Sea Change, Chapter 53: The Cottage

By Josh

In the morning, the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes was Dan's blond hair lying across his face. He was sleeping on his stomach facing me, and I had an arm and a leg over his backside. Our faces were only inches apart and our breath blew alternately onto our shoulders.

He was beautiful in his sleep. He always had been, but he was more so this morning. Things were different this morning.

We had burned bridges. We had made choices. It was Dan and me together, no matter what. It would always be Dan and me together. That became as solidly clear the night before as any ceremony could ever make it.

Beloveder and beloveder, I thought to myself with a slight smile, watching Dan's deep breathing. He had grown dearer, more precious to me than I ever imagined he could. And with those thoughts, my heart swelled. I kissed his cheek.

His eyes opened and he smiled. "Mornin' Seany."

I placed my cheek on his and hugged his back hard. "I was just thinking," I said, "how much I love you."

He nuzzled in under my cheek.

"I was thinking," I continued, "how amazingly lucky I am. The guy I'm spending my life with is the only perfect guy in the whole batch."

He chuckled. "Not hardly."

"Perfect for me, Danny" I said, kissing the side of his hair. "And you know what else I was thinking?" I asked in a whisper, rubbing a growing erection against the side of his firm butt.

"What?"

"We're going to keep lots of butter on hand."

He smiled. "Even after that shower last night, I still feel a little loose in the behind."

"Want me to stuff something in it?" I asked, kissing his cheek and thinking how soft the skin of his butt felt to my cock; how firm the tight mounds of his ass were under the inside of my thigh; how taut the skin of his back was under my arm; and how the scent of his hair was so familiar and wonderful, despite competition from our morning breath. I slid up over him, laying my cock in the length of his crack and running it up and back.

I kissed behind his ear. "You arouse me," I whispered.

Dan purred and rocked his butt under me. "I sure as hell had trouble doing that last night."

"No you didn't," I said, gnawing on the back of his jawbone. "You always arouse me and you know it... and you used that last night."

"Had to do something, Seany," he said, reaching a hand back to rub the side of my butt. "You were being stubborn as hell."

"I was trying to be careful for you," I said. "I love you." My nipples had hardened. They always did when I was bare-chested around any naked part of Dan. I moved them against the tight skin of his back.

"As if I don't love you!" Dan complained. Then softly... "I love you with all my heart, Seany."

I paused. Sliding up on him, I kissed the side of his cheek and wrapped my arms under his chest. "We're really in it together now, Danny," I said quietly. "You and me."

He nodded the side of his face on his pillow. "You and me."

I hugged him tightly. "I want inside you," I murmured. "I want to be in you. I want us joined up... together... now."

Dan nodded, understanding.

I pushed up. Sitting back onto the back of his thighs, I placed a hand on each of Dan's smooth butt cheeks, like laying my hands on two little melons; and I spread them. Leaning over, I drooled spit between them. Then moving forward, I guided the end of my cock into his crack and rubbed my spit against his opening with my cockhead.

Dan lifted his butt, waiting for me.

I pushed in, and watched the length of my shaft disappear inside Dan... joining us... making us one. I slid my butt forward and felt his tightness travel down my shaft's length. Then I lay down on him, pressing in the last inch, fitting his butt snuggly to my loins and squeezing his long legs between mine. I slid my hands, palms up, under the front of his shoulders and grabbed on.

Dan reached a hand back again, grabbing the side of my butt. We both began to move.

"You and me, Seany," he said as I chewed on his ear and the side of his neck. "You and me."

. . . . .

"Phone numbers, too," Mary instructed. "This is going to be awfully short notice and I want to call people as well as send out invitations."

"We have four weeks," Dan said.

Mary rolled up her eyes. "If you want anyone to come, we need to get out invitations now!"

"We aren't sure of everybody yet," I pointed out.

"Put down any you are sure of," she said. "Put down anyone you think you might want to come."

"You're going to call them all?" I asked.

She nodded.

When she stepped from the kitchen, I leaned toward Dan. "We need a second list," I said. "People like Ry, who we don't want Mary to call."

"Or the Three Monkeys," Dan said. "They asked the other night if they could come."

"We can call them ourselves," I said.

"Or let Lenny call them," Dan said. "It's sorta the thing at weddings and stuff to let someone else organize things like that... in case people wanna bring presents or something."

"Wedding gifts?" I asked with a laugh.

"Well, someone might want to," he said defensively.

"Lenny'd love coordinating that," I said. "We'd get nothing but jewelry and women's clothes."

. . . . .

Neither Dan nor I thought Ry would be able to make it to the ceremony. But we weren't going to leave Ry out. Not out of the ceremony if he could figure out how to make it. And not out of our "marriage." He was the one, wide-open door we were leaving to our relationship. I thought it unlikely that Dan and I would ever have the depth of relationship with Ry that we did with each other, but that left a lot of room for a lot of love. We just had to wait until we knew we were safe before the three of us moved on.

We waited to phone him until late that night when we were back in San Antonio and knew that Ry would be back at his school. We called from Lenny's where we could both get on extensions and speak freely.

"My mom knows," Ry said immediately, before we could begin to tell him about anything else.

"What do you mean by that?" I asked.

"She saw the different dates on my luggage tags," Ry said. "It was stupid; I know. I should have pulled them off... but it's OK."

