Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 14:05:48 -0800 From: Rick Beck Subject: Billie Joes Journal Chapter 5 Chapter 5 Is This the End My Friend? What are we going to do, kid?" "Let's go back to the room." "Will you stop. We got to talk! You know we got to talk about it sooner or later." "Let's talk about it later." "Later I'll be gone, and then I won't know what we're doing. What all this means. I can't leave not knowing." "You going to stay with me?" I asked, remembering his original mission. Carl looked at me and grabbed my other hand so he was swinging both of them right in between 1st and 2nd Streets where you could see the front of Pike's Market. Hustler's stood in the doors of the magazine shops waiting for a hungry sugar daddy to take them away and hookers stood just in the gutter all along the block, waiting for their sugar daddies to whisk them away. People in rain coats passed in a flurry, and Carl held both my hands and looked so deep in my eyes I wanted to jump on him to make him stop. "You know what I have to do." "Then we've got nothing to talk about, Carl. When you leave you're gone. If I see you again, then we'll deal with that when it happens." "You won't write me while I'm over there?" "I didn't say that. I'll write you constantly. I'll be starting my next letter when I'm mailing one. I'll think of you every night, and my heart will ache because I can't reach out and hold you, but I can't go back now. You've opened the door, and I can't go back to Minnesota, to that stupid lie I lived the past three years. I won't do it!" I looked down at our hands, and my voice dropped almost to a whisper. "I can't do it." "You're nuts. You've got to go home. You're a fucking kid. You got to go home." "I can't Carl. This kid knows what he feels, and if I can't be with the man I love, then I'll go somewhere that people will at least let me be. I won't live that lie any more. I can't, and since I don't know what it all means, I can't tell you I will stay true blue to you. It's not fair you going away for a year just when I'm realizing what I want and need to finally be happy. It isn't fair, and I won't make that promise to you because I won't lie for you." "You're too young to be out on your own." "Maybe. I'm too gay to go home. I'll find out. I'm going, Carl. When you get on that plane, I'm hitching to California. I'm going to find people who accept me. That ain't going to happen in Minnesota. I do know that much." "You do, you'll get kilt out on the road. You're a little kid." "I'm a smart little kid, and I've grown up the last few days. I've grown up to know I can't be living like I did now that I've been with someone like you. No way I can do that. It would be like taking a beautiful rose in full bloom and putting it in a jar and screwing the top on so tight it couldn't get no air. I'd do just what that rose would do, Carl. I won't go back to that." "You're scaring me, Billie. I can't be thinking about you out there. I want to keep you safe." "Stay then. If you stay I won't need to go, Carl. I'll stay with you forever and I won't ever care about what anyone else does or thinks. But if you leave me alone and I'm going somewhere that I'm not alone. That's the thing, you see. I can't be alone any more. I been alone sixteen years. I didn't ask for this but I got it. You can go hang out with your marine buddies, but I can't do that. I got no reason to be pretending about what I am no more. I'm gonna to where people will like me because I am me." "Why do you sound so smart all of a sudden? You were a little kid when we met and now you sound like my girl friend with all the answers." "No, not your girl friend. I'm your boy friend, Carl. I'm your boy friend and I know what I am, and I won't live a lie. Never again. I've got to go where people want me the way I am. You got to do what you got to do and that's what I got to do too." "Stay with John, then. He seems cool enough. I'll pay him and that way you can finish school." "I thought of that, and I could stay with John if I wanted, but my parents would be at him every minute to make me -- force me -- to come home. It only works if I get in the wind where they can't get to me and don't know where to look." Carl turned away from me and pulled me along by one arm. He walked one giant step ahead of me, and I couldn't catch up to him without running, and I wouldn't run, so I just walked as fast as I could to keep from having him drag me onto my face. His legs were long and his strides were quick and decisive. I knew he was like totally pissed at me. He was leaving me, and I was angry with him about that. I wanted him to worry about me, and I wanted him to be thinking about me. I wasn't going to make it easy for him. I wanted him to feel like I felt. "So what's it mean?" he snarled, as he turned and faced me after two blocks of dragging me with him. "You tell me?" "Are you going to wait for me or not? Do you love me or not?" "I will be at that gate when you come off the plane. Yes, I love you. God do I love you. But I'm not sitting in Minnesota waiting to see if your ass comes