by Anyta Sunday
It wasn’t a draught leaking through the cracked open windows, it was William breathing over his ear whispering their childhood secrets.
All he had to do was unroll the life-size version of William and he went from a ghost to real boy. “What are you doing to me?” he asked it, shaking out the edges that tried to curl up on itself.
He grabbed some Blutack and stuck the sketch to the back of his door, smoothing his hands over it, until he stood right in front of him, in his almost naked glory, their gazes clashing.
Rory paced the length of the room in front of him, anger and hurt mixing and boiling with every step. “I shouldn’t run again. I don’t want to. I have . . .” His mind flashed briefly to Eric. “ . . . things could be good for me here.”
Then he stopped pacing and stepped up against the picture so his nose touched William’s, forehead pressed against pencil, paper and wood. And, if he closed his eyes, pressed against William, their breaths mingling as they leaned on each other.
Rory pulled himself away a fraction, studying the shades of grey that made up an echo of William. The hair didn’t look right. It was too neat.
Before he was aware of it, Rory had charcoal in his hand, going over the key lines of William’s face, and smudging his hair.
Touching and studying the curves and angles of his body, Rory remembered the real thing. How beautiful William had been, how self-confident, too. Images flashed in his mind and he grew hard. He liked and hated it at the same time. He pressed through his slacks, squeezing his balls painfully to make it go away. It wouldn’t.
“Fuck you, William. Why? Is it because I never told you? Is that why you won’t leave me alone? Because I never said the words to you? Told you how I really felt?”
His eyes blurred as he continued sketching over William, his shoulders next, then his tapered torso. Each of his strokes grew rougher until they were almost violent slashes. Not that he could see much through the haze of memory and tears.
“Do I have to say it to you to make you go away? Is that how I break this hold you have of me? Well, I do, William.”
He threw the charcoal to the floor and peeled off his t-shirt, quickly followed by his slacks and boxers until like the picture he’d adapted, he was standing naked, shaking, crying.
“Look how turned on I am by you.” He tugged his cock hard in time to a harsh sob. “You want to know how many times I thought about you while I jerked off? Too many to fucking count.”
He stepped toward William again, tracing his fingers over the planes of his face, charcoal smudging over his cheek. “Want to know how many times I dreamed of kissing you?”
Rory’s hot breath bounced off the paper back to him. He leaned closer, pressing his salty lips onto William’s charcoal ones.
The tack slid off the door, and William’s sketch flopped over him. Rory roughly grabbed the thick paper and threw it and himself onto the bed. “You want the truth, William?” He jerked his hard dick into the paper. It was rough and sore. He didn’t care. He thrust again.
“This is the truth. I’m a fag.” He repeated that, thrusting and sobbing at the same time. He’d worn a hole through the paper and the kinder grip of bed sheets cushioned him as he suddenly came. “I was so damn in love with you.”
The words hurt him to say, because this truth had been bottled too long and had rusted, slowly poisoning him. He clenched the paper and yelled at it, shaking it, wishing to ball it up and being too paralyzed to.
He rolled over, turning his back on the mangled picture, and curled into a ball. Tears streamed down his cheeks, over his mouth, onto his chest, but no matter how far they reached, they would never wash away all the rust inside.
To:
ericgraham8 @ gmail.com
Subject:
Sorry
Maybe we could have made it work as friends. I’d hoped so, but I don’t think I can stay in Wellington anymore.
Sorry.
Rory
For a minute, as Eric read Rory’s message—checked half an hour after it’d been sent—he wanted to find the guy to shake some sense into him. But his anger dissolved quickly, replaced by a throbbing dread Rory had left already and they’d never have the chance to make it past the awkward first steps of friendship.
Eric grabbed his keys and hightailed his car to Rory’s place, parking in front of the drive. Maybe he’d be lucky. Maybe Rory hadn’t left yet and he could convince him not to.
He flew out of his car and up the path, chanting under his breath: please be home, please be home . . .