"That's hard to believe," Dan said.

"No. It's OK... really. It is. Look, I didn't tell her everything. Like I didn't tell her anything about Austin doing guys and stuff. But I told her that I was gay, and she already knew you guys were. I told her that the three of us have been, like, close... for three years. But Sean, I told her that you and me... that we didn't mess around when I used to go over on Sunday afternoons, because usually we didn't, right. And I wanted her to know that we've always been good friends."

"OK."

"But I told her about Nate and me. And I told her about you guys and me being in love and me staying with you overnight."

"She's not stupid, Ry. She's gotta figure we did stuff," Dan said.

"I was getting to that," Ry said. "I told her we did, and that it wasn't the first time."

"Oh, geez," I moaned, picturing the cops arriving at any moment.

"She understands," Ry quickly said. "She's always guessed about me. She even knew that I had a crush on you, Sean. She told me. And she likes both of you. She told me that, too."

We let that sink in.

"Guys," Ry said, "My Mom and my Dad... well, they aren't getting along. Mom thinks they're going to divorce. If they do, I'm going with her."

"I'm sorry, Ry," I said.

"Me, too," Dan agreed.

"It's OK," Ry said. "My dad's never liked me. I can handle it. I wish they were divorced already. If they were, I bet Mom would let me come to Houston for the ceremony. We talked about it, and she thought it'd be a bad idea because if she and Dad go to court for custody, she wouldn't want to mess things up, you know?"

"Yeah," we both answered.

"But she told me things could happen fast," Ry said. "Dad's only sticking around until after Christmas. If they haven't worked things out by then, they're going for the divorce. And then..." Ry said, his voice rising, "I could probably come stay with you guys at Spring Break!"

"You'll die when I tell you where we'll be by then," I said.

"Where?"

"Living on a lake," Dan said. "Maybe."

Ry came unglued. After hearing about Mary's lake idea, he sounded like he'd try to speed up his parent's divorce himself.

And then we warned him about GRIDS and talked for a long time about making sure that Nate hadn't had sex with anyone else over the holiday, and if so, they needed to wait for a couple of weeks before they started having sex again and that they'd need to start using rubbers when they did.

"You're crazy," Ry said. "Nate didn't do anybody over the holiday and I only did Austin."

"Make sure, Ry," Dan said.

"And it's not like you can't do anything," I said. You can always do mutual JO or frot."

"If you do come to see us Spring Break," Dan said, "we aren't going to have sex together unless you've been following the rules. We're that serious."

"I'm coming Spring Break," Ry said. "Whether my parents are divorced or not."

. . . . .

I was tired that night; we both were. I stripped to my briefs while Dan let Cutter out and was sitting on the edge of the bed when Dan came in to the room.

"Roger's still up," Dan said, kissing me on top of the head. "He'll let Cutter back in."

Dan pulled off his shirt and tilting his head back, shook his hair out. The muscles in his belly and torso flexed as he stretched. I watched, and Dan smiled at my watching.

I looped an arm behind Dan's waist and pulled him over, burying my face in his flat stomach.

Dan chuckled and mussed my hair. "I've been thinking all day," he said as I looped my other arm behind his waist as well and playfully growled into his tight belly. "Ever since you attacked me this morning," he said, "and you told me that I aroused you."

"That wasn't news to you," I said, nuzzling up between his pecks.

"No," Dan said, wrapping his arms around my head. He kissed the top of my hair. "But I was thinking..."

I was thinking, too. I was thinking that as cool as girls' breasts were, guys, especially Dan, had much, much better nipples... firm, tight, and so suckable. I closed my mouth over his right nipple and sucked gently.

Dan cradled my head and stroked my hair as I suckled on him, teasing his nipple to hardness. "I'm not entirely sure why," he said, "but it means a lot to me... that I arouse you."

I paused and looked up at him, my chin on his chest.

Dan smiled down at me, still stroking my hair. "It does," he said simply. "Maybe it's sorta important to guys, you know? It's a trip when someone gets off to your body. And you," he said, affectionately combing my hair with his fingers, "are a constant trip for me... an ego trip, a sexual trip; it's exciting to excite you; to have you respond to my body."

"It's a trip for me, too," I said, switching to his other nipple. I started sucking gently.

Dan moaned softly and ran his fingers into my hair. "You won't get tired of me?" he asked in a whisper. "You won't get used to how I look?"

"Who ever gets tired of a masterpiece?" I murmured.

"Yeah, right," Dan said. "And what happens when the masterpiece gets old?"

I stood up and pulled him close. "You wanna know how bad it really is?" I whispered, kissing his cheek. "In the last few days, we've had a ton of sex, not a whole lot of sleep, and we had the shit scared out of us." I pressed my nose into his hair and took a deep breath. "And still, you intoxicate me... holding you close like this, bare chest to bare chest, and pressing here..." I pressed the front of my briefs to the front of his pants and slid my hands down to his butt.

"Your body is beautiful, Dan," I said, nuzzling his ear. "Incredibly beautiful. But it excites me because it is your body. And I know every inch of it. And every inch is precious to me... not just because you're beautiful, but because I love you."

I pressed my mouth to his ear. "The more I love you, the more beautiful you are," I whispered. "And I love you more and more every day. You're going to get more and more beautiful to me as we get older, Danny."

