Jack Edwards
jnuanced@gmail.com

The Activist , Pt 16b

In May, Nate and I sat Pauly down at the small dining table in our apartment.

“We need to talk,” Nate told him.

Pauly’s brow furrowed with concern.

Nate glanced at me, and reached for my hand across the table.

“Pauly,” he said, “you know how Loren and I feel about each other. You know we’re together for good. You also know how we love you. But you’ve been interested in Tommy lately, right?”

Pauly nodded.

“We just think,” I said, “that if you’re getting a boyfriend of your own, you should probably have the other bedroom to yourself.”

Pauly’s eyes dropped. He nodded sadly. When he looked up, there were tears in his eyes. He looked from Nate to me. He started to say something, stopped, then got sadly up from the table and began to head back toward the bedroom. He stopped, and came back, and he knelt down between Nate’s chair and mine.

He took our hands in his, and held them to his wet face. “Not yet,” he said. “Don’t make me move yet.” He smiled up at me through his tears, and then at Nate. “I wouldn’t know how to make love with only one guy at a time.” His smile faded. “I love you… both of you.”

Only a day or two later, I had sex for the first time with Pauly without Nate. I knew the two of them had sex at least a few times on mornings when I had to leave early for class. It just hadn’t happened between Pauly and me until that Saturday afternoon.

The apartment complex had a pool and the water was finally warm enough to go swimming. I had gone by myself because Pauly was working on a paper and Nate was at work.

I felt good, and after watching a couple of other guys at the pool, I was horny. It was that spring day kind of horniness when you feel great and healthy and your cock feels heavy, even when it’s flaccid. Pauly was reading on the living room couch, in just his shorts. He saw the way I looked at him, and he saw the growing erection in the front of my swim suit, and he put the book down.

I came up to the couch, standing beside him. Pauly pulled down my suit, and my dick sprang free. Closing his hand around the base, he closed his mouth over the end, and he bobbed.

My wet swimsuit dropped to my feet. When Pauly had my dick well coated in saliva, I bent over him and pulled off his shorts. I grabbed under his knees and pulled him down flat onto his back on the couch. Pauly opened his legs to me, and I knelt between them. He pulled up his knees and I pressed my crown at his upraised opening. My crown popped in, and I scooted forward on my knees until my cock was all the way inside his warm bottom.

His cock was thick and pink, lying up his belly, but it wasn’t fully hard. His balls rested loosely between his legs. I sat on my haunches, and with the flat of my hand, I rubbed the underside of his cock to get him hard.

Pauly smiled at me. I smiled back.

His dick stiffened and I stroked it. Pauly’s eyes closed. He arched back slightly and pumped his hips with my stroking. It moved me inside him.

I fell forward onto my hands over him. He opened his eyes and looked up at me. Smiling, he clasped his hands behind my neck.

“You love me,” he said, happily.

“You know Nate and I love you,” I said.

Pauly shook his head slowly. “You love me,” he said, and wiggled his bottom, moving me inside him. “And I love you.”

Pauly smiled, circling his butt. “You love Nate, and Nate loves you. Nate loves me, and I love Nate.” His look grew serious. “I’ve loved you from the beginning, Loren,” he said, “just like Nate has.”

I lay down onto him, wrapping my arms under him. Pauly hugged my neck and wrapped his legs around my waist. The sides of our faces pressed.

“I’ve loved you, almost from the beginning, Pauly,” I told him; confirming. I lifted my head and looked down into his eyes. “I loved you, and I really loved you the first time we made love. I love you now. And I love it when we’re like this.”

Pauly smiled. “Me, too.” Then his brow furrowed. “Loren?” he asked.

“Yeah?”

“Can I call you Thumper the way Nate does?”

“Will you call Nate Thumper the way I do?”

“Yeah,” he said softly. He lifted his head and kissed my cheek. “Will you guys call me Thumper?”

“Do you want us to?”

“Yeah.”

“You might have to do more thumping to earn it.”

Pauly laughed and hugged my neck. I sat up, pulling him up into my lap, and then holding him by his butt, I got up and sat back down onto the couch, managing to keep my cock inside Pauly, with Pauly astride my lap, still hugging my neck. I held him with a hand on his back and one on the back of his waist as we settled onto the couch, and he began a gentle ride of my cock.

“Loren,” he said, quietly beside my ear.

“Yes?”

