A couple of chapters ago we left our hero feeling as if the roof had caved in on him. Now we're going to rewind to the day after those fateful conversations in Tony's bedroom and follow him as he heads out across the Atlantic in search of a complete break from his problems – though if he can get some advice about how to handle them while he's there, so much the better...
Jeremy had always looked forward to going to stay with his dad: his visit to America had always been fun, a chance to do stuff with his father, who always took at least three of the four weeks off work so that they could go places and see things together. But this year things were different, because his life had become so much more complicated since the previous summer. He was now at secondary school; he now had a step-father; and he now had a whole lot of emotional baggage that he really didn’t want.
He hoped he would be able to forget about things back in England and just have fun with his dad as in previous years, but he also hoped he would get a chance to ask for advice on how to deal with… well, things. Though he also didn’t want to admit to his father how he felt about Bilal, in case it got him disowned on the spot…He decided to just wait and see if an opportunity presented itself to ask some questions in a suitably vague and oblique way.
This was, of course, a very long journey. First Adolf drove him to Heathrow, then he had a flight of about eight and a half hours to New York, then he had to wait for a connecting flight, and then it was about another five and a half hours to San Francisco, where his father would meet him – and then it was quite a long drive to get to his father’s house. Of course, because he was flying east to west it didn’t actually take fourteen hours according to the clock, because Pacific Time was eight hours behind London Time, but he always felt exhausted when they finally got to his father’s house and had to spend most of the following day acclimatising and adjusting to the time difference.
This year he had far too much time during the journey to sit and think about things, and even though he tried to distract himself with a book his attention kept drifting away, so that he kept reading the same page without actually taking in a single word. He dozed on and off but kept waking up with the same stuff going round and round in his head, so that didn’t help, either.
Eventually he got to San Francisco, and at the sight of his father waiting for him at the barrier with a big smile on his face he was finally able to put all the heavy thoughts to the back of his head, at least for a while.
“So how’s Little Rolo?” asked his father, as he came through the barrier. “Good journey?”
Jeremy smiled: his dad was the only person to call him Little Rolo, which he had been doing for as long as Jeremy could remember. His middle name was Roland, which was also his father’s first name, and when Jeremy was small he and his father always called each other Big Rolo and Little Rolo.
“Not too bad,” said Jeremy, hugging him. “I’m a bit tired, though.”
“Don’t worry, you can stay in bed tomorrow morning until at least… half past six?”
“Make it half past ten and I’ll think about it.”
“So, how’s your mother?” asked Mr Fielding, picking up his son’s bag and heading towards the parking lot.
“Okay.”
“And is everything working out with Andrew?”
“Andrew? Oh… yes, I think so.”
Jeremy had promised himself he wasn’t going to spend this holiday moaning about Adolf: he simply wanted to forget about his home life for four weeks and just enjoy himself. So he answered all his father’s questions briefly and without adverse comment.
They got into the car and worked their way out of the airport, getting onto Route 101 and heading north. Jeremy always felt that the holiday had really begun when they reached the Golden Gate Bridge, though his father never failed to point out Alcatraz Island off to their right: he had regularly threatened to send Jeremy to stay there if he misbehaved during his stay. It hadn’t been until last year that Jeremy had discovered that the prison had closed many years previously.
It was a journey of a good hundred miles, and once they were clear of the city Jeremy settled down and dozed. His father woke him up when the lake came into view, because it was a beautiful sight, and he knew that Jeremy would complain if he wasn’t awake to see it for the first time. This was always a strange moment for Roland Fielding, who was convinced that if only his wife had seen this she would have been prepared to try living in America after all: nothing could be further from the bleak view of American inner cities that she saw on television and on the big screen, and which she thought was typical of the whole country. And if she had come with him, things would be so different…
He sighed and drove on, aware that there was no point in speculating on what-ifs.
They reached the house at about five o’clock in the afternoon, though to Jeremy it felt more like one in the morning, and he was in no condition to do very much more than have a quick bite to eat and then fall into bed. The next morning he woke up early, and having spent about thirteen hours in bed he didn’t want to stay there any longer, so he got up, threw his clothes on and – moving quietly so as not to awaken his dad – went out and sat on the porch, looking out over the lake. He was still there when his father got up a couple of hours later.
“Do you think it’s too early for me to go and call on Scott?” he asked. “I mean, he does know I’m here, doesn’t he?”