He ran his fingers into the back of my hair and melted into me; his breath hot on my ear. "You're beautiful too, Seany. You know that. And precious to me... every inch."

He chuckled suddenly, and pulled back with a grin. "This is going to sound silly, but I was thinking about my jeep today. Roger had it almost two years before he gave it to me, but when he did, the jeep was suddenly different somehow. It was my jeep. And even some of the things I didn't like about it before, I liked now... because it was all mine."

I laughed. "I'm your jeep?"

"You're mine, Seany," he said seriously, running his fingers lightly over my shoulders. "And I love your hair... your eyes... your nose... your throat," he said, running a finger over each. "There isn't a part of you that isn't perfection itself. There isn't a part of you," his voice dropped to a whisper, "that doesn't belong to me, or that I don't love."

"Since last night, it's even more that way for me too," I said. Reaching down between us, I unfastened his belt. "Do you want to make love?" I asked.

He wrapped his arms around my shoulders and pressed his cheek to mine as I dropped his pants from his hips. "We've had a lot of sex lately," Dan whispered.

"Sometimes, the more we have, the more we want," I pointed out.

"Do you need to?" he asked.

"No," I said softly, reaching into the front of his briefs. "I don't need to. I want to."

. . . . .

I'd been trying to deal with my imagination. Ever since Roger's talk, I'd been thinking that things didn't feel right in my groin. I worried every time I coughed or sneezed that I might already have something.

I knew it was just my imagination. If anything felt wrong in my groin, it was probably because I'd been fucked so much, or because Nu and I had such wild sex... shit, it was amazing my cock was still attached. And hell, I often sneezed, simply going from hot to cold... like walking outside or back in.

But I still found myself worrying. Lap swimming on Monday afternoon for the first time in days, I worried because my groin felt sore and I wondered if that meant anything. And then I got pissed at myself.

I decided that I was fed up with being worried. And right there in the water, while swimming from one end of the pool to the other, I made a decision - a conscious decision - to start ignoring my imagination. If I'd caught something, I'd caught it and would know soon enough. Either way, it was stupid to worry.

. . . . .

Dan had stayed in San Antonio on Sunday night. I drove to Austin on Monday night and we slept in the Bronco. Dan drove down on Tuesday after classes. I drove up on Wednesday. Dan came back to San Antonio on Thursday night.

By then, with all the schoolwork we were also juggling, we had begun to wonder how realistic it was to try being together every night; especially now that we knew we'd be living together the next semester.

That night we were studying on the floor of Lenny's living room, on our stomachs in only our shorts. Lenny was on the couch watching TV.

Ken and Michael had been on the other couch, but it had become late and they retired to Michael's bedroom. Before long, Michael's bed began squeaking.

Dan moved up over me, throwing a leg over my butt, and he began kissing the back of my neck.

"I've really gotta get this assignment done, Danny," I said.

"You need a break," Dan said, rubbing the back of my shoulders, rubbing his crotch on my butt.

I chuckled. "You need a break... but if I stop to make love now, I'm gonna be all sleepy and too tired to do this when we're done."

He continued nibbling the side of my neck.

"C'mon, Seany," Dan said, tonguing my ear. "I won't let you fall asleep."

"Yeah," I said, squirming away from under him. "You'll fall asleep and I'll have to stay up."

Dan lay there beside me a moment, and then got up from the floor and headed back toward our room.

"That wasn't good, Baby," Lenny observed.

"I'm glad I make him horny," I said. "It's fine for him to ask me anytime."

"No, Baby," he said. "What you did wasn't good... blowing off your lover. I hear they tell young wives to never say 'no' to their husbands. A few times of that and they go lookin' elsewhere."

"Dan's not gonna do that," I said.

"All the more reason that you should take care of him, Sean. If he's trying to be faithful to you, then you're the only one who can take care of him when he needs it."

I frowned, looking down at my half-finished assignment.

"You want to spend your whole life with that beautiful boy," Lenny said. "What's more important? Your homework or him?"

I laid down my pen and glanced up at Lenny. He cocked an eyebrow. "You want me to take care of him?" he asked with a mischievous grin.

With a sigh I got up from the floor and frowned down at Lenny. "Like hell, you will!" I bent and kissed him and he took it on the lips. "Thanks, Lenny. You're right. I'll go do my duty."

Lenny laughed and swatted my butt. "Do your duty," he scoffed. "Every gay guy in the world would love that duty."

I needed to tell Dan I was sorry, and I had an idea how. Leaving my books on the floor, I went to the kitchen and scooped a dollop of butter onto my fingertips. Then I slipped back to our room.

Dan was in bed already, reading a textbook. I closed the door behind me and came over to sit beside him on the edge of the bed. He set down the book and I took him by the wrist, lifting his open palm; and I scraped the butter off my fingers on to his.

Dan frowned.

"I was wrong, Danny" I said. "I'm sorry." Standing, I wiped my fingers on one of the towels we had started keeping in the room, and then I began to undress.

Dan rolled onto his side, watching me, the butter on his fingertips. "I'm not sure I'm in the mood anymore," he said.

"Are you mad?" I asked.

He nodded. "Yeah, I am. It would have been so easy to just stay in the dorm tonight, but I drove all the way down here to be with you."

