Double Up

by Vanessa North

  “Hey.” He stops me with a finger on my lips and a questioning glance. “Is this about the lovemaking vs. getting off thing? I didn’t mean it like I’m in love with you. I just—”

  “No, no,” I reassure him. “I liked that. I never had anyone make me stop and enjoy it the way you did. And I don’t usually spend the night with guys I hook up with, but staying with you was nice. As I said, unexpected. But hot. I guess it’s making me feel all introspective.”

  “I’d like to ’spect your intros.” He leers at me and waggles his eyebrows again. I have to laugh.

  “I bet you would.”

  His hand on my waist tightens slightly, and I lean into the embrace.

  “Dave, are you okay if we don’t go ‘intro’ anytime soon?” I wince as I ask. My turn to blush, hot discomfort creeping up my face.

  “Um, okay.” He pulls back and turns my head with his other hand so I’m forced to face him. “This is an odd time and place for that conversation. I wasn’t sure you even wanted to go again, let alone ‘intro.’ Also, can we not call it that?”

  His smile grounds me, and the unsettled feeling I’d been fighting since crawling out of his bed finally fades.

  “Okay. I would like to go again. For sure. I had a good time, and I like you, and we’re friends—and I think we could be more. Going again would be awesome. But I don’t— I should tell you …” Why can’t I just fucking say it?

  “What? Ben, we didn’t use anything last night, are you trying to tell me—”

  “No.” I shake my head. “I would never put you at risk. I might be used to keeping it casual, but I’m careful.”

  “So … what’s got you running scared?”

  “Idon’tbottom.” The words come out of me in a rush, and I cringe inwardly as I wait for his response.

  “Okay.” He shrugs. “That’s cool. You can do me if you want.”

  Just like that?

  “It doesn’t upset you? Wait, you’d let me? But you’re so obviously a top.”

  He laughs. “God, Ben. I like you. I trust you. I think that little curve in your dick is going to feel amazing. I mean, as long as you know what to do with it.”

  “Hey!”

  “This top-bottom shit doesn’t have to be so black or white. I’m versatile. I mean, sure your ass is hot, but so is your dick. And your mouth. And your hands, with those calluses from the rope handle?” He shudders. “Seriously hot.”

  “It really doesn’t bother you?”

  He takes my hand and kisses one of my knuckles before saying, “No. Your penchant for energy drinks over coffee bothers me much more. Speaking of, I’m going to go make a pot. Whenever you’re ready, why don’t you join me in the kitchen and I’ll make pancakes or something.”

  He makes pancakes and coffee, and doesn’t even tease me about how much sugar I put in it. He, of course, drinks his black. Instead of insisting on breakfast table small talk, he pulls out a tablet and asks if I mind if he catches up on the headlines while we eat.

  I shake my head, take out my phone, and do the same. We pass the meal in companionable silence, and I move on from the news to Facebook. My friend Tina has drawn eyebrows on her little mutt and posted the evidence on her page. When I laugh, a big belly laugh that sounds loud even to me, he looks up and I show the photo to him, provoking a guffaw before he goes back to his reading.

  He looks up at me suddenly. “What are you going to wear?”

  “Wear?”

  “On the boat. You stayed over, you don’t have your stuff.”

  “I’ll just stay in my clothes, I guess.” I shrug. Wouldn’t be the first time I didn’t get in the water while giving a lesson.

  “Want to borrow a pair of trunks?”

  And so I follow him back up to his bedroom, this time admiring the rest of his home in daylight as we go. In the hallway, colorful photographs of strange, narrow houses hang in contrast to the modern gray walls. I point to one. “Is that Charleston?”

  “Yeah. It’s a Single House. Kind of a signature style there.” He pauses and points at one of the photos. “My former business partner helped renovate that one when it got damaged in a hurricane. Amazing house.”

  “Do you miss it?”

  He looks at me with his head cocked to one side. “What, Charleston?”

  I nod.

  “Sometimes. I miss my dad more. Charleston reminds me of him.” He shrugs and then leads me back into the bedroom.

  He starts rummaging in a drawer, and I’m struck by how easy this is, how comfortable I feel with him.