back to me. Not going to happen after only a few days, Carl. I'm just figuring out who I am. You've opened me up so I can feel things for the first time in my life. I can't put it on hold until you get back to me, if you get back to me. I've got to go on with my life, Carl. Whether or not I love you, you won't be here to help me make it through. If you were we wouldn't be talking about it. You're the one leaving me. Don't forget that." We started walking again and this time Carl's strides were less angry and thoughtful enough that I could keep up by walking quick-like. He stopped after another block. "Okay! I got to go. You got to go. You do what you got to do, Billie. When I get on the plane I'll be loving you just as much, but you go and do what you've got to do to keep you going until I come home. You get yourself kilt and I'll kill you myself. You let anyone hurt you and I'll kick your ass all the way from here to Minnesota where you belong. I won't say anything about not loving you if you don't wait for me, because it wouldn't be true. "I'm going to love you forever because you were my first one, and no one else will ever be my first love. My intentions are to be making you my second as soon as I come back. I'm not touching no one while I'm over there. No way, no how. I'm waiting to come off the plane to see your face, and I'll probably dribble all over myself when I do after a year, but I'm not even looking at anyone with sex on my mind. I did it three months, and I'll do it twelve more." "It's up to you. I'll make no promise. I can't stop feeling because after a few days you've gone off to war. You don't have to go, but you are going. I plan to find out more about myself once you're gone. I won't promise to be true blue to you, because I don't know what I'm going to find. I'll be waiting for you one year from now. That's my promise. Unhurt, undead, and very much wanting to be your second one and third and last one forever." "Go back to the room," he ordered in a strange voice. "What?" "I said go back to the room. There's something I got to do." "Find a woman to stick it in 'cause you won't stick in me." "If that's what you want to think, Sure. Some woman to stick it in. Right! You ass hole." "I don't care. Go ahead and find a woman. Maybe that's what you need." "I know what I need. I got what I need. I need to walk and think. Alone! You give me a lot to think over and I plan to think without you around on account of I can't think with you around. I can only think of one thing when you are around, and I want to think about a lot of shit right now." "Okay. Give me the key so I can get in." "You aren't going out?" He asked as if he was surprised. "Only if you tell me where you're going, and then I'll go out to you." "Go to the room." "Yes, sir. I'm going, sir. You have fun, sir." "Fuck you." "Now you're talking. Come on back to the room and you can do just that. We'll stay there until I get big enough for it to fit me." "You are nuts, you know," he said, looking at me as we separated. "Never said I wasn't nuts, Ponyboy." Carl laughed an ironic little laugh and turned around, going down hill, back towards the seedy blocks we just left. I pushed it out of my mind and walked with one foot in the gutter and one on the curb as cars and buses splashed water all over me. I didn't care. It took me an hour to walk the three blocks to the hotel. The manager looked at me funny seeing me splattered in mud and dirt as I slipped through the entranceway and ran up the stairs. I sat in the dark a long time and cried. I knew Carl was leaving me. I would have said anything to get him to stay. If he did stay, we'd live together, and I'd work to support him, but I knew he wasn't staying with me. I cried harder before finally taking off all my clothes. I went and sat in the tub with the water pouring on me and with the steam rising up into the stale air of the tiny room. It was hours before I heard the door shut real soft, but the latch made a distinctive click I could hear even in the bathtub and because I was listening for it. I closed my eyes and leaned back pretending he wasn't there. I was mad at him for leaving me for the first time when we could have been together. Our precious hours were slipping away from us. I heard the door pushed open and I could see his shadow filling the doorway. "You want to come out here a minute?" "You want me to meet your bimbo or something?" "Fuck you." "Get undressed." "Fuck you." "Get undressed." "Get your fucking ass out of the tub. I ain't playing here." As I stood up a shiver ran through me. I opened the curtain and felt naked as he looked at me. He looked from my feet to my face and smiled at what he saw. He had one hand behind his back. He stretched it out and in it was a royal blue jewelry box. I looked at him and started crying. "Open it. Why are you crying?" "Because I treat you so mean, and you're so fucking nice all the time. That's why." "Open it," he ordered. I wiped my eyes and opened the top. Inside was a solid gold bracelet with huge links. On the top was engraved Billie in the upper left hand