Likely not - he's too busy rationalizing his sorry existence.
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In Praise of Hanes
- Thread starter EasyRory
- Start date
EasyRory
JUB Addict
Chapter Fifteen
Monday morning was always a slow start off the blocks for me. I got to work and my path veered dangerously in the direction of reactive depression. Sarah Felsen was giggly, restless, and moving with a practiced lubricity that went far beyond her usual I-got-laid-and-you-didn't gloat. She busied herself with minor tasks of a housekeeping nature, things like loading paper in the copy machine, checking the supply cabinet, placing the newly washed glassware on shelves – all of which required her to bend over repeatedly while wearing tight stretch jeans or straining to reach high shelves, showing off her barely confined tits. If her buttons didn't pop by noon, she must have wired them in place.
Meanwhile Woody was slumped over, asleep at MY desk. He wasn't snoring, but I could hear him breathe. The deep rasping in and out was now and then punctuated by an abrupt gasp for air.
“Poor thing. He's a little tuckered,” Sarah Felsen could barely keep from laughing while delivering this cloying, treacle-clogged expression of sympathy. She made sure no one was looking and then held her hands out in front of her for my edification.
“If that is supposed to mean he has a foot and a half long cock, I don't believe you.” At the same time I said that I slammed a stack of journals down on my desk, waking Woody.
“Mmmmffththsp!” he mumbled, raising his head too far and losing his balance so that he had to grab the desk. Agile, I'll give him that; an older man would have fallen out of the chair.
“Aren't you supposed to be joining your tour group?” I asked the stirring corpse.
“Sally thought I'd get more out of spending the morning here … with you.”
With me? Sally? No one had ever called Sarah Felsen 'Sally'. My frown turned to a scowl. “If you want to sleep, do it in the patient wing.”
No, Refo, I'm sorry, Really,” Woody pulled himself together.
“Have you ever run a mass spectrometer?” I asked him; he shook his head. “Well, you might want to learn. Come on … I need to verify some results.”
He quickly woke up and became attentive as we powered up a machine that far exceeded the capabilities of anything an undergraduate science course could afford. Several awesomes and cools later I said, “Now you try it.” My stern approach gradually melted as Woody proved to be a quick study and appreciative of my time. “Want a souvenir of the day?” I asked him. He nodded dumbly and then smiled when I returned with a camera. Turned out he was a ham in front of the camera.
Between spectrometry and then chromatography, the morning went more quickly that I expected. At noon Woody actually did join the rest of his student group for a campus tour. He thanked me profusely and said a pleasant good-bye, making me think perhaps I had genuinely contributed to the development of a future Nobelist. Sarah Felsen spoiled it by whispering something to him; the only word I caught was “tonight”.
“Woody, I'll email you the pictures,” I called out to him. He waved in return.
“What pictures?” Sarah Felsen inquired, feigning a mild interest. She was acting more like herself; the strain was off her buttons.
“Just some of him working with the machines. Souvenirs of his glorious morning with me. Any pictures of his time with you?” She may have actually blushed; I couldn't be sure because of her sallow complexion.
“I did take some pictures,” she admitted. “Not what you think!” she added. We left it at that. She knew what I thought and I wondered if my surmise wasn't correct despite her denial.
Once I got home I loaded the camera's memory stick into my laptop and transferred the photos of Woody. I began a slow slideshow and couldn't believe my eyes. Could it be? I thought when I saw the first one. I can pretty much see the outline of his dick! Right through the denim! I looked at more shots and almost always saw the same thing. It was like those old pictures of rock musicians with bleached-out, tight denim displaying their dicks in a lot of detail.
Then, when he was bent over, loading a cell sample in the machine, there it was: 'Hanes'. Actually, 'Hanes … Hanes … Hanes'. The whole width of his waistband showed over the top of his saggy jeans. And skin! A swath of skin almost two inches wide. And there was a palpable softness. My fingertips zinged a message instantly to my brain saying exactly how that skin would feel under my touch. Firm but yielding, soft and smooth, that indescribable boundary where a man's back ends and his ass begins, that part you want to hold as you pull him closer. Move your hands just an inch upward and say I love you; an inch downward, I want to fuck you. And Woody is so straight! I was ashamed of the hard on I was getting.
Straight? The next photo showed him grabbing his crotch, you know the way guys do: unconsciously adjusting themselves. His ample handful showed the full extent of his package, bulging lewdly. But the look on his face! There was nothing unconscious about what he was doing. He knew exactly what he was doing! When did I take that one? It was outright lewd; it was pure porn; and it was hot. That nerdy student turned into a dynamite stud in these pictures. Ok, 'stud' was overstating it, but he had real appeal. Maybe that was what Charlie and Frank and Sarah Felsen saw instantly and I missed completely. Why did it show up only in the camera and not to my naked eye?
There were some other unremarkable pictures of the lab that would serve only to let Woody's professors see that he had not wasted all of his time in Washington. I selected out the ones I wanted to forward to him and reduced their size for emailing and then I looked again at the crotch shot. It couldn't have been an accident; I never took that picture. How did it get on my memory stick? Was it still in the camera at work? It would not be a great idea to let somebody stumble upon that one while reviewing microscopy. Deleting it could wait until the morning, but I really needed to do that – first thing
The next day I dressed quickly and went to work determined to get the telltale picture of Woody off the camera. I was too late. Sarah Felsen held the camera, staring at its reviewing screen. She looked at me with panic and quickly put the camera in her desk.
“You took that picture!” At once it became obvious. Sarah Felsen wanted to keep a record of her conquests, like notches in her bedpost.
“Refo … I … er … he wanted me to take it. A present to you, I swear.” Sarah Felsen lost her cool. Completely. Irretrievably. Spectacularly. She clutched. She panicked. The score was tied. The momentum swung decisively to my side. I could smell the ashes of her devastation. This was not a small victory; this was monumental.
“Really,” I said. J'accuse was what she heard. A blow with a closed fist would have been gentler.
“Yes, really!” Her tone firmed; she was trying to brazen it out without Woody there to expose her.
Leave it alone, I thought. Leave her amid the ruins of her smug composure. Don't concede an inch. Don't let her incrementalize any attempt at a comeback. Turn and leave her alone in her defeat. Say nothing. Not one word.
“Why would he do that?” I asked her. Mistake. I knew it the instant the question came out of my mouth.
“Because he knew you wanted him.” Her eyes blazed.
“But I didn't!” My voice sounded like a wail. She was doing it. She was making it about me. A dismissive snort confirmed she was off the mat. She was making her comeback. The ground was shifting again.
“Delete that picture,” I demanded.
“I don't know how.” She retrieved it from her desk drawer and passed it to me. “You delete it.”
I took the camera and deleted everything; then I cleaned the memory, ensuring no file remnants could be read or reconstructed.
“Pretty thorough job,” she commented, her smugness was back.
“I thought you didn't know how to do it.”
She just smiled. She knew when to retire from the field. I had blown it. My commanding advantage was dissipated. An impartial judge might only say that she had not lost; but to me it felt like she had won again.
My mood didn't improve until lunchtime when I went for a walk outside the building. An employee group was holding a plant sale. It was a good distraction. I was not a gardener, but I appreciated those who were. Frank was probably a great gardener and now living out in the country where he'd have land. If I bought him a plant, I'd have an excuse to visit him and see the barn he was building with Charlie. It was hard to imagine Charlie moving to the country, but the little I could get out of him never included a single bad word about Frank. Maybe a plant would be just the thing. But what kind? I decided to ask.
“What would you get for a person who just moved to the country?” I asked a woman who looked knowledgable.
“Where in the country?” she countered.
“Southwest of here - out toward the Shenandoahs.”
“What about an apple tree? Perfect spot for apples.” She sounded very positive; plus it seemed like a good masculine gift, not too sentimental or personal - practical, and a tree would be low maintenance. I agreed at once.
“What breed?”
How the hell would I know? Of course I didn't tell her that. She waqrmed to the subject and pointed out the relative virtues of several species without giving me any basis whatsoever for making a choice. It was like vegetarian multiculturalism: every apple tree was sacred. I ended up buying four little trees. That was the easy part. Carrying them was the hard part. Sarah Felsen just smirked when she saw me with my arms full, dirty from the rusty, earth-covered coffee cans they were planted in. Let her smirk, I decided and Frank's reaction proved I was right.
Frank was delighted with the idea I had a gift for him. He invited me to his barn. “Come any time, Refo. Any time you want.” He was at a job site so we couldn't talk more, but he sounded so pleased. Wait! I didn't know where his barn was. I called him back later that night to find out and he gave me an address. Then I heard him call out to Charlie something about directions before he came back on the line. “Directions are complicated. Just put it in your GPS,” he said.
“I don't have a GPS,” I reminded him.
“Oh. Right ... Look in the bottom of that chest of drawers I use. In the bottom drawer, I think. I've got a portable one in there somewhere. Just look around.”
Now with Frank's permission going through the chest wasn't spying or snooping at all. But I shouldn't have done it. I found the GPS. That was easy. I also found a picture of the two of us in a crowd at an outdoor art exhibit on the Mall near the Smithsonian. Frank looked handsome, and I looked pretty good. Just that would have been a warm memory, but there was more to the picture. It was Frank's expression that made the shot. He held me by the waist and looked at me with total love and he didn't care who else saw it. How come I never noticed his expression at the time? – or when I had processed the picture?
More details came back to me. I had set the camera on a bench and set the time-delay to take the picture automatically. “Pose for the picture,” I remember telling him, but he would never pose; no clowning, no mugging, he was just himself in every picture I ever took. And he looked so sweet. Heartbreakingly sweet, in fact.
Quit holding your breath, I told myself. I took a deep breath and then another. I carefully put the picture back under the cargo shorts and went to the kitchen for water. I didn't want the apple trees to die before I delivered them to Frank.
Monday morning was always a slow start off the blocks for me. I got to work and my path veered dangerously in the direction of reactive depression. Sarah Felsen was giggly, restless, and moving with a practiced lubricity that went far beyond her usual I-got-laid-and-you-didn't gloat. She busied herself with minor tasks of a housekeeping nature, things like loading paper in the copy machine, checking the supply cabinet, placing the newly washed glassware on shelves – all of which required her to bend over repeatedly while wearing tight stretch jeans or straining to reach high shelves, showing off her barely confined tits. If her buttons didn't pop by noon, she must have wired them in place.
