He had to stop talking then because he ran out of air, but it kind of covered everything, so he simply pleaded with his eyes after that.
In the end, he wondered if he would have had to even go through that kind of prompting, because when they came into the kitchen, the basket of insanity was exploded all over the table, overflowing and gaudy and so beyond over the top it needed a new zip code to get the job done. There were six kinds of pasta, all of them high-end label and promising the kind of crazy health benefits things Whole Foods loved to do. There was more produce than could fit in their fridge. Lisa was busy unpacking enough chocolate coconut ice cream for Kelly to eat his weight in it from a cooler they could have stored a small body in. It looked like they were survivalists and Walter had come to replenish their stock for the winter and part of the summer too.
Walter stood behind a chair at the table, lit by the overhanging light, looking down at his offering as if he were horribly embarrassed by it and as if it were paltry all at the same time. Walter, who never let a damn thing bother him and rarely even let Kelly know if he was upset, stood there more naked and raw than Kelly had known he could be. Kelly wanted to hug him, to haul him downstairs to his bed and wrap him up tight in a down-alternative blanket and make everything better.
He didn’t have to soothe Walter because his family did it for him.
Sue pressed her hands over her face and approached the basket as if it were the baby Jesus’s cradle. She touched each item in awe and wonder, murmuring Midwestern silliness like “for goodness’ sake” and “my word,” all until she found the Le Creuset, and then she burst into tears and hugged Walter so hard she nearly knocked him over, thanking him and asking him how did he know, how had he known that was what she wanted most for Christmas, because she hadn’t even told Dick, let alone Kelly? It was so genuine and tearful that it had to be true.
This seemed to be the cue for them all to start pawing over the food, holding up their favorite things and grinning, and in the case of a rather phallic butternut squash, laughing. All but Dick, who stood at the end of the table with a quiet, reverent look on his face. Walter watched him, Kelly noticed, and as soon as he did he kept the pair of them in his sights, holding his breath.
Eventually Dick turned to Walter, as if he’d known he’d been watched all along. Countenance soft but serious, Dick held out his hand to Walter, gave him a small jerk of a Minnesota nod and said, “Well done, son.”
He shook Walter’s hand when he put it there, then pulled him in close for a steady, man-pat hug. Walter stayed stiff for a second, then when Dick let the embrace linger, giving Walter space, Walter let himself sag for a moment and closed his eyes in relief.
At that point Kelly had to look away, or he’d start crying.
“I think we fixed his Christmas,” Lisa whispered in his ear.
Kelly started to say he agreed, but he ended up howling in mock rage instead because Lisa poked him with the phallic squash, laughed and ran away, begging him with a grin to give chase.
He did.
It didn’t take but three hours for Walter to figure out that the Davidsons weren’t as good as he’d thought they’d be: they were better.
Seriously, if he didn’t love them so much, they’d make him sick. Their happiness made him feel happy simply by watching them. That part surprised him. He’d braced himself against their camaraderie, thinking it would make him feel lonely and left out, but it didn’t, and not just because they included him as if he were one of them. Their goodness was like one of those candles in the window in the old Christmas stories. It eased him and gave him hope.
Dinner was amazing, and after three bowls of soup, and more cornbread than he should have tried to stuff into his belly, he played a few rounds of Scrabble with Lisa, Sue and Kelly while Dick did the washing up. After, he curled up on the couch in the basement next to Kelly to watch some mindless TV by the light of a small, beautifully kitsch Christmas tree. He texted Tibby to make sure she was still doing okay, then leaned back into Kelly’s hands as he gave him a slow and more than slightly arousing massage.
He tipped his face back, stroked Kelly’s cheek and pulled him down for a kiss.
They made out languidly, not taking things too far because they could still hear everyone moving around upstairs. It was almost better that way, tension building, knowing they’d make love later in Kelly’s bed but still able to touch and fondle each other now. Walter drew on Kelly’s lips, tongue stealing inside, winding him up but never taking him anywhere.
