Author: Aardvark

Email: losingthewill2live@gmail.com

 

The following story is almost certainly a work of fiction.

If you shouldn't be reading this sort of thing, because of the rules which operate in the place where you live, then your decision to continue reading must be a matter between you, your conscience, and your relationship with whoever it is who makes the rules – be it your mother or your government.

 

I should address the `playing safe' issue, I suppose. Leo and Michael don't, because they don't need to: Leo was a virgin when the relationship began, and has only ever had unprotected sex with Michael, who had tested `negative' in his most recent test, since when he had not been exposed. Which means they can indulge freely, without having to break off in mid-flow and start scruffing around in search of condoms (remember what those days were like?)

 

Comments are welcome. And, as ever, donations to Nifty are encouraged. We all get a helluva lot of `entertainment' from these pages; give something back. Follow the link on the Nifty homepage to see how you can donate. 

 

Many thanks for your input, and particularly to those people who've lasted the entire ride of all twenty episodes. I only hope that it's been as rewarding to read as it has been to write. There might be the occasional one-off at some time in the future (there are plenty of Leo-events that would merit telling, but which I haven't included here, as they didn't form part of the narrative structure: `Leo's first threesome', for example – which was in fact a foursome, now I come to think of it – and `Leo's Christmas dildo...'), but that will depend on how I'm feeling, some rainy afternoon, with a keyboard at the ready ...

 

For now, though...That's All, Folks!

 

 

 

 

Lost Ball: Part 20

`Epilogue...(2)'

 

 

"Jesus, Leo!" It was impossible to keep the irritation out of my voice. He'd done it again.

And, from the sheepish expression on his face when he appeared from the direction of the laundry-room, in answer to my pissed-off exclamation, he knew perfectly well what he'd done. Again. Clearly, he'd just finished toweling his hair dry, and it stood in confusion, while his hands held both ends of the towel which was now slung around his neck. Dressed only in a pair of skimpy red briefs, his body was lean and toned, from all the time he spent either rowing or playing tennis - although he had the lines of an athlete, rather than of a gymn-bunny. At twenty-one, he'd matured into a young man of noticeably good looks, and any puppyish roundness in his features from before had given way to classic lines, with a strongly-defined jaw and cheekbones, and just a hint at concavity in his cheeks. Long eyelashes and dark eyebrows framed eyes which hadn't darkened from the blue-grey which I'd found irresistible from the start, and which made such a striking combination with his dark hair. I'd seen him turn heads in the street, before now, with good reason – and, although, he affected to be completely unaware of his looks, he had the self-confidence of somebody who knows that they're likely to get what they want, if they smile and ask nicely.

He'd not completely dried himself, and his back and shoulders were still dotted with drops of water, from his shower. Although, these were nothing in comparison with the puddles on the bathroom floor, which he'd apparently created in the process of his ablutions, and which were the reason for my annoyance. Nothing had changed in Leo's bathroom habits, over the years; it was like leaving a warthog on the loose, or a baby elephant - and although he was generally sufficiently conscientious that all traces were cleared away before I had to wade through the aftermath, on occasion – like now – he didn't get to it quickly enough. I glared at him, and then merely shook my head in surrender as his look of abject contrition, as ever, completely won me over. With feigned brusqueness, I took the towel from around his shoulders and made him turn, so that I could dry his back for him, and then I dropped the towel on the floor, so that he could deal with the worst of the water damage merely by pushing the discarded towel through the puddles, with his feet.

As he finished, standing behind him, I rested my hands on his shoulders, and my eyes met his in the mirror above the basin. Lightly I snapped the waistband of his briefs, and my raised eyebrows communicated an ironic complaint. The briefs were mine, and yet again he'd helped himself to my underwear. He reached up with his right hand to touch my left hand, where it rested on his shoulder, and he dipped his chin to give my palm a quick kiss - of negotiation, I thought, wryly. His habit of taking my underwear for himself was a complicated riff between us – in fact, I liked the fact that he liked wearing my underpants, but I had to pretend that it riled me, as otherwise it risked losing for him the frisson of doing something which he shouldn't.

