Hey ya, boys and girls! Here's the new chapter! Thank you for all the wonderful, inspiring, and sometimes heartbreaking letters!

I urge all of you to go see "Farenheit 911". If you still have any doubts about how insidious and dangerous the Bush administraton is for our country, this movie will finish them off. Take your friends and family to it!

A huge thank you to Bill and Jonathan for their editing prowess! Butch editors, don't ya just love it?

Would you all just please stop hammering for a few minutes?

My eyes slitted open when I realized nobody was building or tearing anything down. The steady hammering was going on inside my head. My eyes hurt too, and my stomach, and everything else. Ahhhh, my first hangover. I'd worked hard for it-- well, danced hard for it. I'd had a great time, but I seriously doubted it was worth this.

What woke me was the jostling of Jerry crawling out of bed, morning wood swinging-- or two of them it looked like, as I tried to focus my throbbing eyes. He just looked too damn `ok'. It wasn't fair! He'd drunk more than I had! But then, he was used to drinking and I wasn't, not to mention he was so much bigger than me. I remembered him cautioning me to slow down at one point though, which I had conveniently forgotten by the time I ordered my next drink, and the next one.

I lay there in terminal misery, trying to not move a single muscle as Jerry did his morning stuff, shaved and showered. I had to pee very badly, but couldn't raise my head, let alone my whole body, to pull off something like that. He disappeared to the kitchen for a while, and the aroma of brewing coffee gradually wafted into the room. For something I was just beginning to tolerate the taste of, coffee sure smelled wonderful when it was brewing.

After a bit, he came in and sat on the bed looking down at my eye slits with sympathy and a bit of humor, "Hey, John Travolta, you wild and crazy dancin' machine, you alive in there?"

I raised and pointed my index finger a couple of times in the air like Travolta did in "Saturday Night Fever" and grunted.

He laughed and leaned in, "Here, baby, drink this. Just down it, don't think about it and don't taste it, just down it as fast as ya can. It's my mom's sure-fire hangover remedy. It never fails."

I took the glass from him and groaned as I raised up, setting off a percussion storm in my head. I struggled to keep my head up and aim the glass at my lips. I finally got it aligned and tried to gulp it down. "OH SHIT!" I made that `bitter face' and it hurt my head to talk, "Oh man, that's nasty!"

He laughed again, "I told you not to taste it! Ya just gotta chug it down as fast as ya can. Every drop. I guarantee you'll be ok within the hour."

I was willing to try anything to stop the pounding in my head. I sat fully up, pinched my nose and slopped it down in four gulps, a little of it dripping down my chin. Jerry chuckled, reached over and wiped off my chin as I held the glass out for him to take and fell back down, making my head explode with more spinning drums. I muttered, "Thank you. Oh God, I hope it works."

"It will. You just stay there in bed while I go to the store. Mom `n Dad were down here not long ago, so it's stocked with most things, but no fresh food. I'll get us some breakfast from somewhere, too. It's 10:30 now. By the time I get back, you should be up and around. I made some of this for Dave too. I think he's in about the same shape you are, so I'll go take him some now."

"Did he barf all over your beach house like I did?"

He laughed, "Well, he did heave a few chunks, but he made it to the bathroom in time. Ya couple a lightweights," he teased.

"No doubt about that," I agreed.

He leaned down and kissed my forehead, "Poor baby. But hey, you were soooo cute last night. I had to hold myself back from jumpin' yer bones right there on the dance floor."

I smiled at him and groaned.

"Heh heh. I'll be back in a little while."

I mumbled another thanks as he left the room. I fell back to sleep within minutes and didn't wake up till I heard Jerry bang the front door open, carrying sacks into the kitchen somewhere in the `beach house' that was as big as my house, but up on pylons. I sat up slowly, expecting my head to swim, but was amazed that it was almost completely clear.

I hobbled to the bathroom and unloaded at least ten gallons. I rummaged around in my overnight bag and found my toothpaste and brush, made quick work of that and showered quickly as well. Still didn't need a shave. After that, I felt almost human. I put on some shorts and a tee and wandered into the kitchen where Jerry was setting out to-go orders of breakfast from Denny's. I was almost hungry even.

"How ya feelin'?" he asked with a smile.

"Better than I thought possible, thank you. You were right, that stuff really works, as gross as it is," I said as I sat down at the table. I was still a little unsure on my feet.

"By the time you finish breakfast you'll be good as new," he said, still just a bit too cheery for me.

Dave came stumbling into the kitchen in his underwear, hand down inside the front, scratching his nuts. "Man, Jerry, that shit really works! I can't believe it! I just wish I'd known about that gross shit a long time ago. Ohhh, coffee! Gimme coffee!" He moaned with anticipation as he inhaled the steam while he poured himself a cup, looking around for cream and sugar.

We ate the lukewarm breakfast and sat back, full and content. I looked out the window and it was a beautiful sunny day. I looked over at the kitchen counter and saw a bottle of Bloody Mary mix and a half gallon of vodka. Oh shit. I didn't think I was ready for any more booze.

Jerry saw me eyeing the fixings and said, "Why don't we have a little hair o' the dog and sit out on the deck for a while? Days like this at the beach, on the deck, well, it just wouldn't be right without Bloody Marys!"

"Oh, man, I don't know about that," I grumbled.

"Tell ya what, I'll make you one-- a weak one-- and you see if you like it. If you don't, I'll get ya somethin' else."

So Jerry made us all a spicy Bloody Mary and we adjourned to the deck after Dave changed into his swim trunks. Jerry had hosed off my contribution to the décor of the deck last night, and the planks of the decking had almost dried to their driftwood grey. I'd never had a Bloody Mary and it tasted good, since I couldn't even taste the vodka, so I kept it and sipped slowly.

Jerry and I applied suntan lotion all over each other and Jerry applied some to Dave's back, since he had it in his hand already and was closest to him.

After a few minutes in the sunshine, with a gentle breeze tickling my shoulders, I began to really feel good. I relaxed into the very comfortable deck chair and enjoyed the brilliant warmth, and being with my honey. Dave sat a few feet beyond Jerry, facing out with his feet up on the wood rail, quiet.

Jerry angled his chair so we were facing each other and put the heels of his feet up on the outer edges of my seat with his knees spread wide, unaware he was displaying a very tantalizing view of his equipment where the leg of his shorts gaped wide open. The net liner inside had given up and stretched out long ago from the weight and bulk of his endowment, so it gaped just as wide as the shorts.

I don't know why, but seeing it like this, like a stolen glance at an unintentional flashing, was somehow even more exciting and erotic to me. Knowing I could see it anytime I wanted to didn't matter; I was almost glad I hadn't gotten a peek up close like this of him a long time ago; I would have turned into a complete blubbering idiot whenever he was around... not that I didn't anyway when I actually met him...

He lay his head back to sun his neck, and I looked him over wistfully for a while, lightly massaging both of his feet, coaxing contented sighs from him. It almost hurt how much I loved doing things like that for him and causing those little happy sounds. I wanted so much to do this and other things like it for him for all of our future.

What would it be like, the future? Would we be able to handle all the things that would come our way? We hadn't yet discussed college, where we would go--separate schools or together-- what we'd do afterwards, things like that. And before that even, things like his parents, the last of school... the future was so uncertain. I knew I would love him for a very long time, no matter what, but I couldn't figure the rest.

I tried to soak him up with my eyes. I just found it hard believe someone as gorgeous and as nice as him could be in love with me. I mean, I believed it, but it was hard to accept, or figure out why. All my insecurities began popping up in my mind-- and I was even aware that it was happening-- but I couldn't prevent them from taking hold again.

Dave's words from yesterday played in my head, `How'd you get two of the hottest fucking dudes in this school to fall in love with you, man?' Talk about a fluke! Jerry's falling in love with me was an anomaly, a freak occurrence in the order of things, something no theorem or analysis could ever explain, a confluence of disparate matter and energy colliding into orbit with each other.

All of this had simply shattered all my assumptions about myself... and everything in life, really. And maybe that was a big part of the problem I was having: I had assumed I would never really be accepted, never be able to `be myself', be openly gay anywhere in life. It was just something I had assumed you had to hide. The `out' people I saw on the news were a sometimes freakish abstract that I didn't see in my reality, maybe because all of them I'd seen were much older than I and lived in exotic, otherworldly places like San Francisco and New York City. Even what Rachel had told just recently me about the gay scene in Houston was still just a concept, since I'd never seen it with my own eyes.

So I had assumed I would never find love. I had assumed I had nothing to offer anyone to draw him to me. And I guess all those assumptions were made from being ashamed of myself and hiding myself from everyone. I was certain that I could never find love if I wasn't even honest with myself and, of course, the rest of the world.

I couldn't seem to pinpoint exactly when I had resigned myself to living a lonely existence, when I had come to expect that I would never find love. And the thing is, before I met Jerry, I had accepted that, completely, and tried to prepare myself mentally for it. Between my debilitating shyness and my `shameful' secret desire for male love, I had truly accepted that I would most likely end up alone. And worst of all--on those occasions in the past when I did allow myself to imagine `finding' someone, it was usually a GIRL!

When I pictured the beaming smiles on my parent's faces when I brought the grandkids over to see them and stuff like that, I would realize even then that those images were all about conditioning and wanting my parents to be happy and proud of me, their `normal' son, and I would end up rejecting those scenarios when I thought about them. Even in that state of mind, I knew that anything like that would be a sham, and would be a cruel and selfish thing to do to another person when you knew beforehand that you couldn't love them, that you really wanted a man.

I knew even back then that I couldn't live up to the ideal of the picket fence, little woman and 2.5 kids or whatever. Now, this nagging worry was building in me that I couldn't live up to anything, to the expectations, that after a little while, Jerry would realize that I was a boring nerd, pathetic, too clingy, needy, that I just couldn't keep him satisfied, and he would drift away. I panicked as I pictured his eyes slowly, subtly, wandering. I pictured him coming home late or staying gone, feeling guilty that he'd promised to never hurt me again, so he'd hide his feelings, and we'd argue and fight and...

I've said it before: I needed to give myself one of those metaphorical `General Patton' slaps sometimes, and sometimes it helped me get those kinds of thoughts in check, temporarily. But it never made the insecurities go away altogether. I did have him, and he did love me, by whatever twist of fate that brought him into my life. And I wondered how exactly I'd wind up screwing it up.

Here this god was, sprawled in a breathtaking pose before me, elbows dangling over the arms of the deck chair, head lolling back... like a cheetah, lazing his long limbs on the savanna under blazing African sun, sublime grace and power in repose.

I studied his neck, his sexy Adam's apple and collarbone, and thought about how much I yearned to lick all around those wonderfully dramatic contours, recalling how doing that ratcheted up his heat every time as I tuned into his every reaction. My gaze swept down to his spectacular bare chest and abs, where little beads of sweat were starting to form in the valleys of the sun, a few sparkling droplets hugging some of the curly hairs at their roots.