“We could go to bed,” Kelly whispered huskily against Walter’s lips, sliding his hand down Walter’s thigh.
“I’m not going to scandalize your mother just because you’re horny.” He nipped at Kelly’s bottom lip. “Besides. I still have to give you your presents.” He’d given everyone else theirs upstairs, but he’d brought Kelly’s down to his room.
“You’re my present.” Kelly slid his hand around to the waistband of Walter’s jeans.
They teased each other until Sue called down good night and shut off the upstairs lights. Kelly dragged Walter back to his room, which made Walter laugh until Kelly pushed him backward onto the bed and started peeling off his own clothes.
They came quickly, no more foreplay, no teasing, just quick getting off against one another before collapsing in a sweaty heap together on the bed.
Kelly traced weary circles in the center of Walter’s chest. “It’s too bad we have this big bed we both fit in and can’t share it all night long.”
“Or use the ample space for extracurricular activities.” God, but he longed to prop Kelly backward against a headboard and rim him good and proper, making him scream. The fact that Kelly would be facing an exceptionally girly Tangled poster while he did so made Walter want to enact that scenario right now.
He didn’t, though, contenting himself with running his hand down Kelly’s naked back. “What if we went to Minneapolis for New Year’s? Stayed in a hotel, saw the sights? I showed you my city, now you show me yours?”
“Minneapolis isn’t my city. I’ve been there a bit, but not as much as I’d like.” He sighed and ran his fingers down to Walter’s abdomen. “The theater district is nice. But I certainly don’t have money enough to get a hotel there. Not even half.”
Walter nudged him in the ribs. “Hey. What did I tell you about letting your boyfriend pay for things?”
Kelly propped himself up on an elbow and frowned at Walter. “It makes me uncomfortable that you do it all the time. I don’t want you thinking I take advantage of you like other people do.”
Walter had opened his mouth to argue, then stopped, frowning back. “Who else takes advantage of me?”
“Who? Everyone. Your family, for starters. Cara calls you for advice but isn’t around when you need her. And don’t give me the wedding excuse. She can do better. I don’t want to be one of them.”
Kissing Kelly’s chin, Walter pulled him back down onto his chest. “You’re not taking advantage if it’s something I want.”
“It is if it’s always a one-way street, you paying for everything all the time, me never doing anything for you.”
Walter closed his eyes and kissed Kelly’s hair. “If you think that’s true after today, you haven’t been paying very close attention.”
Kelly nuzzled him back, burrowing into his neck. “I’ll ask my parents.”
“You do that.” Walter teased his backside. “I’ll reserve a soundproof room so you can really howl.”
Kelly arced into his touch and nipped at his neck. “Maybe…maybe if we go, maybe we can…” He nuzzled again, ducking his head a little. “Have sex.”
Walter went very still. “I believe we’ve already done that, young Padawan.”
Kelly licked Walter’s neck. “Not all of it.”
“It’s still sex even if a cock doesn’t go into an opening.” Despite his words, however, his aforementioned organ swelled at the idea, and his voice grew rough. “Did you have a particular cock and
opening in mind?” Go on, Red. Talk dirty for me.
Kelly slid his naked leg against Walter’s hairy thigh. “Your cock, my ass.”
Groaning, Walter flipped him over and kissed him hard, his dick telling him it’d be happy to go another round if this kind of talk kept up. Walter drew back from the kiss. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah.” Kelly looked wanton and hungry. A little guilty too, though, as he added, “Is that okay? I mean, I know you like to bottom too…”
Walter laughed and ran his finger down Kelly’s nose. “Sweetheart, I knew you were a nellie bottom a long, long time before tonight.”
Kelly frowned. “I don’t know what that means.”
“It means you love to bottom and vocally show your enthusiasm while doing it.”
“But I haven’t even been a bottom yet.”
Walter pressed his fingers against Kelly’s hole, making him gasp and bite his bottom lip to keep from crying out. “I know, baby. I know.” He teased him a few minutes until they were both good and riled, then kissed him slowly to take them back down. “I swing, sweetheart. I don’t mind either way.”
