Date: Fri, 30 May 2008 14:37:17 -0700 (PDT)
From: erik ritler <erikritler@yahoo.com>
Subject: space ship boys chapter 5

As many of you who have emailed pointed out, this story is indeed very
wordy, and this chapter is no exception. It grew longer than I anticipated,
but a lot happens and I hope it's an enjoyable read. As you'll see, things
are starting to happen, and I look forward to seeing where Devon and
company will take us next. Please feel free to email me at
erikritler@yahoo.com with comments or suggestions -- I'll always respond to
feedback.

As always, for those seeking a quicker and more arousing read, I header the
sex scenes with the phrase `xes' -- just use the find function in your
browser if you get tired of my lengthy plot.

To recap the story so far, Devon is a sarcastic and witty college kid who
finds himself on a ship on an 18-year voyage to a new home planet after the
destruction of earth. The mass majority of the passengers on Devon's ship
guys from the boy's college he attended. Devon begins questioning his
sexuality after spying on two friends, Sean and Dog, mutually
masturbating. It makes him realize he may either be gay or turning gay
because of the demographic makeup of the ship. He gets a chance to explore
more when he discovers that his friend, Charlie, has wandered off drunk. He
goes searching and finds him passed out in one of the unoccupied dorms. He
can't resist feeling him up, and although Charlie wakes up halfway through,
Devon wanks him off. The next day, Charlie doesn't remember anything, and
Devon thinks he's off the hook. But then he discovers that someone had been
watching him and Charlie through the vent. Who could it have been?

While pondering his sexuality, Devon is trying to fix his friendship with
Conner, a friend he's neglected since leaving earth. He spends an afternoon
with Conner, and realizes this is a great friend that he can entrust with
anything. But he doesn't think this is the appropriate person to talk about
his sexuality with. Neither is the lovable slacker and Devon's co-worker,
Zane, who is openly bisexual. And he doesn't want to talk to his best
friends, Reid and Patrick, lest his experimenting damage his relationship
with either of them. He determines to try and just live a normal life when
things take another sexual turn. Accompanying Reid for a lengthy scan in
the medical bay, Devon is approached by a mystery intern who ends up
jerking him off. It's a great experience for Devon, although a little weird
since he is never able to see the intern's face. Reid, drugged up and
tranquilized because of his claustrophobia, is oblivious to
everything. When they leave the medical bay, Devon discovers that his
anonymous intern and the phantom wanker who spied on him are one and the
same. It's exciting for Devon, but also a little weird. He resolves to talk
to someone about it, and after putting Reid to bed runs across Patrick
alone in the dorm. Instead of formulating a plan, Devon just blurts out
that he thinks he's gay, opening a whole can or worms. Patrick stops to
think about that for a moment...

And that brings us up to chapter five. Enjoy!



Space Ship Boys

Chapter 5 -- The Party


i

An uncomfortable silence hung in the room, the only sound the slight whir
and click of the environmental unit pumping air into the space. It gave me
time to briefly think about two personality traits of mine that I might
consider working on in the future, one being that I tend to impulsively
rush into things without really thinking them through, the other being that
I get really nervous when confronted with conversations about unpleasant
personal subjects.

The all-time best example of the first was the time I committed myself to
violin lessons. I was eleven, and had just seen a movie about a violinist,
so when I got home I announced to my parents that I would be taking up the
instrument. They didn't take me seriously, but after three months of
begging and whining, they agreed to my request. As one might expect, I got
my violin, took one lesson and realized I hated the damn thing. I tried to
get out of the lessons under the argument that this would save my parents a
good deal of money, and this stance seemed to have weight with my father,
who I could tell was wavering, but my mother was immutable and demanded I
take lessons for at least a year. I guess they figured the cost of classes
was worth the life lesson I was being taught about `stickwithitness'. So I
struggled through fifty-two weeks of excruciatingly boring practice
sessions before dropping out, and I can play you a really scratchy
god-awful rendition of `Old MacDonald' if you want proof, but trust me you
don't.

However, I'm gonna have to say that my current situation might have to
replace the violin catastrophe as worst idea ever. After weeks of worrying
that being gay or bisexual it would mess up all my friendships,
particularly with Reid and Patrick, I decided to talk to someone about it,
and instead of waiting and doing it in some logical manner at an
appropriate time, I just blurted it out to Patrick. Maybe I should have
asked someone else's advice, because now I realize that either Patrick will
be cool with it, in which case I didn't have anything to be worried about
in the first place, or that he won't, in which case I've now provided the
catalyst for what I was worried about.

And that line of thought kicks in personality flaw number two. I think
about all the worst case scenarios -- me getting kicked out of the flat,
losing Reid and Patrick as friends, ending up alone on this stupid space
ship for the next eighteen years. I'm all at once nervous, excited and
scared, and I can feel my stomach turn. I'm also starting to get shaky -- I
can feel my fingers trembling against the paper pages of the book I'm
holding, so I set it down on the side table and try sitting up straighter
with my hands in my lap, although then I consider I look a little like a
haughty child awaiting admonition, so I try draping an arm over the side of
the couch. Nope, that looks a little dorky, like I'm trying really hard to
unsuccessfully play it cool. I return the hand to my lap.

And so we sit there, me on the couch fidgeting and Patrick in the chair
next to me. I'm getting more and more freaked out, and he just seems to be
as calm as ever. It seems like an hour goes by like that, but in actuality
it's only twenty seconds or so before he speaks again.

"Yeah, Devon, you know, I figured that," he says quietly, clearly weighing
his words. Wait, what? He figured what? He figured that being on a space
ship with all guys was going to make me gay? Why's he agreeing with me like
that? And all at once I have a new fear about how people perceive me. Maybe
Patrick already knows I'm a little weird and already dislikes me a little,
and this will be the final blow to the friendship.

While I ponder this I get even shakier, and my chest muscles start
trembling uncontrollably against the cotton fabric of my shirt. This is my
typical reaction to conversations like this -- all of a sudden my body acts
like I'm immersed in ice water. Patrick must have noticed that his comments
are causing a monumental reaction because he gets a really concerned look,
almost like he's scared, and then walks over to where I'm sitting.

"Wait, whoa, hey, I didn't mean that in a bad way." He sits down right next
to me on the couch and I'm both relieved and alarmed by his proximity. On
the one hand, it's reassuring to feel the warmth of his body close to me,
but on the other I feel like I'm about to lose it and start bawling, and I
don't really want anyone around for that. I'm a little old to start crying
like a little girl, and the thought of that makes me angry. Angry at myself
for opening this can of worms in the first place, and angry at Patrick for
having the audacity to be present for this horrendously embarrassing show.

"Look, Devon, what's the matter? You can talk to me about this." But
suddenly I don't feel like talking. That's what got me in trouble in the
first place, and it was a dumb idea to broach the subject with anyone,
least of all Patrick. So instead, I figure I'll clam up and sit here
without saying anything until Patrick gets bored or frustrated and
leaves. I turn away from him and stare down at the arm of the couch. It has
a stain on it that looks suspiciously like old cheese spread.

And there we sit for a good five full minutes, maybe longer, me staring
sullenly at the couch and Patrick staring compassionately at me. It doesn't
take me long to figure out that I was being a little silly in thinking that
he didn't like me. We're good friends, and his expression is all I need to
see that he's genuinely concerned about me. Still, I'm a little pissed at
myself for getting into this conversation at all with him, and even if he
doesn't care whether I'm gay or not, it also pisses me off that he'd say he
always thought I was. And besides being angry, I'm still totally nervous,
and I can feel all the adrenaline and stomach acid sitting right below the
surface. It's fucking up my emotions on every level, and I feel like if I
start talking I may throw up. God, I wish I could go crawl into my bunk.

But Patrick doesn't get bored or wander off, and after we've been sitting
here for a while he starts talking.

"Ok, here's the deal," he begins, "If you don't want to talk, I will. If
you want me to stop, just tell me, otherwise I'll babble on.

"The first thing is, you know I'm an open-minded guy. I don't judge people,
and when I say you can tell me anything I mean it. You could tell me you
were an ax-murderer and I'd still be your friend. I might not go into a
dark utility closet with you, but I'd be your friend." His attempt at humor
doesn't work and when I fail to smile even a little he continues on.

"Erm, anyway, obviously you seem a little angry or scared about talking to
me about this, and maybe I should have responded differently. What I maybe
should have said was that you are a great guy. You're funny and sarcastic
and smart and energetic, and those are things I noticed in you on that
first day we met at orientation."

I thought back to that weekend, almost a year ago now. Prospective students
had come to JDU for a week to see the campus and pick a course of study and
meet one another. That's where I'd met Patrick, and we did hit it off right
away. We'd been through a couple of developmental sessions together -- at
least that's what they called them. You broke off into a group of like
twenty students and completed these lame assignments. Like in one we
pretended we had been stranded in Newfoundland. We had a list of fifty
items we had with us and had to determine a course of action as well as
categorize the supplies and rank them from most to least important. Patrick
had been the nerdy guy that tried unsuccessfully to convince everyone that
we should stay put and wait for rescue, and he also tried to explain that
the compass should be put in the `useless' category because it wouldn't
work when we were sitting on top of the magnetic pole. He was shot down by
a know-it-all fake-boobed bimbo named Traci who took over the group and
started bossing everyone around. Three or four of us paid attention to
Patrick, but we were outvoted and in the end everyone died. I, of course,
didn't take the game seriously, and when we turned in our cards and mine
stated `make a raft out of breast implants and float to safety', thereby
putting the bossy Traci in her place, I derived some scorn from the group
but made an eternal friend in Patrick, who came up to me later and thanked
me. We'd been fast friends ever since.

Patrick continues talking while I reminisce about better days, "And then as
we got to know one another, I found out you liked reading and architecture
and cooking, and those are things I was interested in. But that sets us
apart a little, because they're not necessarily what your typical 16-year
old thinks about. And that's when I started to realize you're
different...well, maybe different isn't the best word...that's when I
realized you're, hmm, an individual, and that made me like you more because
it's always easier to try and fit in than to stand out as unique.

"But you've always stood out, Devon, with your hair-color-of-the-month and
neon t-shirts, and as we got to be better friends, I realized that I was
never going to be able to guess what you'd do next. One moment I'd think I
had you pegged, then you'd come home and tell everyone you had started a
dodge ball league. Or that you were going to learn how to make soufflés.

"You know me, I read a lot, and I had to consider that as, hmm,
quirky?...no, maybe eccentric? Anyway, whatever we'd call it, as unique as
you were, I had to consider that your life could go in any one of a million
possible directions, and yes, early on I did consider that maybe you could
be homosexual, or at least the kind of guy that would experiment before
making a final decision on that." I shifted uncomfortably in my seat.

"I mean, you're not girly or anything, but definitely a character. And for
a while on Earth I was sure you would come home someday talking about some
boy or other in class, and that a couple of weeks later you'd be dating
him. If you had, I would have been completely excited for you. But you
surprised me again, and when you did come home pining over someone, it was
over a brown-eyed girl down the road. Classic Devon. You proved me wrong
again, and I adopted a whole new opinion of you. Now you're doing it yet
again, because I think the last thing I expected from you tonight is this."
I cringe again. "Not that this is bad, in fact I think it's good that
you're thinking about these things. I thought you were going to want to
talk about something else. I mean, I know you've been having nightmares all
the time, and I was worried something else was wrong, something about being
here. I thought you were going to say you've been contemplating suicide
because you're depressed about earth or something. If all you're concerned
about is that you might start liking boys, that's not a big deal."

"Oh," was my feeble reply.

"Well, ok, it is a big deal," Patrick pattered on, clearly capable of
filling the void with conversation even if I didn't pitch in. For a guy
that was usually quiet, he had a lot to say tonight, "It's a big deal
because it means you're finding your way, learning about yourself, which is
something a healthy teenager should be able to do. Sometimes I get scared
that living like this -- all of us crammed in this metal ship in space --
will mean we can't have normal lives, but here you are being as normal as
you possibly can. You're growing up -- like how you took your natural
talents and found a job here that suits you. That took a certain amount of
confidence and maturity. Maybe figuring out your sexuality is another step
you need to take right now. You're clearly upset about this process, and
growing up can be painful at times, but I think you need to understand that
what you're going through is a good thing. And not something to fear or
blame on our weird situation. I don't think you're starting to like boys
because of being on this ship, I think you're finding out you like them
despite being here."

I thought about this last part. He was probably right. I had, after all,
started down this path before we left earth, and had the catastrophe never
happened, I have to admit I'd probably still be curious about guys. Putting
it in that perspective, I started to think that maybe talking to Patrick
was a good idea. He clearly had some insight that I lacked, even after
weeks of wandering around the hallways mulling these things over in my
head.

"Maybe," I answered, "but the thing is, I'm not worried that much about
whether I'm gay or not. I mean, I am a little, but the I'm not, you know?
I'm more scared that if I am I'll lose my friends."

