This is a work of erotic fiction.  It will contain a few graphic scenes of gay sex.  If this is objectionable to or illegal for you, please do not read it. 

As with my other stories, which can be found under my name in the Prolific Authors section of Nifty, this work will contain only a little sex.  It deals principally with relationships and growing pains of young teens, and as sex is a part of most teen boys' lives, it is a part of this story.

This story is copyrighted by the author.  His permission must be obtained for any use of this story other than reading it on the Nifty Archive site. 

This story will be fairly long.  I will try to post chapters as rapidly as possible with the hope one can go up every other day.  I hope you find it entertaining.

My thanks to my editors and readers who helped shape this story.  I won't embarrass you by naming you.  Your association with me remains sacrosanct.

In the past, you readers have been extremely kind in giving me your feedback.  I respond to all notes, and enjoy hearing from you.  I can be reached at:

                                     colepark@gmail.com

Cole Parker

Chapter 28

From Chapter 27 -          Bryan spoke up, his voice now neither nervous nor hesitent.  He first looked at Josh, then at Dr. Warren, and said, with great resolve in his voice, “I would like to be adopted.  I would like to be Bryan Warren.  And I would like to do it as soon as we can.  I’m tired of calling him Dr. Warren.  I want to call him Dad.”

It was a week later that tryouts for the cross-country team were being held. Josh and Bryan had been talking about little else the past couple days. Josh had complained to Bryan that he had to work a lot harder than they did just to keep up with him and Eric, and it was because he wasn’t any good at running.

“That isn’t true. You do great. You’ll be as good as anyone there. Just wait.”  Bryan had tried to encourage him, but Josh had been worried, and in a funk.

Today, he was nervous at lunch, thinking about the tryouts. Eric was next to him and Bryan across the table, their usual alignment.  Cal usually sat next to Bryan, and this way Josh could look at her and spar with her, which he liked doing.

          He was speaking to Eric but was being distracted because Eric kept switching his eyes, first looking him in the eye, then glancing past his eyes and over his shoulder. The third time he did this, Josh stopped in mid-sentence and asked, “What’re you looking at?”

          “Mark. Don’t turn around. He keeps looking at you, and then when I glance at him, he looks down and blushes. Remind you of anyone?”

          Mark was one of the kids that had joined the table after the confrontation at the mall that had made them all celebrities for a day.  He was as shy as Josh had been and only moved to the table because of something Frank had said to him that Josh hadn’t been part of. Josh had asked Frank about it but hadn’t got any good answer, which puzzled him.  Frank was usually pretty straightforward. Now, Josh glanced over at Mark before looking back at Eric as he replied to his teasing. “Hey, I don’t do that so much any more! I’m getting better. But Mark’s looking at me? Are you sure? How can you be sure? He’s at the end of the table and we’re way down here. Maybe he’s looking at you? Especially if he looks away when you look at him.  Why are you looking at him anyway?”

          Eric blushed, then tried to cover up by quickly saying, “No, I’m pretty sure he’s looking at you. His eyes don’t seem to quite meet mine when I look over. I think they’re pointed at you. I think he likes you.  I can see why. You’re really cute, you know.”

          It was Josh's turn to blush, and he immediately hated himself for doing it. He’d been controlling that really well lately. But here, he just couldn’t help it.       

          “Even if he is looking at me, that doesn’t mean he likes me.  He might be thinking of asking me for help with something, and doesn’t know quite how to go about it. We really don't know each other.  But it's probably something like that.”

          “Nope, he likes you. I can tell.  I know.”

          “How could you know?”

“Because he reminds me of me.”

“What do you mean? You don’t like me that way.”

“How do you know?”

“Well, you don’t. You like Bryan."

“Actually, that’s what I meant. I meant, I used to look at Bryan that way, so I know what it feels like.”

“Does that mean you don’t like him, like him like that, anymore?”