When he reached the door, he let out a relieved breath. Rory had to be home, he’d left his keys in the door.
Withdrawing the keys, Eric stuffed them in his pocket as if maybe it’d give him some leverage with the guy.
He remembered the way to Rory’s room and sprinted up the stairs. He strained his ears for any sign of life. He thought he heard a muffled something, but couldn’t figure it out.
Rory’s door was shut. Placing one palm in the middle of it, he twisted the handle and slowly pushed it open. The muffled sounds he’d heard became clear as he looked inside. Rory’s art sketches carpeted the ground; curtains billowed in a breeze, and . . .
And Rory lay naked on the bed, back shuddering as he sobbed into his pillow.
As if sensing Eric was there, he twisted his head, glancing toward the door. Rory didn’t move, didn’t try to cover himself, he just stared at Eric, and said: “I’m a fag. I was in love with him.”
There was a soft break in his voice.
Eric moved into the room, over to his bedside, and lifting the duvet, he draped it over Rory.
Seeing the mangled mess of paper next to Rory, he knew what had happened. He knew this was the most private he’d ever had—could possibly ever have—with Rory, and Rory wasn’t fighting him. No, he had seen and let him in.
Eric carefully removed the paper off the bed, and, along with all the sketches littering the room, packed them away into the container.
Rory didn’t move, just stared across the room.
After taking off his shoes, Eric slid onto the bed and reached out. He curled one arm around Rory, holding him.
Through the blankets, Eric felt him freeze, and he tightened his grip. There was a half-hearted attempt to shove him away, but Eric wriggled closer and rubbed circles on his back.
Rory submitted to him, his body falling into the embrace. Eric felt the sob through his palm first. Then shuddering breath hit his neck. “I loved him—but I want him to let go. I want to move on.”
“And you will,” Eric said back to him, running a hand down his spine and back up to the nape of his neck to Rory’s hair. “You will.”
“I didn’t want . . . F-fuck. I didn’t mean for—”
“Shhh, it’s okay.”
“Em-embarrassing.”
“Nah.”
A fresh sob. “I fucked a fucking p-piece of paper.”
Eric just gripped him tighter.
“The weirdest shit I-I-I’ve done.”
“Shut up. I don’t care.”
“But . . . but that’s screwed up.” Rory’s arm moved from his side, looping around Eric’s waist, gripping him as if afraid he might leave. “I’m a freak.”
“Stick with weird. The F words are reserved for me.”
Rory looked at him a moment, and then buried his face into the pillows. “You have to share fag.”
Eric ran a strong hand down his back. “You’re going to have to start calling it gay.”
Rory sobbed again, his torso shaking in Eric’s arms, but it soon morphed into a hiccupping laugh. “Fuck. Look at me. Don’t look at me. What a pussy I’ve become.”
“Well that would solve things, wouldn’t it?”
Rory convulsed into a fresh bout of laughter.
Eric smiled into his hair, half-tickling his nose and smelling of Herbal Essences.
As he worked to control his breathing, Rory burrowed into him, all warm limbs and need. They both grew qui
et, neither saying anything until Eric’s stomach decided to break the silence.
“Hungry much?” Rory asked, rolling away from the embrace to stare up at the ceiling.
“Food can wait.”
“I can . . . make us something?”
Eric swung his feet off the bed and sat with his back to Rory. “How about you try get some shut-eye, and I’ll fix us dinner?”
“Sleep? . . . Yeah, right.”
“You sound like a Tui ad—”
Rory’s packed bags nestled in the corner of the room caught Eric’s eye. He shivered.
He missed what Rory said to him, and murmured a standard ‘ahhm’.
When he looked over his shoulder, Rory was facing away. Eric stood swiftly, quietly grabbed the bags and slipped out the room with a: “Rest. I’ll bring food up soon.”
Bags in tow, he found the kitchen.
And then the pantry.
There was a nice spot behind the door for a couple of bags. He set them down.