Leo, and stolen pleasures.

And so, unless they were either brand new, or else perhaps a pair which he'd recently given me himself, he usually got away with stealing my briefs – but generally only after the ritual had been gone through, like now, of my having acknowledged and grudgingly accepted that he'd done so. When he raised his chin again, he was smiling overtly sweetly, as he received my apparently reluctant permission. I kissed the back of his ear – not the top, any longer, but the back, as, these days, he was probably less than half an inch shorter than I was – and I reached down to pat his bum.

"Come on. We're going to be late." Nevertheless, we neither of us made a move, apart from my hand moving round from where it rested on his arse, to embrace him around his waist, while my other arm held him across his chest. And his arms came up to clasp mine. He half-turned his head, to meet me, and I kissed along his jaw, to his waiting lips.

We were – inevitably – late.

*

We didn't live together. Not formally, anyway. And not all of the time.

When Leo had begun his university course, his parents – like many Italian parents do for their offspring, if they can afford it – had bought him an apartment in town. Two bedrooms, so he could rent one of them to a fellow student. And Leo even spent some of his time there. But for the most part he seemed to treat my house as home – he had his own keys, to come and go as he liked, and there was at least as much of his stuff - books and clothes and general detritus - littered around in my living space as there was in his own apartment. When it came to looking for his passport, for some trip abroad, for instance, it was just as likely to be in a drawer in my desk as it was to be amongst his own papers.

My friends all knew Leo, and whenever an invitation was proffered to some social event, it was always understood that if Leo wanted to come as well, then he was definitely included. Often, he did – but not always. Nobody ever asked – or, not overtly anyway – the exact nature of our relationship...whether we were formally `partners' or not. It was just taken for granted that wherever one of us was to be found, then the other probably wouldn't be far away...or, not for long.

Although, it wasn't the case that we were joined at the hip. Leo had a wide social network all of his own, most of which I was aware of in only a very vague way. I'm not sure I'd call these people his `friends' exactly, but Leo was the kind of person that other people wanted to know, and so his address book was very full, and he had a social life of student parties and that sort of thing which he dipped into as he wanted, entirely separately from me. Occasionally, he'd go off for several days at a time to some event in Florence, or Milan, or Padua – a rock concert or a party of some kind, that would be of no interest to me – and would then reappear, sometimes looking slightly the worse for wear. And, on occasion, I had business-related trips that took me away for days, or even weeks, at a time. Sometimes, if it was feasible, I'd ask if he wanted to come along, and sometimes, he did.

As far as he was concerned, we were very definitely Partners. But that was something that existed entirely for and between us. It was of no concern to anybody else. On more then one occasion recently, though, he'd raised the issue of making it legal.

"But, Leo...I'm thirty years older than you are, I'd objected. "I can't see it's a good idea for you to tie yourself to somebody who's so much older than you are."

"It's getting less, all the time," he argued. I looked sceptical. "Well, not absolutely...but in relative terms, it is." I gave him an amused glance that indicated I was prepared to listen. "When we first met, you were three times my age." I nodded. "And now, five years later, you're only two and a half times."

"Ok." I smiled – his logic was entertaining, even if the argument was bollocks.

"And, by the time I'm the age you are now, then you'll only be a bit more than half again my age."

"Your maths is crap – I worry about anybody who might have to live in one of your buildings, in years to come." Leo was studying to become an architect. "And anyway, you make `us' sound like some kind of nuclear half-life."

"Well, what's wrong with that? Nuclear half-lives go on for ever." Which was kind of unanswerable; and something quietly to relish. "And, so?" he persisted, not wanting to let the legal-partnership question just go unanswered.

"Well, maybe...I'll think about it." He grinned. Where I was concerned, Leo knew perfectly well what `yes' sounded like.

