by Neil Plakcy
Monday morning, he was copied on an e-mail from Alan in LA to Miles, confirming their agreement. Gavin nearly hopped up and down in his excitement at the chance to spend time with Miles in Wisconsin, and he was still jazzed by the time he burst into Miles’s studio that afternoon.
“Everything’s set, isn’t it?” he asked. “We’re really doing this!”
“Yup. I worked it out with your dad’s attorney in LA, and he’s been in contact with the concert promoters too. They want you all to sing three songs: ‘Apple Cider Time’ for sure and then two others. I’ve been listening to every recording I can find, and I have some ideas what you guys should sing, but I figure once we get up to Wisconsin, we’ll try out a bunch of choices and see what works.”
“Maybe we can fly up together,” Gavin said.
Miles shook his head. “I have a lot of equipment to bring. I have a friend in Nashville, and I’m thinking I’ll drive up there, stay for a few days, and then head to your family’s place.”
“What kind of friend?” Gavin asked, trying to sound casual.
“A straight one, from music school,” Miles said. “Don’t you worry. But if I’m going to be away for a few weeks, I have a lot of work to do, which means I can’t see you much.”
Gavin was disappointed but tried to cover it. “We’ll have Starlit Lake,” he said.
“For now, we have some time to work on your voice,” Miles said. “After that, if you don’t have any other plans, we can grab some dinner and then…”
“I like the ‘and then’ part,” Gavin said. “Let’s get to work.”
It seemed like Gavin couldn’t sing a single note without Miles stopping him. “Again, Gavin,” he said often. “You can do better. I know you can.”
Gavin was frustrated. Couldn’t they just skip this part and get right to the sex? That’s what he’d always done in the past. But one look at Miles reminded him that Miles was different. He didn’t just want to get Gavin in bed—he wanted to make him a better singer. Which was important because Gavin was determined not to embarrass his family on stage and to find something he was good at.
He wanted to do it for Miles too. He wanted to show Miles that he was more than just a pretty face, that he had a talent and follow-through, that he was worthy of all the effort Miles was putting in.
So he sang. Again and again and again. He pulled together everything Miles had been telling him about tone and breathing and hitting the right note. By late in the afternoon, he was able to sing entire verses without Miles stopping him once.
“I think that’s enough,” Miles said. He opened a drawer of his desk and pulled out a bag of throat lozenges. “You’re starting to sound raspy. Here, suck on one of these.”
Gavin looked down at Miles’s fingers, holding out the wrapped lozenge, and grinned.
Miles must have been reading his mind, because he blushed. “You’re wicked,” he said.
Gavin took the lozenge, unwrapped it, and popped it in his mouth. Sometimes, he thought, it was better not to say anything and let the other guy’s imagination run.
They went to dinner at the restaurant where they’d had drinks a few nights before. Miles was obviously a regular, because the host ushered them immediately to a table in the back and the chef sent over an appetizer sampler even before they’d had a chance to look at the menu.
“You come here often,” Gavin said, spearing a slice of ruby-red carpaccio.
“Almost always alone,” Miles said. “When I’ve been cooped up in the studio all day, the last thing I want to do is go home and cook.”
Gavin let the “almost always” slide. Miles suggested the Caesar salad and the lemon chicken piccata with artichokes and capers, and Gavin went along. Miles ordered a bottle of prosecco, an Italian sparkling wine Gavin had never heard of.
“To music,” Miles said, lifting his glass in a toast.
“To making music together,” Gavin said, clinking his glass against Miles’s. “How did you get started in music, anyway?”
“The usual way. Piano lessons as a kid. When I showed an aptitude, my parents let me experiment with other instruments, and when I was in my teens, I started sneaking into clubs to listen to the musicians. I got really into salsa and merengue for a while.”
“But you’re not Latin, are you?” he asked. “I mean, Goodwin?”
“My mom is from Guatemala,” Miles said. “That’s how come I speak such good Spanish.” He ate some salad before he continued. “She left home at sixteen, went through Mexico, actually swam across the Rio Grande outside Matamoros, although to hear her tell it, the water was so low they could walk almost all the way.”
