Disclaimer: This story is a continuation of the story of Kevin Foley, Rick Mashburn, and their "sons," Tim Murphy, Kyle Goodson, Justin Davis, and Brian Mathews that started in "Tim," continued in "Justin" and "Kyle," "Kyle, Part 2," and "Kyle, Part 3." It now continues in "Summer Fun." It is about gay men and gay boys living and loving together as a family, and it contains descriptions of sex. The sex is never intergenerational, though. If you are offended by descriptions of gay sex, or if the law in your area forbids you to read them, please exit the story. Otherwise, I hope you enjoy it. I appreciate feedback, and you can send it to me at brew_drinker23@yahoo.com.
--Brew Maxwell
Summer Fun
Chapter 3
(Kevin's Perspective)
My birthday was great. Having Paul and Jackie Thomas show up out of the blue was the first of a series of things that happened to make the whole thing wonderful. Their two friends were as nice as they were, and I thoroughly enjoyed getting to know them a little. It turned out that the trip to Emerald Beach was more than just a vacation for Paul, though.
"Kevin," Paul said at the party, "I told you yesterday I'm trying to relocate to New Orleans, and I am, but I'm actually here to talk to a company about a job at the Navy Base."
"That would be terrific," I said. "In fact, it's almost too good to believe."
"Could you stand having me around," he asked.
"Are you out of your fucking mind? Stand it? We'd love it, Bubba. You know that, man. You saw how the kids reacted to you and Jackie yesterday. Could you stand being friends with a house full of queers?"
"Are the boys all gay," he asked.
"Every one of them," I said.
"Kevin, I know you didn't mean anything by that question, but had somebody I didn't know and love as well as I know and love you asked me that, I would have been insulted. You know where I have always stood on the subject of homosexuality. In fact, if that Kyle kid was a little older, I might have to go after him myself," Paul said.
"Are you telling me . . ."
He laughed. "I'm not gay, Kev, and I'm not bi, either. I'm straight. But that kid's got a lot of sex appeal, even for me."
"Yeah, he does. I don't want you to misunderstand anything, Paul. Rick and I are scrupulous about making sure there is no adult-kid sexual contact, at least that we are aware of. And I'm 100% sure they haven't had any sexual contact with any adult since they've been here," I said.
"It never crossed my mind that it would be any other way, Kev. You forget how well I know you, man."
We grinned at each other.
"You and Rick look very much like an old married couple to me. Am I right about that?"
"Oh, yeah. It's only him for me and me for him," I said. "Not that your fine black ass doesn't make me wonder if I shouldn't reconsider."
He howled with laughter, and I laughed hard, too.
*****
Another unexpected treat of my birthday weekend was learning that Jeff had started dating. The boy he brought over, Tyler Jones, was handsome, well built in a lean way, and gifted with the kind of sense of humor that would make him fit right in among us, if that's what was in the cards.
"You're the famous Kevin," Tyler had said when Jeff introduced us.
"Famous?"
"Aren't you the guy who hung the moon," he asked facetiously, grinning warmly.
I was both a little embarrassed and greatly flattered that Jeff would have spoken so highly of me.
"He's actually the one who shoots the moon," Jeff said.
We all laughed.
We made small talk, getting to know one another. He asked about my job, and I told him, and I asked about his career field. He was in computer network administration, and he told me his rank, which was, unfortunately, meaningless to me. For some reason, many military people think everyone knows what all those different ranks mean. I had the officer ranks pretty well under control, but that was about it.
Tyler seemed pretty self-confident, and he seemed to like Jeff very much, too. Jeff made it obvious he and Ty were very good friends and on the road to becoming even better friends. Jeff later told me in private that they had logged many hours chatting on the Internet and had actually had a few dates before that night. The dates came as a surprise to me, but I then realized that our evenings were often splintered. He could have been out with him every night some weeks, and I wouldn't have noticed Jeff's absence.
I saw Jeff's tattoo for the first time while I was talking with them. They had been playing basketball, the only sport Jeff had ever really shown any interest in at all, and they had their shirts off. The tattoo was small, tasteful, and meaningful to him and his brothers. I asked about the word written under the heart, and he told me it was French for Clay.
"That's a nice touch, isn't it," Ty said.
"It's a very nice touch," I said. And it's damn nice of you to say that, I thought.
