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http://donate.nifty.org/donate.html **Additional Note:** There will be sexual scenes throughout this story, but it won't be predominately sex. If that's the type of story you are looking for then make another selection.
When Noah and I woke up Monday morning, we got dressed, and then I fixed something for breakfast and made our lunch, which I took in the small cooler. After we ate, I drove Noah back to the trailer and dropped him off. I waited until I was sure he was safely inside before I pulled away, and both Noah and his mother waved at me as I drove off.
I spent the first hour at work thinking about my weekend with Noah, as well as thinking ahead to the following weekend, and then I got down to business. I spent the rest of the morning working on the things I needed to get done, but when it was finally lunchtime, I walked to the park to meet up with my boy.
"My mom was really excited when I told her I was able to swim a little now, cuz she can't do that."
"I wish everyone could swim, because you never know when it will come in handy."
"Yeah, my mom kinda said that too, but she never got the chance to learn."
"That's too bad."
"Oh, and I saw Sam earlier, and he wanted to know what I did when I was with you. I just told him you were teachin' me to swim."
"Did you tell him you spent the entire weekend with me?"
"Nah, I just said you took me to the state park and was showing me how to swim. He said he wished you could teach him too."
"I'm not sure his mother would go for that."
"I'm glad my mom lets me do this stuff with you."
"Me too."
We talked about a few other things as we ate our sandwiches and drank our water, but all too soon it was time for me to return to work. The rest of the week went about the same, and then on Friday Noah began bugging me about what we were going to do the following day.
"Why do you keep asking when you already know what my answer is going to be?"
"Cuz I hope you'll forget and just tell me."
"No way! You'll just have to wait and see."
He playfully punched me in the arm to let me know he wasn't happy about this, and of course I made a big deal out of it and acted liked he'd really hurt me.
"Stop doin' that. I didn't hit you that hard."
"You just don't know your own strength. It felt like I'd just been punched by Superman."
He giggled. "I wish I could hit that hard, but I know you're just fakin'."
"Maybe a little, but you pack quite a wallop."
"I didn't even hit you as hard as I could."
"If you did, you'd probably have knocked me right off the bench."
He giggled again. "You're silly sometimes."
"Maybe, but I'm ugly all of the time."
"No you're not..." he began, but then he realized I was just teasing him. That's when he punched my arm again, but this time he hit it a little harder, so I intentionally fell off the bench.
"See, I told you that would happen."
"You shouldn't have done that, cuz now your clothes are all dirty."
"Oh, I can brush off what little dirt got on them." He smiled and then helped me clean off.
When our time was up, I said goodbye and told him I'd see him the following day, and then I walked back to work. I focused on my job for the rest of the day, but starting with the drive home I spent all of my time concentrating on what I was going to do with the boys the next day. I only had a rough idea, so I tried to work out the details during the drive, and I continued doing that while I was jogging, fixing dinner, and eating. I spent the rest of the night trying to make sure I wouldn't forget anything, because I wanted it to be perfect.
I slept fairly well and then hurried through my morning routine when I awoke, seeing I wanted to get to the park and get started with the boys. When I arrived, I was met with another surprise -- Gus was there too.
"Can't I start doing this with you again?" he begged as I walked toward them.
"Not unless you get your mom to say it's ok."
"She won't know that I'm doin' it, cuz I won't tell her."
"But she could find out, and that would be bad for me."
"Nah, she only found out the other time because she saw the candy."
"But she warned me to stay away from you, so that's what I have to do."
"No, you don't, cuz I won't tell her. I promise."
"You may not tell her intentionally, but you may slip and accidentally say something that lets her know what you've been up to. Either that or someone else might say something so she'd figure it out, and I can't take that chance. If that happened, she would probably call the police and have them give me a warning too, and I don't need that kind of hassle."
"Even if she did, they wouldn't do nothin', cuz you aren't doin' nothin' wrong."
"She would tell them that she told me to stay away from you, so they'd give me a more severe warning, possibly even lock me up for a night to make a point. They could also arrange for an Order of Protection, which is a legal document that would order me to stay away from you."
"This isn't fair! Sam's told me what you've been doin' with them, and I want to do those things too."