How in the hell could a person so awesome, so perfect, so desirable, want me? And like I said, those doubts wouldn't go away: I agonized that there will always be any number of guys and girls wanting him, trying to steal him away from me. What could I offer that would keep his eyes `for me only'? `When the new wears off, what will be left to hold him? I'm just not of his caliber! I don't add up to enough to keep his attention in the long run...'

He raised his head to take a drink, squinted in the sun, saw me staring at him and winked, "Hey, baby." He stared at me for a couple of seconds, but before I could respond, he added, "Whatcha thinkin' `bout?" in a slightly odd tone and look.

I smiled at him and brushed my forearm across my erection, making it bob as I moved one hand to join the other on his right foot. I looked at the big angular foot in my hands and glanced back at him while I massaged his toes. I took my time replying, "You."

He looked hungrily at my one man tent, wagged his eyebrows and grinned, "Yeah?" He looked seductively down at his own shorts, dragging my eyes to them in time to see the fat tube lurch and start inching its way down his left thigh. "Wanna go inside?"

Oh my God, those golden brown eyes made me shiver! I didn't have to see his cock. Just him giving me that sexy, devilish look was enough to make me nearly climax.

My mouth was dry. "Oh yeahhhh." I stood up and he quickly locked his ankles behind my knees, trapping me between his powerful legs.

"OR..." He drawled like a redneck, with an evil grin, "We could stay `rightchere' an' you can get down on your knees an' suck my big ol' sweaty dick, boy." He adjusted his butt more to the edge of the seat, letting his rapidly growing meat hang even more temptingly. My knees almost buckled and I expelled a big helping of precum into my shorts. Without hesitation, I put my hands on his knees and started to sink to mine, but stopped myself halfway down.

Ummm, anybody home?

I stood up and looked around. Besides Dave, the only signs of life were an old couple cleaning their deck about twelve houses away on the other side, another couple just past them and one sailboat working its way down the channel behind the houses across from us. I was surprised it was so deserted on such a beautiful Saturday afternoon, even though it was early in the year. But the raised beach houses beside us and across the way, which were built on coastal marshland on the mainland side of the island, before they started protecting this kind of land, all were just a few feet apart with no trees, even palms, to block the view along the man-made channel.

"Well," I mumbled as I stood back up, "I will, Stud, but, it is kinda public."

He leered lasciviously, "Yeah, but that makes it that much more exciting, don't it?" He wagged his eyebrows again.

I grinned and blushed at the thought-- because I knew I would actually do it if he really wanted me to, even though I'd never been so daring in my life. "Yeah, but... we do have company," I said, quietly exaggerating looking over him at Dave.

Dave, who'd been trying to act like he wasn't hearing all this, just five feet or so behind Jerry, looked up and over at me anyway; he blushed and grinned apologetically for being right there. He had on his gold and black `Friendswood Swim Team' Speedo, which I could see was expanding muy rapido.

Jerry's eyes went wide with an `oops' expression. He'd obviously momentarily forgotten Dave was with us. He jerked his head around at Dave and back, blushed, rolled his eyes and laughed, "Yeah, well, uh, I guess we should take it inside, huh." He grinned some more and added, "Sorry, Dave," over his shoulder, to which Dave grunted good-naturedly. Jerry said to me, "I wasn't gonna actually let you do it out here anyway. I was, uh, just teasin' ya, to get ya all worked up."

I looked in his eyes and squeezed my erection through my shorts, not caring if I could be seen, "It worked."

He stood abruptly, sucked in a lungful of air and told Dave we'd be back out in a little while to toss the frisbee around on the beach or take the boat out for some skiing. I had looked at the big beautiful motorboat, moored right below the deck on the channel and stupidly not realized it was the Loring's.

Dave nodded, squeezed his thighs together in frustration and said-- while stealing glances at Jerry's cock hanging heavily down below the hem of his shorts, "Uh, but I uh, need another drink. I'll get a refill and come, uh, back out here."

Jerry said, "Oh, let me get ya one," and reached for Dave's glass.

Now I knew Jerry had to be aware that his heavy, turgid cock right in front of his face was causing poor Dave all kinds of... problems. I mean, it would make anybody get hot or very nervous! So what was he doing? But then, he knew Dave had seen it all the way hard in the shower at his house, so I guess he thought it was no big thing, pardon the pun.

"No, that's ok," he held his glass away from Jerry. "I'll finish this last bit and get my own. You two go ahead `n do your thing," he gave a sheepish, wistful smile.

As we got in the master bedroom, immediately off the hallway by the living room, I heard Dave come through the sliding glass doors into the kitchenette. Jerry yanked my shorts down from behind and we both giggled naughtily. He went down on his knees and turned me around to face him. Our giggles faded away as he looked my body over.

I automatically shied away from his eyes, wanting him to concentrate on something besides my pale body in the daylight of the bright room. My thoughts from out on the deck still weighed on me. Let me kiss him and lick him-- anything but focus on my scrawny body. But he grabbed my hands at my sides and made me stand in front of him on his knees. I heard the sliding glass door open and shut again as Dave exited.

He looked up into my eyes with a semi-scowl, "What? Why you tryin' t' hide your body from me? You ain't shy now, are you?"

I looked away as I tried to deflect the question, flustered that he'd read me, "No, I, umm-- let me, suck on you or something?"

He scowled more, but spoke tenderly, "No, not yet. I wanna look at your body. It belongs to me, after all, just like mine belongs to you, so I can look whenever I want, right?" He smiled up at me and ran his hands up my stomach and chest, making me shiver at his touch. When he saw how I was still mildly resisting, he stopped and drilled my eyes, forcing me to look at him. He stood up and spoke with authority, "Danny... do not, do not be ashamed of your body. You have the most beautiful body in the whole fucking world. It turns ME on, and that's what really matters, ain't it? Look..." He looked down at his cock, pushing up and out from the left leg hole. "See what lookin' at your body does to me? Baby, you turn me on so fuckin' bad I can't hardly control myself in public! I know you know that, don't you?"

I timidly nodded yes.

"Then why all of a sudden... you're thinkin' like this again?"

I looked around the room to avoid his piercing stare. "Umm... I dunno," I mumbled, staring off at the window. "I just... sometimes, I don't see how you can, you know... find me, attractive or anything."

He smiled at me, "That's crazy talk, Danny, fuckin' loco shit `n you need t' get over it. Know what? I'm gonna take your dick where it belongs, in my mouth, and you're gonna drive me crazy with my dick in yours, then I'm gonna put my dick deep up inside you and move it in `n out a whole buncha times till it spits up cuz you turn me on so fuckin' much. Sound good?-- Oh, and by the way..." He pulled me into him by my wrists and spoke softly with that deeply resonant voice in my ear, "I'm gonna love you like nobody's ever loved anyone while we're doin' all that."

I may have wondered how he could love me, but I never had to wonder why I loved him. My cock, which had drooped, was fully hard before he was halfway through that little spiel and it bounced up and down excitedly as I grinned sheepishly into his deep brown eyes and nodded yes again. "Anything and everything you wanna do to me, Stud."

"That's more like it," he smiled. "Now, be a good boy and feed me that hot dog," he snickered as he went back down on his knees, while reaching around and fondling my ass.

I giggled, aimed my hot dog at his mouth, put my hand on the back of his head and pulled his lips slowly onto me, sinking into that warm wet suction, causing waves of pleasure to roll over me as I sighed on his tongue. He hummed around it, sucking greedily while I worked his mouth on and off my hardness. He had gotten quite good at this and had me too close within a couple of minutes.

I pulled away, paused to kiss him on the way down and laid out on the floor on my stomach. I worked my face up into his sweaty nuts through the leg gap, while his cock draped across my cheek, ear and neck. I took my time teasing his low hanging lemons with my tongue until he spread his knees wider, grabbed the back of my head and ground my face up into them.

"Oh yeah, that's it baby, that's it, pull... on `em with your... mouth. Suck on `em, yeah, like... that, yeahhhhhh..." I know it sounds like porn, but it was really very sensual and loving.

After a couple of minutes of me loving his bull nuts, he held my head still, aimed his cock at my mouth and fed it to me slowly and deeply, causing me to have to raise up onto my elbows and knees to eliminate the friction on my own cock. I definitely didn't want to cum yet, but anytime he fed it to me like this, it was like I was `in my element', loving how his manhood tasted and felt going down my throat, loving him pushing it down, instead of me sinking onto it, and I ran the risk of exploding all over the place way too soon.

When he got too close himself, he pulled out of my mouth and stripped off his shorts while I watched from on my hands and knees hungrily. He looked down at me with the same hunger in his eyes that I know he saw in mine and made his cock leap around several times in front of my face while I panted and drooled.

He squatted and rubbed his shaft in my face and asked, "You ready for it, baby? Want it up inside you?"

I moaned and mouthed up and down the underside of his thick column, "Yes, I need it soooo bad, Stud, soooo bad. It's what I need, pleeease."

He stepped around, straddled me and lifted me up by my hips, depositing me on the edge of the bed on my knees. I buried my face in the mattress and held my butt in the air, anticipating. Sweet, sweet anticipation.

He went down on his knees on the floor and kissed and nibbled around my cheeks then jammed his face in my ass, slicking and probing with his tongue, moaning into my hole, driving me crazy, making me beg him to come back there when he'd dip down to suck and nibble at my perineum and tease the back of my balls with his tongue and hot breath.

He held my cheeks spread with his hands, thumbs spreading my ring, and backed his face off for a moment, blowing softly on my hole, "Man... I never woulda thought in a million years I'd get so fuckin' turned on by eatin' ass, but baby, I need yours." He darted his tongue in and out and blew on it again, "So sweet. So, so sweet."

He tongue-fucked me for a while, telling me several times how much he loved doing it. He had me so ready, I mumbled over and over again into the mattress, "Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me, please, please give it to me."

Finally he stood back up and leaned over me, growling in my ear as he ground his cock against my slickened crack. "This is the most beautiful ass in the whole fuckin' world. I leak all over myself every time I think about it, baby. If you only knew what your tight little hole does to me..."

Then he chuckled, momentarily distracting me. He asked, "Ever heard of `pussywhipped'? Well, I guess I'm `asswhipped'. I mean, seriously Danny, I'm so fuckin' glad you love me fucking you so much, cuz if you didn't want it so bad all the time, I'd be on my knees beggin' you for it." He kissed and licked around my neck and shoulders between words, hunching his cock up and down my crevice while I moaned and writhed up into it, getting so worked up from what he was saying and the way he was saying it I was about to orgasm.

"I know I'm not s'posed to tell you all this-- it's against all the rules, an' most girls would try `n play head games with it-- but, I'd fuckin' go insane if I couldn't have it, baby. If you ever pushed me away, I swear, I'd be like a mongrel dog, followin' you all around on my hands and knees, whining an' beggin' you for it, humpin' your leg," he chuckled again and I did too, while goose bumps broke out all over me. Then he growled and bit my neck, "I'd hafta just mount you and take it, maybe... No, no, I couldn't do that. No, I'd just beg `n whine and beg and beg you till you gave in an' let me have some, and let me lick your sweet hole and..." He grunted loudly and rolled his hips around on my ass, "God, just rubbing my dick against it could make me cum." He hunched forcefully and I moaned and hunched back.

