Swimming in Basements

[ChrisGibson]

revelations



i.



Don't let me sleep too long

Yesterday it was damn near night when I woke from too much dreaming

under amber lights

I kept yawning then went back to bed.

I needed the night

The day before was full of heat and falling leaves and I thought:



This gold light and blue sky, waiting in the dying grass in the ruined

terminal for a bus that will not come

I began to hope this was the first day of the beginning

of the end of all things



I have to get up at four in the morning,

sitting on the steps across from this old dilapidated building

frees the mind up.

And at three a.m. I can write the best of these bad poems.

The dark is the nurturing place of mushrooms, minds and all fermented things.

Walking in the dark, I pass the tombs of kings and whores and prophets,

my feet are wet with the burial clay of the last five thousand years.



And it is not that I know better that thing which is longing to be known, that seventh wave past the six that always washes over my feet, but that I am a little nearer.

Lord of darkness, king of light, there is a temple I almost reached,

and I sit outside the locked doors and contemplate the erosion of things



One by one they file in, all I white, bearing beeswax tapers, and they have come for the ceremony, they have come to the altar to be initiated in the ceremony, and all is hush and darkness and bronze crosses, all is a six and a seven and an eight pointed star, and when you read from the book, then we remember how we lost the language,

we who come here only halfway, quarter way, gibbous and waning waxing way understand the ceremony. There is no understanding

And

If you were to ask the high priestess she would tell you she can’t remember her own name



But the ceremony half forgotten is better than no ceremony at all



I dreamed of you. And I dreamed of her, and my mother was there, and God, I was exhausted, and I don’t remember the dream but that there was red velvet, a tortoise and exasperation



If I sink my head in this fucking water, and come back up, even if it’s a swimming pool filled with chlorine, it will be baptism

And in the baptism she will smile and say, she will smile and say, pushing back the gauze curtain of heaven, this is my beloved daughter, and my son as well, and had you waited for my last time, who can tell what might have happened, who can tell what silken crucifixion there might have been in place of two thousand years of war and bone and blood?



ii



And a voice said cry out and I said, what shall I cry out, and the voice said, that no one knows what the fuck is going on,

that now we await instructions on what we believe and notes to let us know when we are angry, and letters to tell us when its time to laugh,

that they played in the streets a dirge and we didn’t cry,

and a ditty in the alley and we didn’t dance

and

here you sit, staring into a piece of broken window mounted on a stick, and gazing through it, call the glass a mirror



Carefully, and almost with success, I link these words with ink and ribbons

and robotic time into a spell that works only half as well as I wished

it did to make a fence around all that seeks to drown us,

make us forget we ever lived.

It’s the best of times and I’m broke

You were all asleep until I brought you to life, and like rag dolls

you’ll fall down and sleep again when I live.



Give me a way to make this place identifiable to you

Everything around here is liable to melt before your eyes

and I waited and I waited and I waited for the companion to come,

but in the end I run into me,

Look into the mirror and see the face of the beloved, the spouse.

That was always you

All these mansions, this house, the palaces by the river fall into the sea and we

Pray to saints of our own making for the mercy of another day, reflected in red candles



And how the fuck can it be nearly august, all of us are still reeling from the month of may

And you said, and you said, and you said that you almost loved me

In that place there was almost color

In that place we were almost taken out of our graves

If I’d stayed a little longer I might have saved myself from falling


iii



It’s always easy to write poems till you sit down and do it

I don’t even know what makes a good one

I’m sure I’ve never ever done this before.