"I know, but you'll need your mother's permission first, and I'd need to hear her tell me it's ok. Otherwise, if you're here when I show up then I'll have to leave, because I don't want any problems."
"My mom's a bitch and I hate her!" Gus screamed.
"Don't say things like that. She's only trying to protect you and keep you safe."
"That's not what she's doin'. She's just keepin' me from havin' fun, like Noah and Sam are."
"But if you say stuff like that to her, or about her, you'll only make the situation worse."
"It can't get any worse."
"I'm sorry, Gus, but I have to honor your mother's wishes and do what she told me."
He spun around and took off, and I had a feeling he was going home to confront his mom again. That wouldn't improve the situation for either of us, but at least she'd know that I was keeping my word and not hanging around her son. I felt really bad about Gus, but I didn't need the hassle, especially if she were to call the police about it.
Noah and Sam wanted to talk about what happened first, because they were hoping to convince me to let Gus join us again, even if it went against his mother's wishes. By the time I convinced them it wasn't a good idea, Sam had another question.
"Can I ask my mom if I can go with you and Noah so you can teach me how to swim too? I don't know how to do that, and she might let me go with you so I can learn."
"I guess it wouldn't hurt to ask her, but don't argue if she says no. If she has any questions about it, she can always come here tomorrow and ask me in person."
"Yeah, I'll do that then," he agreed. I just prayed this wouldn't cause any more problems.
Since we'd used up quite a bit of the time already, today would be a short quest. "Ok, guys, this time we're going to be knights looking for the dragon's lair, the same dragon we wounded in one of our earlier adventures. It stole everyone's valuables when it attacked the other times, and we want to get those things back. I'm pretty sure the dragon probably hoarded everything in its lair, but since we don't have any idea where that is, we'll have to search for it."
During our adventure, we had to fight off some mountain giants, and
we only beat them when we caused a mud dam to collapse. The raging water swept the giants away, and because they didn't know how to swim and were too heavy to stay afloat, they all drowned. After that, we were challenged by a troll when we tried to cross the bridge it was living under. This happened at night, and at first we merely tried to reason with it, but then it attacked and we had to fight it off. We did that for hours and the battle kept it distracted so it didn't notice when it was nearly time for the sun to start rising. At the last minute it realized what was about to happen, but we were able to prevent it from getting under the bridge in time and the sunlight turned it to stone. The boys thought that was even better than defeating the mountain giants, and we eagerly set off again.
When we finally found the dragon's lair, we weren't sure if it was sleeping or if it had died from the wounds we gave it when we fought it before, so we were very quiet. We loaded up several bags we'd brought with us with as many valuables as we could carry and then we took off. We made it out of there ok and never saw the dragon, and now we had enough treasure to allow us to live comfortably for the rest of our lives.
When our adventure ended, we promised to meet Sam again the following day, although I warned him I wasn't sure if I'd have another adventure to go on. If not, I promised to push them on the swings and do other things with them instead, so they'd still have a good time.
"Do you think Gus will be there tomorrow?" Noah asked as we were heading to the car.
"I hope not, unless he gets his mother to change her mind. If that's the case, then I'd still need to hear it from her."
"Do you think Sam's mother will let him go swimmin' with us?"
"There's a better chance of that happening than Gus joining us, but I have no way of knowing if she'll allow him to do it. If not, he'll have to be happy that she's letting him participate in our little adventures at the park."
"Yeah, I know, but will you be able to teach both of us at the same time if she lets him come?"
"Yes, that won't be a problem. I'd just take turns working with both of you, if he's permitted to come with us. I'd work with one of you while the other one watches from the beach, and then we'd switch."
"Would we change at your house?"
"That's a good question, and I'm not sure how we'd work that out. I guess we'll just have to wait and see if he can go with us first, and then we'll worry about changing."
"Oh, ok."
I was having trouble thinking of what we were going to have for lunch as I drove to the house, but then I thought of something. "Noah, you like salad, right?"
"Yeah, if it's got Ranch dressin' on it."
"Then what if we stop at Zaxbys for one of their salads. We can get salads with strips of chicken in it too, and you can smoother it with Ranch dressing if you want."
"It'll be cheaper to make the salad at your house."
