Date: Sun, 27 May 2007 22:26:41 -0300
From: Duncan Ryder <duncanryder@hotmail.com>
Subject: Everybody's Wounded, Chapter Two

This is a work of fiction. The characters exist only in the author's
imagination.  This is a gay love story and contains explicit descriptions
of sex between consenting men; if this offends you, is illegal where you
are, or you are too young, don't read it. This story is copyright by the
author; please don't copy or circulate it without my permission.

This is my first attempt at this kind of story, and I'd welcome feedback
to: duncanryder@hotmail.com.  Thanks to everyone who has commented so
far. I've tried to respond to everyone, but if I've missed someone, my
apologies.  You're responses have been very encouraging and I am very
grateful.

I've been asked to start an update list, so if you'd like to be
notified when the next chapter is posted, just drop me an email at the
above address.


Everybody's Wounded
Chapter Two


Thanksgiving was a pretty sombre affair after that, though we all did our
best.  The whole family saw me off at the airport Monday afternoon: Mom,
Dad, my sister Emily, even Ben and Ryan were there.  I could feel their
love and concern, and I could also feel their strength.  There were no
platitudes, just warm hugs, and when I caught up with Josh in the departure
lounge, I was coping.

Not for long.

"So Big Guy," he said, dumping his pack off the chair he'd been saving for
me.  "Did ya get laid?"

I guess my face kind of fell, because his grin disappeared.  "What
happened, man?"

I slumped down into the seat, feeling empty.

 "David dumped me," I said.

"Aw, Scott, I'm sorry."

And he really sounded sorry.

"Me too," I said.

"You wanna talk about it?"

To my surprise, he turned out to be a surprisingly good listener.  The
whole time we were waiting to board our flight, he led me with careful
questions that kept me thinking and feeling about what had just gone down
with David, and what it meant to me.

"He sounds like a really good guy," he said at one point, as I described
how upset David had been.  "And an incredibly honest one.  Like he knows
himself really well, and makes no apologies for it – even to himself."

I thought about that for a minute.  I realized that Josh was right.
"Maybe," I said slowly.  "Maybe he knows himself a little better than I
know him."

"What do you mean?" Josh probed gently.

I remembered something that Ry had said to me once, before I went off to
college.  It was my sister's birthday, and the whole family – Ben and Ry
included – had gone for dinner to a restaurant in down town Toronto to
celebrate.  David had been really excited; it was the first time he'd been
invited to a family gathering, and the first time he'd met Ben and Ry.  He
got a little loud and giggly, and at one point I realized that people at
other tables were watching him and kind of whispering to one another, and I
got really uncomfortable. Finally, I asked David to be a little quieter.
He'd looked really hurt, and was very quite for the rest of the evening.

Before we left, Ryan took me aside.

"David is a great guy, Scott," he said quietly.  "And he's got to learn to
be comfortable in his own skin.  If you love him, you have to help him do
that. It's pretty obvious that he's not like you or Ben.  Just remember
that he's not like me either.  You won't change him, and you'll only hurt
him if you try."

I had been puzzled and confused, and dismissed it at the time, but now I
found myself rethinking what Ry had said that night.  David is a lot like
Ry physically: small and blonde and slight.  But Ry's much calmer, much
more self-contained and confident.  Maybe he was right after all.  Maybe I
really did want David to be more like Ry.  But even if that were true, it
wasn't because I didn't love David.  It was because I thought he'd be safer
that way, that the assholes in high school would leave him alone.

"Well," I said slowly.  "I think there are elements of David's personality
that I maybe didn't value as highly as I should have, that were more
important to him than I knew.  He has this really...dramatic side, and I
was always trying to keep him a little more...low key."

"Bit of a drama queen?" asked Josh with a chuckle.

"Yeah."  I found myself grinning.  "But in a good way.  Most of the time,
anyway.  When we were with his friends, it was really fun.  I mean, he is
so smart, and so wickedly funny.  And he could be so outrageously accurate,
you know?"

Josh nodded.  "But?"