“But you like to be fucked too.”
“Regrettably, only one of us can get fucked at a time.” He drew Kelly’s earlobe into his mouth and nibbled on it before responding. “I want to fuck you, baby. I want to fuck you until you come apart.”
Kelly whimpered and drew his knees up to give Walter better access.
Their second go-round was rougher, and inspired by the conversation they’d just had, Walter turned Kelly face-down, spread his legs wide and thrust up against Kelly’s cock from behind. It wasn’t enough to make either of them come, but it drove them both crazy and gave them a foretaste of the feast to come. When they finally met face-to-face again, they gripped at each other hard enough to leave marks, and Walter had to seal his mouth over Kelly’s to swallow his cries when he came.
He vowed, as he drifted off to sleep beside his boyfriend, to make damn sure they got to Minneapolis and a proper hotel room for New Year’s Eve.
In the middle of the night he woke and dragged himself out to the couch—they’d never blown up the mattress, but he wanted to respect Sue and her fussing and not have her find him tangled in her baby’s sheets if she didn’t have to. Even though it was short for him, he slept like a log. When he woke, he smelled coffee and breakfast food. Curious as to what food, exactly, eager for coffee and drawn by the murmur of voices drifting down the stairs, Walter rose, hit the bathroom and headed up the stairs.
That’s when it happened.
All he did was pad around the corner to the hall outside the dining room, hanging back because he could hear Kelly and his dad talking intensely at the breakfast bar, and he didn’t want to interrupt. Kelly was in his line of sight, bed-rumpled, wearing a pair of sweats and nothing else, morning sun filtering through the window over the sink and streaming through the whole of the dining room. It lit up Kelly’s hair, his bare skin, his face, his eyes. Something Dick said made Kelly smile, that shy, head-ducking one that usually came with a blush, and it caught at the corner of Walter’s heart.
It held him and turned something in his gut, like a key that opened a door to a subbasement, a door Walter hadn’t even known was there. The lock clicked, the door opened, and longing, soul-deep longing poured out.
He tried to slam it shut, but it wouldn’t go—Walter wanted to hold on to the wall, but he leaned into it instead, trying to control his breathing as he desperately fought the emotions inside him. It was futile. The longing burned at him, making his arms ache, but that wasn’t even the worst. Wanting. Behind the longing was wanting, craving—like a parched plant facing a lake. Yearning that burned in his blood, that made him heavy.
Need. It was need.
I want Kelly.
I need Kelly.
His heart beat so hard it felt like he was going to have an attack. It wasn’t anything, though, next to the pain of what he realized that fervent beating meant.
I love Kelly.
He would have run, would have gone back down the stairs or into the bathroom, into the fucking street, he felt so shaken, but at that same moment as his revelation, Kelly lifted his gaze to Walter’s, and he smiled. He motioned Walter into the kitchen, and when Walter didn’t come, Kelly went to him, asking his dad to pour coffee, letting Dick know just how Walter liked it. Kelly kept talking, asking if Walter wanted some breakfast casserole or a cinnamon roll, inquiring as to how he slept, was he warm enough, did he have a crick in his neck, should Kelly have made him go to a bed—Walter heard him, but it was just noise in his head. All he could do was stare at Kelly and think, I want you. I need you. I love you.
I’m terrified.
“Kelly, I think you want to give him a minute to wake up before you chew his ear off,” Dick said, breaking the spell. “You fix him a plate of everything, and I’ll get him settled at the table.”
“Oh.” Kelly blushed, but he smiled too. “Sorry.”
He vanished deeper into the kitchen. Dick came forward, pressed coffee into Walter’s hand and looked him right in the eye.
“Don’t worry, son. We’ll take care of you.”
Walter blinked, stared, and Dick took his arm.
“Table’s this way,” he said, and gently led Walter into the sunshine.
