The Luckiest (15 page)

Nik keeps mumbling, though, pressing words to his skin between kisses, and as Nik slides his hands around Aaron’s torso and pulls him away from the seat so that their bellies and chests press together, so that Aaron’s own spine is a concave mirror of his own, Nik says, “Want you, God I
love
you, never want to stop touching you,
Aaron.
”

Aaron takes Nik’s face between his hands; Nik’s eyes are glassy, the pupils blown, and his cheeks are flushed. “Just wait, sweetheart. Wait until I have you alone.” The endearment falls from Aaron’s tongue, rising up as if it’s simply been waiting there all this time, ready to be used again when Aaron feels tender and protective. Maybe it has—he can’t tell—but when Nik collapses against him, buries his face in Aaron’s neck and goes still, Aaron whispers it into his hair. “Shhh, my sweet­heart.” Nik shakes against him and clutches him tighter.

Later, when they’ve tripped up the stairs and Nik has locked the door behind them, Nik gently maneuvers Aaron into the narrow shower. After they’ve rinsed away the last of the soap, he eases Aaron up against the cold tiles and then drops to his knees. He takes a long time, tracing his fingertip over the crown and down the long purple vein and then following with his tongue, and he’s quiet while he does; just the rush of warm water and the stutter of his own breath fill Aaron’s ears. Nik lingers over the slit, squeezing out tiny beads of salty slickness so he can rub them over his lips and then lick the taste away. Nik looks up through eyelashes dark and spiky with water while he does this, while his mouth is glossy with Aaron’s pre-come. Aaron’s body is wrecked with fatigue and desire; maybe that’s why he feels as if he wants to roar and cry and shake until he falls apart. When he holds Nik’s head between his palms, though, and pushes his dick between those lips (his
mouth
, it’s like sense memory but it’s real again,
God),
he can’t look away, locked there by Nik’s gaze, in this moment that’s theirs, only theirs, with no clocks and no observers and no expectations but their own.

In Their Own Words

A
post from
an untitled, anonymous, deeply confessional blog, Wednesday, October 29, 2014:

Once upon a time, I was a little gay boy growing up in a world hostile to me. I was poor and kind of gawky and probably too smart and definitely way too interested in making sure everybody knew it. I was immature and too mature all at once; my dad had run out on us and I had way too close a relationship to my mother, a woman who worked so hard to make sure I never wanted for anything, and who I still think is a saint. So far, so clichéd.

But I was really lucky. I had good friends, really surpris­ingly good friends in retrospect, and then I had the enormous good fortune to fall in love with one of them. And, even more improb­ably, he loved me back. It seemed, at the time, like I was set for life: I had the people I needed, I had him next to me and I had convinced people who had never even met me that I was smart. Life was going to be glorious. As a boy I churned through fantasy novels from the library as quickly as I could get them, so I knew that I had gathered my party and was ready for the adventure to begin.

And then he left me—all it took was the loss of one person, and suddenly it was apparent that I had never had anything; it only
seemed
like I did. The circumstances changed, somehow I didn’t know myself at all, and my adventures turned into a simple struggle for survival.

A year later I was in a new city and a new life. I had a new boy­friend. He liked to kick his roommates out and cook din­ner for me. He had money; he talked about whisking me away to Europe, something that seemed impossibly exotic to me and frankly still does. I never told him that I thought he over­cooked the pasta; I never told him that I was a much better cook than he was; I never told him that I didn’t like the way he dressed; I never told him that I couldn’t imagine all those places he dreamed about, not when I barely had my feet under me; I never told him that I didn’t love him. And then, one day, I looked at him and it was like looking at every­thing I hated about myself, and I told him everything, and I burned it to the ground. I have never felt so power­ful; I was glorious in my destruction and I was thorough. But after I was left there in the middle of the ashes, I didn’t feel proud. I felt alone, still barely surviving.

Since then I’ve been doing something new with myself: I’ve been fucking around like it’s 1976, a celebration of freedom, only with every barrier known to young gay men. My best friends, who knew me when I was just a boy—the people who probably still know
me
—would be horrified, religious by default as they are. Sex without strings is their only real taboo; alcohol is fine, drugs are probably fine (not the good stuff, don’t get crazy, it can’t be
too
good), and sex is okay if you’re in love. But the kind of pleasure that I’ve been after is something they just wouldn’t understand, and so I don’t really talk about it. They wouldn’t understand the release that I find in it, the way that I find it something just shy of sacred but definitely holy. There are so many different kinds of pleasure, and I think some of them can be sacred; but sacred is rare, isn’t it? You can seek for a lifetime; it’s a quest, not an everyday pursuit, and certainly not the kind of thing you can go after while you’re just trying to survive.

