Screwups (26 page)

Danny smiled and leaned forward to plant a kiss on Jake’s forehead. “Sure. Hopefully you’ll be less afraid of heights than David was.”

He wasn’t sure if this had really accomplished much. He’d have to see how Jake reacted when he was fully awake, assuming he remembered it. But it did feel good to have it all out in the open, and he felt a small spark of hope deep in his chest for the first time since the first day they’d had sex. The instinct to stomp it out before it could get out of control was still there, but Danny resisted, letting the spark warm him as he drifted off to sleep.

D
ANNY
WOKE
to someone—most likely Jake—fondling his ass. He turned his head to look over his shoulder and immediately had Jake’s mouth tickling the corner of his. Danny smiled at him. “I figured you’d sleep all day.”

“It’s almost noon. And I’m horny.”

“You’re always horny.”

Jake made an attempt to climb on top of him but winced. Danny put a hand on his arm and said, “Lie back down, idiot. I’m not going to have you pulling out your stitches.”

“I’m horny,” Jake whined.

“Lie on your back.”

Jake did as he was told and Danny rolled over to face him, reaching out to caress his naked skin wherever it showed through the bandages. Jake still looked a bit like a mummy, especially when viewed from behind, though a number of the bandages had been discarded as his skin healed. He’d have some scars, most likely, but fortunately nothing disfiguring.

“Do you remember anything I told you last night?” Danny asked, as his hand ventured lower on Jake’s abdomen.

Jake’s eyelids fluttered as Danny caressed him, and he didn’t look like he’d be capable of coherent conversation for much longer, but he replied, “I remember all of it. And I don’t think it was nearly as horrible as you were making it out to be.”

That was good. “I never really said it was horrible,” Danny said. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with casual sex. I just….” He stopped, not knowing how to complete the thought.

“You just think it makes you unlovable.”

Danny shrugged.
I guess that’s it, isn’t it?
“Well, since that… incident… nobody has ever wanted more than a quick fuck from me. A lot of guys have been attracted to me, but nobody ever wanted to stick around. Nobody wants a slut for a boyfriend.”

“I’m sticking around,” Jake insisted. “And stop calling yourself a slut.”

“You’re just saying that because I’ve got my hand on your dick.”

Jake groaned, partly from arousal and, perhaps, partly from frustration. Danny knew he was being childish, but it was hard to let it go after all this time.

“How about you just shut up and fuck me,” Jake said, “and we can talk about this in a few months, or a few years, when you see I know all the so-called sleazy things you’ve done, and I’m
still your boyfriend
?”

Danny laughed, but he was surprised to find his eyes tearing up. Embarrassed, he glanced away. Maybe it was time to change the subject. “Hold on.”

He got out of bed and scampered across the room to his desk. Then he grabbed the bottle of lube and a condom out of his top drawer. He scurried back to the bed and climbed on top of Jake, who’d already grown impatient enough to start jerking himself.

“Would you like to try fucking me this time?” Danny asked, holding up the lube. “You can just lie there and I’ll ride you.” So far, it had always been Danny on top, because Jake loved—in an epic way—being fucked.

Jake looked up at him with eyes clouded by lust. “Okay.”

He was so into what he was doing that Danny had to slap his hand away from his dick, but he groaned and let Danny take over. Danny rolled the condom over him and applied some lube. Then he positioned himself over Jake’s cock and placed the tip against his anus.

“You aren’t just going to shove it in, are you?” Jake asked, his eyes going wide.

Danny laughed. “No. I may be experienced, but that doesn’t mean I can just do a high beam dismount and land on your dick. This works for me, though, if we do it slow.”

He relaxed and allowed himself to open up as he pressed his sphincter down against the head of Jake’s cock. The hardest part was getting the head of Jake’s dick inside, but fortunately dicks were designed for penetration. After a minute or so of pressure, his anus relaxed enough for the lubricated head to slip inside. Danny gasped, but it wasn’t pain he was feeling—at least not enough to override the pleasure. The temptation to simply slide down the rest of the shaft was strong, but he resisted, moving very slowly and pausing to allow his body to adjust. Jake waited patiently, caressing his sides and giving Danny’s erection slow languid strokes to encourage him.