He got his mouth right to my ear and said, "And when you beg me for it?" He licked my ear and I shuddered all the way to my toes. "When you beg me to fuck you, I just lose it, I swear, I lose my head and I'm so fuckin' delirious you're mine an' so fucking lucky you love me." I could swear he had tears in his eyes...

He buried his face in my neck, then, his voice became laden with emotion, almost like confessing, or a testimonial, and he said, "And you make me feel... like I'm Superman, Danny, like I'm the strongest man in the world, like I can do anything. You loving me makes me feel like I'm somebody."

"OH-OH-OH-OHHHH!" I cried out as I climaxed without even touching myself, the stimulation of his cock running up and down my crevice, him draped over me, holding and rubbing my body and his deep voice saying all those incredible things bringing it on.

He clutched at my stomach and humped me while I came, growling in my ear, "Oh yeah, Danny, cum for me, cum for me baby, oooh yeah. I'm gonna push inside you now, while you're still cumming."

He let his cock catch at my hole and started in fast, between spasms, only his spit and copious precum for lubricant. He quickly pulled me upright on my knees as he plunged in, gripping my chest and my throat from behind. I dropped my head back on his shoulder and cried out to the ceiling in ecstatic pain and pleasure as I felt him sluicing into me while I was still spraying my load all over the sheets in front of me.

After getting just past my ring, he went the rest of the way in steadily, reveling in my muscle spasms clinching and massaging his cock, talking to me, "Oh God, Danny, Oh God oh man oh man, I can't belieeeeve..." he ran out of breath and just held still when he reached bottom, trembling, mouthing and biting my neck, inhaling and exhaling fiercely through his nose, gripping me with his hands and his emotions. My body was in exquisite shock from him entering me while I was climaxing, all but shorting out on the sensations. I cried out long and loud in what sounded like agony, but was really heaven.

He clutched desperately at me, releasing and gripping as he held the side of his head rigidly against mine and made little whimpering sounds into my neck like a puppy. I whimpered back and tried to angle my head to kiss him, but could only reach his cheekbone beside his eye.

He let me know with little sounds and body twitches that he couldn't turn his head to kiss back right then cuz it was just way too intense and give him a moment...

So I milked him, working my ass on his cock and crying with the intensity of sensations and emotions and feeling his body against mine, holding me so tightly from behind like he was afraid to ever let go. My arms just floated somewhere around us till I brought one back to his hip and the other to his head and clutched at his sweat drenched hair while I kissed and licked his cheekbone and gave my love to him in the afternoon light.

He slowly regained his coordination and began pumping in and out of me. I worked his shaft with all my muscles and jammed myself back against him in slow, determined thrusts. I think he was crying too. He was whimpering and grunting and moaning and humping and squeezing me into his heaving chest, letting me work my ass in rhythm with his gradually building thrusts. He kissed all around my neck and whispered his love to me and I told him yes.

After a while, I reached down between my legs, groped under and back, trying to feel his balls and the base of his cock but I couldn't quite reach. He released his hold on me and pushed my face back down into the bed, holding me down with one hand on my neck and the other on my hip, while he increased the power of his thrusts, jarring me with each impact. I had just gotten ahold of his balls but had to let go as he pulled slowly almost all the way out and held a second, then slammed all the way back in again, and again. Each impact deep up inside me sent a sharp jolt through my body and forced a loud `OH!' from me. I felt possessed, truly possessed, and loved, and I only wanted to give myself even more to him.

I held my hand up against my hole from between my legs, my forearm stimulating my own dripping cock, and felt his thick shaft ram through my fingers till his pelvis smashed into them and his heavy balls slapped my knuckles and the back of my hand. Then I would feel it retreat slowly, seemingly going on forever and ever through my fingers until I could feel the flared head, then that hold, suspended animation for a timeless moment, then plunging back in with an impact that would lift my knees off the bed.

I was reduced to babbling incoherently, something like words of pleading and begging and demanding trying to form around my guttural animal moans of total surrender to him and the overwhelming pleasure he was giving.

He hissed, "God, Danny, oh god, Danny..."

Jerry was upright, knees against the edge of the bed, spread legged, muscles all tensed and straining, as he gradually sped up, clamping my hips in his grip and pounding my ass while I begged him to keep on loving me. As I got to the point of no return, I raised my face from the bed to demand he fuck me even harder, clutching fistfuls of sheet while my toes hooked over the edge of the bed to keep leverage to maximize impact, grunting, "Ugh! Ugh! Ugh! Ugh! Oh God plee-ee-eease, Jer-ry!" then grabbing my cock and squeezing as it pulsed wildly in my hand.

My eyes randomly rolled in and out of focus as I writhed and bucked. My face happened to roll sideways and I saw... Dave, standing in the hallway about four feet back from the half closed bedroom door, swimsuit stretched down under his nuts, pounding furiously on his cock with a side-but-slightly-back view of us that gave him the perfect angle to see Jerry's cock slamming in and out of my hole. In that instant, I watched his eyes roll back with the power of his orgasm.

It was just timing that made it all happen the way it did. I'm sure that one of us would most likely have frozen up in embarrassment or whatever, if it weren't for the fact that we were all climaxing at that very same moment. Jerry heard me wail and felt my muscle spasms, which sent him over the edge as well.

Like a slow motion dream sequence, I watched the cum shoot out of Dave's cock at least to the threshold of the door while I felt mine fire out of my own and felt Jerry's cock expand rigidly and pulse deeply inside me. It seemed like all of our shots were firing in synch with each other. I would feel Jerry pulse inside me, matching my own and see Dave pulse another shot at the same time. Lit from one side by the living room wall of glass, Dave's cockhead was burning an angry dark purple as it jettisoned its load while every muscle in his body bulged and strained and flexed, every surface vein taut and highlighted through his skin, while I shot myself in the chest, throat and chin repeatedly. Jerry was grunting, shouting and cussing loudly while Dave was silent and I was freaking.

It was wildly erotic, intensely embarrassing, very confusing and breathlessly exciting.

Jerry was still jerking around in the throes of orgasm inside me as my last shots were dribbling out, and I did freeze in place, with my head lying sideways on the sheet, eyes darting between Dave's cock and his tightly shut green eyes as his hand slowed down, wringing the last spurts from his visibly throbbing shaft. The cream dribbled down his fingers and stretched down in long dangling strings toward the floor, slinging themselves away with his hand movements as they were followed by more.

As his last shots shook his body and made it twitch around in place in a silent epileptic fit, his eyes slowly opened and came back into focus, locked on mine, and he blushed deeper red than I think I've ever seen anyone do.

The cold shock of reality came over his horror stricken face. He brought his other hand up and covered his eyes in profound embarrassment as he jerked his body backwards, still holding his hard dripping cock, and tried to soundlessly disappear without getting Jerry's attention too.

Jerry finished depositing his seed deep inside me and slumped over my back, supporting his weight on one fist while reaching under and rubbing sensuously all over my chest and stomach with the other.

He gasped out between heaving breaths, "Goddamn, Danny, you just, fucking, huh, blowmymind. I, love you, so much." He kissed all around my neck and pumped his cock just slightly back and forth in my ass as he spoke, which I so loved him doing.

I was still frozen in place, still kind of in shock, still tingling from... the whole thing; from Jerry being just so fucking incredible, taking me to a whole new level, to the vision of Dave... doing what he did.

"Mmmmmm," was the only response I was capable of. I squeezed his cock with my ass muscles and worked it a little, milking it. My mind wasn't really registering what had happened, wasn't yet even weighing what the implications of this might be, or giving me a clear sense of what my reaction was.

Jerry eased his shaft out of me and rolled me onto my back more fully onto the bed. He climbed on top and started kissing me while grinding his still hard cock into mine as I wrapped my legs around his waist and kissed him passionately back. He licked down under my chin, scooping up a splatter or two of my cum, then brought his mouth to mine and shared it with me, staring into my eyes. I forgot all about Dave for the moment and purred at him, arching my body up into his while pulling down on his back and ass with my hands and heels. I wanted his full weight on me. I loved that feeling. I whispered breathlessly over and over again how much I loved him and needed him and how I would never let him go.

After several minutes of catching our breath and letting our heart rates settle, he raised his head and looked down at me. He was solemn, and just bored into me for a while with those deep brown eyes of his. My look of rapture gradually gave way to uncertainty under his stare.

Finally, I asked, "What?"

He didn't smile. "You gotta love yourself, Danny. You gotta love your own body too... if only cuz I do so much."

I wanted to say how those thoughts were gone, for now, how he'd made them go away so there was no need to get back into that right now, after what we had just shared, but he continued, "I don't love losers, so you're not a loser. Understand what I'm sayin'?" He slid off beside me, running his hand up and down my stomach and chest. "You're so fuckin' amazing, so beautiful inside an' out... You just gotta see it too, Danny."

I tried to think clearly, but couldn't. Thoughts and images raced in a tangle all through my mind. Jerry waited patiently for me to respond, so I just started talking.

"I just... no one's ever loved me before, or even liked me. No one ever even noticed me, so I didn't... What's there to love? I mean, in all this time, if no one ever found anything worth..." I rolled my head away from him. My thoughts were disjointed and all over the place, and I knew I wasn't making any sense, "I feel like I've tricked you or something, or misled you into loving me somehow..." He started to speak, but I kept going, "I know what I look like. I know I'm not one of the `beautiful people'. And I know I don't have the personality to overcome that like some people do. There's not enough good about me to keep you..." I raised my voice a little, "You don't know what it's like for someone like me. I've been hiding, and lying for so long, to everyone. I don't... deserve..."

He put his finger on my lips to silence me, then pulled my head back to face him. His eyes were watery as he brought his lips to mine and kissed me.

"Baby, you're wrong. All of that is wrong. You're so beautiful and wonderful. Everyone who knows anything about you knows..." He backed his head away to look at me, "There was no trick, Danny. You couldn't have tricked me into changing everything I knew about love and sex and..." he trailed off.

He pulled me onto my side and into his body as he kept kissing me. I wrapped my arm around his back and clung to him, now sobbing and kissing and blubbering, "But I know you love me. I know that, and it makes me so happy... but I just can't see why you love me."

He pulled my head down into the niche of his neck and shoulder, kissed my ear and whispered, "Who knows why, Danny? Who knows why anyone falls in love with anyone else? I've told you how much you turn me on, how beautiful you are as a person. All I know is, I love you more than I ever thought I could love anyone. Loving you has made me a whole new person, and it's made you the most important person in the world... the most loved."