Meanwhile Woody was slumped over, asleep at MY desk. He wasn't snoring, but I could hear him breathe. The deep rasping in and out was now and then punctuated by an abrupt gasp for air.
“Poor thing. He's a little tuckered,” Sarah Felsen could barely keep from laughing while delivering this cloying, treacle-clogged expression of sympathy. She made sure no one was looking and then held her hands out in front of her for my edification.
“If that is supposed to mean he has a foot and a half long cock, I don't believe you.” At the same time I said that I slammed a stack of journals down on my desk, waking Woody.
“Mmmmffththsp!” he mumbled, raising his head too far and losing his balance so that he had to grab the desk. Agile, I'll give him that; an older man would have fallen out of the chair.
“Aren't you supposed to be joining your tour group?” I asked the stirring corpse.
“Sally thought I'd get more out of spending the morning here … with you.”
With me? Sally? No one had ever called Sarah Felsen 'Sally'. My frown turned to a scowl. “If you want to sleep, do it in the patient wing.”
No, Refo, I'm sorry, Really,” Woody pulled himself together.
“Have you ever run a mass spectrometer?” I asked him; he shook his head. “Well, you might want to learn. Come on … I need to verify some results.”
He quickly woke up and became attentive as we powered up a machine that far exceeded the capabilities of anything an undergraduate science course could afford. Several awesomes and cools later I said, “Now you try it.” My stern approach gradually melted as Woody proved to be a quick study and appreciative of my time. “Want a souvenir of the day?” I asked him. He nodded dumbly and then smiled when I returned with a camera. Turned out he was a ham in front of the camera.
Between spectrometry and then chromatography, the morning went more quickly that I expected. At noon Woody actually did join the rest of his student group for a campus tour. He thanked me profusely and said a pleasant good-bye, making me think perhaps I had genuinely contributed to the development of a future Nobelist. Sarah Felsen spoiled it by whispering something to him; the only word I caught was “tonight”.
“Woody, I'll email you the pictures,” I called out to him. He waved in return.
“What pictures?” Sarah Felsen inquired, feigning a mild interest. She was acting more like herself; the strain was off her buttons.
“Just some of him working with the machines. Souvenirs of his glorious morning with me. Any pictures of his time with you?” She may have actually blushed; I couldn't be sure because of her sallow complexion.
“I did take some pictures,” she admitted. “Not what you think!” she added. We left it at that. She knew what I thought and I wondered if my surmise wasn't correct despite her denial.
Once I got home I loaded the camera's memory stick into my laptop and transferred the photos of Woody. I began a slow slideshow and couldn't believe my eyes. Could it be? I thought when I saw the first one. I can pretty much see the outline of his dick! Right through the denim! I looked at more shots and almost always saw the same thing. It was like those old pictures of rock musicians with bleached-out, tight denim displaying their dicks in a lot of detail.
Then, when he was bent over, loading a cell sample in the machine, there it was: 'Hanes'. Actually, 'Hanes … Hanes … Hanes'. The whole width of his waistband showed over the top of his saggy jeans. And skin! A swath of skin almost two inches wide. And there was a palpable softness. My fingertips zinged a message instantly to my brain saying exactly how that skin would feel under my touch. Firm but yielding, soft and smooth, that indescribable boundary where a man's back ends and his ass begins, that part you want to hold as you pull him closer. Move your hands just an inch upward and say I love you; an inch downward, I want to fuck you. And Woody is so straight! I was ashamed of the hard on I was getting.
Straight? The next photo showed him grabbing his crotch, you know the way guys do: unconsciously adjusting themselves. His ample handful showed the full extent of his package, bulging lewdly. But the look on his face! There was nothing unconscious about what he was doing. He knew exactly what he was doing! When did I take that one? It was outright lewd; it was pure porn; and it was hot. That nerdy student turned into a dynamite stud in these pictures. Ok, 'stud' was overstating it, but he had real appeal. Maybe that was what Charlie and Frank and Sarah Felsen saw instantly and I missed completely. Why did it show up only in the camera and not to my naked eye?
There were some other unremarkable pictures of the lab that would serve only to let Woody's professors see that he had not wasted all of his time in Washington. I selected out the ones I wanted to forward to him and reduced their size for emailing and then I looked again at the crotch shot. It couldn't have been an accident; I never took that picture. How did it get on my memory stick? Was it still in the camera at work? It would not be a great idea to let somebody stumble upon that one while reviewing microscopy. Deleting it could wait until the morning, but I really needed to do that – first thing
The next day I dressed quickly and went to work determined to get the telltale picture of Woody off the camera. I was too late. Sarah Felsen held the camera, staring at its reviewing screen. She looked at me with panic and quickly put the camera in her desk.
“You took that picture!” At once it became obvious. Sarah Felsen wanted to keep a record of her conquests, like notches in her bedpost.
“Refo … I … er … he wanted me to take it. A present to you, I swear.” Sarah Felsen lost her cool. Completely. Irretrievably. Spectacularly. She clutched. She panicked. The score was tied. The momentum swung decisively to my side. I could smell the ashes of her devastation. This was not a small victory; this was monumental.
“Really,” I said. J'accuse was what she heard. A blow with a closed fist would have been gentler.
“Yes, really!” Her tone firmed; she was trying to brazen it out without Woody there to expose her.
Leave it alone, I thought. Leave her amid the ruins of her smug composure. Don't concede an inch. Don't let her incrementalize any attempt at a comeback. Turn and leave her alone in her defeat. Say nothing. Not one word.
“Why would he do that?” I asked her. Mistake. I knew it the instant the question came out of my mouth.
“Because he knew you wanted him.” Her eyes blazed.
“But I didn't!” My voice sounded like a wail. She was doing it. She was making it about me. A dismissive snort confirmed she was off the mat. She was making her comeback. The ground was shifting again.
“Delete that picture,” I demanded.
“I don't know how.” She retrieved it from her desk drawer and passed it to me. “You delete it.”
I took the camera and deleted everything; then I cleaned the memory, ensuring no file remnants could be read or reconstructed.
“Pretty thorough job,” she commented, her smugness was back.
“I thought you didn't know how to do it.”
She just smiled. She knew when to retire from the field. I had blown it. My commanding advantage was dissipated. An impartial judge might only say that she had not lost; but to me it felt like she had won again.
My mood didn't improve until lunchtime when I went for a walk outside the building. An employee group was holding a plant sale. It was a good distraction. I was not a gardener, but I appreciated those who were. Frank was probably a great gardener and now living out in the country where he'd have land. If I bought him a plant, I'd have an excuse to visit him and see the barn he was building with Charlie. It was hard to imagine Charlie moving to the country, but the little I could get out of him never included a single bad word about Frank. Maybe a plant would be just the thing. But what kind? I decided to ask.
“What would you get for a person who just moved to the country?” I asked a woman who looked knowledgable.
“Where in the country?” she countered.
“Southwest of here - out toward the Shenandoahs.”
“What about an apple tree? Perfect spot for apples.” She sounded very positive; plus it seemed like a good masculine gift, not too sentimental or personal - practical, and a tree would be low maintenance. I agreed at once.
“What breed?”
How the hell would I know? Of course I didn't tell her that. She waqrmed to the subject and pointed out the relative virtues of several species without giving me any basis whatsoever for making a choice. It was like vegetarian multiculturalism: every apple tree was sacred. I ended up buying four little trees. That was the easy part. Carrying them was the hard part. Sarah Felsen just smirked when she saw me with my arms full, dirty from the rusty, earth-covered coffee cans they were planted in. Let her smirk, I decided and Frank's reaction proved I was right.
Frank was delighted with the idea I had a gift for him. He invited me to his barn. “Come any time, Refo. Any time you want.” He was at a job site so we couldn't talk more, but he sounded so pleased. Wait! I didn't know where his barn was. I called him back later that night to find out and he gave me an address. Then I heard him call out to Charlie something about directions before he came back on the line. “Directions are complicated. Just put it in your GPS,” he said.
“I don't have a GPS,” I reminded him.
“Oh. Right ... Look in the bottom of that chest of drawers I use. In the bottom drawer, I think. I've got a portable one in there somewhere. Just look around.”
Now with Frank's permission going through the chest wasn't spying or snooping at all. But I shouldn't have done it. I found the GPS. That was easy. I also found a picture of the two of us in a crowd at an outdoor art exhibit on the Mall near the Smithsonian. Frank looked handsome, and I looked pretty good. Just that would have been a warm memory, but there was more to the picture. It was Frank's expression that made the shot. He held me by the waist and looked at me with total love and he didn't care who else saw it. How come I never noticed his expression at the time? – or when I had processed the picture?
More details came back to me. I had set the camera on a bench and set the time-delay to take the picture automatically. “Pose for the picture,” I remember telling him, but he would never pose; no clowning, no mugging, he was just himself in every picture I ever took. And he looked so sweet. Heartbreakingly sweet, in fact.
Quit holding your breath, I told myself. I took a deep breath and then another. I carefully put the picture back under the cargo shorts and went to the kitchen for water. I didn't want the apple trees to die before I delivered them to Frank.
Hi, Rory. I was unexpectedly off the web for the weekend. I got an e-mail out to my group, but I didn't have your address to be able to give you a heads up.
A very good chapter. A lot of simpler, plainer reality hitting our Refo. A simplicity from our college cutie du jour, and a sad realization of just how much love he had been blind to.
Now the question is, what to do - certainly make sure the gift trees are delivered in good health.
But, to try and wrest Frank back, or to let he and Charlie have free sailing to develop their relationship, and allow for as casual a friendship as possible in the background?
A very good chapter. A lot of simpler, plainer reality hitting our Refo. A simplicity from our college cutie du jour, and a sad realization of just how much love he had been blind to.
Now the question is, what to do - certainly make sure the gift trees are delivered in good health.
But, to try and wrest Frank back, or to let he and Charlie have free sailing to develop their relationship, and allow for as casual a friendship as possible in the background?
EasyRory
JUB Addict
Chapter Sixteen
Woody's email acknowledgment of receipt of the photos was troubling. “Howja like the 1s Sally took?” he wrote back. As I read his email, I felt eyes over my shoulder.
“Told ya,” Sarah Felsen commented while casually adjusting her décolletage, if t-shirt necklines can ever be said to need adjusting.
It bothered me enormously that Woody thought that I … Well, what did he think? That I lusted after him? That I debauched every young man who came to visit the lab? Very few of the lab's visitors were tempting in the least, but 'kids' as I would classify nineteen-year-old Woody were not my thing at all, not even when I was nineteen. One detail of the email however caught my eye.