  I wrap my arms around his waist and kiss the back of his neck.

  “What’s that for?” He grins over his shoulder at me.

  “I don’t know.” That soft feeling is back, the same one that sent me scurrying out of bed first thing in the morning. But instead of running away from it, this time I squeeze him a little tighter and lay the side of my head against his shoulder blades.

  “Mmm, that’s nice. You’re a cuddle bug, aren’t you?” He turns around in my arms, braces his shoulders against the dresser, and widens his legs.

  “Only with you.” I move in for a kiss.

  It’s not one of those kisses that are supposed to lead to sex. It’s just a soft brush of my lips to his—at least, that’s what I intend. But then he makes this noise, this kind of groaning sound, and I can’t help myself. I take his face between my hands and start really kissing him, pouring all that soft, warm feeling into him, grinding against him, and it starts to get really hot—

  My phone rings.

  His groan as we pull apart is not a sexy one. I look at the display. Kinky Eddie.

  “Hello?”

  “You’re late. I’m supposed to be driving Bedhead’s boat around while you teach him to ride a wakeboard. Instead, I’m standing at the end of my dock in my bathing suit, nary a Bedhead in sight. Did I miss a text or something?”

  “No. We’ll be there in a few minutes.” I pause. “We just need to get dressed.”

  The line is silent for a moment.

  “Oh, well there’s a lovely mental image. I’ll just ponder that for a while until you get here. Mmm. Brawny and Bedhead. Love-ly.” Eddie makes a lascivious growl and hangs up.

  Apparently he really did ponder it, because by the time we maneuver to his dock, he’s sporting a raging hard-on, proudly displayed by another Speedo, this one emerald green. And he makes sure Dave and I both get a good brush of it when he hugs us hello.

  “Good grief, Russell. Stop molesting my student,” I protest when the hug he gives Dave gets a little gropey.

  Dave laughs but Eddie pouts theatrically. “Gawd, darling, you know I have a vivid imagination, you can’t tell me you’re naked in Bedhead’s house and not have that go straight to my dick. I mean, just thinking about the two of you together, him so innocent looking with those freckles and you all blond and tough. It’s absolutely savage. It would make the hottest porn.”

  “Bit of a voyeur, are you, Eddie?” Dave grins at him.

  “Mmmmmm. Yes. Absolutely. Especially if I’m tied up while it’s going on—so I can look, but can’t touch. New favorite jerk-off fantasy.”

  “Told you he was a kinky fucker.” I laugh.

  “Never heard any complaints from you.” Eddie shoots back. “Oh, Bedhead, is that awkward? Brawny and I are just friends, I promise.”

  “No, it’s fine. I know exactly where I stand with Ben. Why do you call him ‘Brawny’?”

  “On top of his glorious physique, there was an ill-advised moustache situation back in 2005.” Eddie waves his hand. “It stuck. Thank goodness the moustache didn’t.”

  Dave grins for a moment, then looks out over the glassy lake. His eyes light up; he’s definitely hooked. “Can I ride now?”

  His lesson starts smoothly, I teach him how to slide on the heelside edge of his board, make him practice between the wakes, then on the wakes. While he takes a break, we hit our first bump. I describe how to do a backside slide, and his face goes wh
ite.

  “You want me to do what?”

  I ignore the twinge of sympathy—bending over with your back to the boat is terrifying, but he needs to learn this. “Turn away from the boat, lean forward on your toeside edge until the heelside edge pops out of the water. Hold it in the slide.”

  “What the fuck am I doing with the handle while this is going on?”

  “Hold it with one hand, or both, whatever’s comfortable. Just hold it down by your ass—like your hands are cuffed behind your back. You’ll be fine.”

  His first attempt ends with him going over backward, hitting the water so hard, he lies gasping for a moment before he tries again.

  And again.

  After the fourth attempt, he makes a short, choppy gesture with his hand and tugs his feet out of the bindings. When we go back to fetch him, he climbs on board, sheds the vest, and paces around the boat like a caged animal.

  “I can’t do it. Why do I even need to learn that? It’s fucked up.”