Patrick then did something completely unexpected and wrapped his arm around
my shoulder. This was completely out of character for him -- I don't think
he'd ever hugged me or even shook my hand in the year I'd known him. He was
one of those guys that was physically distant, and one whose personal space
I always instinctively respected. It was comforting to have him close now,
but also a little awkward.

"Devon, look, I wish I could tell you that no matter what you decide to do
with your life everyone would be ok with it. I've already told you that I
am, but I'm the only person I can vouch for. You know how it is, how it's
always been. Gays are equal and accepted, but that's the big picture. In
the `real world', teenagers have a lot of emotions wrapped up in their
personal identities; I don't know how everyone will react if you announce
that you're going to start dating guys. Most people will probably be fine
with it, but on the other hand you'll probably see some difference in the
way you're treated. Like, for example, you might have a friend you play
rugby with all the time, and before you might always grab a shower together
afterwards. If you come out as gay, you might notice that all of a sudden
that changes. Maybe you notice he starts heading back to his room to
shower. Most people our age, and especially most people at our education
level, are absolutely fine with homosexuality, and in this scenario you
might be tempted to think this hypothetical friend is one guy that
isn't. But maybe that's not true. Maybe your friendship changes because
even though he's fine with gays, he's scared of being labeled as
such. Maybe he's afraid that if people start thinking he's with you, he'll
lose his friends, the same way you're afraid right now. Fear is a really
powerful thing, especially when it comes to sex and teenagers. When you
think about it, maybe all of adolescence is about overcoming our fear. So
anyway, my point is that I want you to understand that I will support you
one-hundred percent, and I'm sure your close friends will as well, but you
also have to prepare yourself that being openly gay or bisexual may mean
that some things change. Some for the better, some not so much. But I think
guys coming out on this ship is something we all need to get used to."

I didn't quite get what he meant. "Get used to?"

"Yeah. I mean, think about it. Approximately 2.3% of the population is
outright homosexual, and another 4.4% is bisexual. We're on a ship with
what? Six thousand people?"

"Five-thousand nine-hundred forty three," I correct him. Patrick loves
numbers, and I assume he'll appreciate the factoid.

"Ok, yeah, so let's just round up so I can do the math in my head. With
those numbers, if all the homo- and bi-sexuals end up going after guys,
that's like four hundred gay guys on board. So it's not like you're
alone. And then we have to consider the portion of the population that will
choose to live a gay lifestyle even if it's not their inclination, just
because people our age are a little more flexible, and we're also more
hormonal, so for a lot of people it may be preferable to celibacy. I have
no idea how to estimate how much of the population will adopt homosexuality
as long as we're in this situation, but I've thought about it. I supposed I
could do research on all-male communities historically. Or maybe in prison
populations. Or maybe..."

"Enough, Enough. Uncle!" Patrick usually figures out a way to turn any
conversation towards math and research, and somehow I'm not surprised that
this conversation heads in the same direction. Calling uncle is our inside
joke about him being too scientific for me. He's predictable, and it's one
of the things I love about him. Realizing this makes me chuckle...well,
normally I would have chuckled, but all the nervous energy and adrenaline
makes it come out more a silly giggle.

"Sorry," he replies, "you know how I get. The perpetual nerd."

"I know, I know. It's what we like about you." He's kept his arm around me,
and almost unconsciously I lay my head on his shoulder, feeling somehow
that this contact will convey my appreciation for him as a friend. He
doesn't move away or flinch, and I take this as a sign that he's either ok
with the physical contact or too concerned about me to push me away. Not
that he has anything to worry about. Patrick is a good looking guy, but
he's a friend and that's all I'd ever think of him as. In fact, it was hard
to imagine him being sexual with anyone.

"Um, but I guess we should maybe talk about what's been going on with
you. I mean, you wanted to talk, and here I've been babbling and being a
total geek. If you want, I'd like to hear about why you suddenly think
you're gay."

And somehow, sitting here with one of my best friends, the surge of
adrenaline and nerves past, I feel like I can talk about anything with this
guy. And I do. I tell him everything -- I tell him about accidentally
spying on Sean and Dog and how that made me wonder about sex with other
guys, and I even sheepishly tell him I got off on it; I explain about
trying to find other guys fooling around and how I ended up seeing Mike and
Chris masturbating (albeit separately), and then the late night tomfoolery
with the drunken Charlie and the phantom wanker who spied on me and then
later returned to jerk me off in the medical bay. I censor out the part
about looking up Reid's shorts, but I do honestly talk about looking at all
the guys in my life in a new light and wondering what it would be like to
go to bed with a fair number of them. By the end I feel like I pretty big
pervert, actually, although I'm also relieved to have it all off my
chest. I eventually stop talking, and we just sit there for a moment before
I pitch in again. "So, I guess some of that may have you rethinking the
no-judging thing, huh?"

"Nope, sorry kid, you're stuck with me." He shifts and pulls out from under
my head, turning to face me with a serious expression on his face, "But
look, Devon, if I'm not going to judge you, can I at least talk with you
honestly about this? I mean, even if it means giving you some advice you
might not like to hear? You never have to take it, but I think I should say
it."

It seems like a fair bargain. "Yeah, of course. What is it?"

"Well, the thing is, I wonder if maybe you should think about your
experimenting. Some of the stuff you just told me about seems a little,
hmm, I don't know, dangerous maybe? Spying on Sean and - what did you say
his name is? Dog? -- spying on them was an accident, but even if it was
they might not appreciate being watched. And I know Chris wouldn't. If you
haven't noticed, this whole being in space end-of-the-world thing has made
him a little crazy and on-edge. He gets angry about everything, and I can't
say what he'd do if he caught you, erm, beating off to him beating off. And
Charlie is pretty fragile lately. He might like you jerking him off, but it
might also push him over the edge..."

"I know, I know. God, I've been such an idiot. Running around, scared of
you guys and then acting like a weirdo." I put my head in my hands, a
little ashamed.

"No, don't start that. I don't mean to chastise you. I just think that all
of that was part of you figuring out what you want in life, and maybe now
that you seem to know you can experiment in ways that are a little more,
hmm...mutually voluntary?"

"Yeah, yeah..."

"No, hey, don't be sarcastic. What I'm saying is that you should go out and
find another gay boy and experiment to your heart's content. Hell, go out
and fuck all four hundred of them," I laugh out loud at his
uncharacteristic profanity, "but I think it would be advisable to knock off
the non-consensual stuff. I'd hate for that to come back to haunt you."

"Yeah, you're right, and I'm being serious now. Talking with you, I realize
that I've been scared to go out and try anything. I mean, how do you walk
up to a dude and say `hey, want to go to bed together and see what
happens?' That's really scary, and I think I've been hiding from that by
doing all this spy shit, and it needs to stop. I promise, no more peeping
tom stuff. And for real this time."

"Good, I'm glad to hear it. But I also want to talk to you about the whole
scanner thing. This other guy seems kinda creepy. It concerns me. I mean,
he's following you around. Doesn't that bother you?"

"Well, you know, yeah, maybe. But I'm not sure. It was a little weird at
first, having the guy spy on me and Charlie and then come track me
down. But you know, he's really just doing exactly what I was doing to
other people, and it was fun to have him mess with me, you know, like
exciting in a way I'd never thought of before. It doesn't bother me."

"Well," Patrick replies, "if you're sure it doesn't bug you. Still, it
doesn't seem like that's something really healthy to pursue. I'd tend to
recommend finding someone you can be open with and get to know each other
and explore things together. Like in the same room and not on opposite
sides of a vent."

"Oh, ha ha, very funny." I guess I deserved that.

"Don't worry, we'll find you a hot not-co-ed and then I'm guessing we'll
never hear from you again. Hey, Reid is available, what about him?" It was
a joke, but one that hit in just the wrong spot. My heart thumped a double
beat in my chest and somehow I could sense that I had just gone pale. It's
especially weird since Reid is sleeping in the next room, which all of a
sudden is almost terrifying for some reason.

"Um..."

"Look, god Devon, don't be so freaking sensitive. I was just kidding." He
drops into a hushed whisper, "But I know you have a crush on him, whether
it's an `I want to be like you' or an `I want to bed you' crush. And don't
worry, I'm sure he doesn't know. Just me, because I watch people. But even
if you tell him everything you told me tonight, you know that he'll be your
friend no matter what you do with your life, just like you know you'd
always support him no matter what."

"Yeah," I replied thoughtfully and then pondered for a second how I'd
handle the whole Reid thing. I didn't feel like I had the balls to outright
talk with him about it like I had with Patrick, but then I also felt like I
needed to let him in on the situation lest he find out some other way and
feel betrayed. Then an idea struck me. "Hey, Patrick, can I ask you for a
favor? Do you think maybe you could talk to Reid for me? Like, you know,
don't tell him all the details and pervert stuff, but maybe bring up the
gay thing casually? You guys have been friends for a lot longer than I
have, and I think it would help if I didn't have to tell him from scratch."

Patrick pondered for a second before replying. When he did, I could tell he
was really uncertain and a little uncomfortable with my request. "Jeez,
Devon, I don't know. I mean, you know I'll do anything for you, but I don't
think that would work out that well. You could go tell him now. Or tomorrow
morning."

But I don't like those options. I like the idea of Patrick breaking the
ice, and I quickly formulate a plan.

"No, hey, look. Here's the deal. Tomorrow we have that big party, and
you'll be hanging out with him all day helping with the preparations,
right? So maybe when you have a moment you bring up that you think I might
be, well, you know, and see how he takes it. If he seems cool, then fill
him in a little more (but again, leave out the perverted stuff) and then he
and I can talk right after the party. I want him to know too - I mean,
we're best friends and I'd never keep something this big from him, but
there's no way I can approach him and just start talking about this
stuff. What he thinks about me means a lot, and if he responded negatively,
and you have to admit that's a possibility, it would kill me. I mean, I
don't think I could take it. So c'mon, please talk to him?"

He thinks about it while I stare imploringly at him. "Yeah, yeah, ok look
Devon. I think it's a bad idea, and it feels kind of like you're asking me
to gossip about you, albeit with your permission. But if it's that big a
deal to you, I'll feel him out and if, like you say, he's cool, then I'll
tell him more. But then you have to promise to take it from there. I don't
want any weirdness because of this."

"Definitely," I agree, "No weirdness. Right after the party, I'll talk to
him and then we can get past all this. You have no idea what that would
mean to me. I've been scared of what others would think if I were gay, yes,
but mostly freaked about the two of you. I feel like throwing up all the
time, I can't sleep. I mean, even before most everything else in my life
blew up you two were my best friends, and with everything else gone the
idea of losing you has been terrifying. I think that's why I've been such a
weirdo, now that I think about it."

He stands up, putting his hand on my shoulder, "Yeah, you mean a lot to me
too. And I'll talk to Reid, I promise, and I promise everything will turn
out ok. But for now I have to go to bed. I'm sorry, but I am exhausted. You
have no idea how much dirt I hauled around today." And with that we said
our good nights and Patrick slumped off to bed, his fatigue evident in his
belabored stride. I sat up for another two hours, replaying my conversation
with Patrick in my head over and over. He had made a lot of good points,
and I needed to think about them. He'd also taken things really well. Maybe
everything would work out and things could be just like before. Maybe I
could have Patrick and Reid as best friends and go out and find a boyfriend
from the supposed four-hundred candidates. When I finally turn in, I fall
asleep immediately, cocooned in my covers and warmed from a mote of happy,
joyous hope deep within.

Little did I know, the following day things would begin to fall apart, and
in more ways than one.


ii

The next morning, I wake up early to an overly bright room shining with
simulated sunlight. I hide under my covers for a few minutes, reluctant to
give up my cozy warm spot and not wanting to face the fully lit room. Once
my eyes do adjust, which takes a painful couple of minutes, I discover that
I'm the last one in the room to get up, and when I finally drag myself to
the bathroom to pee and shower, the whole flat seems empty. Jeez, everyone
must be excited about this party to be up and out at freaking dawn.

As I shower, I thought about the day before -- the weird incident in the
medical bay and then my long conversation with Patrick. In classic `Devon
style', it wasn't long before doubt begins to creep up into my stomach and
make me feel a little nauseous. I'd talked to Patrick, and that turned out
great. So I was happy about that, but then I had to go and do something
stupid and ask him to talk to Reid for me, and I honestly had no idea how
Reid would take things. And that's what was bothering me now, and why my
plan was stupid. For all I know, Patrick has already talked to him. Or
maybe he hasn't -- maybe he won't. Now the whole Reid thing is like some
obnoxious time bomb, and I imagine a variety of scenarios, one of which
envisions Reid storming into the dorm, punching me, and telling me to never
talk to him again. That gets my stomach acid churning, and then two seconds
later I imagine scenario number two, which has Reid storming in to push his
hands down my pants. That fantasy gets my hormones churning, and here it is
barely eight a.m. and I'm nervous, about to throw up, horny and boning
up. Ugh. Life as a gay teenager in space.