I had stripped to my briefs and sat down on the floor facing Dan with my back to the wall. He scrunched the pillow under his head with his non-butter hand, watching me.

I pulled my knees up, wrapping my arms around them, watching Dan.

He looked at the butter on his fingers.

"What else can I say?" I asked. "I'm sorry. I'm really sorry."

Dan shrugged. "No big deal. Go back and get your assignment done."

I shook my head. "I am doing my assignment right now... my life assignment." I took a deep breath and brushed the hair back from my forehead with the back of my forearm. "Look, Dan, you know me; I screw up a lot. I know that. But I'm trying. And I'm going to try; really try, to never repeat mistakes." I looked him in the eye. "I'm never going to tell you 'no' again. I promise."

He considered that. "Never?"

"Never," I said. "You call it; any time, any where,"

He smiled and climbed from the bed, taking a seat on the wall next to me, shoulder to shoulder; wrapping his arms around his knees like I had, still holding the butter on his fingertips.

"Because we're being faithful to each other..." I said, "are you ever going to feel stuck with me?"

"No," he said with a chuckle, and leaned to kiss my shoulder. "It might not always be easy for us if we don't do other guys, but I'll never feel stuck with you and you know it... or you should if you feel the same way about me."

I leaned my head to his. "Asshole!" I said, affectionately. "Am I forgiven?"

"Not only are you forgiven," he said, leaning close, "but you're damned hot, sitting there in your skivvies." He glanced at the butter in his hand and his cock, which was starting to rise from his lap, and then patted his thigh. "How about pulling off your underwear and coming over here?"

. . . . .

Lenny was in the kitchen when Dan and I hugged each other goodbye in the morning. I felt a little guilty because I hadn't hugged Lenny like that in several days; since before we parted for Thanksgiving.

"So you'll rest tonight and I'll see you in the morning?" I asked Dan.

"Yeah," he said with a squeeze of my butt. "Keep it warm," he whispered.

After Dan left, I poured a cup of coffee, grabbed a piece of toast off Lenny's plate, and sat down at the table with him.

"Daniel's not coming tonight?" He asked.

"No."

"And you aren't going up?"

I shook my head. "All the back and forth is wearing us out."

Lenny nodded. "OK then, I'm taking you to the symphony tonight, Baby," Lenny said. "It's a special concert, and I had planned to invite you as soon as I heard about it, but I thought you'd be in Austin or Daniel would be down here."

I sat back in my seat. "Really?"

"Yes," Lenny said. "Wouldn't you like to go? I know you like the symphony."

"That's about the only thing I'd go out for tonight. I saw the program. They're going to be playing two of my favorite Ralph Vaughn Williams pieces. I'll go," I said, "as long as you don't go in drag."

He grinned. "Spoil sport."

. . . . .

"You look good, Baby," Lenny said when he answered my knock at his bedroom door that evening and found me in my sports coat and pullover. He gave me a hug and a closed-mouth kiss that turned into a lingering embrace.

I started to grow hard and pulled away.

"Baby," he said laying his hand on my chest. "Are you sure we couldn't get together tonight? It's been days for me."

"I told you, Lenny. I could have caught something at that party in Houston for all we know."

He looped an arm around my neck and rose on his toes to put his mouth in my ear. "Sleep with me tonight. We don't have to do anything if you don't want, but I've missed you."

My hands dropped to his waist, naturally, and our loins pressed together. "I can feel how much you missed me," I said, pressing my hardness against his. "But I love you, Lenny. I'm not going to take a chance of passing on something to you like GRIDS."

He leaned his head on my shoulder and hugged me. "We can be careful, Baby. Please?"

"We'll see," I said, "I can't think clearly when you've got me all hard."

Lenny laughed and looked up into my eyes. "I love you too, Baby."

. . . . .

A spirited performance of Moussorgsky's Pictures at an Exposition preceded the intermission. The audience was talkative and excited as we all milled in the foyer and mezzanine.

"Lenny!" a voice called.

A square-jawed, solidly built man in his early forties was coming our way. He was well-dressed, carried himself well, and with his salt-and-pepper hair, he cut an imposing figure. I recognized him from his picture as Lenny's old sugar-daddy/lover, Jack.

With him was a younger man; one in his early thirties. He was an inch taller than me and solidly built with Clint Eastwood good looks - he was exactly the type Lenny went for.

Jack introduced him as Jonathan. Jonathan took Lenny's hand to shake and held it. Their eyes locked.

Jack's eyes however, traveled up and down me. "And who is this, Lens?" Jack asked, extending his hand.

"I'm Sean," I said. I was prepared to not like Jack after the way he treated Lenny, but the guy was friendly and had a disarming smile.

"Sean's my special friend," Lenny said. "Behave yourself, Jack."

Jack laughed. "I have to, my wife's here. She's gone to the ladies room, but that takes forever at one of these things."

"I've heard all about you," Jonathan said to Lenny.

"Don't believe a word Jack says," Lenny said with a party laugh, his hand still in Jonathan's.

Jonathan cocked his head. "I don't think he told the half of it," he said.

Lenny simpered, and his bright eyes flashed delightedly.

"Lens," Jack said, releasing my hand and turning to Lenny. "I hear you're doing landscaping work. I've heard good things about you."

