Date: Mon, 06 Aug 2001 00:31:15 -0500 From: Brennan Jobse Subject: Running Scared - Chapter Nine Disclaimer: Hey, guys and dolls! Wuz new? Well, I'd love to get my lazy ass in gear and write you up a groovy little disclaimer (because I know everyone just HANGS on these things), but I'm a slacker. :) Kill me. Besides, I figure if you've hung around this long, then you probably know the score by now. Psst... It's Canada 5 -1 against Australia. Never mind. My cerebral wiring's faulty right now. Yeah, yeah. Like it wasn't before. Enjoy, muchachos! Running Scared Chapter Nine By Brennan Jobse "You know, you look pretty cute running around out there in wet soccer shorts. Might have to become a permanent fixture," Austin said to me the next day as we walked to my house in the rain. "Yeah, well, you look pretty cute when you're wet, too. Maybe I should drown you and keep you in a pond behind my house," I replied irritably. "Ouch! A barb disguised as a compliment! To what do I owe this negative energy?" "Sorry," I apologized. "It's the weather. Getting me down." "Liar. I know you like the rain. It's Aaron, isn't it?" Dammit. Was I really that clear as glass that anybody could just look at me and automatically tell what was wrong? Well, I suppose it wouldn't be too hard if the problem was me and Aaron. We were a pair, Thing 1 and Thing 2, to put a Dr. Seuss spin on it. And we had ignored each other for four days now. In the vast rumor mill known as high school, I had heard at least eight different explanations why Aaron and I were incommunicado, none of them true (to my overwhelming relief). The one that floated easiest around the halls was that I had banged Amy and now Aaron was pissed. I would have laughed my ass off had the whole thing not been so crushing to my psyche. Throwing away 12 years of hanging out for a one night stand with a girl, when I didn't even like girls! Soccer practice had been a nightmare. See, Aaron and I were opposing positions, and as such, we had to have a certain level of communication between the two of us, just like anyone else. But seeing as how we weren't on speaking terms, that was a no go. Coach Haverland nearly had an aneurysm. She told us to get over whatever little tiff we had going and put it behind us, because the Westington game was less than two weeks away. "Yeah, it's Aaron," I told him. Why lie? He would just worm it out of me somehow later. He stared at me for a while before I noticed it and started to get paranoid. "What?" "I talked to him today," Austin informed me. I shot him a quick double take. "Yeah, we talked about the movies and Amy and Napster. You know how Aaron is with Napster. And then we talked about you." "What'd he say?" "He just asked how you were, if you were okay." Shit, shit, shit. I didn't want to know that. It was so much easier to stay mad at Aaron if I could defend the action with the argument that he was on some psycho hero kick. I felt a stab of guilt in my stomach for muddling up the situation so badly. "What happened, anyway?" Austin asked as we got inside. I sighed. "He was being a dick when I went to see him that day you came over with your space papers. He yelled at me about a lot of stupid shit, so I yelled back. We had a fight, and I left, so now we aren't talking." "Interesting approach," he said wryly. "Spare me, Spaceman," I warned, only half-joking. He shook his head at the Spaceman thing and smiled. That whole glorious sex-filled weekend, I had called him Spaceman. Don't ask. He fought it for a while, but by the time the Simpsons were half over on Sunday night, we both knew I had won. "Anyway, you wanna go somewhere tonight?" Austin asked me. "Sure. Where're we going?" "Supper at my place." He rolled his eyes a little and grinned. "My parents are asking about you." "Why?" I asked, a little cautiously. It occurred to me that his parents might not be as oblivious to my act as I thought. What if they suspected I was gay? Or that Austin was gay? Or that we were together? "They don't..." "What? Oh, no," he shook his head with a smile. "No, they just like you a lot. My mom keeps asking me where that nice little bookworm is. I assume she means you." "But you're sure they don't--" "I'm sure. Besides, even if they did, they'd just brush it off as a result of Michael being at home. Hey, he's moving, did I tell you that?" "How come?" Ever shanty. In spite of how nervous I was around Michael, I had grown to like the guy. "He can't live with us forever. It's like my