Middle of Somewhere Series Box Set

by Roan Parrish

  “Okay?”

  I don’t know if I’m okay. I don’t know if I’ll ever be okay again. Because the feeling of him inside, filling me up, connected with me… it makes me feel like a different person. I squeeze my eyes shut, too overwhelmed to keep looking at him.

  “Colin, are you okay? Please, I need you to tell me.” His thumb brushes at my closed eyelids and I feel moisture there. I blink it away, nod, then spread my legs farther for him and pull at his back.

  “’M’okay. Just, c’mere.”

  He nods. Then he slides the rest of the way inside me. He groans desperately, but doesn’t move once he’s inside. I try to keep breathing, but I feel too full.

  I scrabble at Rafe’s shoulders, starting to panic again.

  “Okay, try to relax for me. I know, babe, I know.” He kisses me, and as distractions go, it’s a good one. His mouth on mine is hungry, possessive, but his hands are soft, rubbing my stomach, stroking up and down my arms. When he reaches between us and strokes my dick, I clench up and we both cry out.

  “Oh,” I gasp as the feeling of uncomfortable fullness transforms into something so much better. Something deep and powerful. Rafe is frozen above me, an intense look on his face. He’s biting his lip and gazing down at me. “I—oh Jesus, Rafe.” Because I can feel him throbbing deep inside me. And this feels nothing like the painful, hurried mess of before.

  Rafe takes my mouth in a bruising kiss and starts moving. As I relax my muscles, I start feeling these little tingles ripple through my ass, like electricity. Rafe leans back and rolls my hips up, then pushes back inside me, and I cry out as he comes in contact with that spot inside me. He does it over and over and I’m lost in the sensations. My whole body is hot and tense and liquid at the same time.

  “Fuck, you feel amazing,” Rafe says, thrusting inside me and freezing there, his muscles tight. “How’re you doing?”

  I’m falling to fucking pieces. I can’t even speak. When I open my mouth, all that comes out is a garbled moan that sounds embarrassingly desperate. I just reach a shaky hand into his hair and kiss him with everything I’ve got. That seems to do the trick. He speeds up, and the smooth slide sends sparks all down my spine. I dig my fingers into his back, needing more.

  “Harder?” he asks, and I kiss him again. He groans, then starts thrusting harder, muscles tight with control. I start moaning, these choked sounds that would humiliate me if I could pay attention to anything except the feeling of Rafe inside me. Then he reaches between us and grabs my dick and I cry out.

  He’s muttering my name and things I can’t make out and I don’t care because he’s stroking my erection in time with his thrusts and heat is curling in my lower belly. The trembling starts in my thighs and then Rafe hits that spot again and I’m coming—an orgasm that starts somewhere deep inside and radiates through my ass and lower back and balls and, fuck, shoots out my dick in thick pulses of pleasure I can’t control. Rafe’s groaning and muttering sweet filth about my ass and my dick and how hot I am, but I can barely hear him.

  “God, babe, you’re gonna make me come,” he chokes out, then he freezes inside me, moaning brokenly, pulsing his hips over and over, each movement stirring a shiver of pleasure deep inside me.

  Rafe moans one last time and buries his face in my neck, kissing me worshipfully. I rub my fingers through his hair. He softens inside me and I squirm.

  “Hold on.” He drags his lips over my throat. When he pulls out, the soreness hits. I feel tender and a little swollen, but I don’t care.

  Rafe runs a finger around my hole. “You okay?” he asks. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

  I shake my head, reaching blindly for him so he’ll lie down again and stop talking. He gets the message and lies next to me, kissing me softly and running his hand over every part of me he can reach.

  “I’ll be right back.”

  I must doze off for a minute because I startle awake to a warm washcloth cleaning come off my stomach.

  “Sorry,” Rafe says softly, hand on my hip. He drops the cloth on the floor, but I let it go, for once too warm and relaxed to get up and put it in the hamper.

  Rafe slides down next to me and gathers me to him. “That was…. Mmm, damn,” he moans.

