraid you drowned… I woke up and you weren’t in the house!”
Leif snatched a towel to cover himself and tugged up his swimming trunks. “No, I was just spending some time on the beach… talking. It’s okay, Papa.”
“Talking to who?” Leif’s father sounded angry, suspicious, as he peered down toward Mal.
Leif didn’t even glance at Mal as he hissed, “Get dressed! And put out the fire, will you?”
Words jammed up in his throat in the wake of the unfinished encounter, and Mal watched Leif jump up to the grass where his father was. Leif took the older man’s elbow gently. “Come on. Let’s head back into the house.”
“But who were you talking to?” The older man still sounded peevish.
“No one,” Leif said flatly. “No one.”
On the beach, Mal reached for the towel Leif had abandoned. He stared at it numbly as he heard the door of Leif’s cottage slam behind him and his father. After a second, he remembered why he’d wanted it and used it to scrub off his stomach.
He sat with his heels in the sand, his lips bruised from Leif’s kisses. He could still taste him, could still feel the way he’d been shaking when he—
“You’re experienced, Harrison,” he scolded himself aloud. “This is no big deal.”
He upended the pot of water, which still simmered like a magic potion, over the tiny circle of flame Leif had made. The dying fire hissed and steam rose. Mal found one tea bowl half-buried in seaweed and shifting back and forth with the waves as they hit the beach. The other was cracked, so Mal carefully gathered the shards, worried someone might step on them.