  “You can do it. And you need to learn it because you need to know what it feels like to ride your edges. You need to know that before you start jumping.”

  “Bending over behind the boat while it goes twenty miles an hour? It’s crazy.”

  “No, Bedhead,” Eddie interrupts, “‘crazy’ is entering a double-up contest before you even know how to ride a wakeboard. Ben’s just making the most of your own crazy. Now, if you don’t mind my borrowing your board, I’ll show you how it’s done.”

  To Dave’s surprise, Eddie takes Dave’s vest and board and hops in the lake. This oughta be good. I drive so Dave can watch as Eddie demonstrates a backside slide, followed by a few jumps, including a wicked spin with a Mellon Grab. Watching as best I can in the rearview mirror, I note Eddie still rides almost as well as he did twenty years ago. Does he regret the choice to encourage me back then, rather than competing for himself?

  When he joins us in the boat again, his expression is smug. “See, Bedhead, nothing to it. If an ancient queen like me can pull it off, you can too.”

  “Eddie was your friend who lived on the lake when you were a teenager, wasn’t he?” Dave glares at me accusingly.

  “Yep.” I grin.

  “And he rides almost as well as you do.”

  “Actually, Eddie probably rides better than I do. He just never had any interest in competition.”

  “Lake jocks are still jocks. Present company excluded, the only thing they’re good for is eye candy.” Eddie frowns.

  “Eddie, you’re twice the athlete any of those guys were.”

  “Athlete, yes. Jock, no. There’s a difference.” He takes off the vest and hands it to Dave. “Now, are you ready to try again?”

  Dave nods, pulling it back on and reaching for his board.

  He doesn’t master the backside slide during this lesson, but he makes a lot of progress—actually frees up his heelside edge once or twice before crashing. By the time we head back to his house, leaving a waving Eddie on the dock, Dave looks exhausted, but happy.

  Too soon, we’re stashing his gear in the boathouse and lifting the boat out of the water.

  “I have an early meeting in the morning,” he says as we walk around the house to my car. “And I’m leaving for New York tomorrow afternoon.”

  I swallow my disappointment. “I forgot you were going out of town. When will you be back?”

  “Monday. So we can do another Tuesday lesson, if that’s cool?”

  “Yeah, same time next Tuesday.”

  “You could come over tonight and rub my shoulders again.”

  A sharp wave of longing hits me—but I can’t. “I have an appointment tonight after work. I’m sorry.”

  I could skip physical therapy. It’s not like I’ve never skipped before. But I know the stretches and exercises are a huge part of what’s allowing me to forgo another surgery. I’m damn lucky to still have most of the mobility in my legs, and the stretches keep me strong and generally pain-free. When I have a bad day—even though they’re rare now—it’s almost always a day or two after a missed appointment.

  “It’s okay. Maybe next week.”

  “Yeah.”

  “So, I’ll see you Tuesday then?”

  I nod my agreement, but I can’t make eye contact. Part of me wants to explain why the appointment is important, but a larger part makes me keep quiet. I don’t like keeping this from him, but if I explain why I still need therapy, he’ll want to know why I won’t have the surgery. And once he knows the whole story, how could he possibly want anything to do with me?

  I swallow the sudden lump in my throat when he leans in to kiss me. I slide my hand up to his neck, tug him against me, looking for that soft feeling from this morning, but it’s gone, and I’m just the guy giving him a very uncasual, desperately hot kiss in front of anyone out for a morning walk.

  He pulls out of the kiss and raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t say anything. He just waves good-bye and watches as I drive away.

  he next day, Dave’s absence in my life seems really fucking huge. Weird, since we hardly know each other. Everything makes me think of him, from the energy drink I grab on my way out the door to Tina’s new profile photo on Facebook—the photo we laughed at together of the newly eyebrowed dog. I can’t get Dave out of my head.

  I wonder what time his flight to New York is.

  I wonder where he’ll stay when he gets there.

  I wonder why he’s going.

  I wonder if he’s thinking about me.