corner and Joe in the bottom right hand corner. "It's not right. I want your name on it, not mine." "Turn it over, asshole." On the bottom was printed the word loves in the upper left hand corner and on the bottom was the name Carl. He took the box from me and put it on the back of the toilet and hugged me as the water ran over him and me and all over the floor. "I paid the jeweler fifty dollars to come back to work to engrave it. That's what took me so long. He only engraves during the day, and I wanted it tonight. I thought a ring would be a bit much this soon." "You're crazy. You couldn't have waited until tomorrow." "I'm crazy about you, and I wanted you to have it tonight so you know what I feel, Billie." "Why Billie Joe Loves Carl. Why not Carl Loves Billie Joe?" "Because I know I love you. I want you to remember you love me while you're on the road. I want you to look under it where it touches your skin and see that you love me. I don't want you to forget that." "How could I forget?" "Want to prove it to me?" "What do you have in mind sailor?" I asked coyly. "Well, I just blew a months pay on your ass. I thought maybe we could... you know." "Yeah?" "I been dying all the way back up here thinking about you doing that to me. I almost stopped to whack off in a doorway, but then I thought I'd be away from you that much longer and so I didn't whack off. I need you to do that for me tonight. All night tonight if you want. You and me together." "With your clothes on? Get real, big boy," I said in my best May West voice. We kissed there for a long time with water running everywhere. It would have been easy to turn it off or for him to get in or me to get out, but it never came up at the time. We just wanted each other, and that was all there was to it. Love is like that. When we finally dried off and hung up all the clothes to dry, he laid me flat on the bed before straddling me. Each time I went up inside of him the warmth and tight fit shifted my mind on to this billowy cloud that kept going higher and higher. His hot silken insides kept me fired up and driving for pleasure. I became his private bull as he rode me into the night. We stayed that way for hours. When I unloaded, our hungry kisses became warm and tender until the bull got back on his high horse and Carl rode me again. We didn't know there were limits so we didn't look for any. We rolled and kissed and wrestled each other after he flooded my face, neck, and chest with his love, but he always ended back on top of his bull with my back flat on the bed and my hips pushing up toward the heavens. It was the first time we really tried to stick with it for any length of time. His head rolled back on his neck, moving around and around while he moaned louder and louder while doing all he can in an effort to stay screwed down on me. My body became a perpetual motion machine I couldn't stop if I had wanted to, but I didn't. The longer we went the longer I wanted to go. As good as everything was before this was the best of all because it finally lasted for long enough. Each time we finished a round later in the night, we kissed and he leaned forward so he could hold me against his powerful chest, being ever so careful to keep me inside. Rubbing my hands up and down his well-shaped thighs electrified me. With his legs bent back under him the muscles stood out even more impressively. His chest stretched and the muscles shifted as he leaned back and wiggled down on me, but there was no jiggle or movement that wasn't a tightly controlled reaction to some move he made. Each of his muscles was fine tuned and hard. With all the things I had to play with it took me awhile to start on the nipples. That's when I learned the first time was no fluke. When I started twisting them, he started losing control of himself immediately. I remembered how much he liked me to pinch hard, and so I tried to get just the perfect pressure between my thumb and forefinger. Air started gushing out of his mouth as his prick twitched and jerked in my fingers. The feel of it was incredible as his body twisted and ground down on me. He was moaning a lustful tune and seemed lost some where in space. He reacted to my hand's quick time motion on his swollen spike, and I squeezed it and stared at the wide open slit. His hole started doing that grabbing thing on my pole. It was a dead giveaway that he was in launch mode but I was too caught up in the moment to come to that conclusion. The wet eyes and face was the other sure tip off that we'd achieved liftoff, only this time his first stream swooshed past my forehead and onto the backboard with me twisting away on the ruddy ripe nipple. Then he drilled me in the chin but could only manage a few squirts onto my chest after that. My hips stayed in motion until I'd drained my nuts one more time. I waited for the pleasure of his lips and started to feel worn for the first time. I was surprised to find the passion still churning in his kisses. I no longer felt so guilty about wanting him all the time. His cock had become slightly supple before it once again hardened in my hand. We