Warning: the following story contains graphic descriptions of male/male sex between consenting adults. If that sort of thing bothers you, or you are a minor, or it is illegal for you to read this type of content under the laws of your area, don’t read any further.

This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual people or events is purely coincidental.

Accolades, encouragement, suggestions, comments, and corrections are welcome and gladly accepted. Flames will be utterly ignored. <lavenderquill@yahoo.com>.

Other work by The Lavender Quill can be found on the web at <http://lavenderquill.tripod.com/>.

Setting: Sacramento, California, 2002.

Chapter 5.

The next morning I woke to the feel of my splooge cooling and running down my torso. A wet dream. I was not too surprised. I dreamed of that hot picture of Robby. I smiled when I pictured the smooth curves of his ass. I wiped myself off on the sheets.

I quickly showered, dressed, and ate breakfast. I was not meeting Robby at the office building until noon, so I decided to go to a local mall, and see what I could do to liven up my apartment. I decided that I wanted bed sheets in Robby's green. The sheets I had were serviceable but boring hospital white. I had to search three different stores before I found just the shade of green I was looking for, and then got lucky when I found the ones I wanted were on sale. My favorite color is burgundy, which I thought went well enough with Robby's green, so I bought burgundy pillow cases. Feeling like I was on to something, I also bought new towels, a couple of placemats for the kitchen table, and three big pine-scented candles about the size of soda cans.

I was tempted to keep going, but I stopped at that point. I had not spent all that much money, but it was still the most I had spent on purely decorative stuff ever. And I didn't want to get too carried away. I took my purchases back to my apartment, washed the new linens, made the bed, ate an early lunch, and was all ready to go by 11:30. I met Robby at noon at the office building, quite pleased with my morning's efforts.

"If you email me any more pictures like that," I said, "I might molest you right in the middle of this parking lot."

He laughed. "You can't molest me," he said. "'Molest' implies that I would object." He opened that back of the van, and started to pull stuff out. Some of it I recognized, some I didn't. He put huge spool of cable on a dolly. "The spool has to be big in diameter," he explained, "so that the cable doesn't get damaged. It might kink on a small spool."

We went in to the building lobby, where we found a security guard. The guard gave us an envelope. In it, we found keys to the panel room in the basement and the office on the sixth floor. We went down to the basement first. Robby started setting up the testing equipment on the spool of cable.

"So, Robby," I said. "Do you always send pornographic pictures of yourself to other guys?"

"Pornographic?" he said in mock horror. "That was barely 'R' rated."

"Well, I suppose that's true. My reaction wasn't exactly 'R' rated, though." He looked at me quizzically. "I had a wet dream," I admitted.

He smirked. "God, I'm almost afraid to see what would happen if we actually got naked together."

I laughed too. "Well do you?"

He looked blankly at me for a second. "Oh, you mean send pictures? No. Normally I'd be too afraid that someone might spread them all over the internet. I maybe shouldn't have sent them to you, but you just don't seem like the type to do that to me."

"That would be pretty cold," I said.

"Well, yeah, but guys can be kind of mean sometimes, you know? You don't seem like that. I mean, hear you are, a macho construction worker, but you also seem like a nice guy."

"My mother would be pleased to hear that."

"The cable tests okay," he said, standing up. He fastened the end of the old damaged cable to the end of the new cable on the spool. He carefully wrapped the splice with Teflon tape. "This will make it slide through the conduit easier," he explained. "I'm gonna go up to the office and pull it through. I have to be very careful so we don't damage the new cable. Your job is to make sure it doesn't bind or kink or twist or anything coming off the spool. It can't handle more than about fifteen pounds of pressure. I'm going to go pretty slow, so if anything happens just tell me to stop, okay?" He handed me one of the two-way radios.

"Okay," I said. I took one of the wires and snaked my hand up under his shirt like we had done before. This time, he pulled my face to his and we kissed. Even though it had only been two days since he had last kissed me, it felt like an eternity. I plunged my tongue hungrily into his mouth and rubbed his chest. He wrapped his hands around my waist and ground his hips into mine. God, I was so hot for him! I started to pull his shirt off over his head, but he stopped me and disengaged from our kiss.

"Damn, Kevin," he said panting. "You're an animal!" He smiled and licked his lip. "Not that I'm complaining, but we gotta have a little self control. Work now, play later."