*****
The food was pretty simple, but it was delicious. That was definitely a pool party, and we were back to plastic plates and cups, although Rick did use the new cutlery Kyle had bought us for entertaining purposes. The family member who probably had the most fun at the party was Trixie. Everyone, kids and adults alike, couldn't resist her when she came up for a morsel and cocked her head. Most of them had never met Miss Trix before that night, and they all fell in love with her.
Pretty much everyone had been in swimming before we ate. The adults, including Jeff and Tyler, had bothered to put shorts or a bathing suit on before dinner. Most of the kids, however, led by Kyle and Justin, stayed nude. The year before, both of them had often had partial erections at pool parties, no doubt a function of hormones and a young boy's natural need to flex. I noticed that they were both completely flaccid all the time that night. I knew they were still horny as hell, but they were moving into the age when they got erections because they wanted them, not because there happened to be a breeze. Tim and Brian were still young enough to be worried with spontaneous pop-ups, but, as usual, they handled the situation well.
I opened my presents before dessert, and I got the usual assortment of shirts, ties, books, CD's, and gift certificates. Kyle and Tim gave me a beautiful antique lap desk that I was sure Rita had found for them. Justin and Brian gave me a crystal decanter that I had no doubt Rita had bought as well. George gave me a subscription to National Geographic, and Gene and Rita gave me an embarrassingly large check.
The best gift, though, was the one from Rick. I had started collecting small statues a few years back. I had a particular fondness for horses, but I had one or two other things, as well. For my birthday, Rick gave me a set of twenty antique lead British redcoat soldiers. They came with a beautiful oak display box to hang on the wall. It was gorgeous, and tears came to my eyes when I opened it. There was also a thank-you letter from the United Cerebral Palsy for a donation to them that had been made in my name by a Mr. Richard Mashburn. From that day on, the CP kids of Emerald Beach were going to be our charity, all thanks to a happy little monkey named Chris Uhle.
After dinner there was dancing, pool, ping pong, basketball, cards, and, of course, swimming. Kyle had taken quite a few pictures, and he set those up on the computer for whoever wanted to see them.
"Those ain't the good ones," he told me in hushed tones as I was looking at them. He was inside the clubhouse, still naked.
"Where are the good ones," I asked.
"I have to develop them," he said. "The good ones are the ones I took with my SLR."
"What the hell's your SLR," I asked.
"Single lens reflex camera," he said. "The one that uses film."
"Oh. How do you know those will be better than these?"
"I just know," he said and smiled his irresistible smile.
It was a great party, and everyone had fun. Trixie didn't know what to make of the dancing, and she thought everyone wanted to play with her. Justin picked her up at one point, and the two of them danced together. Kyle went crazy and took a bunch of pictures of that. Justin was still nude, but it hardly mattered. I knew that at least some of those would have to go on the Web site.
Gage had brought over a karaoke machine, and Kyle, who really did have a very good voice, did some singing. Trixie wanted to sing, too, and everybody, including Kyle, doubled over in laughter when she started to howl at his singing. Kyle finally put his Speedo back on to act as MC of the karaoke machine, and several guys, including Jackie Thomas, tried their hand at it. Gage had brought a dirty-lyrics songbook, too, and we had fun with the puns and changes in words of songs we had all heard a hundred times. That was fun, and I knew Kyle's next purchase would be a machine just like that one.
"Jesus Christ! When are they going home," Rick said around 1:30 Sunday morning. "Some of these damn people have been here more than twelve hours."
A good many had left already, but there were still quite a few there.
"Are you tired?"
"No. I just can't wait to get your ass in bed," he said with a leer.
"Let's tell the kids to start cooling it," I said, as eager for my ass to be in bed with him as he was to have it there.
"Okay."
I don't know what Rick told Kyle, but a few minutes later Kyle made the announcement over the karaoke equipment,
"Tim, let's go to bed so these people can go home."
That broke everybody up, but it also gave them the hint they needed. The house was empty except for us by 1:45. Nobody left without saying what a wonderful time they had had.
The kids, including Tyler, insisted on cleaning up the place, and Rick and I went on to our room. It didn't take him long to show me why he wanted me in bed.
(Kyle's Perspective)
The party for Kevin was a big success. Everybody had a great time, and they proved it by staying late. My motto is, If you're not having fun at a party, get the hell out of there. I think most people believe that.