"It would, but I don't have what I need, and stopping to buy it and then cooking the chicken first will take too long, especially if you want to have time to do something else."
"Ok, let's do what you said then."
After we went inside, I ordered Noah a House salad and chocolate milk, while I had a Caesar salad and water. I ordered them to go, in case we couldn't finish, but we sat down at a table and ate there.
"Hey, this is really good," Noah said with his lips covered in Ranch dressing.
"I'm glad you like it, but do me a favor. Wipe your mouth off and try some of my salad too. I want to see if you like the Caesar dressing."
"K, I'll try it," he agreed, and I gave him a forkful. "Yeah, that's good too."
"Good, so now you'll have a choice and won't need to order the same thing every time."
I finished my salad, but Noah only ate a little more than half of his, so we took the rest home. I put it in the fridge for later, and then he looked at me. "Are we goin' swimmin' now?"
"I thought we'd do that tomorrow, in case Sam can go with us."
"Then what are we gonna do today?"
"Do you have anything in mind?"
"Ummm, we can find a movie to watch..."
"Sure."
As I was looking at the cable guide, I saw 'Ender's Game' was going to be on soon, so I turned to that. I had a feeling Noah would get a kick out of it, but he wanted me to tell him what it was about.
"Just watch it, because I'm pretty sure you'll find it interesting."
He started to pout because I wouldn't do what he wanted, but he quickly got interested in it once it started. When Ender and the other cadets were floating in preparation for their challenge, Noah got all excited.
"Wow! I wish I could do that. I bet it's really fun."
"I'm sure it is," I agreed, and then we watched the rest of the movie.
"Man, that was really awesome, but how did a bunch of kids beat all those other things?"
"It's because kids your age, or even slightly older, are a lot better at video games than those of us who are much older, and Bean used his skills to be victorious. He was also very smart and thought of things to do that no one else did."
"Yeah, he was really good."
I noticed it was time for dinner, so I had a little surprise for him. "I know you like cheeseburgers, so I bought the best ground beef and some hamburger buns, along with a container of potato salad for dinner. You can eat more of your salad too, if you want, cuz I'm also going to make a salad for myself."
"Did you buy cheese too?"
"No, I already had that in the fridge."
"K, sounds good then."
I fixed him one cheeseburger, and two for myself, along with a green salad, and we also took a little potato salad as well. He drowned his cheeseburger in ketchup, while I was a little more modest with how much I put on mine, and then we stuffed ourselves. Noah still had some of his salad left over when we finished.
"I can't eat no more."
"Ok, you did pretty good, so we'll put it in the fridge again. Maybe one of us can eat the rest of it tomorrow."
"K. What are we gonna do now?"
"Unfortunately, I forgot to go out for a walk before we ate, and now we're too full to do it, so we'll have to think of something else."
"Let's watch TV for a while, and then we'll go for a walk."
"It might be too late by then."
"Don't worry, I'll protect ya if you're scared of the dark," Noah teased, and then he broke into a fit of laughter.
"Very funny, young man, but I guess we can try doing that, if you want."
"Yeah, I do."
To my surprise, I found the movie 'The Sandlot' was coming on soon, so we settled down on the sofa to watch it. Noah got a kick out of that movie as well, especially the part about the big dog, because he had never seen this before. The movie lasted two and a half hours, so it was after 9:00 when it ended.
"Are we goin' for our walk now?"
"It's getting late, so do you still want to do that?"
"Yeah, I liked doin' it with you before."
Since that was what he wanted to do, I agreed. We were already dressed appropriately and still had our athletic shoes on from being at the park earlier, so we merely headed out the door and got started. Actually, it worked out better this way, because it was cooler than it would have been if we'd done this earlier, and we set out on the same route as before. I was surprised that Noah was able to keep up with me, since he'd eaten so much, but I guess his metabolism had already taken care of that problem.
When we got back to the house, we took off our dirty clothes and tossed them into the laundry room, and then we went to take our shower. As had become our custom, we washed each other, rinsed off, and dried. After that, we brushed our teeth, used the toilet, put on clean underwear, and crawled into bed. This time, Noah rolled over and cuddled with me, instead of the other way around, so I bid him sweet dreams, kissed him on top of the head, and we drifted off to sleep.