Out and about, the ship is alive and buzzing, particularly for a Sunday
morning. I guess everyone is excited about the party tonight. It was only
announced three days ago, but it's pretty much all every has talked about
since Captain Bianchi popped up on the intercom system and told us we'd be
having a special celebration for our hundredth day in space.

The Commons is totally packed, especially the main lobby. I run into Jacob,
Nick and Ian there -- they're playing wall-z, an electronic game we
discovered on the ship that had become quite popular. Between rounds of
throwing brightly glowing orbs at one another, they tell me Reid and
Patrick and some of the other guys had already headed down to the Rear
Observation Deck to assist in setting up. I knew they'd be there all day,
right up to the party, and I needed to get to work anyway, so I declined an
invitation for a couple rounds of wall-z and headed over to the cafeteria,
although I do take a second to take in how alluringly Ian's t-shirt clings
to his lanky frame since it's all soaked in sweat. But then he almost
catches me looking at him and I take off awkwardly. `No more spying, no
more spying,' I tell myself along the way.

I was actually looking forward to work today -- we were getting to cook
with some actual food for once. Captain Bianchi had authorized us to use
some of the frozen stores, as well as some of the fresh fruits and
vegetables that the ship's gardens were starting to produce. So although we
had limited supplies, we at least had some leeway to get creative and come
up with something for the party.

When I get to the main kitchen, I find that Zane is already hard at work,
his floppy hair concealed under his usual faded ballcap. And the guy isn't
scheduled for another hour. Good grief, does this party have everyone
hyped? Zane's never shown up for work on time, let alone early. We partner
up right away, partially because we like working together and partially
because we dislike most of our coworkers. Zane explains that he's gathered
up like fifty pounds of fresh tomatoes and that we should figure out how we
want to serve them. I'm pretty sure we could serve them raw -- most of us
have had like one piece of real fruit since coming on board, and I'm sure
they'd be popular no matter what we did to them. However, we want to make
the party special so we brainstorm while prepping. In the end, we decide to
garlic and toast some ration bread and make a bruschetta with it. While
we're dicing the tomatoes, we get into a conversation with some of the
other cooks.

"So, Brian, today's the big day, huh?" Zane poses, grabbing a tomato,
tossing it in the air and catching it before taking it to the knife. Brian
Fervson has been in our training since the first day, and he belongs to an
exclusive group on the ship I usually refer to as `the dicks'. Brian isn't
such a bad guy, but his friends, all upperclassmen, tend to be, well,
dicks. This guy, Steven, is kind of the leader, and somehow when we took
off from earth he felt that his rank should somehow be preserved in our new
little microcosm. After all, he and his friends are like three months older
than anyone else, why shouldn't they run the show? Steven and four or five
of his lackeys were the guys who refused to take shit detail, and they're
the ones now finishing up thirty days in the brig. Needless to say,
Steven's ideas of governmental systems in space didn't hold a lot of weight
with Captain Bianchi or the security force. They were slated to get out in
two days, but it had recently become common knowledge that their sentences
had been reduced so that they could attend the party.

Although Brian hadn't refused to work, he was still something of a
dickwad. Brian Fervson had been a business student on earth, and that fact
had probably made him realize the economics of the ship made cooperation
essential. Still, he was arrogant, obnoxious, and had an over-inflated
opinion of himself. He looked a little like a weasel to me, and I always
imagined that if all of this hadn't happened he would have graduated and
taken a position in some corporation laying people off to cut costs or
something. If I had to spend the next eighteen years cleaning toilets, one
of the benefits was that a guy like Brian would too.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever Flynn," Brian rudely retorts, referring to Zane by
his last name, something the dicks seem to do a lot of.

"Hey, I'm jus' saying. It must have been tough these past few weeks, your
boyfriend in jail, no one telling you how to dress and what to say. I'm
surprised you remembered how to zip up your pants. Except, oops, you
didn't." Brian looks down hurriedly and turns his back to everyone in order
to examine his fly. I can't tell if his zipper was really down or not, you
never know with Zane, who is a funny guy, but one who can ruthlessly cruel
in his silliness. Zane loves baiting Brian, and although Brian is reluctant
to get into it with Zane today, eventually the two end up bickering back
and forth while the other fifteen cooks and I prepare the party food. It
makes the time go faster, and as always Brian comes off looking like
something of a jerk.

We finish up after a couple of hours and the head chef sets us all free to
spend the afternoon getting ready for the party. I tell Zane I'll see him
later and head off to hang with Conner for a while. On the way to Conner's
room I pass Sean and Dog in the hall -- you might remember that I once
caught them jerking each other off. Well, I didn't catch them so much as I
watched them. I can't help but imagine that they're coming back from some
afternoon tryst and I have to giggle a little. They look at me curiously as
we pass.

Conner, who challenges me to another round of his racing game as soon as I
enter the door, doesn't have any duties today and has had the whole morning
to himself. Hmm, I wonder what he did with his time? While we play, he asks
me why I smell like oregano and I explain the bruschetta to him. He gets
excited at the prospect of fresh food, and I consider telling him about the
stuffed mushrooms and ham tarts we came up with, but I figure I'll let it
be a surprise.

While we play, one of Conner's flat mates, Eden Stratton comes in. I know
Eden the way everyone knows Eden -- he was associated student body
president at JDU and just about the most popular guy at the school. He
played like four sports, performed violin (and a tad bit better than me, I
can tell you) and was one of those guys everyone liked. At first this made
me hate him, but then when I met him and actually got to know him I
discovered that he was the nicest, most genuine guy in the world. And now
that I was gay, or at least open to experimenting, I had to consider that
he may be the best looking guy in the universe, tall and dark with
perfectly browned flawless skin and these awesome bulging pectorals (I had
never seen him naked up close, but he tossed his shirt off after every
soccer game) and baby blue eyes. He had a smile that could win anyone over
in a half second, and although he didn't need it considering every single
one of his other features was perfect, it sure helped. He even had bushy
eyebrows, and where mine looked a bit stern and untidy, his were perfect
and framed his face so that you knew right away that he was intelligent,
kind and someone you'd want to be friends with.

"Conner, hey, finally taking some time off work, eh?" he asks as he walks
into the room. He's carrying a large box of something, but when he notices
me he puts it down on a nearby table and walks over to the couch, offering
me his hand. "Hey, Devon, right? Good to see you."

We shake hands -- Eden is the kind of guy that shakes hands with just about
everyone every time he enters a room. "Good to see you too," I reply,
making an effort to stop staring at this upperclassman god and trying to
think up some small talk, "So, is that something for tonight?" I nod in the
general direction of the box he'd come in with.

"Nah. Well, I guess sort of. It's actually something for James." By which
he meant Captain Bianchi. He called most people by their first names. He
gets a conspiratorial smile on his face and sits down in the chair next to
the couch. In a hushed tone he leans over and asks us, "Hey, can you two
keep a secret?"

It's the kind of question you have to answer yes to, and we both
immediately agree, which Eden accepts but qualifies with a longer
explanation that rumors have a way of getting around on this ship and that
we absolutely have to keep quiet until after tonight; again we both agree.

"Ok, I trust ya. What I have in here is the last part needed to get the
ship-to-ship working." Conner and I stare back in wide-eyed amazement, not
really knowing what to say to that. Ship-to-ship communication would mean
we could find out who else survived from earth. It would mean finding out
about our families, and there wasn't a passenger on board who didn't think
about that forty times a day.

"You're kidding." I finally manage to say.

Eden smiles hugely and slaps me on my chest. There's a painful tingle where
his hand hits, but also a residual excitement that runs down my spine in a
shiver. "No, I know, wild huh? Once this is installed, we'll be able to
send data packets back and forth, and that should be as soon as I carry
this baby upstairs. It'll be announced at the party. Should be quite a
night."

The problem with ship-to-ship contact was that we were already travelling
at near-light speed, so sending communications back and forth was tricky at
best. Add to that the fact that the explosion and subsequent implosion of
our sun had generated a massive radiation burst, which was now all around
us, moving slightly faster. It wasn't dangerous to us here in the ship, but
for a couple of years sending messages would be like sending a message
between two oceanic vessels by lantern in the middle of a hurricane. Still,
the original DENON "think-tank" had "thought-tonked" of everything, and
there was a plan for fleet communication in place. Over the past three
months, all the ships had been lining up in a huge caravan -- thousands and
thousands of them. Once in place, we could send data packets to the nearest
ship in front of and behind us. The vessels would then begin piggybacking
data up and down the chain in large packets, first priority being a
complete census. We'd never be able to have a live conversation back in
forth between one individual to another, and it would probably be a year
before the lines were freed up for personal or non-essential messages, but
this would at least let us know where all our friends and family were.

We congratulate Eden over his accomplishment -- it would seem he had
figured out how to modify the frequency components to adjust for some
issues the equipment hadn't been designed for and was preventing the system
from working -- and he took his leave to go test his equipment in the
command center. We swore complete and utter silence again as he was
leaving.

The rest of the afternoon passes quickly, and as party hour approaches even
I can't help but get a little excited. We sometimes get everyone together
in the large auditorium up in topside for stuff, but there hasn't been a
social event that included everyone on the ship since we took off. As seven
rolls around, I convince Conner to head down to the commons with me a
little early, my anticipation palpable, and as I get more and more
hyperactive Conner becomes amused and gives in to my request.

We take the long way around, passing up the elevator in lieu for a
leisurely stroll through the upper areas of the ship. Although we pass
someone now and again, for the most part everywhere is deserted, which
would be a little creepy if I didn't know they were all congregating in the
commons. Once we get there, the high overhead dome as spectacular as ever,
we're greeted by the noise of a couple hundred rowdy college guys. There's
an energy in the air, not unlike a pep rally before homecoming. Groups of
ten to fifteen guys are spread around the open space, some of them talking,
some of them playing games of wall-z or cards or just horsing around.

At the rear of the large room is the entrance to the tunnel leading to the
rear observation deck, where the party will be held. Hundreds and hundreds
of people are all crammed into the space in front of the entrance, and as
far as we can make out they aren't letting anyone in yet. They said 7:30,
and it's a little early still. Conner says that it's too crowded and noisy
for his tastes, and I have to agree, although I sure am excited to go
in. We decide that even after they open the door it will be a while before
everyone can filter down the hall, so in the meantime we decide to go hang
out in the library.

As I've said before, The Commons sits in a massive sphere in the exact
center of the ship. The lobby is the half of the sphere facing
`up'. Sitting on the other side in the opposite direction is the
library. It's a little confusing at first, because you'd expect that the
library ceiling would be the floor of the commons lobby. However, the ship
can program any plane to be gravitational `down', so the library actually
faces the opposite direction -- the domed ceiling being the other side of
the sphere and facing `down'. It's a little wacky to take a stairway down
there and come out the other side `upside down', but you get used to it,
and in this case it's only these two huge areas that are off kilter. Some
rooms have both the floor and ceiling programmed to be `gravitational down'
so that you can have people working on both planes. Now that's a little
nauseating!

We take the main stairway that sits next to the main lobby elevators; it's
narrow and twists at an improbable angle, but once we reach the end we've
been `repolarized' so that gravity pulls us towards the floor of the
library. Like the main lobby, the library is a rather stunning space,
although not quite as open. A series of mezzanine floors ring the dome and
extend up to the ceiling, each floor containing stacks of books, amongst
other things. Unlike traditional libraries, the books here are not paper,
but miniature data servers that store information from earth. Books, music,
newspapers. Thousands of years of the human experience lie on the drives
here. There is also a gene bank, as well as a section of works of art from
earth. Most of whatever is left of our home, whatever we managed to save,
is stored in this and a thousand rooms like it.

The library is not as noisy as the lobby, but it seems a lot of guys are
congregating here so it's not exactly quiet either. I run into Peter and
Bronwyn, who are oddly without Chris this evening and causing some trouble
on one of the computer stations. I'm not sure what they're doing exactly,
but it appears to me they're putting together some weird Mip file to send
to Beck to annoy him. From what I can gather, they're mislabeling some lame
light jazz song as one of Beck's favorites and trying to get him to play it
tonight. Ok, that is kind of a funny prank, and I imagine Beck spinning up
some god awful sax cover of a Billy Joel song at the party. That would
irritate him, to be sure.

Right at 7:30 there is a general cheer from upstairs (downstairs?) that we
can hear through the floor, and we take that to mean the doors have
opened. Everyone who had opted to hang out in the library cram up the
narrow stairway back to the lobby, and then we join the crush to get into
the rear observation deck entrance.

The rear observation deck -- the only place you can see out of the ship
through an actual window -- is located in the exact rear of the ship (hence
the name). However, there really aren't any other passenger areas back
there -- pretty much the entire rear third of the ship is taken up by the
two massive Rolls Royce fusion engines that provide the thrust to get up to
near light speed. So, the passage to the deck is a single hallway extending
the 2,500 or so feet from the commons. The entry to the hallway is a large
proscenium arch at the rear of the commons lobby, which is actually one of
my favorite things on the ship. The arch features a gigantic white art deco
carving that depicts the launch of hundreds of ships like the one we're in
now -- they look almost like angels flying upward to heaven and they remind
me of some pictures of Roman statues I've seen in books.