Eric glanced over at Bryan. Bryan was talking earnestly to Cal and was focusing entirely on their conversation. Eric lowered his voice. “I still like him a whole lot, Josh. But I don’t have the crush anymore.  When I had that, it almost hurt to see him, and then hurt when he walked away. The feelings were real intense.  I wanted to be with him all the time, too, and then was scared of my feelings when I was with him. Now, I like him, but I know him, he’s my friend, we hang around together, and it’s just different.”

“You mean you wouldn’t want to, uh, do things with him?”

“Oh, sure, I’d love to. But I don’t think I’m in love with him.”

“It seems confusing to me.”

“You’re not the only one!”

Josh laughed. Then he asked, “But what about Mark?”

“Unless you want to encourage him, forget about it. It’s his problem. We all have that problem, one time or another. It’s his problem. Let him figure it out.”

Josh took another glance at Mark and saw him look away.  "I don't know, Eric.  He could have been looking at you."

---- [] ----

There were 42 boys dressed out and standing listening to Coach McKinley.  He was explaining how today would work.

          “We’ve got a five mile course set up with orange marker cones.  You’ll all be timed when you get back, so you’ll know how fast you ran, and we will too. I don’t want anyone pushing themselves too hard. If you haven’t been training, getting ready for today, you’ll probably overdo it and end up walking part way back, or, you could pull a muscle. So don’t push it beyond what you're capable of. If you do end up stopping, it’s OK. Remember, anyone that wants to be on the team can be. But only the guys with the best times will compete in the meets. Today’s tryouts will be used to help determine who runs in the first meet.

          “You guys that are new to this, listen up. The guys that were on the team last year, a couple of them are really fine runners. They’ll set a pretty hot pace.  You’d be best off if you don’t try to keep up with them.  Run within yourself.

          “OK, remember to watch the cones and stay on the course.  Everybody line up here.”

          The boys all crowded together at the starting line. Coach Mac raised a starter’s pistol and fired it. There was general pushing and shoving, but after about 20 yards, the boys were sorted out and moving at a pretty good pace away from the school.

          Josh, Bryan and Eric were running side by side in the middle of the pack. They had been running longer training runs, increasing them steadily and at the beginning of the past week, they’d got up to six miles every day; none of them was worried they’d end up walking back. They knew they could handle the distance. They were only worried about the pace and how they'd do versus the other runners.

          The pack was running considerably faster than the boys' normal training jog. After about a half mile of this, Bryan told the others to slow down. He slowed, and the others stayed with him. They were quickly passed by several boys running behind them.

          “Why are we slowing?” asked Josh.

          “We can’t run the whole way that fast. I think everyone has too much adrenaline. Or they're a lot better than I hope they are.  If they can all run like that all the way, we’ve got a lot of work ahead of us, but I don’t think they can. Let’s go a mile or so like this, see what it looks like then.”

          They continued at the slower pace. It was still a little faster than their usual training pace, but they were able to maintain it without it bothering them. Bryan thought that might be due to their own adrenaline helping them out.

          By the time they passed the three mile marker, they had passed a significant number of straggling boys. Some had just stopped and were standing on the path breathing hard. Some had just slowed down a lot and were slowly jogging onward. Bryan looked at Josh and Eric.

          “How are you guys feeling?”

          “I’m fine,” quickly answered Eric. “I could up the pace a little. We only have two miles to go.”

          “Josh?”

          “I’m hanging in there. If you guys want to push it a bit, I’m game.”

          Bryan watched Josh. He was plodding along with them. He didn’t seem to be laboring too badly, but wasn’t running as easily as he was, or Eric.  But then, that was always the case.

          “OK, let’s push it just a little.”

          Bryan ran a little faster, and the other two stayed with him.  They kept that pace till they had passed the four mile mark.  By then, they had passed several more boys who had reached their limits.

          They could see the better runners, a group of five older boys, considerably ahead of them. There were eight or nine other boys spread out between that first group and them.

          “What do you guys think? Try to catch a few more guys, or just settle in and finish like this?” Bryan’s breathing was a little gaspy, but he wasn’t panting hard. Neither was Eric. Josh was breathing hard, his face was red, but he was plugging along. As usual.