Lenny nodded, his eyes still on Jonathan's. They couldn't have been much more obvious.

"Jonathan here builds pools," Jack said. "I bet he can refer some business your way."

"I bet he's good at what he does," Lenny said.

"He is," Jack said with a grin. "Real good."

"Well I'd love to see his... pools," Lenny said, with a provocative grin.

"I'd love to see your... landscaping," Jonathan answered with a grin.

Jack laughed and turned to me. "I knew I shouldn't have introduced them."

"Are you and Jonathan like...?" I started to ask.

Jack grinned. "Friends," he said, then raised an eyebrow and looked right into my eyes with his steely blue ones. "Maybe like you and Lenny are friends."

I looked away from his gaze. "Lenny's special," I said. "Very special."

Jack clapped a hand on my shoulder. "I agree."

People were starting to return to their seats. "You guys want to get together after the concert?" Jonathan asked.

Lenny looked at me hopefully.

I considered it. It might be fun. But it might be better to let Lenny go on his own. "I need to get on back, but Lenny's welcome to go if one of you can give him a ride back."

Jonathan smiled and gave Lenny's hand a final shake. "I will."

"Perhaps you two should go alone," Jack said. "My wife's never met Lenny, but it could be a little awkward... something could slip out about how things used to be."

"Sure, we can go alone," Jonathan said, and then to Lenny. "I'll meet you here after the concert."

Lenny took my hand and squeezed it as we returned to our seats.

"You aren't going to hear another note of this concert, are you?" I asked.

"What?" Lenny asked as he looked over the audience, trying to find where Jonathan was sitting.

We didn't see Lenny for the rest of the weekend.

I saw him on Monday evening when he came from his shower, toweling his hair.

"Well?" I asked.

Lenny howled and hugged me, dancing us around in a circle. "I'm in love, Baby... and he likes me!" He stopped dancing and grabbed me by my biceps. "He says he fell for me the moment he saw me."

"Lenny, Baby," I said, looking at his wet-slicked, long black hair, his pale eyes and dark skin, his high cheekbones and strong neck and shoulders. "I'm sure he did."

Lenny kissed my cheek and danced a quick jig... then stopped as if remembering something. "I've gotta hire some guys - full time," he said. "Jonny's already got me another job."

"Well there goes the Elephant men," I lamented good-naturedly.

Lenny laughed and gave me a bear hug. "I'll always have use for a few good elephant men."

. . . . .

I drove to Austin on Tuesday after swimming and Dan and I slept in the Bronco, inside the dorm parking lot. On Wednesday night, I stayed in San Antonio and had supper with Tom and Sarah.

In his study afterward, Tom was in a philosophical mood; philosophical about marriage now that he had a couple of weeks of it under his belt.

By the start of my second scotch, I was feeling pretty philosophical too, and wound up telling Tom more about Daniel and me than I ever had before.

I told him about our upcoming ceremony and invited him and Sarah to come. I told him about GRIDS and why we were worried (leaving out most of the details of the party), and I told him how Roger and Mary were going to try to find a place for us to live that next semester at Canyon Lake. I even told him about Dan's and my spat the previous Thursday night, and how we were still having to work things through.

"Squeaky bed, huh?" he asked, swirling his scotch. "Nothing like a squeaky bed... I loved my big squeaky brass bed. Now Sarah won't sleep on it. She says it's too noisy and that's why it's in the spare bedroom... the one she didn't make into a sewing room. You need a bed like that for your apartment at the lake. I'll sell it to you."

"Ha!" I said. "We'll be happy for a sleeping bag on the floor."

Tom leaned back, eyeing me. "You sound a lot like any newlywed," he observed. "I never thought about it, but I guess it could be the same for two gay guys."

"Same and different," I said, laying my head back on the chair. "There is one big difference," I murmured. "Wanna know something stupid? I mean, like I've never told anybody this..."

"What?"

I let my head roll on the high back of the chair to face Tom. "I like being a guy. I really do. I've never understood a guy wanting to be a girl. But there's one thing girls can do..."

Tom laughed. "More than one, Sean."

I looked away from Tom, up toward the ceiling. "I like Dan being a guy, too. Sometimes, I like him being the guy... you know? And this is what's really stupid... I got this idea once, about how two guys could have a baby together by removing the genetic strands from an egg and replacing them with those from a single sperm from one guy and then fertilize the egg with a sperm from the other." I sighed, staring up at the ceiling. "Just a crazy, off the wall, I think it could be done, kind of idea. But it started me thinking - and this is the crazy part - it started me thinking how incredible it would be to be pregnant... you know... make a baby with Dan and carry it for us... have a son... a little blond son running around." I took a deep breath. "I'd give anything to be able to do that."

I'd forgotten Tom for a second and glanced at him. He was watching me, expressionless.

"Dan used to worry that I'd get a girl pregnant," I tried to explain, "and I'm just saying I understand why he worried. It's the one thing we can't do for each other."

And then I felt incredibly embarrassed for having said anything.

I sat up, trying to laugh it off. "Too much scotch," I said, pushing up from the chair. "Forget I ever said anything like that."

Tom shook his head. "No, I won't. And you shouldn't. Someday, those feelings ought to be described in a story."

I laughed. "I can't imagine too many people reading that one."

. . . . .

Linda called that night. "I've been worried about you," she said.