“Ones … plural, he says. Just how many did you take?” Sarah Felsen blanched. Instead of her exceedingly rare version of a blush, she whitened visibly. “Ah-hah! Gotcha!” I couldn't help it; a triumph was in the wind.
“Fuck you,” she replied. Yes! It must be serious; she rarely used such a crude directness. “I feel sick,” she said and abruptly left the lab. She was never sick, but at that moment she looked like death.
She returned after ten minutes or so and was quiet all day, which suited me. I got lots done including the redraft of an animal handling protocol that was now so animal-friendly not even my great aunt with all the cats could object. I dreamed of the day I could live as well as the lab animals did. Maybe I should allow them the right to redecorate their cages every two years, I joked to myself. Even hiring an interior decorator wouldn't cost much; so few of our furred, feathered, and finned friends lived that long.
“What are you muttering about?” Sarah Felsen demanded. I heard the sound of ice water sloshing in her glass and felt the cold heat of her glare.
“Shoes and ships and sealing wax,” I answered without looking up.
“Cabbages and kings,” she added and then laughed, another unusual event in her professional life. “I love that poem. And oysters, too. I love oysters”
“I can see how its cruelty would appeal to you.”
“We all have to eat, Refo. It's only a question of who eats whom. Do you like oysters?”
“I worry about hepatitis in most restaurants.”
“Given your life-style choices, restaurants aren't your biggest threat.” She wasn't being critical, just matter-of-fact.
“Yes … well … are you going to be using more mice over say the next six months?”
She hesitated, no doubt gauging whether my question contained any hidden traps. “Probably not, but ...”
“Ok, the new protocol will allow for a ten percent increase in the sacrifice rate, but if we go over that, there will be paperwork.”
She relaxed. “No, I'm pretty sure I won't unless Arnold makes changes.”
“Ok, I'm taking this draft to the animal committee. I'll probably go home from there, if anybody's looking for me.”
She made some kind of mumbling noise while sipping her water and I was on my way. I knew the animal people wouldn't be prepared to discuss anything on the spot, but it gave me a chance to leave earlier than usual. The drive to Frank's was two hours and I wanted to beat the rush. If I could get onto the Beltway before three, I should have an easy time. The clerk made me wait while he counted the pages and entered the draft into some kind of ledger book with elaborate columns and headings.
“Isn't that process automated?” I asked. Mistake. I got a ten minute justification for the importance of his self-devised and totally redundant bookkeeping method. I tried not to show any sign of impatience. Maybe I tried too hard. I think he may have misunderstood my attention as a sign of attraction. He began responding in a flirtatious manner that wasn't what I was looking for at that moment. I faked a series of sneezes and it worked. I was out of his office in seconds.
The traffic was worse that I expected, but at least it was moving and I remembered Charlie's comment about “clearing Manassas.” He was right. Five minutes out of Manassas the road became an adventure in driving that required skill and made me wish I had a better car. After just a couple of wrong turns I got used to the sound of exasperation from the GPS. “Recalculating route,” the anonymous bitch whined as if I personally had inconvenienced her. One time last winter Charlie screamed back at her, “Did I used to be married to you?” That was in the city, however; I was more tolerant of her vexations – I had the beauty of rural Virginia to soothe tempers. The Culpepper Bypass slowed me only a little and about twenty minutes later the bitch announced with perfect indifference, “Your destination is ahead on the right.”
The small roadside mailbox had “Pierce” painted on the side. Franklin Pierce seemed totally unsuited to Frank, but that was his name. It was also the name of the fourteenth president about whom neither Frank nor anyone else professed to know much. “No relation,” he once said with a shrug.
The approach to the barn was a dirt road that wound past the remains of a farm house and a couple of fenced plots that may once have held horses and now contained only overgrown weeds. The barn however showed signs of occupancy and care. Frank was sitting on a covered porch and came out into a parking area to wait for me.
He greeted me with a “bro hug” that new guy-thing that I totally screwed up. He took my hand in his, pulled me close and gave be a hearty pat on the back, the correct execution of the maneuver. I kissed his cheek which was totally wrong, but I'd been sleeping with him for a year after all and just a pat on the back seemed … well, weird.
He didn't care. He kept hold of my hand for a little bit extra and gave me a huge grin. “You found it. Was the drive ok?” Then he said, “You want to park in the shade? Your car will heat up ...”
“Yeah, and your gift might get ruined.”
“What did you bring? Ice cream?” I could hear the hopefulness in Frank's question. He liked a kind of coffee ice cream with little chocolate chips in it and could even make his own except he used bigger chips.
“No ...” I opened the trunk and got out two of the coffee cans. “I got you some apple trees. The nursery woman said they're good in this part of Virginia. Four of them.” He looked pleased with the trees. “This is Earlycrisp. It tolerates a cool spring and the harvest is early and crisp, I guess. And this is Ginger Gold – supposed to have a spicy taste and store well. And Rome, a late harvest. And Arkansas Sweet, which is supposed to be good in heat. I wasn't sure exactly what your weather was ...”
“Great choices. Perfect choices, Reef.”
There was a sudden, embarrassing, and uncomfortable silence. We knew so much about each other that we couldn't act on. Finally, Frank said, “Let me show you around. This place has a history. Not a good one, but I'm hoping to change that.”
We walked and talked and he explained about the wars, the families, and a couple of fires that had made the property what is was. The last fire had burned the main house down in the late 1930's and, by the time the family had saved enough money to rebuild, the ensuing war had prevented the rebuilding long enough that after the war, when it would have been possible, nobody wanted to. One son lived in Richmond, a daughter lived in Norfolk, and another son had a hardware store in Haymarket. “That was my dad, the one in Haymarket,” Frank explained
“So this was your family's farm?”
“A couple of different times, it was. The family has had it's ups and downs I guess. Now it's mine and because it's pretty much a wreck of a farm – the last owners only rented it out as pasture – it was cheap.”
“I don't know what cheap means in Rockingham County,” I replied..
“Everything I had, plus a mortgage,” Frank answered. “So I still lease most of it out for pasture; but now, with this new apple crop coming, I'll be doing better,” he smiled.
We walked back to the barn and he showed me what he was doing to it: a complete overhaul. He was making it into a two level loft with great views of the mountains to the west and the rolling pastures to the northeast.
With the tour complete, the earlier feeling of edginess returned. It's hard being around an ex-lover, especially when that ex-lover is being so charming that you wonder why he's an ex. I got in my car while we were still saying our farewells. He leaned on the window and almost stuck his head in the car. I thought he was going to kiss me; but he didn't. He ended saying he wanted to plant the apple trees before it got dark.
“Right now?” I asked.
“The sooner the better.”
“Could I take pictures of you planting them?” I pulled my camera out of the glove box.
So we delayed my departure. Aftert a brief survey of possible sites, he chose a low rise that was near a pond for his mini-orchard. I took pictures while he planted the first two and then helped him with the second two. The result was four widely spaced, barely green twigs, the most pathetic sham of an orchard I could imagine, and a lot of sweat. We walked back to the barn and I set the camera on porch rail.
“Come on, Frank. Pose with me.”
“I'm all sweaty and dirty,” he protested but he did it. The camera snapped automatically at measured intervals while we compared blisters, joked, and relaxed in a breeze off the mountains.
“It's getting late. You could stay, if you want, Reef.”
His invitation surprised me. It was plainly an invitation for more than a night's sleep. There wasn't a bit of guile or calculation to it. He wanted me to stay and so did I.
“Oh, Frank,” I stalled. Do not sound sappy and maudlin, I ordered myself. “How do I tell you no when I really want to say yes?”
“I think you just did, Reef.” Frank smiled and didn't press.
“It's a Tuesday and tomorrow I have to ...”
He shushed me. “I understand. Another time, maybe.”
“Can I come back? I'd like to.” No promise, just honesty. I did want to.
“O' course you can. Anytime you want.”
“I'll call,” I could promise him that much.
“Or just drop in. If I'm here, you're welcome. And if I'm not, stay 'til I get here. There a key taped to the underside of that window sill.” He pointed at a new double hung window near the door.
I felt foolish shaking his hand and then I didn't want to let go of it. I held on, partly because I wanted to convince him that I wanted to stay and partly because his hand felt so good and partly because I didn't know what else to do.
All the way back to Washington I told myself, idiot. You should have stayed. Idiot. He wanted you to. You wanted to stay. Idiot.
The next day was Wednesday. I wasn't bullshitting Frank - there was stuff I needed to get done at the lab. I stayed busy all day and got home tired. I swore I was going to stay in and read. Instead I went to the gym; I stayed until closing and fucked Jawan. It wasn't any fun. I don't know why I did it. I felt slutty even while I was doing it. The damned wrist band felt tight and pinched my balls. I could barely come and I'm pretty sure Jawan didn't. Then I had to listen to his sales pitch for more sessions. I said no with enough conviction that he quit in the middle of his pitch.
Woody's email acknowledgment of receipt of the photos was troubling. “Howja like the 1s Sally took?” he wrote back. As I read his email, I felt eyes over my shoulder.
“Told ya,” Sarah Felsen commented while casually adjusting her décolletage, if t-shirt necklines can ever be said to need adjusting.
It bothered me enormously that Woody thought that I … Well, what did he think? That I lusted after him? That I debauched every young man who came to visit the lab? Very few of the lab's visitors were tempting in the least, but 'kids' as I would classify nineteen-year-old Woody were not my thing at all, not even when I was nineteen. One detail of the email however caught my eye.
“Ones … plural, he says. Just how many did you take?” Sarah Felsen blanched. Instead of her exceedingly rare version of a blush, she whitened visibly. “Ah-hah! Gotcha!” I couldn't help it; a triumph was in the wind.
“Fuck you,” she replied. Yes! It must be serious; she rarely used such a crude directness. “I feel sick,” she said and abruptly left the lab. She was never sick, but at that moment she looked like death.
She returned after ten minutes or so and was quiet all day, which suited me. I got lots done including the redraft of an animal handling protocol that was now so animal-friendly not even my great aunt with all the cats could object. I dreamed of the day I could live as well as the lab animals did. Maybe I should allow them the right to redecorate their cages every two years, I joked to myself. Even hiring an interior decorator wouldn't cost much; so few of our furred, feathered, and finned friends lived that long.
“What are you muttering about?” Sarah Felsen demanded. I heard the sound of ice water sloshing in her glass and felt the cold heat of her glare.