“I want to always belong to Nathan and you. I don’t want another boyfriend. I like belonging to you.” He hugged my neck more firmly. “I want to belong to you, all my life.”

With a surge of affection, I wrapped my arms around him, hugging his smaller body tightly to mine. I pressed up with my pelvis, thrusting up with my erection, hard, all the way, so that I couldn’t be farther inside him and I held him squeezed to my body. I rubbed the side of my face against Pauly’s.

“I love you, Pauly,” I whispered. “I really love you. We aren’t going anywhere without you.”

Pauly and I fixed supper for Nate that night; steak. I fixed it the way my dad did; the way Nate liked it. I told Pauly to tell Nate what he told me, about wanting to belong to us, always.

“Tell Nate as soon as he walks in the door,” I said, “and wear only the black nylon briefs he likes you in so much.

Pauly did, and Nate hugged him, hard, and kissed him. When he grabbed Pauly’s butt, I stopped him.

“Supper’s ready first, horn dogs,” I told them. “I did the steaks perfectly, Nate, and I’m not going to let you tell me they got screwed up ‘cause we let ‘em get cold before eating.”

Nate stripped to his briefs like us, and dutifully commented on the job I’d done with the steaks. They would become my specialty; when we could afford them.

As I cleared the food, Pauly straddled Nate’s lap, facing him, their packages nestled together. Pauly looped his arms over Nate’s shoulders and rested his forehead on Nate’s.

“Loren and I want to ride double tonight,” Pauly told Nate. “We want you to be the horse.”

Nate smiled. “I’ve been horny as hell all day.” He picked Pauly up, butt high over his shoulder, and called for me to follow. He headed for our bedroom.

Nate dropped Pauly onto the bed, and then pulled off his own briefs, while Pauly pulled of his, and I pulled off mine. Nate climbed onto the bed, and lay on his back between us. Pauly and I lay onto his sides. We rubbed our cocks against his hips, getting them hard while we fondled Nate to hardness – he was almost there anyway. The three of us kissed and nuzzled and laughed when a wrong move put Pauly’s tongue up my nose.

Pauly grabbed the lube, and I knelt up beside Nate’s hips. Then I lubed Nate’s cock while Pauly lubed mine and Nate lubed Pauly’s.

I knelt astride Nate’s waist and backed onto his cock. Pauly held Nate’s cock for me, and I took my time sliding its slick thickness up inside me. When I had most of it in, Nate pulled his legs up; the backs of his thighs against my back. He planted his feet on the bed, and I settled into his lap with my knees tightly against his sides. .

Pauly knelt astride Nate’s chest and backed toward me, sliding his feet outside my legs. Soon, Pauly and I were nested like frogs on Nate’s belly with Nate’s cock up my butt and mine up Pauly’s.

When Pauly was the horse, his torso was short enough, and our dicks were long enough that, with his head up on a pillow, he could usually suck the end of the cock of the front rider. Even though Nate was about my height, he had a longer torso, and when he was the horse, and Pauly was the front rider, Pauly could bend enough for them to kiss. Pauly bent now, and Nate wrapped his arms over the backs of Pauly’s shoulders.

Grabbing Pauly’s hips with both hands, I rocked my hips; back onto Nate’s cock, forward into Pauly’s bottom. As the back rider, I would do most of the work. I intended to get a lot of noise out of them before I was done, but my first moves brought a moan of delight from me.

We lay afterward, me, on my back, in the middle. Pauly was draped on my left side, and Nate was backed up to my right side, hugging my arm to his front.

I stroked Pauly’s back and Nate’s tummy. None of us was asleep yet. “It’s like it’s the way it was always supposed to be,” I said quietly.

Nate nodded. “Yeah,” he murmured, and hugged my arm.

Pauly lifted his head and smiled at me. Then he nuzzled into the side of my neck, happily.

“You know,” Nate said, thoughtfully, “it’s still early, and tomorrow is Sunday; we can sleep in.”

Pauly chuckled, and his hand slid down my stomach and between my legs.

EPILOG

When I look at pictures of the three of us from back then, that first year or two, I think how beautiful, young, and totally naive we looked. That's probably why we were always so damned happy.

Through a friend of a friend, Dad was able to get Nathan a chef’s apprenticeship at the main restaurant inside the Hilton that summer. I had cross country and classes at UT. Pauly stayed in Austin that summer as well, working at a job which Nate helped him get at Penney’s. Pauly made us go house hunting.