In just under a year, I’ll hit a major milestone in my life—I’ll finish one chapter, and so far the rest remain unwritten. They aren’t even outlined, and that’s a scary place for a writer. I really have no idea what I’m going to do with myself. Lately, though, I’ve been thinking about those old novels that I loved so much as a boy. They start with a quest, a simple question, and it always looks the same: Something has been lost, and somehow a simple boy from the middle of the sticks (a poor boy, usually—that’s probably part of why I loved the books so much) is, improbably, the only person alive who can find it.

I’m not a big thinker; I’m self-absorbed and self-obsessed and my life begins and ends with me, standing alone in a crowd. And I can think of a lot of things that I’ve lost: my father, my first love, my virtue. I’m not sure any of them are worth questing after; I can’t help but think that if those things were so damn important in the first place, they never could have been lost. But lately I feel that same old disquiet, that yearn­ing for adventure, and I think: Maybe I survived, and maybe it’s time to start thinking about adventure again.

I have one year left to assemble my party and gather supplies before I am required to set forth. I have one year left to bask in the comfort of my new routine and my new home; one year left to try to survive and make my mother proud. And then it’s all on me, and the place I take that first step will decide the fate of my quest. Stand by while I gather my weap­ons: the power of the pen, the tatters of what was once an iron will, the love of a mother who will wait by the door forever and an unlikely collection of loving buffoons.

Hell’s bells, being an adult is hard. My mother would finally be proud.

Friday

From the moment
Aaron opens his eyes his mind is full, busy with everything that needs to be done. He disentangles himself from Nik with one soft kiss to his bronzed shoulder, strokes his hair and whispers until he settles back down, and then sits in the chair by the window.

He pulls his tablet from the table, and the first thing he sees is the personal blog entry he made on Wednesday, still up on the screen once he unlocks it. He rereads it quickly and smiles at himself, shaking his head.

He shifts into his list-making app, noting everything that needs to be done. It’s going to be a busy day, full of things to take care of, and half of them have to be done while keeping Alex at least partly in the dark. He envies Nik his morning run, the chance to think without anybody interrupting or asking questions.

Nik shifts on the bed, rolls onto his back and reaches for Aaron. Aaron drops his tablet on the table and goes to sit at the edge of the bed, waiting for Nik to wake up enough to talk to him. Nik’s hand hits his leg and clings, and Aaron strokes some hair away from his face.

“I see you’re joining us this morning,” Aaron says, watching Nik’s eyes flutter.

“Mmmm, hey,” Nik says, voice still sleepy. “I was dreaming about you.”

“Good things, I hope.”

“No, it was—” Nik clears his throat and opens his eyes. “It was bad. We were back on your front porch, and we were like we are now, like, we looked like we do now, I mean, but you were telling me that you hated me, that it was a mistake. And then Alex was there, and she was wearing her high school clothes but her hair was like it is now, and she was all mad at me, too. And then we were at my high school for my prom, only it was—I mean, I
knew
it was high school, but it looked like my dorm building at school, and my parents were there and—”

Aaron strokes Nik’s face. “Oh, gross, I hate dreams like that.”

Nik grabs his hand and pulls. “Just—come here for a minute.”

He lets Nik pull him down, and Nik curls up on his shoulder and rests his head there, running his hand over Aaron’s other shoulder.

“I’m right here, sweetheart,” Aaron coos as he strokes Nik’s hair; for an instant he feels like an ass, but Nik cranes his neck to look up at him, beaming.

“I still love that,” he whispers.

“I’m glad, because I don’t appear to be able to stop saying it.” Aaron reddens a little and raises a hand to run through his hair.

Nik intercepts it and presses a kiss to Aaron’s palm. “No complaints from me. Say it all you want.”

“I think I’m done for now, thanks.”

“Ah, the romance is dead,” Nik says, grinning.

“The
romance
is still getting its feet under it, so go easy on it. And on me, please. I’m a little distracted at the moment.”

“Right, busy day.” Nik rolls over to lie flat on the bed next to Aaron. He stares up at the ceiling, finds Aaron’s hand and laces his fingers through it.

“It is. We both have a lot to do today.”

“And then it’ll be tomorrow.”

Aaron turns to look, and Nik is already watching him. “It will.”