"Still healthy," I told her.

"I'm glad to hear it," she said. "From what you said, I expected you to be. But I was worried because you were a little down last time we talked."

"I'm OK," I said. "I've decided to just plain not worry about GRIDS. Dan and I are staying faithful to each other and that should keep us safe as long as we don't already have it."

"So you decided not to wait until you were sure before having sex together again?"

"Dan was pretty insistent,' I told her, and described what happened the evening after we'd seen her.

"How soon would you know that you're safe enough to be with me?" she asked quietly.

"Linda," I said. "You shouldn't count on us for that, you know? I mean, it would be at least a couple more weeks, and then we're having our ceremony and we'll be trying to be faithful just to each other."

She was quiet.

"We both like you. You know that. I mean, like you're the only close girl friend that either of us has."

"Yeah, I know," she said, sounding like she was about to cry. "Just friends."

"Not just friends," I said. "Special friends."

She laughed.

"Why are you laughing?" I asked.

"Oh, nothing," she said, not sounding like it was nothing.

"Look," I said, "maybe Dan and I could make it over there this Sunday. We promised Lenny that we'd help him with a landscaping job on Saturday, but we can come Sunday.

"Don't worry about me," she said.

"It'll be fun," I said. "We can go somewhere to eat. Dan's folks might be in the area looking for a place for us. Maybe we could all meet up."

"Nothing private?" she asked quietly.

She was like my big sister, and I felt sorry for her. In her own way, she was fighting a battle against her nature in much the same way we were beginning to fight ours; to limit our intimacy to a worthy partner.

"We're not safe, Linda," I told her. "At least we don't know that yet."

"Do you remember?" she asked quietly, "In my room that first time you heard my tape of arias? What we did then would be safe, wouldn't it?"

"Things short of intercourse?" you mean.

She was quiet a moment. "Yes," she said.

"I'm not sure," I said. "It could be safe. I'll talk to Daniel, and we'll at least try to come up there to see you, OK?"

"OK," she said.

. . . . .

I called Dan as soon as I hung up from Linda. "I need to see what you think about something," I told him. "We need to consider an errand of mercy on Sunday."

"I'm in a merciful mood," Dan said. "I just spent almost an hour and a half on the phone with Tolly when I should have been studying."

"Is something wrong?" I asked.

"He thinks so," Dan said. "We've talked four times since the party, and every phone call, I've pounded into him how serious this whole GRIDS thing is and I have him agreeing with me that he needs to be careful. The problem is that Kyle and Jeff were the only ones he'd been having sex with before the party and now they're in love and all wrapped up in each other, and they've left Tolly out."

"So he doesn't have anybody?" I asked.

"Not off hand. He knows of guys, of course, but no one who hasn't been doing other guys, and certainly no one he can trust to be faithful to him."

"Won't Kyle and Jeff do anything with him?"

"One time since the party. Only one time. Tolly's going crazy. He's begging me to come home for a weekend."

"You can't do that, Dan. You've been with me since you were with him, and we need to make sure we don't have it. Besides, you can't go home this weekend anyway."

"I know," he said, "But we might consider it soon if he doesn't find somebody. We can do something fairly safe with him and maybe keep him from doing something foolish."

"Well," I said, "that brings me back to why I called about Linda."

. . . . .

On Thursday night, I took Trevor for a drive after supper; just to talk. As usual, he lamented his virginity. He was beginning to sound more desperate each week, and I wondered about helping him the same way Dan and I had talked about helping Linda or Tolly.

I asked about Milam, and Trevor told me that they were still just friends. Then he tried coming on to me, which he normally did at least once a visit, and I turned the conversation to Dan and me and our upcoming ceremony.

"I wish I could come," Trevor said.

"Why?" I asked. "All the gay guys?"

"Hadn't thought about that," Trevor said.

"Why were you thinking you'd want to come, then?" I asked.

"Because you're my big brother," Trevor said, as if that should have been obvious.

Late Friday afternoon, when Dan arrived from Austin, I asked him, point blank, "How safe do you think Tolly really is?"

"Safe. Why?"

"At the party, did he do anybody besides you and me?"

"No. And he did you before you were with Nu or Scott."

"Yeah," I said, "but you did him after doing the blond guy. Did you wash up after you did the blond guy?"

"Yeah... wait... yeah, I did. In fact, I washed up pretty good because I didn't know the guy. I washed good enough that for Tolly to catch anything from me, I'd have to be like instantly contagious or something. So why are you asking?"

"Because we need to come up with a better solution for our little brothers, Tolly and Trevor, than us jacking them off whenever we get a chance. But man, I don't want to take any chances with Trevor."

I told Dan my idea.

"Tolly's gotta be pretty safe," Dan said. "I really think he is. As safe as anyone Trevor's likely to run into. Maybe safer than most."

I chewed my lip.

"They're both going to do somebody else sooner or later," Dan said. "You know that.... probably sooner."

"We'll tell them to wear condoms," I said.

Dan nodded.

The two of us called Tolly in Houston. "Dan told me that you wanted to come to our ceremony," I said, "and I have an idea I want to bounce off you."

"I liked it the last time you bounced something off me," Tolly said, teasingly.

"Yeah, well, you'll probably like this, too." I said. "I want to bounce a boy virgin off you. But you have to promise on pain of death to treat him right and make it good for him."