We enter the hallway with a bazillion other people and start the somewhat
lengthy hike to the deck. Unlike most of the halls on the ship, which are
plain and utilitarian, the ship designers went all out on this
space. Although essentially a long steel tube stretching along a radian in
the ship, the walls have been decorated in elaborate mosaics depicting
scenes of earth and our voyage, as well as historic scenes from
earth. They're all done in oranges and blues with contrasting greens and
yellows, and each time I see them I'm reminded of the stained glass windows
in the departure station on that last day of earth. I wonder if the same
artist designed these, and if they did, it makes me happy to think that
some of their work survived the end of the planet.

We opt to walk down the center of the room, which is slow going because of
the crowd, although there is a moving sidewalk to either side that will
shuttle you down the hall a little faster. We pass my favorite mosaic, a
scene of sailors dancing in the streets of New York on V.E. day at the end
of world war two, President Roosevelt (or is it Lyndon Johnson? I can never
remember) looking serenely down at the revelry.

It takes a bit longer to walk the hall than usual tonight, but when we
finally get to the end we emerge from the claustrophobic tunnel into
another of the ship's most spectacular spaces.

The Rear Observation Deck (R.O.D.) is designed to be a multiuse gathering
place. It's essentially just one huge empty room, but on a space ship `big
and empty' is something of a novelty. The room is over eighty feet high,
which feels like a lot after walking the packed tunnel. Both the walls and
ceiling are covered with a dark carpet-like material, which helps keep down
the glare as well as filter the sound from the engines (which are currently
offline, but when they're firing it can be loud in here). But the main
feature of the room, and what makes it so special, is the transparent
section of the hull, which stretches over two hundred feet wide and twenty
feet tall along the back wall. It's here that you can look out into the
endless star fields of space, and while the newness of that wore of pretty
quickly after we launched (you can only stare at stars for so long before
they get boring), I still come here every once in a while.

"Remembering launch day?" Conner asks. That first day after we emerged from
our protective lift-off pods (and after Reid and I had paid a first visit
to the sarcastic Dr. Moreno, who patched us up), everyone had gathered here
to watch as we bid our home farewell. Now that I think about it, I'd run
into Conner here, although the pain medications for my broken fingers had
left me a little loopy.

"Yeah, it feels like a million years ago," I reply. That day everyone had
gathered silently, as if at a funeral or wake, and you could hear every
little cough and snuffle in the room.

Today, however, was quite a different picture. The deck, which was normally
kept dim to make the most of the viewing windows, was brightly lit with
holo-laterns that were intermittently erupting and sending showers of
orange and blue sparklers into the crowd. Lasers decorated the large rear
wall of the room in shifting patterns, stopping every couple of seconds on
an animated version of the ship that had the label `EV5997' dancing around
it. Loud music filled the space, echoing off the walls in the deep
thump-thump of electronica. Off to the side of the windows, I could see
Beck in his makeshift dj station. He's volunteered to provide music for the
celebration (of course), and surrounded by holo-copters, a discet ball and
all the flashing lights he could muster, he looked right at home. His
selection for kicking off the evening wasn't exactly dance music, but it
had a funky groove and added to the positive energy of the party.

The room is large enough to hold everyone comfortably, although it's
packed, and I'd guess just about everyone opted to attend. There's a large
dance floor in the center where several hundred people have started working
off some of the excess energy that gets pent up being on a space ship,
although the majority of the partygoers have congregated in small groups
throughout the room. We wind our way through, saying hello to the friends
and colleagues we run into here and there.

There's a large square object off to the side of the room covered by a
tarp, and I wonder what it could be briefly before spotting Reid and
Patrick working next to it. They'd been drafted into helping set up for the
party, and I have to say they did a bang-up job, although I wasn't sure
what they were working on now. I wave to them across the room and they both
look up, Reid giving me an odd look that seems somehow curious and cross at
the same time. Although I'm excited to be at the party, instantly I get
that old sinking feeling in my stomach and wonder if Patrick has talked to
him. Well, of course he has, he promised he would, and now I had to
consider that the next time we talked in private it would have to be about
my blossoming sexuality. Well, I think to myself, no need to worry about
that now, I'll run into him after the party and straighten things
out. Besides, he's probably just busy, that's probably why he looks
flustered.

In the meantime, Conner and I check out the refreshments table -- partially
my proud creation. I'm happy to see that people are wolfing down most of
the appetizers. Like I said, there haven't been that much `real food' since
liftoff, so I'm sure their excitement doesn't indicate much about the
quality of the cooking. But when Conner tries a slice of my bruschetta and
comments on how delicious it is, I beam a little.

Suddenly a pair of strong arms are wrapped around my neck and holding me in
a makeshift wrestling lock. I struggle at first before hearing, "Is Devon
taking credit for my cooking again, the little punk?" It's the familiar
voice of Zane, who is surprisingly strong actually.

"Hey, I came up with them too," I laugh, struggling out of Zane's hold and
punching him lightly in the kidney.

"Ok, ok!" he squeals, "Easy there, let's go with co-creators on this one."

"Deal," I extend my hand and we shake. Conner is standing there with a
confused look on his face, munching on his food. I introduce him to Zane
and explain about the afternoon's cooking experiments. He warmly
compliments Zane on the grub as well.

It's while we're sharing small talk about the food that the newly released
Dicks make their grand entrance, an event that instantly captures the
attention of everyone in the room, as if we all sensed a disquieting
metamorphosis as soon as they crossed the threshold from the entrance
tunnel.

In front was Steven Caine, the leader of the little coup, who after liftoff
so eloquently stated his case that he and his group should have their pick
of quarters, jobs and pretty much everything else on the ship due to their
seniority. Like every pundit and special interest and politico that had
come before, he had a myriad of reasons why a hierarchy should be
immediately established and why he should be at the top. When the crew had
explained marshall law to him he'd gotten several of his buddies to go on
strike and refuse to work some of the shit details. This eventually got
worse, with Steven's followers passing up any job they viewed as `beneath
them', and after about two months in space they had succeeded in becoming a
pretty big nuisance. Considering that the crew needed everyone's help to
ensure our survival following the evacuation, they had rounded up Steven
and his lackeys and sentenced them all to a month in the brig. They'd been
let out this afternoon.

I see that none of his sycophantic turd-eating friends have abandoned him
after their incarceration -- they all march in with him, smug grins on all
of their faces. Johns Rockwell, Sandor Lewis, Paul Eigeberg, even Brian,
who didn't join the revolt and end up in jail, is with him. Wonderful.

The crowd kind of parts to let them through. There is a general animosity
towards these guys -- after all, any jobs they refused to do had to be
picked up by us. In general, I get the sense that Steven thinks we've
fallen for the argument that his actions were supposed to benefit everyone,
even though it's blatantly obvious his own self-interest was at the heart
of his lame revolt. He's not going to find many fans here tonight, and as
they make their way past more than a few cold stares you can see doubt
creep onto their faces.

They head over to the food table, much to my chagrin, and Steven picks up
one of the stuffed mushrooms we'd made that afternoon, eyeing it dubiously.

"Who's responsible for this food? It looks like shit." he asks. I know I
shouldn't care what he thinks because he's a total cum wad, but I still get
instantly defensive about my cooking. Still, I'm not really going to
confront the guy.

"Well, you clearly aren't," a voice chimes in behind me, "since you've been
spending the last thirty days sucking your boyfriend's ass."I turn to see
Chris scowling at the obnoxious Steven, and although I can't get behind the
mildly bigoted and nasty remark, I smile at his brashness. He gives me a
small nod back. He's accompanied by Peter and Bronwyn, his ever-present
posse, as well as Arlo Johnson, Grant Scathman and Diego Redosa, three
other guys from our flat who spend more than a little time lifting weights
in the gym with Chris and company.

Steven eyes them for a second, clearly judging whether to make a comeback,
start a fight or let it go. Perhaps tempered by the time in the brig, he
drops it. "Yeah, well, it sucks."

"But not half as bad as you," Zane retorts, which gets a general laugh from
everyone around (even though it's not overly witty).

Steven is a jerk, but he's not dumb, and he knows that the general opinion
of him is low. "Whatever," he sneers, slinking off with his entourage.

"Well, that was tense," Zane says, pointing out the obvious. As usually, he
draws a laugh from the crowd and the atmosphere around the table lightens
significantly.

A little while later I'm talking to some of the farm coordinators about the
progress with the crops when I spot Reid over by the dance floor. My
stomach is instantly in knots again, and I consider walking the other
direction, but something about the past couple of days has made me want to
be a little more mature, so I decide to talk to him. Whether Patrick has
told him anything or not, and whether he accepts it or not, he's still my
friend.

"Hey," I say cordially, "You guys did a killer job in here. It looks
awesome."

He shifts around a little nervously, looking this way and that. Ok, well
that's a dead giveaway that something's up, and I'm pretty sure I know
what's on his mind. "Yeah, thanks," he replies quietly. Something off to
the side of the room seems to catch his attention, or at least it seems a
lot more interesting to him than I am right now. "Hey, look, I have to go
do something. See you later?"

"Yeah. Hey, wanna get together after the party?" I ask. It's kind of a lame
question, considering that we live together and everything. Still, like
Patrick advised, we need to talk soon so that things don't get
awkward. Well, more awkward than they already are.

"Uh, maybe. I don't know, but maybe," he quickly replies before heading
off. What the hell? He was all tense, and I have no idea what that's
about. Well, ok, I do, but I was hoping he'd react better than avoiding me
and making up some lame excuse to ditch me. That more than anything pisses
me off, and I consider going after him and having the whole fucking
horrendous conversation right here, right now. Yeah Reid, I'm attracted to
guys, what the fuck is it to you? And I actually start walking after him
when all of a sudden the music stops and the lights come up a
little. Everyone stops what they're doing and turns to the front of the
room to see Captain James Bianchi taking the stage. Well, there's no stage
really, but he has a mike and makeshift podium. Reid ducks off to the side
of the room and I end up trapped in a compact group of guys.

"HELLO!" his voice booms into the room at about ten times the necessary
volume. He gives Beck a scolding look, who shrugs comically and makes and
adjustment on his board. When he begins speaking again it's at a more
appropriate level, "Er, hello. I just wanted to welcome you all here
tonight and say that this social event..."

"PARTY!" Someone yells from the back of the crowd, resulting in a murmur of
laughter throughout the deck.

"Yes, well, this party," Captain Bianchi continues, "is being thrown for a
couple of reasons. First and foremost, we have now been in space for
one-hundred days, and although there is a long journey ahead of us, we have
made it successfully through the most dangerous part of our voyage -- our
exodus." Mild clapping fills the chamber.

"Secondly, I wanted to take the time to reward all of you for your hard
work. As you know, there were less than 100 crew members when we took off
from earth, hardly enough to keep a ship like this running. Today, I'm
happy to say that I consider each and every one of you a valued member of
my team." Another round of polite applause.

"And while I have you here, I wanted to mention the significant
contributions made this afternoon by one of your shipmates. Aden, are you
in here somewhere?" Everyone mumbles and looks around for a second before
someone spots him in the center of the room. "Ah, there you are. Could you
come up here a minute?"

Aden shakes his head, but the crowd pushes him forward nonetheless until
he's standing at the front of the room next to the captain. He awkwardly
smiles and waves to the large crowd. Captain Bianchi puts his burly hand
around Aden's shoulder, as if the two are fast friends. "This young man,
you will all be happy to know, has successfully repaired a modulator
problem we were having with the com system, and as of about an hour ago,
his efforts have resulted in the establishment of ship-to-ship
communication. We are now broadcasting and receiving."

It takes a moment for the news to register, but when it does the reaction
to the announcement is instant, excited and noisy. All at once about five
thousand college kids let out an ear-deafening roar, filling the chamber
with cheers and hoo-rays and applause. Beck adds to the effect with a
little trumpet riff on his keyboard.

Captain Bianchi goes on to explain what we all already know -- that data
will begin pouring through the com system shortly and that lists of
survivors on other ships will become available. He has to stop every two
minutes to wait for the applause to die down again, but he doesn't seem at
all annoyed by our excitement, grinning widely at the group. It's a good
day for us all.

To finish his speech on a high note, he announces that a large portion of
the alcohol reserves have been ear-marked for the party tonight, and with
great panache a couple of guys pull a large tarp off the mystery shape on
the side of the room to reveal a fully stocked bar. This off course gets
another round of rowdy cheers, which Captain Bianchi takes advantage of to
wave to the crowd and take his leave, but not before inviting us to all get
completely hammered (I supposed a father figure would have asked us to be
responsible, but he is a sailor after all).