“Wow.”
Miles nodded. “She’s an inspiration. Every time I feel like I can’t do something, I think about all she did.”
“You were born in the US?”
“Yeah, my mom made her way to Chicago and got a job as a maid for this rich family. My dad’s family.” He leaned back. “Classic love story, really. Dad was already in college, commuting to the University of Chicago. He says it was love at first sight, but he knew that his parents would freak so he couldn’t ask her out or anything. He decided to take a Spanish class so he would have an excuse to talk to her.”
“That is so romantic,” Gavin said.
Miles nodded. “Kind of spoils you for dating, when your parents have a story like that. After my dad graduated, he proposed. My grandparents were really mean, just like he expected. So my mom and dad eloped and moved to Miami. He worked, and she went to school to become a music teacher. I was born while she was still studying.”
“So that’s where the music started.”
Miles nodded. “My mom says I was kicking to the beat while I was inside her.”
“I’d love to see pictures of you as a kid,” Gavin said. “I’ll bet you were totally serious, weren’t you?”
Miles laughed. “I started wearing glasses in third grade. These clunky black frames that made me look like a little geek. By the time I was a teenager, the glasses worked for me because the musicians I listened to thought I was older, and they kind of adopted me. I got to sit in when they were practicing sets, and I had the chance to learn from masters.”
He looked at Gavin. “But what about you? Were you always the best-looking kid in school?”
Gavin was rescued from answering immediately by the arrival of the waiter with their chicken. “I was a cute kid,” Gavin said as they ate. “My dad had me act in commercials for his car dealership.” He put on the pretend voice he’d used back then. “Kaz Cars, for the kid in you!”
Miles laughed.
“Yeah, they were pretty funny commercials. But even then, I could tell my sister felt bad about them.”
“You have a sister? You haven’t mentioned her before.”
Gavin shrugged. “Gretchen is smart, but she’s not pretty, and she’s not a very outgoing person, either. Smart isn’t as important to my family as good-looking and charming are.” He took a sip of the bubbly wine to fortify himself. “Gretchen is three years older than I am, and I think she resented me showing up and taking all the attention away from her. She got out of the house as soon as she could, and she’s never looked back.”
“That must have been tough for both of you,” Miles said.
“Back when we were kids, I hated her because she was mean. She’d cut my hair weird. She’d tell me I was adopted, which was dumb because I look just like my dad.”
“So when I see him, I’ll know what you’re going to look like when you’re older?”
“I guess.” Gavin shifted uncomfortably in his chair. These weren’t the kind of questions guys usually asked him on dates, stuff like how he started modeling, where his shots had been published, if he ever got it on with other models or photographers.
But these were the right questions, he thought. He asked Miles more about his childhood and talked about growing up in Eau Claire with his family around him. By the time they finished, he thought it was the best date
he’d ever been on.
Which was weird, because when they got to Miles’s apartment, Gavin was feeling shy. Miles left him by the door to go put on some music, and when he came back, Gavin was still standing there.
“Everything all right?” Miles asked.
“Yeah, great,” Gavin said, but still he didn’t move. How had he done it, all those times? Just shucked his clothes and jumped into bed? He felt awkward and clumsy.
“You don’t look great,” Miles said. “Listen, we don’t have to do anything, you know. I’ll still work with you and your family.”
“No!” Gavin said. “I want to. I just don’t know…”
Miles leaned in and kissed him, and Gavin felt the tension that had been making his body feel like a guitar string release. He let Miles set the tempo, the two of them kissing very lightly. Miles ran a hand through Gavin’s hair, cupped his chin, and looked into his eyes.
Please don’t say I’m handsome, Gavin thought. I hear that all the time, and I’m tired of it.
Miles placed his palm over Gavin’s heart. “I can feel your heart beating,” he said softly. “Listen to the rhythm. Lub-dub, lub-dub.”