childhood all over again," he said, shuddering. "Where?" "He doesn't know yet. He's looking for an apartment." "He's staying in Vancouver?" "Yeah. He's got a good job with an advertising agency downtown. Wants to climb the corporate ladder and all that jazz. But you'll come for supper, right?" "Only if YOU do something for me." "What?" I smiled and pressed my lips against his. I felt him smile slightly and he moved to hold my face in his hands. My own hands found their way to his sides, pulling him close, and I felt warm breath from his nose on my cheek. His hair was still wet from the rain outside and it made him smell really good. Austin started walking backward at some point and before I knew it, we had backed up into the chesterfield. He stumbled a little and fell down on the cushions, and before he could say a word, I had crawled on top of him and kissed him again. He moaned softly and I took the opportunity to slip my tongue into his mouth. Never, in all my days will I get tired of this, I decided, as I ran my tongue along the ridges of his teeth. I pulled away from his lips and focused my attentions on his neck, just below the pulse point on the left side. His mouth was next to my ear and I could hear him moaning breathily, hot air meeting my skin in slow puffs. He nibbled at my earlobe, a sensation that rocketed through my body and made my cock twitch, and I sucked harder at his neck. "Dinner with my parents, dinner with my parents..." he reminded me in a whisper, his lips brushing my ear as he said it. Damn. I had forgotten his parents even existed. I groaned and reluctantly brought my head up from his throat, and he turned to meet my lips, grasping a handful of my hair gently in his fist. He moved his mouth against mine in growing insistence and rubbed my chest fervently. I moaned quietly into his mouth and it was like he sucked the air right out of my lungs. My hands fumbled with the buttons on his Hawaiian-style shirt while he attacked me with his tongue. I got them undone and pulled the blue and yellow cloth off a chest that looked like it was made for Greek statues. Austin's hands were up under the hem of my wet soccer shirt in seconds and he lifted it over my head so fast I was lucky it didn't catch on my splints. He grinned, lust in his eyes, and kissed me again, taking me with him as he reclined back into the couch. Bare skin against bare skin is, in my somewhat limited experience, one of THE most erotic things in the world. I think this belief of mine was founded during this particular episode with Austin. For some time, we just lay there on my dad's $1500 couch, making out like it was going out of style. Every time I would pull back from Austin to take a breather, his lips would find mine and wouldn't let go until it was he who needed air and the whole process would repeat itself in vice versa. And for the whole duration of this, I could feel Austin's heart go thump-thump beneath his ribs. It was this feeling that brought my attention back to his torso. I ran my thumb lightly over the top of his nipple and he sighed contentedly, flicking his tongue into my mouth again. I kissed him once more and lowered my head to his chest... The phone rang. I froze, and when I realized what the sound was, I collapsed on Austin's chest with a groan. Shit. Figures something like this would happen. I looked up at Austin, who smiled helplessly at me and nodded toward the phone. With a frustrated sigh, I flopped off of him, and padded toward the source of all my present discomfort. "Hello?" I said, trying to mask the irritation in my voice. "Is Austin there?" I sighed. "Hi, Mrs. Albrecht," I greeted and glanced pointedly at Austin, who buried his smiling face in his hands. "Hi, Ben. How are you boys making out?" I stifled a snort of laughter. "Fine," I replied once I had gotten it under control. "Just fine." "Excellent," she said, and like her son, I could hear her smile through the phone. "So are you coming for dinner?" "You bet. Austin and I were just taking care of a few things before we left," I told her with another peek at Austin. "Sounds good. So we'll see you boys in half an hour then?" "We'll be there. Thanks, Mrs. Albrecht." "No problem, Ben. Bye." "Bye." I hung up the phone and crossed the room, back over to Austin, who was right where I had left him, sprawled out on the couch with his shirt open and a big stupid smile on his face. I fell into a chair and threw a thwarted smile his way and started to laugh. Pretty soon, the both of us were cracking up at the absurdity of the situation. "I can't believe that just happened," he said finally, once we had calmed down a little. "I can't believe your mom, man. 