Ty stayed to help us clean up, and I figured he and Jeff were going to slip up to Jeff's room. They didn't, though. Jeff walked him out to his car, and I watched what happened.
They stood real close facing each other. Jeff had his hands on Tyler's hips, and they might have even been touching in front below the waist. I couldn't see that part. Ty had his hands on Jeff's shoulders. They looked at each other for a few minutes, and Jeff kissed him. It wasn't a hot, get-your-dick-hard kiss, but it was a kiss. I prayed to God right then that Tyler and Jeff would become boyfriends. I loved Jeff, and I wanted him to be happy and to have somebody special in his life.
I found the puppy sound asleep behind one of the sofas in the clubhouse. I picked her up to take her to bed, and she only stirred a little bit. She put her head on my shoulder when I carried her inside, and I wished somebody could get a picture of that because I bet she looked cute. I put her in her bed, and she didn't even open her eyes. She had sure been a trooper that day, and she was worn out. I had never had a dog before, had never wanted one, really, but I was so glad we had her. I knew Rick wouldn't be running in the morning, so she could sleep for a long time. I put fresh water in her water bowl, and I filled up her food bowl in case she got hungry during the night. I popped a couple of the kernels of food in my mouth to see what it tasted like. It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't steak, either. I knew she liked steak better, too.
Tim and I got in bed around 2:30. He was so tired he only mumbled "good night" when I kissed him. I snuggled up next to him, like I always did. He smelled really good to me, and ordinarily I would have been hard in five seconds. Not that night, though. In about half a minute, it was lights out for Kyle.
*****
The next morning we both woke up hard. Surprise! Anyway, we peed, and then we made each other feel real, real good.
"Did you like Tyler," I asked, when we were relaxing after making love.
"Yeah, I liked him a lot. Did you like him?"
"Yeah, I did. I hope he and Jeff hit it off," I said.
"You really care a lot about Jeff, don't you," Tim asked.
"Yeah, I do. I think there's like this bond between us, you know? More with me than with anybody else."
"Yeah, I know. But you chose me, didn't you?"
I didn't know what that was supposed to mean, and I didn't much care.
"Yeah, I chose you because I saw the monkey potential in you from the first," I said.
"Kyle, I love you so much," he said.
"I love you more," I said. "Come on. Let's get up."
*****
It was eleven damn o'clock by the time we got downstairs, and Tim and I were the first ones there. I let Trixie out to go pee or shit or whatever she does first thing in the morning. Tim and I were standing at the kitchen window watching her out back. She squatted to pee, and then she started sniffing around the patio.
"She's looking for meat," I said.
"Somebody put food out for her last night. She didn't even touch it," he said.
"Yeah, I did. That food isn't good, Babe. Don't eat it," I said.
He looked at me real strange.
"How do you know it's not good? Did you eat some of it?"
"Just a bite or two last night. I wanted to see what it tastes like. It's not awful, but it's not good, either," I said.
"Kyle Goodson! You kissed me after eating dog food? Did you at least brush your teeth first?"
"No."
"Oh, my God. I'm going to throw up," he said.
He and I were both laughing hard.
"I kiss you all the time right after I've been licking your butt. You don't seem to mind that."
"My butt's clean. Don't ever kiss me after you've been licking your own butt, though. Don't do it, Kyle."
"I'm going to kiss you any time I want to," I said.
"Like right now?"
"Yeah, like right now," I said, and I started in on him. Kissing was one of my favorite things we did, and I could kiss him any time, any place and never get tired of it. We played tongues for a while, and then we heard somebody clearing his throat. It was Rick.
"Isn't this sweet," he said.
"We're sorry, Rick," Tim started.
"No, I meant it, Tim. It is sweet. I know you guys love each other, and I know nobody else was around. But it's still pretty damn sweet. Don't be embarrassed."
I appreciated him saying that, but I wasn't the least bit embarrassed. Our dicks were hard as rocks in our underwear, but so what? He'd seen that before, and he was probably going to see that again.
We all made ourselves cups of coffee and went out into the den.
"What are we going to eat," I asked. "They're not still serving breakfast anywhere that I know of."
"I'm way ahead of you, Kyle," Rick said.