  And I know I should say something. Tell him he made me feel amazing. That I loved it. But I can’t. I’m afraid if I say any of it out loud, think about it for too long, the shame will hit. I just hum against Rafe’s shoulder and squeeze my eyes shut, sliding a hand into his hair and absently untangling it until I fall asleep.

  9

  Chapter 9

  When the doorbell rings, I’m just getting out of the shower and I almost break my neck getting tangled up in my sweats as I drag them over still-wet skin.

  Relief floods me when I see that it’s Rafe. I haven’t heard from him since he left my house Sunday morning. I even texted him a few times, but he didn’t respond, which isn’t like him.

  I find myself smiling automatically, and Shelby practically climbs the leg of his jeans. Rafe gently detaches her from his leg, but sets her down on the floor without playing with her. Also not like him.

  “Hey,” I say.

  “I need to talk to you.” He sounds like he’s trying really hard to keep his temper.

  “Okay.” I back away from the door.

  “I’m going to ask you a question and I need you to be honest with me.”

  I nod. He’s still standing just inside the door.

  “Do you wanna sit down?”

  But he shakes his head. He looks like a different person than the Rafe I woke up to on Sunday morning. The one with the warm, sleepy kisses. The one who told me I was beautiful—even if that did make me blush and smack him. The one who said he liked being at my house because his apartment felt lonely since Javier died. The one who cooked me breakfast and hugged me tight before he had to leave.

  “Were you alone with Anders here on Monday night?” he asks, voice tight.

  My heart starts to pound. “Uh… no? Not here. But yeah, he came to the shop. Wanted to talk.”

  Rafe puts his head in his hand and groans, like Anders wanting to talk to me is some kind of horrible nightmare.

  “I mean, I’m sure he’d have rather talked with you, but he didn’t know where you are when you’re not at YA and he knew where I worked, so….”

  “I’m not—Jesus, Colin, I’m not jealous. I just can’t believe you would do something so monumentally stupid! Fuck!” Rafe drops down onto the back of the couch. “What were you thinking? Were you alone with him? Who else was there? Did people see him?”

  “Hold the hell on. What are you implying? I didn’t… I didn’t do anything to him!”

  “Yeah, unfortunately, that’s not the point. That’s why there are protocols for working with youth. You have to be absolutely beyond fucking reproach at all times or you leave yourself open to every accusation under the sun. And I’m the one who brought you on as a volunteer, so if it looks like you’re being inappropriate with the kids, then it’s on me!”

  “Well, how do I know this shit? I was trying to help.” Okay, my first response had been irritation that Anders had come to the shop, but I got over it.

  “You don’t know so there are times you can’t help,” Rafe says, like I’m an idiot. I hate it when he does this. Acts like there is this whole set of rules that I’ll never understand. Not that he’s wrong. It’d just be nice not to be reminded that I fuck up everything I touch.

  “Look, he wanted to talk to me because I’m not… you know, because people don’t know about him. Being gay. Queer. Whatever. Like, he wanted to know should he tell his parents and shit. And I think he just wanted to know how it was for me.”

  Rafe takes a deep breath like it’s all he can do to control his temper. “So, what did you tell him?” he asks slowly.

  I’d been finishing up a repair when Anders slunk in. All I saw of him at first were his skinny legs encased in their usual black denim and ending in too-heavy black boots th
at scuffed the grimy concrete. Pop had left and I had pretty much scared off Brian and Sam by bringing up the idea of proposing more custom repairs to Pop. They’d both done the we-don’t-want-to-make-waves shuffle and I’d been pissed at them the rest of the day for being such cowards. So, chances were no one would see Anders, but I’d led him into the office anyway, not wanting to take any chances that we might be overheard.

  He apologized about a hundred times for bothering me before I finally got the story out of him. He’d begun coming to YA with Mikal after they connected on social media, and his family had no clue he was queer—his word. He said he hadn’t really even talked about it much with any friends. Seemed like he’d been a bit of a loner before he met the other YA kids. He spent a lot of time practicing violin—I guess he played in pretty major competitions. Recitals. Whatever you call them. His dad was some kind of banker and his mother did something with trading stocks. They were Swedish and still spent a lot of time going back and forth to Stockholm so they weren’t around a lot. But when they were, they seemed to hold Anders and his brother and sister to pretty exacting standards. Sure, Anders’ father’s expectations ran more to perfect grades and ten-year plans, but I was familiar with the sentiment.