I cried louder into him and he let me. After a couple of minutes of it, I tried to get control of myself and started apologizing, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry." He shushed me but I kept on, "I'm sorry I'm so pathetic, and keep whining. I get so fuckin' emotional these days. My moods are just all over the place, up and down. I know that, like, saying all this sounds like I'm playing for sympathy or whatever. I'm ashamed of myself for-- `cause it looks like I'm trying to get you to feel sorry for me. But I'm not! I'm just trying to, to put into words what I feel. It's like a big, constant pressure on me. I don't know how to get away from these feelings. I have them all the time." I buried my head back into his neck.

He just stroked my back for a moment and kissed my shoulder, then he said, "I think, part of the problem is... maybe, you see my life `n think it's so good, `n think, like, I don't get those same kinda thoughts sometimes. Well, I do. I get `em a lot. Things like not thinkin' I'm good enough, not able to make the cut, that no one really likes me. I mean, every day, all of that's in the back of my mind, or up front when somethin' happens. And like, I don't have any real friends either. All those dudes you see me hangin' with... they're not really friends, y'know? I guess cuz I don't think about or want the same things they're all focused on, or something, I dunno. I don't feel a part of them. I'm around people all the time, but I'm mostly always alone. Brenda was pretty good about makin' me feel, like..." He searched for the right word, "Present."

This was a revelation to me. I could hardly believe that he had any insecurities-- before, of course, me and the whole gay thing turned his life upside down. He continued, "Danny, my biggest worry is that I'm not good enough for you. Especially after what I did to you... I keep thinkin' I don't deserve you, don't even deserve all the love you give. And, I worry that you'll wake up one day and realize that I'm this big asshole an' tell me to get lost. And that would kill me--" He stopped himself, thinking he shouldn't use that kind of analogy.

He quickly jumped to another thought, "I have a fucked up personality or somethin'. I have a problem with lettin' anyone get really close, like, lettin' anyone inside." He kissed me on the ear again and whispered, "Until you. You're all the way in. And the thing is... that doesn't scare me. I thought it would, but it doesn't. It makes me... feel better about... everything. And I guess that's what makes me so sure it's for real, makes me know how much I love you."

He pulled my head back and kissed me deeply. I melted into him and clung even tighter. When he slipped off my mouth and kissed my cheek and jaw, he said, "But I am scared, Danny. I'm scared as hell of all this... what'll happen when everyone finds out, especially mom and dad." He drew back and looked in my eyes, stroking my jaw with his thumb. "And the only thing that makes me think I might be strong enough to face it all, is knowin' how much you love me `n I love you. You're the only thing in the world I feel totally sure about now."

He smiled at me. "But that's all I need," he nodded. "I mean, that's totally enough."

I took the hand he was stroking my face with and kissed the back of it while staring into his eyes. I kept my lips pressed to it and we just held our eyelock for a long time, absorbing each other.

Smiles began to form on our faces as we kept the eyelock, unblinking, and the smiles built into chuckles and the chuckles built into laughter, laughing at the rest of the world, cuz they didn't have what we had. I climbed up on his naked, sweaty body, rolling him onto his back and pinning his arms beside his head.

I laughed at that, at my cheetah letting me pin him down. I looked down into his eyes and grinned my own evil little grin, "Ahhh, I got ya where I want ya now. I can force my will upon you and do anything I wanna do." I dipped my face down into his chest hair and nuzzled, moved over and nipped his right nipple, eliciting a yelp, then raised back up with a grin.

He rolled his head to the side dramatically and used a high, breathless voice, "Oh no! Please don't hurt me! Please be gentle! I'll do whatever you want."

"Hmmmm, I think I'm gonna make you my personal sex slave."

"Oh no! Anything but that!"

"Oh yes. I'll lock you in my basement and make you service me whenever I want."

"That would be such sweet torture..." He went back to his own deep voice, "...if you had a basement."

"Let's not get sidetracked with details, slave. We'll have to fit you for manacles, then we'll have to..."

I heard a noise, that reminded me Dave was around somewhere, and of course, that instantly brought back the scene of him at the door. I blushed and Jerry looked curiously at me. I fumbled, "Uhhh... we, uh, told Dave we'd take the boat out, right? We should, uh, probly do that before it gets too late."

Jerry eyed me almost suspiciously, wondering what caused this reaction, but didn't say anything when I climbed off of him and went to take a quick shower. He joined me after a couple of minutes and I was able to act normal. I dried off as fast as I could while he finished his shower, because I wanted to get out there and make sure Dave's cum got wiped up, if he hadn't already done it.

I went to the door and saw that he hadn't wiped it up. I wondered what he was thinking, and why the hell he didn't think to come clean up his mess while we were in the shower, if he didn't want Jerry to know about this. As I quickly wiped up the very large load with Kleenexes, I looked at the drops and thought about sperm in and of itself, what a miracle it was, how teeming with life each splatter was, how it wasn't something that tasted particularly good-- like when I had tasted my own before Jerry-- yet now I loooved tasting it, drinking it, preferably straight from Jerry's cock. And I loved it when he'd shoot some of it on my face and lick it off.

It was a gift from him, and like, tangible proof that I was giving him much pleasure. And it seemed even better when it came shooting into my mouth with force, like that somehow emphasized the life force it contained, and of course, the physical urgency of his climax. I would anticipate it with so much hunger.

I considered tasting Dave's cum-- yes, I actually considered it-- but I thought, `Wouldn't that be like cheating on Jerry, in some technical way? In an ethical sense? Would tasting another man's cum be considered a sexual act? Besides, it's on the hallway hardwood floor and totally cold now. Nahhh, no way. I don't know if Jerry would consider it cheating, but I guess I do.'

I deposited the cum-drenched wad in the guest bathroom toilet and flushed, then looked around for Dave. He was in his room-- which I assumed was normally Jerry's room-- sitting on the edge of the bed, elbows on his knees, his face in his hands. I stood in the doorway, apprehensive, trying to decide what to say, or how to approach him. He looked up at me with worried questions in his eyes. I could see how extremely embarrassed and ashamed he was, afraid I was going to go off on him.

I still hadn't really decided just how I felt about what happened yet. I was very confused. I did know that I didn't want this to mess things up, to affect our friendship-- but I wondered if it might do that anyway, on his end. He seemed so ashamed of himself I worried he might back away from our newfound friendship out of just being unable to face me. I'm sure he assumed I would tell Jerry about it too, and he probably worried Jerry would get pissed off. Hell, I didn't know how Jerry would react either. I decided not to tell him yet.

I sat on the bed next to him and tried to think of what to say. I heard Jerry step out of the master bedroom and stood back up. I put my hand on Dave's shoulder and said, "Be right back." I gave him a little smile to let him know I wasn't pissed off.

Jerry tossed the cum drenched bed sheet in the laundry nook at the back of the kitchenette and said he was going downstairs to get the boat ready and load the skis in. That was perfect. I went back in and sat again with Dave. We both tried to think of what to say. The air conditioner kicked in and muffled the silence.

Dave spoke first, "Man... I'm... I can't even believe I did that." He shook his head in disgust at himself as he spoke, "That's so perverted. I'm so ashamed of myself. I'm so sorry, Danny."

I thought for a moment, not sure of how to respond. "Umm, it wasn't that big a deal, Dave. It's not like we... had sex or anything. I mean, you just kinda got a..." I grinned crookedly at him, "free show-- and gave one too, so, it kinda evened out, I guess." I winced and thought, `God, what a stupid context to put it in!'

He looked at me in disbelief, "What, you're not pissed? I mean, I invaded your privacy, like, in a real personal way, in a very personal moment." He shook his head again, "I can't believe I did that. I'm so sorry." He looked down at the floor and asked with dread in his voice, "You gonna tell Jerry?"

I shook my head, "Not... not yet. I mean, I know I will talk to him about it, or, I think I should, `cause like, we-- I don't wanna keep anything from him, y'know?"

He buried his face in his hands again and rubbed it around, "Oh man, he's gonna hate me. He'll be so disgusted. He's probly gonna kick my ass all over the place." He looked back up. "An' I deserve it, too."

"No, Dave. I won't say anything till I can think of how to say it without it sounding... I dunno, dirty or whatever. But really, it's not such a terrible thing, y'know? You just..." I gestured and shrugged, "did your thing an' watched us. That's not so bad. I mean, there's nothing really bad about that, is there? It's not like ya came in an' joined us or somethin'."

"It's totally pathetic is what it is." He straightened his back and looked at me, "Fuckin' pathetic. I'm such a fuckin' loser. Man, I can't think straight..." We both smiled limply at that phrase, but didn't comment on it and he continued, "My dick just takes over an' I don't think clearly. I ain't had sex since I moved here-- not with anyone but my hand. And I'm just not capable of getting with girls, to like, relieve the tension, y'know? I mean, there's just no fuckin' interest there, nada, zip. I had a girlfriend for a while, cuz she kinda pursued me, but luckily, she didn't wanna have sex. I wasn't even very good at pretending to want it," he smirked.

He gestured helplessly, "But I don't got the balls to go after guys I think are hot either, to see if they're interested. I mean, that's scary shit! I did once, with Jerry, and that hurt, cuz it was way more than just... you know, lust. I don't know how to play that whole game though, to see if they're interested in, like, me. I couldn't even get Tyson to look at me, shit. I'm so fuckin' pathetic."

I consciously didn't say anything until he had gotten all that out. When he didn't say anymore, I said, "You're not as pathetic as me-- or as I was. I mean, I'm still pretty pathetic in so many ways..." I was going to say how pathetic I was but look at how I had Jerry, so he should have hope, since he was so much less pathetic than me, or something to that effect, but he cut me off.

"Bullshit. There's nothin' pathetic about you."

I looked at him wide eyed, "Do what?! Gimme a break, Dave! I'm the most pathetic person I know! I cry like a fuckin' baby at every little thing and..."

He cut me off again, looking at me with something almost approaching anger in his emerald eyes, "What the fuck you talkin' about? You're good lookin', you're a really nice guy, and ya got the hottest dudes fallin' all over ya. You fuckin' had to turn one down! Danny, you got the hottest fuckin' guy I've ever known wrapped around your finger, ready to risk everything, ready to fight for you, cuz he's so fuckin' in love with you. How the hell can you call that pathetic?!"

I backed away a little from the force of his voice... and let his words soak in. I had no response ready for all that. But, boy, did it make me think! Jerry's words from minutes ago came back to me: `Loving you has made me a whole new person, and it's made you the most important person in the world... the most loved.'

It was like: millions of particles of thoughts, concepts, images and intuitions streaked through the corridors of my mind at the speed of light and all came to a convergence and clicked into place.

Oh man, WHAT A FEELING!!! It's not easy to even describe the actual physical sensations that washed over me, flooding me with a warmth and contentedness while lifting me up to look upon life from a new vantage point, a solid foundation, a stand of confidence and understanding, seeing all my fears and insecurities for what they were. That just doesn't do it justice though. The comfort that was instilled in me, the peacefulness, feelings I'd never known...