He went into the kitchen and brought out four big boxes of doughnuts, two dozen in each box. I'm sure my eyes lit up when I saw those. I am always so damn hungry the morning after a big meal, and I dove in. I ate about a dozen, which I knew wasn't the polite thing to do, but there were plenty.
Kevin came in next. He had showered up and shaved, even, and I wondered what that was all about. He got some coffee and ate a few doughnuts.
"Are you going somewhere, Kevin," I asked.
"Yeah, I'm going to ride around to the hotels and motels to see how things are going," he said.
"Why," I asked.
"This is Memorial Day Weekend. It's a very big weekend for us. We have 100% occupancy at all of the properties. I just want to show my face."
"Oh, yeah. My dad used to do that on big weekends," I said.
"Now I do it," he said. "Do you want to go with me?"
"Yes, sir, I do, but we're supposed to go camping today, remember?"
"Oh, that's right," he said.
He got a second cup of coffee, had a cigarette, and then got up to get dressed. He came back in nice pants and a Polo shirt.
"If I don't see you before you all leave, have fun camping," he said.
"Do you want me to come get you and Rick for dinner? Say on Tuesday night," I asked. "I'll bring you home, of course."
"Or we could spend the night," Rick said.
"Yeah, let's plan on that, Kyle," Kevin said. "Well, I'll see you all later." He took off.
*****
We farted around in that den for way longer than I wanted to. Justin and Brian came down around 11:30, and I pretty much knew there was no hope of us seeing Jeff that morning. That boy was a sleepy head.
I finally told them I wanted everybody downstairs and ready by 12:30. Justin had to give me a little bit of a hard time about that, just like I knew he would, saying who fucking made me boss, and so on. He knew somebody had to get us going, though, and he was just teasing me about it.
Our first stop was the grocery store. They all wanted to know why we didn't just get on the boat and go.
What the fuck are you going to eat and drink, I thought. You can't just go off camping like that without food and water, at least. Justin probably didn't know any better, but Tim and Brian were fucking Eagle Scouts. They should know that. Sheesh. The only one who didn't complain was Trixie.
We were in Tim's Wrangler, and I was driving. We had the top down and the radio on. One of the old Beach Boys songs came on, and I love those guys better than anything. I started to sing, and Trixie started to howl.
"Why does this dog want to make that noise every time I sing. She did it last night, too," I said.
"She wants to sing with you, Bubba," Jus said. "And truth be told, she's got a better voice than you."
"Very funny," I said, but everybody but me was laughing. Trixie was barking, even. What is this all about, I thought.
Tim and Brian stayed in the car with Trixie, and Jus and I went shopping. There were two pretty good-sized coolers on the boat, so we would have plenty of room for stuff that we needed. We got some good meat and cheese in the deli for sandwiches, and I bought eight nice steaks for Tuesday night when Kevin and Rick would be there. There would only be six of us, probably, but I was holding out hope that I could talk Jeff and Tyler into coming out with Kevin and Rick. We bought lots of chips and some dip, fruit, candy, cookies, a couple of bags of salad greens and two tomatoes. I got two bags of marshmallows and a big box of chocolate-covered graham crackers for So' mores. Justin loved pickled okra better than anything, so he put a couple of jars of those in the buggy.
For drinks, I got twelve-twelve-twelve. Twelve bottles of water, twelve cokes, and twelve beers. I had already packed a quart of Jack Daniels whiskey, in case we wanted it, too. Knowing that crowd, we might bring back all twelve beers and an unopened bottle of Jack, or no beers and an empty bottle of Jack. You just had to be prepared. I bought myself two packs of cigarettes, too. I didn't think I would smoke more than three or four the whole time, if that, but I wanted to be prepared. I got a large bottle of sunscreen, too. I didn't want any burned butts or dicks on that trip.
And we didn't forget the puppy. I got a bag of the stuff she ate at home, and I got a bag of bacon snacks for her, too. I knew we couldn't feed her as much as she would eat, even though we might want to, but this was going to be her only vacation. She deserved to eat good.
"How long are we going to be camping," Justin asked while we were in check-out.
"Me, Tim, and Brian don't have to report for work until Monday week," I said.
"Kyle, you're already brown, man. You're going to be brown as a nut after a week," he said.
"So?"
"So nothing. Have at it," he said.