“Instead of paying rent,” he said, “we can make payments on a house and fix it up, and sell it for more than we paid when we’re ready,” he explained. “My uncle did that.”

With my dad’s help on a down payment, and his co-signature, we bought a small, two bedroom home, not that far from campus. Dad created a limited partnership for us so that Nate, Pauly, and I could own the house together. Mom and Dad put up money for inexpensive furniture. Pauly’s mom donated a few things. We splurged on one, king-size bed.

Toward the end of summer, I helped Travis organize welcoming activities for new gays and lesbians who would be arriving at UT that fall. We were finally recognized, officially, by UT, with a charter, and our first officers. We made Travis president. I had no desire to be, and he wanted it.

Nate, Pauly, and I kept our little house that year, and the next year, and the next.

The three of us were so different from one another, and yet, our lives wove into patterns which knitted us together. Nate did almost all the cooking. Pauly did almost all the laundry. I did much of the housecleaning. No matter how we made love and in what positions, when it was finally time for sleep, I always wound up in the middle. Nate was always to my right. Pauly was always to my left.

When I was down or moody, Nate knew exactly what to do to lift me out of it. When Pauly was down, he always came to me, usually to simply be held. Nate’s moods were different. He was rarely down, but he often needed me to match him with energy, and when he was in a whacky mood, it was usually me that kept up with him. Pauly was thoughtful, and best at giving us little gifts. I was the mechanic when anything needed fixing. Nate kept us happy.

Pauly graduated and entered grad school to work on a master’s in elementary education. My junior year, at the encouragement of two of my professors, I switched to pre-med. Nathan worked hard to learn at the Hilton and became a Chef de Partie.

I did well at cross country, but there were always one or two guys just a little better than me. By my junior year, I also knew I was never going to be Olympic material, or professional.

And now, I must give you the rest of the story. That year I was a junior, Nate, Pauly, and I were all so busy that we drifted a little. It was, perhaps, the roughest year for our relationship. Seth, the swimmer, had remained one of my better friends, and I looked at him, as just a friend. But his senior year – my junior year – he had a dorm room to himself. What happened then, was something that I looked back on later and realized I had a dozen opportunities to avoid. But then fate always seems so avoidable in hindsight.

It began simply. I had a slight hamstring pull, and Seth offered to work on it. Neither Nate, nor Pauly had offered to. Frankly, we didn’t think of it. I was getting rubdowns from the cross country trainer. But Seth offered, and I had to take my pants off for him to work on it.

It was the only time in my life that I had sex with someone that much taller than me, and it was hot; it was very hot. Though I slept with Pauly and Nate at night, I found myself being drawn back. I rode Seth’s lap like Pauly rode mine. Or he’d get me on my back, legs up, and make a ball with me like I would do with Pauly or Nate. After each time, I promised myself I wouldn’t do it again, but Seth’s room was close to one of my morning classes, and he made it a point to be in.

The absolute truth was that I was grateful when Seth graduated. I wasn’t sure how to stop, and it took me months to forgive myself and to feel normal again with Nate and Pauly.

That summer, Nate had an affair with a bus boy at the restaurant. I didn’t know at the time, but I’d met the bus boy. He was Hispanic with dark good looks. He wanted into Nate’s pants, and he made it in. Nate was as human as the rest of us; maybe more so. He’d had sex with a lot of guys before he and I met, and sometimes, I think it made it more difficult for him.

Pauly had a few episodes of his own, mainly with another grad student. For a while, I thought Pauly might move out on us.

My senior year grew busy for all of us, and I think that saved us. I hate to admit it, but I think our sex became confined to our own bedroom once again, simply because it was convenient and we were so busy. And honestly, we knew each other so well, that when we took the time to do it right, we could really please one another.

The year I graduated, I was accepted to medical school in Houston, and we had to decide if we would all move. Actually, the three of us had to decide whether we were going to stay together.

“Before you decide,” I told them, “I have to confess something to you.”

I told them about Seth. Nate told us about the bus boy. Pauly told us about the grad student, and we told him we’d already guessed.

We took a week to decide, not because we didn’t want to stay together, so much as we had basically lied to each other. We did a lot of talking.

In the end, Nate and Pauly moved to Houston with me, with the promise that we would never lie to one another again, no matter what.