“He does, but you can’t call on him this week because they’ve gone to visit with his grandma. He came by before he left and said to tell you he’s sorry – but he’ll be back next week. And I’m sure we can find enough to do to keep you busy until then.”
Scott was a boy of about Jeremy’s own age who lived two houses away from Mr Fielding. They usually spent a lot of time together during the summer, and Jeremy was disappointed to discover that they’d be apart for the first week of his stay. On the other hand, his father usually had some interesting trips planned, and no doubt those would be fun, too…
Jeremy loved the desert, because it was so different from south-east England, and so this year his father took him on a four day drive through parts of Nevada, allowing him to enjoy huge vistas of emptiness. To balance that there were some shorter expeditions to the woods and lakes closer to Mr Fielding’s home, though these too were completely different from Jeremy’s corner of England, being… well, of a much larger scale, for a start.
It was fun being with his father, but Jeremy was glad when Scott returned home at the start of the second week: he wanted to spend some time with boys of his own age. So when Scott came and called for him on the first morning after his return Jeremy greeted him happily… and also found himself looking at him in a whole new way. Last year Scott had just been a boy to play with, but since then Jeremy had started to notice boys in a completely different way, and now he realised that Scott was really very good-looking: he was tall – well, a couple of inches taller than Jeremy, anyway – and tanned and had quite long dark blond hair and blue eyes and a nice smile…
Jeremy realised he was staring and looked away quickly, hoping he wasn’t going to start blushing, which he thought would be an absolute give-away. But Scott didn’t seem to have noticed anything.
“Hi, Jeremy,” he said, displaying that perfect smile again. “Doing anything today?”
Jeremy looked over his shoulder at his father, who smiled and shook his head: he’d deliberately kept the day of Scott’s return free.
“Apparently not,” said Jeremy.
“Great! Then let’s go hang out by the pool!”
Jeremy paused long enough to grab his trunks and a towel and then followed Scott to his house. The pool was new: this time last year it hadn’t even been started – they’d done most of their swimming in the lake.
“Do you like it?” Scott asked him.
“Yes, it’s brilliant! Aren’t we going in?”
“Maybe later. Go get yourself a soda and we’ll catch up on what’s happening.”
Jeremy knew where the kitchen was, of course, so he went and collected a couple of cans from the fridge and took them back to Scott, who had removed his shirt and was relaxing on a lounger. Desperately trying not to stare, Jeremy handed him one of the cans and parked himself on the other lounger.
Scott filled him in on what he had been doing over the past eleven months, inadvertently dashing Jeremy’s hopes of a holiday romance by waxing lyrical about a girl called Jeanette who went to his school.
“Her titties are just starting,” Scott said, a dreamy expression on his face. “Just little buds… I’m sure she’ll go out with me if I can just ask her right… so, what about you? Have you found a girlfriend yet?”
“No,” said Jeremy. He had been hoping Scott might be able to advise him, but now he thought it would be a bad idea to mention it, since Scott was apparently into girls.
“Don’t worry, you’ll meet one soon. So – what do you want to do? We could swim awhile, then maybe we could go sit on the pier and watch girls go by – or we could go fishing…”
Watching girls wasn’t on Jeremy’s list of Things To Do, though maybe there’d be some boys he could watch go by… and then maybe Scott would see him staring at boys, and that would be the end of another friendship. Bad idea, he thought.
“Let’s swim and then fish,” said Jeremy. “I mean, I won’t be here long enough to get anywhere with girls, will I?”
“Guess not. Come on, then.”
Scott threw off his jeans, shoes and socks, revealing that he was already wearing his Speedos underneath. Jeremy stared again, caught himself doing it and turned around quickly, covering his embarrassment by taking his own clothes off and pulling his trunks on, and by the time he had done that Scott was already halfway down the pool.
They swam for about an hour, racing, chasing each other and trying to duck each other; they had competitions to see who could make the biggest splash jumping into the pool, and they showed off their diving techniques to each other (neither really having much of a technique at all, in fact). This was exactly how things had been in previous years, and Jeremy was happy to be able to escape to a time before sex.
They were still in the pool when a boy whom Jeremy had never met before came into the yard.
“Hey, Scottie – is this the English kid?” he asked.
