by Anna Martin
Henry wasn’t lying—all his friends in New York were paranoid about getting older. He found it hilariously cliché, the gay man entering his thirties who didn’t quite know what he wanted out of life anymore. Settling down, getting married, and having children were things that gay people were aspiring to now, or maybe they had always aspired to it and it was only now that society was allowing it to happen. Either way, Henry had watched too many of his friends freak out about another birthday that was just a number, really, no different to any other year, and he was determined not to be a big squealy queen about it.
His morning was stacked with deliveries, directing furniture into the right rooms and supervising finishing touches that seemed to be taking longer to do than the actual renovation work.
At three, he left Scott in charge of finishing up the work and locking the house down for the night and headed into the village to meet Shenal. It was supposed to be a short meeting to discuss his different applications for funding and the like, putting Stretton House on various tourist information and venue location websites.
It ended up taking hours, things never being quite as easy as he hoped they’d be, and it was past five thirty when he made it back to the house.
And he should have known that Ryan wasn’t going to let the whole birthday thing go.
The house was quiet, but the smell of cooking drew him through to the kitchen, where Ryan stood at the stove, stirring something that smelled delicious in a big pot.
“Hey,” Ryan said easily.
Henry leaned in for a kiss. “This smells good,” he said.
“Well,” Ryan said and cocked his head to the side. “I know you said not to make a fuss, but I thought making you dinner was the least I could do.”
“You’re adorable. Thank you,” Henry said, genuinely touched. “I’ll go get changed.”
“No one else is coming,” Ryan said. “You don’t have to make an effort or anything.”
It was still nice to change his shirt when someone had gone to the effort of making dinner for him, and Henry found a favourite light-blue button-down to put on over his jeans. He left his feet bare and padded back down to the kitchen.
“What are you making?” Henry asked, picking up the glass of ruby-red wine that Ryan had set on the counter and taking a sip.
“Um, beef bourguignon with dauphinoise potatoes and green beans,” Ryan said. “I remembered you mentioned before about liking French food.”
“It looks great. Too great, maybe… did Stella cook it?” he teased.
“No! Well, she helped.”
Henry laughed. “I knew it.”
“She came with me to Waitrose and helped me pick up the ingredients. And she gave me a recipe. But she didn’t actually do any of the cooking. There’s wine on top of the fridge. You can help yourself.”
In another slightly clumsy attempt at romance, Ryan had found a couple of candles and stuck them into empty milk bottles. He carefully lit the wicks as they sat down to eat at the kitchen table, feet tucked up on chairs like they did so many evenings.
“This is really good.”
“Really?”
“Yeah,” Henry said, smiling. “I think you were making it up, all those times you said you can’t cook.”
“I really can’t,” Ryan said. “Well, Stella taught me to make a few things. And Sarah….”
“You can mention her,” Henry said. “I don’t mind.”
He shrugged. “Okay. Sarah liked being a housewife, so she did most of the cooking. But I wanted to learn how to do a roast dinner once, when my parents came back to visit, so I’m pretty good at that.”
“Then why do we always go to the pub for lunch on Sundays?”
“Because Stella’s dinners are much, much better than mine,” Ryan said, grinning. “And it’s easier.”
“You’re terrible.”
Henry speared a tiny pearl onion on the end of his fork, considered it, then crunched into it.
“Do you miss her?”
“Who? My mum?”
“No. Sarah. But yeah, your mom, too.”
“My parents, yeah,” Ryan said. “I go out to visit them a few times a year, and they come back here, for Christmas and Easter and Jack’s birthday. Tenerife is a pretty big tourist destination, though, so trying to get flights out there in the summer is really expensive.”
“You talk to them quite a lot, though.”
Ryan nodded. “Yeah. We talk and video chat, too. I got my mum set up with a webcam so she can see that I’m not starving.”
“And Sarah?”
Ryan reached for his wine. “Do you really want me to talk about my ex-wife on your birthday?”