“I’m looking forward to it, Aaron.” The look on Nik’s face and the tone of his voice make it pretty damn clear he’s not talking about the wedding.

“So am I. I have been for days.”

“Me too.”

“Then why on
earth
did you make that agreement with David?”

“It seemed like the right thing to do at the time. And also…” Aaron watches him and waits for him to finish. “Well. I know it’s probably stupid. I just wanted to give you a little more time. I know it’s not much, just a few days, but I could tell you were having some trouble with all of this, and I wanted you to be able to really
decide,
without jumping right back into bed. Because no takebacks, not this time.”

“You mean this bed? The bed we’re lying in right now?”

Nik rolls his eyes. “I know, I
know.
Still. I feel like… there’s a difference, I think, between what we’ve been doing so far and what I hope will happen tomorrow night.”

“You mean, just—” Aaron makes an incredibly vague hand gesture.

“Well. Not
just
that, not really. But I want… I want time. I want to take all night with you, if we want to, without worrying about what needs to be done, or worrying about Alex walk­ing in the next morning. I want to spread you out and get to know you again,
all
of you, and I thought… well. Give it a few days.”

It’s a heady thought. Aaron says, “You want epic, dirty, newly­wed sex. Well, it’s a good thing you waited a few days.”

Nik smiles back. After so long, he’s unfazed by Aaron’s sar­casm. “Yeah. Something like that. And look, we didn’t even have to get married!”

Aaron pushes at his hair gently and says, “That might be a lot to ask for a first time back together.”

“After the other morning?” Nik chuckles and wipes a hand over his face. “God, I
really
don’t think that’s a concern. I am
never
giving up running, if that’s what it inspires.”

Aaron smiles and quirks a brow. “No complaints here.” They’re quiet for almost a minute, and then he says, as gently as he can, “Why weren’t
you
having trouble with all of this?” He waves a hand between them to clarify. “It’s been a long time.”

Nik grins at him, his smile bright and a little impish. “It has. It’s also been a long time coming. I’ve been ready for this for months, mostly just thinking about it. I’ve been pretty sure I wanted to try since last summer, and then when I saw you at Christmas… yeah.” He stretches. “I’m prepared for you, Aaron Wilkinson. Gimme your worst.”

Aaron quirks a brow at him and Nik rolls his eyes and says, “Sure, why not, that too,” and then he waggles his brows at Aaron and Aaron has to climb on top of him and crush him into a kiss. Nik is still smiling against his mouth when he gets there.

After they’re up and breakfasted and showered, Nik runs in to the business end of town to raid Wal-Mart for blank CDs, jewel cases and liner inserts, and Aaron drags Tu upstairs with him to get photos for the inserts and then finishes the layout. By the time Nik is back, breathless from running around and then up the stairs, Aaron has transferred everything to a thumb drive and closed up his laptop, and then he feels guilty about handing Nik his keys and asking him to run everything back down to the car so Alex doesn’t find it and they don’t forget it when they head out later. Nik presses a kiss against his temple and then goes off again. Aaron shakes his head and smiles and starts packing up his sewing supplies—they’ll need the table space later tonight.

Aaron hears the cars from the window, and he looks out to see Nik meeting both the rental truck
and
the minivan full of musicians pulling up in the driveway. Nik throws his arms around his friends, smiling and joyful to see them again. He’s gone all out for this wedding, calling in every favor he’s amassed at UT to get people to play for this event. It won’t be long, just some of the ceremony music, but Alex will be walking down the aisle to one of Houston’s finest string quar­tets because somebody’s dad is the violist. Nik always does manage to know everybody, and remembering Alex’s squeal of joy when Nik told her about it and Nik’s grin in return leaves Aaron smiling all over again.

He heads downstairs to work on the cakes, meeting David and Stephanie on the stairs; they are running outside to work with the people from the rental company. In the kitchen, Mia is frying pounds of bacon and Nicole is sniffling while she chops her way through a pile of onions, eager to get most of the prep work out of the way before noon. The menu is simple and designed to be stable in the summer heat, but as elegant as possible considering the entire dinner service will be buffet style—Alex and David hadn’t wanted either the stuffiness or the expense of hiring servers—still, they have a lot of work to get through today and tomorrow morning. Aaron rolls up his sleeves and washes his hands, pulls the cakes out of the refrigerator and gets to work.