Jeremy wasn’t sure that he wanted to be described as ‘the English kid’, but he let it pass. Scott introduced him to the boy, whose name was Joe and who had moved into the neighbourhood the previous September. Apparently he and Scott were good friends, and for a moment Jeremy felt jealous: at this time of year Scott was supposed to be his friend. But that feeling subsided immediately when Scott pointed out to Joe that anything they were going to be doing for the next three weeks would have to include Jeremy.
“Sure, why not?” agreed Joe. “He’s told me all about you,” he added to Jeremy,” and he says you’re cool, and that’s good enough for me. So, what’s the plan?”
“We’re going fishing,” Scott told him.
“Great! Can we take the boat out?”
“Sure – the weather’s okay, so it’ll be good on the lake. We’re gonna have a bite to eat and then go get the boat. You wanna eat with us?”
“’Kay.”
“Come on, then, Jeremy, let’s go get changed.”
Jeremy thought he’d have to be really careful here: staring at Scott while he was changing would be a really bad idea – but, on the other hand, he really wanted to know if anything was happening to Scott, development-wise: last year he had been as small and undeveloped where it counts as Jeremy himself.
They went into the poolside room and started to dry themselves off, and then Scott brazenly removed his trunks right in front of Jeremy’s eyes. The previous year when this had happened Jeremy had barely glanced at his friend, but this year there was rather more to look at, because Scott got an erection as soon as he removed his Speedos.
“I don’t know why, but I can’t stop getting boners lately,” he told Jeremy, displaying himself.
“You must be thinking about Jeanette,” said Jeremy, admiring it: it was definitely a bit bigger than his, and Scott now had a little pubic hair, too. Of course, he was six months older than Jeremy…
“Just ignore him,” said Joe, who was leaning on the wall by the door. “He’s just showing off because he’s got a few little bitty hairs. And because he thinks he’s got a big one.”
“It’s bigger than yours,” responded Scott.
“Not by much. And it’ll take more than that to impress Jeanette.”
Scott was in no hurry to cover it up, and so Jeremy felt far less worried when he took his trunks off and revealed his own erection. Scott spotted it straight away.
“Hey, Jeremy’s popped a boner, too,” he commented. “Come have a look, Joe.”
That wasn’t an invitation Jeremy would have issued himself, especially when he was demonstrably smaller than his friend, but there didn’t seem to be any way to avoid an inspection now.
Joe wandered over and peered at him.
“So what’s it like having a foreskin?” he asked. “It looks different… does it feel different? Okay, that’s a stupid question – how would you know how it feels NOT to have one? Only there aren’t too many people to ask here – most of us are cut. One or two of the Mexicans aren’t, but I don’t know any of them well enough to ask, except Raul, and he’s been cut, too… Can I touch it?”
Jeremy gaped: that was an astonishing thing to ask a total stranger, even if Scott had described him as ‘cool’. On the other hand… why not?
“Okay,” he said. “As long as you get undressed first, that is.”
“Okay, then – so long as you don’t worry about getting shown up…”
Joe wasn’t wearing much, just a tee shirt, shorts and underpants, and he threw those off and came to stand next to Jeremy. His penis, which rose swiftly to attention as Jeremy watched, was only about the same length as his own, but it seemed thicker, and Joe’s balls were larger, too. And of course, like Scott, he was circumcised.
He put out a hand and took hold of Jeremy, rolling his foreskin up and down.
“That feels neat,” he said. “Try it, Scottie.”
Scott hesitated – after all, he was into girls. But then he guessed it might be interesting to see how a foreskin worked, so he gave it a quick try, too.
Jeremy found he liked being handled like this, and so he was disappointed when Joe said, “Okay, I guess we’d better go eat, then,” and pulled his clothes back on again, leaving Jeremy with a raging erection. Scott grinned at him as he put his own clothes on.
“Looks like your jeans won’t do up, huh?” he commented. “Just push it in best you can and then come through to the kitchen.”
Scott left him to it, and Jeremy felt frustrated: naked and stiff and nobody to do anything with. Again. He’d have rubbed himself, but he knew with his luck that the other two would walk in on him at the vital moment if he tried that here, so instead he got dressed and followed them into the kitchen. They had their heads together and started laughing when he came in, which immediately raised his suspicions that they were up to something. But they simply got on with making sandwiches without saying anything, so he supposed that maybe he was imagining things.
They stuffed themselves full of sandwiches, made some more to take with them and then walked down to the boathouse where Scott’s family kept their small boat. Jeremy didn’t fish – he’d never had the patience for it – but he was quite happy to lounge about in the boat and talk to the other two while they went after bass, which were allegedly plentiful in the lake but which usually managed to avoid Scott’s rod completely.