'How are you boys making out?'" "She ASKED you that?" he asked incredulously. We dissolved into another fit of laughter and it was ten minutes before we noticed the time. "Shit, come on, we gotta go have a shower," I said, pulling him up off the couch. "Yeah?" he grinned. "And we actually have to shower," I smiled and tapped him on the nose, breaking his little bubble. "We have to be at your house in twenty minutes." He scowled and I kissed him again, real long, and ran my hands up and down his back underneath the light rayon of his shirt. I leaned my forehead against his and his eyes were closed still. I loved it when he did that. "When we get back from this dinner thing," I said as his eyes opened, "you're mine." He resigned himself to that, and we went and had our shower. It was rushed because we just couldn't afford to play around any more or we'd be late. Austin helped me wash my hair and what not, which I was eternally grateful for. Have you ever tried to have a shower and actually get clean with only one hand? Not easy. Fifteen minutes later, we were at Austin's place, seated around his kitchen table chatting with his family. "Hey, Ben. How's the hand? My little brother taking good care of you?" Michael asked me over a bowl of carrots. "Yeah, he's doing a good job," I smiled, surprised at my quick, easy response. Hey, maybe I was getting used to this. "How's the apartment hunting going?" "Slow," he answered. "There seems to be a shortage of beautiful women who want to have me room with them out of the goodness of their hearts. However," he grinned and slipped back into his flamer accent that I had come to expect, "the offers from the guys are just piling up." I laughed and marvelled at how at ease I felt with this family. I could hang with them as easy as I could with Aaron's family, and I'd only known them for a few months, whereas I'd known the Rivestes almost my whole life. My mood drooped as I thought of Aaron, and I was trying to force it out of my mind when Austin's dad bailed me out. "Austin tells us you've got a big soccer game coming up," he said. I thanked the stars for the diversion and filled him in on the details. "So if you beat Westington, you're pretty much guaranteed to win Provincial Champs provided you beat Penticton?" he asked. I nodded. "And if we beat Penticton, we'll go to the Western Division. Vancouver hasn't had a team in the Western Division in years." "Wow. No pressure, huh?" We talked about me some more. How long I had lived in Vancouver, what my dad did... I noticed they avoided talking about my mom. I guess Austin told them she died when I was little. I was relieved I didn't have to talk about it. As much as I liked these people, I would still be a little uncomfortable giving my life story if I had to talk about my mom. Eventually, me being the center of attention got me feeling a little squirmy and I shifted the conversation from me to other things. We talked about Austin's CSA acceptance (you should've seen him beam and blush when I brought it up), life in Regina, books, and somehow (it's a mystery to me even now) we got on the subject of cloning. More than once, Michael tried to educate me on the finer points of cars, but gave up when Austin laughingly called his attention to the lost look on my face. When dinner was over, we hung around for a while, then split for my place. We were doing homework, as Austin told his mother. "Why can't you do it here?" she asked. "I left my stuff at Ben's place." He clasped his hands together and flashed those incredible eyes at his mom like a pouty little kid. "Please?" "Yeah, go on. Get out of my house," she smiled. "Be home in two hours." "Thanks, Mom!" He went to grab his raincoat from a nearby chair and his mom kissed his cheek. "Mom," he said, with an embarrassed glance at me. I smiled slightly and, not without a faint ache in my chest, thought about how much I would give to have my mom kiss my cheek again. "Sorry, sweetheart," she smiled. "Two hours. And try to get at least SOME of your homework done, okay?" And boom, we were gone. We made it back to my house in record time and I had just turned away from the front door, when I was pleasantly surprised by Austin's lips pressed lightly against my own. They were warm, despite the cool humidity outside, and I felt heat