For lunch I ate bad Mexican rice, but it was free, and we sat in the dark with tacos, cherry and me

I never knew how big this place was or that a bus will take you to the Indian casino, and in one night I know a crackhead who won his rent and spent it all in his arm except for what went up his nose

All around us is the kingdom of the crazy, and in darkened gardens, like mushrooms, the hand of heaven grows



I went to my mother, she was stretched out, they said she was dying, and as she left this world, in a groan like a shutting door, she was lying even then, as she’d lied her whole life

So

I wait for the midnight hour and monastic prayers

When david’s words come out my mouth into the empty spaces

And ancient hymns to angels take the places of all the bullshit rumbled from the mouths of men



This is the last poem before this cliff we’re on falls into the sea

This is the message we put in the glass bottle



Remember on the eclipse when we got high and sat in the park,

and geese that waddle to the river chased us, they were so mad with the coming darkness, and you almost fell into the river, and I caught your hand?

And the geese ran again, they were like bulls in pamplona!

That was the same night, after twenty years of friendship, dan sent me pictures of him naked and said, if you ever get down to Louisville, you can have this



And I will have it



I will have so many things.



But not tonight.

 

[CharmedFan28]

I’ll make two seperate comments for the poems and story portion. It was great to get back to this story! I am glad that Swann and Jack finally talked. Jack really fucked up where Swann was concerned but it seems everyone has definitely moved on. I did not see Jack becoming a brother but it seems that’s what he wants. Great writing and I look forward to more soon!

 

[CharmedFan28]

Those were excellent poems! I am glad you posted them and I look forward to when you post more! Well written and really makes you think.

 

[ChrisGibson]

I’ll make two seperate comments for the poems and story portion. It was great to get back to this story! I am glad that Swann and Jack finally talked. Jack really fucked up where Swann was concerned but it seems everyone has definitely moved on. I did not see Jack becoming a brother but it seems that’s what he wants. Great writing and I look forward to more soon!

I know, it was a bit of a shock,and of course, who knows if it will last? But here Jack is at least attempting to be in the brothorhood.

 

[ChrisGibson]

Those were excellent poems! I am glad you posted them and I look forward to when you post more! Well written and really makes you think.

Thanks a lot. I think these are my favorites.

 

[ChrisGibson]

For reasons he could not entirely fathom, the almost unsuccessful conversation with Swann had put Jack Rapp in a very good mood and he got dressed quickly, returning to his old self, wiping his face, grabbing his wallet and saying, “Come on, boys, let’s go.”

Mike volunteered to take the back seat, but Jack said, “That’s ridiculous, lovers should be together.”

As they were pulling out of campus he also said, “I am incredibly fucking hungry. Let’s stop and get something to eat.”

“What’s open?” Ben wondered as they came onto Foster Street.

“Mc.Donalds is always open,” Jack said, leaning over Mike’s seat.

“I should have brought my wallet,” Mike said. “I want a shake.”

“I got you, Mikey,” Jack said before Ben could.

For some reason he was ravenous now, and strangely hopeful. He was also the kind of exhausted one felt after despair, and this night had contained a fair measure of despair. Jack sat in the backseat, devouring a Big Mac as Ben drove up Sheridan Road, the old street twisting like a serpent in the night, and now, as they approached Linden Avenue and the border of Evanston with Wilmette, rising like an ornate white dome out of the dark was the Baha’i Temple.

“Let’s go,” Mike said.

“Isn’t it closed?” Ben wondered.

“The temple and the visiting center,” Mike said, “But it’s not like there’s a lock on the gardens and that staircase. We can go up on the hill. Or something.”

It was strange that this ornate, nine sided building, white in the darkest part of the morning stood on a great hill, surrounded by nine tiers in, of all places, a sleepy street in a sleepy suburb of a suburb of Chicago. In the cold, they left the sidewalk for the first flight of steps and went up and up till they stood at the bronze doors, gazing inside. It was locked, but that was no moment, for going inside wasn’t that important. This view, where Lake Michigan stretched out blue in the blue night, another sort of endless blue, and the yachts of the frozen marine with their white sails looked like sleepy seagulls beneath them. Beneath stretched the homes of Wilmette and Evanston.

“It’s so perfect right here, “Mike said, grinning at Jack.

Ben, hands in the pockets of his parka, nodded

“Maybe you all should have a threesome,” Jack heard Swann say.