“Is it true that all you Brits are cold-blooded?” asked Joe, after a bit. “Like, you never react to anything, except to say something like ‘I say, gracious me’?”
“That’s a rotten accent,” Jeremy pointed out. “And no, I don’t think I’m like that at all. Why?”
“Well, we thought we’d invite a few friends round for a party Saturday, and we wondered if you’d be able to relax your stiff upper lip enough to enjoy it.”
“Of course I can! I like parties…except… you’re not talking about drugs, are you?”
Joe burst out laughing. “Of course not, numb nut,” he said. “Do we look stupid to you? Okay, this is California, but we’re not all into tripping our brains out. Maybe when I get to college – everyone does it then – but not before.”
“That’s okay, then,” said Jeremy.
“Good. My parents are away, so my brother will be in charge, except he’s usually sort of busy at parties… well, you’ll see. And you can sleep over, too, if you want. So, what do you say?”
Jeremy looked at Scott, who nodded, and that was good enough for him. Maybe a good party would take his mind off the problems waiting for him back in England.
They caught nothing, which Scott admitted was usually the case, though he claimed that this was because this wasn’t the best place to fish for bass, or anything else, come to that, and not due to their lack of ability. After a couple of hours they gave up and took the boat back, and then spent the rest of the afternoon sitting on the pier watching girls (and in Jeremy’s case, surreptitiously, boys) and eating ice cream and talking about this and that. And then Joe went home and Scott and Jeremy walked slowly back up to Scott’s house.
The rest of the week passed in a number of outings with his father and some splashing about in Scott’s pool or sailing on the lake in his boat, until Saturday night rolled round and Scott came to collect him for Joe’s party.
“Are there going to be girls there?” he asked, surprised to see that Scott hadn’t bothered to put his good clothes on.
“No. Joe’s parents won’t let us, and Brian – that’s Joe’s brother – wouldn’t let us sneak any in anyway. Too bad, because if Jeanette was there I’d have to show her the basement, or the attic – somewhere where nobody’s likely to go, anyway… maybe next year…”
Joe met them at the door.
“Hi, Jeremy. Come meet my brother,” he said, looking at him in a strange way as if trying not to laugh. Jeremy couldn’t see what the joke was: he was pretty sure he didn’t have dirt on his face, and his jeans were properly zipped up… he shrugged and followed Joe through to the kitchen.
Brian was a slightly larger version of Joe – same mid-brown hair, though worn a little longer, and Brian had a small gold stud in one ear, which surprised Jeremy, who had never seen a boy wearing ear jewellery before. The brothers both had green eyes, too. But the main difference between the twelve-year-old Joe and the not-quite-fourteen-year-old Brian was what Brian had draped around his shoulders: standing behind him and holding him in a firm embrace was a boy of about the same age, though this one had curly black hair and brown eyes and a big smile.
Jeremy was aware that Scott and Joe were watching him closely to see what his reaction was going to be: this was obviously something they’d been planning for a while. So he did his best not to react at all.
“Hello,” he said. “I’m Jeremy. Thanks for inviting me.”
“Glad you could come,” said Brian, in a voice that had barely started to change. “This is Raul.” And, apparently disappointed by the reaction so far he turned and hugged the curly-haired boy and then kissed him on the lips, watching Jeremy out of the corner of his eye.
“Hello, Raul,” said Jeremy, politely.
“Jeez, you were right,” said Brian, looking at his brother. “Cold-blooded and stiff-upper-lipped to the nth degree. Doesn’t anything surprise you?” he added to Jeremy.
“Not really. Are you really boyfriends, or are you just trying to wind me up?”
“No, we’re for real. And we’re out, too.”
“Huh? Out where?”
“Out of the closet, you… never mind. Maybe you don’t have closets in England. I mean that we don’t try to keep it a secret. The kids at school know about us.”
Jeremy gaped, and now the sang-froid had completely disappeared: he couldn’t begin to imagine telling the boys at school that he was queer. “But… don’t they call you names and stuff?” he asked.
“Not any more. We just don’t react to anything they say, and the only time they tried to beat up on us we ended up kicking their asses instead. I’m on the track team and Raul plays basketball and swims, so we’re in good shape. And it’s weird, but a lot of the girls supported us. I don’t know why – I have no idea how girls think – but it helped. We still get some remarks, but we can handle that. So, have you got a problem with gay guys?”