run from them into my own slightly colder mouth. "Mmm..." I managed when he pulled away. It was all I could come up with after that. It was like he'd stolen my ability to speak. "I'll say," he said quietly. He slid his hands down my sides, let them come to rest at the small of my back, and brought me closer. "So," he murmured, stopping every few words to brush a butterfly kiss across my lips, "we've... got two hours... anything... in particular... you'd like to do?" "You have homework," I said stupidly. Apparently, he'd also stolen my ability to prioritize. Who the hell cared if he had homework? But for some reason, this fact was incredibly important. He smiled like I had just said the funniest thing in the world and shook his head patiently. "What?" "Did I bring any books here with me this afternoon, Ben?" he asked, the smile still ever apparent on his face. I shook my head no. "Well, then?" The whole thing suddenly jumped into my mind with crystal clarity and I took the hint and kissed him firmly. He held my head in his hands and played with my hair, twirling it around his fingers slowly. "You wanna go to my room?" I asked in a husky voice in between kisses. He covered my mouth again and nodded. I grabbed him by the front of his shirt down by his stomach, and led him up the stairs without breaking the kiss, discarding our long forgotten raingear in piles on the floor. In my room, the clothes came off slow. I had two hours with Austin and there wasn't a chance in hell I was going to waste it on a fast fuck. He stood there and let me strip him however slow I wanted, his lips barely touching mine at times, just enough for me to feel the vibrations from his soft moans resonate to my lips, daring me to go faster. It took longer than I had planned because my left hand kept botching up my attempts to get that boy's clothes off, but hey, slow was what I was going for. I got him all undressed and he started in on my pants. "You're ridiculously overdressed," he muttered in the short time he took his lips off mine to see what he was doing. I smiled and he pulled down my zipper and baggy denim fell in a pile at my feet. I stepped out of them and ran my tongue along his lips, while he traced his fingers lightly over the bones of my hips and stroked my rapidly hardening cock through the flimsy material of my boxers. I moaned and he hooked his thumbs into my waistband and slid them down as far as he could and still keep contact between our mouths. I kicked them off the rest of the way and guided Austin's hands to the buttons on my blue shirt that I had put on to go to his place for dinner. He got them undone and threw it aside, along with my white tank top (call it a by-product of the last nine years, I couldn't stand to call them wife beaters). "Hmm..." he hummed next to my ear in that incredibly seductive voice. "You still haven't told me what you wanted to do tonight, you know." "I thought it'd be obvious by now," I said quietly, and bit softly at the tender flesh of his neck. "Mmm... spell it out for me..." "Spell it out for you?" I kissed him hard on the lips and pulled his ass toward me so that his cock rubbed against mine. He inhaled sharply and sighed into my mouth. "Basically, my dear boy," I whispered in his ear, my desire more than evident, "I... am gonna make you scream..." I dragged my lips across his collarbone and he shivered. "How's that sound?" "Good..." he breathed just above a whisper. "...really good..." "Good." I put a hand on his chest and pushed him gently onto my bed. He scooted back into a patch of sudden moonlight and I was reminded once again why Austin had first commanded my attention so intensely all those months ago when he helped me up from the hallway linoleum. The light rays from outside caught his features and made him look like he was glowing. It took my breath away. If I had looked out the window, I probably would have seen the clouds breaking up and the moon come out just then. As it was, it was like magic, and he was glowing because that's just what he did. His jet black locks were a little longer and they fell into his eyes, and he swiped at them with his fingers. Silver light from the window made his blue eyes sparkle with a metallic hue I'd never seen before. I let my eyes travel down his body and I took in every sexy inch of him, from his long, dark lashes to the bottoms of his feet. Sometimes when I was alone and had some time to kill, I would look in the mirror for hours and wonder why Austin bothered