          “Catch some,” voted Eric, using as few words as he could.

          Bryan looked at Josh. Josh looked back and didn’t speak. Then he began running faster.  Bryan smiled at Eric, then those two picked it up and matched Josh’s pace.

          They managed to overtake six of the other runners by the time they reached the finish line. They crossed it together. Bryan and Eric immediately grabbed hold of Josh, who was wiped out by the effort, but smiling.

          As he was sitting on the grass, recovering, with Bryan and Eric standing a ways off to the side, he watched Coach Mac stroll to the timer, check some of the times he’d written down, then walk over to him.  He squatted on the grass next to Josh.

          “Josh, that was great effort, and a really decent time, too.  You three guys are going to help us this year. We usually don’t have a lot of freshmen competing in the meets, but you guys showed me something. I’m proud of you.  Your friends have a lot of talent. You’ve got talent, too, but you’ve also got a lot of heart.”

          “Thanks, Coach. Yeah, I know they’re better than I am. I have to really work hard when we’re training just to stay with them, and they’re not pushing as hard as I am.”

          “Josh, I was watching you. One of the reasons you’re working so hard is your form isn’t very good.  We can work on it. We need to adjust your stride, and the way you use your arms. You’re not very efficient now. I can help with that.  I can make it a lot easier for you. What I don’t have to work on is your determination and courage. You’ve already got those.”

          Josh smiled up at the coach, gratitude in his eyes.  “You’ll be able to help me?”

          “Without question, Josh. And you’re the type it’s fun to coach. You’re going to get a lot better pretty quickly, and you really care. I’m going to enjoy it.”

          “Do you think maybe the three of us will get to run in some meets?”

          “Yeah. I’m pretty sure of it. Keep working.  That’s the thing. And tomorrow, I’ll start working with you. Hey, I’ve got to talk to some of the others. Take care, Josh.”

          The coach winked at him, ruffled his sweaty hair, and walked off.  Eric immediately walked over and slumped down next to him, and then Bryan was on his other side.

          “What’d he say?” asked Eric.

          “He said Bryan and I were in, but you weren’t good enough.”

          Eric’s jaw dropped. “WHAT? How could he say that! We finished together!  Hey, I’ve got to talk to him! He can’t do that!” Eric jumped up, started to walk away, then saw Josh and Bryan rolling on the grass, holding their stomachs, trying hard not to break out laughing. He stopped.  “You assholes!” he said.

Then they couldn’t stop themselves. They roared.  Other guys turned to look at them. They didn’t care, they just laughed. Eric looked disgusted.

---- [] ----

          They took their shower together that night, and Bryan, after the success at the tryouts, was feeling frisky. It had been three days since they’d messed around, and Josh was eager, too.

          There was none of the fumbling and awkwardness now that had accompanied their first adventure. Additionally, Josh wasn’t the same person. He had been eager then, but timid and nonassertive. Now he was sure of himself and not shy about asking for what he wanted, and making sure Bryan was as satisfied as he was. They were two happy, relaxed boys, drying off.

          When they got back to their room, Bryan sprawled on the bed and Josh sat at the computer. Josh turned around at looked at Bryan. He grinned. “You look awfully comfortable.”

          Bryan was lying spread out on the bed, the picture of teenaged comfort. He even had a relaxed smile on his face.  Even though some of the sparkle was still missing from this personality, he still looked like he thought he owned the world.

          “I am, Josh. And I’m happy. Another two weeks, and I’ll be your brother. You know that?  Well, I guess you do. But every time I think about it, I can’t help feeling good. I love saying it. Your brother. I hope you feel as good about it as I do.”

          “You know I do. I love you, Bryan.  Not just for what you’ve done, but because you’re you.  I love you.”

          Bryan didn’t respond. His smile just got broader.

          Josh continued. “But I want to talk to you about something.”

          “I’m listening.”

          “OK. I think about things a lot.  And, since we’ve been planning for the adoption, I’ve been thinking a lot about what you told Eric. Bryan, you made a lot of sense. You probably don’t remember.  You told him why you didn’t think you should do things with him, you know, sex, even though you liked him and kind of wanted to do that.  What you said was really smart.