He shook the thought from his head and said, “If only we never had to come down.”







The next morning there was a soft knocking on the door, and Swann didn’t even say come in, but Joe Stanley did. He looked little, and he was in his pajama pants and a hoodie. Sal was asleep on his side under a blanket, and Joe sat down in a chair while Swann, crouched in the window seat with a cup of coffee, waited for him to speak.

“Last night…” Joe started. “Did we…?”

“Yes.”

Joe nodded.

“I thought so.”

Joe got up, and he went to the coffee pot perched on a shelf in the closet. There was another cup and he poured himself one, but he didn’t add any sugar. He sat back down and he said, “Should we talk about it?”

“No,” Swann said.

Then he said, “Yes. I mean, I don’t want to, but we should.”

“I hadn’t planned on that happening.”

“Of course you didn’t. You didn’t even plan on being high.”

And then Swann said, “For the record I didn’t plan on it either. Whatever I am and whatever we are, you’re my cousin’s boyfriend. He’s in love with you.”

“And I’m in love with him.”

“Great.”

Sal grunted a snore and turned over quickly on his face.

“But I wanted to do it, Swann. I did. I mean, we weren’t drunk or anything. I knew what I was doing. I’m glad it happened. I always wanted us to. I wanted to do it with you. I wanted the three of us to. I always did. I don’t know how to feel about it, about us, but I’m not sorry it happened.”

Swann kept nodding.

“I try to be so cool,” he said. “But… I’m not sorry, either, Joe. I’m confused. I don’t know what we do after this. I… It’s a lot going on. But I wanted to have sex with you. I put it behind me, but last night I really wanted it, and it was good. I liked being with the two of you at the same time. I’m sure Sal did too, and I don’t know what that says about us.”

Joe was rocking himself. He pulled his knees to his chest.

“There was this guy,” he began. “I tried to go out with him. I was trying to have something real. We got together and I said sort of the same thing you did, and he said it doesn’t matter. He said there was no point trying to do things the way they had been done before or the way you thought they should be, doing something your mom and dad did, only doing it in gay. He said we could make our own world. And I just looked at him. I didn’t know what the fuck he meant. And now I do.”

“Joseph, you are my friend. I know who is and who isn’t and you are my friend.”

“And you’re my friend.”

“And I love Sal, and I love Doug. And I love you.”

“And I love you,” Joe said earnestly. He touched Sal’s hip and said, “And I love this smelly bastard too.”

“But…”

Joe nodded.

There was a knock on the door.

They both called come in, and then Joe shrugged apologetically to Swann as the door opened and Doug and Jill entered.

“Who feels like post shrooms breakfast?”

“Aw, man,” Joe said, sounding like a kid, his voice higher than it had been in their whole conversation, “I’d love that. I’ll wake up Sal.”

Doug entered, kissed Joe on the cheek, and then kissed Swann too. He left the room and Jill closed the door behind him.

“I better get dressed.”

Joe stood and stretched so that his navel was exposed and his pajama pants fell just to reveal the hair at his groin.

Swann was frowning, looking almost unhappy.

“Joe?”

“Yeah?”

“You wanna have sex first?”

Joe scratched his bed head, and his big eyes rolled over the floor before he swallowed and said, not looking at Swann:

“Yeah. Can I fuck you this time?”

“That’s kind of what I was hoping for.”







“When you think that we’ve been locked up here for a week cause some girl cried wolf!” James Lung declared.

“What?” Annette said, and Jill tilted her head.

“Not you all,” James said. “You all are cool, but some girls, they ask for stuff they can’t handle, and then when they get it, run off and cry, police, police, rape, rape.”

“Right!” Harry agreed, with a laugh.

“What the hell do you know about that?” Jill said.

James looked at her.

“What the hell would either one of you know about that?” Jill said. “When were you ever a girl, and what girl ever asked you to do anything?”