with me. It wasn't like I hated myself or the way I looked or anything like that. I just couldn't see it. I couldn't see why he liked being around me so much. In the beginning, I thought it might have been just cause I gave good head, but I didn't really think that anymore. Every time I would wrap up my latest inner questioning session, it would be with me not having figured it out, but in the end I was comfortable not knowing, and I would go do something else, accompanied with the profound knowledge that I was damn lucky. I had those same thoughts again, and decided that I might as well have a good time while it lasted. True, I wasn't getting tired of Austin, and he showed no signs of getting tired of me, but for some reason, I just didn't think it would last. I tried to shake it off and dismiss the thought as your basic teenaged doomsday premonitions, but something kept holding me back. "What's wrong?" he asked, snapping me out of my reverie, insecurity in his eyes. I smiled and leaned forward to graze his lips with my fingers. "Absolutely nothing," I said softly, and kissed him. He responded by massaging my tongue with his own until my head started to spin and I had to pull away before I got too dizzy. I trailed my fingertips up the inside of his thigh for a while and when I looked at Austin again, his eyes were closed and he was biting his lip with this intense look on his face. I flicked my eyes downward to his crotch. He was leaking big clear drops of precum all over the place. I licked up one side of his dick and his face screwed up some more, a whimper escaping his lips. "Ohhh, my God, Ben..." I grinned to myself, enjoying my little power trip, and ran my hand lightly over his shaft, which was rewarded with another big dollop of precum. I blew on it gently and the liquid spread, while his cock jerked. My tongue traced a line up from his cock to his stomach, over a thin scar that I'd never noticed before. I teased the edge of his belly button and with a loud moan, his abs tightened into a delicious six pack. He arched his back and clenched his hands into tight fists at his sides. "Holy fuck," he gasped audibly. "Holy fuck..." I stretched out on top of him and he crushed his lips against mine passionately. His tongue shot between my lips and delved into my mouth like it was possessed by something otherworldly. I reached down between us, stroked his rigid dick a couple of times, and felt him moan low in his throat and push himself farther into my hand. I pecked him on the lips and let the very tip of my fingernails hover on top of his nipples. The reaction was instantaneous. I've never seen anything stand up so fast in my life. I made my way back down the trunk of his body to his shiny, slippery dick. God, did he ever look hot lying there on his back; sweating like it was the first of July, with his dick straight up in the air and throbbing. I pursed my lips around it and swirled my tongue around the head, emitting a great long string of jabber from Austin. I kept a tight seal with my lips and moved up and down his length. "Ungh... faster, Ben... ahh, shit... oh, my God, Ben..." he babbled senselessly, and a warm gush of precum flooded my mouth. I pulled off of him and sat back, the taste of salt still on my tongue. The cold air must have told him I wasn't there anymore, because he opened his eyes and leaned up on his elbows. "Wha... what're you doing? Don't stop, Ben... please..." he begged. When I didn't do anything, he fell back down and moved his hands toward his twitching cock, but I grabbed them and held them at his sides. "Tell me something that's not about sex," I told him with a small smile. "What?" he panted in disbelief. "Tell me something that's not about sex and I'll keep going." He was silent, save for his ragged breathing and moans, as he tried to think of something other than the mini paroxysms his cock was in. "Here, I'll help," I said after about ten seconds. "What color's the sky?" I asked, and blew faintly on his cock. He moaned and threw his head back. "Oh God, Ben... that feels so good..." "Wrong answer." I stopped the stream of air. "What country are we in?" I asked, rubbing my nose against his balls. "...please... I gotta cum so bad, Ben..." he whimpered. "Wrong again, Spaceman," I said, shaking my head. "One more chance." I leaned forward and ran my tongue slowly along the scar on his abdomen. "What's this from?" "Unnnghh... oh God... apeh... peh... 