The line was silent a moment.

"What are you talking about?" Tolly finally asked.

. . . . .

We stopped by Trevor's house that evening and wound up staying when Lisa insisted on making a pot of spaghetti for everyone.

"This thing that you and Daniel are going to in Houston," she said, "you said it's a guy thing... like a retreat?"

I glanced at Dan and Trevor. "I guess you could say that. I mean, it's a time to be apart and examine commitments and all."

"And you're sure Trevor wouldn't be in the way?"

"He won't be in the way," I promised. "But like I said, he'd stay at a friend's house; a guy his age because Dan and I will be busy with some of the preparations. And the day after it's over, he'd have to catch a ride back to San Antonio with some friends from here since Dan and I will still be tied up." (I had threatened Lenny with castration if he or Jonathan did anything with Trevor if they were the ones to bring him back to SA for us.)

"You're sure he'll enjoy it?" she asked, "and he won't be in the way."

"I'll enjoy it, Mom," Trevor said, too quickly and too enthusiastically I thought. "And I'll stay out of the way."

"And this is when again?" she asked.

"I'll pick him up the day after Christmas; Sunday. And he'll be back on Wednesday."

"Does he need money?" she asked.

"Maybe a little spending money is all," Dan said.

"What kind of clothes?" she asked.

"Just normal," I told her.

"Something nice for one, evening event," Dan added with an amused glance in my direction.

"OK," she nodded, smiling. "Why not? It'll be good for him."

Trevor barely contained himself, and afterward, on the doorstep as we were leaving, he wanted to know all about Tolly. "Why don't you call him?" Dan suggested. "Or write him. When we get back to our room tonight, I'll call you with his phone number and address."

Trevor leaned close. "And you're sure he's gay?"

Daniel and I both laughed.

. . . . .

Saturday was warm enough for us to work without shirts and we discovered that Jonathan had one hell of a body. The four of us, Jonathan, Lenny, Dan, and I, worked all day, landscaping around a small pool that Jonathan had just installed.

I was pleased to discover that Jonathan was not only a hard worker, but damned capable as well. He'd be good for Lenny.

The house had one, teenage daughter. By late afternoon, a whole herd of them were on the back porch, watching us and acting silly as hell.

"Well," I asked, leaning close to Lenny at one point. "See any new outfits you want?"

. . . . .

When we returned to Lenny's that evening, we found that Mary had left a message for us to call Roger and her at a motel in San Marcos.

"We found it," she said excitedly. "It was only the third place we looked at, but it's absolutely perfect. Can you two come up in the morning to see it?"

Jonathan had a commitment that next day, so Lenny went with us to see what Mary and Roger had found. We picked up Linda as well. I thought taking her with us to "get her opinion, too" would be a great to lift her spirits. I was as worried about her being down as she had been about me.

We switched to Roger's BMW for the trip to Canyon Lake. Dan, Lenny, and I sat in the back seat, with me in the middle. Since it was a short ride, Linda sat in Dan's lap with her legs across ours. And since Roger and Mary didn't want to talk about the place they found until we saw it, they spent the trip getting to know Lenny and Linda.

The day was sunny and mild. And everyone was in good spirits as we drove to the north side of Canyon Lake and turned into a gravel drive that angled down toward the water. "This place?" Dan asked, hopefully. "Seany," he said, gripping my thigh. "It's on the water."

The cottage was wood frame; a little larger than a doublewide mobile or prefab home. Roger pulled onto a covered concrete pad at the west end of the cottage.

As soon as we stepped out of the car, we smelled mountain cedar and oak. A grass lawn sloped from where we stood for a distance of seventy yards down to the water. The lake was smooth close in. Farther out, sunlight glistened on the water all the way to the far green shore. We could see several small boats, including one sailboat, moving across the surface.

Roger and Mary had arranged for the realtor to meet us, and she guided us around the property, almost like a tour group. Mary and Linda gravitated together, appreciating things about the cottage from a woman's viewpoint.

Dan took my hand at times and the realtor swallowed hard the first time she noticed.

There were neighbors on either side, but trees and brush separated them and isolated the cottage. The highway lay twenty yards away, on the north side of the cottage.

A covered, wooden porch extended across the entire southern exposure of the cottage, as did a long room inside the house, with its fireplace at the east end and a breakfast area at the west. Opening off the long room on the north side were the master bedroom, with its own small bath, a second bedroom, and second bathroom. The kitchen opened off the breakfast area and extended back to a large pantry and a side door to the carport.

"The furniture is available with the house," Mary told us, as we stood in the long room with its rustic, western (but comfortable looking) couches and chairs. "But you'd need new curtains," she said looking around. "What do you think, Linda?"

As Mary and Linda stepped over to examine the windows, I leaned toward Dan. "If they decide on lace..." I started to say.

"Oh, hush!" Mary called back over her shoulder.

"You'll have to go out to do your laundry," Roger said, "but pretty much everything else you need is here." "It normally takes thirty days to close, but the owner's anxious to sell," the realtor told us. "If we put in an offer today, you could close by the first of January."

"Let us talk it over," Roger said to her.

She nodded. "I'll head back to the office," she said. "You can drop the keys back by there on your way out."

. . . . .

"It is perfect," Dan said, when we gathered on the long front porch.