The screen door slams and Jasmine, Alex, David, Tu and Steph­anie spill into the kitchen, faces stormy. Alex is
pissed.
It turns out that, among other things, the rental company mis­under­stood something about the electricity on the house and can’t provide the table lighting they ordered. Aaron sags against the sink and takes a moment to be grateful that the weather’s going to hold out and they can cancel the tent—they would have lost the moonlight, then, and would have been in even more trouble.

“Okay. Look. Go back into town. It’s summer, so canning jars should be cheap and they should be
everywhere
.”

“Like jam jars?”

“Yes, exactly. In fact, we’ll reuse the ones from David’s grand­mother—the labels are still on them, with her hand­writ­ing—it’ll add charm. Get… a lot. Get maybe one-fifty—no, two hundred—of those, and enough tea lights to fill them twice. We’ll just use candles on the tables, lots of candles, and with the lighting from the arbor it’ll be fine. And they’ll go with the wildflowers—it’ll be very country relaxed, very summer­time casual. And it’ll be cheap. Alex, are you fine with that?”

“You don’t think that’s tacky?”

“It’s very
casual,
maybe, but look,” Aaron says, reaching for one of the empty, washed jars sitting by the sink. “See? It’s meant to look like cut crystal. Only,
obviously
, not. We’re not using them for glasses—it’s not a
hoedown,
for God’s sake”—Alex grins at him—”but you’re the one who wanted a relaxed summer wedding. And again, the wildflowers. Get the tiniest jars you can find, and I think it’ll work.” He looks at the jam jar, turning it in his hand. “And get a bag of sand while you’re there. We’ll put sand in the bottom, so the candles sort of nestle down in there.”

“Got it—jars, candles, sand.” Alex looks up from her phone, where she is typing all of this in. “Can’t we use beach sand?”

“It’s Gulf beach sand—you wanna think about what’s in it?”

“Right,” Alex says, turning back to her phone. “A bag of sand. Where do you buy sand?”

He shakes his head when he thinks about how many bags of sand he’s bought for use at his mother’s house. “Landscaping department, definitely. Oh, and lemons!” Alex narrows her eyes at him and he smiles and says, “For the
cooks,
Alex.” Aaron nods toward where Mia and Nicole are still actively ignoring them. “They’re losing it about lemonade. Get lemons, a
lot
of lemons, bags and bags, and another few bags of sugar, and some more club soda, and if you see a cheap electric juicer, get that, too. And then I think you’re done.”

Jasmine rolls her eyes and Alex chants the list under her breath while she keeps typing and then they’re off. Tu and Stephanie are arguing about the placement of tables on the lawn and Stephanie’s waving her hands
everywhere,
and that’s
enough.
“Stephanie, your life will not be worth living if you stick your hand in Alex’s wedding cake just to prove you’re right. Out! Get out of the kitchen!”

When Alex walks back into the kitchen, arms filled with plastic bags, Aaron is frowning at the cakes and muttering to himself. He smooths the buttercream, trying to get it as perfect as possible, mentally cursing Alex’s distaste for fondant and yes, fine, it tastes like the sugary paste it is, but at least it’s
beautiful.
This is a mess. If he could only—

“Aaron!” He looks up, and Alex is scowling at Mia and Nicole. “Has he been like this all afternoon?”

They look at each other and refuse to say anything, and Alex rolls her eyes.

“For fuck’s sake, Aaron, come sit down and have a glass of lemonade.”

“I don’t have time for that—I have to finish these cakes. And then I need to—”

“No you don’t—I’m the bride and I
say
that you don’t. Come on, Aaron, don’t care more about my wedding than I do—you’ll just make me look bad.”

Aaron looks at Alex and then follows her into the dining room, slumping into the chair next to her. “How are you not a wreck right now?”

“I don’t have to be—you’re doing it for me.” Alex runs her finger through the ring of condensation the glass is already leaving on the table, and ice clinks in her glass as she puts it down. “You know, the whole point of a wedding is to celebrate. I didn’t mean to make you crazy.”

Aaron looks at her—she’s completely serious. “You might have thought about that before you asked us to burn one hun­dred and fifty CDs
yesterday
.”

She winces. “Yeah—sorry about that. It just… it seemed like a good idea at the time?”

He grins at her. “Ah, yes. One of those.”

“I have a lot of them—like asking my friends to do this for me. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry—it’s been an honor. I want it to be perfect.”

“It will be—I’ll marry David and you’ll all be there to see. That’s enough, it really is.”

“As long as we finish the CDs in time.”

“
God
, yes.” Alex’s smile is bright and sarcastic, and he loves her so much. “Really, Aaron—is it going to be okay?”