*

I wondered, at times, whether he'd been permanently affected by what had happened to him during that summer when he was fifteen. And, it was difficult to believe that he hadn't been. Although, on the surface Leo generally appeared open and cheerful, I was aware sometimes of a distance that he was maintaining, underneath. An unspoken wariness. An unwillingness to trust. Not with me, but with other people. With me, he was entirely himself, and I had his confidence, in every sense, in a way which I sometimes found almost overwhelming, and glorious, in its lack of constraint. But more broadly, there was a subtle sense – probably not visible to others - that he was on his guard...and I doubted that the carefree Leo of the early days would have developed such a protective barrier for himself if he hadn't experienced the traumas of his fifteenth summer. Beneath his apparently gregarious exterior, he had become in many ways a solitary character – he wasn't a team player, any longer, and the hours he spent pushing himself physically, at the gymn and when he was sculling, on the river, seemed to be about him pitting himself alone against his personal challenges. Some part of Leo had been broken beyond repair by what had happened, and for that I felt myself unable to forgive those I thought had been responsible.

These days, his connection with his parents appeared good. Enough, anyway. He spent time with them, regularly, and from what I could gather they had a solid enough relationship. Which did not include me.

It was a situation entirely of my making. Cecilia had tried, even to the extent of asking Leo to invite me to dinner with them, on one occasion. An invitation which he'd passed on, with no expression in his voice, and in relation to which I'd had no difficulty in finding a subsequent engagement. There'd been no second attempt. And, each year, I received a Christmas card, signed by her in both their names, and each year I would send back via Leo verbal thanks, and the excuse that since I don't send Christmas cards to anybody, then the fact that I wasn't sending one to them should be understood as nothing personal. Although, of course, it was. I had no wish whatsoever to be playing Happy Families with Leo's parents. Forgive and forget? Since I couldn't do the latter, then I gave no thought whatsoever to the former. Which gave Leo no problem at all: I'd never told him about my meeting with his mother, but he gathered somehow that something had happened. And he never asked further.

In the summer following the year when I'd met him, Leo had told his parents that he wouldn't be coming with them again to Sardinia. He'd made no fuss about it, but had been quietly determined, and they'd known better than to try and push him. By that stage, his life was clearly back on track – with much still left unsaid - and they hadn't wanted to risk rocking the boat. At sixteen, it hadn't been so strange for them to tell their friends that, this year, Leo would be going on holiday instead with a group of friends. Which meant me. For a week of their three weeks' away, he'd moved in with me, at home, and after that I'd taken him off to Greece, to my old stamping ground, for another fortnight. A week of endless museums, and archaeological sites, until he begged for mercy – and I had to remind him that this was what he'd asked for – and then a week of paradise with him, on a remote beach in the cyclades: candle-lit dinners at the local taverna, and retsina, and watermelon, and sunbathing, and sex.

It was during that holiday that he first showed a serious interest in architecture, looking at the ruins we saw with an analytical eye, rather than merely as a passing tourist, and researching in some detail the entasis on the Parthenon, and exploring the ruins of the temple of Olympian Zeus. And his interest continued once he was back home, and fuelled a lot of further research on his part. To me, it made sense: intellectually he was qualified to do any number of things, and Leo's innate feeling for style, and for theatre, combined with a deeply practical need to pin things down and to ground them seemed a perfect basis, in my mind, for him to choose architecture as a career. Mind you, that wasn't what I'd said when he'd first explored the idea with me. Which had been, with an entirely straight face, that I thought it entirely appropriate for him `to devote his life to creating erections'. It was only after I'd said that, and fended off the bread roll he'd thrown at my head, that I got round to saying all of the other things.

In subsequent years, we'd gone to Paris, and to New York, and to Tokyo. I was never happier, when sitting on a plane, than when I had Leo in the seat next to me. Although – come to think of it - that was probably true wherever we were.

In general, I'd come to feel completed by his presence – and, therefore, logically, somehow incomplete when he wasn't there.