But I'm not amused by the speech, and even the announcement that the
communications system is now operational can't lift my spirits. All through
the announcements I keep thinking about Reid and how his whole attitude
towards me changed after one little conversation with Patrick. I mean, Reid
is my best friend. I don't know, maybe I messed things up by sending
Patrick to break the ice and not telling him outright myself. Or maybe,
like Patrick said might happen with some people, Reid is one of those guys
whose identity is so wrapped up in who they hang out with and who they
sleep with that being associated with a gay guy is too much for them. Maybe
after tonight we wouldn't be friends any more.

And so, what should have been the best night on the ship ever quickly turns
sour, and I find myself mulling over past conversations and hypothetical
future conversations with Reid and hypothetical past conversations about
future conversations, each one echoing around in my skull and making me
more and more worried about things, each one presenting a new possible
outcome to this situation, and each one progressively worse than the last.

I don't know if anyone else does this, but sometimes when presented with
really annoying personal issues I get all obsessed and can't stop thinking
about them. It happened one time when I got an F in history and had to tell
my parents. I almost gave myself a heart attack in the three hours I had to
contemplate things. I knew that I was going to be messed up all night, and
that in the end I would probably end up awake at six am feeling like a
strung out junkie who'd just had forty-three cups of coffee and a shot of
heroin, and I'd probably puke once or twice between now and then, just as
soon as my stomach acid had time to eat into the lining of my innards. To
prevent this, and to stop my worries about Reid from continuing their
horrid cycle through my skull, I decided to turn to the one thing that had
been helping adolescents through their problems for hundreds of years.

Alcohol.

Yep, perhaps not the wisest decision, but then again, neither was wrecking
your whole life by telling your friends you were going gay. Not really
caring, I walk over to the bar and order a shot of vodka, which I quickly
down, ordering another. I down that and two more in the space of five
minutes, which again wasn't the best idea, but I was starting to understand
the phrase `drown your troubles'. I was about to get another when someone
taps me on the shoulder.

I turn around grumpily to see Charlie standing behind me. "When he said to
go get drunk, I don't think he meant right away."

"Yeah, whatever Charlie, go away," I brush him off rudely. I like the guy,
but I kind of want to be alone right now. And hey, besides, it's kind of
Charlie's fault I'm in this mess. Well, not really, but I figure I can
reasonably lump some of the blame on him.

He looks genuinely hurt and tersely responds, "Well you don't have to be
such an asshole, I just wanted to say hi."

Charlie always has a hurt puppy dog look about him, particularly right now,
and I feel bad about snapping at him. He's about to leave, but I stop him,
"Look, Charlie, I'm sorry. I'm just having a really crappy time."

"Yeah," he sighs, "me too. You know, usually I hang out with Beck, but he's
stuck behind that stupid music machine, and I think he'll be there all
night. I told him to just program the a.i. to DJ, but he says there's no
substitute for a live jockey. Hey, I have an idea..."

I turn my head towards him, my vision streaking a little, and I realize
that all four vodka shots are hitting my bloodstream at once. "Yeah?"

"Well, if you're looking to get wasted, you can either do it here, puke in
front of everyone, and wind up looking like a total retard, or we can go
hang out upstairs. I have some good stuff, and I don't judge when someone
passes out in a puddle of puke."

I considered those alternatives and had to admit that leaving sounded like
a good idea. On the other hand, I was supposed to talk with Reid
tonight. Wait a minute, I thought, getting increasingly drunk as time went
by, Reid was the whole reason I was in a bad mood to start with. If he
wanted to be all weird and manly and homophobic around me, let him. I
didn't have to listen to his excuses on his schedule, there would be pretty
of time to hear his b.s. later. Suddenly the whole party is spoiled for me,
and I find that I do want to leave.

"Yeah, you know what, you're right. Let's go do that." Charlie smiles at my
answer. He doesn't have a lot of friends on board, and I can tell he's a
little uncomfortable hanging out in a room with five thousand reminders of
that.

And so, as with many guys exiting parties throughout the ages, we'd entered
in high spirits looking for the time of our lives, and ended up leaving
angry, depressed, and a little too drunk.


iii

I expect Charlie to take me back to our room in SEC 23, but instead we make
our way back to the unused dorm area in section twenty-four, to the same
room where three nights earlier I had gone to `rescue' the inebriated
Charlie and ended up jacking him off, although due to his intoxication he
didn't seem to remember anything.

The empty flat is still stale, creepily empty and devoid of life, but now
it has a familiarity for me, and I guess a sentimentality. This is, after
all, the scene of my first boy-on-boy encounter, one-sided though it was,
and also the place where the phantom wanker, my tattooed stalker, had first
spied on me. After entering the flat I head to `B' room, the counterpart to
Charlie's room downstairs, which is where I found him last week.

He stops me as I enter the door. "No, hey, over here," he points to `E'
room. The flats are shaped like a horseshoe, with two rooms on either side
and one at the end. The end room is generally more desirable, as the beds
are slightly larger and there are less of them. Four guys, Arlo, Grant,
Mark and Micuel, all upperclassmen, share the E room in our flat. Charlie
opens the door for me, and when I enter the dark room I notice a couple of
things. First, it's considerably warmer than the rest of the section, which
is not temperature controlled for habitation since no one lives
here. Secondly, the stale smell is gone.

Charlie flips on a light and I see why. Someone, presumably Charlie, has
decorated the room and turned it into something of a private sanctuary. The
upper bunks, and in fact all the bunks on the west wall, have been
permanently stowed, opening the room up significantly. Where they would
normally protrude from the wall several black and white framed photographs
hang -- all of them seem to be scenes from oceanic and Mediterranean
climates, but they're artistic, not tacky tourist snaps. One bunk has been
left out, and is made with cotton sheets and a big fluffy blue
comforter. And perhaps most conspicuously, the rear bunk has been left
down, but the mattress and sheets removed. Bottles, cans and glasses sit
out in rows -- I laugh a little out loud -- it's a makeshift bar. So this
is where he stores all his liquor. I also notice that he's placed a large
framed photograph on the hatch to the emergency access tunnels. It doesn't
completely cover the door, but it does hang over the ven
 t, which should prevent any repeat of last week's spying incident.

"Nice," I say, making a beeline for the large bottle of vodka sitting
prominently on the bunk-bar.

Even though I'm referring to the alcohol, Charlie takes my comment to mean
the place. "Thanks. This is where I come when things get, you know, too
much. I used to sit down here in the cold, then I figured, why not decorate
it? It's a good place to come and think."

If I'd been sober, I probably would have picked up on Charlie's sullen
attitude, and wondered why he'd want to spend time in an uninhabited dorm
alone. But I wasn't sober, and as I poured myself another drink (which I
didn't really need), I became significantly more carefree and happy than I
had been at the party and started talking about silly stuff. Charlie seemed
happy to comply, and immediately popped out of his dour mood as well. We
talked about where he got all the alcohol (the stores, which seemed
obvious) and where the photographs had come from (they were a collection he
had `borrowed' from the library. Hey, as long as we were stuck on this
boat, he says, we might as well get to look at the treasures we're
transporting across the galaxy).

Ah, Charlie was a good friend, and as often occurs when one is drunk, he
quickly became my best friend. And I loved him. I loved him for sitting
around talking about art and booze with me, and I loved him for being the
vulnerable little lonely cutie that he was. I loved him for having a
crooked smile and for being somehow simultaneously childish and mature. It
was like he was too young to take care of himself or tie his own shoes, but
he also had a wisdom about things that seemed beyond his years. Like the
party. If he'd left me there, he was right, I would have puked and caused a
scene and had to become a hermit until the shame wore off. But he knew I
needed to leave, and now I realize he took me out just in time. I wasn't
grown up enough to know it was time for me to go, but this kid was. But
then, he's not a kid, and I make a note to stop thinking of him as
such. After all, he's only like four months younger than me.

We'd been talking for a while, and it was a good couple of hours, when I
had to let out a groan. Charlie, concerned, asked me what was wrong. I had
to admit to him that a vodka migraine had crept up on me.

A `vodka migraine' is my term for the
grey-matter-in-a-vice-kicked-in-the-balls-nuclear-explosion headaches I
sometimes get when I drink. I don't usually get sloppy fall-down be sick
everywhere drunk, but I do often get headaches that feel like the end of
the world. They usually start with the room spinning, which it was, only I
hadn't noticed because we'd been chatting, and now it was like world war
three was going off in my skull.

xes

"Here, come over here," Charlie suggests, sitting down on the large double
bunk. I look at him questioningly, squinting a little as my headache takes
full effect. "I know an old remedy that might work. Lie down next to me."

Under normal circumstances I might hesitate lying next to him, if for no
other reason than the fact that I might get a boner and offend him, but I'm
in extreme pain and still a little drunk, and I figure whatever he can do
to make the headache go away might save me from cerebral hemorrhage, which
is what it feels like is about to happen.

So I lie down on the bed and he guides me into a position with me on my
back, my head in his lap. "I drink a lot," he explains, "and this seems to
help stop the headaches." I consider telling him that what would really
stop the headache is a shot of morphine, but before I can say anything he
reaches down and puts his hands on either side of my temple, massaging
deeply with his forefingers into the soft tissue there. It hurts a little
at first, but it also feels like it's relieving some of the pressure. Hmm,
maybe he does know a thing or two about drunken headaches. I close my eyes
and try to concentrate on stopping the room from spinning, something I have
limited success with.

I'd been lying in that position for who knows how long, maybe a half hour,
maybe longer, Charlie massaging either side of my temple with varying
degrees of pressure, and I have to admit it was helping. Once my headache
started to abate I returned from semi-consciousness. The room was no longer
spinning out of control, and the threat of nausea was slowly
fading. However, I couldn't help but notice that his hip bone was
uncomfortably digging into the bump in the back of my skull, so I shift
position a little and moved my head further down into his lap. I was
worried that he might be offended by my being such a baby, and in
particular a lightweight with the vodka, but he just smiles his cute
crooked smile at me and continues rubbing my head.

We chatted a bit about the party and other inconsequential things; how
Charlie had taken to spending afternoons in one of the garden bays and how
it was maturing nicely. It was warm and humid there and he tell me it
reminds him a little of home. I talked about how I sometimes went to the
wet farms to see the dolphins, and that sometimes I would pretend I was
back on earth at the pier in San Diego staring out into the Pacific
Ocean. It was the kind of talk you share when a little drunk, uninhibited
and romanticized; talk that might be too embarrassing to share under other
circumstances, but which seemed perfectly socially acceptable under the
warm glow of one too many shots. We both missed earth, and the conversation
made me realize that Charlie and I were quite alike in many ways. We seemed
to miss the same kinds of things about earth - not so much cheeseburgers
and electronic billboards and racecars, but the quiet green places and the
ocean and the mountains.

That may sound like a sad conversation, and it may have been under other
circumstances, but the alcohol helped remove the melancholy as well as the
inhibitions, and I was actually feeling happy about reminiscing with my
friend. It also got us talking about what the new planet might be
like. Would it be lush and green and tropical, or arid and warm? Would
there be alien animals? Charlie said he'd been studying the stats on all
the possible relocation planets since taking off (there were seven), and
he'd sketched some hypothetical animal life on a drawing pad. I told him
I'd like to see it some time and he smiled down at me again. He'd stopped
rubbing my temples some time ago and had been scratching his fingernails
through my hair, which was having the effect of making me really sleepy. We
weren't drunk at all anymore -- I'm not sure he had been in the first place
-- but the closeness felt comfortable and natural and nice, so I remained
in his lap.

That's when I noticed that I wasn't in the most comfortable position,
either for myself or Charlie. Something from his pocket was pressing into
the back of my head, and I figured it must be pushing into his leg
painfully. It was the stupid metal flask he was always carrying around (the
drunk). I lifted up a little and settled more central in his lap. He kept
talking on about the various hypothetical animals he'd imagined occupy our
new home planet; a bird with a long blue beak that fed on tree mice at
night, and a catlike creature that could hide in the shallow water of
riverbanks waiting for prey. I could still feel the shape in his trousers
against my head, it seemed firmer than it had been before, and I started to
wonder if it was really his flask at all.

That alarmed me a little - I didn't want to embarrass the guy, and I
figured it would if it weren't his flask, but on the other hand I was
really comfortable in this position. And I was pretty certain it was his
flask, so I just stayed there listening to his talk. Surely he would have
moved out from under me if my noggin was lying against his manhood.

Except that curiosity is a problem of mine, as I've said before, and I was
intrigued by the shape in his trousers, so I moved my head around a little,
trying to get a feel for the exact size, shape and makeup of the mystery
object. I couldn't exactly reach up and squeeze his crotch (which would
have solved the enigma immediately), but I figured if I shifted my head
right I'd be able to tell if I was pressing against metal, plastic or
flesh. Plus, being a little inebriated I was enjoying the feeling of the
fabric rubbing the back of my head. I get like that when drunk -- I can
spend a half hour examining the feeling the carpet between my toes. If I
hadn't been tipsy, I probably wouldn't run a tactility experiment on
Charlie's lap, and I'd also probably have noticed that Charlie's speech
about the horned guanosaur, another of his imaginary animals, was getting a
little ragged and intermittent. The shape under my head felt a little
larger before, and had more give when I pushed down with my head. Well,
oops, that probably isn't a metal flask.