“Shoes and ships and sealing wax,” I answered without looking up.
“Cabbages and kings,” she added and then laughed, another unusual event in her professional life. “I love that poem. And oysters, too. I love oysters”
“I can see how its cruelty would appeal to you.”
“We all have to eat, Refo. It's only a question of who eats whom. Do you like oysters?”
“I worry about hepatitis in most restaurants.”
“Given your life-style choices, restaurants aren't your biggest threat.” She wasn't being critical, just matter-of-fact.
“Yes … well … are you going to be using more mice over say the next six months?”
She hesitated, no doubt gauging whether my question contained any hidden traps. “Probably not, but ...”
“Ok, the new protocol will allow for a ten percent increase in the sacrifice rate, but if we go over that, there will be paperwork.”
She relaxed. “No, I'm pretty sure I won't unless Arnold makes changes.”
“Ok, I'm taking this draft to the animal committee. I'll probably go home from there, if anybody's looking for me.”
She made some kind of mumbling noise while sipping her water and I was on my way. I knew the animal people wouldn't be prepared to discuss anything on the spot, but it gave me a chance to leave earlier than usual. The drive to Frank's was two hours and I wanted to beat the rush. If I could get onto the Beltway before three, I should have an easy time. The clerk made me wait while he counted the pages and entered the draft into some kind of ledger book with elaborate columns and headings.
“Isn't that process automated?” I asked. Mistake. I got a ten minute justification for the importance of his self-devised and totally redundant bookkeeping method. I tried not to show any sign of impatience. Maybe I tried too hard. I think he may have misunderstood my attention as a sign of attraction. He began responding in a flirtatious manner that wasn't what I was looking for at that moment. I faked a series of sneezes and it worked. I was out of his office in seconds.
The traffic was worse that I expected, but at least it was moving and I remembered Charlie's comment about “clearing Manassas.” He was right. Five minutes out of Manassas the road became an adventure in driving that required skill and made me wish I had a better car. After just a couple of wrong turns I got used to the sound of exasperation from the GPS. “Recalculating route,” the anonymous bitch whined as if I personally had inconvenienced her. One time last winter Charlie screamed back at her, “Did I used to be married to you?” That was in the city, however; I was more tolerant of her vexations – I had the beauty of rural Virginia to soothe tempers. The Culpepper Bypass slowed me only a little and about twenty minutes later the bitch announced with perfect indifference, “Your destination is ahead on the right.”
The small roadside mailbox had “Pierce” painted on the side. Franklin Pierce seemed totally unsuited to Frank, but that was his name. It was also the name of the fourteenth president about whom neither Frank nor anyone else professed to know much. “No relation,” he once said with a shrug.
The approach to the barn was a dirt road that wound past the remains of a farm house and a couple of fenced plots that may once have held horses and now contained only overgrown weeds. The barn however showed signs of occupancy and care. Frank was sitting on a covered porch and came out into a parking area to wait for me.
He greeted me with a “bro hug” that new guy-thing that I totally screwed up. He took my hand in his, pulled me close and gave be a hearty pat on the back, the correct execution of the maneuver. I kissed his cheek which was totally wrong, but I'd been sleeping with him for a year after all and just a pat on the back seemed … well, weird.
He didn't care. He kept hold of my hand for a little bit extra and gave me a huge grin. “You found it. Was the drive ok?” Then he said, “You want to park in the shade? Your car will heat up ...”
“Yeah, and your gift might get ruined.”
“What did you bring? Ice cream?” I could hear the hopefulness in Frank's question. He liked a kind of coffee ice cream with little chocolate chips in it and could even make his own except he used bigger chips.
“No ...” I opened the trunk and got out two of the coffee cans. “I got you some apple trees. The nursery woman said they're good in this part of Virginia. Four of them.” He looked pleased with the trees. “This is Earlycrisp. It tolerates a cool spring and the harvest is early and crisp, I guess. And this is Ginger Gold – supposed to have a spicy taste and store well. And Rome, a late harvest. And Arkansas Sweet, which is supposed to be good in heat. I wasn't sure exactly what your weather was ...”
“Great choices. Perfect choices, Reef.”
There was a sudden, embarrassing, and uncomfortable silence. We knew so much about each other that we couldn't act on. Finally, Frank said, “Let me show you around. This place has a history. Not a good one, but I'm hoping to change that.”
We walked and talked and he explained about the wars, the families, and a couple of fires that had made the property what is was. The last fire had burned the main house down in the late 1930's and, by the time the family had saved enough money to rebuild, the ensuing war had prevented the rebuilding long enough that after the war, when it would have been possible, nobody wanted to. One son lived in Richmond, a daughter lived in Norfolk, and another son had a hardware store in Haymarket. “That was my dad, the one in Haymarket,” Frank explained
“So this was your family's farm?”
“A couple of different times, it was. The family has had it's ups and downs I guess. Now it's mine and because it's pretty much a wreck of a farm – the last owners only rented it out as pasture – it was cheap.”
“I don't know what cheap means in Rockingham County,” I replied..
“Everything I had, plus a mortgage,” Frank answered. “So I still lease most of it out for pasture; but now, with this new apple crop coming, I'll be doing better,” he smiled.
We walked back to the barn and he showed me what he was doing to it: a complete overhaul. He was making it into a two level loft with great views of the mountains to the west and the rolling pastures to the northeast.
With the tour complete, the earlier feeling of edginess returned. It's hard being around an ex-lover, especially when that ex-lover is being so charming that you wonder why he's an ex. I got in my car while we were still saying our farewells. He leaned on the window and almost stuck his head in the car. I thought he was going to kiss me; but he didn't. He ended saying he wanted to plant the apple trees before it got dark.
“Right now?” I asked.
“The sooner the better.”
“Could I take pictures of you planting them?” I pulled my camera out of the glove box.
So we delayed my departure. Aftert a brief survey of possible sites, he chose a low rise that was near a pond for his mini-orchard. I took pictures while he planted the first two and then helped him with the second two. The result was four widely spaced, barely green twigs, the most pathetic sham of an orchard I could imagine, and a lot of sweat. We walked back to the barn and I set the camera on porch rail.
“Come on, Frank. Pose with me.”
“I'm all sweaty and dirty,” he protested but he did it. The camera snapped automatically at measured intervals while we compared blisters, joked, and relaxed in a breeze off the mountains.
“It's getting late. You could stay, if you want, Reef.”
His invitation surprised me. It was plainly an invitation for more than a night's sleep. There wasn't a bit of guile or calculation to it. He wanted me to stay and so did I.
“Oh, Frank,” I stalled. Do not sound sappy and maudlin, I ordered myself. “How do I tell you no when I really want to say yes?”
“I think you just did, Reef.” Frank smiled and didn't press.
“It's a Tuesday and tomorrow I have to ...”
He shushed me. “I understand. Another time, maybe.”
“Can I come back? I'd like to.” No promise, just honesty. I did want to.
“O' course you can. Anytime you want.”
“I'll call,” I could promise him that much.
“Or just drop in. If I'm here, you're welcome. And if I'm not, stay 'til I get here. There a key taped to the underside of that window sill.” He pointed at a new double hung window near the door.
I felt foolish shaking his hand and then I didn't want to let go of it. I held on, partly because I wanted to convince him that I wanted to stay and partly because his hand felt so good and partly because I didn't know what else to do.
All the way back to Washington I told myself, idiot. You should have stayed. Idiot. He wanted you to. You wanted to stay. Idiot.
The next day was Wednesday. I wasn't bullshitting Frank - there was stuff I needed to get done at the lab. I stayed busy all day and got home tired. I swore I was going to stay in and read. Instead I went to the gym; I stayed until closing and fucked Jawan. It wasn't any fun. I don't know why I did it. I felt slutty even while I was doing it. The damned wrist band felt tight and pinched my balls. I could barely come and I'm pretty sure Jawan didn't. Then I had to listen to his sales pitch for more sessions. I said no with enough conviction that he quit in the middle of his pitch.
Could it be that there's still hope? And Refo might be getting his fucked up head turned back around the right way?
Great installment, Rory.
Great installment, Rory.
EasyRory
JUB Addict
Chapter Seventeen
Sarah Felsen was not herself. She was very quiet and kept busy with busy work around the lab, work that was closer to housekeeping than science. Strange. She glanced at me and scowled. It must be my shirt, which was new and one I liked. It was a very subdued Hawaiian print, you could hardly make out the palm trees. Not a Washington shirt, exactly, but it was cool on a hot day.
“Not liking the shirt?” I asked her.
“Not everything is about YOU, Refo,” she snarled and left the lab rather urgently.
Suits me, I thought. She had worked herself into serious bitchiness in the past few days; it was safe to blame the early onset of summer. I glanced at my reflection in the window and thought the shirt had a certain flair. It's not as if the lab was a fashion center, scientists being not especially tuned into things like that; but the shirt didn't call for her reaction. She returned to her desk and caught me checking myself out. I quickly sat down and pretended I had merely been checking out the weather.
“Hot and humid with occasional periods of rain to make it worse. You need a regular update? It's going to be the same until October. A daily race between the temperature and the humidity to see which hits ninety first!” She coughed abruptly and sipped on her ever present-glass of ice water. “Sorry, I realize the weather is not entirely your fault. The shirt actually does look cool.”
My God, a compliment!
“Not COOL cool, as in good looking; I mean suited-to-the-weather cool,” she amended.
“Ok, a semi-compliment from Dr. Felsen.” That drew the hint of a grin and a deep breath from her. The breath reminded me she did have nice tits and on pure reflex I gave her an admiring look. Her reaction was to slump over, disguising things. I wondered if she had puffy nipples or the kind with the protruding centers; she never wore anything that conveyed the details. It occurred to me that Woody knew exactly what her nipples were like. “But not me,” I said out loud, feeling an odd bit of jealousy.
“I'm not going to ask what that meant,” she said.
“Good, because I'm not sure either,” I said and was glad for the phone's interruption. “Refo Fitzjohn,” I said to the unknown caller.
“Hi, Refo, it's Carter. I'm in Washington.”
“Where …? How long...?” I was stunned by the no-warning call.
“Yeah, it was an all-of-a-sudden trip to make a pitch to the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. That's near you, right? How long depends on whether the Hughes people like my grant application.”
“Kind of a long block away. Yes, it's close.”
“I'm staying at the Doubletree in Bethesda. If you'd like to meet for a drink after work … I could meet you any place ...”
“That's walking distance. We could start there … and then I know some better places ...”