It was THAT moment, that Dave's words triggered, the feelings they set off, the chain of images--- I felt wonderful and I felt stupid. I felt wonderful at the realization of what he'd made clear. I felt stupid that I had prevented myself from seeing it all, even when Jerry had shown me and told me these things more than once, and again just minutes ago.

Loving Jerry had made me a whole new person! Yes, loving Tyson had helped shape that new person as well, no doubt. I was a very different person than I was just a month or so ago. I was in love and loved back. I was open and honest with my parents now. Yes, I was very different. In reality, the only thing pathetic about me now, was that I hadn't let myself see that I wasn't really pathetic up to now.

All of that happened so fast, Dave didn't even notice that my focus had changed. I half expected him to be able to feel the new quality of energy that flowed through me, but I guess he was too caught up in his own dilemma to see me glow.

I looked at him and said with total confidence, and love in my heart, "Yeah, you're right, Dave. I'm not pathetic, but neither are you. I'll tell ya somethin'-- and don't let it go to your head-- but if I wasn't... if I had met you first, man, I'm tellin' ya, I woulda fallen big time for you. You're so great, so nice, and so hot. I haven't told you how, back at the first of the school year, I went with Barry to interview the swim team and the one I turned onto in that locker room full of gorgeous guys was you, and how I had to hide behind my backpack so people wouldn't see my hardon."

He reared his head back in surprise and said, "Bullshit," not really disputing me. "Really?" He grinned, "What, did you see me naked?"

I laughed, "No, but you were just wearin' your Speedo, like now, which you fill out so nicely, and you were so fuckin' gorgeous." I grinned apologetically, "But then, I saw Jerry, and well, you know, it was meant to be. But Dave, you're not pathetic, man, you're just frustrated and horny! Shit, if I was in your place right now, I'd be goin' crazy too! Man, havin' to see me `n Jerry bein' so happy, and knowin' we were right there in the same place havin' such awesome-- well, you know." I looked at him and grinned apologetically, "Shit, I know sayin' all that doesn't help the situation, but, you get my point? You're horny and ya gotta sit here and watch us go at it. That'd drive anyone crazy!"

He nodded his head and sighed heavily, "Yeah... it's real frustrating, that's for sure. But man, I shouldn't let it get me to the point of, like, doin' what I did awhile ago. That's like, seriously depraved."

I grinned shyly at him, "Well, I gotta admit... to me, it was... fuckin' hot," I nodded firmly, like it was the only possible conclusion. "I mean, I don't know how I should feel about it, y'know? I don't know if I should even admit that it turned me on." I blushed a little. "I know it surprised the hell outta me, that's for sure. But, like..."

"Man, y'all were fuckin' hotter than anything I've ever seen in my whole fuckin' life, dude. I mean, you two set that room on fire! It was like spontaneous combustion in there!" He held up his right hand in an oath, "I swear, I was just goin' to my room to get my sunglasses, tryin' t' be quiet so I wouldn't bother y'all, and your door was partly open an' I walked by just when he lifted you up and put you on the bed, and I wasn't gonna stay an' watch, I swear to God, Danny! But when he started sayin' those things to you... it was like, I couldn't make myself leave, y'know? I got, like, hypnotized by it. It was kinda like how you can't help but look at a car wreck or somethin'. Man, I didn't even know it could be that fuckin' hot. Like, me `n Wayne would go at it and get way lost in it, but..." he shook his head in wonder, "Man, nothin' like that!"

I grinned and blushed, but couldn't think of a reply. Then he looked at me with the most pitiful look in his eyes, that made me want to hug and comfort him. "Will I ever have that? Like, will I ever find someone who loves me so, fiercely, like that? I mean, when he was talkin' about how he'd be sniffin' around and humpin' your leg like a dog..." he chuckled dreamily. "Oh, man. Then, when he said that about how you make him feel like Superman... God, Danny!" All the muscles in his neck, jaw and the veins in his temples tensed as he kinda hissed through his teeth, "I want love like that soooo bad..." He pleaded, almost in tears.

I wrapped my arm around his shoulder and tried to comfort him. "Of course you'll find love like that, Dave, of course you will. Man, the dude who finds you is gonna be one lucky motherfucker, I can tell you that without a doubt, Dave. When he finds you, he's gonna..." I stopped speaking as I heard Jerry come back upstairs announcing that the boat was ready to go.

Dave and I looked at each other and silently acknowledged that everything was ok, that we would just move on from here. I stood, light on my feet from the revelations he'd sparked for me, feeling like I had the world by the balls. As I turned to go, I said, "Thank you, Dave." He looked at me questioningly, so I added, "For the things you said. You opened my eyes and I thank you."

I don't know if he knew what I meant at that moment, but it wasn't really important that he did.

Both of them had skied, Dave a couple of times, Jerry since he was little. Not me. But, with their detailed instructions, patience and enthusiastic encouragement, I made it up on my feet, finally. I won't tell you how many times it took. I will tell you this: that `in between' point, squatting, is NOT a good pose to be in! Talk about racking your nuts! Water is surprisingly hard when you're skimming across it at ungodly knots and your nuts are held tightly in place by your shorts!

At least Jerry had the good sense to bring sunscreen, and more Bloody Mary supplies. It was a wonderful adventure. The water was pretty calm, being between the island and the mainland. Jerry let me `helm' the boat too, which was awesome! That sucker could move! And when we took a break from skiing for a bit, after joking around about `all-over tans', we all went ahead and got naked and sunned ourselves with drinks in hand, everything from mellow Gerry Rafferty "Baker Street" to hard driving Foghat "Slow Ride" blaring from Jerry's big boombox. I felt so stress free and laid back.

We skied some more. Jerry and Dave did it naked, and since we could barely see the shores and the other boats we could see were far away, I finally tried it too. Radical!!! SKI NAKED!!! What a rush!

By the time the sun was sagging in the sky, and I looked down and noticed the outline of my life preserver highlighting my reddening exposed skin-- even with repeated applications of sunscreen-- it was time to go back to shore.

How do I convey the vast array of thoughts and emotions that played through my mind and heart as the day progressed, after having such a-- I hate to use the overworked word, but it's the only one that really fits-- breakthrough? This day was the turning point for me, and would be forever etched in my mind.

The exponential acceleration in confidence and contentment was like a religious experience. I felt... expansive, like I saw the world with much greater clarity and could wrap my mind around it for the first time. I suddenly felt so much wiser, and so peaceful. I guess I felt big enough for the world for once, like I had a rightful place in it.

It's like never knowing your eyesight was bad, `cause you didn't know what things should look like, until you tried on someone else's glasses and freaked out at how crisp and sharp everything looked, how you could see every individual blade of grass instead of just a green lawn. Suddenly, you see things in a whole new way... a way you now know is the right way, but you couldn't have known that until you got to see it this way-- and it only takes one glimpse. Once you've seen it, you know you'll never see things the same old way again.

I suddenly felt so grown up, and... yeah... fearless.

I didn't know if the fearless part would last or not, but I knew the rest would. Once you've seen it...

When we docked and secured the boat, Jerry took care of all the maintenance needs while Dave and I stowed the skis and ropes in the room under the beach house. We were all exhausted from skiing and being in the sun all day, plus the alcohol, so we took naps. When we woke around 7pm, Jerry fired up the barbecue and grilled us some awesome ribeye steaks and served them with potato salad he'd bought at the deli.

I sat there beaming, almost smug with confidence, but feeling generously loving to the world at the same time. Jerry saw the change in me-- and probably thought it was strictly from our own talk, which certainly was a big part of it-- and kept giving me curious looks and little secret smiles and winks as he did the typical male thing and played chef over a barbecue pit amid a cloud of smoke. Ahhh, guys and barbecue pits. I think it's hardwired into our brains.

I could barely keep from jumping up and shouting to the world how much I loved him and life and every fucking thing!

After letting our food digest for a while, we decided to go cruise the Seawall until around 11pm or so, then we would go back to the Kon Tiki. It was unspoken but understood by both of us that Priority One was to get Dave laid.

We drove up and down the Seawall a few times in that never-ending Saturday night procession of carloads of teenagers and college students all blaring their music and waving their arms and heads out the windows and sunroofs, yelling all kinds of things at each other or to the throngs milling or walking on the wide cement `boardwalk' overlooking the dark beach. We joined in, playing the Eagles' "Life In The Fast Lane" and Led Zeppelin "For Your Life" and others, having moving conversations with the cars beside us from stoplight to stoplight. I acted like it was something I'd always done and was able to talk and yell with the best of them. Dave was even louder, hanging on the back of my seat, halfway out the window, doing high fives with passing hands from our neighbors in the next lane.

There was every type of person you could imagine in the crowds, with all kinds of different ways of expressing themselves; but they all had two things in common: they wanted to party and they wanted to get laid.

We eventually parked down on Stewart Beach and walked up to the Seawall. We stayed together for about thirty minutes, until Dave started talking to someone he knew from our area who was with some more people who seemed to know and like Jerry, even though Jerry didn't remember them. So, after a few minutes of hanging around while the group got loud and horsed around with each other, Jerry and I told Dave we'd walk on down to the Balinese Room and back.

Dave seemed to want to stay with this group of guys for a while. I scanned the group and wondered if he'd gotten a signal or something from one of them, and how that might work out if he did. There were three out of the six that I thought were good looking. Well, there was always the Kon Tiki later if this was a bust. Just as we were walking away, one of them suggested they all go down to the beach and smoke a doobie. For some inexplicable reason, there was unanimous agreement to that, so Dave and the rest headed for the nearest stairs down to the dark beach.

Jerry and I strolled in silence for a few minutes amid all the noise of the cars and crowds. We watched the students and a few adults as they posed and gyrated, flowing from one group to another in the ageless game of showing everyone how good a time they were having. I had to scold myself for looking on them all so smugly. I just suddenly didn't even crave all that attention and the acceptance of my peers. I had the love and attention of the only person in the world who mattered. I decided it was perfectly ok to gloat a little. I had everything I could possibly want.

We had walked for a couple of minutes, approaching the big Flagship Hotel, jutting out on its huge pier that included parking even, as well as the station building for radio KUFO-- which wasn't rock `n roll. Jerry startled me when he spoke, "It looks good on you."

"Huh?" I looked up into his eyes as the oncoming car lights made them glow a fiery gold.

"Confidence. It looks good on you. All day, since we were in the bedroom, I been watchin' you, and besides how you always look so cute and sexy, you look... I dunno... You seemed to get so peaceful, so unwired. Yeah, that's what it is. You've always been so wired, since I've known you, wired, or tense, even nervous most of the time, y'know? Now, it's like another side of you just kinda came out `n let you relax."

I smiled and nodded, "Yeah, well, that kinda sums it up." We walked on a few steps. "Remember the other day in the boiler room when I had that epiphany?" He nodded. "Well, I guess I kinda had a big one today... in stages." I chuckled.

"Was it cuz of what we talked about?"