"That feels really good," Charlie says in a husky whisper.

"What, that?" I ask, raising my head up and letting it settle back against
the lump in his jeans. I could feel his body throb a little in response
under me.

"Yeah." He's stopped talking about animals, and lays his head against the
back of the sofa, but he continues to twirl and play with my hair.

Now, I've been in this position with Charlie before. Well, not this
position exactly. Last time he was asleep and drunk and I made the
irresponsible decision to feel him up. I agreed with Patrick that it was
time for me to experiment with a willing partner, but I was torn. I figured
if I got Charlie so amped up we could fool around a little and not
acknowledge the situation, but on the other hand this was a chance for me
to be a little more mature and treat the people around me a little better
than I had been.

I decided to go `middle of the road' on this issue. "I can stop if you want
me to," I said, not stopping, but instead moving my head a little side to
side. Charlie sharply breathed in, signaling that he rather liked the
sideways motion.

"No, please," he groans, "I'd hoped we could finish what we started the
other day."

Wait, what? He had told me he forgot all about that, and now I realize that
had all been a lie. The little prig. Well, I couldn't be angry with him, I
was the one that had started it, and I figure he had said he forgot it
because he was embarrassed. I guess I do owe him an apology. I stop moving
my head around, but I remain lying in his lap.

"Look, Charlie, umm, about that, uh," I stutter, looking up at Charlie and
feeling a little exposed in this position.

"No, hey, Devon," he says in a more serious tone as he sits up a little
straighter, "I'm not angry with you. I liked it."

I'm not sure what to say to that, but I should finish my apology, even if
he doesn't seem to require one, "Well, yeah, I could tell you liked it,"
Charlie smiles, obviously slightly embarrassed, his cheeks flushing a
little and contrasting his big deep brown eyes. I continue on, "The thing
is, it was wrong for me to start that while you were sleeping and
drunk. I've been in this experimental mode lately, and I saw you lying
there passed out with your dick flopping out and I couldn't resist feeling
it, and then things got out of hand from there."

"My dick was sticking out?" he laughs. I explain how I'd come across him,
passed out on a bed in one of the unused dorms, shirtless, his pants
halfway down his thighs with his flaccid penis popping out the hole in his
flannel boxers. The picture I paint is pretty comical, and we both laugh
about the silliness of stumbling upon someone in that condition. Charlie is
really embarrassed now and swears me to secrecy forever about the whole
thing. I agree, not telling him I'd already confessed the scene to Patrick.

"The thing is, I still shouldn't have molested you. Especially since,
well...since I'm probably gay and experimenting with drunk sleeping boys
isn't the best way to express that." There was that word again, hanging in
the air like some garish neon pink balloon. Funny, I could never have said
that to Reid, but with Charlie it just came blurting out and I didn't feel
nervous about it at all.

"Well, yeah. I mean, grabbing a guy's package while he's sleeping isn't a
good idea. It's a good way to get a punch in the nose or thrown down a
garbage chute, but it's ok if you're gay and want to experiment. I
figured."

"You figured what?" The tone of the conversation had shifted, and where
talking with Patrick had made me uncontrollably nervous, I could tell that
Charlie had some valuable insight to share and I was really at ease with
him. Again, lying in his lap having my head stroked after drinking all
night was probably helping with that.

"I always figured you might be. You know, gay. Or bisexual. I mean, your
hair is always a different color and you just seem like that kind of
guy. It's ok, definitely not a big deal."

So I've learned several things today, one being that people are a lot
cooler with gay friends than I had suspected, and the other that I
apparently have really bisexual hair. Charlie goes on to surprise me
again. He tells me he figures he falls in the ten percent of the population
that has somewhat flexible sexuality, and would have gone after a girl if
he had the choice, but given the circumstances he'll probably end up
shifting to adapt to his surroundings. Did everyone in the world but me
read the same book on sex? I mean really.

"So what does that I mean?" I ask.

"Well, I guess I'd say that we're pretty good friends and I like you a
lot. If we were still on earth, I'd definitely fool around with you, and
I'd probably even do it if I had a girlfriend, and now that we're stuck in
space with five thousand undersexed guys, I guess it makes even more
sense. Just one thing, though."

"Yeah, what's that?"

"It has to be on condition that we do it as friends. I mean you can have
sex with someone you're dating, or someone you love, but you can also have
sex with friends, and that could be with close friends or acquaintance
friends. I guess you could even have sex with enemies, but I'm not sure how
that would work out," Charlie chuckles a little at his semi-joke, which
isn't very funny but perhaps a good observation, "But anyway, if you are
totally gay and would always have been, I think that's awesome, but it
would be unfair for me to do anything with you without saying it would
always be as friends. When I was twelve a guy in my school fell in love
with me, and that got messy."

"Yeah, I can see how that would be a problem. But as for you and me, I
completely just think of you as a friend, and if it weirds you out that I'm
gay and could get a crush I'd rather stay friends and not fool around than
mess things up. That's something I'm learning a lot about lately,
apparently."

"No, hey, if you say we're friends and always will be, I'm happy to, erm,
take a tumble and help you figure things out. And you don't know how much
it means for you to say I'm your friend. I have to admit, it's been kinda
crappy for me on this ship. I'd really like to hang out with you more, and
hanging out like this is especially cool." He runs his fingernails through
my hair and plays with one of my ears gently, it feels really good and I
get goose bumps on my arms and down my back.

And there it was. Where I had been sneaking around for weeks acting like a
total creep, Charlie had just stated everything in a calm, collected
manner. I had previously thought of him as a little immature, which given
his drinking habits maybe he was, but in the area of sexuality and
relationships I think he's more than trumped me. Taught me a lesson too -
just say what you want and wait for a yes or a no; no need for stress and
throwing up, and especially no need for crawling through emergency ducts.

"Cool," I smile up at him. I don't smile all too often, but this time it's
earnest, and so is the wide grin he's giving me back.

And that's when things get awkward.

I guess we'd just agreed to be sex buddies, and I'm lying with my head in
his lap all alone in a room where no one will disturb us. Given that he's
very explicitly said that he wants to fool around, you'd think I'd have
gone at it right away. It is, after all, the kind of opportunity I've
waited weeks for. However, although the frank conversation was probably the
right thing to do, it's kind of broken the mood. Charlie must feel the same
way, because he's staring uneasily at the blank wall on the opposite side
of the room and the mystery object in his pants seems to have shriveled off
into oblivion, I can't feel anything against the back of my head any more.

Thinking that doing what I had done before would get things moving in a
more sexual direction again, I lift my head and rub it around Charlie's lap
a little, but I hit the wrong spot and stray a little too far south. I
think maybe I pressed his balls into the side of his leg.

"Owch," he yelps uncomfortably and shifts his weight, involuntarily
knocking me in the face with his bony elbow.

I mirror his sentiment, "Ow!"

He laughs at me, a little pain still in his voice from the testicle
press. "Ok, well that's not overly erotic."

"Yeah, now that we've agreed to have se...uh, fool around," I stumble, not
wanting to scare him off with the `s word', "this must be the part where we
discover that we both suck at it."

"Yeah, no kidding. Maybe you'd have an easier time if I were, I don't know,
asleep or something," he laughs, the bastard.

"And maybe you'd have an easier time if you got me drunk again and came up
with another retarded home remedy that involved putting my head in your
lap." Take that.

"Oh, you are just so dang mouthy, you know that?" And in retribution for my
comment he starts tickling my sides, which has the immediate effect of
sending me into giggling convulsions. I claim a direct violation of the
Geneva Convention with that one, but I can only get my argument out in
gasps and he doesn't seem overly concerned about the fairness of this
torture anyway. Under normal circumstances I might make him stop, but I'm
happy - happy to be really laughing, and happy to be sitting here next to
him, and just happy that all the stress of the past several weeks is out of
mind for once.

Eventually, Charlie stops tickling me, probably because I shouted out that
he was about to give me a hernia or embolism or something. He lets me catch
my breath a little, and while I lie there panting, he says, "Here, maybe
this will help a little." I'd slipped down onto the mattress of the bed,
which gave Charlie enough maneuvering room to unbutton his jeans and push
them to the floor. He's foregone the boxers tonight for a pair of bright
orange briefs with white striping (and he says I'm the gay one). Then he
reaches over, which makes me flinch a little because I'm sure he's going to
start tickling me again, but instead he tugs upward on my shirt, revealing
my bare belly. He pulls a little harder with both hands, and I get the
point. I raise my torso a little so that he can slip it up and over my
head.

Discarding the shirt on the floor, he pulls me towards him a little and
puts my head back in his lap. His legs are warm and soft against my skin,
and the sensation of the downy brown hair of his thighs against the back of
my neck is far more pleasurable than that of the fabric from his
pants. Suddenly we're not just two drunk friends sitting on the sofa, and I
feel a wave of tingling pass through my chest as I settle into this
intimate position. Charlie's legs are warm and soft under my head, his lap
humid from the recent confines of his pants; I can smell his sweet scent
wafting up from under me, it's a boyish smell that reminds me of summertime
play in the garden and locker rooms and freshly dug earth, but also a manly
smell with the tangy scent of pheromones and testosterone and sex dangling
in the background. My head is now lower in his lap that it was before, and
when Charlie scoots down in his seat a little the front of his orange
undies rest against my cheek.

The air of the room is cool against the bare skin of my chest, although
between the alcohol and the conversation I feel like my body is radiating a
fair bit of heat, and thoughts of what we're about to do send my metabolism
into overdrive - for me alcohol combined with horniness results in wave
after wave of warmth emanating from my core. This time, instead of playing
with my hair, Charlie reaches down and strokes my side just above my rib
cage. I recall that this is how I first touched him that first time a
couple of days ago.

His hand runs up my side and over my smooth chest. I don't have a lot of
definition there, and that's always been somewhat embarrassing for me,
especially on a ship of well-built college guys, but right now it feels so
good to have someone touching me that I don't really think about it,
especially when his warm fingers graze over my right nipple. This one
feathery touch is enough to bring all my roiling hormones to full bore, and
sensations of pleasure streak through my chest, over my stomach and deep
down into my groin. I gasp as all my sexual engines rev at once, and I can
feel the blood immediately flood into all my secret places. If I were naked
I'd probably be hard in two seconds, but my tight white briefs and jeans
keep me somewhat confined, although I immediately begin conspicuously
tenting my shorts.

Apparently I'm not alone, because I can feel Charlie responding the same
way against my flushed cheek. This time, his pants long shucked, it's clear
that this is no pen or flask. The pouch of his orange undies has filled out
a little, the shape of Charlie's hardening manhood becoming more apparent
and defined against my face. Instead of putting my head back up on top of
his crotch like it had been before, I decide to rub up and down against
him, allowing my cheek to stroke him gently through his shorts, moving up
and down in the same slow throbbing rhythm I can feel coming from him as
blood engorges his dick. Charlie groans, it's a cute whimpering noise, a
kind of surprised gasp, and it's oh-so-sexy. He looks down at me and
smiles, his eyes starting to glaze over a little from the hormones, and I
smile back.

The scene is all at once intimate, comforting and erotic, although I feel a
little clumsy and inexperienced at this point. We hadn't discussed exactly
what we meant by `fooling around', so I wasn't sure where all the
boundaries were, and even if I did, it's not like I have all that much
practice with guys, so I wasn't clear on what should come next.

"What's the matter?" Charlie asks, having noticed my hesitation.

"Um, it's just I don't know exactly what, erm, to do," I reply, worried
that I was going to break to heat of the moment again. Not that there's
much of a chance of this, Charlie is stroking my stomach with his long
fingers, and slips one under the waistband of my underwear coyly. Another
surge of passion flows through my body and deep into my balls.

"Here," Charlie smiles, shifting his body and sliding out from under me. He
pushes me over slightly and rotates his body so that he's lying in the
opposite direction as me, then pulls my hip so that I turn on my side to
face him; we're now flip-flopped belly to belly, me staring into Charlie's
inviting tangerine y-fronts. "I'll do whatever you do to me to you. So just
do what would feel good on yourself."

It was an intriguing game, and one I caught onto very quickly. Somewhat
meekly at first, I reached out and ran my hand over the back of Charlie's
thigh. He did the same to me on the opposite end of the couch, and although
I was touching soft fuzzy skin and he was stroking my leg through my pants,
I was immediately energized by the notion that anything I did, any little
exploration I made, would be reciprocated. At first I stuck to feeling the
tender skin between his legs, running my fingers up and down his leg from
knee to thigh. I kept my touches light, intrigued at the connection between
what I was doing to Charlie and how it related to the sensation of him
reciprocating. Experimentally, I tugged a little on the soft downy hair
that became somewhat thicker higher up on his leg -- not hard, but gently,
feeling the thin wispy quality of the fine hair there.