“I think I'm last on the agenda. How would it be if I call you when I get a feel for timing?”
Of course, I agreed - with the proviso that I'd be in the bar of the Doubletree at five if we missed connections. The trouble with the lab is there is no real privacy. Sarah Felsen listened to every word on my end of the call. She could fill in the blanks.
“Are you working Bethesda pickup bars now?” she asked.
“A friend is defending a grant application at the Hughes. We're going for a drink after work. I'd really like to hear more from him about the Hughes. They're so secretive there. You never hear much about them.” Mostly I wanted to deflect her questioning, but also the Hughes was something of a mystery I wanted to hear more about.
“Hmmph, if you say so. I'll be out for about an hour,” she concluded and left.
Just minutes later the phone rang. “This is Melanie at Frick and Sickler for Doctor Felsen, please,” the impatient voice announced. I explained that she had just left and could be reached on her cell. “Mmmm, yes. Could you tell her that Mr. Sickler is needs to cancel her appointment today … Just a moment please.” Melanie didn't wait for my agreement or even put me on hold while she briefly discussed a deposition filing. “I'm back,” she said after an interval.
“I'm thrilled,” I answered. She ignored that and repeated her message. “I'll make sure Doctor Felsen gets it,” I told her and wrote out the note saying “Melanie from your lawyer's office called to cancel today's meeting.”
Two hours later Sarah Felsen still had not returned so I left the note on her computer screen and left to meet Carter. I wondered if I should go home and change but decided not to. Why would I do that? Because you want to make an impression, I replied. And why would I want to do that? I followed up. Because you want to get laid, I answered; you want to get laid by this incredibly hot guy who knows exactly what to do to turn you into a steamy puddle of jizz.
I went home and took a shower, paying particular attention to aspects of anal cleanliness and then messed with my hair. I don't really have good or bad hair days; it's just there. It grows and I get it cut. Every couple of years I ask the barber if I should try a different style and he looks at me as if I'm requesting an amputation. Maybe I should pay more for my haircuts, I concluded for the twentieth time; but that wasn't any help now. I dried it and left it alone. Clothes would be harder. I rooted through my closet and rejected almost everything. Fuck it. I wore all black, the way I always do. I grabbed a couple condoms and left the house.
The next calculation was transportation. Should I drive? That would give us options for later. Should I take the Metro? But that would imply I was expecting an invitation to his room for the night. The weather made up my mind for me. If I took the Metro, I'd be sweaty by the time I walked to the Doubletree. Maybe it would be ok if I walked slowly, but I hate doing that. I really have only one walking speed and that is as fast as I can go without actually running. I'd be sweaty which would make the whole trip-home-to-shower thing a waste of time. So, I drove and even used the A/C, another thing I hate to do because it degrades the already poor performance of my car and, with the windows closed, I can't hear the people honking at me.
I had barely started the engine before someone honked at me. It was a woman in a large SUV who wanted my parking place and she wanted it NOW. Like Gaul, the Washington area is divided into three parts with very different types of motorist. There are Maryland assholes - aggressive drivers with a heavy ego-investment in getting there first. This makes “the merge”, for example, a very difficult maneuver for them. Next come the District dickheads; these drivers are not normally aggressive unless they are using their cars as get-away vehicles. They tend to drive slowly and with a directional unpredictability that infuriates the Maryland assholes trapped behind them. Lastly, the Virginians are airheads. They occupy an alien dimension that coincides with ours only on the highways. The laws of physics are different for them; apparently two object can simultaneously occupy the same space in Virginia. Yes, they tailgate! All too often, these three cultures are forced to mix. It's easy to see why the cab drivers are so pissed off all the time.
I gave up my parking space drove away, slowly enough that I could watch the woman fail to fit her SUV into the space I had left her. That put me in a good mood. I cheerfully allowed a couple of cars to cut me off executing illegal turns in ironically-named Friendship Heights.
I got to the hotel a little late. The Metro would have been faster; but at least I was dry and composed. The bar was very dark and my eyes took a while adjusting. No Carter. The wines looked overpriced, so I ordered an overpriced beer and glanced around. This close to the National Institutes of Health it was a pretty nerdy crowd. Sparkling water was the big seller in this place. “No liquor license?” I asked the bartender, to make conversation.
“We had one, but we never sold any liquor. It's not that kind of place,” he explained, shaking his head and looking over the clientele. He appraised me. “You look like a martini man.” He smiled at my nod. “You staying in the hotel?”
“Meeting a friend who's staying here,” I told him. I sensed someone sitting down next to me. “And here he is! Carter!” We shook hands and the bartender asked him what he wanted to drink. He nodded and politely moved away when Carter declined.
“Let's go to my room,” Carter said. “There's something I want to show you.” We walked through the lobby and Carter drew admiring glances. His good looks were compelling. The elevator doors closed and Carter confided, “That bartender thinks were going to my room to fuck.”
I swallowed. “Are we?”
“I hope so,” he said as the door opened. His room was about five doors from the elevator, but the walk seemed endless. He opened the door with his room card and ushered me in.
“What did you want to show me?”
Carter began unbuttoning his shirt.“A good time? A stiff dick? Me?” He didn't leave much time for decisions. With his shirt off, he worked on mine, pulling the tails out of my pants. He assumed permission and nuzzled my neck as he worked on my buttons. “You smell good, Refo.” That was pretty much it for foreplay. I was about to complain, but he stuck his hand into my pants and squeezed me. I responded, thrusting against his hand as my cock came to life. He pushed me back onto the bed and went to work opening my belt. “You want another beer? I've got some in the minibar. Mmmffglup.” He went down on my cock before I could answer.
The vision of this gorgeous guy sucking my dick was overwhelming. So fucking gorgeous, it hurt to look at him when he would glance up at me. I would have agreed to anything. As he suck he worked off the rest of my clothes. I helped him with the trousers and socks.
“You look so hot with your legs in the air like that. I can see your asshole.” That was his prelude to rimming me: “I can see your asshole.” And, boom, he's sucking on it. I think I might have been pissed except his rim job was fantastic.
“Oh, Carter,” I sighed. I relaxed physically and tensed mentally, both at the same time. “Oh … Carter ...” My words were as inane as his. It hurt when he put his cock in me. I winced and gasped, but he didn't even slow down. He went balls deep on the first thrust. I wasn't sure how he did it.
“Use some lube,” I gasped.
“No need. I precum a lot,” he answered and pushed in a second time.
“Not enough,” I protested, but, in truth, the second thrust wasn't so bad. He chuckled and kissed me. Because he wanted to? Or just to shut me up? I wasn't sure. I was sure of his cock, though. At the moment that thing was my central experience and bigger than I remembered. He was fucking me at an increasing pace. I thought he was going to pump himself straight to cumming, but he stopped and rested on his heels. He stroked my cock and rubbed my precum around the head with his thumb.
“You are just about perfect,” he said as he stroked me and played with my balls. “Mmmm,” the sound of his concentration was strange, until he explained. “I like watching how guys work up. You're starting to tremble a little.”
“ 'Cause I'm getting close,” I said between gasps.
“I'm close, too. You want to come together? Or should I make it last? Or we could make it a now-and-later ...” He stroked my slick cock slowly.
“I'm gonna cum!” was my frantic answer. He began fucking me while he stroked me and we came together. The A/C in the room wasn't enough for the heat we generated. We were both sweaty. We showered and drank a beer and then fucked again. The second time was slower and more intimate. Then we went out for a pizza. Then we fucked again. That time I fucked him until I almost came and then he rolled us over and fucked me again until we both came. He was pretty affectionate that time.
If I hadn't been so wiped out by the night of sex, so physically exhausted and consumed, I might have felt something missing. Maybe his good looks blinded me. Plus, he was very focused and attentive. He never looked at another guy; and there were a couple of hotties in the pizza place. He concentrated on me all night. Yes, of course I agreed to see him the next night, too. Who wouldn't?
Frank probably wouldn't. That was a jarring thought that didn't come to me until I was at work the next day. Frank would have known it was just sex. Great sex. Fantastic sex. World class orgasms, even. But ultimately, to Frank, it would have been just sex. That took the edge off my high spirits.
“ 'Sa matta?” Sarah Felsen asked. “Did your balloon brain just crash?”
I shook my head clear of Carter and looked at her. “You get the note about the lawyer?”
“How'd you know it was a lawyer?”
“How dumb do you think I am?” I parried, reveling in my correct assumption of the day before. I moved to the door planning to go for coffee.
“So tempting … so tempting, but I will say nothing.” She shook her head and smiled. “Why are you walking funny?” Her grin said, “Gotcha!”
Sarah Felsen was not herself. She was very quiet and kept busy with busy work around the lab, work that was closer to housekeeping than science. Strange. She glanced at me and scowled. It must be my shirt, which was new and one I liked. It was a very subdued Hawaiian print, you could hardly make out the palm trees. Not a Washington shirt, exactly, but it was cool on a hot day.
“Not liking the shirt?” I asked her.
“Not everything is about YOU, Refo,” she snarled and left the lab rather urgently.
Suits me, I thought. She had worked herself into serious bitchiness in the past few days; it was safe to blame the early onset of summer. I glanced at my reflection in the window and thought the shirt had a certain flair. It's not as if the lab was a fashion center, scientists being not especially tuned into things like that; but the shirt didn't call for her reaction. She returned to her desk and caught me checking myself out. I quickly sat down and pretended I had merely been checking out the weather.
“Hot and humid with occasional periods of rain to make it worse. You need a regular update? It's going to be the same until October. A daily race between the temperature and the humidity to see which hits ninety first!” She coughed abruptly and sipped on her ever present-glass of ice water. “Sorry, I realize the weather is not entirely your fault. The shirt actually does look cool.”
My God, a compliment!
“Not COOL cool, as in good looking; I mean suited-to-the-weather cool,” she amended.
“Ok, a semi-compliment from Dr. Felsen.” That drew the hint of a grin and a deep breath from her. The breath reminded me she did have nice tits and on pure reflex I gave her an admiring look. Her reaction was to slump over, disguising things. I wondered if she had puffy nipples or the kind with the protruding centers; she never wore anything that conveyed the details. It occurred to me that Woody knew exactly what her nipples were like. “But not me,” I said out loud, feeling an odd bit of jealousy.
“I'm not going to ask what that meant,” she said.
“Good, because I'm not sure either,” I said and was glad for the phone's interruption. “Refo Fitzjohn,” I said to the unknown caller.