"Absolutely." I agreed.

"It's beautiful," Linda offered.

"Needs a few shrubs," Lenny said, looking out from the porch. "And maybe an oak tree over there."

Smiling, Mary hugged into Roger's side and he put an arm around her. "So you like it?" he asked.

"Are you kidding?" Dan said with a laugh.

Roger looked around the porch and property. "They're asking a fair price for it." His gaze returned to us. "You'd have to agree to let Mary and me stay here with you whenever we want to come to the lake."

"You bet," I said.

"Of course," Dan agreed. "It might be the only time we eat decent meals."

Roger smiled, hugging Mary sideways. "If you're ever making enough money," he said, "to take on a small mortgage payment, you could buy it from us." He smiled. "We'd sell it to you at a ridiculous price."

"And I'll only charge for the plants," Lenny said with a grin.

...

They let Dan and me walk around the property by ourselves. "We've got to bring our bicycles," Dan said, slipping an arm behind my waist as we stood at the end of the dock and looked out over the lake.

"I'm not sure my knee's up to that yet," I said.

Dan turned to me and pulled me to him. I glanced back toward the cottage to see if anyone was looking.

"Don't worry about them," Dan said, wrapping both arms behind my waist and pulling my belly to his. "We're going to ride our bicycles," he said. "And you're going to run again."

I started to say that we'd have to see, but Daniel interrupted.

"Seany!" Dan said in a no-nonsense voice. "Don't even think about arguing with me. If I have to run with you, you're going to run... every evening."

I wrapped my arms over his shoulders. "If you run with me, maybe I will."

Dan smiled and we kissed.

. . . . .

"You're going on a trip after the ceremony," Roger told us when, hand-in-hand, we rejoined the others on the porch.

"A honeymoon, Baby," Lenny said with a broad grin.

"We can honeymoon here," I said.

Roger waved us off with his hand. "We can't close until the first anyway."

"And we need time to get the place ready," Lenny said.

"We have some ideas," Mary told us.

"Involving lace," Linda added with a sly smile.

"How does a trip to New York City for the New Year's celebrations sound?" Roger asked.

Dan and I glanced at each other.

"I could handle that," Dan said.

I nodded. "Yeah, no problem."

. . . . .

We lunched in San Marcos at a German restaurant that Linda wanted to try. It was growing late in the afternoon when we finished and Roger and Mary left to head back to Houston. We still had to get Lenny back and then Dan had to drive back up to Austin.

"I'm sorry," I told Linda with a kiss to her cheek as we dropped her off at the sorority house.

"Me too," Dan agreed, kissing her other cheek. "Seany and me were going to give you a little lovin' this afternoon."

She smiled and kissed us each on the cheek in return. "I had fun. I really like your mom, Daniel."

"Call her Mary," he said. "Everybody does."

Linda smiled. "Yeah, she told me to." Then Linda slipped an arm behind each of our backs. "Promise me a rain check at your cottage as soon as possible."

Dan and I glanced at each other. The cottage would be after our ceremony, when we would be married.

"Or before," Linda said quickly. "Will you be safe next weekend?"

"I don't know," I said. "That's pretty quick."

"And," Dan said, "we'll have finals coming up."

"And Christmas shopping," I added, "and final preparations for the ceremony."

"I'm helping with the ceremony," Linda said. "You're mom... Mary... is already planning on it."

Linda pulled us both closer. "Please," she whispered.

Dan glanced at me and I shrugged.

"Let me see if Lenny will give us a few minutes now," Dan offered.

. . . . .

She lay between us under the covers, holding us each by the cock while our hands and mouths roamed her, teased her, caressed her, and fondled her delicate places.

We covered her sides with our bodies and our knees met inside hers. We didn't open our mouths when we kissed her, just to be safe. But we came with her, on her, on her sheets; and we didn't stop until we'd brought her off twice.

. . . . .

"You owe me," Lenny said with a frown when we returned to the Bronco. He'd been sleeping in the back.

"Yeah, we owe you," Dan agreed. "Thanks for letting us do that. She really needed it."

"What'd you do?" Lenny asked, moving up behind the front console.

We told him in general.

"Babies," Lenny said, stroking each of us on the arm with the back of a finger, "There are always going to be guys, and girls, trying to get you into bed. In fact, I'm one of them. This whole thing with you being afraid of having GRIDS and me meeting Jonny has all happened so fast that I never had a chance for one last time to be with you... especially you, Baby," he said, patting my arm. "You know how I feel about you."

I glanced at Dan, but Lenny kept on. "But now I have Jonny. And you two have each other," he said. "Take care of each other. That's what's important. You can't take care of everybody else. Just start telling them 'no.'"

Dan reached across and took my hand. "He's right," Dan said.

"Yeah," I agreed.

"Except for me of course," Lenny said, settling down behind the console. "If the opportunity ever came up for us to..."

Dan squeezed my hand. "Behave, Lenny, or we're telling Jonny," he called back over his shoulder.

"Doesn't matter, Baby," Lenny said. "He knows how I feel about you two."

"You mean about Sean," Dan corrected.

"About both of you," Lenny said. "Someone has to take care of you two. I think of myself as like... your guardian angel."

"We're doomed," I said.

"Keep it up, baby," Lenny said, "and I'll start charging you rent."