Was it strange to hide Rory’s stuff like that? he wondered as he placed a pot on the stove to boil water. Maybe. But it’d sort of been instinctual. And it calmed him. Rory couldn’t leave without them . . .
At least not right away.
He grabbed some potatoes and began peeling them with quick furious strips.
Then, setting down the peeler, he shut his eyes. In the last few hours, his need to help Rory had deepened. It was more than trying to make right what he should have with his grandpa. There was . . . something there.
He’d felt it in the way Rory had returned the hold. There’d been a moment, fleeting, but strong, when he thought this is what Grandpa meant. There was nothing slutty or shallow about this. He and Rory, well . . . this was real. And he knew if he’d known Rory like this when he was up in Auckland, he’d have come to his grandpa’s funeral. Would have used those strong, corded arms to embrace him.
A shuffle came at his side, and Eric snapped his eyes open. Rory stood at the end of the kitchen bench, a towel wrapped around his hips, and looking more than a little flushed. His face had been splashed with water, but it hadn’t taken away the tear stains.
“Where’s my stuff?”
Eric refocused on the potatoes. Could he get away with telling him he hadn’t a clue?
Probably not.
He tried anyway. “Huh? No idea what you’re talking about.”
Rory ran his hand through his hair. “Sure about that?”
“Why do you want it?”
The guy glanced down at his naked chest. “That not obvious?”
Eric hesitated. “There were clothes on the floor up there.”
He caught Rory’s shudder. “Need something fresh.”
Dumping the potatoes into the pot, hot water leaping out to scold him, he spoke, “Are you still planning on leaving?”
Rory moved to the fridge and pulled out a container. He passed it to him. “I don’t want to.”
Eric hesitated before taking it.
“That’s pumpkin mash, by the way. I have no clue how I’m gonna eat it all.”
“I’ll give you your stuff back on one condition.”
There was a long pause. Rory frowned slightly, biting his bottom lip. Then he met his gaze and lingered there. “Yes.”
A tingle ran through him, and Eric couldn’t hold the look. He cracked open the plastic container and breathed it in. The pumpkin smelled of garlic and cream. “Looks great.” He placed it on the bench and moved to the pantry.
Rory gave a light laugh when he pulled his bags out. “This is a change from a few weeks ago. Don’t want me gone, huh?”
The answer to that was simple. What Eric didn’t get was why he felt so nervous admitting it. “No,” he said, his voice coming out rougher than he’d have liked.
Rory gripped and re-gripped the corded handles. “What was the condition?”
“If you want to run, tell me in person.” And . . . let me try to stop you.
After they’d eaten a quiet dinner, Rory had been practically shoved back to bed. Eric found the laptop he’d packed and turned it on, telling him they were watching a movie.
They sat—slouched—side by side on his bed, the dark room sparking with light as guns blasted and bridges blew up on screen.
He peeked at Eric out the corner of his eye. A red glow from the screen cast distorted shadows over his face. He really needed to say something to him. To explain it. And to thank him for being there. But also, he wanted to get why. Why had Eric stayed?
He sat up straighter, swiveling slightly, stopping when his leg hit Eric’s. The connection was like jumper cords to core, and he lost his words. Instead, tumbling out of his mouth, came: “T-thanks for making dinner before.”
Eric looked at him. “Anytime.”
He tried again. “I think . . .”
“Yeah?”
He wasn’t good at this type of talking. “Um . . . I might know who’s leaving the pumpkins.”
Fuck.
“Oh yeah?”
“The Forster brothers. I think it’s their idea of a bizarre prank.” He rested his head back against the wall. “I just sure as hell hope they aren’t pissing on them first.”
Eric choked on a lungful of air, and grabbed Rory’s shoulder, half-laughing, half trying to recover his breath.
Rory grinned, the press of Eric’s fingers on his t-shirt and scraping his neck, warm and welcoming.
“That’s gross.”
“Don’t worry. I wash them before I cook.”