“My high school English teacher said that’s why iambic pentameter is so powerful,” Gavin said. “Because it mimics the beating of the human heart.”
“Mmm,” Miles said, rubbing his nose against Gavin’s throat. “Words and music go together so well, don’t you think?”
Gavin felt short of breath, his heart racing and his dick straining for attention. Miles nipped Gavin’s throat with his teeth, and Gavin felt such a jolt of sexual adrenaline he was surprised he didn’t come in his pants.
Miles pulled back with a devilish gleam in his eye. Then he pulled his T-shirt up over his head, ruffling his dark hair. Gavin leaned down and took Miles’s right nipple in his mouth, sucking it first, then nibbling the way Miles had nipped at his throat. “Dios mio,” Miles said, shuddering.
They moved slowly through the rhythms of lovemaking. Each piece of clothing that was removed had its own ceremony, exposing new flesh to be worshipped. The last thing Miles took off was his glasses, and without them, he looked sweet and vulnerable, and Gavin wanted to hold him in his arms and never let go.
Miles took his hand and led him to the bedroom. “Good thing this is my apartment and I know my way around, because I’m blind as a bat without my glasses.”
“You could use echo-location, like bats do,” Gavin said. He sang the A above middle C, proud that he knew what note it was and how to sing it.
Suddenly, Miles’s hand was beneath Gavin’s balls, squeezing, and Gavin yelped. “I always knew you could reach those high notes with the proper motivation,” Miles said.
Gavin laughed. “But I won’t have you playing with my balls when I’m up on stage.”
They collapsed into Miles’s bed, giggling together. Gavin was on his side, with his leg sprawled possessively over Miles’s. He leaned up on one arm, looking down on him. A shaft of moonlight came in through the window and illuminated the angles of Miles’s face, and Gavin’s heart was filled with a swelling sensation. He leaned down, kissed Miles lightly on the lips, and had to stop himself from whispering the words that rose in his throat. It was too early for that, and he didn’t want Miles to think he was the kind of guy who tossed the L word around easily.
Miles reached down and palmed Gavin’s dick, already slick with precum. His fingers probed around the head as Gavin moaned with pleasure. Gavin squirmed around so that Miles was on top of him, face to face, dick to dick. The sensual Latin rhythm from the speakers in the living room floated around them, and they moved languidly against each other, kissing, rubbing dick to belly and belly to dick.
Gavin wrapped his arms around Miles’s back and pulled him down.
“I don’t want to suffocate you,” Miles said, trying to back away.
“I want to feel every bit of you,” Gavin said. “Really, push down on me. Let me carry all your weight.”
For a moment, Gavin worried he’d said the wrong thing. Did Miles think Gavin was implying he was fat? Because he wasn’t; he was sturdy, with the build of a real man, a grown-up, and Gavin loved that about him. But then Miles gave in, resting his furry body against Gavin’s smooth skin.
Gavin’s pulse accelerated, and he felt the weight pressing down on his chest, but he knew he was strong, that he could take anything, do anything, as long as Miles was there with him.
Miles began bucking his hips against Gavin, pressing his dick into Gavin’s with an abandon that Gavin hadn’t seen before in him. It made Gavin rise up to meet him, rubbing sensuously beneath him. His light-headedness added to the pleasure of his building orgasm, and he began whimpering and squirming, desperate for the release he knew was coming.
Gavin came first, with an explosive power that knocked him out for a second, and then when he came to, he realized Miles was sliding against him faster and faster, and then he yelped, and a cold splash hit Gavin’s chest.
“Mi cielo, mi amor, mi Corazon,” Miles whispered as he slumped beside Gavin, and Gavin regretted the clunkiness of the English language, which had no words to match everything that he was feeling.
Exhilaration
Gavin sat up beside Miles in the shaft of moonlight.
“Want to sleep,” Miles said groggily, reaching for him.
Gavin scrambled away and stood up. “I have an early shift tomorrow. You sleep, mi amor.”