I thought about it.  "But... it wasn't so good sometimes when we were in
less...supportive places.  Like the caf at school, or the coffee shop
across the road...I mean, David just...attracts attention, you know?  And
it got him into trouble with the jerks at school.  They just zoned in on
him.  It was wrong – they had no right to do it -- but I could see why.  I
mean, when it was just us with our friends, we loved it, he was so funny.
But you could see what set some people off.  I really just wanted to get
him to tone it down a bit in public, you know, draw less attention to
himself, to fit in a bit better.  Or at least not to stand out so much.  I
wanted to keep him safe."

"Did it work?" Josh asked quietly.

I sighed.  "Kinda.  I mean, he was a lot quieter.  But now..."

I thought about his dyed hair and the ear piercings, and how he'd clearly
been really nervous about my reactions to them.

"Now, I'm not sure, I admitted. "I don't know if it made him happy.  It
wasn't really him.  Sometimes, well, I could see he just really wanted to
say something, and he'd look at me, and he'd kind of look away and say
nothing at all..."

Shit.  Just thinking about it kind of choked me up. "Look, it's not like I
disapproved of him, or that I was ashamed of him, ok?  I just wanted him to
be safe.  I wanted people to leave him alone.  He went through so much shit
– you've no idea."

"So you wanted him to, what?" asked Josh.  "Hide that he was gay?"

"No!  How can you say that? Fuck, I'm gay!  I didn't hide it.  I came out
for him – before I even really knew him.  I just wanted him to – to learn
to kind of tone it down a bit, you know?"

Fuck.  I sounded pathetic.

Josh reached over and touched my hand.  "Actually, yeah, I do know.  But
did you ever think that your way of being gay just isn't David's?  Look.
You and I, we're like most gay guys.  No one would know if we don't choose
to let them know.  It's not just that hiding's always a possibility –
keeping it right off the table is always a possibility. Most gay guys are
like that.  But it sound like David's one of the ones who isn't – one of
the ones who couldn't stay in the closet if the door was bolted shut."

"That doesn't mean I don't love him!  Or that what we had wasn't – wasn't
--"

"Of course it doesn't.  Look at yourself, man, you're a mess.  You wouldn't
be this cut up if you didn't love him.  And it's obviously you were right
for each other then. All I'm saying is... maybe you aren't right for each
other now.  Maybe David's done the right thing.  Not just for him, but for
you too."

"I don't get it," I said.  "I did get people to lay off him.  It was a lot
better when I was with him."

"And when you weren't?"

"But that's why –"

"That's why you tried to change him?" Josh said softly.

I stared miserably at the floor.

"Scott, I've got a friend like that in Toronto, a film editor.  He had a
really rough time when he was a kid too.  But now, he's pretty amazing.
And he doesn't get his strength from being able to fade into the
background, believe me.  He gets it from being totally in your face. He
likes to say that he's not just "out" – he's outrageous.  I'm not saying
that David will be like that.  I'm just saying he needs to figure it out.
He needs to be his own man, just like you do, and your way might not be
his."

I nodded slowly.  "You're not the first person who's told me this," I
admitted finally.  "My uncle Ry tried to tell me the same thing.  Ry's gay
too. He said that I seemed to want to change David, and that was a mistake,
that it would only hurt him..."

Josh rubbed my shoulder sympathetically.  "I can understand why you tried,"
he said.  "You're a sweet, protective guy.  And at the time, I guess it was
what both of you needed."

"I guess."

"So basically what you're saying is that David could be himself with his
circle of friends but not in the general high school community."

I nodded.

"What about with your friends?"

I shrugged.  "We didn't spend any time with my friends. I mean, being with
David made me realize that I while I had a lot of buddies, guys I'd been
doing sports with all my life, I didn't really have any close friends.
It's like – all my relationships were really, well, superficial.  I still
hung out with them a bit, mostly when I had to for team things, but I
always went alone.  David I spent our time with his friends, or alone, just
the two of us."

"And what was it like when it was just the two of you?"

"When it was just the two of us –"

I sobbed.  I couldn't help it.  I wasn't used to talking about these
things, even with another gay guy.  David had been mine, I had been his.
What had been between us had been magic, at least, I thought it had been.
And now it was over, and there was nothing I could do about it.

I thought of him Friday night, his small, perfect body stretched out the
length of mine, trying to kiss away my tears as his own dripped down onto
my face.

"When it was just the two of us," I mumbled to Josh.  "It was fucking
wonderful."