When Danny had settled down to the base of Jake’s cock, feeling its comfortable warmth nestled deep inside him, he began to rock back and forth. Jake moaned and closed his eyes as he slid in and out of Danny’s ass. “That feels amazing.”

“I thought you’d like it.”

It was hard to keep Jake from thrusting into him. Danny wouldn’t have minded that
—
he would have loved it, actually—if it weren’t for the fact that Jake needed to stay relatively still. The entire purpose of doing it in this position was to keep him from flexing his back too much.

Somehow, he managed to keep Jake still enough to get through it without pulling any stitches. At least, he didn’t detect any signs of pain. There was no stopping the idiot from thrusting hard into him as he approached orgasm, and Danny enjoyed the way Jake hammered into him, until he slammed in as deep as he could go and scrunched his eyes closed to make a rather cute “orgasm face.” Danny felt Jake coming inside him in powerful spasms, and the sensation resonated deliciously throughout his entire body as he furiously stroked himself off. He grunted and squirted come all over Jake’s stomach and chest, and even managed to splash a little on Jake’s chin.

“That was awesome!” Jake gasped when it was over, trailing his fingers through Danny’s come on his stomach, the picture of wantonness. “But I miss you coming inside
me
.”

Danny allowed Jake’s dick to slide out of him as he lowered himself onto his hands and knees, hovering over Jake’s wet torso. He cursed himself for being an idiot—he’d sprayed all over some of the bandages. They might have to change them.

Before he got up to get a towel, Danny licked his come off Jake’s chin and then moved up to kiss him. When he broke the kiss, he said, “I never would have thought, when I first met you, that you’d be such a bottom.”

“Is that bad?”

“Absolutely not,” Danny said with a smile. “I can’t wait to fuck you again.”

Jake looked deep into his eyes a moment, his blue eyes clear and utterly without guile. Danny realized that he’d been wrong to compare them to Steve’s eyes, when they’d first met. Steve’s eyes had always seemed distrustful and suspicious. Jake had been closed off for a time, but he had always looked at Danny without deception, trusting him sexually and perhaps even emotionally. And his open gaze invited Danny to trust Jake back.

“I’
LL
TEACH
you to make fools of us!” Jake shouted at Shane. Then he charged, his boffer hammer aiming to crash down on Shane’s head. The theater major sidestepped, causing Jake to stagger as his hammer swung through empty space. His stitches were out now, thankfully, but he could still feel a tiny twinge in his back when he did it.

“With that,” Paul announced, “Utgard-Loki vanished, along with his entire castle and all of its guests!”

Jake looked around in a comic parody of astonishment that drew guffaws from the audience. Well, he’d never claimed he could act. Danny, who was playing Loki, snorted and clapped Jake on the shoulder. “Come along, Thor, before you hurt yourself.”

“How do you always manage to get us into these messes, Loki?”

“Skill.”

When they walked out of the lounge together, the audience of Eatonites at the far end of the room, where the couches and chairs had been pushed, erupted into applause.

“That was awesome!” Sonny shouted above the noise.

Jake led the small band of performers—Danny, Shane, Holly, and a few of the other theater majors—back into the lounge for their bows. He was pleased to see Paul grinning like a goofball, looking surprised that his play had gone over so well. It had taken Jake forever to convince him to write up one of his original RPG games as a play for his dorm project. Then he’d gone around the dorm with Paul to recruit actors, since Paul was too shy to do it on his own.

Mark was in the back, rolling his eyes, but nobody paid any attention to him. The play had been very entertaining, Jake’s “acting” notwithstanding. Paul had a knack for dialog and a better sense of humor than Jake, or probably anyone else, had given him credit for. He’d revealed to Jake a secret dream of becoming a fantasy novelist, and Jake suspected he’d be doing a lot to fan that little spark into a flame over the next few semesters. He wasn’t quite sure why, but he seemed to have taken Paul under his wing.