"Yeah. But I gotta tell you, ummm... something else happened that kinda kicked it in big time." I looked up at him and he waited expectantly for me to go on. "I'm gonna tell you this in reverse order, kind of, ok?" He nodded. I pointed over the ledge of the Seawall and said, "Let's go down to the beach and talk."

"Must be heavy, huh?" He smiled, almost nervously.

We walked to the next stairs down, just a ways before the Flagship, and navigated our way in the dark out to the end of a long jetty made of big jagged slabs of concrete from demolished buildings. We sat close together, with the starlight dimly illuminating the whitecaps of the small breaking waves less than a foot below our feet. I couldn't find the moon when I looked around for it, but the cloudless sky was bright with stars.

He put his arm around my shoulder and I sank into his side. It was cooler down here at the water and his body warmth felt wonderful to me. I wanted to crawl inside his shirt, press my face against his chest and just absorb his heat and listen to his heartbeat for, oh, say, the rest of my life.

Jerry was gazing up at the stars and I said, "Make a wish."

He scanned the sky and sighed, "I already got my wish." And he kissed me.

When he pulled away, I rubbed his stomach and said, "Jerry, don't ever try `n tell me you're not a romantic again. I think you're even more of a romantic than my dad-- and that's sayin' a lot."

He grinned and put his index finger to his lips, "Shhhh. Don't tell anyone." I kissed him. My boyfriend. My lover.

We knew that people up on the Seawall, and even the few down on the beach, could barely see our form in the dark out this far. No way could they tell what we were doing.

"So, what you got to tell me in reverse?"

"Well, today was like... Man, how can I put it all together? Our talk really meant a lot to me. Then, uh, Dave and I had a talk too, while you were out gettin' the boat ready. He said some things that just... I dunno, brought it all together for me, triggered it, like, the things he said, coming right after what you said, kinda opened my eyes to, uh, myself. I mean, what he said wouldn't have had the same impact if it hadn't of been right after what you said though, y'know?"

"What'd he say?"

I fumbled for a moment, "Umm, well, when I think about it now, it's like the words wouldn't seem like they would have that kind of impact. Well, I mean, it was mostly what you said, and then what he said made me snap to it all. Basically, all of it came together in my head to show me, like you were sayin' to me, that I'm not a pathetic loser. I just, like, in an instant, saw myself and everything in a whole new light, y'know? He more or less verbally slapped some sense into me." I smiled and rested my arm down across his crotch, letting my hand dangle in the air between his legs, my elbow supporting me on top of his thigh as I leaned my shoulder into his chest and snuggled.

"I've thought about all these things a lot in the last few days, and each time, I knew how fortunate I was, but like I was tellin' you earlier, it was just so hard for me to accept that it was all real, that I could possibly deserve it all, you, your love. I guess it comes down to: today, I realized I was worthy of being happy, being in love and being loved. I realized how wonderful my life suddenly is, and how it's all happened practically overnight. It's fuckin' amazing, Jerry! Fuckin' amazing. I just have so much to be thankful for, y'know?"

I leaned away and sat up straight, looking at his face in silhouette from the lights in the distance, my excitement barely contained, "And for the first time, for the first time, I'm not worrying about when it will all fall apart!" Joy erupted and poured out of me in a flood that made me bounce around on the slab like an excited child. "I can't describe how good that feels! It's so amazing, Jerry! It's so fucking amazing! It feels so big! Like my world just expanded and I'm in control of it. I've never, ever felt in control, y'know? I mean, in control of myself even, let alone the world around me."

Our eyes had adjusted to the starlight and I could see him clearly. Jerry was grinning broadly and his teeth glinted in the starlight. His eyes darted as he watched me gesturing animatedly while I talked.

"And it's exactly like you said: Knowing how much I love you and you love me is what makes me not afraid anymore. Finally accepting that someone as fine as you can love me, plus bein' open and honest with my parents finally-- it's so wonderful, Jerry! It's all too fucking wonderful and I--" I jumped up and shouted, spreading my arms wide, "--can't help but YELL IT OUT TO THE WORLD! I LOVE YOU! AND I'M SO HAPPY YOU LOVE ME TOO!"

Then I slipped and fell onto Jerry's knee, laughing. I kissed him energetically. Yes, energetically. You know, that state of excited, bubbly, bouncy energy mixed with bigger-than-life-love that you can barely contain without just wringing yourself out all over the place.

My shouts were carried away on the waves as Jerry embraced me and kissed me back every bit as wildly, caught up in my joy and release. I flung my arms around his neck and all but climbed on top of him. We began laughing again and lay back on the concrete side by side, looking up at the stars, holding hands, listening to the surf.

He looked over at me and said, "I'm so happy for you, Danny. Like I said, it looks so good on you." He smiled with great satisfaction, "It's like, all the best things about you are right there, up front now. Y'know... it makes us both stronger. I mean, you feel so much stronger, emotionally, now; that makes me stronger too. We've got a lot to deal with, soon."

"Yeah, I know."

"But hey, we're not alone, either. We got friends, like Dave, and Celia & Mickey." It sounded like he was thinking of them as a couple, even though he'd heard about Jet. I didn't bother correcting him though. "And having your parents on our side is so cool, such a big relief. That helps a lot."

"That makes a huge difference, no doubt," I nodded in agreement. "And then there's Mr. Janke, too. You know he knows all about us, don't you?" He looked like he had suspected it but wasn't sure. I said, "Yeah, he tried to get me to talk about it the day I came back to school after that weekend, but I just couldn't handle talkin' that day. He said he knew how I felt about you and you felt about me, and he was cool with it all, and like, totally supportive. He gave me his home phone number and said I could talk to him anytime. He was so... It was so awesome! I didn't expect anything like that. He's such a cool guy. And, you haven't even met Rachel and Ron Green, either. You gotta meet them! They're sooo nice. Like I told you, Rachel saved my life, Jerry."

A pained look distorted his eyes and face for a moment, then he smiled. "I definitely wanna meet her."

"Uhhh, speakin' of Dave... I gotta tell you what happened today." I stared up at the stars as he sat up and looked at me. "I don't want you to... I hope you don't... Don't take this wrong, or... Hell, I'm just gonna tell you what happened. Please don't get pissed off or anything, ok?"

He tensed up, "Well that depends on what happened." I was afraid he was thinking something physically sexual had happened between us.

I sat up and looked at him. "Today, when we were making love, Dave was goin' to his room to get his sunglasses and the door was partly open, and he kinda watched us..." I turned slightly away and mumbled, "and jacked off." I turned back and blurted out, "But he felt so bad about it afterwards! I mean, he was so embarrassed and felt so bad about it. He apologized several times. I told him I was gonna tell you and he's so afraid you'll hate him or even kick his ass or something. Please don't get mad at him, Jerry. He didn't do it on purpose; it just kinda happened."

He was looking at me, but he was trying to picture the scene, trying to decide what he thought of this. After a minute, he said, "You mean he watched the whole thing?"

I nodded, "Yeah. Well, from the time you lifted me up onto the bed."

"And he jacked off while he was watchin' us, huh?"

I nodded again. "But babe, you gotta understand how frustrated and horny he is! I mean, last night, he was so into Tyson, but Tyson wouldn't give him the time of day, and he passed up a couple a chances he had. So then, he's sitting there on the deck with us when you started gettin' me all hot-- and you know, that made him hot too! I mean, anyone who was already horny who heard you get all sexy like with me would get hot `n bothered, y'know?"

He shook his head and chuckled, "Yeah, I guess so, huh. Man, I really did forget he was there. I saw he was almost hard when I went to get him somethin' to drink. But to jack off while he watched us? So that's why you got that weird look on your face and acted all strange when you went to shower. Man, that's..." He shook his head, chuckling, then cocked it to one side, sounding serious again, "But, that means he heard all the things I said to you, you know, what was meant only for you, from me to you. I mean, that was really private, like, totally personal stuff for..." he trailed off, embarrassed.

"I know, and that's what he felt the worst about. That's what he said, that he felt so bad about invading our private moment, but it was all just too hot not to watch, to see how incredible we are together, he couldn't walk away. That's how he put it. And he said he never knew it could be so intense and hot. He said we set the room on fire."

He chuckled again. "He said that, huh?"

"Oh yes. He said, and I quote: "It was like spontaneous combustion in there!" He was blown away by it."

"It was pretty fuckin' mind-blowing, wasn't it." He smiled at me and I nodded enthusiastically. "So, what, you actually saw him doin' it? Saw him jackin'?"

I blushed, but I don't think he could see it in the washed out light of the stars. "Well, I never saw him till right when I was cumming and he was cumming too. I mean, it was right at that moment when I noticed him. He'd closed his eyes for his climax, so he didn't know I saw him till he was through. Then, he just about died of embarrassment and ran to his room."

"Wow. That's kinda weird, huh. I mean, I don't-- I'm not pissed at him or anything, but... Poor dude. Now he knows how good we-- what he's missin', huh." He grinned.

"We're just mind-blowing together, Stud, and I don't think anyone could walk by our room `n see us and not stop and watch, y'know? And besides, you know, he was in love with you before, so for him to get to see you in action and doing it with so much love-- how could he walk away?"

"Hm. Yeah. I guess I'd hafta watch us too. And I guess I'd have to whack off if I saw us in action. We should make a movie so we can watch ourselves." We laughed and he continued, "Yeah, a movie, cuz a lot of the time, I can't see your face in different positions an' stuff. I love it when I can see your eyes and your facial expressions." He thought for a moment. "Maybe in a mirror..." He chuckled and winked at me.

He continued solemnly, "But yeah, I still don't know how to handle knowin' he was in love with me. And like, he says he's over it, but... I see a look in his eyes that makes me wonder. He's such a cool dude, though. I really like him and wanna be friends, but I haven't quite sorted out all my feelings about him."

He clasped his hands together and brought them to his chin in thought, elbows on his knees. "I wanna be totally honest with you, Danny. You remember in the car when I told you he was the first guy I ever really thought about `doing something' with?" I nodded yes. "Well, I've found myself wondering, thinking some sexual thoughts about him since he said he had been in love with me. Purely sexual, though. No emotion."

He grabbed my arm and leaned into me with an intense look, "Now, you know I love you like crazy and would never do anything to fuck our love up again. I will never act on any thought like that. I give you my word, Danny. I just wanna be totally honest with you and tell you everything I think and feel. But, I'm tellin' ya, I don't need anything else. No one could blow my mind like you do. I guess it's just a kind of curiosity."

He said no more for a minute and my thoughts were going around many aspects of the situation. I offered this, "Still, he's such a nice guy, y'know? Your heart just goes out to him. And you know what? I know you know I feel just as strongly about what you just said, about not needing anything else from anyone. And I feel so sure of us, that I can say that..." I looked into his eyes, sure of what I was about to say, "If you wanted to have sex with him, to know what it was like, to satisfy your curiosity, or his, whatever, I wouldn't mind, or be worried or jealous. I mean, I know it would just be sex, that you weren't making love with him like you do with me. You know, if it was something we discussed, and I knew about it, I wouldn't have a problem with it." I added, "I couldn't have been this secure about something like that before today."

