Thunderstorms on the Horizon

by Kendel Duncan

  Twenty-Nine

  Brent sat on the couch, his Uncle Tim staring at him from the recliner while his Aunt Mindy fussed in the kitchen. “You really don’t have to go to any trouble, Aunt Mindy, I fine.”

  She emerged with a tray of cheese, crackers, fruit and glasses in one hand, a pitcher of lemonade in the other. Brent jumped to his feet, “Here, let me help,” he said as he pulled the tray from her hands.

  “Thank you, sweetheart,” she said as she set down the lemonade and began filling their glasses.

  “Mindy, sit down dear. We need to hear what Brent has to say,” Tim said as he leaned forward to squeeze Mindy’s hand.

  She squeezed her eyes shut but didn’t move, “Is he dead?” she whispered.

  Brent’s hand closed over her arm, “No, Mindy, no. He’s not dead or injured, I promise.”

  She wiped a tear from the corner of her eye as she sat on the couch next to Brent, “Good, I, that’s good.”

  Brent looked at the two of them, “I want you both to hold onto the feeling you have right now. The relief and joy that just rolled through you when I told you he was okay? Hold onto that. You’re going to need it.”

  Mindy and Tim glanced at each other. Her hands fisted on top of her thighs while his squeezed the arms of the chair. After a few seconds, she nodded at him. “Tell us,” Tim said.

  Brent leaned forward onto his thighs, “First off, let me tell you that your son is fine, he’s happy even. Actually, he’s in love.”

  Mindy’s face lit up with a smile, “He is? Oh my, that’s wonderful! When do we get to meet…”

  “Who is he?” Tim growled, interrupting Mindy.

  “Wait, what? What do you mean, he? He’s not still confused, is he?” she said.

  Brent barked out a laugh, “No more confused than I am. Listen, him being attracted to guys isn’t a phase or confusion, it’s who he is. It’s how he’s built. Can you accept that or not?”

  Mindy glanced down at her lap, “Does, um, will this mean that he wants to get married…..to a man?” she said, lowing her voice to a whisper at the end.

  “Yes, Mindy. Us gays can do that now, the law says so.”

  “Oh, I know that, dear. I just, it’s just so difficult for you, um, the gays, sometimes, getting picked on and attacked and what not. I’d worry about Jaden so much.”

  Brent chuckled, “You’re a mom, Mindy. You’re going to worry about him no matter what he does.”

  “That’s very true, dear. So, um, when do we get to see him and meet, um, this boy?”

  “Well, he’s not a boy, he’s a man. And that’s the other thing I need to talk to you about.”

  She gasped, “Oh no, is he, is he deformed or handicapped in some way?”

  Brent’s eyes went wide, “What? No, it’s nothing like that. He’s actually really hot, er, um, handsome, he’s very handsome.”

  “Who is he?” Tim growled out.

  Brent looked at him and he knew the man could see that there was more to Brent’s story.

  “Tim?” Mindy said.

  “I’m tired of waiting for the other shoe to drop, Mindy. There’s something he’s not telling us.”

  Brent looked down at his hands, “I’ve made mistakes in my life, a lot of them. But I always made amends, apologized to the people I loved. They forgave me, well, most of them anyways, and we got past it, moved on, paved a new road.”

  “What did this man do?” Mindy whispered.

  Brent rubbed his thumb into the palm of his other hand. He was unsure if he should just blurt everything out or wait. He thought about how he felt when he was told who Jaden was seeing. It wasn’t until he met Colby in person that he was able to accept him and the important role he now played in Jaden’s life.

  He reached into his back pocket, pulled out his phone and shot off a text. As he slid it back in, he looked at his Aunt and Uncle, “I think it’s best to let him explain.”

  “You’ve met him?” Mindy said.

  Brent nodded, “I have. And he’s a good man, a very good man. And he loves your son very much.”

  “How did they meet?” she said.

  Brent chuckled, “I think it might be best for them to tell you that too. They’ll be here in a few minutes,” he said as he reached for his lemonade, “Why don’t you guys tell me what you’ve been up to?”