  When his father had found out that he’d been going to YA instead of spending time after school practicing, he’d flipped out. Anders had told him he was just going there to support a friend. That it didn’t mean anything. He looked ashamed when he told me that, as if he owed them the truth as some kind of familial tithe. But he knew his parents wouldn’t like it. His father especially would be disappointed. Something about business and being the oldest son, Anders said, but clearly beneath it was just the same kind of old-fashioned disgust that Pop had displayed since I was a kid.

  And that was the heart of why Anders had come to me, I think. He’d been looking for someone who had the same issue as him. It wasn’t very flattering, being sought out because you have the same shit going on that a teenager does when you’re supposed to be an adult. It was the adult part Anders was clearly after, though.

  He knew Rafe better, sure, but Rafe was a damn shining beacon of integrity, whereas I… well, I may have had a similar problem, but I had no solutions. Not even for myself. I wished I could tell him a brave story like Rafe’s—always having been honest about who he was and damn the consequences. Hell, I wished I could tell him a story like Daniel’s, even. Where he hadn’t chosen the moment to tell people he was gay, but when it had happened, he’d taken control over it.

  I even started to tell him those stories. As if we were in some soppy movie and my words would inspire him and change everything. But in real life we were just in a messy office at the back of a damn auto shop, and the only perspective I could bring myself to give him was my own. And maybe it had helped, knowing someone else was going through something similar.

  I have no clue if Rafe will think I said the right thing, though.

  “I told him that his personal shit wasn’t anyone’s business, not even his parents’. That he’d be out of the house in one more year, and if telling them he was queer meant that he’d have to put up with a bunch of awful shit for a whole year, then it wasn’t worth it. He has a lot of time later on to figure everything out. He doesn’t have to decide anything right away.”

  Rafe runs a hand through his hair like he’s at the end of his patience, but at least he isn’t looking at me like I’m a child molester anymore. He just sighs and doesn’t say anything.

  “He’s pretty pissed, though, man. That he can’t come to YA anymore.” And hurt. That was clear beneath everything Anders said. He’d finally found someplace where he could feel comfortable, and now he’d been rejected from there, too.

  “Yeah, all the kids are pissed. I’m pissed. Of course I wish Anders could still come. I wish we didn’t need permission from a guardian—it cuts so many youth off from service, or forces them to weigh their desire for an inclusive space against the potential cost of coming out to their family. I wish I could do more for all of them in a thousand ways.”

  “Then couldn’t you just make an exception? He could just tell his dad he was somewhere else?”

  “You don’t understand how serious this is. It’s all so fucking precarious. The slightest whiff of something suspicious, something not aboveboard, and YA could get shut down in an instant. One of the kids says something at school about how we’re letting someone hang around adults unsupervised and a teacher overhears? Disaster. I heard fucking Mikal telling Dorothy that Anders was hanging out at your house, Colin! Who knows who else he might’ve said it in front of? It doesn’t matter if it’s not true, it just matters what people will believe. You cannot be alone with a minor. End of story. It’s for the volunteers’ sake too. You just… you can’t leave yourself open to any accusations. Not any more than YA can. And it can’t be Anders’ responsibility, okay? He’s a kid, he’s hurt, he’s confused, and looking for comfort. I know it feels like the worst fucking thing in the world, but you have to be the one who draws the line.”

  He’s ranting at this point, and I never know what to do when he gets this way—furious about a system that he thinks is unjust but unwilling to sacrifice what good is in place to break out of it. I’m not sure if he’s angrier at himself for following the rules or the rules themselves.

  “YA is everything to me, Colin. Javi built it from nothing. And those kids… they’re—they’ve been what I wake up for in the mornings. For years. Helping with them—giving them something I didn’t ever have—it’s—Colin, it’s the only decent thing I’ve ever done. I can’t fucking lose that.”