'pendicitis," he blurted at last. I smiled. "Good enough." And I wrapped my lips around his hardon and slid from tip to base and back again. Austin's hands were in my hair and his moans in my ears. "Aahhh... God, Ben... holy shit... ohhh, my God... that's so good, Ben... harder..." I followed his lust ridden instructions to the T. What the hell. I figured I had teased the poor guy enough already. Soon, his voice got louder and his cock began to spasm as he came. "Oh, FUCK, Ben! Oh! Oh, my GOD! AAHHH!!" he screamed, and emptied his balls into my waiting mouth. I swallowed every drop. Couldn't get enough. I loved how he tasted. When he was all cummed out, I moved up to his face and kissed him deeply, salty sweet cum on my lips. I pulled my face back and looked at him. He was lying on my bed with his eyes closed, lips parted, and barely moving, except for the rise and fall of his chest, which glistened with sweat. There was this post coitus flush in his cheeks that was scarcely visible in the moonlight, but if you looked at it the right way, you could see it was there. Sweaty black hair lay plastered against his skull and goosebumps had risen all over him. Smiling, I brushed the wayward strands from his face and kissed his forehead. He opened his eyes and smiled at me, and I cupped his face in my hand. "You okay?" I asked quietly. He sighed and nodded. "Have I told you lately that you're REALLY good at that?" "I think I caught that somewhere along the line, yeah." "Okay. As long as you know." I smiled and kissed him again, then got up off the bed. "Where're you going?" he asked me. "To find you a blanket," I answered. I grabbed one out of the hallway closet, and flapped it open on my way back to my bedroom. I got back to the side of my bed, held out a hand for Austin, who got to his feet on shaky legs, and wrapped my arms around him in the blanket, pinning his arms to his sides. He smiled at me again and kissed my nose. "Thanks. Uh, what about you?" "I'm not cold." "No, I mean aren't you hard still?" I shrugged and looked at the electronic digits of my clock. "We've got over an hour to worry about me. In the meantime," I smiled, "you wanna see my attic?" "Sure. I've already seen your basement," he grinned, and playfully nudged my groin with a blanketed knee. "Nark," I smiled. "I mean my real attic." "I would love to see your attic, Ben." He still couldn't stand too well. If I had dared to let him go, I had no doubt that he would go down faster than the steel bricks the fisheries guys used to weigh down their nets, so I was holding him, which seemed to suit him just fine. The thought crossed my mind that he might be faking his wobblyness of his legs, but in all honesty, I didn't care as long as I got to hold him. I kept my arms around him and had him lean against me a bit as I led him down the hall. My house's attic entrance was through one of those hatchway doors in the ceiling that you pull down. After making sure he could stand on his own for a sec, I jumped up and grabbed a hold of the cord that hung down. Wooden stairs came down, creaking as they did. The stairs were only big enough for one person at a time, so I pushed Austin in front of me. That way if he fell, I'd at least break the fall a little bit. We made it to the top of the stairs in one piece, sans falling. "Welcome to my parlor," I told him with a grin, and sat him down in the green chair. "What is all this stuff?" "My mom's stuff." "Oh." He didn't say anything for a while. I think he was uncomfortable or unsure or something. I turned on a couple lamps, the soft light confining the shadows to crevices behind various boxes, furniture, and crossbeams. I went and sat on the floor by Austin, my back against the footrest part of the chair. I felt a pair of hands come down and caress my ears. Mmm... it felt nice to be there with him. I'd never brought anybody up here before. Not even Aaron. I leaned my head back contentedly, and, seeing it on the floor near my feet, picked up a book with a swirled red marble-like cover. "Whatcha got?" he asked from above me, his chin resting on the top of my head. "Photo album." I opened it up and my mom's smiling face stared back at me. "Wow. She was beautiful." "She was," I agreed. "Hey, you have your mom's smile," he remarked. "Yeah," I said softly. I brushed my fingertips lightly over the plastic. In my mind's eye, I saw her under some trees, sunshine streaming through the leaves, bathing her in emerald light. She spun around and her long dark blond hair fanned out behind her, eyes