I heard a car drive past in the parking garage just outside the panel room. "Yeah, you're right. Sorry." What was I thinking? A minute ago I was on the verge of going down on him in a fucking parking garage.

He gave me a quick peck on the lips. Then he slipped my wire up under my shirt. "I'm sorta tempted to clip the radio to your shoe so I can run the wire up your pant leg."

"That would definitely put an end to my self control," I said. We both laughed.

He gathered up his stuff and left. A minute later I heard his voice in my ear, "Can you hear me okay?" he said.

"Just fine," I said. "How long will the batteries hold out on these radios?"

I heard static, then "… hours."

"What? I lost you for a minute."

"Yeah, I sometimes loose the signal in elevators. I'm on the sixth floor now. I said they should last sixteen hours. We can talk all day." I waited in silence for a while. He had said 'play later'. That was promising. I entertained my mind with thoughts of what we might to together 'later'. Finally I heard his voice again. "Okay, Kevin, I'm going to start pulling now. Like I said, I'm gonna go real slow. This is going to take a while."

I watched as the cable started to move. I carefully held the splice until it was pulled into the end of the conduit. After that, it got pretty boring, watching the cable inch slowly into the conduit.

I started thinking about Robby. I remembered what he said about mean guys spreading his picture around. "Robby," I asked, "have all the guys you've been with been mean?"

"All the guys? You make me sound like a slut or something."

"Sorry, I didn't mean it that way. But I assumed that you have more experience at this than I do. I've only been with four guys, and none of them lasted more than a couple weeks."

"Well, don't assume that I've done a whole lot more, just because I'm two years older. I've never been in a relationship either." He paused. "Though I admit I've had sex with more than four guys."

"Hopefully not all at once," I laughed.

"Hey, don't knock it till you've tried it."

"Robby! You haven't?!"

"No," he laughed. "I had an opportunity to once. Actually a few times. I've always been too chicken."

"I've never even been in a room with four gay guys at once, never mind been offered sex by four at once."

"You're shitting me?"

"No," I admitted. "There was a gay student group at my high school, but I never had the nerve to go to any of there meetings. I'm too young to go to any bars. I just haven't had much chance to meet many other guys."

"Are you still a virgin?"

I didn't say anything for a minute. I wasn't sure what to say. It sounded like a very personal question. But I detected no teasing tone to his voice. "I'm not sure," I finally said. "It depends on how you define virgin." I wasn't sure how far I was willing to go with this question.

"You don't have to tell me if you don't want to. I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

"It's okay. I guess I'm just not used to talking about it." I pressed on. "I've never been, well, fucked, before. But I've done other stuff."

"So you're a top?"

I almost choked. "I… I don't know. I've only done that once. Well, twice, sort of. The first time I didn't have any lube, and it didn't work too good. I just know guys turn me on. You turn me on especially. I never gave much thought to, um, specializing. The other guys I was with, well, we never got past blow jobs." I stopped, feeling a little embarrassed about my disclosures. "So what about you? I assume you are not a virgin. Do you, uh, specialize?"

I heard him laughing. "No, I'm not a virgin," he said. "I got fucked by a mechanic in the bathroom at an auto dealership when I was fifteen. Christ, that hurt."

"Oh my God!"

"Don't be too alarmed. I wanted it. I was desperate. How come we have to learn the hard way about lube? They should teach us that in sex ed."

We both busted up over that one. I couldn't imagine such a thing.

"It hurt, but I loved it," he said. I was having a hard time imagining the scene. Robby looked so innocent, and seemed like such a nice guy. I couldn't picture him at fifteen begging some mechanic to fuck him. I told him so. "Well, yeah, in hindsight it seems pretty stupid," he admitted. "I was just so turned on that another guy actually wanted to have sex with me."

"Oh, bullshit," I said. "I don't think I've ever met a better looking guy. You must have half the homos in Sacramento after you."

"I think you exaggerate. I know I'm decent looking now, but I thought I was ugly when I was fifteen. I'm a little more discriminating now about who I'll do that with. Thank God, at least he wore a condom."

"I was wondering about that. Don't you worry about AIDS?"

"Of course. Don't you?"

"Sometimes," I said. "I go through periods of paranoia. I keep going downtown to a clinic where I can get HIV tests anonymously. I go every six months, even if I haven't done anything with a guy. I'm always relieved, even when I know I haven't done anything that would expose me to HIV." I chuckled nervously. "Seems kind of silly, but it makes me feel better."