          “You said sex could get in the way of the type relationship you wanted to build with him. You said you wanted to be his friend, get to know him and who he is, and then, if things develop in that direction and you both feel the same, maybe sex could be involved, maybe not, but you’d be on equal ground and the sex wouldn’t be a fundamental part of the relationship.”

          “Yeah, well, actually I was a little worried. He said he had a crush on me, and by the tone of his voice, he sounded like he had it bad. I like sex.  I like it a lot. I like it with you. I know what it feels like, and the thought of doing it with Eric when he felt that way was scary. I really thought he could get hurt if I didn’t like him as much as he did me, and I didn’t like him that much in that way. I really had a special feeling for him, but it wasn’t a boyfriend type of feeling.”

          “Well, for whatever reason, you were very smart, and what you said sounded right. And I’ve been thinking about it.  We’re going to be brothers soon. We have a great relationship now. I don’t want anything to come between us. I think sex could do that.  It’s so important and involves so many emotions. It’s so easy for someone to get his feelings hurt. Let’s say we keep having sex, and I’m really desperately in love with you, not a brotherly sort of love but a sexual one, but you’re just in love with the sex, and then Julie starts flirting with you. See the risk here?”

          “Why did you mention Julie?”

          “Because I’ve seen how you look at her. I see everything, you know that.”

          “So are you saying you don’t want to have sex anymore?  Because I have to tell you. I like the sex we have, a lot.”

          “So do I. And I don’t think it’s a problem right now. I just think it could get to be one.  And I don’t want that to happen more than I want to have sex.  You gave Eric a hypothetical choice. Sex or friendship with you. I want you to think about the same thing. What if we continue with the sex, and our relationship suffers for it? We’re only 14.  We’re going to change a lot in the next four years. But we’ll still be brothers.  We'll always be brothers.  I want that to be the most important thing, not the sex.”

          Bryan was quiet for a while, thinking. Then he said, “Josh, I really love the sex. I really love you too, and a whole lot more than the sex. I guess I can get sex someplace else. In fact, I think at this age we’re supposed to be looking to do that, get it someplace outside our home. I don’t want to do anything you don’t want to do, you know that.”

          “And I don’t want to force you to make that choice, our relationship or sex. That's not really where I'm going with this.  I want you to think about it in those terms, though.  What I feel is, even if I don’t ask you to make that choice, the nature of our relationship will force us to make the choice.  Hey, this is all new to me.  I don't have all the answers.  I'm saying things here that might be stupid.  But I'm saying what I feel.  What I've been thinking about.  If we continue to have sex together, we’ll have one type of relationship, and it will be different. It’ll be thrilling and sexy and exciting and complicated. If we don’t continue with the sex, I think our relationship can grow deeper and more profound. I don’t know why I feel that way, I don’t know any more about this stuff than you do, but in my gut, it just sort of feels that way. Basing our relationship on how we feel about each other, our trust, our mutual feelings, seems better than having sex confused in the mix and maybe messing things up.

          “I’ve been thinking about what’s ahead of us. In the next few years we’ll both see people we’ll be attracted to.  Everyone else will going through that too and they’ll be dating.  We’ll want to too. What will happen if you start dating Julie, or Eric, and I get jealous. Say you make out with her, or him, feel one of them up, and want to talk about it, discuss with me how you're feeling, say. But you can’t talk to me about it because you know I’m jealous.  So you talk to someone else. See, already, we’re not as close as we were. And I’d know you were making out with her, or him, I could tell from the way you both acted, and the jealously would eat me alive. I don’t think we can help this, unless we don’t date, don’t get involved with other people. And we’re 14. We’ll want to do those thing, and we should. We’re not old enough to commit to each other like that. And we don’t know how we’re going to feel next year, or even next week.”

          “You’ve really thought about this, haven’t you?”

“Yeah, a lot. Because I like the sex too, and don’t really want to stop.   I just think we need to.”