dancing, arms outstretched. I could hear her laughing. I felt a lump rise in my throat and coughed to clear it. Austin caught this and wove his fingers in and around mine. "Are you okay?" "I'm fine," I said in an unruffled tone. He didn't buy it, but said nothing more about it. Just stroked my hair and touched his lips lightly to my temple. I felt the lump come back and blinked away an unexpected fleet of tears. I wasn't going to cry. It wouldn't do anything. It didn't do anything then, and it wouldn't do anything now. And it was NINE YEARS ago, for Christ's sake. Shouldn't I be over it by now? Or at least have dealt with it a little? I flipped the page to bring up a better memory and it worked. I was sitting on a bench with a book in my lap and this real brooding expression on my face. My mom was sitting beside me, her arm around my little shoulders, and she was pointing to something on the page. In the one next to it, some girl and I were playing in the sand. "You were such a cute little kid," Austin said, as I leafed through a couple more pages. I looked up at him and he had this big dumb smile on his face. I scoffed at him affectionately. "All little kids are cute at one time or another." "Yeah, but not all of them STAY cute once they get older," he shot back and pecked my lips. I smiled at the compliment. "Sweet talker." He was silent and I glanced back at him. He was staring at me with the oddest expression on his face. Scrutinizing, like I had announced some profound verse and he was trying to decipher exactly what it meant. "What?" I asked after a while, starting to feel a little creeped out, but in a good way. "Hmm?" he blinked abruptly and refocused his eyes on me. "Why were you staring at me like that?" "Oh." He shook his head and smiled. "It's nothing." "Come on, tell me." I got up and turned around so I could see him better. "I can't," he said, laughing a little. "It sounds like a line." "Please?" I whined in my best little kid voice and stuck out my lower lip. "I was thinking about you," he consented at last, suddenly finding the blue and gray blanket I had given him very interesting. "And how whenever I'm around you, it's like I don't even need the Space Agency. Because when I'm with you, I get higher than any rocket could ever get me." I was speechless. Austin had the power to lift me up into the clouds and bring me to my knees in a matter of seconds. I knew that, but I didn't know I was in the same ballpark as the CSA. He had wanted that for years. I was just his boyfriend. I had no idea what to say, so I did what I always did when things got like this. I stared. He flicked his eyes up to meet mine briefly and he flashed me an embarrassed smile. "See? I told you it sounded like a line." His words wrenched me out of my mute state. I reached out a hand and ran my knuckles down the side of his face, causing him to look at me again. "It doesn't sound like a line," I said softly, and met his lips, trying to convey all I felt for him, big muddled ball of confusion that it was, into that kiss. "Wow," he breathed when I had pulled back. "Maybe I should give you lines more often." "Tsk, tsk," I chastised and messed up his hair. "That one-track mind of yours is going to get you into trouble, Spaceman." "Ooo, punish me, Ben," he grinned. "Perv," I cracked with a smile. I sat back down on the floor between his legs and resumed flipping through the photo album with Austin looking over my shoulder. "Who's that?" he asked, pointing to a little boy flying a kite. "That's Aaron." The resemblance was faint at best. Aaron had changed a lot since he was five. Shiny brown hair had replaced a mop that was once blonder than mine and he now had a mouth full of teeth, contrary to the image in front of me. But he had looked toward the camera and the impish smile he had thrown around so freely when he was a kid was one he kept as he grew older. Austin squinted at the photo, trying to equate the kid in it to the Aaron that he knew. "Huh. Yeah, it is." He paused. "Have you decided what you're gonna do about that yet?" "I don't see why I should have to do anything," I said stubbornly. "He was being an asshole for no reason. He can come talk to me if he wants." "I don't think he was doing it just to spite you. If he was, he wouldn't have asked me if you were okay." "Why are you taking his side?" "I'm not taking anybody's side, Ben. I'm just trying to help. Aaron's not the kind of guy who freaks out over nothing." "How would you know? I've