“God, no. In fact, I think it’s brilliant. What do your parents think?”
“Mine are great – I mean, I guess my dad was disappointed when we first told him – I guess it’s hard for a red-blooded guy to find out his son’s a faggot. But he’s been pretty supportive since. Raul’s folks, though…”
“I haven’t told them,” said Raul. “They’d say it was a sin against God, or something. I guess I’ll have to tell them in the end, but… hell, it can wait.”
“And what about Joe? Doesn’t it make life difficult – I mean, I sort of imagine all the kids at school going ‘your brother’s gay’ all the time.”
“They don’t any more,” said Joe. “My brother can beat the crap out of anyone who badmouths me, and they know that. And a lot of them seem to think it’s sort of cool, somehow. This is California, remember, not the Bible Belt.”
“And are you okay with it?”
“Sure. I love my brother, even if he is a fag – joking, Brian, okay? I just wish they’d let me watch when they do stuff – I bet I could learn plenty if I did.”
“You’re too young,” said Brian. “And I’ll bet you’re not going to let us watch you when you finally start making out with girls, are you?”
“No way!”
“Well, then. Now go get in the pool before we throw you in.”
“Okay. Come on, Jeremy.”
Joe led him up the stairs to his bedroom and told him to dump his bag and get into his swimwear. This time Jeremy had thought to put on his trunks under his jeans, so it didn’t take him more than a minute or so to get ready. Then he followed Joe back downstairs.
Joe's pool wasn’t quite as big as Scott’s, but it was big enough. By the time they arrived there were already three or four boys of their own age messing around in and around it, so Jeremy just dropped his towel by the door and leapt in.
The evening passed in swimming, eating pizza and playing basketball (there was a hoop above the garage door). Jeremy was useless at basketball – the only time he ever played was during his summer break with his dad – but nobody seemed to care, nor did he seem to be the only one with limited skills.
One by one the other kids left the party – including Scott, who told Jeremy that he had to go to church the following morning, and that his mother didn’t trust him to get home in time if he slept over. He’d be home from church before twelve, though, so they could hang out after lunch.
By ten o’clock all the guests had gone except for himself and Raul, who was also staying over.
“Maybe we should sneak into their room later and find out what gay boys do to each other,” suggested Joe, as they all sat in front of the TV.
“Do that,” said Brian. “Of course, five seconds later you’ll be flying out of the window. If you’re really lucky you might land in the pool.”
“You wouldn’t do that to a guest.”
“I would if he tried sneaking into my bedroom when Raul’s here. I’m serious.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” Jeremy assured him.
“Good.”
Fifteen minutes later Joe went out to use the toilet, and Jeremy felt that this was a chance not to be missed.
“Look,” he said, “I need some advice, and I reckon you two would be the perfect people to ask…”
“Why us?” asked Brian.
“Because… well… look, I think I’m probably like you, and I’ve got a problem. I really like this friend of mine, except he doesn’t like boys. And this other friend fancies me, but I don’t really fancy him, and I don’t know what to do about it. Can I possibly talk to you later when Joe’s not about?”
“Joe’s cool,” said Brian. “Okay, he makes fun of us sometimes, but I’ve seen him really lay into a kid who called us faggots in front of him. It won’t worry him if you tell him you’re gay.”
“Yes, but… I mean, I don’t really know him. And really don’t want it getting back to Scott…”
“Scott’s cool, too. But okay, if you’d prefer not to tell him, I’ll send him to the store in the morning and you can talk to us then.”
“Thanks. I mean, really.”
Joe reappeared and they watched TV for a bit and then went up to Joe’s bedroom.
“So, you want to borrow my sleeping bag and sleep on the floor, or do you want to share the bed?” Joe asked him.
Jeremy thought about that briefly. He’d have to be really careful not to touch him, or even get too close, if he didn’t want him to guess about him… but the bed was quite large and the floor looked hard…
“I’ll share, if you really don’t mind,” he said.
“Great!”
Jeremy went to his bag and got out his pyjamas and then started to get undressed.
“You’re not going to wear those, are you?” asked Joe.
“Why not? What do you wear in bed, then?”
“Just my shorts. Or if it’s hot, like today, sometimes I don’t wear anything at all. You should try it – it feels really good, sleeping naked.”