When we got up the next morning, we had breakfast first and then got dressed to go to the park. I'd forgotten all about Sam asking his mother about going swimming with us, but I quickly realized what was up when I saw her with him at the park.
"Hi, I'm Monica Emerson, Sam's mother."
"Nice to meet you, Monica, and I'm Brian Thorne."
"I guess I should have come over to meet you before this, but I heard that Noah's mom trusted you, and Sam seems to enjoy spending time with you, so I felt you must be alright."
"Sam's a good kid and we've enjoyed including him on our little adventures here at the park."
"Sam said you told him to ask if he could go swimming with you too?"
"Noah told Sam that I was teaching him how to swim, and Sam asked if I could teach him as well. I said I would be willing to do that, but he had to get your permission first."
"I'd like him to know how to swim, but there's nowhere around here for him to do that. The city pool is on the other side of town, and that's too far for him to go alone, because they only have classes early in the day."
"I know, and it's usually too crowded to really do any swimming later. I've been taking Noah to the state park, because there usually aren't too many in the kiddie area, so there's room for me to work with him."
"So you'd don't mind taking Sam with you too?"
"Not as long as you and your husband don't mind."
"It's only me. My husband and I divorced a couple of years ago and Sam and I haven't seen him since. I get a check from him now and then, but it's never enough."
"I'm sorry to hear that."
"Sam doesn't have a bathing suit, so you'll have to wait until I can get him one, and then you can take him, if you don't mind."
"I don't, and he'd probably be alright just wearing a pair of shorts, as long as they're clean."
"Then I'll have him bring another pair with him next time."
"Are you guys goin' swimmin' today?" Sam asked, slightly panicked.
"Yes, that's the plan," I confirmed.
"Then can he bring me home after we're done here, so I can go with them today?" Sam asked his mom.
"I suppose that would be ok, as long as Mr. Thorne doesn't mind."
"I don't, and it's just Brian. That's what I've told the boys to call me too."
"Ok, as long as you told him that. Thanks, Brian."
"We shouldn't be here too long today, so I'll bring him home before we leave to go swimming."
"What about lunch?"
"Don't worry about that. We'll stop to eat first, my treat. I always take Noah to my place or we go out to eat both Saturday and Sunday."
"That's really nice of you," she stated, while looking at me slightly differently.
"Are you rich?" Sam asked, and I knew that's what his mother was thinking too.
"Sam, it's not polite to ask questions like that."
"It's alright, and no, I'm not rich, but I have a good job. I work in the office at Atlas Manufacturing, and since I live alone, I can afford to do this once in a while. It doesn't really amount to very much, so it's not a big deal."
"No wonder the kids like you."
"Hey, I just like to help out. I don't want them growing up without some really good memories of their childhood."
"You're certainly making a difference when it comes to that. It's hard to do the extra things for Sam on what I make, and it's not easy being a single parent."
"I'm sure, and that's why I told Cheryl, Noah's mother, that I was happy to help out."
"Thanks for doing this, because I know the boys really enjoy it. I think Sam misses not having his dad around to do things with him, so this takes care of that problem, and it helps me out as well. I'm sure Noah's mom feels the same way."
"Well, thanks for trusting me with your son. I'll bring him over to get his things when we're done here, and then I'll bring him back when we finish swimming. Is there any time in particular you want him home?"
"No, whenever you're done is fine."
"If he's got flip-flops or sandals, have him bring those with the shorts. Noah and I both wear sandals when we go there to swim."
"Ok, I'll have them ready for when he gets back."
The boys and I headed toward our bench, while Monica returned home. "I'm so glad she's gonna let me do this," Sam announced with a huge grin.
"Yeah, but how come she said something about a bathing suit? We ain't gonna take a bath."
"It's just an old fashion name for a swimsuit. Before there was indoor plumbing, like I have at the house and you boys have in your apartments, people used to bathe outdoors. For modesty sake they would wear their bathing suit to the creek, river, pond, or lake when they were going to take a bath, because there were usually other people there doing the same thing. They would also use their bathing suits when they went swimming too, although some preferred to go skinnydipping instead."
"What's that?" Noah wanted to know.
"It's another way to say they went swimming naked," I explained.