The adventure of the move, and of a new house, and new schooling and career moves, gave us a fresh start. We started taking time for dates. Even if it was only for a quick meal. Once a week, Nate and I would have a date; and once a week, Pauly and I would have a date; and once a week, Nate and Pauly had a date. We made it a point, also, for the three of us to do fun things together. We worked at our relationships, and sometimes, it was work. Our lives grew incredibly busy.

Pauly taught elementary school while finishing his master’s. Nate was given a job as a Sous Chef at the Hilton.

The next few years were a blur for the three of us. I sweated through med school. Nate worked up to executive chef. Pauly got his master’s while teaching sixth grade. And then he began taking bookkeeping courses, at first just for fun. Of the three of us, Pauly was the best with money, and we nominated him to ‘handle the books’. Nate wanted to open his own restaurant, and Pauly started socking away money for it.

I interned, and then began my residency at the Methodist hospital in the Houston Medical Center. The AIDS virus had just been identified. Some of our friends had come down with the disease.

It began a dark time for gay guys, even for Nate, Pauly, and me, because of our friends who were dying from it. And then, one night, Pauly didn’t come back to bed with us. He slept on the couch.

We thought nothing of it, thinking he had simply fallen asleep there. But he slept there the next night, as well. We were so busy, it wasn’t until the third night that Nate and I sat Pauly down on the couch between us.

“What’s up?” Nate demanded.

“What do you mean?” Pauly asked uneasily.

“You know what he means, Pauly,” I said. “Why aren’t you sleeping with us.”

Paulys eyes filled with tears. His head dropped. He began to sob.

“Pauly,” I asked, barely able to speak. “What have you done?”

It took several minutes to calm Pauly down enough to understand him. He’d had sex with another male teacher at his school; without condoms.

“How long has this been going on?” I asked.

“Only once!” Pauly said, hurt. “We promised to be honest. Remember? I’m being honest. It was only once, two days ago. And then afterward, I kept thinking, what if he has AIDS, and I… I couldn’t risk giving it to you guys.”

This was back before we were even sure how AIDS spread. We only suspected that condoms might provide some protection.

I glanced across at Nate. His eyes were wide with concern. I laid my arm over the back of Pauly’s shoulders and hugged him to me. Nate hugged him from the other side.

The three of us had been lovers for ten years by then. We had begun to take each other for granted a little. I realized it then. I realized it, thinking we could lose Pauly. It scared the shit out of me.

“You aren’t sleeping out here anymore,” I said. “They think AIDS spreads, mainly through sexual transmission. We just won’t do any fucking or sucking for a while,” I told them. “We all like frot. We’ll all do frot, and wash up right away afterward. And no kissing on the mouth, in case the virus can spread that way. Nate and I won’t do it either.”

“But we still sleep together,” Nate said firmly, patting Pauly’s back gently. “We sleep together.”

They had a test for the virus by then. I had Pauly tested right away. He showed negative for the virus.

“We have to wait, though,” I told Pauly and Nate. “I talked to a guy at the hospital who’s really up on this. He said they have no idea what the incubation period for the virus might be; maybe years. But he said if Pauly still showed clear in six months, we were probably okay.”

It was the longest six months of my life.

Pauly and Nate waited for me in the examining room, sixth months later; the day I brought back the results of the last test. Nate and I had agreed; if Pauly was clear after sixth months, we would consider him clear for good and not wait any longer.

They stood up when I came in and shut the door. Both were pale and nervous.

I walked up to Pauly, pulled him into my arms, and kissed him on the mouth.

“He’s okay, then?” Nate asked.

I nodded. “Yeah.”

Pauly began to weep. Nate hugged us, and we all wept silently.

I squeezed Pauly hard. “Don’t you ever do something stupid like that again, or we’ll kill you ourselves,” I told him.

Pauly nodded, clinging to me.

“Now, Pauly,” Nate said, “We’re gonna take you home and fuck and suck till we can’t get it up anymore.”

Pauly laughed happily, sniffling.

Sometime after midnight, as I lay spooned behind Pauly and Nate lay spooned behind me, before we drifted off to sleep, Pauly whispered, “I don’t deserve you guys.”

“Sure you do,” I told him. “We’ve all screwed up. You know that.”

After ten years, I knew from the way he lay in my arms, that Pauly wasn’t comforted. He was still grieving over what happened, and I knew the little guy might brood for a long time.

I glanced back at Nate.

“I think it’s time,” Nate said, quietly.

I rolled onto my back between Nate and Pauly, and tapped Pauly to roll back over to face me. Nate was facing me already. I hugged Pauly up to my side.