Later, they went out for hot chocolate to celebrate Paul’s first public accolades—Jake, Danny, Paul, and Eva. It was early May and though the night was chilly, it wasn’t unbearably cold. Jake had his winter jacket on, but went without mittens so he could hold Danny’s hand in his as they walked across the campus.

Jake purposely hung back a bit, letting Paul and Eva get ahead of them. Paul didn’t even notice. He’d been babbling on a mile a minute ever since they headed out, thoughts of new plays bouncing around in his head and spilling out to anyone within earshot. Eva listened with an expression of amusement.

“You’ve created a monster,” Danny observed, smiling.

“He deserves a pat on the back now and then.”

“Yes. I suppose everyone does.” They walked in silence for a while, enjoying the feeling of warmth between their hands, until Danny said, “There are only a couple weeks left ’til the end of the semester.”

“I know.” Jake also knew the real reason Danny mentioned it. Jake had been saying he’d find an apartment for the summer, but though he’d gotten a list from the Memorial Union Building of available apartments off campus for students and checked some of them out, he hadn’t found anything. There was simply too much competition for apartments near campus. Plus he still didn’t have a job. The Financial Aid office had managed to scrape up some grants and loans he qualified for, so it seemed likely he’d be able to pay for next semester and possibly the one after that.
But changing his major at this point meant he’d have to take an additional two semesters of classes, and how he’d manage to pay for that
was anybody’s guess.

“You know Mom would love to have you,” Danny said.

Jake sighed. “I’ve already been there for winter break and spring break. She’s going to get sick of me.”

“She loves you. You know that. We’ll find some shit jobs in town, so we can at least help buy groceries.”

“All summer is a long time for her to have me as a guest.”

“I’ve managed to put up with you for almost nine months,” Danny said, grinning at him.

“That’s different,” Jake replied. “You’re madly in love with me.”

Danny laughed and brought Jake’s hand up to his mouth to plant a warm kiss on the back of it. “Yeah… I am.”

Jake stopped walking, so Danny was forced to do so too. He pulled Danny close and wrapped his arms around his body, leaning down to bring their faces close together. “And I’m madly in love with you,” he said, just before he closed the remaining distance for a kiss.

When he pulled away, Danny was grinning. He no longer turned away when Jake lavished affection on him or told him, “I love you.” He could even say it back now.

“Are you guys coming?” Eva called out. “And by ‘coming,’ I mean walking this direction, not what you look like you’d like to be doing.”

“Shut up,” Danny told her affectionately.

Jake just rolled his eyes. But he took Danny’s hand in his again, and they went to catch up with their friends. He knew he’d end up going to stay with Danny and Althea. It was, after all, what he wanted. He’d find some kind of job so he could avoid feeling like a deadbeat, and he’d visit his mom whenever he could to help her through the divorce. He might even agree to see the twins again, since they’d been calling him and trying to come to grips with his relationship with Danny, almost like real human beings.

And each morning he’d lie in bed, waiting for Danny to open his eyes, so he could see that Jake was still there… still wanting him… still loving him. No matter what.

J
AMIE
F
ESSENDEN
set out to be a writer in junior high school. He published a couple short pieces in his high school’s literary magazine and had another story place in the top 100 in a national contest, but it wasn’t until he met his partner, Erich, almost twenty years later, that he began writing again in earnest. With Erich alternately inspiring and goading him, Jamie wrote several screenplays and directed a few of them as micro-budget independent films. His latest completed work premiered at the Indie Fest 2009 in Los Angeles and also played at the Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival two weeks later.

After nine years together, Jamie and Erich have married and purchased a house together in the wilds of Raymond, New Hampshire, where there are no streetlights, turkeys and deer wander through their yard, and coyotes serenade them on a nightly basis. Jamie currently works as technical support for a computer company in Portsmouth, NH, but fantasizes about someday quitting his day job to be a full-time writer.

Visit Jamie at http://jamiefessenden.wordpress.com/.