Jeremy didn’t say anything. Of course, he’d slept naked in the garage, and he’d even shared the mattress in the garage with Tony without anything on; but he’d known Tony for several years, while he had only met Joe a few days ago.
“What’s the matter?” Joe asked him. “Too daring for you? I thought you told me Brits aren’t all dull and boring…”
“Okay, then,” said Jeremy, and he put his pyjamas back in the bag.
“Great!” said Joe once more, throwing his own clothes off and flinging them onto (and around) a chair in the corner of the room.
Jeremy put his own clothes in a pile next to his bag and turned around, grateful that – so far, at least – his usually rebellious penis was behaving itself and staying properly limp.
“Hey, guess what I got?” said Joe, lifting his mattress a little and retrieving a magazine from underneath it. “One of my friends at school got me this. What do you think?”
Unfortunately – at least, from Jeremy’s point of view – the magazine in question was designed for an exclusively heterosexual male audience, and he really wasn’t remotely interested in its contents – in fact, he couldn’t understand how some of his school-friends could find those huge swellings and all that hair attractive. But Joe came and sat next to him and opened the magazine, and soon his penis had gone hard; and by looking discreetly at Joe rather than the magazine Jeremy was soon able to achieve the same result.
“Hot, isn’t she?” asked Joe, looking down at Jeremy’s groin and then back at the magazine.
“I guess,” said Jeremy, hoping his lack of enthusiasm wasn’t too obvious.
Joe looked at the magazine for another minute or so and then turned to look at Jeremy.
“Hey, wanna jack off?” he said.
“What?”
“I feel like jacking off. You wanna?”
“Sorry, I don’t understand.”
“Jeez, Jer, don’t you know how to jack off yet? Well, don’t worry, I’ll show you. See, what you gotta do is to take some lotion – this hand-cream’s good – and you squeeze a little out onto your dick. Then you take hold of it like this, and you sort of massage it…”
“Oh, right… no, I know all about that. It’s just called something different where I live.”
“So what’s it called?”
“Wanking. But I don’t use any cream or anything.”
“You should try some. It feels neat.” And Joe passed him the bottle.
Jeremy wasn’t at all sure about doing this in front of someone else: as far as he was concerned it was an intensely private activity. Though, of course, he had fantasised about doing it with Bilal… and maybe he should try using the cream, just to see what it felt like. So he took the bottle, poured a little onto his right hand and took hold of himself. He felt extremely self-conscious, and he was very aware that Joe was watching him closely; but then he thought that now that he’d come this far he might as well get on with it. So he started to rub it.
It did feel different using the cream: not better, necessarily, but different…
“How does that feel?” asked Joe.
“Nice.”
“Good. Say… do you want me to do it to you? I’d sorta like to know how it feels jacking one with skin.”
To Jeremy things seemed to be hurtling along almost out of control here: he’d gone from undressing in front of another boy to being on the point of being wanked by one in less than five minutes. Nobody back in England had ever touched him before, far less actually rubbed it, and he’d known Joe for no time at all… but then, why not? Nobody back in England would ever hear about this unless he decided to tell them, which he thought was pretty unlikely. And it would be interesting to find out what it felt like…
“Okay, then.” And he lay on his back, and Joe grinned at him, applied a little more lotion to his hand and set to work. And Jeremy quickly decide that this felt nice… really nice, in fact. Soon he was wriggling about, aware that he was getting close… and then Joe stopped.
“Please don’t stop,” Jeremy begged him. “That feels magic!”
“You like that, huh?” And Joe grinned at him again, but instead of rubbing it some more he just slowly rolled Jeremy’s foreskin up and down a couple of times. And it felt really nice, but it wasn’t going to get him to where he wanted to be, so Jeremy begged him once again to rub it some more.
“Okay, if you really want me to…” Joe teased Jeremy’s foreskin for another few seconds and then got back to work, and in less than a minute Jeremy was bucking and gasping his way to the best orgasm he had ever experienced.
“Bloody hell, Joe, I never knew it could feel like that,” he said as Joe finally let go. “That was amazing!”
“I knew you’d like it. So, you wanna do me now?”