“It’s too dangerous to let this happen again, for any of us,” Nate said. He laid his hand on my chest. “Even without AIDS, screwing other guys will tear us apart. You guys know that.”

“And AIDS is real,” I said. “There’s no telling how many guys out there have it. I’ve told you about the patients I deal with every day. I’ve told you what they go through.” I hugged Pauly to me and squeezed Nate’s shoulder. “Any one of us screwing a guy with AIDS could kill us all,” I told them.

“Guys,” Pauly said, quietly. “These last six months have been hell. Never again. I promise. I really promise.”

“We all do,” I said.

Nate stroked my hair, then reached across to lay his arm on Pauly’s shoulder. “That’s why I say it’s time. We’ve talked about it. We’re ready to make the promises. Let’s get married,” he said.

“With witnesses?” I asked. “We give each other rings, and our promise.”

“Our absolute vow,” Nate corrected.

“Can I tell my mom?” Pauly asked.

Of course, no one was performing gay marriages back then. We simply made our own vows, and now I wear two different wedding bands on the ring finger of my left hand. So does Nate, and so does Pauly.

In the next two years, we lost Travis, and Andrew, and other friends. Seth was one of those extremely rare guys who, inexplicably at the time, seemed immune to AIDS.

They called me an AIDS activist for a while, because of my aggressiveness in pushing us all toward a cure. I had to. Precious, precious friends were dying. I also preached to groups of my fellow gays about safe sex and urged them all to find one or two partners to settle down with. We finally got the safe sex message drilled in. Few settled down with partners.

One success, which we had something to do with, and for which I will always be grateful, was Chase and Phillip. They roomed at OU together, and though there were other gays around, they stayed pretty faithful to one another. They both took five years to graduate, and during that time, became deeply attached to one another. They live as life partners in Oklahoma City, and are good friends of ours.

“You are an activist,” Nate told me. “You’re an activist at everything you do. You’re just like your dad; always fighting to make something the way you think it should be.” Nate smiled the first time he told me that. “You’ve fought to keep us together,” he told me. “Pauly and I have learned that from you.”

No matter how much I tried, though, I never got Pauly or Nathan into running. But when my joints began to show the effects of a lifetime of running, the two of them got me into bicycling, and the three of us became avid cyclists for a while. We also got into canoeing, and I finally bought the only boat I’ve ever owned; a canoe.

In the interest of absolute honesty, I have a final confession, and it involves Chase and Phillip. The summer that I was thirty-seven, Nate, Pauly, and I took a Costa Rican fishing vacation with Chase and Phillip. It was our second vacation together. Only this time, there were beach boys around, and boat boys.

The five of us were drinking rum punches one evening in the three bedroom cabana we shared, and talk turned to how cute one of the boat boys was; and how ‘friendly’.

“It’s so damned tempting,” Phillip said. “The kid’s almost begging for it.”

“Tempting, but dangerous,” I pointed out.

“I have an idea,” Chase said quietly, gazing down into his drink. “I had it last vacation, but didn’t say anything.” He glanced around at us. “Look at us, sitting here in our swimsuits. We all stay in shape. We’re all still hot.” His brow furrowed. “Don’t hate me for suggesting this, but we could make this a sex vacation… with each other.”

He rushed on before any of us could say anything. “Just think a second. We’re all faithful to our partners. We’re safe from AIDS. We’re friends. Once a year, or whenever we vacation together, we could ‘sow our wild oats’ safely by having affairs with each other. It could take pressure off, you know. During the year, when you’re tempted, you can resist knowing you‘ll have affairs on your sex vacation.”

I shook my head. “If just one of us breaks our promises to one another… "

"I brought a box of condoms, for when we’re all together; just in case," Chase interrupted.

Nate frowned at Chase. “You still have the hots for Loren,” Nate said.

“I’d start with you, Nate,” Chase fired back. “Watching you in that Speedo of yours, all day, had me leaking precum more than once.”

None of us said anything, for a moment.

“I’ll get us more rum punches while we think about it,” Phillip said.

He filled each of our glasses, ending with me. Then he knelt on the floor next to my chair. “How about it Loren?” He glanced across me at Pauly. “Pauly? Could you guys get it up for a guy who’s almost bald?”

Phillip worked out as much as any of us. He was ripped. He glanced across at Nate. Nate glanced at Chase. And then Phillip laid his hand on my package.

