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A Single Soul

Book 3

Deer Crossing Farm

Prologue

 

 

When I was a child, I spake as a child,
I understood as a child.
I thought a child:
But when I became a man,
I put away childish things.

1 Corinthians 13:11

 

 

 

 

 

"So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past."

F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

 

 

 

 

 

"Matty," Dad said quietly as he knocked on my bedroom door, "Jimmy's on the phone again."

I had heard the phone ringing and I had guessed who was calling. "Too busy packing to talk, Dad!" I called out, with more cheer than I felt and without turning around—I didn't want my dad to see the tears in my eyes.

Having managed to make it through the entire summer without seeing my former best friend, despite Jim's many entreaties, I just couldn't bring myself to see him again, and I was just hours away from leaving for college and a new life, so I definitely didn't want to get involved in an argument or painful discussion.

My father talked until he was blue in the face, trying to convince me to see Jimmy and he repeatedly told me that I was being unfair—that I needed to give him a chance to explain himself; I just couldn't do it, for each time his words replayed in my head and my breath caught; nothing he could say now could ever make up for what he had said before.

I was always a good friend to him— my constant companion— and we had shared everything since the first day we'd met...I think, even then, I loved him. Then he spoke those words that I can still hear, ringing in the still of those dark nights when I can't sleep. For weeks it took everything I had to climb out of bed each morning, but I did. I vowed to put the pain in a box and file it away; that done, I was now ready move on and live my new life— or so I told myself.

In the days and weeks following the insane events that led to Jim, Barry, and Clinton all being injured, my own life was thrown somewhat out of kilter. Exactly how does one get past watching one's lovers being shot? I handled it the way I have always handled hard times, I moved on with my life.

 

For the most part, I have been successful in keeping all of my unpleasant memories and life experiences safely locked in their own special box and securely stowed away: from my mother's indifference and religious fanaticism, to the snide remarks from kids about my "slanty" eyes, and then the betrayal I felt on that awful day, long ago, in the school parking lot with Jim. Some may call it denial, some may call it avoidance, but I called it being stoic. In my college philosophy class I was fascinated by the Stoics; Zeno, Seneca, and Epictetus; I did my best to always practice self-control and fortitude; to stop myself from being pulled under by the tide of destructive emotions.

 

However, there are times when the glimpse of a stranger's back or perhaps a half-heard song or maybe some fragrance on the edge of one's memory or merely the remembrance of the curve of a road, that allows the past, pleasant or unpleasant, to intrude on today, causing me to lose my resolve and give into regret and self-pity or, more usually, just to bittersweet melancholy.

 

Yesterday, while shopping at the local farmers' market, it was the sound of two teenage boys laughing about something while waiting in line for soft pretzels. There was something sweet in the sound; the sound of youth filled with that mixture of bravado and innocence. It reminded me of the laughter Jim and I had shared and it made me think of my lover lying next to me this morning with his arm in a sling, the result of being shot by his crazy brother two weeks ago, and of all the years we'd missed because I had acted like a child instead of a man.

 

In college I embraced the concept of Stoicism and, as a result, I have allowed myself few regrets in my life—perhaps too few— and, of those few, there is only one that I can't just keep safely locked away: I never spoke to Jim on that last day.

Whenever that painful summer worms its way into my consciousness, I can't help but wonder what my life would have been like if I had just given him a chance to talk with me. Of course neither of us could know if things would have turned out any differently. Hell, we didn't even know that we were really gay and in love. The only thing that could be said for sure is that we would have at least been friends for all those years. But after further thought, I reflected that this too might not have happened, considering whom Jim married. While Jim and I did eventually did end up together, the time we were apart is my greatest regret. And I have vowed never to let something come between us again—and now that vow includes the third person in our trinogamous relationship, Barry.

 

My new found step-brother, who is convalescing with us at the farm, seems to find our relationship particularly interesting. Although he hasn't asked outright, he often dances around the subject with innocuous questions. Finally, I surprised him during one of our daily chats by bringing up the subject myself and attempted to explain how our relationship worked. He listened as I explained how I felt that Jim and I were really `a single soul', so that adding Barry just completed the `couple'. He listened, and asked no questions. He was, however giving me the `I'm not buying it' vibe. In the end it didn't bother me, I felt no need to explain myself.

 

What I didn't share with him was just how exciting was our lovemaking—or maybe it could better described as `how kinky'. Whichever you chose, there is nothing more stimulating for me than licking Barry's balls as Jim fucks him; and when Jim occasionally pulls out, I swallow his cock and soak it with spit before he moves back in to deposit his load. Our lovemaking is sometimes slow and sensual and other times down right piggish—which ever it is, it is always hot and satisfying. However, entering into this new relationship was always more about love than sex, but I won't lie and say that both Jim and I weren't initially interested in Barry sexually—it was only after we got to know him that love entered the rather complex equation.