Jeremy wasn’t one hundred percent sure about that, but he felt that he owed Joe, so he dribbled some lotion over the tip of Joe’s erection and rubbed it in with the tips of his fingers. Of course, Joe was circumcised, just like Bilal, so if he closed his eyes, maybe he could imagine that it was Bilal he had hold of…
He took it quite slowly, wanting to make it last. It wasn’t quite the same, of course: there was no hair at all around this one, and he thought Bilal was probably a little bigger, but all the same it still felt interesting.
Slowly he speeded up, and Joe began to react, and that made it even more fun, knowing that he was responsible for those little gasps and groans. It took a long time to get Joe to orgasm, and Jeremy had to change hands a couple of times and add more lotion as well, but eventually Joe got there, wriggling and clenching his toes and throwing his head back as the feeling overwhelmed him.
“You ever do that to someone else before?” he asked, sitting up.
Jeremy shook his head.
“You learn real quick, then, because that was… well, you did great.”
“Thanks. Joe… do you think you’re gay?”
“Jeez, no! I like girls. We’re just having fun, is all. I do it sometimes with a boy from my school, but he’s away with his parents right now. But just because we jack off together doesn’t mean we’re fags, or anything. It’s just fun, that’s all. So, you wanna take a shower? We need to get that lotion off…”
So they walked down the landing and took a shower together, and that was quite enough to get them both hard again, and they towelled each other down, which did nothing to reduce the swelling, and then Joe said, “Let’s go see what my brother’s doing.”
“What, like this?”
“Well… maybe not. It might be fun to see their reaction, but… no, let’s go put our shorts on first.” Joe ran back to his bedroom and pulled his shorts on and then marched off along the landing and down the stairs. Jeremy threw his own shorts on and followed him, having by now just decided to go along with whatever Joe suggested and see where it led.
Because they had bare feet they got downstairs without being heard, and so were able to get within ten feet of the couch before Raul looked up and saw them.
“What are you doing?” he asked. “We thought you’d gone to bed.”
“Obviously,” said Joe. The two older boys had shed everything except their shorts and had been cuddling happily, engrossed in each other, before being interrupted.
“So what do you want?” asked Brian, trying to conceal an obvious tent in his briefs.
“We thought we’d come see what you guys were doing. We’ve just been jacking, and we thought you might be, too.”
Jeremy wasn’t happy about this intimate detail being aired quite so freely, and it must have been obvious from his expression, because Joe looked at him and laughed.
“Lighten up, dude,” he said. “I don’t keep secrets from my brother. ‘Sides, he knows it don’t mean nothing.”
“I bet it does when you two do it to each other,” said Jeremy, looking at the older boys.
“Of course it does,” said Brian. “But I don’t have a problem with Joe doing it with his friends, so if you two want to give us a show now, go right ahead.”
“No, thanks,” said Jeremy quickly, before Joe could agree to that suggestion. “At least, not unless you two are going to do it as well.”
He expected that to meet with an immediate refusal, but in fact Brian appeared to be considering it.
“Go on, Bri, it’ll be fun,” said Joe. “Jeremy’s hot – and he’s got this real neat little foreskin. You guys wanna see? Go on, Jer, show them.”
“Not unless they take their shorts off first,” said Jeremy, who was feeling like an exhibit in the zoo again.
“Want to?” said Brian, looking at Raul.
“Okay, why not?”
So they stood up and removed their shorts. Brian’s was still partly erect, though it still wasn’t huge, and he didn’t have a lot of hair yet. Raul’s looked a little bigger and it was definitely hairier. Jeremy removed his own shorts and let them examine his penis, which was soon nice and stiff once more.
“What a cute little dick,” said Brian, grinning at him.
“Don’t laugh at him, Bri. You know yours was smaller than that last year,” said his brother.
“Guess that’s true. So, Jeremy, sit down and we’ll talk about what you told us earlier. I know I said we’d send Joe to the store, but I don’t think we need to, especially now we know you’ve been having fun with him. He won’t tell anyone about what we talk about – will you, Joe?”
The younger boy shook his head. Jeremy wasn’t sure he wouldn’t change his mind when he heard what it was about, though, so he asked, “Joe… what would you say if I told you I think I’m gay?”
“I’d say ‘so what?’ probably. Why, are you?”
“Well… I think so.”
“That’s not really a problem to me. All the gay guys I know… okay, both the gay guys I know - are way cool.”
“Okay, then…. Look, I don’t want you to tell Scott about this, okay?”
“I won’t if you don’t want me to.”