Bryan put his arm over his eyes, the position he always fell into when he wanted to think. He considered his feelings for Josh. Doing so, he realized he was deeply in love with him, but the feelings weren’t sexual. He loved his character, his determination, his kindness, intelligence, humor, everything about him, even his self-conscious blush, and he especially loved how they interacted together, but his thoughts never strayed to his body when he was thinking this. He loved messing around with Josh, he loved the feeling of sexual intimacy they had, but it was a lesser feeling than the strong bond they’d formed. His love of messing around with Josh grew more from the wonderful feelings it gave him in his own body. And he realized this wasn’t love. Love would mean that he was more interested in making Josh feel good than getting those feelings for himself. And that wasn’t the case. He just didn’t love Josh that way.

But he did love the sex.

“Well then, how about a compromise?” Josh was a deeper person than he was.  Josh thought about things more.  Bryan was much more up front.  He thought he'd make a stab at this at least.  “We stop doing it whenever we want, and instead cut it way back, just as sort of a way to stay connected, be extra close to each other, but not really get attached that way.  And, if either of us feels we’re getting that way, or wants to stop for any other reason, we talk honestly about it and decide what to do and if that means stop altogether, we do.”

“What’s this, The Bryan Compromise?”

“Maybe. How’s it sound?”

“What does ‘way back’ mean?”

“I don’t know.  How about, say, once a week?”

“Bryan!  I don’t think you’re taking me seriously.”

“Hey, I’m negotiating here. Once every two weeks?”

“I haven’t said I agree yet.”

“That’s a good negotiating ploy. Gives you the upper hand. But I have two offers on the table. Your turn.”

“OK. Only because I’m weak. And horny like you are and don’t see much on the horizon that’s going to help with that. We’ll make it once a month or so.” 

“And does the 'or so' mean a little more often or a little less often?”

“A little less.  Now you've got me thinking about once every two months.”

“Hey, you're going in the wrong direction!  Let's get back to where we were!"

“So you like the sound of once a month?  I guess we could give that a try.”

          “Done.”  Bryan grinned at him.  His eyes sparkled for a second.  “Now, since we decided this a second ago, the new month starts a second ago. So, wanna fool around?”

          Josh pounced on him, and eventually Dr. Warren had to come up and quiet them down.

---- [] ----

          It was Friday, and the cross-country meets didn’t start for three weeks yet. Everyone was at lunch, and Eric was talking about the weekend.

          “We should probably run after school today, and I was thinking you guys should stay the night. We could run, then eat dinner, then go to a movie. How does that sound?”

          Bryan glanced at Josh, then said, “Sounds great to me.  Anything special you want to see?”

          “Yeah, there are three or four out right now that I want to see.  We can look at the times in the paper and choose one.  This OK with you, Josh?”

          Josh was sort of daydreaming. His mind was elsewhere. He was biting on his lower lip, a sign of nervousness he was trying to stop.

          “Josh?”

          Josh looked up at Eric, then said, “I’m thinking. I’m going to do something. Hold on. I hope this works.”

          He turned and looked at Cal who was sitting across from him and was engaged in a conversation with Julie.

          “Hey, Cal, want to go to the movies tonight? With your Prince Charming? And some other people.”

          “Huh? Who’s my Prince Charming? Oh, you? You’re asking me to the movies?” Cal had a look of surprise on her face, which quickly was lost as her smile took over. Awareness and something he couldn’t quite read came to her eyes; Josh wasn’t sure what it was, but he could clearly read happiness mixed into it.

          “Yeah, I am. Wanna go?”

          “Sure. That’d be great.”

          “And Julie, do you want to go, as Bryan’s date? He’s too bashful and shy and scared to ask you himself, but I’m sure he’d like to go with you.”

          Julie looked surprised, then glanced at Bryan, who was looking dumbstruck. She blushed and said demurely, “Well, maybe, if he’d ask me himself.”

          Eric was looking puzzled. Josh looked at him and winked. Then he got up and walked to the other end of the table. He squatted down for a minute, then stood and walked back to the others and took his chair.