"They went swimmin' with nothing on?" Sam gasped, totally shocked.
"Yes, it was a fairly common thing for boys and men to do back then. Since most people grew up in small homes with lots of children, it was fairly common that they would see each other naked anyway, especially when they were younger. Usually, the parents did it less and less in front of the children, but swimming naked with others of the same sex was acceptable."
"Can we try doin' that sometime?" Sam asked, surprising me. I thought Noah would have been the one to ask that question.
"I don't think you'd want to skinnydip at the state park, because there will be a lot of other people there. You can only do it if you have your own pool or a private swimming hole."
"Oh, ok," Sam stated, realizing his error. "So what are we gonna do today?"
"Can we do like in 'Ender's Game' and fight those other guys?"
"Sam might not know what we're talking about. Have you seen that movie, Sam?"
"Nah, we don't got a TV."
"In that case, we'll do something else."
It's a good thing I had another adventure planned, or this would have turned out to be a total disaster. "Today we're going to be spies for the American government," I began, "and our mission is to sneak into a really secure building in Russia. We're looking for proof that they've been hacking different governmental offices and private businesses, and we'll copy all of the computer files that we find onto a flash drive so we can bring it all back with us."
"But how are we gonna know what we need, cuz they don't write in American," Sam pointed out.
"Yes, they wouldn't keep that information in English, but I forgot to tell you that we can all read and write Russian," I explained.
"Ok, I get it now."
Over the next couple of hours, we snuck around the park as we pretended to make our way through the countryside to get to the remote, secret location. When we got there, we had to sneak around the building as we looked for their servers, which happened to be located on the upper floors of the building, which in our case was the tower that we'd used so many times before.
"Ok, guys, I'll stand guard down here while you sneak up to the offices and copy the files we need. Be careful that you don't trip any alarms, because we don't want to have to fight our way out of here, and we don't want anyone to know we've stolen the information, at least not yet."
"K, we'll be really careful," Noah agreed.
The boys then climbed into the tower and pretended to copy the necessary files, and then they brought the flash drive back to me. "Everything is on this," Sam said as he handed me a stone that was suppose to be the flash drive.
"Thanks. You'll probably get a Presidential Medal of Honor for this," I stated, causing both boys to smile.
"Neat," they whispered.
We now had to get out of Russia and back to the US without being caught. As we were going through security on the flight home, the authorities nearly discovered the flash drive. Earlier, I'd bought some souvenirs, a ceramic model of St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow, and pewter models of both the Winter Palace and Hermitage Museum, and I hid the flash drive in the final item. I was able to find a hollow space large enough to tape the flash drive inside, because I didn't think the security agent would be overly curious about my carry on bag with the souvenirs in it.
However, as we were being checked in, the agent looked inside my bag and made a face. "Souvenirs," I explained in Russian. He made me set my bag on the conveyer belt so it would go through the x-ray machine, and I prayed the x-rays wouldn't damage the files. Luckily, the examiner didn't spot anything, so I was able to pick the bag up again on the other side and we flew back to the States. Shortly after we landed, I turned the flash drive over to the N.S.A. (National Security Agency), and a few days later the three of us had to go to the White House for the medal presentations. Both boys were beaming and extremely proud of receiving this honor.
As soon as we were done, I led them to my car and drove over to the old factory building where Sam lived. I told him I'd wait until he got what he needed.
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E-mail responses to the stories, story suggestions, or other 'constructive' comments or advice may be sent to: ErastesTouch@aol.com - but please put the story title in the subject line, so it doesn't get deleted as junk mail.
My other stories:
http://www.nifty.org/nifty/gay/adult-youth/different-points-of-view/
http://www.nifty.org/nifty/gay/adult-youth/a-throw-away-kid/
http://www.nifty.org/nifty/gay/adult-youth/the-guardian/
http://www.nifty.org/nifty/gay/adult-youth/chance-of-a-lifetime/
http://www.nifty.org/nifty/gay/adult-youth/all-the-worlds-a-stage/
* * * * * * * *
Although the boys in these stories sometimes have unprotected sex, I strongly urge all of you out there to be smart and protect yourselves from various sexually transmitted diseases by using taking appropriate precautions before engaging in sex.