“Hey, now!” the cross eyed James began, “plenty of girls—”

“That’s not true,” Jill interrupted, “And its not even the point. The point is you don’t know what any woman goes through, and you don’t know what happened to Heather Ingram, so why don’t you shut the fuck up?”

“Why don’t we all just…. Calm down,” Pete Agalathagos started.

“I don’t wanna calm down,” Jill said. “A girl got raped here—”

“But here you are anyway,” James interrupted.

Swann thought of saying something, but Jill was doing fine on her own.

“You speak over me one more fucking time—” Jill said, rising, and though James opened his mouth to speak, he thought better of it and shut up again.

“I’m not going to be calm about something no one should be calm about,” Jill said.

Annette had not spoken. Beside Brad she only nodded.

“And I’m tired of everyone blaming her,” Jill said. “What’s wrong with you people? Is it a Catholic school thing? It’s always fucking Eve’s fault, and every girl is supposed to be Eve. Three guys jumped on her, held her down and—”

“Please, Jill,” Pete said.

“Please?” she looked at him. “She got raped, but your ears are too sensitive to hear about it? And everywhere you go at school, these dumb bitches keep whispering that they would have never been in that position, and they would never have been caught that way. Even the sluts who were supposed to be her friend are talking about how dumb she was, and now she can’t even stay at Saint Anne’s. How could she?”

“Wasn’t it supposed to be a secret?” Swann said. “How did her name get out?”

“Cause it’s a small nasty world around here, Swann. It’s so holy and so religious and so whatever, but everyone’s just a bunch of stuck up bitches. This isn’t holy at all. It’s just fucked up.”



Brad took Annette on a walk. When he came back, after she and Jill had left, he said, “She’s really shaken up. She’s not a speaker, like Jill. I told her we’d always watch out for her, that nothing will ever happen to her, that we’re decent guys. I’m right. Right?”

But while Brad and Annette were walking, Jill and Swann went walking too. Winter was coming, and strands of Jill’s hair escaped the fur hood of her coat.

“I wanted to kick the shit out of that cross eyed fucker,” she said of James.

“He could stand a good kicking,” Swann agreed.

“How do you live with people like that?”

“Well, the key is not to. Chris and I are way over on the other side with a room between us.”

“You know what?” Jill said, “You know what the worst part is?”

“What?”

“I blame her too. I’m like, how could she let herself get caught like that? How’d you get set on by three boys like that? And then I think, well here are me and Annette, and before that it was just me, hanging out at all hours with a bunch of boys. What’s the difference?”

“You know us. You’re my best friend. And Chris’s. There’s a difference.”

“Right,” Jill said. “Except that’s probably the way, right or wrong, Heather felt too.”

“Also, if you had to, you could kick James Lung to death.”

“Oh, fuck him,” Jill said, shaking her head and chuckling. “I could just not brush my teeth for one night and knock him down with my breath.”

 

[CharmedFan28]

Thanks for posting this portion so soon after the last one! This was a heavy one. That poor girl and that James sounds like a jerk. I am glad Joe had that talk with Swann. Great writing and I look forward to more soon!

 

[ChrisGibson]

conclusion of chapter fifteen


Around Christmas, Abbot Prynne summoned Chris and Swann to his office. It was not his room in the dorms, which would have been closer and which was often open for students to stop by, but his actual office in the monastery proper, the large one where abbots and their assistants had conducted their business for a century.

“Did we do something wrong?” was the first thing out of Swann’s mouth.

“Good to see you too, Swann,” Eutropius Prynne said. He was looking very grand at his desk under the great old crucifix, and Chris observed the amazing views, one of the great windows looking across the field and past Saint Anne’s

“I mean, good morning, Father Abbot. I never thought I’d get used to calling you that, but it fits.”

“Well, the majority of the order seems to agree with you,” Prynne said.

“No, neither of you has done anything wrong, which is sort of the problem.

“Excuse me? Chris said.