*

For his twenty-first birthday, I took Leo to Rome. Not on the day itself, which was a weekday and he had lectures – and, anyway, he had a family celebration that evening - but, on the following weekend. I rented an apartment for three days in the Monti district, overlooking the forum, and Leo had put together a programme of ruins and restaurants to cram into the time. Although the many stairs to get there were not a plus, the apartment was a real find. In Via Baccina – right at the top of the building - with a bedroom and a living room, both of which opened onto a roof terrace with views down over the forum and directly across to the Wedding Cake and the Capitoline. In November, we were unlikely to make much use of the table and chairs placed on the terrace for al fresco dining, but the view out and down over the rooftops and then the vista over Rome itself was spectacular. In order to attract more rental customers, I imagine, the owners had installed a hot tub out there, as well – which I could see, without him having said a word, Leo thought rather tasteless.

We'd arrived quite late, since the train had inexplicably idled on its route down the coast, and there was only time that first evening to dump baggage before we headed out for dinner. And returned, several hours later, to an epic session in bed, where Leo rode me to one of the more memorable orgasms he'd ever generated in all of our time together. Followed by an exhausted sleep, on both our parts.

The following day was mild, but overcast and drizzly. The morning at the Capitoline museums, and then an exhaustive inspection of the Pantheon – where the weather did us the favour of actually raining, down through the central occulus – and then lunch in via Gesu, before we traipsed across to Trastevere, to spend the afternoon looking at pictures in the endless and deserted galleries of the Corsini Palace. And we took so long about it that when we then wanted to get into the Farnesina, across the road, we found that we'd not left enough time, and we'd have to leave it for another day. So, instead, we had a long and leisurely walk all the way back to via Baccina, rubbernecking as we went. An hour or so to relax – I soaked in a bath, while Leo pored over the facsimile edition of Vitruvius Britannicus that I'd given him for his birthday – and then we went by taxi to Evangelista, which I'd always had in mind as the place for his celebratory dinner. Afterwards, feeling comfortably replete, we strolled all the way back – and, after we'd passed Trajan's column, Leo's finger had found its way discreetly into my hand, and I clasped it lightly as we made our way through the final few streets, deserted at this time of evening, on our way home.

I'd not mentioned it at the time, but before we'd left for the restaurant, I'd turned the heater on in the hot tub. Tasteless or not, I had in mind soaking away the end of the evening, in there together, as we drank in the glorious view before us. And it was with a deep sense of contentment that I sank beneath the water, and stretched out, langorously – a complete day of energetic sightseeing had taken its toll, and my muscles welcomed the soothing buffeting as I pressed the button to turn on the underwater jets. The terrace was illuminated by the lights that I'd left on in the living room, as well as by the luminous nighttime nimbus which rose from the city below. Leo was only a minute or so behind me, and I watched as he quickly stripped off his jeans and polo shirt, and then shucked his – actually his, for a change – briefs, before he joined me in the tub. My right arm slid around his shoulders, as he snuggled against me, both of us seated on the side of the tub which afforded the view out over the neighbouring rooftops.

"Have I ever told you that I love you?" he asked, as I turned towards him for a kiss.

"Once or twice." I stroked the back of his neck. "But I don't think I could ever get tired of hearing it." He wrapped his arms around me, and we remained like that, half lying in the churning water, as we talked lazily of this and that. He was annoyed with himself, in his position as programme-manager for the weekend, that we'd not managed to get into the Farnesina, that afternoon, and he was trying to work out how we could fit it in, later on. Under the water, his right hand moved down, first of all onto my thigh, and then up, where it came to rest between my legs. It was the kind of relaxed physical intimacy that I so loved with him, and I stretched my legs forward and slightly further apart as his hand toyed with my balls, and then slid down further to clasp me lightly between my splayed legs. Although it wasn't an overtly sexual move, not the way he was doing it, my cock appeared to think otherwise, and I could feel myself hardening under his touch.