  I wonder if he jerked off last night, and what he fantasized about—maybe me?—and what it smelled like when he came, and whether he might be willing to let me watch him jerk off sometime, and if I could suck on his balls while he does it.

  I’m fucking gone over this guy and I’ve known him what, three days?

  Eddie stops by the shop just as I’m closing up, looking professional and polished in a light-gray suit and salmon-colored tie.

  “Evening, darling.” He looks around. “I was next door going over purchasing for next month. Jerry actually sold that behemoth cabin cruiser he brought in on trade last fall, so we can fit two more wake boats in the showroom.”

  “Awesome.”

  “Want to go get some dinner?” His invitation isn’t accompanied by innuendo or grabby hands, so I know he’s only offering a meal, but still, I’m not feeling up to it.

  “Sorry, Eddie. Not tonight.”

  “Hot date with Bedhead?”

  “Nope. He’s in New York.”

  “Ooh. A traveling man. What does he do? I can’t imagine he needs to work.”

  “He’s an architect. Why would you say that? About him not needing to work?” Sure, I suspected the same thing when I first met Dave, but I’m curious, and Eddie knows people, pays attention to the town gossip. I don’t—not the way Eddie does—and I don’t know the business scene at all. Come to think of it though, I probably know most of the business crowd’s kids—my clientele. Shit, I really am Peter Pan.

  Eddie’s eyes widen, and he looks away. He scrubs at the back of his neck with the heel of his hand. “His father was loaded—the kind of money where he doesn’t have to do anything and it grows all by its lonesome. Davis was his old man’s only kid, and I’m pretty sure the gold-digging ex-wife didn’t inherit, so … that leaves Bedhead.”

  Huh. That explains the house. “Dave’s homophobic mama is a gold digger?”

  “If the Kanye song fits.” Eddie’s shrug is less than casual.

  “Do you know his stepdad?”

  “Rodney Romeo? We run in some of the same business circles, donate money to opposing causes, and loathe each other both professionally and personally.”

  Oh. I rack my brain trying to remember if he’s ever talked about Romeo before. Usually business talk bores me senseless, but the quiet rage on Eddie’s face when he says the guy’s name is definitely interesting.

  “Because of his political shit?”

  “You know how a few years ago, that roads b
ill got killed because the state couldn’t come up with a budget for it? He donated a ton of money to the senator trying to push it through.”

  “The one that would have widened the bridge out there? They were going to buy out the dealership and we were going to have to relocate the shop? What’s that called, something domain?”

  “Oh, they’d have paid what the state called ‘market rate’ for it.” He rolls his eyes. “Trust me, the details are boring as fuck, but if they’d been successful, we wouldn’t be standing here right now.”

  Before I can press him for more information, he changes the subject.

  “Honestly, Ben, if you like Bedhead as much as it seems like you do, I should tell you …”

  “I know, I know, be careful, you don’t want to see me get hurt, all that stuff.” I mimic his lilt, digging back against his condescension.

  “I wasn’t going to say that, darling.” Eddie grins. “Have you told him about the accident?”

  “Yes.” Sort of. “And it wasn’t an accident. It was a fall on a wakeboard. I jumped; I fell. Nothing accidental about it.”

  “How much did you tell him?”

  “I told him I broke my damn back.”

  “And that’s it?”

  “He knows I don’t drink.”

  “But does he know why?”

  “For fuck’s sake, Eddie, back off.”

  He lifts both hands. “Peace, Ben. I’m not accusing you of anything.” His voice is quiet when he starts speaking again. “I just think if you’re going to be pursuing a relationship, a real one, not fucking around, then maybe you need to fix yourself first.” A horrified expression crosses his face. “Not that you’re broken, but you know the surgery could really …”

  “Oh, hell, Eddie, we are not going there again.”

  “It’s a quality-of-life issue, Ben. I’ve seen the changes in your posture, and don’t think I haven’t noticed you rubbing your hamstrings when you don’t think I’m looking. You’re hurting.”

  “My quality of life is just fine.”

  “It could be better,” he snaps.

  “It’s my life.”

  “Fine. I don’t want to have this fight again.” Eddie holds up his hands again and looks away. “Just think about what I said.”