“I told you, my family never makes a big deal of birthdays. This is the nicest thing anyone has done for me in years.”
He sighed. “For a long time I used to defend her. I said that she wasn’t a bad person; we just weren’t the right person for each other. I think I’ve got a different perspective now, though. She used me to get what she wanted, and when it became clear to her that I couldn’t, or wouldn’t, do it any more, she got stroppy and left.
“Tell me about your ex,” Ryan said, turning it back round.
“Drew?” Henry was shocked. Mostly at himself—he hadn’t thought about Drew in weeks. Maybe longer.
“Yeah.”
“He was… I don’t know. I thought I loved him, but looking back on it now, he never loved me back. He cheated on me, you know,” Henry said, toying with his wineglass. “With a guy who was barely legal.”
Ryan laughed humourlessly. “Nice.”
“Hmm. I suppose, when you think how quickly I got over it, it tells you something about the state of our relationship in the first place.”
“And so here we are,” Ryan said with a little smile. “Both of us let down by someone in the past.”
It was Henry’s turn to laugh. “If you like, yeah. It’s weird, though. I feel like I know you better than I ever knew Drew. I only met you a few months ago, and I was with him for years.”
Ryan nodded. “Me too. It’s the same for me.”
“I don’t know what that means.” Henry’s voice had dropped to a whisper.
“I don’t know if I want to think about what that means,” Ryan said. “If someone had told me ten years ago that I would have someone like you, I would never have believed them.”
“I know,” Henry sighed. “Trust me. I know how much of an abnormal blot I am on your life.”
“No,” Ryan said, grabbing his arm, determined to make him understand. “No, I would never have believed that I would feel like this about someone. And I would have convinced myself that I don’t deserve you.”
With some foreign emotion fluttering in his chest, Henry offered a small smile. “You don’t.”
Ryan laughed breathlessly. “I know.”
They forced the conversation into lighter territory as they washed the dishes and stacked the clean plates away, sharing light kisses and teasing each other as they completed the chore. Once done, with his shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows, Henry took Ryan’s clean towel to dry his forearms and wiped down the counters.
“Do you like living here?” Ryan asked, somewhat out of the blue.
“Yeah,” Henry said immediately, then considered the question further. “Yeah. It’s very comforting here.”
“Because of me, or because of the house?”
Henry smiled, caught Ryan by the waistband of his jeans, and pulled him in close.
“Because of you,” he said softly and pressed a kiss to Ryan’s lips, wondering just when it had become acceptable to use kisses as currency for thank-yous. “Thank you for dinner.”
“You’re welcome. What do you want to do now? There’s still time to go to the pub if you want.”
“No,” Henry said absently. He retrieved the bottle of wine and emptied what was left into their glasses, then led the way through to the living room, where Hulk was sprawled out in front of the unlit fire.
&nb
sp; They ended up sticking a movie on and not watching it, abandoning it in favour of lying close to each other, indulging in careless touches, intense kisses, feet that rubbed absently together. The relationship seemed to be settling down around them without either man making a conscious effort to define it, or even acknowledge its existence. Every moment they spent together was another piece of the puzzle clicking into place.
Henry thought he could do this forever. The weight of Ryan’s head on his chest, the feeling of his light whiskers tickling his skin, and the waxy smooth silkiness of his hair through Henry’s fingers. All of this was turning what Henry thought was true inside out. He was being challenged.
It was wonderful.
When the movie ended, Ryan retrieved the remote for the TV from where it had fallen to the floor and changed the channel so he could watch the sports results. The program was called “Match of the Day” and was apparently something of an institution.
Henry dragged his lover to bed before he fell asleep. There were much more important things than waiting for the Bristol City results to come up.
They had spent a few nights together now, sleeping in each other’s arms and learning all the different ways they could extract pleasure from each other’s body. It didn’t happen every night. Henry worked increasingly late hours and Ryan exceptionally early ones, and someone would inevitably end up with an inadequate amount of sleep.