"That's not really fair," Charlie says, "here, let's get on equal footing."
I feel him grab the waistband of my jeans and begin feeling around the fly,
working the button and zipper to remove my pants. It's an erotic thing,
having another boy take off your pants, but I was struck that it made me
feel something else too. I think it was happiness. Happiness and
excitement. I was energized and joyful at what we were doing. This was fun,
dang it. Eager to continue our game, I assist him in getting my clothes
off, pushing my pants down over my knees and quickly pulling them off,
grabbing at my socks at the same time and removing them as well. While I
did this, Charlie removed his t-shirt, baring that beautiful brown torso I
was so drawn to a couple of days ago. We settle back into position, two
mostly naked boys lying face-to-crotch, me in my white briefs and Charlie
in his carrot-colored underwear with the sexy white striping.

For the first time this evening, Charlie's sexy tummy is exposed, and
resuming our game I reach up and feel the smooth skin there. He responds in
kind, and I feel his fingers graze the flesh of my abdomen. I run my
fingers up his side and he giggles a little, and as he does the same to me
I get gooseflesh at the sensation. I'm looking right into his crotch, and
it's apparent that all of this has him aroused, although the confines of
the briefs appear to be keeping him from going fully erect. He's filling
them out quite a bit, but they seem stretched to the max, and unless
removed I don't think he'll have room to develop a full erection. I can
feel the same thing happening in my shorts, and at first I consider
relieving Charlie (and therefore myself) of this pressure by pulling down
his underwear and allowing him to spring free, but I want this game to last
a while, and I'm in no hurry to get to the hot and heavy part, although
every fiber of my being is screaming out for that.

Instead, I reach around Charlie's body and run my left hand over his
back. I can feel the muscles there, warm and meaty against his
frame. Charlie, like me, is somewhat thin and lanky, but he's by no means
scrawny. Reaching a little higher, I feel around his shoulder blade and run
my palm over the width of his back. I feel a throbbing and wonder what it
is for a second before realizing that I'm feeling his heart beat; I notice
that my heart is also beating very strongly, not fast, but throbbing
intensely in a slow steady rhythm. Everything is exciting to me, and
although I've felt Charlie's body before, this mutual experience is
starting to drive me wild. I move my hand down Charlie's back, feeling him
doing the same to me, and pause briefly at the waistband of his shorts. I
consider lifting my hand and passing over his butt, but the entire point of
this game is to explore one another's hidden places, so I keep on going,
feeling the round, smooth flesh of Charlie's buttocks at my
fingertips. It's intimate and exciting and erotic, and as Charlie does the
same to me I feel electric sensations surge through my body. I dig into
Charlie's rump with my fingernails, scratching lightly at his skin through
the fabric. His softness under my fingers feels so good, and it feels even
better to experience him doing it to me. And yet I immediately want more,
and despite fearing this may be going too far (although deep inside I
suspect there's no line to cross with this guy, so I shouldn't be too
worried), I push my hand under the waistband of his shorts to feel the skin
of his rounded boy butt directly against my fingertips. It's soft and
muscular at the same time, perfect mounds for my exploring hands to cup and
stroke.

At first I stick to feeling the one cheek I can best reach, but as Charlie
groans in pleasure I grow more brazen and brush my hand across the breadth
of his ass; the skin of his crack is moist and tender, and I run my fingers
up and down the spongy flesh there, allowing my fingernail to gently scrape
between his cheeks. He does the same to me and it instantly drive me wild;
it seems like a forbidden touch, but one that I long for. It's unbelievably
hot, but at the same time comforting, to be lying in this position, cupping
one another's buttocks in our palms. Keeping my hand in his briefs, I feel
along his body to his hip bone, and explore the firm boniness of it. I can
feel the beginning of the thicker, wiry hair of his pubis tickling my
knuckle, so I press further into it and finger the patch of hair
there. Although I am not yet touching his penis in any way, Charlie lets
out a gasp and thrusts his groin in my direction. He loses concentration
for a moment and pulls his hand out of my shorts, and I can see that his
erection is now fighting furiously with the taut fabric of his briefs, and
is stuck pointing straight down. I'm also about as hard as I can get, but
fortunately because of the way I'm lying with my legs slightly bent my own
boner has managed to go erect in a more comfortable position, pointing
straight out from my body into the slightly roomier pouch of my briefs.

I can tell that Charlie is heading deep into boy heat - he's squirming a
little more at every touch and thrusting at me every once in a while. I
know that what he wants is release -- that the sexual energy is building up
and becoming more and more unbearable. The nice thing to do might be to
grab him and move on to the heavier petting, and my body is screaming out
for that as well, but I still want this to last, and I'm enjoying the
prospect of torturing the poor guy a little. However, I think he's right
that it's time to move this forward.

First things first, I decide not to cause him permanent boner injury by
keeping him pointed uncomfortably towards his feet. I hate waking up in
that position (it can really hurt!), but I'm not quite ready to touch him
there, so I grab the waistband of his shorts and pull away from his
skin. "Here, let's make a little adjustment," I tell him, but his erection
is a bit stubborn and is still stuck pointing down despite the additional
room. Dang it. "Ok, here, let's try this." With my other hand I grab the
lower part of his undies and pull downward. It results in my grazing the
head of his cock a little through the shorts, which makes him gasp and
jump, but it does the trick and provides enough space so that his turgid
penis flips upward in an arc and slaps against his abs. I'm not quite ready
for that particular toy, however, so having repositioned him successfully I
gently place the fabric of his underwear back over him. He's still tenting
the shorts, and he's just about long enough to be popping out the
waistband, but he's more or less completely covered, although a little
crooked. I slide the shorts around, rubbing the waistband along the head of
his cock.

"Ugh, wow, man, that feels so good," Charlie groans below me. At this
point, he's excited enough to forget he's supposed to be doing the same to
me, but I can forgive him this once. I know if I don't move this along to
being more genital oriented soon he's going to pop, so I focus on his
package.

Unlike the other night, when he was lying in the dark mostly clothed,
Charlie is now about four inches from my face, stripped down to his undies,
and definitely in some serious lust. I was pretty seriously boned then too,
but having this smooth brown boy laying next to me with an open invitation
to feel every inch of him, and to have him feel me back in return, has
driven me into a sexual frenzy. My erection is throbbing uncomfortably
against my underwear, which is feeling smaller and tighter all the time,
and the thing I want most in the world is for Charlie to haul my rock hard
dick out and go to town. I consider moving things immediately in that
direction, but then I pause and consider that this is my first time messing
around with another guy -- I should make it last. I don't have a lot of
willpower, but I have some.

Instead, I decide to tease and play with Charlie a little more. His cock is
completely erect and straining against the fabric of his orange shorts, and
I can see a wet spot forming in a dark patch above his glans. I move into
position and put both my hands on his thighs between his legs, which causes
another involuntary hip thrust from my overly excited companion. He seems
to sense what's coming, and I can feel his entire body go a little rigid
next to me. The room is suddenly conspicuously quiet, and our breathing
seems almost a roar, particularly Charlie, who has started panting a little
in his sexual frenzy. I can feel each exhale as a hot breath between my
thighs, and I grow more excited knowing that I am the one doing this to
him, driving him to this point of physical exertion and extreme pleasure.

Slowly, I move my hand up his thigh towards his crotch, just inches from my
face, tickling the fine hairs of his groin with my fingertips. And then,
ever so gently, I brush all five fingers over the prominent bulge of his
scrotum, rubbing them along the satiny fabric of his underwear. His
reaction is immediate and intense -- Charlie lets out a guttural husky
sound that can only be described as part gasp and part groan. Rather than
mimicking my fondling, which is what he's supposed to do, Charlie scrunches
closer to my body; I feel him wrap his arm tightly around my waist and butt
and pull me into him so that his face is now cradled deep in my boyhood; I
can feel his chin pressing against my turgid penis and I instinctively
press back in a slow thrusting motion. I continue fondling Charlie's balls
through the fabric, one minute, then two, then three, taking my time in
stroking the ever more excited boy. I watch intrigued and delighted as each
time I make contact he throbs in his shorts; a darker wet patch is growing
around his head as my ministrations result in enough excitement to start
producing spurts of precum with each stroke. Our actions are quickly going
from game to full on sex, as we both thrust our hips eagerly towards one
another.

Moving another step forward, I run my forefinger up Charlie's hard shaft,
and get another positive response. Each time I touch him, Charlie groans,
and since his face is tucked in so close to my body I can feel each
exclamation of pleasure vibrate through my balls, the warm air from his
throat landing hot and moist against my package. I consider teasing the
poor guy for a while longer, but I'm not sure he can take it, and to be
honest I might not be able to either. Slowly, I grab the waistband of his
shorts and pull the elastic away from his body. I start to pull the
underwear off slowly, but Charlie grabs them with his hand and kicks them
off in a couple of rapid, jerky motions that almost throws me off the
couch. I make a note to experiment with torturing him to the point of
insanity later, but for now I'm happy to oblige him and let him get
naked. I'm a little sad that his warm face is no longer nuzzling my crotch,
but he makes up for it by stripping me in the same desperate fashion so
that we're both naked.

I take in the scene, two completely nude and completely erect young guys
lying side by side, head to toe. It briefly hits me that you don't spend
even close to enough time in your life naked, and especially naked with
someone else, and for sure you don't spend enough time naked doing
this. I'm glad that I took time to savor this, and judging from Charlie's
drooling cock he's enjoying it too. The other night I felt him up through
his fly, but now he's totally exposed and I take in his beautiful young
body. He's smooth and hairless other than a line of light brown fuzz
descending from his navel into a thick patch of pubic hair. His dick stands
proudly at attention, pointing outward at me and slightly upwards towards
his face. Now that he's naked, I realize he may be a little longer than I
gave him credit for before. His hard dick stretches most of the way up his
abdomen towards his navel, probably a full hand-width and a half. Whether
it's that he's really super excited tonight or that I didn't get a good
look last week, the kid must be pushing seven inches, his rosy pink helmet
throbbing wet and cute at the end of the shaft.

I'd say that I could have sat there all night staring at my nude friend,
but that would be a lie. The truth of the matter was that the hormones and
the adrenaline and the excitement were all pushing me deep into sexual
lust, and I was getting to a point where I would soon need release. I could
tell Charlie was too, and while I might take time in the future to explore
and play with him until he was begging for release, for tonight it was time
to take things down the home stretch. I slowly wrapped my hand around
Charlie's wet shaft and felt the hot, hardness of his penis. He bucks and
kicks a little -- I'll have to remember to take it easy with this guy or I
might walk away with some serious bruises. I stroke him up and down, slowly
but firmly. He's produced a decent amount of precum, and my hand glides
effortlessly over his tool. As I'd noted the other night, Charlie was a
little longer than me, but about the same girth, and his cock feels
comfortable and large in my fist.

I play with him like I play with myself, holding the shaft hard in my fist
and running my thumb up over the wet head. Each time I do this Charlie
groans until he starts making these cute chirping sounds with each intake
of breath. This encourages me to stick to solely running my fingers around
the sensitive glans, which gets him squirming and writhing. "You like
that?" I whisper rhetorically -- his body language tells me everything I
need to know without feedback.

"Uh, god Devon, that feels so good," he grunts. Suddenly, realizing that
he's left me out for a couple of minutes, he grabs my dick and starts
stroking me as vigorously as I am him.  Waves of pleasure shoot throughout
my body and I swear for a second that I'm seeing stars. It feels so good I
rub Charlie harder and faster and he groans, responding by stroking me off
even faster. And so we go on, each beating the other off at an increasing
rate until my hand is sliding all over his wet tool, slapping it in jerky
motions. I am now completely absorbed by the pleasure and lust, each stroke
takes me further and further into a sexual frenzy and I can feel the climax
building in my loins. I grunt and press as close to Charlie as I can while
still remaining in position to have enough leverage to masturbate him. I
feel like I am only seconds away when he pauses, to my immense frustration,
although I continue fisting his turgid slick cock as quickly as I can.

And then, quite unexpectedly, I feel something I had never felt before. All
of a sudden I was enveloped in hot, wet pleasure, the nerve endings in the
very core of my being firing at full capacity. I look down to see that
Charlie has taken my dick into his mouth -- oh god, he's sucking me. He's
sucking me and it is the most wonderful thing I have ever felt in my
life. Either because this felt really good or because seeing someone
sucking you off is hot, all at once I feel my balls contract as my
inevitable orgasm builds. "Holy fuck, ugh!" I exclaim. My instinct is to
push against Charlie with all my might and blow right then and there, but I
don't want to cum in his mouth and offend him. Gasping and about a
millisecond from the end, I manage to grunt out an nearly incomprehensible,
"Charlie, ugh, I'm cumming, gawrk..."