I knew that wasn't enough food for us for a whole week, but I figured I could re-provision on into the week when I took Jus in to work. We bought eight bags of ice, something we wouldn't have to do before long, once we got our ice machine. I was pumped about buying that ice machine.
There really wasn't that much room in Tim's car for all that stuff we had bought, and we had to put some of it on the floor of the seat Justin and Brian were sitting in. Brian was holding Trixie against his chest, and he made her get under the seatbelt. She kept turning her head around to lick his face. That was really cute.
We got the boat all loaded up. We were probably taking way too much, I knew. We had a soccer ball, a volleyball, a volleyball net, a football to toss around, my cast net, four fishing poles, a couple of Frisbees, and a .22 to shoot sharks, if we had to. We had all our camping gear. We didn't take a tent, but we took sleeping bags as ground cover, some charcoal in case we couldn't find enough wood, my boom box and about a hundred CD's, snorkel masks, and, of course, my cameras. We didn't take many clothes 'cause we didn't really plan on wearing them. We had the bare essentials, of course, but that was all.
It was two o'clock before we took off, and that bothered me a little bit that we were so late. Then I thought, Chill, Kyle. You've been with them having a great time all morning. It's about having fun, dude, whatever the fun is. Just about everything I ever did with them was fun, and shopping in that grocery store with Justin had been fun. It's the people you're with who are fun, I thought, not what you're doing. I pretty much had fun all the time, but I had to remind myself of that sometime.
(Rick's Perspective)
Kevin and I had a great day, just the two of us, on his birthday on Monday. We drove over to Tallahassee and rode around on campus. Summer school had already started, and we saw a few students darting around. It was a holiday, though, and the campus was pretty much deserted. We marveled at how much it had changed in the four years we had been gone. There were three new buildings, and there were two others under construction. My mom had commented that the campus wasn't what she remembered when she had visited there, and more and more Kevin and I were feeling the same way.
Kevin and I knew a lot of the same people, and we hooked up with a few of them. We went to the place where he had worked, and three people, two guys and a girl, were still there from his time. One guy had dropped out of college altogether, and the other two were still going at it sporadically. He and I both knew all three of them, but from different connections. They were hanging out, drinking beer, not working that day.
Driving home that night, Kevin said,
"Did you get the feeling that we were grown-ups and they were still kids?"
"Yeah, I did. I wanted to grab all three of them and say, 'Get a fucking life!'"
"We got a life, didn't we?"
"Yeah, we did. And it's a damn good one," I said.
"What would you change about our life," he asked.
I thought for a minute, but I didn't need time to think. I knew what the answer to that question was.
"We'd adopt them," I said.
He smiled.
"We couldn't adopt Tim and Kyle," he said, "or Jeff."
"I'm not so sure about that, Babe. A teacher at my mother's school was adopted by his aunt, and he was thirty-two. His parents were both alive, too."
"The aunt was straight, though, wasn't she?"
"Maybe, maybe not. Who knows?"
"Florida is a great state, and I love living here, but this adoption thing is all wrong," Kevin said.
"Thank you, Rosie O'Donnell," I said.
"Well, our guys have adopted us, even if we can't adopt them," he said.
"Do you think it's ironic that the only family member we totally control is a female dog?"
"You've really taken to Trixie, haven't you," he said.
"Well, yeah, you know."
"Rick, I knew you would, man," he said.
"I guess I'm a sucker for a cute face," I said.
"How about a cute dick," he asked.
I laughed. "Ohhh, that was low, Kevin."
He laughed, too, and we drove home.
(Justin's Perspective)
The very first thing Kyle did after we got the boat unloaded was strip. Kyle looked good naked. I don't mean just his dick, although that was really nice. His whole body looked good, and he was so totally natural about it. A lot of guys are a little self-conscious at first, but not him. One thing I noticed that he always did when he got naked was kind of fluff out his pubic hair. Brian and I trim ours and shave the tops of our dicks because we use condoms. If you've ever gotten your pubic hair caught in a condom when you were rolling it down to take it off, you know that's not any fun. A little trim and a little shave takes the pain away.
Trixie was real cute when we first got there. Tim was running around playing with her, and she was barking and playing with him like she was a kid. Tim stopped and took off his clothes, and then he and Kyle were sort of playing chase with Trix. They would run after her, and she would run away. Then she'd turn and chase them. Tim and Kyle ran into the water, and she was right on their tails. Kevin had told me that Labs were hunting dogs and wouldn't think twice about going in the water after a duck or a bird or something. She proved it that day, for sure.