That felt good, he thought, returning Miles’s endearment back to him. As Gavin dressed, he heard Miles settle into the rhythm of sleep. He walked back home under starry skies, punch drunk on sex and elation. He couldn’t wait to get to Starlit Lake, to be with Miles all the time.
A pair of guys tumbled along the street in front of him in each other’s arms, on their way to the kind of make-out session Gavin had left, and he smiled and silently wished them well.
Ever since he’d hit puberty, he’d sat back and waited for guys to make the moves on him. He had never bothered to work at loving anyone because there was always another guy around the corner, another one at the club, another willing to jump into bed with him.
But Miles was different. For the first time he could remember, Gavin wanted a guy and was willing to work to get him. Miles wasn’t the kind for a quick fuck; he was one of those long-term guys, one who was worth holding on to.
What would it be like to be with Miles at Starlit Lake? Gavin had spent his childhood summers there with his cousins and their moms, while their dads worked and came up on weekends. He remembered long, lazy days, swimming in the lake, barbecuing burgers and hot dogs, all those clichés of country childhood. But this was going to be totally different.
First, it would be a working vacation. Despite the praise he’d gotten from Miles, he knew he had a lot of work to do to catch up to Archie and Erica.
And second, he was going to spend as much time as he could having sex with Miles. In his third-floor bedroom, out on a rowboat, on a tiny island in the middle of the lake. Anywhere he possibly could.
Tuesday morning he worked his shift, still in an excellent mood.
Careful was delighted. “You keep this up, bwoi, you’ll fill that tip jar to overflowing.”
“I’m going to need some time off, Careful,” Gavin said. “Like, three weeks.”
Careful shrugged. “It’s summer, so we can manage. When?”
“I want to leave August thirteenth and come back after Labor Day. I’m going back up to my family’s house in Wisconsin.” He didn’t want to say anything about the concert, or about Miles, not wanting to jinx anything so new.
For the rest of the week, Gavin spent every free moment singing or studying music. He saw Miles in the morning at Java Joe’s, but they said little to each other. He went over “Apple Cider Time” again and again, connecting the notations on the page to the notes he was singing. He sang the “Do-Re-Mi” song from The Sound of Music so often he felt like one of the Von Trapp kids.
It was exhila
rating, though he wasn’t sure if he was putting so much work in because he was going to perform or because he wanted to show Miles what he could do. He got hung up for a while on key signatures, on sharps, flats, and naturals, but eventually he felt he understood them.
Miles finally had some time for him on Friday afternoon, and his heart raced as he waited for the elevator up to Miles’s studio. He worried that Miles would think he hadn’t made enough progress. That he’d say there was no way that Gavin could be good enough to perform at the Dells concert. By the time he walked into the studio, he was a mess.
“What’s the matter?” Miles asked, looking up. He jumped from his chair and hurried over to Gavin. “Here, sit down. You need some water or something?”
The feel of Miles’s arm around his shoulder made Gavin feel even worse. “I’ll be fine,” he said. “Can we just get started?”
Miles cocked his head and looked at him, then shrugged. “Sure.” As he sat down at the keyboard, Gavin walked into the studio. He put the headphones on and stepped up to the mike. As he heard the first few notes of “Apple Cider Time,” he took a deep breath and started to sing, and though he felt wobbly at first, he was determined to continue, and he began to feel the lyrics. It was as if he was singing directly to Miles.
By the time he finished, Miles had a broad smile on his face. “That was great, Gavin. You’ve been working hard.”
Gavin came out of the studio and sat across from him. “You really think so?”
“I do. I can’t believe we only have one more week here before we go up to Wisconsin.”
“Have you got all your other work cleared out?”
Miles shook his head. “I have a ton of studio work. But I should be done every night by around nine or ten. If that’s not too late for you. I know you have early shifts.”
Gavin looked down at the floor. “Would it bother you if I stayed over at your place? It’s a quick walk to Java Joe’s. I’d be real quiet in the morning so I wouldn’t wake you.”
Miles smiled broadly. “That would be great. Um, up in Wisconsin. Are we going to be sharing a room?”