Tonight, though, Henry wanted to celebrate turning thirty. That thought felt strange in his head, as if he were betraying some part of himself by not only accepting his ageing, but revelling in it. He was older, and he had changed. The Henry Richardson who had lived in New York and played baseball for a crappy, homophobic team and planned parties was starting to slip away. This new, thirty-year-old Henry Richardson lived in a little village in Somerset and played cricket for a crappy, happy team and turned dilapidated manor houses into something new and beautiful.
The new Henry probably had a boyfriend, although neither of them in the relationship was ready to admit to it yet.
He pulled his not-boyfriend close and demanded kisses, the hot, sweet slide of lips and the insistent pulling at various items of clothing until they fell away.
“I changed my mind,” Henry murmured, tilting his head back to allow Ryan’s lips access to the long line of his throat. “I know what I want for my birthday present.”
“Is it too late? I’m not sure if it’s your birthday any more.”
“Please, Ryan.”
Strong, sure hands skimmed down Henry’s sides, and he gripped hard at Ryan’s shoulders, wanting more but not willing to ask nicely again. When Ryan took a step forward, pushing Henry one step back, toward the bed, he felt like moaning with relief. They had been building up to this point for a long time, and now it was here, or almost here. As far as he knew, Ryan could just want to exchange blow jobs again, and Henry didn’t think he could handle that.
In an attempt to take control of the situation, Henry shuffled back onto the bed, kicked off his left sock—the last remaining item of clothing on his body—and drew one knee up, opening himself to Ryan’s inquiring gaze.
Part of him felt like it was his responsibility to go and get whatever it was that he wanted. Another part told him it was a bigger deal for Ryan than it was for him, and he needed to go at the pace his partner set. Unfortunately, that kind of thinking had allowed them to carry on for months not having sex, and Henry was more than a little fed up.
He watched, entranced, as Ryan pushed his jeans down and stood naked at the end of Henry’s bed, hesitating for a moment and looking uncomfortable or self-conscious. Henry couldn’t tell.
“Come here,” Henry said, extending a hand, and Ryan took it, allowing himself to be pulled down onto the sheets.
Lying back, Henry invited soft kisses that trailed over his chest, whispering up the side of his neck as Ryan nudged his knees farther apart and chuckled at Henry’s attempt to encourage more touching, or more friction, or more something.
When Ryan pulled one of Henry’s nipples with his teeth, Henry hissed, arching his back into the sensation and feeling the hot throb of arousal through his body. Ryan was getting increasingly bold with his touches, less afraid to explore and find out just what elicited a reaction.
Not wanting to wait any longer, Henry wrapped his fingers around Ryan’s erection and slid his palm down the hard flesh. He appreciated the twitch in Ryan’s jaw, the only tell that this was what Ryan wanted. They were both hard. They were both ready. Fuck, was he ready.
Henry had stocked his nightstand with a bottle of lube and a box of condoms in anticipation of this moment. To his amusement, Ryan seemed shocked to find the lube already opened and the condoms still sealed.
“Who else do you think I would have fucked since I’ve been here?” Henry murmured against Ryan’s neck as Ryan fiddled with the wrapper, then the box, then the foil, then the latex, finally smoothing it over his cock.
“No one,” Ryan said with more than a little edge of possessiveness.
“Exactly.”
Ryan slicked the lube down his cock, squeezed more out onto his fingers, and pressed it against Henry’s hole, patiently waiting with even pressure until Henry’s body welcomed those curious fingers inside.
It was all quick and messy, and Henry expected it to be over too soon, but he didn’t care. His body was calling the shots now, not any rational part of his mind, and he spread his legs wide, offering himself.
Ryan’s eyes dropped to where the first two fingers of his right hand were now knuckle deep inside Henry, and they darkened, his throat letting a tiny noise escape. With his free hand pinching at his own nipple, Ryan’s fingers gave an experimental wriggle, and Henry arched his back off the bed, both his body and mind overcome with the possibilities.