He carried on talking...but it had become a monologue, by now, as I registered, to my surprise, that his fingertip was working its way backwards and forwards along the crack in my arse. And I suddenly found it challenging to concentrate on anything else.

This was...different.

In all the many, many, many times that we'd fucked, Leo had always been on the receiving end – by his choice, as much as mine, or so I'd understood – and never before had he indicated any interest whatsoever to approach things in any other way.

His finger continued to stroke, and explore...and by now, he too had fallen silent. As the jets under the water continued to surge, whatever was taking place beneath the surface was hidden by the water's movement. With apparent nonchalance, I lifted my left foot up, and placed it on the edge of the seat – my knee breaking the surface as I did so - and thereby indicated to him my willingness that he carry on with what he was doing. I could feel the intense hardness of my erection, under the water, and I was sensitive as well to the fact of my nipples hardening, even without the attention of anybody's touch. My position allowed him better access, and as he gently pushed his finger inside me, just a little, I held my breath, and then let it out with a low murmur of appreciation. He slid his finger in further, and I closed my eyes, my head tilted back, as he found my g-spot. I moved my pelvis against his hand as he touched me, inside, and I was in heaven.

"That feels...amazing," I told him, through half opened eyes, and with my voice now laboured. I turned, to meet his gaze, serious and intense, as his finger slid further in, and then almost out, and then repeated, again, and again.

"Leo?" I sought affirmation of what I thought this might be about. "Do you want...?" And then, I groaned a second time, deeply, in pleasure. I couldn't finish what I had to say. My eyes rolled back into my head, as he found exactly the right spot, once again. When I opened my eyes properly once more, he was looking at me with an expression partly of concern, but more of raw desire.

"Michael...can I...?" His voice was ragged. It seemed that he couldn't finish his question either...although not for the same reason – probably, more because he was uncertain of the possible enormity of what he wanted to ask.

"God, yes!" I managed. And I raised my other foot up, also onto the edge of the seat, in order to make entirely clear that I was available to him in whatever way he might want. It seemed easier than trusting myself to words. He rolled off the seat, and he knelt in front of me, in the water - and as I held my knees back and apart, he slid his finger back into me, and then joined another one to it. As I pushed back against him, my cock rose up out of the water, and he leaned forward, and took me into his mouth. He sucked me and fingered my arse, as I tried not to thrash around too much or to make too much noise – I didn't want some neighbour to summon the vigili, thinking that a murder was taking place. My mind was a complete maelstrom of responses, as it was assaulted by the incredibly thrilling sensations of what he was doing.

Leo hooked his arms under my knees, and drew me forward in the water, so that only the small of my back now rested against the edge of the seat, and he resumed his deep fingering of my arse, as I supported myself not entirely comfortably on my elbows, half floating. In response to him lowering his face, I pushed my groin up, to meet him, and he pushed my buttocks as far apart as he could, using both hands in the process, before he tried to put his mouth to my arse, which was not properly clear of the churning surface of the water. As much because I thought one of us was in danger of drowning as from a desire to move matters on, I suggested that we move things indoors, and to bed. And Leo agreed.

In haste, we got out and cursorily toweled ourselves down, before racing for the bedroom. Rock-hard erections led the way.

One, very dim lamp – a nightlight, really – was turned on beside the bed, and otherwise the room was illuminated by the city's luminescence which came in through the uncurtained glass doors which led out to the terrace. I lay on the bed, resolutely on my back, and played with my rigid cock, in readiness, as I looked up at Leo, standing beside the bed and looking down at me. His hand slowly worked his own cock, as he stood there.

He lay down next to me, and I raised my knees, as his hand slid back down and into place at my arse. In silence, I reached for the lube which was still there, on the bedside table, from the night before, and I handed it to him.

"Are you sure?" he asked, suddenly uncertain. I met his look with a determined gaze. There was no turning back, on this one – I just hoped that he hadn't bitten off more than he could chew.

"You have no idea..." and I clamped my thighs against his hand, to make my point. As if it needed making.

