by J P Barnaby
Starting with Information Technology, he scanned the different opportunities, searching for one that would allow him the comfort of isolation. Networking, mobile communications, project management, they all sounded like group type settings. Instead, he moved down to the Associate Degree programs. Maybe he should start smaller. More than one shrink had used the phrase “baby steps” with him. He fucking hated that term. They had no concept of what it meant to increment your life by inches.
He clicked on the software development associate degree and read the description. Yes, he liked to solve puzzles, or at least he used to. Yes, he liked computers, as well as anyone else. He felt comfortable with them, more comfortable than he did with people, anyway. Computers didn’t stare at your scars or give you looks of pity and disgust. They couldn’t burn you or destroy your soul. He read through the rest of the description and decided that it sounded just as good to him as anything else would. With grim determination, he clicked the Apply Now button and filled in the form.
When he received the response, he read through it briefly, feeling the sweat bead on the back of his neck. They would be sending him a brochure for the college, and wanted to schedule a campus tour. They’d be calling to talk to him. They wanted to meet with him. Forwarding the e-mail to his mother, he slammed the computer closed and all but threw it onto his desk. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t. His breathing came in sharp, pained gasps as he rolled to his side and pulled his knees up. Curled like a baby, he stared at the wall and tried not to think about what would come next.
Just because he applied, that didn’t mean he had to go.
Until it did.
Just as she took care of everything else in his life, Aaron’s mother handled everything with ITM. She met with the dean to explain about Aaron’s issues. She met with his instructor to give him an idea of what having him in class would mean. She didn’t accept the dean’s recommendation that maybe Aaron should wait before attending college. His class was scheduled, paperwork was completed, tuition was paid, and throughout the process, Aaron sat idly by and watched his life being lived without him.
As Aaron sat ordering his textbooks for the new semester, the one thing his mother let him do alone, he wondered why in the hell he couldn’t just take classes online. He could register online, buy his books online, even turn in homework online—it was a fucking computer degree, and yet he couldn’t take classes online. He’d signed up for only one of the recommended four courses. Baby steps. After talking it over with his mother, they decided to wait on taking English and public speaking. English frustrated the hell out of Aaron, and his mother planned to talk to the dean about public speaking. They were sure when they explained the magnitude of Aaron’s discomfort, the school would let him take a different elective. It would take him much longer than two years to graduate at that rate, but degree or no degree, he doubted that he would ever be high functioning enough to hold down a job. Most of the time, he was barely able to make it to dinner.
Entering the credit card number that his mother had given him for the books, Aaron set the pick-up date for the Friday before classes started. His mom could take him over to the college. Even in his diminished capacity, he should still be able to walk into the bookstore and pick up a bag. Vaguely, as he clicked the order button on the badly designed bookstore site, he wondered if he would be the only student on campus whose mother chauffeured him to and from school. After a moment of deliberation, he printed the receipt and decided that he probably would.
SPENCER STOOD watching his father sleep, sprawled out in the recliner with a leather-bound edition of Tolkien’s trilogy cracked open on his chest, the binding stretched beyond reasonable limits. He didn’t take the book from his father’s hands, but simply watched as it rose and fell with each rumbling snore. Henry Thomas wasn’t a violent drunk, or even an angry one, but it broke Spencer’s heart to see him in pain. It had been just the two of them for so long, relying on each other, and he felt like they just weren’t the same anymore. He didn’t know how to get their closeness back. He didn’t know how to help.
Shivering lightly in the late night breeze, he closed and locked the sliding glass door and grabbed one of the throws from the back of the couch. Carefully, he laid it across his father’s legs and brought it up over the man’s chest. His father merely grunted and slept on. With a heavy sigh, Spencer went up to his room and pulled out his new laptop. Memories from his encounter with the delivery guy flooded his mind and made his cock begin to fill. They were marred only marginally by the delivery boy’s post-sex behavior, but he could look past that and remember what being inside the boy had felt like.
Bringing up his favorite Twitter app, he watched his timeline for a few minutes to see who else was up who could distract him from worrying about his father. He talked to people all over the world in a dozen different time zones. Having friends on Twitter was easier than having them in real life. He didn’t have to tell them he was deaf. He didn’t have to see the fucking pity in their eyes. He could simply be Spencer, and that was okay. Talking to guys and flirting with them online was safe—it wasn’t like he’d ever see them. Fucking guys over Twitter had turned into his escape.
Mark John-Thomas @Mark4873
ikr? WTF? I’m sick of hearing str8 guys going on and on about pussy. #Unfollow
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Favorite
Todd Marshall @BottomBoi574
I’m so bored
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Favorite
Brandon Masters @BrandonMastersXXX
Doing an insanely hot three way with this mega fucking stud and his boyfriend
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Favorite
Spencer Thomas @Spence9876
@BottomBoi574 I got somethin you can play with if you’re bored.