"It's not silly at all," said Robby. "I panicked after the I let the mechanic do me. I went to get tested a few days later. The nurse told me it was too soon. That if I'd been exposed, it might not show up for months. Even though he wore a condom, I just about gave myself ulcers for the next three months. I went down and got tested every few months for almost two years before I was calm enough to try it again with anyone else. I've been very careful the last few years, and I get tested at least once or twice a year."

I was relieved to hear that. If I was going to try and get serious with a guy, AIDS was something I really worried about.

"Kevin, my phone is ringing. I'm gonna turn the radio off for a minute. I'll let you know when I come back on."

"Okay," I said. The cable stopped moving, and I could hear a click as he shut it off.

A few minutes later I heard his voice in my ear. "Kevin? You there?"

"I'm here."

"I'm going to start pulling again."

"Okay." The cable started to move again.

"That was one of my buds, Jeremy, on the phone. He was wondering if I was going to a party he's throwing tonight. I forgot he'd asked me a week or so back."

My heart sank. I thought of the stuff I'd bought to make my apartment nice for him, and the food I got so that I could actually cook a decent meal for him. "Oh," was all I said.

"I told him I wasn't sure I could make it, and I asked him if I could bring a friend. He said I could if he was cute. I said you were way cute."

"I guess that means he's gay? Or at least he knows you are.?"

Robby laughed. "Of course. Pretty much everyone there will be gay, or at least bi. So? You wanna go with me? Here's your chance to meet more than four gay people at once."

He said I was way cute! I decided the food could wait. "Sure, okay. How many people are going to be there?"

"Dunno. Maybe twenty or thirty. Maybe more."

"Is it, like, a birthday party or something? Do I need to bring anything?"

I heard him totally crack up laughing, and the cable stopped moving. After he stopped laughing, the cable started to move again. "Oh, Kevin. No, it is most definitely not a birthday party. It's more like a mini rave. You don't have to bring anything. You just have to wear something sexy."

I'd heard of raves, but had never been to one. I hear on the news that there is lots of drugs, and they get raided by the cops sometimes. "Oh. Is there going to be a lot of drugs there? I don't much care what anyone else does, but I'm not really into that, and I don't want to get busted or something."

"Nah. There will probably be some drugs there, but not much. It's at Jeremy's grandmother's place."

"Your kidding?" In my mind, I envisioned raves taking place in big warehouses, not at somebody's grandmother's house.

"No. Really. She lives in this old mansion. It's been in the family for several generations. The top floor used to just be attic, but in the 1920s, they built a dance hall up there. It's all one big huge room with old hardwood floors. Like a fuckin bowling alley in the attic. Anyway, about once every month or two, she goes down and spends the weekend in San Francisco. Sometimes she lets him use the attic dance hall as long as he doesn't break anything or disturb the neighbors."

"Wow."

The cable stopped. "Okay, I've got the cable through at this end. It will take me a while to connect it to a new jack, then I'll come down and do that end. Then we test it. If it tests okay, then we're out of here."

"Great."

"There is nothing to do down there until I'm done here. You can come up here, or just wait."

"Hmm. Let me think," I said. "Do I want to sit in a bare unfinished room in the parking garage staring at unfinished gray walls, or do I want to go up to the sixth floor and stare at your cute butt while you wire a new jack? Tough choice." I headed for the elevator.

When I got to the sixth floor, I found him sitting on the floor connecting the cable to a complicated looking jack. At least it looked more complicated than a typical electrical outlet to me. There was a huge spaghetti pile of old cable next to him.

"See if you can find a trash can to throw this in," he said, elbowing the pile of old cable. There was a small waste basket in the room, but it was too small. "Maybe see if there is a break room or something with a bigger trash can. We can cut it up if we have to."

"I was coming up here to stare at your butt," I complained.

"You can stare at it all night at the party," he laughed.

I went to find a trash can. I found one, eventually, and disposed of the old cable. When I was done, Robby had finished installing the jack into the wall. We went back down to the basement.

"So, do you go to these parties every month?" I asked. "Do you know everyone there?"

"Actually, I haven't been to one in a long time. I used to go more often, but since I turned twenty-one, I can get in to the clubs now. I don't do that very often either, but I don't feel like Jeremy's parties are my only outlet anymore. I'll probably know most of the people there, or at least met them before. There's always a few new people, though."

"That's good. I would feel strange if I was the only new person there."