They shared a look, Eric slowly dropping his hand. Rory knew he had to try a third time. He swallowed down the rock of nerves climbing up his throat. “Look, about earlier—”
“You don’t have to talk about it. Not while it’s still so fresh.”
“But I want you to understand—”
Eric looked across the room at the closet he’d stuffed the art container in. “I do, and it’s okay.”
With that one glance, the heaviness of the day sunk over him, and he couldn’t bring himself to argue. He nodded. “Thanks.”
They continued watching the film. Half-way through, Rory yanked the duvet from under them and draped it over their legs. Eric didn’t say or do anything except for blink at the screen.
When their legs touched again, Rory bit his lip. It was accidental, he was sure of it, but every time it happened a zing sliced through him.
Fuck he must be tired.
Eric glanced at him when it happened yet again. Did he feel the shock of it too?
“This is the first time I’ve had a guy in my bed,” Rory blurted out as an apology. Well, that’s what it was meant to be. He wasn’t sure it came over as one.
“Sure it won’t be the last, either.” Eric yawned and shuffled down until his head hit the pillow. “I’m just gonna close my eyes a second. Tell me what happens.”
A second turned out to be the rest of the movie. Rory went to nudge him awake, but the guy was lightly snoring, his lips parted. The light from the computer screen stamped over the arm Eric had resting on top of the duvet. The koru tattoo glowed out toward him, much like the first time he’d seen it.
He stared at it for a few minutes before turning off the laptop and plunging the room in darkness.
Resting his head on the pillow across from Eric’s, he strained to make out his profile. When he did, he said to it, “Why are you here?”
“Want me to leave?”
Rory stilled. Shit.
He shuffled, bunching his pillow. “No. I mean, you’ll be lucky to catch a wink of sleep with me tossing and turning next to you. But . . . feel free to try.”
Air shifted around him as Eric moved.
“Lie on your back.”
“What?”
“Just do it.”
Rory shuffled into position.
“Close your eyes.”
“I don’t know I want to.”
“Why?”
“What are you going to do?”
“I�
��m not going to fuck you. So you can just relax, okay? Now close your eyes.” Eric’s hand lightly touched his face, dragging over his eyelids. “Keep them that way.”
Only problem now was Eric’s words were all he could focus on. His mind filled up with hot, sweaty visuals of the two of them fucking.
“Why the hell did you have to say that?”
“So you’d calm down and let me help you fall to sleep.”
“Like I’m gonna fall asleep now.”
Eric chuckled, and said suddenly: “With jokes like that, you’re going to move on just fine, Rory.”
Rory opened his eyes. Eric’s face looked down at him. “That’s . . .” He swallowed. “Good.”
Eric smiled. “Now I want you to do as I say.”
“Bossy.”
“Shut up and close your eyes. I want you to imagine what it is you most want in the world. Got it?”
Rory nodded. He had it all right.
“Now concentrate on that image, and expand on it as much as you can. Just keep expanding.”
Rory did.
In one hand he held William’s sketches, in the other a lighter. He moved the flame under the paper. Dropping the lit paper into a bowl, he watched the flames flicker and rise as they consumed William and took him away for good. . . .
Chapter Ten
Eric woke with a jerk of his foot, disoriented at the cream curtains billowing in a light draft. He rubbed his eyes and took in the room. Mid-morning light poured into in, making dust sparkle and dance in the air.
Rory lay on his side, one leg over the duvet and a hand hanging over the bed. He mumbled something in his sleep and curled his legs toward his chest.
Stumbling out of bed, Eric made for the bathroom to wash up and come alive. When he got back to the room, the bed was all tangled sheets and no Rory.
He followed the sound of clanking and muttering to the kitchen, where the smell of coffee beans welcomed him. “Oh yeah, that would be perfect.”
Rory jerked his hair-matted head toward him. His eyebrows rose a fraction, and then he let out a breath. “I thought you’d gone.”