  Thirty

  Colby handed Jaden yet another tissue. He couldn’t seem to stop the tears from rolling down his cheeks. He flipped open the cover of yet another brown covered sketchbook, “Oh my god,” he whispered.

  “Oh, shit, I, uh, I didn’t realize that one was in there,” Colby mumbled as he tried to pull it out of Jaden’s hands. The first charcoal sketch was of Colby, a very young Colby but there was no mistaking the beautiful almond shape of his eyes. He was draped diagonally across a bed with rumpled sheets, on his side, his head laying on his outstretched arm. He was naked, his soft cock laying on his bottom thigh. But it was the smile on his face and the love glowing from his eyes that drew the viewers focus. It was like a beacon that drew you in and made you feel warm.

  “Don’t you dare take this away, Colby. It’s beautiful.”

  “But, but, but….”

  “But what? It’s not like I don’t know that you and my brother were together before. Don’t hide it from me. It helps me to know who he was, it shows me the boy he was outside of the shadow that my parent’s cast.”

  “Okay,” Colby mumbled, “but just to warn you, those get quite a bit more, um, graphic in that book,” he looked away, blushing.

  Jaden flipped through a few more drawings, “Oh, OH!” he said as he took in the sequence of the drawings. In the next one Colby had rolled to his back with a playful grin in his face. The next one had him wrapping his hand around his cock.

  And the next…..

  Well….the next one had Jaden squirming in his seat, his heartrate speeding up and his cheeks heating, “Holy…this is hot as fuck, Colby. I’m keeping this one.”

  “What? No, oh god, no you can’t,” Colby mumbled as he put his hands over his face.

  “Babe. Look at this. You’re skinnier than you are now but you’re still hot. But it’s the way your head is thrown back, your mouth is open, your chest is bowed, and the cum shooting out of your cock and landing on your chest. This is…..this is….”

  “It’s what?”

  “Hotter than any porn I’ve ever seen.”

  Colby stared down at the picture for a few quiet seconds. “He had me jerk off three times in order for him to get that look on my face just right, at least that’s what he told me. Thank god I was young and I had a quick recovery time. I’m pretty sure that face is from orgasm number three.”

  Jaden set the book to the side and leaned over to give Colby a kiss, “I think I’m going to have to do that with you tonight, just so I can see that face for myself.”

  Colby smiled against his lips, “Yeah?”

  Jaden nodded, “Oh yeah.”

  “I’m down for that.”

  Colby’s phone pinged with an incoming text just as his Mom stepped into the room with her car keys around her finger.

  Colby frowned at her first and then read the text. He rolled his eyes, “Ma, will you stop doing that?”

  “Doing what? You do need my car now, correct?”

  Colby flipped his phone around so Jaden could read the text from Brent that told them it was time to come over as he said, “Yes, Ma, we do.”

  He pulled the keys off of her fingers and shoved them in his pocket.

  She smiled at him, “Good. Don’t forget to take the drawings. But I would suggest leaving that book here,” she said with a grin as her eyes darted down to the drawing in Jaden’s lap, the one of Colby in full orgasm.

  Colby grabbed the book and flipped it closed, “Oh my god, Ma!”

  She ignored him and grinned at Jaden, “Nothing prettier than a man showing his pleasure,” she said with a wink before she turned and headed back to the kitchen.

&nbs
p; “Not your own son, Ma! Geez!” he called after her.

  “Still a man,” she hollered from the kitchen.

  “Oh my god, just kill me now,” Colby said with a groan.

  Jaden chuckled as he leaned over to kiss Colby’s cheek, “She’s a hoot, babe.”

  “Oh yeah, a real hoot.”

  “She’s just saying all that to embarrass you, you know that, right? If you’d stop reacting, she’d stop too.”

  Colby looked at him, “Trust me. That woman doesn’t know the meaning of the word stop. She lives to embarrass me. When Westley first started coming over, he and I walked in kitchen to get something to eat. She walked in with grocery bags and said, oh I got you boys something. I’m thinking it’s soda or chips or something but nope. She reached into those bags and set a box of condoms and a bottle of lube on the damn counter. At that point, Wes and I hadn’t really done anything more than kiss. It was embarrassing as fuck.”