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Favorite
Todd Marshall @BottomBoi574
@Spence9876 WTF I sent you a DM like 3 days ago?
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Favorite
Mark John-Thomas @Mark4873
Hey @Spence9876 Where the fuck have you been?
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Favorite
Kyle Stacey @KyleStaceyXXX
I love SF pic.twitter.com/387g83H8
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Favorite
Spencer Thomas @Spence9876
@Mark4873 Sorry I’ve been busy getting shit done… Checking DMs now
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Favorite
Spencer clicked the link to switch the page to his private messages, and sure enough, there was one from @BottomBoi asking him to Skype, and it pissed him off. He’d already explained about a dozen times that he didn’t want to talk to him over Skype. The kid thought he would be getting great video chat sex. All he’d get was fucking silence and maybe a video to jack off to.
Spencer Thomas @Spence9876
DM @BottomBoi574 My mic doesn’t work on the laptop. Can’t Skype. Sorry
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Favorite
It was an excuse he’d used over and over again, but one that seemed to work. Well, except with @BottomBoi, who offered to ship him a brand new computer headset so they could talk. God, if the guy only knew what he was asking, he’d shut the fuck up. One day soon, he’d just give up and unfollow Spencer, who couldn’t wait for that day.
Mark John-Thomas @Mark4873
@Spence9876 No prob man. Wanna chat?
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Favorite
Mark, whoever he was, understood that Spencer didn’t Skype. He’d asked once, and when Spencer refused, he hadn’t asked again. Instead, they’d gone onto chat and talked there privately. It was faster and more reliable than the private messaging system in Twitter.
Spencer Thomas @Spence9876
@Mark4873 Yeah, logging on now.
View conversation Reply Retweet ★Fa
vorite
He brought up the chat window and minimized Twitter, no longer in the mood to deal with BottomBoi and his neediness. Besides, Mark was always fun inspiration for a late-night hand fuck. Just to be safe, he got up and locked his bedroom door as Mark’s first message popped up on his screen.
[MARK]: been hard 4 u for days fucking loved those pics you sent
Spencer leaned back in his desk chair and popped the button on his jeans. He might not be able to talk a guy to orgasm, but he could certainly share some hot come shots. A few videos might reside on his phone, too, but he felt reasonably sure his password would save him from curious eyes. He hadn’t been brave enough to send one of those out. A still shot he could argue he’d gotten from the Internet and shared. A video taken on his phone was another story.
[SPENCER]: Think my cock is enough to satisfy you?
[MARK]: yeah it’s a work of fucking art is it hard for me now?
[SPENCER]: Yeah, I’m typing one-handed if that’s what you’re asking.
[MARK]: it is
[MARK]: so am i
[MARK]: wish u had me over the desk right now pounding into me
[SPENCER]: You like it hard and fast?
[MARK]: fuck yeah
[SPENCER]: You want me to pin you to the desk? Drill you into it with my cock?
[MARK]: omg yeah
Spencer pulled his jeans and briefs down to his calves and spread his legs wide. The cool leather of the office chair chilled the backs of his thighs. He liked being naked and spread like that, still half-dressed, stroking his cock as he imagined the faceless guy on the other side of the chat window doing the same. He wondered if their rhythms matched and what Mark thought of as he jerked off. The blood rushed to his cock, filling it, lengthening it as he wondered if Mark was using his pictures to jack off.
[MARK]: want to ride you
[SPENCER]: I could do that, lay back on the bed and watch you fuck yourself on me.
[MARK]: tell me something about you
[SPENCER]: Tell you what?
[MARK]: don’t care, anything about you
[SPENCER]: I’m starting college in a couple weeks.
He didn’t know what made him reveal that about himself. Usually, he didn’t share any kind of personal information with anonymous guys online. The need for a connection and the lack of blood in his brain made him stupid.
[MARK]: Jesus ur a twink?
[MARK]: fuck im so hard please let me watch?
[SPENCER]: No. And if you ask again, the conversation is over.
[MARK]: sorry tell me what you’re doing
[SPENCER]: I’m getting up and moving to the bed.
His hard-on started to falter as he stood up. Spencer was rapidly getting out of the mood to play tonight, but jerked his jeans all the way off anyway. Pulling his shirt off over his head, he pulled one of the pillows up and propped it against the headboard. The screen moved up as another message came through. He ignored it for the moment and settled the laptop on the bed next to him. God, he just wanted to fucking jack off and go to sleep. He didn’t think that was too much to ask. Glancing up, he saw the message Mark sent, and his dick got harder. It was a picture of the thirtysomething brown-haired guy straddled over a dildo. Naked from the waist down, his nondescript blue T-shirt had been hiked up above his nipples, which were pebbled out on his chest. The base of the dildo barely peeked out from beneath his balls, prominent because of the way his back arched and his cock jutted up toward his stomach.
It was fucking beautiful.