Of all the things Henry had imagined their first fuck to be like, sweet was not one of them. Ryan was undoubtedly sweet, though, once he’d withdrawn his fingers and pulled Henry closer, lifting one of Henry’s ankles to rest on his shoulder and kissing the sensitive skin that covered his ankle bone.
“Ready?” Ryan whispered, yes, sweetly, and Henry nodded. And smiled.
Maybe it was just instinct, or maybe he had done this before and was lying. But the first achingly slow push forward felt like Ryan was claiming him, and Henry screwed his eyes shut, not ready to expose himself any further.
Henry grunted around the initial burn and groaned as Ryan filled him, then fell forward onto his hands so their chests were pressed tightly together. Like this, their mouths could move together seamlessly, exchanging kisses and whispers of encouragement, long, soft sighs, and tight exclamations when something felt particularly good.
Henry hadn’t expected it to feel this good.
And then there was the love. Among the sweetness, and the tenderness, and the fucking-good-at-sex… ness…. There was no way to miss the love that seemed to pour out of Ryan at every last point where skin touched skin, even more when they finally locked eyes.
Ryan had quickly fallen into a slow, punishing rhythm, moving his hips at exactly the right pace, exactly the right angle, to turn Henry from a man confident of his own body and desires to a pool of mush content to lay back and just feel.
His fingers grasped inefficiently at the sheets, holding on for dear life as Ryan filled him over and over and swallowed each one of Henry’s cries of pleasure.
“I’m close,” Henry murmured, his lips roaming over Ryan’s neck.
“I think I’ve been close forever,” Ryan whispered back, and Henry laughed.
“Come on, then,” Henry challenged and leaned back, relaxing his spine and letting Ryan do what he wanted to take them both over the edge.
There was something incredibly erotic about the way that Ryan’s tongue stole out to wet his lips, and Henry grabbed his own cock in response, squeezing tight, a warning to himself to wait.
They shifted together until both Henry’s legs were wrapped around Ryan’s waist and his arms lo
osely looped around his neck, holding on. Still, he wasn’t really ready for the hitch of Ryan’s hips that brought them even closer together, and the hard, snapping rhythm that made him cry out, over and over.
His orgasm hit hard, draining his body of energy as he spilled over his own hand and let the clench and release contractions in his ass pull Ryan’s orgasm out too. With zingy aftershocks skimming all over his skin, Henry allowed himself a long, satisfied moan as Ryan collapsed onto his body, his head pressed against Henry’s shoulder.
They would need to move soon. Biology and time were working against them, but for that moment Henry was content to lay back with someone he cared for sprawled over his chest. His fingertips traced the words he didn’t dare say in the space between Ryan’s shoulder blades, unsure if the tiny shiver Ryan gave in response was because he understood or if he just felt it.
Chapter Sixteen
Waking up with Ryan in his bed was a novelty. He was usually up and about long before Henry surfaced, and Henry never expected Ryan to change his routine just because of what they’d gotten up to the night before.
“What are you still doing here?” Henry asked as he rubbed sleep out of his eyes.
Ryan looked down from his seated position, smiling indulgently and brushing Henry’s hair back from his face.
“Just thought I’d stay and wait for you this morning.”
“Don’t you have to work?”
He shrugged. “It can wait.”
“Oh.” Henry struggled to free himself from the tangle of blankets. “I need to pee.”
As he stood and took a few steps toward the bathroom, he heard Ryan’s surprised inhalation.
“What?” he said over his shoulder.
“Nothing. Nothing. What the hell are you wearing?”
Henry glanced down at his brightly coloured jock, that he’d slipped into after cleaning himself up the night before, and smirked. “Not a lot?”
“I’d say,” Ryan muttered.
Since he really did have to pee, Henry abandoned the conversation to take care of business but made sure he was tucked away nicely to ensure maximum bulge when he returned to bed.