There was only the sound of the waves for a long minute or so. Jerry and I were both deep in thought. Then he announced, "Well I don't need to. I don't. You fill all my needs and way more." He shook his head and chuckled, "Goddamn, so much more than I ever thought could-- I mean, you create new needs in me and totally fill `em at the same time, y'know what I mean? You're just fuckin' incredible, Danny." He ran his fingers through my hair, then rubbed the top of one ear. I think I glowed like one of the stars above me, finally able to accept his praise without questioning it.

Another pause, then he said, "I appreciate what you're sayin', though, and that you would trust me like that. That really means a lot to me, Danny, a whole lot." Then he shook his head, "But man, I honestly don't know if I could look at it the same way with you. But that's only cuz I can't even picture you having sex without giving all your love at the same time. I'm afraid anyone would fall in love with you if they had sex with you. I mean, every time we `do it', your love just fucking pours out of you like a flood, and I feed on it." He nodded, "Yeah, that's the right word. I feed on it, baby, seriously."

He furrowed his brow and kicked at the edge of the slab below him a couple of times. His voice lowered to an introspective mutter, "I hope I give you at least something like what you give. You're just so intense... I don't know if I'm giving you even half of what you give to me. I mean, I want to SO bad, and I don't just mean the sex... no, it's ALL the time..." he waved his hands around, "I just wanna be with you, just, in the same place, even if we can't be touchin' or anything. It's really amazing. I mean, it really is, Danny. I never thought I could love anyone so fucking much that I'm just buzzed about it every fuckin' minute of the day. And like, my biggest worry is that I'm not showing you enough how much I love you. All my other worries, they're nuthin'. All that matters is tryin' to give you all the love I can and hopin' it's enough."

"Wow," I shook my head with a huge grin. "That's exactly how I feel, and it just makes it that much more intense when I know you're feeling the same thing."

I gestured that I had more to say, "And, and, and like Dave, he wants what we have with someone so badly! He told me that. And it's not like, jealousy. It's more like, he gets to see such a perfect example so up close, and when one of them is someone he already had love for, the poor guy is goin' nuts!"

Jerry grinned smugly, "For real." Then he gave me a question, "Would it be downright arrogant to say it would be doin' him a `favor' to have sex with him?"

I laughed and then he did. I said, "Well, I don't think arrogant... more like, generous." We both busted up laughing.

Then he got serious again, "But I couldn't-- I really don't think I could even get started, with him or anyone else, if you weren't a part of it." He shook his head.

I looked at him wide eyed, "What, you'd want me there? Part of it? Joining in?"

"No, no-- but yeah, I'm just sayin'... if we were to decide something like that was ok, for me to have sex with him, as a `generous' thing or whatever," he flash-grinned, "I couldn't even begin to get into it if you weren't involved. If it was like, somethin' we did together, to make him happy, or you know, like a gift of us, to him, then, maybe I could get into it. It would have to be someone special to both of us, though, y'know? I couldn't do that with just anyone."

"Oh, absolutely. I know exactly what you mean. Yeah, I... well, yeah." I looked down at the water lapping at the concrete, trying to picture the three of us and how the scene might go-- and felt my cock start getting hard, even though the thought of it all wasn't getting me as excited as I thought it might have.

"I just know I couldn't get into it alone with him. I'm serious, Danny, I just don't think I could really get into it. I'd be thinkin' about you the whole time, and I couldn't stand the thought of you not bein' there. It just wouldn't work."

I wondered if I would feel jealousy if I was right there with them, participating. I wondered if I could handle it all. I knew in my mind I lusted after hot guys-- even now that I was in love-- whenever I would see one, like some of the hot guys we'd seen up on the boardwalk just a few minutes ago, but, I also knew I loved Jerry too much to really want to do anything with anyone. I mean, who could possibly come even close to the magic Jerry and I had? I knew I would back out, if it came down to a situation where I was with someone else, even Tyson now-- without Jerry there-- if sex was about to happen. Like Jerry said: I wouldn't even be able to get started.

But this, together, with Dave, was a whole different thing to consider. It was both exciting and scary. I acknowledged my lust for Dave. It seemed like I already knew him so well, even though it had only been a few days. In any case, I felt a closeness and connection to him that took him way out of the abstract `guy you see and think is hot and you wonder what he'd be like in bed' category. I felt a kind of love for him, friendship love.

And if Jerry had a desire to try this, I figured there was no better choice than Dave. I thought, `I would be there. I would be able to gauge Jerry's reactions. I can understand how he would desire Dave sexually, `cause I had too. I think I can trust him not to fall in love with Dave. I don't think that's my concern. My concern, maybe, is, will he want to do this again? A lot? If he does, could I handle that? I guess I would have to, huh. Oh, man. Would I be able to? I lust after guys, so maybe I could get used to it if he wanted to do it a lot. Wow. That's hard to picture. He did say it would have to be someone special, though, so it's not like this would become a regular thing. But I would do anything for him, anything, whatever would make him happy. Ok, so tell him yes.'

I said, a little hesitantly, "I think, maybe I could get into it with someone like Dave, as long as it was us together... like a team, sharing our pleasure. He's such a great guy, y'know?"

I thought for a moment, then said, "But y'know, when you said that about how I give my love when we're having sex... We couldn't help but give some love to him when we're together doing something like that. Still, I think that's a good thing. It's not like we have to worry about giving too much away-- we have so much. An' when I think about it, really, it wouldn't be any good if we didn't share our love with him while we did it. It would be... kinda meaningless, y'know?"

Jerry nodded, "Yeah, you're right. Yeah. I just wonder if I would be able to focus on him enough to let him feel like I was giving him some of that. I mean, I've seen his body, it's nice, but he just don't excite me the way..." A siren wafted through the steady sound of the waves, drawing our attention for a moment, getting louder as it neared then passed by up on the boulevard. I watched the hyperactive lights dance across the buildings and cars. "So..." Jerry flapped his knees together and apart several times. "Do we wanna give him that? Are you sayin' you wanna do that?"

I looked at him and he turned to face me. "I dunno. Should we? I mean, you don't think we'd regret it, do you?" I searched his eyes. "It wouldn't... We wouldn't, like, feel regret the morning after, would we? I wouldn't wanna do it if it even had a chance of making us, like, even a little bit uncomfortable, y'know?"

"Yeah, I know what you mean," he nodded in complete agreement. "Yeah, we would have to really decide... like, be totally sure within ourselves that this wouldn't hurt `us' in any way. In fact, it would have to be something that would make us feel good about doin' it, baby. If we're sure we're totally confident in our love, that neither of us would feel any kinda jealousy... that would be the only way I could even begin to consider it."

I shook my head, "I just don't know, Jerry..."

"Then that settles it."

"Huh?"

"That settles it," he nodded his head with finality. "We won't do it. Look, I don't think either of us is ready for somethin' like that. I know I'm not really comfortable with it, and I can see you're not, so... it's just not worth the risk to us. I just won't do anything that has even a remote possibility of hurting us." He leaned over, kissed me and said, "Baby, we don't need anyone else like that. I know I said I had thoughts like that about him, but they're just thoughts, y'know? They're not wants. I guess I'll have thoughts like that about guys sometimes-- maybe even girls too, I dunno-- but, they're just thoughts, just quick little fantasies. They're not somethin' I ever wanna actually do, ok? Can you accept that I `look' at others, but don't wanna do anything?"

I nodded and smiled, "Yeah, I can accept that, `cause I was just thinkin' how I think those same things but don't wanna act on `em either. I mean, I can't help it when I see a hot lookin' guy and think how sexy he is; it's like, automatic. I think that's just human nature-- or at least `guy' nature-- and we should be honest about it with each other, `cause it doesn't mean we wanna do it with `em."

He kissed me again. "You're so smart, and sexy, and..." He trailed off and looked out over the ocean. After a moment, he said, "Y'know, it still freaks me out a little when I think about you, or like when I see you an' I think, `There's my guy.' I mean, it's just so strange. It's not-- well, I would never have thought I'd be thinking like this, y'know? That I'd be in love with a guy. So like, when I look at you or picture you, it hits me sometimes. I think, `That's a guy's body that's drivin' me crazy, that I wanna kiss `n lick... that I need to kiss `n lick. I'm in love with a guy! I mean, shouldn't I have had some kinda signs, or signals in my life that I was really gay? I mean earlier than like when I thought about Dave-- and a couple of others, less seriously-- cuz that was only a few months ago, or like, during this year, maybe. It seems like I shoulda had a hint, or somethin' long before that, y'know?"

"Yeah, it's strange how these things work." I looked at him and cautiously asked, "So, when you think about me like that, you say it freaks you out. I know I just asked you somethin' like this the other night, but, does it make you question yourself, us?"

He shook his head no and leaned back, "No, not at all. It just... surprises me, and makes me think about how everyone else thinks of gay guys, how I used t' think of `em too. And that's what I'm sayin'... Like, how could I have looked at being gay as, `not a good thing'," he did quotation marks with his fingers, "if I was really gay myself?"

"Well... I did too, an' I hated myself for feelin' that way for a long time. After a few years of tryin' to deny it to myself, I finally started accepting it a little in the last year or so." I had told him about my dream and the pictures from Kmart, so I didn't need to cover those things. "Then you happened, and Tyson. It was like, BAM! SMACK up side the head." I clapped my hands together loudly. "Once you told me you loved me and made love to me... there was no way to deny what I felt-- an' it wasn't the sex that did it. It was you, all your love. I didn't wanna deny it anymore. It was too wonderful, too powerful, fuckin' overwhelming." I sighed, then leaned over and kissed him lightly. "And now, like you said, I'm so buzzed about it every minute of the day, I don't give a shit what the rest of the world thinks. I'm so happy. They can't stop me from loving you."

"Yeah," he sighed contentedly. "Plus that, we were written in the stars, baby, like Romeo and Juliet or Antony and Cleopatra."

"Or Alexander and Hephaestion," I offered. He looked at me quizzically.

"Alexander The Great. The love of his life was Hephaestion, his battle partner. When he was killed, Alexander went crazy with grief. He built huge monuments to him. It was one of the great loves in all of history. They'd been together since they were kids."

He smiled widely, "Cool! I didn't know that. They never taught us anything about that in world history. They just told how Alexander conquered the known world."

"I doubt they ever will teach that. But it's true history, even if they don't like to admit it. I read it in a book I got from the U of H at Clear Lake City Library. Yeah, their love was written in the stars."

"That's really awesome to know that the greatest warrior in all of history was gay and totally in love with a man. Cool. And like I say, we were written in the stars. When I had that dream, with Celia right there talkin' to me, showin' me... Man, that was so fuckin' amazing. I still get goose bumps all over when I think about it. An' it's so great, cuz like, I don't have t' wonder like everyone else does when they fall in love. Everyone else always has that little question in their minds, like, `Is this really the right person for me? Will it last?' But I know! Without a doubt, I know. And that... that just makes me... Man, I'm so lucky."