  “I heard that! Language, Colby!” she hollered from the kitchen.

  Jaden laughed as he picked up one of the boxes of drawings, “Grab the other one, babe, we need to go.”

  Colby put the lid on but just before he lifted it, he saw one sketchbook on the table, “Is that the risqué one?”

  Jaden glanced at it, “Yeah, why?”

  Colby grabbed it and put it on top of his box, “I’m bringing it with us. I’ll leave it in the trunk. I don’t trust her with it.”

  “I heard that!” his mother yelled from the kitchen.

  “Smart move, son,” his dad mumbled as he walked by.

  Jaden could only shake his head and laugh. He was actually a little in awe of them – of how close they were, how accepting. He wished he and Westley had that when they were growing up. His parents were strict and religious but Jaden had no doubt that he was loved. Whether he would be fully accepted was another thing…..

  Thirty minutes later, Colby pulled his mother’s car into the driveway of a house that he hadn’t seen or been to since he was a kid.

  “I’m scared, Jade,” he whispered as he stared out the windshield.

  Jaden threaded their fingers together, “I know, babe. So am I. But whatever happens with them I want you to know that it won’t change how I feel about you or us. I swear.”

  Colby gave him the best smile that he could, even though everything inside him felt like it was about to crumble. Jaden could promise as much as he wanted but Colby knew the truth – he knew the cruel power that family had over people sometimes, he knew how it could fracture a love that had felt impervious to absolutely everything, he knew how it could send the strongest people to their knees.

  Jaden looked back at the porch, “I think it might be best if I go in first. I’ll bring one of the boxes with me, show them the drawings and then I’ll have you come in so I can tell them where I got them. I’ll introduce them to the man who saved them for Wes.”

  “Yeah, the man who killed Wes.”

  Jaden leaned over the console and used his palm to turn Colby’s head towards him, “Stop, just stop it, Colby. You were a kid for fucks sake. It could have just as easily been him behind the wheel. Or he could’ve died in that house if you hadn’t gone to find him. Are my parents angry with you for this? Of course, they are. But only because they need someone to blame for their son’s death. If he had died in that house, they would’ve blamed the homeowner. If he had tried to stumble home drunk and got hit by a car in the dark, they would’ve blamed that driver. They can’t bring themselves to blame their son, who made the wrong decision to drink too much. But the truth is, that’s what happened, Colby. Westley made that choice, he swallowed that booze down his throat. If he was grown up enough to do that, then he needs to be grown up enough to face the consequences for his actions.”

  Colby’s hand reached up to clasp Jaden’s, “I, I love you, Jade, so much.”

  Jaden’s face lit up when he smiled, “I love you too, Colby.”

  “Go. Talk to them. I’ll be here waiting for when you’re ready for me.”

  “Okay,” Jaden whispered. He pressed his lips to Colby for one more kiss then he got out of the car.

  He grabbed one of the boxes off of the back seat and then Colby watched Jaden as he walked towards the house.

  His hands shook so he clamped them around the steering wheel. With every step that Jaden made that took him farther away, the intense need to jump out of the car and stop him grew inside of Colby to the point that he actually reached back and re-buckled his seatbelt to make getting out that much harder.

  “Fuck,” he whispered when he saw Tim Payne standing in the doorway. The man’s eyes flicked to the car but Colby didn’t think he saw any recognition in them. He wasn’t a teenager anymore. He’d bulked up. He had a beard now, more lines on his face that hadn’t been there before. But still…..

  Colby blew out a breath when Tim slid his arm around Jaden’s shoulders and the two of them disappeared inside.

  Thirty-One

  King’s eyes blinked open. Sunlight still drifted in through the windows but it looked like it was waning. He stretched his legs out and began mentally taking stock of how he felt. His body ached, more than likely because the two of them were still on the floor, he could feel dried come in various places, and his ass ached. That last thing brought a smile to his face. He was still having a hard time believing that he and Row were back together. Not only back together but it felt like they were even better than before. After the hell he’d gone through, that they’d both gone through, over the last year, it was hard to get used to this being his new, albeit familiar, normal.