"I'm glad you're coming. I want you to meet some of my friends." He was quite for a few minutes. He cut the new cable to the right length, then attached the test box. "I sometimes go through periods when I'm kind of depressed. I haven't paid much attention to my friends recently. I've been going through some things on my own, trying to get my shit together. I've been working real hard, trying to get out of debt."

He looked sad as he'd been talking. Then he looked at me and reached over and lightly touched my face. "Lately, I've felt like I was turning my life around a bit. And then I met you, and I've been feeling like I'm on some kind of high ever since." He smiled, pulled my face to his and kissed me softly. "I'm happier than I've been in at least six months, maybe a year." He released me. "When Jeremy called, I suddenly realized I needed to reconnect with my friends. I want them to meet you. I want them to like you as much as I like you." Then he smiled to himself. "Well, maybe not quite that much."

I wasn't sure what to say. I was sort of thrilled that Robby wanted me to be a part of his circle of friends. I liked the idea of becoming more a part of his life.

"I'm going back up," he said, handing me the text box. "Lets hope this works." He walked out, and I stayed in the panel room.

"How often does it fail?" I asked after we flipped the two-way radios back on.

"About twenty percent of the time," he said, getting on the elevator. "The percentage goes up the further away from the panel you get."

"That seems pretty bad."

"Like I said, it's pretty touchy stuff. It's easy to damage, even just pulling it through conduit." By then he was back up on the sixth floor. We ran the test sequence. I remembered some of it from the last time we did it.

"Alright! It tests good on all modes," said Robby. "I'll be right down.

He showed up a few minutes later. He disconnected the test unit, and connected the new cable into the panel. "We're out of here," he said. He gave me a soft lingering kiss. "Thanks for coming with me."

Not fully satisfied with his kiss, I kissed him back, only harder. I dove past his lips with my tongue, and he eagerly accepted my invasion. I pushed him slowly backwards until his shoulders contacted the wall of the panel room. I pushed my body against his and he moaned softly into my mouth. His hands roamed up and down my back under my tee shirt. I closed my eyes and our kiss seemed to take on a life of its own, our breath merging, the whole of the outside world evaporating from my senses, leaving only the passion of his lips, his mouth. I pressed a knee between his thighs, and he parted his legs. I ground my crotch against the bulge in his pants.

I came up for air briefly. "Fuck, Robby," I gasped in his ear. "I want you so bad." His eyes were half lidded, yet still incredibly intense. He crushed his lips against mine and our kiss intensified yet another notch. I reached down between us and groped at his crotch. It is difficult to determine the size of a cock through the heavy fabric of his jeans, but Robby's bulge was impressive. I squeezed gently, and was rewarded with another moan. I kept at it, groping, fondling, his moans encouraging me on. I reached down with the other hand and started to unfasten his pants.

He broke our kiss. "Down boy," he said, pushing me back a couple of inches. "Not so fast."

I stood there taking in great lungfuls of air. Reality crept back into my consciousness, and I realized where we were. I was pretty much past caring, but Robby took my hands in his and gazed at me.

"Kevin, I don't want our first real sex to be in a parking garage."

With effort, I banked down the raging fires of my desire. I regained control of my breathing. He watched me, and I knew he could see my struggle. He smiled at me, and I began to chuckle. "I suppose this isn't the most romantic way to start us off," I conceded. "I must be out of my mind. I think if you let me, I'd blow you in the middle of a crowded shopping mall." We both cracked up.

"Lets try to think of some place a little more appropriate than that," he said. He released my hands. "I want you too, Kevin. But I don't want it to be just a desperate fuck, like the auto mechanic. I think we can do better than that."

He was right, of course. We deserved better than this. "Sorry dude," I said. I dropped my head to his shoulder.

"Don't be sorry, Kevin." He lifted my head and gave me a chaste kiss. "I'm flattered. Really." He smiled and his eyes sparkled. "I've never had anyone offer to blow me in a shopping mall before." We both cracked up again. "Lets get out of here."

We took the keys back up to the security guard and took all the equipment back out to the van.

"I'll pick you up at 9:30 for the party," said Robby, once we had everything ready to go. "Since it's on the top floor, Jeremy locks the door at 10:00. After that he only comes down once an hour to let stragglers in, or you have to wait till someone leaves. It kinda goes all night after that."

"Okay."

"Remember, wear something sexy."

(To be continued.)