He stared at me in a kind of satisfied awe and his eyes were glistening with emotion. Chills went down my spine and I grabbed the back of his head and kissed him with all my love.

When we came up for air, I said, "Maybe we're star warriors, like Alexander and Hephaestion were. Maybe them and all gay guys through time have come here from the constellation Orion, the original star warrior... or like, some of us are starchildren and some are starwarriors, and we, like, balance out that way."

"Mmmmm, I love the way your mind works," he smiled and nuzzled down into my neck, kissing around. "I don't know about war, but I wanna make love to you under the stars tonight when we get back to the beach house, Starchild."

I grinned up at him and thought, `You're more of a romantic than I am, even! How did I get so lucky?' I almost said it aloud, but didn't want him to hold back on that sort of thing if I kept making a point of it and making him self-conscious. I was in a continual state of amazement at how Jerry had so much more depth and dimension to him than the image of the big muscular jock, the all-brawn-no-brains and no heart stereotype.

We strolled back up to the Seawall and found Dave sitting at the end of the line of guys on the rail facing the street. They were quieter now and Dave didn't seem to be joining in the conversation much.

I sat next to him and nudged him with my shoulder, asking very quietly in the din of noise, "So, any prospects?"

He grinned knowingly at me, shook his head and sighed, "Nahhh."

I nodded in understanding. "Drag." I leaned in even closer to whisper in his ear, "That one tall guy with the shoulder-length brown hair and the puka shell necklace is really sexy. Too bad, huh."

He chuckled and whispered back to me, cupping his mouth with his hand to my ear, "Yeah, Andy. He's the one I had my eye on, for sure. Man, is he hot or what! He took his shirt off a while ago an' I just about lost it! I could... Man, I could get into that." He leaned away and looked back at me for agreement.

"Oh for sure," I nodded with a lusty smile and said at regular volume, "Wanna go to the-- where we went last night?" I didn't dare say the name, in case any of them could hear me, had heard of it and knew it was a gay bar.

He glanced down the line of guys and abruptly stood up facing Jerry and I. "Hell yeah!"

There was a payphone right beside where we parked the car downtown about two blocks from the bar, so I decided to call Celia's and see what they were all doing, while Jerry and Dave looked in store windows. Mickey answered and we chatted for a minute. Celia and Jet were upstairs fucking, as Mickey so delicately put it, and Tyson was was asleep as far as he knew. He told me Glen had left around noon, fucked ragged and just as clueless as when he'd arrived. I laughed-- with just a slight touch of jealousy left in my heart. I said not to bother anyone and that I would maybe call back tomorrow.

The Kon Tiki was just as festive as last night, but I was determined to pace myself. As it turned out, Jerry and I only had one drink and danced a little, but mostly just stood, me leaning back into him with his arms wrapped around me, observing the wonderful, sexy, quirky, eccentric, horny crowd and all their gyrations, machinations and flirtations, while their libations brought on their inebriations, heh heh.

A pretty good looking guy asked Dave to dance shortly after we got there, and Dave never looked around again. The guy was not real appealing to me, but I could see how many would think he was hot. He was a little bigger than Dave, nice body, short brown hair and gray eyes with a round face and bushy eyebrows. He looked ruggedly handsome, I guess, maybe of eastern European descent. He seemed nice when Dave introduced him as Mark, and he had a good firm handshake.

Mark was down here from Memorial City, on the far west side of Houston, was 23 and a Virgo, he informed us. He was friendly and horny and sharing a two-bed hotel room with three `just friends', so going to our beach house was the perfect solution for him and Dave.

Dave was charged up. Dave was salivating. Dave was practically cross-eyed with lust, all but sucking Mark off on the dance floor. Jerry and I joked to each other that we were going to have to tie him to the bumper for the ride home, or he'd go so crazy in the backseat with Mark and cause a wreck.

We left around midnight and all decided to cruise West Beach-- which kinda surprised me, as the two of them seemed so impatient to get on with it. Aside from several small groups of friends sitting on the hoods of their cars partying here and there, most of the long stretch of beach was deserted. We chose a particularly empty stretch and got out to walk the beach and large dunes as the breeze rustled the sea oats that tenaciously grew out of the ever shifting sand. We climbed to the summit of the tallest dune we saw. Jerry spooned me and wrapped my shoulders, folding his arms down across my chest just like he had at the Kon Tiki. I sighed and lay my head back against him, looking contentedly out across the placid water with my new eyes.

That we were on West Beach on the dunes, I thought of Ty and his Charger challenge and sighed. Jerry put one hand down on my butt possessively right at that moment and I thought of that as a sign of our connection. Jerry just always seemed so in tune with me. He kissed my ear and whispered sweet nothings, making me tingle.

Watching our lead from about ten feet away, Mark pulled Dave into a full on, tongue-swapping kiss, and Dave molded into him until they became one body with extra hands and feet. I could hear Dave moaning hungrily into Mark's mouth, letting him know just what he wanted. Mark seemed to understand `moanspeak' and broke the kiss long enough to tell Dave he was going to eat him up and fuck him into a coma.

Dave, who'd had three drinks and smoked some pot, was ready to do it right then, and pulled Mark's cock out through his fly, giggling, while Mark talked dirty.

Jerry said, "Uh, guys, how `bout we head on home?"

They stopped in mid movement and both grinned over at us like little kids caught in the act. Mark stuffed his-- from the glimpse I got of it in silhouette-- nice sized erection back in his jeans and we all made our way back to the car.

Dave urgently pulled Mark by his belt buckle to their room and Mark had Dave half stripped before they even hit the door. Jerry and I laughed at them and were so happy for Dave that he was finally getting some dick, and who knows, maybe even a boyfriend?

Jerry yelled through the closed door, "The bed's bolted down for hurricane resistance, so you can get as crazy as ya wanna!"

They laughed and Mark yelled back, "I hope ya got insurance on this place, `cause we're gonna tear it down!"

Dave yelled out, "FULL SCALE DEMOLITION, BABY! WORK THAT JACKHAMMER!" He laughed like a maniac, and damn if it didn't sound like they were already starting to tear the room down!

We laughed so hard we had to sit down on the couch for a moment. It was quieter for about thirty seconds, then we heard a loud, frustrated moan and a, "Damn!" and then, "It's ok, baby, that's just the first one."

Jerry and I looked at each other and covered our mouths to keep from laughing loudly. Jerry whispered to me, "I swear that sounded like Dave already came!"

I whispered back, "Yep, that's what it was. It sure sounded like it anyway." We both bolted over to the front door and outside to let loose with our laughing, holding each other up by the rail.

We went back inside and quietly gathered up some supplies, then headed down to the beach. We hiked hand in hand well away from Dave and Mark and all signs of humanity. The shore just south of Jamaica Beach wasn't much of a beach, really; it was mostly tall grass and scraggly weeds nearly to the water's edge for much of it, but there was some sandy beach.

It was so beautiful out under the stars and the breeze was perfectly gentle. We laid a blanket out and sprayed the grass nearby with mosquito spray, then lit four mosquito coils, and they must have worked ok, 'cause nothing came between the stars and us.

We undressed each other sensuously slow, trading kisses and little caresses up and down each other's bodies. Then we stood at the edge of the blanket and Jerry opened a bottle of his parent's good champagne, watching the mushroom cork shoot out over the water, only to bob it's way back to shore later. We stood holding our tongues together under the fountaining foamy sparkle, laughing and lapping as it ran down our chins and bodies. He poured us a glass and we toasted `us' and this remarkable day.

We lay back propped on our elbows and talked about it all again for a little while. There's no need to rehash the conversation, as it was all about the same things we'd talked about earlier; but I'll tell how it ended: Jerry poured champagne in my belly button and licked it out.

Then he looked up from my stomach, running his hand feather-lightly all over my chest where the champagne had made it sticky and said, "Man, I'm glad we didn't get with Dave. I just need you all to myself, baby." He took a hold of my hand and brought it to his lips to kiss my open palm many times, then said, "And I only want to be your man-- your only man. Let's never share ourselves with anyone."

"Never anyone else but us," I sighed.

He moved in between my legs and kissed his way up my stomach, chest and neck, bringing his magnificent body up over me as he went. The little hint of cool in the whisper of a breeze made every point of contact with his skin burst into warm choruses of loving fire. When his face reached mine he kissed my chin lightly and held above me, boring down into my eyes, building, building, building...

Can I ever really adequately describe to you what it feels like to be so utterly consumed in love? Can mere words ever justly describe electric vibrating humming rushes that course through my being, igniting Roman Candles and sonic booming starbursts in my heart and soul? There is nothing else in life that can even begin to approach this feeling. This is the feeling every human being instinctively searches for. After survival has been met, this is the most urgent, driving search programmed into our genetic code, the one we live our entire lives for. This is the one discovery, the one moment we subconsciously know at our core is the only one that truly matters, and that all searches, all needs, all longings after this are distantly secondary at best. Finding This: Real Love, my friends, is the whole point, the real purpose of life.

I felt myself spinning away into the stars as he entered me... just to commune with me, just to consummate that flesh and liquid cellular connection with me, and I pulsated and radiated with the staggering beauty of it all. His eyes glowed into mine and his deep voice resonated all through me like I heard it from inside me instead of from his mouth, "I've seen the future. I already know I will love only you forever and ever."

I levitated in the vision of the halo of stars that framed his face as the center point of the brightest constellation, which was one with the billions of fireflies in the night sky that were this confluence of disparate matter and energy that collided and swirled into orbit with me and became infinitely harmonious in the rhythm of the universe. This was no fluke, no anomaly. It was meant to be. Every light in the sky converged in our coupling... and we knew our love was as big as eternity.

And some where, some when...

The teller of ancient and modern myths and legends holds his hand aloft for silence, then reverently declares to the children huddled shoulder to shoulder around the fire with wide eyes and eager ears that indeed the Starchild did sing this very song to his beloved Starwarrior:

In the starlight, you are golden

You are light and you are love

You are everything I need, and all I wanted

And you draw me to the stars where you

Stand holding out your hand

And we both alight on wings

Over Heaven

In the twilight, you are glowing

You are promises of dawn

You are everything I see, in all my visions

And you give me light throughout the night

You meet me in my dreams

Where we become the star

Over Heaven

In the prism, you're the spectrum

You are breath and you are sigh

You are everything to me, and we are one

`Cause everything I am is all wrapped up in you

Five points for anyone who can tell what song's tune I wrote that poem to. The first line is the biggest clue, as it's similar to the actual song's lyrics-- starting at the chorus, not from the beginning of the song. It's a classic from 1970, written by a great female songwriter and made immortal by a legendary group of four guys, three of whom still perform together. The fourth guy is one of my all-time favorites, long may he run.