known him a lot longer than you have," I replied caustically. I was being a snot, and I knew that, but I wanted to maintain my position that I was right and Aaron was the one at fault. I didn't do anything, dammit! What was Austin ragging on me for? "Which is exactly my point," he said, ignoring my bratty disposition. "Look at all these picutres. You guys have been friends way too long to have it dissipate in the aftermath of some stupid fight." He laced his fingers into mine again and tipped my chin back so he could look into my eyes. "Look, Ben, I'm not gonna make you go and talk to Aaron. But think about it, okay? Please?" I was still irked, but I agreed, if only to get him to drop the subject. I didn't want to think about the Aaron thing. All I did was run it in circles in my head until I wasn't sure I could even remember quite how it happened. And if I couldn't remember how it happened, I ran the risk of feeling guilty enough to go and tell him the truth. The grandfather clock we had downstairs chimed and the sound rose up through the open hatchway door on the floor behind us. Austin looked at me, a dismayed expression on his face. "Fucking hell, I have to go home," he said dejectedly. "Relax, there'll be other nights," I told him, not really understanding why it was such a big deal tonight. "But I didn't get to play," he pouted. I smiled and leaned in close for a kiss. "Well, then I guess you'll just have to come back tomorrow and make it up to me, won't you?" He left for home that night, with a kiss that shook me so much I stumbled when he pulled away, and a promise that he'd be thinking of me. I almost told him I loved him, but bit my tongue at the last second. I was really going to have to get a handle on that. I did not love Austin. Or did I? Whenever he kissed me, I could feel my knees go weak and (not to betray my own kind or anything) I'd get dizzier than a blonde on a merry-go-round. "That doesn't mean anything," I said aloud to myself. "All that me getting dizzy proves is that I don't know how to breathe properly when I kiss." But what about how my heart sped up whenever I thought of him? There, it was doing it now. His face had jumped into my mind and I saw his blue eyes glitter with that eccentric look he sometimes got in them. The way he moaned when I bit at his neck filled my ears. "Hormones. That's all it is," I said tenaciously. Then there was the way he looked so cute when he was sleeping, or how he drummed on his desk at school when he was bored. And then he'd roll his eyes at something the teacher said and smile at me and my chest would puff out because that smile made me so happy. And how good I felt tonight when he told me I made him feel as good as his space thing. "I'm sentimental." And what about-- "Shut up, shut up, shut up," I muttered and put my hands on my ears, which was counter productive in itself, because I was arguing with the voices inside my head, not outside. "I'm eleven days short of sixteen," I told myself finally. "I am NOT in love. With Austin or anyone else. Got it?" The voices were quiet. "Okay, then," I nodded, and hoped they'd stay quiet for the rest of the night. I had a shower, not daring to whack off for fear that'd get the voices going again, and collapsed into bed, not allowing myself to think a thing, until the sun came up the next morning and wrestled me out of my slumber for school. Brennan's Ramblings: HI!! I'd give you guys all a hug, but there's the little problem of me being a bodiless cyber figure. But it's the thought that counts, right? Anyway, here it is. My undying apologies for the long wait. I had the most god-awful writer's block these past two weeks. Half a page in five hours. Five! Not to mention I had an identity crisis that was more than a little distracting. But all that crap's been smoothed over now, so pretty flowers should start popping up from it soon. Don't give me that look, you're here of your own free will, remember? :) Anyhow, my email box is lonely... Send me a note (or a report, you know, whatever turns your crank) at bjobse414@hotmail.com The Recs: Alright, dudes and dudettes (that's such a funny word), the latest one I managed to pull from the every shallowing depths of my memory is called Kenny. It's in the Bisexual Relationships corner of Nifty and was finished on January 5, 1999. Wonderful story. It's kinda long, so maybe get yourself some apple cider, some nice music... Make a night of it and all that jazz. Have fun with it! Later, kidlets.