And then I lost it.  Right there in the departure lounge of the Toronto
International Airport.

Josh pulled me into his arms.  His body was warm and hard and comforting,
and I wanted to just sink into it.  I felt my cock stir, and that startled
me. Emotionally, all I felt was the enormous pain of David leaving me.  I
didn't expect to have any kind of physical feelings at all, ever again.  I
just wasn't ready for the touch of another guy's body.  For a minute I kind
of pulled away, but he didn't let go.  It was like he knew what I was
feeling and was waiting for it to go away.


***

We were both really quiet on the flight back.  There was some chick flick
playing and we both pretended to watch it, and then pretended to doze off,
or at least I pretended, maybe Josh really did.

Josh has a car and he'd left it at the airport.  He offered to drive me
back to school.  On the way, he asked if I wanted to spend the night at his
apartment.

"No sex," he said, with that wicked grin.  "Just company.  I know you're
not a casual sex type guy.  But sometimes, well, sometimes it's good not to
be alone."

I was going to say no, but suddenly the thought of heading back to my res
room left me cold.

***

Josh was from a wealthy family, and lived in a condo a ten-minute drive
from the university.  He'd bought it as an investment, on the advice of his
parents, with money he'd inherited from his grandfather.  The building was
beautiful, only six stories, in a park- like setting overlooking the ocean.
He told me that most of the other owners were from out of province and only
lived there during the summer, though there were a few other students in
units that their parents had purchased.

His apartment was a complete shock to me. I don't know what I was expecting
– a party place, I guess, given Josh's stated preferences for casual sex.
But what I found was something totally different.  Definitely not student
digs.  It was a real home, a sophisticated home, the kind of home that Ben
and Ry would have designed and built for a really discerning client.  The
ceilings were high and the walls painted a kind of pale browny grey. The
furniture was leather and chrome, and I'm sure some of the chairs had
names.  Everything was tidy and orderly.  The overwhelming atmosphere was
peaceful.

But the most dramatic thing was the wall opposite the windows that
overlooked the water.

"Holy shit," I said staring at an enormous canvas that must have been seven
feet high and ten feet wide.  "That is so beautiful."

It was a painting of a storm-wracked sky and ocean, so real that the wind
and rain made your skin crawl cold.  To the left was naked young man,
life-size, shown from behind in slight profile, staring up into the wild
sky. The rain and wind were beating down on his face, and had flattened his
black hair to his head.  Every line and angle of his body was perfect,
shimmering with rain and an almost other-worldly inner light.

The execution was positively brilliant, the style so hyper realistic that I
wanted to reach out and run my fingers through those rain slicked curls,
down that strong back, over that perfect, white ass.  The form was so
beautiful I could only stare at it.  It was some minutes before I noticed
the young man's face, which was in profile.

"Fuck, that's you," I said softly.

"Sort of," said Josh, actually sounding a little embarrassed. "Let's just
say it's a very much idealized me. What can I say? The guy who painted it
was in love. For the length of time it took to paint the picture, anyway."

I looked at him in surprise.

"Don't go there, Scott," he said.  "He's been gone a long time.  Toronto,
Paris, New York, San Fran – fuck, I don't even know any more.  This --," he
waved his hand at the painting, "This was more important than us.  Than me.
You can see why.  He's fucking brilliant.  He couldn't stay here. I know
that."

"This must really freak out the guys you bring home," I said, still
studying the painting.

Josh didn't say anything for awhile.  "I don't bring guys home," he said
finally.  "Ever. You're the first person I've invited in who didn't know
Graham and me as a couple.  I don't even invite my parents here."

He laughed.  "How could I, with this hanging on the wall?  It's not the
only painting he did of me, but it's the best – and the only thing he left
behind. It's not like I can stick it in the closet when guests pop
over. Hell, I'm not even sure how I'm going to get it out of here when I
sell the place!  He painted it in here.  It's too big to go out the door.
I'm going to have to get a gallery to come in and take it down.  I just
can't bring myself to do that yet."

***

We talked until after midnight, when Josh said we really should go to bed,
since I had a 9 a.m. class.  I felt pretty much as I had since Friday
night: tired, exhausted even, but not sleepy.  In fact I'd hardly slept at
all over the last three nights.  Every time I closed my eyes, I saw David,
heard his final goodbye, felt his mouth moving down over my body.  I didn't
cry about it.  I was done with that.  But I couldn't seem to let go of it
either.