“Hi, Refo, it's Carter. I'm in Washington.”
“Where …? How long...?” I was stunned by the no-warning call.
“Yeah, it was an all-of-a-sudden trip to make a pitch to the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. That's near you, right? How long depends on whether the Hughes people like my grant application.”
“Kind of a long block away. Yes, it's close.”
“I'm staying at the Doubletree in Bethesda. If you'd like to meet for a drink after work … I could meet you any place ...”
“That's walking distance. We could start there … and then I know some better places ...”
“I think I'm last on the agenda. How would it be if I call you when I get a feel for timing?”
Of course, I agreed - with the proviso that I'd be in the bar of the Doubletree at five if we missed connections. The trouble with the lab is there is no real privacy. Sarah Felsen listened to every word on my end of the call. She could fill in the blanks.
“Are you working Bethesda pickup bars now?” she asked.
“A friend is defending a grant application at the Hughes. We're going for a drink after work. I'd really like to hear more from him about the Hughes. They're so secretive there. You never hear much about them.” Mostly I wanted to deflect her questioning, but also the Hughes was something of a mystery I wanted to hear more about.
“Hmmph, if you say so. I'll be out for about an hour,” she concluded and left.
Just minutes later the phone rang. “This is Melanie at Frick and Sickler for Doctor Felsen, please,” the impatient voice announced. I explained that she had just left and could be reached on her cell. “Mmmm, yes. Could you tell her that Mr. Sickler is needs to cancel her appointment today … Just a moment please.” Melanie didn't wait for my agreement or even put me on hold while she briefly discussed a deposition filing. “I'm back,” she said after an interval.
“I'm thrilled,” I answered. She ignored that and repeated her message. “I'll make sure Doctor Felsen gets it,” I told her and wrote out the note saying “Melanie from your lawyer's office called to cancel today's meeting.”
Two hours later Sarah Felsen still had not returned so I left the note on her computer screen and left to meet Carter. I wondered if I should go home and change but decided not to. Why would I do that? Because you want to make an impression, I replied. And why would I want to do that? I followed up. Because you want to get laid, I answered; you want to get laid by this incredibly hot guy who knows exactly what to do to turn you into a steamy puddle of jizz.
I went home and took a shower, paying particular attention to aspects of anal cleanliness and then messed with my hair. I don't really have good or bad hair days; it's just there. It grows and I get it cut. Every couple of years I ask the barber if I should try a different style and he looks at me as if I'm requesting an amputation. Maybe I should pay more for my haircuts, I concluded for the twentieth time; but that wasn't any help now. I dried it and left it alone. Clothes would be harder. I rooted through my closet and rejected almost everything. Fuck it. I wore all black, the way I always do. I grabbed a couple condoms and left the house.
The next calculation was transportation. Should I drive? That would give us options for later. Should I take the Metro? But that would imply I was expecting an invitation to his room for the night. The weather made up my mind for me. If I took the Metro, I'd be sweaty by the time I walked to the Doubletree. Maybe it would be ok if I walked slowly, but I hate doing that. I really have only one walking speed and that is as fast as I can go without actually running. I'd be sweaty which would make the whole trip-home-to-shower thing a waste of time. So, I drove and even used the A/C, another thing I hate to do because it degrades the already poor performance of my car and, with the windows closed, I can't hear the people honking at me.
I had barely started the engine before someone honked at me. It was a woman in a large SUV who wanted my parking place and she wanted it NOW. Like Gaul, the Washington area is divided into three parts with very different types of motorist. There are Maryland assholes - aggressive drivers with a heavy ego-investment in getting there first. This makes “the merge”, for example, a very difficult maneuver for them. Next come the District dickheads; these drivers are not normally aggressive unless they are using their cars as get-away vehicles. They tend to drive slowly and with a directional unpredictability that infuriates the Maryland assholes trapped behind them. Lastly, the Virginians are airheads. They occupy an alien dimension that coincides with ours only on the highways. The laws of physics are different for them; apparently two object can simultaneously occupy the same space in Virginia. Yes, they tailgate! All too often, these three cultures are forced to mix. It's easy to see why the cab drivers are so pissed off all the time.
I gave up my parking space drove away, slowly enough that I could watch the woman fail to fit her SUV into the space I had left her. That put me in a good mood. I cheerfully allowed a couple of cars to cut me off executing illegal turns in ironically-named Friendship Heights.
I got to the hotel a little late. The Metro would have been faster; but at least I was dry and composed. The bar was very dark and my eyes took a while adjusting. No Carter. The wines looked overpriced, so I ordered an overpriced beer and glanced around. This close to the National Institutes of Health it was a pretty nerdy crowd. Sparkling water was the big seller in this place. “No liquor license?” I asked the bartender, to make conversation.
“We had one, but we never sold any liquor. It's not that kind of place,” he explained, shaking his head and looking over the clientele. He appraised me. “You look like a martini man.” He smiled at my nod. “You staying in the hotel?”
“Meeting a friend who's staying here,” I told him. I sensed someone sitting down next to me. “And here he is! Carter!” We shook hands and the bartender asked him what he wanted to drink. He nodded and politely moved away when Carter declined.
“Let's go to my room,” Carter said. “There's something I want to show you.” We walked through the lobby and Carter drew admiring glances. His good looks were compelling. The elevator doors closed and Carter confided, “That bartender thinks were going to my room to fuck.”
I swallowed. “Are we?”
“I hope so,” he said as the door opened. His room was about five doors from the elevator, but the walk seemed endless. He opened the door with his room card and ushered me in.
“What did you want to show me?”
Carter began unbuttoning his shirt.“A good time? A stiff dick? Me?” He didn't leave much time for decisions. With his shirt off, he worked on mine, pulling the tails out of my pants. He assumed permission and nuzzled my neck as he worked on my buttons. “You smell good, Refo.” That was pretty much it for foreplay. I was about to complain, but he stuck his hand into my pants and squeezed me. I responded, thrusting against his hand as my cock came to life. He pushed me back onto the bed and went to work opening my belt. “You want another beer? I've got some in the minibar. Mmmffglup.” He went down on my cock before I could answer.
The vision of this gorgeous guy sucking my dick was overwhelming. So fucking gorgeous, it hurt to look at him when he would glance up at me. I would have agreed to anything. As he suck he worked off the rest of my clothes. I helped him with the trousers and socks.
“You look so hot with your legs in the air like that. I can see your asshole.” That was his prelude to rimming me: “I can see your asshole.” And, boom, he's sucking on it. I think I might have been pissed except his rim job was fantastic.
“Oh, Carter,” I sighed. I relaxed physically and tensed mentally, both at the same time. “Oh … Carter ...” My words were as inane as his. It hurt when he put his cock in me. I winced and gasped, but he didn't even slow down. He went balls deep on the first thrust. I wasn't sure how he did it.
“Use some lube,” I gasped.
“No need. I precum a lot,” he answered and pushed in a second time.
“Not enough,” I protested, but, in truth, the second thrust wasn't so bad. He chuckled and kissed me. Because he wanted to? Or just to shut me up? I wasn't sure. I was sure of his cock, though. At the moment that thing was my central experience and bigger than I remembered. He was fucking me at an increasing pace. I thought he was going to pump himself straight to cumming, but he stopped and rested on his heels. He stroked my cock and rubbed my precum around the head with his thumb.
“You are just about perfect,” he said as he stroked me and played with my balls. “Mmmm,” the sound of his concentration was strange, until he explained. “I like watching how guys work up. You're starting to tremble a little.”
“ 'Cause I'm getting close,” I said between gasps.
“I'm close, too. You want to come together? Or should I make it last? Or we could make it a now-and-later ...” He stroked my slick cock slowly.
“I'm gonna cum!” was my frantic answer. He began fucking me while he stroked me and we came together. The A/C in the room wasn't enough for the heat we generated. We were both sweaty. We showered and drank a beer and then fucked again. The second time was slower and more intimate. Then we went out for a pizza. Then we fucked again. That time I fucked him until I almost came and then he rolled us over and fucked me again until we both came. He was pretty affectionate that time.
If I hadn't been so wiped out by the night of sex, so physically exhausted and consumed, I might have felt something missing. Maybe his good looks blinded me. Plus, he was very focused and attentive. He never looked at another guy; and there were a couple of hotties in the pizza place. He concentrated on me all night. Yes, of course I agreed to see him the next night, too. Who wouldn't?
Frank probably wouldn't. That was a jarring thought that didn't come to me until I was at work the next day. Frank would have known it was just sex. Great sex. Fantastic sex. World class orgasms, even. But ultimately, to Frank, it would have been just sex. That took the edge off my high spirits.
“ 'Sa matta?” Sarah Felsen asked. “Did your balloon brain just crash?”
I shook my head clear of Carter and looked at her. “You get the note about the lawyer?”
“How'd you know it was a lawyer?”
“How dumb do you think I am?” I parried, reveling in my correct assumption of the day before. I moved to the door planning to go for coffee.
“So tempting … so tempting, but I will say nothing.” She shook her head and smiled. “Why are you walking funny?” Her grin said, “Gotcha!”
Carter, the completely focused sex machine - who gives a shit about romance or feelings- sex is good.
Refo is a slow learner, but maybe he can be trained?
The details were pretty arousing, I must say.
Refo is a slow learner, but maybe he can be trained?
The details were pretty arousing, I must say.
EasyRory
JUB Addict
Been traveling and I'm leaving again today ... I'll try to have a Chapter posted by Friday.
We will await the MasterWriter patiently.
Have a good trip.
Have a good trip.
EasyRory
JUB Addict
Chapter Eighteenth
The next night was amazing. Carter came three times. Twice while I fucked him and once when he rolled me on my back. I was barely recovering from the pounding when he bounced out of bed and asked, “Hungry? I'm starved.” He pulled on a pair of my shorts and padded to the door of the bedroom. “Where's the kitchen?”
I grabbed a robe and joined him. I groped for the light switch and turned on my “sexy” lighting – small spots that were aimed at my photography. Carter spotted his in an instant.
“Awesome. Really, Refo! I gotta do it your way. I just hung it over a chair. It looks great like this.” He continued staring at the photo. “I think I'm falling in love with myself. Wouldn't it be great if we actually could fuck ourselves? I'd never leave my apartment!” He gave me a half kiss through his laughter and then turned back to the photo. Reluctantly he tore his eyes away from himself and looked at the adjacent picture. “Hm!” he grunted abruptly. “Lucien Oesch. Where did you take that?”