"Do you want to go in the water with them," Brian asked me.
I was pretty comfortable on the two sleeping bags Brian and I would be using, but I was getting hot.
"Do you," I asked.
"Don't you think it's hot," he asked.
"Yeah. I'm going to take my clothes off," I said.
I stripped just like Kyle and Tim had done, and Brian did the same thing. We teased Kyle sometimes about being a nudist, but what was wrong with that? I pretty much wanted clothes on, at least underwear, if I was inside lounging around, but outside in our yard or on the beach, it felt good to be nude.
After Brian and I had taken our clothes off, but before we had gotten up to go in the water, Kyle, Tim, and Trixie came back to where we were. The boys were dripping, of course, and Trixie was wet as hell, too. She had shaken off when she had gotten out of the Gulf, but that didn't mean she was dry. She came up to me and Brian, just a-wagging that tail. We were laying down, and she wanted to kiss us and love on us. I had never had a big wet dog get on me like that before, but it wasn't too nice.
There was a frisbee within arm's reach, so I threw it. She took off. At first she didn't know what it was, so she pawed at it a little bit where it landed. When she saw it wasn't going to bite her, she picked it up in her mouth and trotted over to us with it.
"Throw it again," Kyle said.
I hummed it.
She took off after it and brought it back.
I hummed it again, and she got it again.
"We need to teach her how to catch it in the air," Kyle said.
"So how you gonna do that," I asked.
"Let's show her how to catch it," he said.
If there was some new way to play and have fun, Kyle was all over it. I got up slow and gave Brian my hand to hoist him up. The four guys got in a kind of circle or something, and we started throwing the frisbee back and forth. The more we threw it, the bolder we got, catching it between our legs and behind our backs and such.
"Let's see if she'll catch it," Kyle said, and he threw it to Trixie pretty easy.
Well, she jumped up just like we had been doing and got that sucker in her mouth. She brought it to Kyle, probably because he had thrown it, tail a-wagging. When she turned it loose, he petted her real good, and it looked like she had a smile on her face. I know dogs can't smile, but I swear to God it looked like a smile. A grin, even.
We played a good bit more with her and the frisbee. She didn't always catch it in the air, but she always picked it up in her mouth and brought it back to us. One time when Brian had thrown it, she started to take it to Tim. When she saw it was the wrong one, she bounded back when Tim tried to take it from her. Then she took it to Brian. Now, I thought, that was damn smart.
We played that game for a long time, and everybody, especially Trixie, had fun. When we finally crashed on the sleeping bags, Trix was panting.
"Babe, I think she's thirsty," Tim said.
"Okay," Kyle said.
He got up and got a bottle of water out of one of the coolers. He looked through the grocery stuff for something to put the water in, and he came up empty.
"Damn. We didn't bring any bowls to give her water in," he said.
"Well, we can't not give her water," Tim said. "Go get her a bowl."
"Let's see if she can drink from the bottle," Kyle said.
He opened the bottle of water and drank from it. She was watching him hard, tongue about to her chest, she was so hot. Then he put the bottle to her mouth, and damn if she didn't drink from it. He was careful not to go too fast for her, and she lapped that water up right from the bottle.
"That's good to know," he said. "I'll get her a bowl tomorrow morning when I take Jus in, but there are going to be plenty of times when she's going to need to drink out of the bottle. I'm glad she knows how to do it."
"I know," Brian said.
*****
We didn't do anything, but we did everything the rest of that afternoon. Tim and Brian wanted to relax and read on the beach. Kyle wanted to go see if he could catch anything with his cast net, and I wanted him to teach me how to throw it.
"We need some sun screen," Kyle said. "We don't want no burned dicks or asses, do we?"
We all laughed.
He had the kind of skin that only tanned, never burned. The rest of us were much fairer than he was. He put a little bit on his face and ears and shoulders, but he left the rest of himself alone. He made the rest of us lube up good, though. I figured Kyle knew what the hell he was doing, so I didn't say anything to him about not lubing himself up.
"I wish I had one of those sun patches," Brian said.
"What are you talking about," Kyle asked.