  Rafe looks wrecked and it’s my fault. It doesn’t matter what my intentions were. I fucked up. Most of all, I hate that Rafe is disappointed in me. So I just stand like an idiot in the middle of my living room.

  Rafe walks over to me and puts his hands on my shoulders. With his expression tense, the fine lines around his eyes are more visible and the crease between his brows is deep. His lower lip is rough, like he’s been biting at it.

  “You can’t do that again. Okay? You can’t be alone with any of the kids outside of the workshops. No matter how much you want to help. I… believe me, I get it. But it’s too easy for everything to go wrong. Please.” He looks so tired. “Please, babe.”

  “Okay, I’m sorry,” I say. “I thought… I thought I was helping. I wanted—I just hated seeing him so upset.” And, yeah, there was the fact that he came to me. That, despite having made a mess of this stuff in my own life, he actually thought maybe I’d have some answers. It felt so good to have someone see me that way. And it’s quite a contrast to how Rafe’s looking at me now. With fondness, maybe, but mostly like I’m a liability. A fuckup.

  Like he gave me something precious and I smashed it.

  Like I can’t be trusted with anything real.

  After sitting in strained silence for an hour, watching a movie about some dude in a small town who turns out to be part of the mafia or something, I’m ready to scream. It would’ve been easier if Rafe had just left, but apparently he didn’t get the memo that it’s awkward to hang out after fighting with someone.

  And then, yeah, my stupid breathing thing starts. I’m just about to get up and go into the kitchen to quietly freak out when I notice that Rafe’s watching me. It feels like I’m cheating because I know he can’t just sit there and not try and help me. My fucked-up-ness is his damned kryptonite.

  He lets out a big sigh and then his hand is on the back of my neck and I close my eyes and try to concentrate on his touch.

  “We’re okay,” he says, but it sounds like he’s trying to convince himself.

  “Yeah? Well, it feels like shit.”

  Rafe sighs. “Yeah. Look, I can’t condone what you did—it’s too dangerous. But I like why you did it. I like that you were trying to help. You’re fucking fierce. I like that.”

  “Thought you liked sweet,” I mutter.

  “Mmm. Oh, Colin. You’re sweet as hell.”

>   “Yeah right.”

  “Kiss me,” he says softly, a peace offering.

  I huff and grudgingly peck him on the lips. He snorts and pulls me closer, kissing me deeper.

  “There, see?” he murmurs. “Sweet.”

  I push off his chest and roll my eyes at him.

  Rafe’s expression turns serious and he moves in and kisses me again. He kisses me like he really does think I’m sweet. As if he has nothing else to do but kiss me.

  “I missed you this week,” he says, kissing my neck.

  “Oh, now you want to be sweet too, huh?”

  He puts on a who-me? expression. “I missed being here with you.” He kisses my shoulder. “I missed eating dinner with you and falling asleep with you.” He kisses my chin. “I like it here.”

  “So you’re just using me for my house.”

  Rafe nods. “Yeah, and your cat.”

  “Damn cat,” I mutter, looking over at her, and one of Shelby’s little ears perks up like she knows we’re talking about her.

  In bed, we kiss until we’re both desperate and pulling at each other’s clothes, as if we can ease the tension with our bodies. Rafe strips his underwear off and we both grab for our dicks at the same time. We kiss hard and deep, and it pushes my head into the pillow so there’s only softness beneath me and Rafe’s hardness on top of me.

  I press my hips up into his, wanting somehow to be on top of him and underneath him, inside him and around him all at the same time. Rafe groans, sliding his other hand under my thigh to grab my ass, and squeezes, holding us tightly together. He pushes my hand off of us and I call him bossy and he grins, slowing his strokes and kissing me silent, our bodies rocking together as his hand controls our pleasure.

  I tug on his hair and he moans into my mouth and strokes us harder. When my balls start to tighten, I squirm beneath him, trying to get just a little more pressure, a little more contact. I gasp into his mouth and he smiles and slows down his strokes again, bringing me away from the edge.