  At some point, Row had reached up to the bed above them and yanked off the comforter, covering the two of them on the floor. Row’s left arm was underneath King’s head, while the right was draped protectively over King’s waist, his hand resting on King’s chest. King had no clue what Row was using for a pillow but for some reason he needed to know, so he carefully turned until he was on his back. When his gaze met Row’s, he found the man smiling as he watched him.

  “Are you watching me sleep?”

  “You needed it,” Row said as his fingers began caressing King’s torso.

  King frowned, “Well, so do you.”

  “I know. I’ll get my sleep later tonight.”

  “But….”

  “Shhhh, it’s okay, King,” he said with a small smirk on his lips and a playful gleam in his eye.

  “What’s okay?”

  “That you couldn’t possibly stay awake after being so thoroughly and perfectly dicked out.”

  King rolls his eyes, “Oh my god, stop.”

  Row grinned as he leaned closer to place a kiss on King’s lips, “You know I’m right.”

  King’s hand reached up to grip the back of Row’s neck, “Yeah, you are,” he said and then he pulled Row forward and crushed their lips together. When he pulled away a few moments later, his eyes met Row’s, “I never should’ve let you walk away from me.”

  Row’s eyes filled with tears, “I never should’ve left.”

  “From now until I take my last breath, I will fight for you, Row, I will fight for us.”

  “I will too, King, I swear I will.”

  King’s lips joined with his again but this time it was with the slow, passionate exploration that two people, who knew they had an endless amount of time, had.

  King’s mouth opened wide, Row’s opened too. King sucked on Row’s tongue, Row devoured King’s. King moaned into Row’s mouth, Row swallowed it whole and returned it with his own groan. King’s big, strong body surged up to cover Row’s. He spit into his hand and reached between their two bodies, lining up their cocks as he began stroking.

  He could tell that Row wanted to say something, he could feel Row’s fingers tightening on his biceps as they readied to push him away. He knew without hearing that Row was going to tell him to fuck him. But not only was he not about to stop, he knew that they were both sore from the night before, and besides, he knew what he needed, w
hat they both needed and he was going to give it to them.

  He allowed Row to push him enough that their mouths separated but before Row could speak, he shook his head, “Trust me, Row,” he whispered.

  His heart hammered in his chest as he waited, because Row wasn’t the only thing he’d lost those many long months ago. He’d lost the man’s trust too, and that hurt more than anything.

  Where Row’s fingers were pushing him away mere moments ago, now they gripped tight and pulled him in closer, “I do, King. I do trust you.”

  Row’s fingers slid into the hair at the back of King’s neck and gripped it, “I like your hair longer,” he whispered.

  “Yeah?” King mumbled, his voice breaking a he continued to slow-stroke their cocks.

  “Yeah. It lets me do this,” Row said and then his fist tightened and he used the grip in the man’s hair to force King’s mouth back to his.

  King was all for that.

  He whimpered into Row’s mouth from the sweet pain/pleasure that shot down his spine from the hold that Row had on his hair and his fist sped up. Even though there was barely enough room between their bodies and his arm should’ve felt trapped and unable to move; it didn’t. In that moment, he felt like he could do anything, he felt like he could give Row the world, hell, he felt like he could fly. His fist flew unencumbered up and down their dicks, sliding through the abundance of pre-cum on the tips on every up-slide, slicking down their skin on the way down.

  Row’s mouth yanked away to gulp in a breath and say, “King, I’m, I’m, fuck, I’m s-s-so close.”

  King pressed his forehead onto Row’s, “Me too, baby. You feel that? You feel how hard my dick is against yours? Do you feel it throbbing? It’s yours, baby, that’s all yours. All of me is yours.”

  Row’s eyes locked with King’s and for a moment he worried that he’d said too much. But then Row whispered, “Mine,” as he slammed their lips back together and his release was moaned into King’s mouth at the same time it pulsed out into King’s hand.