 

Surprisingly, Jim's focus has not been his recuperation, or the fact that his brother died trying to kill him, but the discovery of a nephew—the bastard son of his late brother. He has enlisted the help of his brother, Brandon, and they have made it their mission to find the young man and reach out to him. The only problem I could see with this course of action is his mother, a woman whom I have come to believe, as does Jim, is a lost cause. George has been trying everything, along with his new paramour, Dot, to help Bonnie deal with her grief and mental illness. Jim still refuses to visit her, and from the reports I have received from Jim's sister, there really isn't much change and so I haven't really pushed him to reconsider.

 

For my part, I have been doing all I could to establish a relationship with my own newly discovered family member. Everything regarding my late mother's behavior mystified me. My mother: the women, who left me and her husband because she felt that devoting her life to God and prayer was more important than raising her son and keeping her marriage vows. The irony was completely lost on her, and since she was never a very loving or nurturing person it never bothered me when she left. The man left behind had always been the one with the big warm hugs; he was person who patiently answered hundreds of questions from an inquisitive little boy, so her absence was barely noticed.

If proof was ever needed that she was mentally ill, Clinton was exhibit A. And here was a women who (as my father shared after I was an adult) withheld sex because she believed it was a sin to engage sex unless one was trying to create a new life. So what other explanation could we possibly offer when she leaves her husband and son, only to end up having sex with another man and bears him a child out of wedlock? If the proof wasn't written in blood I wouldn't believe it—in fact I really still can't believe that it actually happened, therefore my conclusion was that she was just plain crazy.

 

Jim, always the joker, has been teasing since me about Clinton by trying to decide which combination is sexier: Chinese/Italian or Chinese/African-American. Of course I told him to decide while sucking my cock!

 

Living in Delaware, and especially at the farm, has continued to provide unexpected surprises. The boys are still enjoying the rural setting they had enjoyed in North Carolina, as well now the proximity of larger towns. There have already been many trips to Philadelphia where the two really lap up the attention of their Uncle Billy, and Tim O'Brian and the rest of the college crew at their house near the Penn campus.

At the farm there are horses to ride, new friends and, of course, baseball to keep them occupied. What made me happiest of all was how well they accepted having three gay dads. The future may prove interesting, as they grow older—puberty may prove to be difficult and confusing as they discover their own orientation. If the boys are anything like their fathers, it will be arriving soon. But I'm confident that all will be well; it seems that if there were going to be problems we would be seeing signs already. Besides, if the three dads happen to miss the signs, Al, otherwise known as "Uncle Buck" surely would catch them.

Al has become the lynch-pin of the household. It was he, while standing at the stove with his well-shaped ass framed by the straps of his jock, who gave me the list of items needed from the farmers' market. While all the guys in the house tend to be naked most of the time —including the boys— Al enjoys his jock, he considers it `a look'. When it comes to kinky, he is the king. Barry feeds his fetish on occasion by visiting his room after Jim and I have each dropped a load in his ass so as to sit on the hairy Italian's face that he might feast on the prize.

Barry isn't the only one of little group to feed Al's veracious appetite for the male form. I know that when Billy is around he'll feed him a load or two (or more) depending on whether Jasmine is around. Then there is his affair with Sam Brines that has flourished recently. They spend a lot of time with my dad and Finn; things really get down and dirty when Grant shows up for his monthly fill of piss and humiliation.

The laughter of the boys brought me out of my reverie (particularly this last) and I collect my order from the butcher and head home wondering what the days ahead will bring. It wasn't so greatly long ago that I was a happily married man with a wife and son. Now I'm a gay man with two lovers, four sons at home and a set of triplets that I fathered with my ex-wife's lesbian lover. What is in store for me, I have no idea, stoically I keep moving forward with life at Deer Crossing Farm neither dwelling on the past and what might have been; or fretting about what might lay ahead.

But I am human after all, and there are times that I'm tempted to call Jewell Conway to ask her what she sees in our future. Of course I never do; it would spoil all the fun of living life—like reading the last page of the book first.

 

Note to readers:

I'm sure many of you have already read the first chapters of Deer Crossing Farm and have been patiently waiting for new chapters; so I shall warn you now that you may notice a few changes in the story. Not to worry though, I think you will like the new version—and you finally have an ending.

Pete

Questions or comments may be addressed to: farmboy7456@gmail.com