“I’d gotten so used to seeing you, and now I don’t anymore, so I’m just going to have to give you this now.”

He reached into his desk and pushed a silver key toward them.

“Father, what’s this?” Chris said, taking it.

“If you can refrain from using it around five in the morning, which is my private time, that is a key to the natatorium.”

“The pool room?”

“You live here. Why should you have to sneak in? Your swim team friends can use it with you, but it’s the two of yours, And I don’t want you all in there at all hours of the night. You still have homework. I know, because I assigned it. Am I clear?”

“You’re the best godfather in the world,” Swann said.

Abbot Prynne nodded solemnly.

He said, “Yes.”



Swann was already spending a lot of time at the pool. Mike, who had been looking for a big brother figure in Chris, quickly latched onto Swann as well, and he loved when they came to practice. Swann, who hadn’t thought much of the boy originally except that he was easily excitable, was amazed at how he shot through the water.

“He’s like a little minnow,” he said, and so they started to call him Minnow. Even when Mike hit his growth spurt and he began to bulk up, his shoulders to square while his nervous trot become a strut, he was still Minnow.

The days of detention had made Chris and Swann close to other members of the swim team, Jim, Pat and Bill, and because the swim team wasn’t known as the coolest bunch, they accepted Chris and Swann, Jill and Annette, as if they were. Though he had mentioned it to Jill once, Swann never mentioned how moe than anyone, when he came to sit in the bleachers at the pool it was for the tall, caramel athletic sight of Chuck Gibson, of the water beading on his long, tall, perfect body which made Swann shudder, thinking of his young, underdeveloped one, but which filled with desire far more than it did with envy.



“This could go tits up if everyone comes to us begging for the key,” Chris said.

“I see the potential for disaster,” Swann said. “But if all else fails, we’ll just give it back.”

They went for one last big swim before Christmas Break, and Swann was happy because he was taking Jill and Chris up to the South Side with him, and then he would spend some time with Chris in Benton. This night, Swann only wanted to watch his friends laughing and playing, and he sat swinging his toes in the water. Jill was flirting with Jim Hanna and when Jim came up to Swann, Swann raised an eyebrow.

“Do you mind?”

“Mind what?”

“Me and Jill?”

“I’m not her boyfriend.”

“But you’re like… her best friend. So…?”

“Jill Montgomery is a grown woman and you do not need my permission to date her, but…. I don’t mind.”

“Great!” Jim said. “Great! You’re the best!”

He leapt into the water like a dolphin and made straight for Jill.

Pete had come out of the water in his Speedo, looking a little bit like a god in the blue light of the night time natatorium, and he sat down on the ledge by Swann.

“Can you believe that we’re through half the year already?”

“No, part of me feels like I’m still a Freshmen.”

“Right?” Pete said. “Right?”

Then he said, “I always thought we’d hang out more.”

“We should.”

“I know James is a goon.”

“He’s not that bad.”

“Yes he is, and Harry’s kind of a moron. But I’d like us to hang out a lot more. I like you, Swann.”

Swann had been paying really entirely too much attention to Chuck’s body, torpedoing back and forth through the water, so he was just now noticing Pete’s long thigh touching his, the way Pete was looking at him.

“Why don’t we hang out after break?” Pete suggested.

Swann found his voice trembling when he said, “Oh, we absolutely should.”

“Yeah,” Pete pressed his thigh into Swann’s.

It took a moment for Swann to process what was happening. He looked down where Pete’s penis was thick through his Speedo, and he looked around the dim pool room before he put his hand on Pete’s thigh.

“Yeah,” Swann said, stiffening under his board shorts, “we should.”

All last year he’d been used to the electric of Jack. That Pete, as he stood up, so well shaped, the red Speedo hugging his ass and his dick, might want him, set his head spinning. There was no way things with him would not be serious, so when Pete said, “I’m going to get changed and go to bed,” whether it was an invitation or not, Swann simply said, “Okay.”