He grabbed his phone and reached far down between his legs. Angling the phone to miss his face, he took a picture of his hand wrapped around the base of his cock and e-mailed it to Mark.
[SPENCER]: Check your e-mail. I have something for you to ride.
A minute passed, and then two.
[MARK]: FUCK I wanna choke on that
Spencer imagined a pair of sweet, soft lips around his cock and groaned. He rolled a bit to his left, reached into his bedside table, and pulled out a bottle of lube. He popped the lid and then poured a bit directly on the head of his cock and used his right hand to spread it across his hot skin. He used his left hand, which was devoid of lube, to type. The result wasn’t the polished typing he usually used because text speak drove his father insane.
[SPENCER]: take it deep
[SPENCER]: I want to fuck ur throat
He’d never done that before, but the thought just make his fucking balls ache. Having the guy trapped beneath him taking everything Spencer gave. Fucking take it. Take my cock. Beyond any sense of reason, he concentrated on the head of his dick, twisting his grip over it. It throbbed in his hand. Jerking his hips up, he thrust into his warm, slick fist and wished it were Mark’s pliable body. He could almost feel the tight heat, and he gripped tighter.
[MARK]: rubbing stretching god so good
[MARK]: please fuck me harder
With the slow response time as a guide, he figured Mark was doing only the barest essentials of typing because his hands were otherwise occupied. One hand drove a dildo into his ass, and the other hand wrapped around his dick. God, he could almost see him as he knelt on a bed somewhere and wished he could be on top of Spencer… or under him.
[SPENCER]: want to spread you wide open across my bed and make you scream
The thought just randomly popped into his head of a guy spread-eagled and face down on his bed. He wasn’t bound, although Spencer wouldn’t be opposed to the idea. He simply lay there until Spencer knelt between his knees and lined his cock up along the sweet valley of ass laid out like a buffet.
[MARK]: make me scream with your mouth or your cock?
In his mind, he spread the guy’s cheeks with his palms and buried his face in Mark’s ass. Precome leaked from the tip of his dick as he wondered what that sweet ass would taste like, or how Mark would fuck the sheets, grinding his hips into the bed as he rode Spencer’s tongue.
[SPENCER]: tell me what you want
[MARK]: god please fuck me
[SPENCER]: use that dildo
[SPENCER]: pretend it’s me
[SPENCER]: get on your hands and knees with your legs spread wide fuck that sweet little ass for me
[SPENCER]: do it hard I like it hard
[MARK]: uggggggggggh yeah so hard
A smile spread across Spencer’s face. The guy was certainly thinking about him and all the things his cock could do. Too bad it could never be real. He tried to push that thought from his mind and concentrate on the feeling in his balls instead, because that didn’t make him feel inadequate. Suddenly, he just wanted it over.
[SPENCER]: close going to come
Speeding the motion of his hand, he focused on the spots where he was most sensitive. Years of practice told him exactly how to get himself off with minimum fuss. It would be empty and hollow, just as it always was, but at least he’d be able to fucking sleep.
[MARK]: me too keep hitting that sweet spot just like you would
Spencer rolled his eyes. Another night that would have been hot, but right then, it grated on his nerves and he snapped the laptop lid closed. Let the guy think he lost his Internet connection. He’d be back. They were all desperate, lonely guys looking to get off. They’d all be back, just as he would.
His orgasm, empty and unfulfilling, finally fucking landed on his stomach in warm, sticky blotches. The pressure behind his eyes and the burning in his throat took him by surprise. An emotional release came right along with the physical, and he turned his head into the pillow trying to stop the lonely ache in his chest.
Four
AS HE expected, Aaron’s mother offered to accompany him into the bookstore just to keep him company. Of course, he knew that she was afraid for him. With the groups of people on campus, would this be the day that he had a panic attack in the bookstore or became unresponsive in the bathroom? The college had been briefed about his various neuroses by his mother and the current stop in his revolving door of shrinks, but at the end
of the day, it was his mother who had to pick up the pieces if he fell apart. It took a long time to convince her to wait in the car outside the quad. If he was going to sit in a room full of other people for class, he had to start doing things for himself.
As luck would have it, the bookstore was relatively quiet when he arrived. Most of the students probably already had their books.
“May I help you?” the young woman from behind the desk asked as Aaron approached. The smile faded quickly from her pointed little face as Aaron looked up, his scars illuminated harshly in the fluorescent lighting. He could tell that she was trying not to stare as she twirled her blond hair around one finger, obviously nervous and uncomfortable. Aaron handed her his receipt without a word, and she looked it over before going to the shelves a few feet behind her to get his bag of books. Looking around at the different products on display as he waited, he was glad that his mother had already taken care of getting everything else that he needed. Aaron thought that maybe his mother took a special kind of comfort in doing something as mundane as picking out his school supplies, because he was still around to buy them for. Picking up notebooks and pens was his mother’s way of celebrating the fact that he needed them.