slept for a few minutes with his chest on mine, or at least I did. I woke up with him massaging my balls and easing off my latest erection. He'd apparently managed to find a rhythm without me. His hot breath and thumping heart along with the strained sounds coming from him told me he was already half way there. "I'm not going to let myself. I'm going to hold on," he gasped through clenched teeth as my fist went right to his main vain. "Me too," I lied, feeling it already pumping up out of my nuts as he was massaging them more vigorously while bouncing up and down on my dick. "I am. I swear I am!" He pledged. He gasped during this speech, rocking and rolling with every muscle in his body tensed to the max in his effort to hold off, but he was already far beyond the point of no return. Even his neck had tightened, and his feet curled up with his toes twitching against my legs as he moaned at the ceiling and gurgled some unearthly sound. "I am," he gushed out in a flood of air, and that wasn't all that gushed out. He'd almost made a believer out of me until the hot wet liquid hit my eye with considerable force and than a new squirt splashed up my nose and then there was the stuff in my hair from this time or the last time or both. That shudder he gave off while unloading finished me off. Waking up like that with him engaged with me that way, instantly took me to the brink. There was all this heat running up through my best part and I almost threw him off by forcing my hips up while all the time thinking I wasn't doing that too forcefully. Then as I gasped for air I took in my first taste of that white stuff he was issuing around the room with impunity. It went right into my gaping mouth. It was my fault. I had control of the thing, but even so, I choked and coughed and wanted to spit it out, but it ran back on my tongue and I swallowed while trying to expel it. It wasn't that bad. In fact, I came to think it wasn't anything like I thought it would be coming from where it came from, but I felt I was getting pretty weird and all, doing stuff with Carl. So don't take my word for it. He was leaning back on his two hands which he placed beside my knees, and the muscles in his stomach and chest all seemed to run together as they heaved, trying to calm down. There was more of that stuff dripping onto the middle of my chest as I breathed real hard while struggling to watch everything that was going on around me. He sat there for a long time with his eyes closed. He didn't move except for him breathing. My breathing went back to normal and I rubbed on those thighs and looked at him all over the tops of my legs the way he stretched back and all. After a while he leaned forward real slow and stayed on top placing his hands beside my shoulders. He opened his eyes, looking down at my face. I knew his lips were coming, but it took five minutes more for them to get there. Then it was like that first kiss. He held them over me and only let them barely touch mine. He moved his so they were like a wispy bit of wind traveling past, barely touching my skin. I wanted them pressed and crushed into mine! I wanted his lips and tongue and mine joining to become one. He was so gentle afterwards. I felt him go soft for the first time in hours. It was a good feeling, holding it at rest for change. I was asleep before I knew it. I don't think I moved and I don't know how long I slept, but when I woke and kissed his waiting lips, he woke as well, like we had just take a break so we could keep going. We both knew we were saving it up so we'd remember this night during the long lonely months ahead. We were quickly rocking and rolling and the bed was squeaking and squawking, but we showed it no mercy as we rode off to destinations unknown. We traveled as one and rode off into the light fixture and flew around the ceiling and up through the slats of the window blinds and out into the cool damp Seattle night. Our bodies left us and explored the universe floating up through the stars and constellations. Just dust mingling together and sharing one universal existence. We rode and moved through the night and only when first light shone in through the window did we know we were too exhausted to take the ride again. Only then did we separate and Carl lay beside me with his lips barely touching mine. My eyes studied his gorgeous face and his freckles and eyelids as they danced and drooped for me while lines of fatigue had become etched into his face. Our arms and legs tangled all together as every ounce of energy in my body was expended for the first time in my life. Each time together I thought we had done all there was to do, and it was as good as it could ever be, and then the next time it got so much better I couldn't remember the last time at all. We held each other and stared into one another's eyes until we drifted away from one another, falling into sleep as the stars twinkled out one by one by one. ***** Email and comments create momentum. bjwalkerjr@37.com If you ARE enjoying this, try my other story, DISCOVERING GREGORY, /nifty/gay/highschool/discovering-gregory/