"You know. A heart or something that people put on to cover a part of them so it doesn't get tanned under it."
"Oh, yeah. Those are cool," Kyle said.
"I don't know what y'all are talking about," I said.
"Jus, it's something that sun won't go through. You put it on before you start to tan, and it's like a non-tanned part of you after you're tanned. Almost like a tattoo," Kyle said.
"Oh, okay. I see what you mean," I said.
"A bunch of guys at school got 'em during Spring Break," Tim said.
"Do we have anything here to do that with," I asked.
"No. They're like little stickers," Kyle said. "We sell 'em at the shops. I'll get some tomorrow when I take you in, Jus. I want two little hearts on my dick."
"Ain't that sweet," I said.
"Yeah? You're gonna want 'em, too, dude," he said, "when you see what it looks like.
"Probably so," I said. "Kyle, you and Tim need to do something about all that hair y'all have down there. Trim it, or something, man."
"You and Brian trim, don't you?"
"Yeah, we do. Ain't no shame in that, man."
"I'd do it right now, except I don't have anything to do it with," he said.
"Tomorrow when you go in, get a scissors, a razor, and some shave cream. We'll neaten you boys up," I said.
"I'll get it, but I ain't shaving my face for however long we're out here. I think this might be our only vacation, and I ain't shaving on my vacation."
Only vacation, I thought. Yeah, Kyle. Since late October we had only been to North Carolina twice, New Orleans twice, Sarasota once, and New York City once. Here it was, late May, and the only vacation you could catch was a week or so on the most beautiful fucking beach I had ever seen in my life. I knew he didn't think about stuff like that. He was all about having fun doing whatever we were doing, but he just didn't realize how good we had it. Even Tim knew the truth about how lucky we were, and he came from a family with money, too.
"What are you thinking about, Monkey," Kyle said to Tim.
"I'm thinking about Chris and about how much fun he would have had here," Tim said.
"Did you see Kevin break down and cry when he opened his birthday card from Chris," Kyle asked.
We all said, Yeah, we had.
"He wants us to come see him," Kyle said.
"I know," Brian said.
"How do y'all know that," I asked.
"Hasn't he been sending you email," Kyle asked.
"I don't really check it," I said. "I don't really know anybody besides y'all."
"Check it every day, Jus. Man, he's sent us some funny ones. And he definitely wants us to come see him," Kyle said.
"He couldn't even wipe his ass. How can he type," I asked.
"He uses voice recognition software," Brian said. "His dad is a computer scientist at the University of Montana, and he's hooked Chris up. A lot of times it's hard to read because his speech is so bad, but you know what he wants to say."
"Now he was a little monkey, for sure," I said. "And I loved that guy."
"Yeah, he was like a little monkey, wasn't he," Kyle said. "I think we all loved him, Jus. I know I did."
Brian and Tim said they loved him, too.
"Kyle, you need to organize a trip to see him, dude," I said.
I knew that was all it was going to take. We'd all be in Montana, including Trixie, before the summer was over. Kyle was quiet just then, and I knew those wheels were turning. That boy was an organizer, if ever I saw one.
"Let's eat," Kyle said. "Only sandwiches tonight."
He pulled out some roll-up sandwiches on pita bread, and they were delicious. He had a bunch of all different kinds that he had bought at that grocery store. I saw him picking stuff out of that case while I was busy eating all the free chicken fingers I could get my hands on from the lady displaying them, and that must have been what he was going after. I felt like Kyle was always going to be the responsible one. I knew I needed to do some of that myself, but I was willing to lay back and let him do it, as long as he would.
I felt like you only had a few perfect days coming to you in life, and I had already had me two or three with those guys. That day wasn't totally perfect because I had to get up for work the next morning, but it was damn near. The four of us were about as close as any four guys could be, and Brian and I loved them. We loved each other different, but we loved them a lot.
Kyle made a little fire for us to roast marshmallows to make So' mores that night, and Trixie got her share of those, too. Tim tossed her a hot one one time, and she caught it. She let it out of her mouth onto our sleeping bag, though, and then she scooped it up when it was cool enough to eat.
"I wish she didn't chew and swallow so damn fast," Kyle said. "How can she taste it?"
"She likes them, though," Tim said.
"I think she might like anything we give her," Brian said.
"I think you might be right, Little Buddy," I said. "I think she just likes us."