He gets the message and pulls my dick out of his mouth, smiling up at me
right as my penis convulses and starts spraying cum, the first shot audibly
splatting against his neck. This time I do see stars, as every muscle in my
body tenses and the orgasm overtakes me. In my ecstasy, I feel Charlie
tense up next to me and then all at once he's also cumming. His first shot
lands on my upper lip, which I might have found gross if I wasn't deep in
boy heat, and the double pleasure of having an orgasm while giving someone
one became so intense that I grab Charlie's dick even firmer and continue
stroking him as hard as I can. He's bucking around and gasping and making
sounds that I take to mean he wants me to stop because it's too much for
him, but I don't care and keep on going. His cum lands on my chest and neck
in hot sticky globs, and I stroke him through the entire orgasm until he
physically reaches down to pull my hands off of him.

"Jesus, ok Devon, enough," he's laughing and panting, clearly happy, but
also a little in pain from being overly sensitive at the end.  I
reluctantly stop stroking him.

"Sorry," I say somewhat sheepishly.

Charlie swings his feet off the couch and sits up a little. At first I
think he's going to get up and leave, which is almost never a good sign,
but instead he rotates around and lies back down so that we're face to
face. We're both still a little out of breath, and I can feel him panting
against my face in warm puffs. He's looking right at me with those huge
brown eyes, and for the first time this evening I feel a little
exposed. Funny how that doesn't happen until AFTER I'm covered in sweat and
cum lying next to a guy in post-coital glow. "No problem at all," he
answers, reaching out to swirl his finger in one of the globs of cum oozing
down my chest. It's sticky and tickles a little. "You're really good at
that. If you want my opinion, I think you'll have a long and illustrious
career as a gay man."

"Well, I'm glad you approve." I laugh a little. I'm tempted to reach out
and kiss the smiling boy on the lips, but I'm afraid that might be taking
things too far. Although we're now clearly sexual partners, and yes, I
would be taking Charlie up on his offer to experiment again in the future,
there were still boundaries and rules to feel out with him. Still, as we
lay there in our masculine glory, I couldn't help but feel that this was
about a thousand times better than any of my experiences with the opposite
sex. Any time I did anything sexual with girls, it always felt awkward and
uncomfortable later. I mean, not like gross, which I know a lot of gay guys
say, I always enjoyed it, but it never felt simple and uncomplicated
afterwards. With Charlie, I understood what he was feeling, and I liked his
warm, muscular body pressed up against me.

At least, I liked it until I realized we were smelling a little ripe -- all
boozy and sweaty, and Charlie must have felt the same way because just
about the same time we looked at each other and mouthed a single word,
"Shower."

Leaping up from the couch I ran into the bathroom, Charlie following close
behind. Unlike most of my sexual experiences, for some reason my boner had
not abated immediately after cumming and swung defiantly in front of
me. Charlie's hadn't either, and as we rinsed off in the communal column
showers he announced that it looked like we both needed `seconds'. Asking
what this was (although I suspected I knew), he explained that often one
cum wasn't enough for him, and apparently it wasn't enough for me
either. Emboldened by our sexual experience, Charlie began rubbing soap all
over his body and erect member, which of course got me excited and had me
doing the same.

"Why Mr. Chasen, that's not the type of behavior that is at all appropriate
in a communal shower," Charlie chided playfully in a deep voice.

"Really, Mr. Barrett? Because I couldn't help but notice that you missed a
spot. Here let me help with that." I press up against Charlie's slick body,
our erections making contact for the first time. Apparently not at all
constrained by needing to feel out the rules of this relationship one by
one, Charlie pushes his face closer and kisses me gently on the upper lip,
his tongue soft and silky, then laughs and runs to the opposite side of the
shower room. I give chase, and we play like this for a while, grabbing at
each other's boners and sneaking small kisses, and eventually Charlie turns
to me, smiling slyly, and starts masturbating his ever-engorged cock
again. I follow suit, and before long we're furiously beating off side by
side, our wet bodies glistening in the soft light of the bathroom. This
time Charlie comes first and almost completes his orgasm before I started
spraying. I'm amazed that I produce a second almost-full load.

As ridiculous as it sounds, we repeat this scene again back out in the
living room, Charlie initiating it by grabbing my butt, which results in me
getting instantly hard, which results in him getting instantly hard. We
stick to jerking ourselves off side by side on the bed, this time coming
with some effort and audible grunting. By the time we're done for the third
time it's extremely late, and although we discuss going back to our real
rooms, we decide to stay here for the night, both of us reluctant to give
up the newfound closeness with one another. Charlie pulls me into bed with
him, and although I would have been shy about initiating the same
invitation, feeling him warm and soft next to me make me instantly
sleepy. He moves close to me, wrapping his naked body around mine and
pulling a thick blanket over our heads, it's only about twenty seconds
before I am contentedly asleep next to him.

The next time I open my eyes the room is pitch black and cool - it's
clearly the middle of the night; night as simulated by the ship's
environmental systems, which regulate light levels and temperatures to
mimic a regular earth cycle. For a second I don't remember where I am, and
am disconcerted that my bunk seems to be totally out of place in my room,
then I realize that I'm not in my room. Then I realize that something is
jabbing me in my side.

"Hey Devon," Charlie jabs me a little harder and I squirm groggily, "Hey,
Devon, you awake?"

"Mrmer, whas, hrmen," is the reply I manage to make. Charlie and I are
still intertwined naked in bed together, and as I am snapped out of slumber
by his rudely poking me in the ribs, I become conscious of the heat of his
body and smoothness of his skin against mine. I'm guessing that he's ready
to go again, and although I am exhausted and groggy my body begins to react
to the notion of another romp. I grab at Charlie's crotch and say, "Geez,
Charlie, don't you ever tire out?"

He pulls away from me a little and replies, "No, hey, that's not what I
meant. I need to talk to you, it's really important."

Something in his tone conveys a sense of seriousness, and this more than
anything snaps me fully awake. I turn over to face him -- there's not a lot
of room in this bunk, and I suppose if we sleep together in the future we
should convert it to a double. Still, it feels really comfortable to be all
snuggled up like this. "Yeah, ok, we can talk. What's on your mind?"

I can barely make out his features, but I can see him well enough to tell
he's looking at me a little sheepish. "It's just, well, I think I owe you
an apology. You know, for what we did, uh, what we did together last
night."

"If that was something that requires an apology, I'd hate to see what it
would take for you to thank me," I chuckle and make my smartass retort
before thinking about what I'm saying. Whoops, maybe I should treat this
more seriously.

"Yeah," Charlie feigns a smile, "It's just that I think I was unfair to
you, and I started thinking about it, and now I can't sleep and I didn't
want to wake you up, but I figured it's better to get it out now before I
rethink things and get scared to talk to you later.

"The thing is, I don't think it was really cool of me to do that with you
last night. I think I was kind of taking advantage of you and I don't think
I should do it again."

 Fuck, I'd heard that gay relationships went by fast, but this was
ridiculous. We seemed to be going from hookup to breakup in a little less
than four hours. My heart started thumping in my chest. I wasn't enamored
with Charlie or anything, but I did like the guy and I didn't want the
night to end like it seemed to be about to. Maybe I could save
things. "Well, I don't see how you took advantage of me," was all I could
come up with, and it sounded like a pretty feeble response.

"Devon, you know, this is tough to talk about, but the thing is that you're
gay. Or you're bisexual. Whatever you are, and I'll always be your friend
no matter what, but whatever you are you confided that in me and my first
response was to suggest that we fool around. I wasn't thinking
straight. Well, I was thinking with my dick to be honest, and I gave you
that lame speech about staying just friends and fooling around, and I don't
think that's really fair to you.

"I mean, where would that go? We could do this every night, and end up in
bed together every night." Charlie smiled a little wistfully, and I had to
as well at the thought of curling up with this sexy boy night after night
rather than spending them alone in my bunk with my bad dreams of a dead
planet, "That would be fun, don't get me wrong. But it seems like
eventually that arrangement would make you think of me as your boyfriend,
and if I were attracted to you like that I'd love to be your boyfriend, but
I'm not, and I'll always think of you as just a friend. What if you develop
feelings for me? That wouldn't be fair to you, to spend your time with me
when you could be out looking for someone to love you back. It could wreck
our friendship -- like I said I've had that happen before, and I don't want
to mess things up. Getting to know you better has been about the only good
thing to happen to me on this fucking ship." Charlie seems on the verge of
tears, and although I feel like I'm about to get dumped my heart feels for
the guy. I don't want to lose him either.

I'm not sure what to say but I start speaking, "Look Charlie, I'll always
be your friend. And you're right, that's more important than fooling
around. So if you tell me you don't want to have sex with me anymore, we
can leave it at just tonight."

"No, that's not what I'm saying. Well, not exactly."

What the fuck is he talking about?

"So if you don't want to have sex with me and you do want to have sex with
me, what does that mean?"

"Well, uh, I guess what I'm saying is that fooling around with you is, erm,
good practice for us both. It's just that I'm concerned that if it's just
you and me fooling around things will eventually get weird. I think that we
need to agree to mess around with other people," he explains, although I'm
still not sure what he's getting at.

"So you want to have sex with me sometimes, and then you want to go out and
have sex with other people so we don't get too attached?" It feels like a
little bit of a rude request to make right after a night of passion, but I
guess I can kind of see where he's coming from. Maybe I would develop a
crush on him. Maybe I had already. That can happen when you jerk another
guy off, particularly when he's adorable and single and well hung.

"No, I'm not saying that we go out and fool around with other people. Well,
I mean, we can do that too. I'm not saying we don't do that. But what I'm
talking about is that we bring other people here to fool around with
us. Like actually with us. You know, like all together." He smiles
sheepishly, and although it's too dark in here to tell, I'd bet he was
blushing. I may be a little too -- I didn't see that one coming at all.

"So you want to have group sex, rather than doing it solo with me?"

"Yeah! I mean, wait, no, not like that. `Group sex' sounds so tawdry. What
I mean is that I like doing it solo with you, and I think we should
sometimes. But I think we should also find some other guys like us who like
to have a good time like that and bring them here to, well, not really to
have sex, but to fool around. You know, all together. Then it's more like
as friends and I think we'd be less likely to mess up our friendship.

"I know that sounds kind of weird, and maybe it's a stupid idea. It just
seems like there's probably a lot of guys on the ship like me, open-minded
and eager to fool around, and there's probably a lot of guys like you,
bisexual or gay or whatever you end up deciding you are, and it might be
fun to get them all together."

"You mean for like a jerk off club?" I'd heard about them, of course, and
even wondered in high school if my boring friends would be more interesting
if we got together like that. But I'd never dreamed of actually initiating
anything.

"Yeah, something like that." And Charlie goes on to explain exactly what he
means -- that we should find several guys like us who have flexible
sexualities, and form a group that meets on occasion to have some fun. It's
not the most uncommon fantasy, and although I'm surprised to hear it coming
from Charlie I have to say it sounds like something he's thought about
before. I'm not sure whether I should be offended that all of a sudden I'm
one of several sexual partners the guys wants or grateful I don't seem to
be losing my sex buddy, and while I think about that I ask him how we would
even do something like that.

"Well, that part seems simple," he explains, "we make a list of people we
know who would be up for it, then have five or six of us meet down here
some Friday night for a poker night or something. A little booze, maybe
some ViCia tabs in their drinks to get them horny, then we pop out some
porn and see what happens. They either get huffy and walk out, in which
case we blame the alcohol and apologize, or we have some fun."

"I don't know, Charlie," I sigh, rolling onto my back, "I'm not sure real
life works like a vintage porno. It could totally backfire on us. I mean,
maybe it would be fun..." I trail off, thinking about Sean and Dog and how
their little twosome might be a thousand times sexier if it were a
foursome. The guy had a point -- if I'd come this far and accepted that I
liked guys, maybe it wouldn't hurt to experiment a little.

"Well, just promise you'll think about it."

"I don't know, maybe I'll think about it. Maybe," I reply, not wanting to
commit to anything.

"Aw, c'mon Devon, for me," he begs in a puppy dog voice while reaching in
between my legs and stroking my still naked thigh. All at once I become
extremely aware of his warm body pressed against me and his boyish chalky
smell. Oh good lord. How am I ever going to be able to say no to this guy?

"Ok, ok," I reply, pushing his hand back to his side of the bed, "I promise
I'll think about it."

"You're the best, Devon." And with that he leans over and pecks me gently
on the cheek. Like I said, how could I ever say no to him? We wrap our
bodies around each other and drift off into sleep once more. Charlie seems
like he's unconscious in two seconds, and I'm not far behind, falling into
a deep slumber with pleasant dreams of naked bodies and sunny afternoons
and ice cream and skinny dipping. When I wake up in the morning I'll find
myself alone, Charlie off to work or something, and my problems with Reid
will begin gnawing at the back of my mind, but for now I'm warm and happy
and sated lying here with Charlie in my arms.