“Well, then…” Jeremy allowed the two older boys to pull him down onto the couch, so that he was sitting between them with their arms round him. Joe, not wanting to be left out, threw his shorts off and came and sat next to his brother. And Jeremy told them all about the way he felt about Bilal and the way Tony felt about him and asked what they thought he should do next.
“You might not want to hear this,” said Brian, once the recital was over, “but there’s no future in trying to score with a straight boy. If you keep trying you’ll just make him so pissed that he’ll never want to speak with you again.”
“I think maybe he already feels like that,” said Jeremy, gloomily.
“If you were friends for a long time he’ll get over it and be friends again, most likely – if you can make sure he knows you’re not going to try anything with him. So don’t, okay?”
“The other boy – Tony,” said Raul. “Is he gross, or something? Or do you just not like him?”
“No, he’s okay-looking, and we're good friends… why?”
“Jeremy, have you got any idea how few gay boys you’re going to meet? I mean real gay boys, not kids like Joe just having a bit of fun… unless things are very different over there in England, you’ll never run into more than one or two at school. Okay, there might be some who are still in the closet, but we’re the only out kids at our school. If you’re gay and a gay boy wants to go with you, you’d have to be a total retard to say no, unless he’s mega-gross or something.”
“But I don’t fancy him.”
“That’s because you’re thinking all the time about this other guy, the one from Pakistan. But you can’t have him, Jeremy: you have to start looking at other guys, and if there’s already one who wants you, I’d say grab him and don’t let go. Guys like us don’t get to pick and choose. I mean to say, look what I got stuck with.”
Brian swiped him, and Raul ducked and grinned.
“Serious, Jeremy, I’m lucky: I got a gorgeous guy, and he loves me as much as I love him. Not everyone can be that lucky. So take what’s there, and maybe you could get to fall in love with him once you’ve been going together for a few weeks.”
Jeremy thought about that. Tony was a brilliant friend, and he certainly wasn’t bad-looking. The only thing wrong with him was that he wasn’t Bilal…
“Thanks,” he said. “Sincerely. Look, I think me and Joe ought to go and leave you in peace now – come on, Joe.”
He walked slowly back upstairs with Joe following him, and when he got back to Joe’s room he dropped his shorts on the pile of his other clothes and got into bed once more. Joe turned off the light and got in with him, snuggling up close, and Jeremy, grateful for the contact, put his arm round the other boy’s shoulders and settled down to sleep.
He still wasn’t certain what he would do next when he woke up the following morning, but he realised that Raul was probably right when he said that gay boys might be thin on the ground. After all, Timmy had told him the same thing: that he and Graham were the only two in their year at school. So maybe he should think seriously about saying yes to Tony. Except that the thought of Bilal in his arms just wouldn’t go away…
“I got another boner,” said Joe’s voice in his ear, breaking into his thoughts. “Wanna jack it for me?”
So he did, and afterwards Joe did it for him.
The rest of the holiday passed happily: he spent plenty of time with Scott and Joe (and if Joe had said anything to Scott about him it didn’t seem to have made the remotest difference to the way Scott treated him), and he saw Brian and Raul a couple more times, and his dad took him on some more trips, including one brilliant afternoon when he got to fly across the lake in a hot air balloon, and – as it did every year – the end of his stay arrived far too quickly. And as he flew back to England he knew that once he was back home he was going to have to get together with Bilal and Tony and try to sort out the way forward. And he was pretty sure that this wasn’t going to be easy…
Well, at least Jeremy seems to have enjoyed his four-week escape - and finally he's managed to get a little action of his own. But now he's going to have to return to the triangular mess he left behind at the end of term. Will Raul's advice help him? Can he bring himself to stop thinking about Bilal? I'm sure we'll find out eventually...
A serious 'thank you' is due to my friends JJ (author of 'Constantin' – go read it if you haven't already!), Pauly (author of 'Geeks', ditto) and Terry (author of 'Brandon and Alex'... and yes, that one is definitely worth reading, too) for casting an eye over my feeble attempts at American speech and gently directing me away from the worst of the incongruities. Please note, all you transatlantic readers, that any remaining improbabilities are entirely my fault and not theirs! If you want to write and complain about any of it you'll need to know where to find me. So I'm not going to tell you.
Oh, okay, then... it's gothmog@nyms.net
Copyright 2008 – all rights reserved. Please do not reprint, repost or otherwise reproduce this or any part thereof anywhere without my written permission.
David Clarke