Chase got up from his seat, disappeared into their room, and returned with a three-dozen box of condoms. He tossed it into Nate’s lap, and then knelt between Nate’s legs. With his eyes on Nate’s, he grabbed the sides of Nate’s swimsuit. Nate lifted his hips, and Chase pulled the swimsuit down. Nate's cock popped up, semi-hard, and Chase bent over it.

Phillip looked up at me with a grin, and tugged at the sides of my swimsuit. I lifted my hips and he pulled my swimsuit down with results similar to Chase’s with Nate. Phillip pointed my cock up my belly, and licked. I clasped the sides of his head. Pauly got up from his seat, and knelt behind Phillip. With a grin for me, Pauly grabbed the sides of Phillip’s swimsuit and tugged. I glanced at Nate. Nate’s head was back, eyes closed, mouth open. I relaxed and did the same.

That vacation, we bought five golden ankle bracelets, with our five names on each. They were to be a reminder to each of us, that we were five, and only five.

Until three years ago, the five of us vacationed together at least once a year. Not only that; during that time, I took a weekend in Vegas with Phillip, twice, and once in New York City with Chase. Nate and Pauly have also had weekends away with them. We spaced the weekends out and kept them rare. I had many more weekends with just Nate or Pauly.

Though it’s been three years, we’re talking about taking a vacation together again. We’re all still in good shape, including sexually. But I’m thinking of writing them all prescriptions for Cialis for those two weeks – and getting a colleague to write one for me. It’s a perverse thought, I know.

AIDS research never paid much, but I maintained a practice on the side. Pauly earned a CPA, and he has made a good income. He’s also invested our income well. And then there’s Nate, our entrepreneur. He has two restaurants, and both are doing well.

We did have one experience of parenthood. One of Nate’s nephews lived with for us a while when he was a teenager. He was a troubled kid, and it was hell on earth for a while. But by the time we managed to graduate him from high school, Matthew had settled down, and now attends UT. He’s gay, which is how he came to us, and he calls us his old Thumpers, though we never touched the kid.

Nate, Pauly, and I, all, have nieces and nephews, and that’s as close to parenting any of us care to get. Stef and his wife have three boys. They live in Tulsa, and for a long time, we saw them a couple of times a year. The youngest will be starting college next year.

We’re thinking of taking early retirement, Nate, Pauly, and I. A few years ago, with or without Chase and Phillip, we began traveling to Colorado for skiing in the winter, and hiking and bicycling in the summer. Pauly’s been on the lookout for some little resort or conference center we can buy. He thinks we could have a profitable retirement running a mountain ski resort and summer health center. Pauly would manage the business. Nate would run the kitchen. I would be coach, trainer, and physician. I’m not sure about the liabilities involved in a ski resort, but Pauly’s researching everything. We would all like to get out of Houston to some place like that, and be able to settle down to finally, and thoroughly, enjoy each other.

I know that after all that has happened, it may sound like Nate and my love has lost the purity and strength it had at the beginning, but when a love has weathered what ours has, and when you’ve hung onto a person as desperately hard as Nate and I have hung onto each other; and when you forgive and sacrifice for one another, daily, love grows profoundly deep, so deep that we’ve always had plenty for Pauly, too.

What works for us might not work for anyone else. The key, though, is work.

Despite occasional frolics with Chase and Phillip, all three of us work at our relationships, and those relationships involve so much more than just sex, though our love making is as varied and rewarding as ever. Nate, Pauly, and I are also friends. We genuinely enjoy one another, and we never have the time for each other that we want. But, that’s why we’re hoping to retire before long.

The Rockies are the last big dream that we share, and I think, it is the best yet. If I’m an activist for anything these days, it’s that dream. And… I never give up. Good things come when you never give up.

I remember that, every night when I come home, and Nate or Pauly throws his arms around my neck, or every time I hear the door open, and I know that one of them has returned home, and I get up to greet them. I remember it at night, when I lay between their warm bodies and one of them caresses me in his sleep. I remember it when we’re watching TV, and one of them takes my hand, or lays on the couch behind me. I remember, whenever I think of how long… how very long, and how very well, they have loved me.

+++++

Over the last five or six years that I have been writing for Nifty, I have heard from a number of couples who have been life partners for years. Several, who bonded in high school, remain partners to this day, though at least one couple are into their sixties. I tell you this to let you know that such things do happen. :)