“At the lab. You know Lucien?
“He's my ex-boyfriend.” There was nothing wistful about Carter's admission.
“He was installing an experimental endoscope.”
“Why is he wearing torn paper clothes?” Carter stood close to the photograph and touched the tear in Lucien's pants.
“He came in a suit and that was all we could find.”
“He came? That was our problem. He could NEVER cum! Almost never.”
“I mean he arrived wearing a very good suit and I suggested he could ruin it. So he put on patient disposables. There was no sex, Carter.” I felt defensive and emphasized the no sex part.
“That's good. He's terrible at sex. He always wore good suits, though. He has a closet full.”
“If he's terrible at sex, why were you boyfriends?”
“I was stupid maybe? Everybody else wanted him; I figured I should, too. The mistake was I got him.”
“I thought he was straight,” I admitted. “I'm not a very good judge of ...”
“You were right about me,” Carter said, shifting the conversation back to himself. “How did you know about me?”
“I didn't. I liked your looks and you seemed friendly. Then I got up the nerve to ask if you had a boyfriend, instead of outright asking if you were, you know, gay.”
“So am I?”
“Dude, we just fucked three times!” I figured the question didn't need an answer.
“I consider myself 'bi', in formal terms.” My mouth fell open and Carter burst out laughing. “Well, I used to. Always used to have a girl friend in reserve, just in case. In fact this one found out about me and said I was a closet straight. She tried to convince me I was really straight and just fooling around with guys.” He waited for my reaction.
“And …?”
“Eventually she figured out I was messing around with guys every night I wasn't with her, which wasn't very often, and she gave up. Kept my secret, though, for a while.” His hand found its way into my bathrobe and he rhythmically squeezed my cock. He put my hand on his cock to let me feel its growing hardness. “So should we eat or fuck? I could go either way. “Maybe we should fuck.” He undid one button let the shorts drop to the floor, then opened my robe and pulled our naked bodies together. “Want to?” he asked. “I want to,” he added in case his erection wasn't convincing.
I have to say: he had stamina and he was sweet, doing his best to make it good for me, but his best, after two nights of marathon sex wasn't enough. I rubbed his nipples to hurry him into a brief orgasm. When it was over, he turned to the photo of Lucien and said, “See, Lukas; that's called cumming. It's easy. Try it some day.” An edge of bitterness peeked through his usually boyish charm and he pronounced Lucien's name loo-kash.
Then we ate. Or I should say he ate. Left-over chicken. A bowl of Rice Chex. He drank all the milk I had. He ate some Nutella, that I didn't know I had, off of a spoon and finished with a half a bag of cookies. He took the rest of the cookies when he left in the morning.
“Still, the funny walk.” Sarah Felsen said as she watched me in the morning. “If I didn't know better, I'd say ...”
“Don't. Just a long workout. On some muscle groups I had neglected.”
“Sphinc ...”
“Don't say it!” I warned her.
“As you wish, Doctor Fitzjohn,” she answered with elaborate courtesy, giving me a little bow of her head.
“You want something.” Then I noticed her lunch was saltines and tea. “Are you sick?”
She smiled benignly. “I'd like you to have a look at this, if you would.” She passed me a manila envelope that didn't feel very thick.
“Sure. Let me get some coffee.” I went down to the machine and returned promptly. She was gone. I sat, sipped, and opened the envelope. The document title caught my eye instantly. Pre-Nuptial Agreement, it read. I picked up my red pencil, struck out the hyphen, and underscored the pointlessly capitalized N. I had never read anything like it before. There were no parties of the first part or any legal gobbledegook at all. Just sentences beninning “Sarah Felsen will ...” and “[fill in the blank] will ...” There was nothing about loving, honoring, or obeying; it was all about financial arrangements, timing, and residual responsibilities. Basically, Sarah would more or less be completely independent and Mr. X, once having completed a year of the marriage, would be responsible for nothing. Except for correcting the opening title, I never used my red pencil again.
While I read the amazing document, I failed to notice Sarah's return. I got up to put it on her desk and reacted with a start. “Sarah! Um, I ...” I carefully placed the manila envelope in her in-box and continued. “I read the agreement. I'm not a lawyer, but ...”
“A lawyer drew it up; I just want the 'guy's' viewpoint. Would you do it? Would you marry me?”
Eventually I squeaked, “Would I or will I? What are you asking?”
“Well, first of all, for the stated financial consideration, would you do it? Purely theoretical.”
“If I needed the money, maybe. But I don't, not enough to ...”
“Secondly, will you marry me under those terms? Just for a year.” She paused.” You don't have anything else going on, do you?” Sarah gave the impression that she felt the deal was compelling.
“Why?” was all I could think to ask.
“I'm pregnant, Refo.”
“Woody?”
She looked at me with annoyance. “Yes, Woody. What do you think I am?”
“Why not make this offer to Woody?”
“He's nineteen, Refo. N-I-N-E-T-E-E-N! It would ruin his life, if he actually has one. And it would ruin mine, if he married me. Thirty year old scientist marries child groom! I couldn't stand the talk, the looks, and what about the kid? When he … she gets old enough. What would the kid think?”
She looked vulnerable; she must be desperate to bring this up with me. “You're thirty-five,” I mentioned in case she had forgotten.
“Yes, thirty-five. I bring this up with you because you would make an excellent father in every way except the part about being the father, of course.”
Sarah ...” I was totally nonplussed.
“Think about it. That's all.”
“You're Jewish and I'm not circumcised.” Why did I blurt that out?
“You are, too.”
“How do you know?”
“Girls know these things, Refo,” she rolled her eyes in exasperation, which I found oddly endearing – the fact that she had contemplated my dick. Then the strangest thing: all day long we shared little smiles. And at the end of the day, she repeated, “Just think about it. Take your time and think about it.”
“WHAT?” was Charlie's reaction. “She wants to WHAT?”
“Marry me,” I replied.
“Of course you're told her NO! And that's short for NO FUCKING WAY!”
“Why are you so upset? You're not marrying her.” I really didn't get his reaction and decided to change the subject. “Are you going to Frank's this weekend?”
“Probably. Yes, I'm pretty sure I am.”
“Good, because I took some pictures and I'd like to send his copies.”
“Pictues! You took pictures of what?” Why was Charlie was so needlessly agitated about a few photos?
“Pictures of him planting some apple trees.”
“Those things. Those twigs with a couple leaves. You know he loves those things like they're his children? You know that, don't you?”
Ah-hah, Charlie was jealous, as I guess I would be if some ex-lover was still making waves in my boyfriend's pond. “They're just apple trees, for God's sake.” That somewhat mollified Charlie and he agreed to take the pictures to Frank.
Of course, now I needed to select and edit what pictures to send. That turned out to be not so easy. Or maybe I should say too easy, because all the pictures, each in its own way, were quite good. It became a question of money, I decided I could afford to print and frame only six.
After a lot of comparing, I chose four of Frank digging and planting and two of the two of us. In one we were looking at each other and laughing about something; Frank's mouth was forming words forever unknown to the viewer and my face was full of expectation. I had no recollection of what we could have been talking about so animatedly; but I could remember my feeling of anticipation perfectly. Frank teasing indirection always had me hanging on every word out of his mouth.
In the other picture we stood next to each other. I was facing the camera but looking at Frank, while he was facing me, but looking at the camera. I liked everything about that second picture; we were both full of something unspoken. Any viewer would be intrigued and drawn into the mysterious byplay so evident in the scene. Plus the sideways shot of Frank, showed off his body almost too beautifully – it made me look kind of … kind of … unworthy of him.
I emailed the photos to Ritz and picked them up the next day from my favorite photo counselor. “What's he planting?”
“Apple trees,” I answered.
“You could get applewood frames,” he suggested. Applewood, as you might guess, isn't in common use for anything but keeping apples off the ground. The special order would take two weeks.
I got home and phoned ther news of the delay to Charlie. He was delighted. I tried to see his point, but it only got me pissed off. Why couldn't I give Frank a simple memento of the tree-planting? Yet, Charlie must have felt threatened. The couple of fucks Frank and I had had right after the break up were just … were only … What were they? Pretty hot, for sure. In fact they were the best we ever had. But they weren't going to change the course of rivers, level mountains, or make me hope for more.
At the moment my dick was withered and worn from Carter's visit and there was a message on the answering machine, probably from Jawan. It was a Wednesday, after all. I played it ready for a laugh.
“Refo, it's Randy Krol. When are you coming to the shore? Give me a call, ok?” My Delaware farmer with political connections! There was a surprise. I played the message twice to make sure I wrote down his number correctly.
The next night was amazing. Carter came three times. Twice while I fucked him and once when he rolled me on my back. I was barely recovering from the pounding when he bounced out of bed and asked, “Hungry? I'm starved.” He pulled on a pair of my shorts and padded to the door of the bedroom. “Where's the kitchen?”
I grabbed a robe and joined him. I groped for the light switch and turned on my “sexy” lighting – small spots that were aimed at my photography. Carter spotted his in an instant.
“Awesome. Really, Refo! I gotta do it your way. I just hung it over a chair. It looks great like this.” He continued staring at the photo. “I think I'm falling in love with myself. Wouldn't it be great if we actually could fuck ourselves? I'd never leave my apartment!” He gave me a half kiss through his laughter and then turned back to the photo. Reluctantly he tore his eyes away from himself and looked at the adjacent picture. “Hm!” he grunted abruptly. “Lucien Oesch. Where did you take that?”
“At the lab. You know Lucien?
“He's my ex-boyfriend.” There was nothing wistful about Carter's admission.
“He was installing an experimental endoscope.”
“Why is he wearing torn paper clothes?” Carter stood close to the photograph and touched the tear in Lucien's pants.
“He came in a suit and that was all we could find.”
“He came? That was our problem. He could NEVER cum! Almost never.”
“I mean he arrived wearing a very good suit and I suggested he could ruin it. So he put on patient disposables. There was no sex, Carter.” I felt defensive and emphasized the no sex part.
“That's good. He's terrible at sex. He always wore good suits, though. He has a closet full.”
“If he's terrible at sex, why were you boyfriends?”
“I was stupid maybe? Everybody else wanted him; I figured I should, too. The mistake was I got him.”
“I thought he was straight,” I admitted. “I'm not a very good judge of ...”
“You were right about me,” Carter said, shifting the conversation back to himself. “How did you know about me?”