Chapter Twenty-Four
They ended up not going to Minneapolis on New Year’s Eve, partly because of a bad weather system in the forecast, partly because Kelly could tell his parents weren’t into the idea. They would have let Kelly go if he’d pressed, but it would have been because they felt they didn’t want to show Kelly up in front of Walter, and they still would have had their reservations. When Kelly confessed his dilemma, Walter immediately voted to give it up.
“It’s cool.” Walter smiled wryly. “This is the part where I give the tired old line about how it must be nice to have parents who care enough to set limits, and so on.”
“Trust me, it’s not the line that’s tired.” Kelly flopped onto his bed. “It’d be easier if they were hard-asses, because then I could get huffy and rebel. They never do, though. They always look so concerned, and they want to talk everything through. Damnedest thing is, usually it’s like this and I say no for them.” He sighed. “I really did want to go, though.”
“We’ll go another time. No sense getting snowed in, and no sense upsetting your family. I like them.” He stretched out beside Kelly and caught his ankle with his foot. “I’ll even go so far as to admit I like the idea of spending New Year’s Eve at home doing stuff like watching movies and playing games.”
The mention of games made Kelly roll his eyes, though he smiled too. Walter and Lisa had a constant game of something going, and they always tried to round the rest of the family into playing too. “I warn you, I’m making you watch a Disney movie for every two hours of Monopoly you drag me into.”
“I can live with those terms.” Walter nudged Kelly’s arm. “Hey, actually, we should do that. Plan a movie marathon. You can show me your favorites, and I’ll show you mine.”
Kelly turned to Walter as realization hit him. “I don’t know what your favorite movies are.”
“Cold Comfort Farm, Ocean’s Thirteen and Fight Club.”
“I haven’t seen any of those.”
“That’s it. Movie marathon. What are your three top favorites?”
Kelly considered a moment. “Top three is hard. Hmm. Well, with only three, I’d have to say WALL-E, Tangled and French Kiss.” He glanced at Walter. “Go ahead, make fun.”
If anything, though, Walter looked intrigued. “I heard WALL-E was good, so I’m already there on that one. Tangled is left field, I’ll admit, though curiosity has me on your hook. But French Kiss? Live action? Can you list that and still keep your Disney Princess street cred?”
Kelly swatted him on the arm. “It’s a great movie. So romantic, and funny too. It’s what every romance should be, real and fictional.”
“Then it’s settle
d. Now all we need is a menu of munchies, copies of the movies and command of the television.”
The only requirement that posed any difficulty was getting Walter’s shows, which he managed by having Tibby overnight them from home. Once all movies were on hand, Walter arranged them on top of the entertainment center in the order they planned to watch them—alternating between the two of them and going in ascending order toward their most favorites. The stack, when viewed as a whole, was completely schizophrenic.
“I look at this, and I can’t believe we’re dating,” Kelly said, staring at it and shaking his head.
“Opposites attract, remember.” Walter clamped a hand on his shoulder. “Come on. Showtime begins in less than twenty-four hours. We have cooking to do.”
It surprised Kelly, though maybe it shouldn’t have, to find that Walter was something of a budding gourmet. He didn’t just make vegan kettle corn, he made vegan kettle corn with cinnamon and vanilla. Together they tried out a vegan-spring-rolls-with-peanut-sauce recipe that apparently Sue had been eyeing. They had trays of vegetables, pita breads and dips, as well as a mini-pizza bar ready. They had a variety of sodas, and when Sue quietly made it known she and Dick had no problem with a bottle of wine or some beer, Walter shrugged this off.
“Oh, no, we’re fine.” Walter licked off a bit of homemade hummus from his thumb and glanced at Kelly. “Unless I’m wrong?”
No, Kelly thought it would be way weird to drink with his parents around. God, what if he got drunk? “I’m fine with soda.”
“Well, I hope you don’t mind if Dick and I have a bottle of champagne,” Sue said, though Kelly knew Walter had just managed to carve himself a whole new point level on the good-boyfriend scale.
Love Lessons Page 24