"There's only one bed, Big Guy," said Josh.  "But I promise to be good."

I dug a toothbrush out of my back pack and made my way to the bathroom.
Although I was glad to have spent the evening talking with Josh, now that
it came down to it, I wasn't sure any more that staying the night was such
a good idea.

What if I got hard?  What if I said or did something in my sleep? I'd never
slept with anyone but David, and the few times we'd been able to share
that, he'd awakened in my arms, with my dick hard and practically in his
ass.  What if I was like that with Josh?

I tried to tell myself that that wouldn't happen, that Josh wasn't my type.
Not that he wasn't attractive – he was. Very. But there was something about
him that kind of...scared me a bit.  Maybe it was just that he was five
years older than me.  Or maybe it was the fact that he was so open about
picking up a lot of guys.  That made me feel very young and inexperienced –
and but it also made me feel like he was maybe a little bit of a slut, at
least by my standards.  I don't mean that to sound judgmental.  I really
liked him.  But it worried me, and I thought that, for me, it put him out
of bounds.

I've been lucky to grow up with gay men in my life who've been role models
for me in many ways.  My uncles and their friends are mostly in stable
partnerships; some of them have actually gotten married since that became
legal in Canada a few years ago.  But they all have a kind of sadness to
them that's never very far from the surface.  When they were my age, they
all lost friends to AIDS.  They never let me forget that.  They all do
charity work for various AIDS foundations.  I've had more lectures on safe
sex than I can count.

But even while I was thinking that Josh was off limits physically, I had to
admit that responding to him wasn't beyond the realm of possibility.  I
remembered how I'd reacted to his arms around me in the airport departure
lounge.  I couldn't deny that, even through all the pain I felt because of
David, his touch was just a little thrilling.

What if I reached for him in my sleep?

What if he reached for me?

It suddenly hit me like a brick: wherever else his mouth and his dick had
been in the meantime, this was the first time Josh had actually invited
another guy to share his bed since his artist lover had left him.

What was going on in his head?

Fuck.

I usually sleep naked, but for propriety's sake I dug a clean pair of
boxers out of my backpack – thank God for Moms who send their boys back to
school with clean laundry! – and put them on like armour.  Then I slid into
Josh's bed.

Josh, of course, made no such concession, to propriety or anything else.
When he walked in from the bathroom he was naked, and I couldn't help but
watch him, and know that he was watching me watch him.  His body was
beautiful; whatever he said about idealization, his lover had captured its
essence in that painting.  He was long and lean and graceful, honed from
years of sports at the clubs his parents belonged too – sailing, tennis,
squash, skiing.  And he had a very pretty cock that was half hard and
bouncing gently with every step he took towards me.

Funny.  Next to David, I always felt big and strong and protective.  Josh's
elegant form did not inspire those feelings.  He just made me feel -- big,
and kind of hulking and primitive.  "Fuckin' huge," as David's friends used
to say.

Josh was also completely unselfconscious.  He just kind of grinned at me,
turned out the lights, and climbed into his bed from the other side.  To my
surprise, he spooned his shower-damp body up against my back.  When I felt
that pretty, half-hard cock against my ass, I shivered.  I couldn't help
it.  Through my boxers I felt it go from half hard to steel in a few
heartbeats, my own cock hardening with it.

"Relax, Big Guy," he said, reaching his arm around my chest and pulling
close to me.  "I meant what I said.  Nothing is going to happen.  I don't
do sympathy sex and I don't do broken hearts and I can sleep just fine with
a hard on."  He kissed my shoulder.  "Go to sleep."

It felt odd, being held like that.  With David, I had always been the one
doing the holding, curling up protectively around my beautiful boy.  Now I
was the one being held, warmly, protectively.  It was...ok.

Even the fact that we were both hard was... ok.

I realized that I really could trust Josh completely. Whatever the physical
attraction was between us, we weren't going to do anything with it.  Not
tonight, anyway.

As I heard his breathing slow into sleep, I began to relax, feeling very
calm and very safe.  I even allowed myself to clasp the hand that he'd
wrapped around me, and for the first time since David left me, I slept
soundly.