“I didn't. I liked your looks and you seemed friendly. Then I got up the nerve to ask if you had a boyfriend, instead of outright asking if you were, you know, gay.”
“So am I?”
“Dude, we just fucked three times!” I figured the question didn't need an answer.
“I consider myself 'bi', in formal terms.” My mouth fell open and Carter burst out laughing. “Well, I used to. Always used to have a girl friend in reserve, just in case. In fact this one found out about me and said I was a closet straight. She tried to convince me I was really straight and just fooling around with guys.” He waited for my reaction.
“And …?”
“Eventually she figured out I was messing around with guys every night I wasn't with her, which wasn't very often, and she gave up. Kept my secret, though, for a while.” His hand found its way into my bathrobe and he rhythmically squeezed my cock. He put my hand on his cock to let me feel its growing hardness. “So should we eat or fuck? I could go either way. “Maybe we should fuck.” He undid one button let the shorts drop to the floor, then opened my robe and pulled our naked bodies together. “Want to?” he asked. “I want to,” he added in case his erection wasn't convincing.
I have to say: he had stamina and he was sweet, doing his best to make it good for me, but his best, after two nights of marathon sex wasn't enough. I rubbed his nipples to hurry him into a brief orgasm. When it was over, he turned to the photo of Lucien and said, “See, Lukas; that's called cumming. It's easy. Try it some day.” An edge of bitterness peeked through his usually boyish charm and he pronounced Lucien's name loo-kash.
Then we ate. Or I should say he ate. Left-over chicken. A bowl of Rice Chex. He drank all the milk I had. He ate some Nutella, that I didn't know I had, off of a spoon and finished with a half a bag of cookies. He took the rest of the cookies when he left in the morning.
“Still, the funny walk.” Sarah Felsen said as she watched me in the morning. “If I didn't know better, I'd say ...”
“Don't. Just a long workout. On some muscle groups I had neglected.”
“Sphinc ...”
“Don't say it!” I warned her.
“As you wish, Doctor Fitzjohn,” she answered with elaborate courtesy, giving me a little bow of her head.
“You want something.” Then I noticed her lunch was saltines and tea. “Are you sick?”
She smiled benignly. “I'd like you to have a look at this, if you would.” She passed me a manila envelope that didn't feel very thick.
“Sure. Let me get some coffee.” I went down to the machine and returned promptly. She was gone. I sat, sipped, and opened the envelope. The document title caught my eye instantly. Pre-Nuptial Agreement, it read. I picked up my red pencil, struck out the hyphen, and underscored the pointlessly capitalized N. I had never read anything like it before. There were no parties of the first part or any legal gobbledegook at all. Just sentences beninning “Sarah Felsen will ...” and “[fill in the blank] will ...” There was nothing about loving, honoring, or obeying; it was all about financial arrangements, timing, and residual responsibilities. Basically, Sarah would more or less be completely independent and Mr. X, once having completed a year of the marriage, would be responsible for nothing. Except for correcting the opening title, I never used my red pencil again.
While I read the amazing document, I failed to notice Sarah's return. I got up to put it on her desk and reacted with a start. “Sarah! Um, I ...” I carefully placed the manila envelope in her in-box and continued. “I read the agreement. I'm not a lawyer, but ...”
“A lawyer drew it up; I just want the 'guy's' viewpoint. Would you do it? Would you marry me?”
Eventually I squeaked, “Would I or will I? What are you asking?”
“Well, first of all, for the stated financial consideration, would you do it? Purely theoretical.”
“If I needed the money, maybe. But I don't, not enough to ...”
“Secondly, will you marry me under those terms? Just for a year.” She paused.” You don't have anything else going on, do you?” Sarah gave the impression that she felt the deal was compelling.
“Why?” was all I could think to ask.
“I'm pregnant, Refo.”
“Woody?”
She looked at me with annoyance. “Yes, Woody. What do you think I am?”
“Why not make this offer to Woody?”
“He's nineteen, Refo. N-I-N-E-T-E-E-N! It would ruin his life, if he actually has one. And it would ruin mine, if he married me. Thirty year old scientist marries child groom! I couldn't stand the talk, the looks, and what about the kid? When he … she gets old enough. What would the kid think?”
She looked vulnerable; she must be desperate to bring this up with me. “You're thirty-five,” I mentioned in case she had forgotten.
“Yes, thirty-five. I bring this up with you because you would make an excellent father in every way except the part about being the father, of course.”
Sarah ...” I was totally nonplussed.
“Think about it. That's all.”
“You're Jewish and I'm not circumcised.” Why did I blurt that out?
“You are, too.”
“How do you know?”
“Girls know these things, Refo,” she rolled her eyes in exasperation, which I found oddly endearing – the fact that she had contemplated my dick. Then the strangest thing: all day long we shared little smiles. And at the end of the day, she repeated, “Just think about it. Take your time and think about it.”
“WHAT?” was Charlie's reaction. “She wants to WHAT?”
“Marry me,” I replied.
“Of course you're told her NO! And that's short for NO FUCKING WAY!”
“Why are you so upset? You're not marrying her.” I really didn't get his reaction and decided to change the subject. “Are you going to Frank's this weekend?”
“Probably. Yes, I'm pretty sure I am.”
“Good, because I took some pictures and I'd like to send his copies.”
“Pictues! You took pictures of what?” Why was Charlie was so needlessly agitated about a few photos?
“Pictures of him planting some apple trees.”
“Those things. Those twigs with a couple leaves. You know he loves those things like they're his children? You know that, don't you?”
Ah-hah, Charlie was jealous, as I guess I would be if some ex-lover was still making waves in my boyfriend's pond. “They're just apple trees, for God's sake.” That somewhat mollified Charlie and he agreed to take the pictures to Frank.
Of course, now I needed to select and edit what pictures to send. That turned out to be not so easy. Or maybe I should say too easy, because all the pictures, each in its own way, were quite good. It became a question of money, I decided I could afford to print and frame only six.
After a lot of comparing, I chose four of Frank digging and planting and two of the two of us. In one we were looking at each other and laughing about something; Frank's mouth was forming words forever unknown to the viewer and my face was full of expectation. I had no recollection of what we could have been talking about so animatedly; but I could remember my feeling of anticipation perfectly. Frank teasing indirection always had me hanging on every word out of his mouth.
In the other picture we stood next to each other. I was facing the camera but looking at Frank, while he was facing me, but looking at the camera. I liked everything about that second picture; we were both full of something unspoken. Any viewer would be intrigued and drawn into the mysterious byplay so evident in the scene. Plus the sideways shot of Frank, showed off his body almost too beautifully – it made me look kind of … kind of … unworthy of him.
I emailed the photos to Ritz and picked them up the next day from my favorite photo counselor. “What's he planting?”
“Apple trees,” I answered.
“You could get applewood frames,” he suggested. Applewood, as you might guess, isn't in common use for anything but keeping apples off the ground. The special order would take two weeks.
I got home and phoned ther news of the delay to Charlie. He was delighted. I tried to see his point, but it only got me pissed off. Why couldn't I give Frank a simple memento of the tree-planting? Yet, Charlie must have felt threatened. The couple of fucks Frank and I had had right after the break up were just … were only … What were they? Pretty hot, for sure. In fact they were the best we ever had. But they weren't going to change the course of rivers, level mountains, or make me hope for more.
At the moment my dick was withered and worn from Carter's visit and there was a message on the answering machine, probably from Jawan. It was a Wednesday, after all. I played it ready for a laugh.
“Refo, it's Randy Krol. When are you coming to the shore? Give me a call, ok?” My Delaware farmer with political connections! There was a surprise. I played the message twice to make sure I wrote down his number correctly.
It was definitely a high powered installment!
Will you engage in my marriage contract for the course of a year, so my illegitimate child will look legitimate, because the boy toy I boinked would be ruined, and me, too! lol
Will you engage in my marriage contract for the course of a year, so my illegitimate child will look legitimate, because the boy toy I boinked would be ruined, and me, too! lol
I love this so far. 
and I really connected with the not letting anyone fuck me part. haha. and the rest is all wonderful. waiting for the next installment. thanks.
and I really connected with the not letting anyone fuck me part. haha. and the rest is all wonderful. waiting for the next installment. thanks.
EasyRory
JUB Addict
I love this so far.
Thanks for the kind words. All events are drawn from real life - and then distorted, of course.
gözlerininrengi,
Welcome to JUB and the Story Forum!
Rory has Lots of stories in the archives that you might enjoy, too.
Welcome to JUB and the Story Forum!
Rory has Lots of stories in the archives that you might enjoy, too.
EasyRory
JUB Addict
One of them - Change at Gallery Place, I think - has a chapter or two that take place in Turkey.
Thanks for the kind words. All events are drawn from real life - and then distorted, of course.
Then we have a lot in common. hahaha. I'm gonna get on those first thing tomorrow.One of them - Change at Gallery Place, I think - has a chapter or two that take place in Turkey.
if they're anything like this I'm gonna be hooked for the following hours. thanks 
Thank you! So kind!
Suffice - A belated welcome to JUB and the story board - it looks like you have been hiding in the background a bit - come, join all the fun in interactive posting - we have a great time.
This is from the end of March, 2010
http://www.justusboys.com/forum/threads/301074-A-Fable-from-the-70-s
This story is from April, 2010 - and it brings a lengthy series surrounding our Alameda boys.
http://www.justusboys.com/forum/threads/304767-Alameda
This is from May, 2010 and is the next installment in the "Alameda" Series.
http://www.justusboys.com/forum/threads/305789-Eric-s-Story
This story is from February, 2011 Includes characters from the "Alameda" series
http://www.justusboys.com/forum/threads/334773-Change-at-Gallery-Place
This story is from January 2012 Includes characters from the "Alameda" series
http://www.justusboys.com/forum/threads/367823-Four-Miles-and-Counting
This is from the end of March, 2010
http://www.justusboys.com/forum/threads/301074-A-Fable-from-the-70-s
This story is from April, 2010 - and it brings a lengthy series surrounding our Alameda boys.
http://www.justusboys.com/forum/threads/304767-Alameda
This is from May, 2010 and is the next installment in the "Alameda" Series.
http://www.justusboys.com/forum/threads/305789-Eric-s-Story
This story is from February, 2011 Includes characters from the "Alameda" series
http://www.justusboys.com/forum/threads/334773-Change-at-Gallery-Place
This story is from January 2012 Includes characters from the "Alameda" series
http://www.justusboys.com/forum/threads/367823-Four-Miles-and-Counting