          “OK, Mark wants to come, so there will be six of us.  I’m sure we can get someone to drive us, seeing as how there are nine parents involved. I’ll take charge of calling everyone after school and getting it all set up. If you each write your phone number down and give it to me, it’ll be easier.   Uh, Bryan? You want to ask someone something?”

          Bryan was still looking like someone had hit him with an axe handle.  Eric was looking distinctly nervous.  He grabbed Josh’s arm and pulled him up. “We’ve got to talk,” he muttered.

          Outside the cafeteria, he said anxiously, “I’m not out, Josh!  How can you be inviting a boy to be my date? You can’t do that!”

          Josh wasn’t the least bit apologetic. “Relax.  I didn’t. I told him you were too shy to ask a girl, but we wanted an even number and you had asked me if I thought he, Mark, would be interested in coming with us, that you wanted to get to know him better. I told Mark I knew you were too shy to ask him when the rest of us were going on dates, and that you were worried about how it would look if you asked him. I told him you were hemming and hawing and I just got impatient. He was delighted when I said you’d like him to go. He got a big smile and blushed. His eyes lit up.  Eric, he's got beautiful eyes.  I’m not so sure his eyes were pointing at me like you thought they were. In fact, I’m pretty sure they weren’t.”

          It was Eric’s turn to blush.

---- [] ----

          Getting ready for the date, Bryan was constantly grinning.  He couldn’t stop. Finally, Josh had had enough.

          “OK, what’s so damned funny.”

          “You are.”

“I am? What’s your dumb grin got to do with me?”

          “I’m just marveling, that’s all.  I saw something today I didn’t think I’d see for a long, long time, if ever.  I saw you take charge in the cafeteria today.  I saw you plan something in your head that involved a number of different people, some you don’t even know very well, and then, you went ahead, with no qualms, no hesitation, no reservations at all, and just orchestrated a first date, a first date!, for six different people.  And made it work.  I’m feeling a little like Dr. Frankenstein.  I think I created a monster.  But what I’m really grinning about is you, Josh.  I’m thinking about a boy in the mall not all that long ago that was so afraid he’d been caught looking at me, just looking, he was going to run away before I even sat down to talk to him.  Then today I saw a boy, not a shy or hesitant boy, but a confident, self-assured boy take charge of himself and five other people as though he were born to it.  What I saw today was the complete and total Evolution of Josh.”

---- [] ----

          The judge looked over his glasses at Bryan, an uncomfortable Bryan wearing a suit that fit him well but wasn’t something he was accustomed to wearing. He’d been making a habit of pulling at his collar to loosen the tie around his neck till Dr. Warren put a calming hand on his arm and stopped him. Josh had giggled. Now, Josh was just standing to the side, watching.

          “And you are in agreement with all we’ve just discussed, the name change as well?”

          “Yes, your honor.”

          “Then let it be ordered. You are now legally Bryan Adams Warren and you are the legal son of Dr. Frederick Warren.  Congratulations, son.”

          The smile on Bryan’s face lit the courtroom. It was not the reserved, lost smile that Bryan had worn for the past few weeks. It was the smile Josh loved, bright and lively and full of mischief and hinting at knowing something no one else knew.  The sparkle was back.  As tears filled his eyes, Josh ran to join the hug his father and Bryan were enjoying in front of the judge’s bench. 

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  I would like to express my thanks to those who have written me during the posting of this story to offer their support.  Hearing that people like a story, the characters and the philosophies being expressed is a huge comfort to a writer.  Your letters and kind thoughts are great encouragement to continue.

  I cannot tell you when I will begin posting another story.  I have several ideas percolating in my porous brain right now, but nothing on paper, or screen.  If you are interested in seeing my next story when it does appear, all I can suggest is keeping track of my name in the Prolific Authors section of Nifty.  When I begin to post chapters, the story will be listed there.  It will be several weeks at the earliest, so there's no need to begin looking in the immediate future.

Again, thanks so much for all the notes you've sent me.  I think I must have the greatest readership on the net.

Cole