With his fingers, he generously lubed my arse, and I couldn't help but move lasciviously against him as his fingers dipped slightly inside me in the process. Then - the lube safely stowed once more – he slid his two fingers up and down against my taint, and he turned to kiss me. The intensity with which I held him as I returned his kiss must have removed any doubts he might have retained about my willingness for him to fuck me, and in those few seconds, I very definitely emphasized the `want' in `wanton'. With my tongue wrestling hungrily against his, his fingers slid as far inside me as they could go, and I let out a long moan of deep satisfaction.

Disentangling himself from me, Leo moved around on the bed, until he was kneeling upright, between my parted thighs. He reached for a pillow, and I raised myself, to allow him to push it into place, beneath my hips. For a second or so, we stayed like that: his hands resting on my knees, as I lay there and looked up at him, at the triangular shape he made, from his broad shoulders to his trim waist, and at his cock, which stood before him, erect and rigid with intent, his glans dark and ready, a gloriously obscene phallus. It's beyond me accurately to describe my feelings as I looked up at Leo, but there was both an intense physical hunger, as well as a feeling of love for him that felt strong and uncomplicated and almost like a force of nature.

The feeling as he entered me was exquisite, in the true sense of the word – not the `pretty-pretty', Fragonard-Watteau meaning it has come to assume, but the `just this side of impossible perfection' that it ought to have. Only just bearable, in the best possible sense. Not a feeling of physical discomfort, exactly, but an awareness that the presence there, deep inside me, was Leo's cock. Was him. I had to grit my teeth, and to reach behind myself and grip the pillow beneath me with both hands and with all my strength in order to withstand the sensation. If my hand had been on my cock, at that moment, there's no way I wouldn't have cum immediately, and I had to writhe around beneath him just to try and keep control over myself as I felt his cock penetrate deep inside me.

And then, he began to fuck.

At one moment, as I moved beneath him, my head was turned to one side, and I caught sight of his dim reflection in the un-curtained window as he fucked into me. His lithe frame – broad shoulders, and the line of his buttocks - and the movements he made as he held my ankles and thrust rhythmically in again and again and again was almost balletic. At one point, he reached for the bottle of poppers on the bedside table, and offered them to me – but I shook my head in emphatic refusal, as this was to be about a pure interaction between him and me, with nothing else forming part of that interface.

As I felt his pace quicken, I willed myself to stay still enough to catch and to keep his gaze, and our eyes were locked together as I sensed he was reaching his climax. Gasping, in noisy rhythmic breaths, he climbed ever closer, and when I sensed he was almost there, I finally reached down for my own cock, and I began to work it in time with his thrusts.

His cry as he came was enough to send me over the top, and even as I felt his final strokes deep inside me, my cock erupted in ropes of cum that shot over my chest, and then my stomach, and then, finally, we were brought to a breathless and sweaty conclusion. The smile of joy which broke across his features as I looked up at him , his chest still heaving, was a thing of beauty all its own.

*

"That was...spectacular." Although he'd been in the driving seat during sex, Leo had reverted immediately afterwards to being my boy, burrowed against me, in my arms, and snuggled under the bedcovers. His voice showed that he was barely still awake. I'd turned off the bedside lamp, but the room was dimly illuminated by the glow from the lights of the city outside – I knew I'd have to get up at some point, to pull the curtains, and prevent us from being rudely woken far too early at daybreak – but, not yet.

"Yes. It was." I pressed my face against the top of his head.

"Can we do it again?" He spoke into my chest, suppressing a deep yawn as he did so.

"I hope so. But maybe not right now. It works better if you're actually awake at the time." He gave a slight grunt, in tired acknowledgement of my joke.

"Well...there's always tomorrow," he murmured, and moved slightly under the covers, to wrap himself more tightly around me. As he did so, the bedcovers moved and a waft came to me of the warm, biscuity scent of freshly-baked Leo. He was battling the onset of sleep, and clearly losing.

"Yes." I kissed his head. "There's always tomorrow."

 

The End