Even as he watched Pete walk to the locker room, he thought of following him, seeing all of him, fooling around in that shower. Convincing him to find a private room in the school. He didn’t though. He just breathed deeply, and then let all the air out of his mouth real slow and told his heart to calm down. In fact he waited until he saw the long caramel form of his friend Chuck climb out of the water and head to the locker room. By then, Pete was long gone. Swann followed Chuck and entered the locker room to see a boy who had been flirting for a while, who pressed his ass against him when they were in close settings.

 

[ChrisGibson]

“You need something?” Chuck asked him, casually.

“Maybe.”

Chuck nodded.

“You mind if I shower?”

“Not at all.”

Chuck nodded again and, standing before Swann, he rolled his Speedo down so that his penis rose like a sausage out of the small bush of cinnamon hair. He placed the Speedo beside Swann and went into the shower area, turning the hot water on, turning away from Swann, slowly washing his body, running his hands over his sides, over his thighs, over the globes of his perfect ass. He turned around, paying move attention to cleaning his crotch than necessary, stroking and stroking it, his penis lengthening as he said, “You’re still here.”

“I am.”

“You see something you like?”

“I do,” Swann said, forcing his voice from trembling, his mind melting together images of Pete in his red Speedo and Chuck naked before him.

Chuck only stretched his long glorious body under the water, rivulets running down his chest, to his groin, water falling from his penis.

“Should we do something about it?”

Trying to sound casual, Swann said, “I think we have to.”





The first time Swann was aware of Joe or Sal had been junior year and now, as he crossed over into Joe’s room, Joe looked little, like the junior he had been, not like the college junior he now was. Whatever he had been feeling thirty second’s ago, Swann sat down on Joe’s bed, looking at his friend, and Joe slowly sat down next to him.

“Before I met you, a long time before I met you, when me and Sal were… together, I told him it was over.”

Swann had heard this from Sal, and he waited for Joe to continue. .

“I don’t know why. I guess I was hearing all sorts of stuff, and I was scared and I told him that we were wrong and what we were doing was evil and it had to stop. I was terrible to him. I wanted him to feel so bad he went away and didn’t come back, and it was a long time before he did. I did that bit. I invited him back, and when things happened it was… I was never sure if it was lust or love or what. We became friends again. Of course. But it was never like it had been. And I never made it right.”

So, whatever had come over them in his room, and whatever might be coming over them in the future, right now here they were, and Swann felt more than he had ever felt anything for Joe, the need to protect him. He moved closer to Joe and put his arm around him, and Joe put his head on his shoulder.

“Has anyone ever told you,” Joe began, “that you’re very comforting?”

“Uh… I don’t think I am. I think I’m kind of cold.”

“That’s not true,” Joe said, his head on Swann’s chest as they fell down on his bed together. “I mean, that’s clearly not true.”

Then he said, “I’d like to…. reflect before I do it, for once, you know?”

“Or do it again?”

“Ha!” Joe shook his head. “That’s right.

“It’s just what we have at this moment is perfect, and it never has been. I mean, never.”

Then Joe said: “May I—”

“Did you just say, may I?”

Joe sat up.

“You’re making me self conscious.”

“Okay.”

“May I kiss you?”

Swann was about to say it was funny that Joe was asking for a kiss when they’d come back here with the intention of having full on savage sex, but Swann said: “Yes.”

Joe pressed his lips to Swann’s and in the touching, Swann suddenly understood why he’d asked. He’d heard someone say that kissing was more intimate than fucking, and he would never believe that, but it certainly was something. He was conscious of Joe in a way he hadn’t been, more with him than he had been last night as his lips parted and their tongues touched and he felt Joe’s hand squeezing his, and then Joe parted from him, and nodded, saying, “Thank you.”

Swann felt strangely warm and shy and nervous and he nodded as Sal opened the door. Swann was glad Sal hadn’t interrupted them, and the tall green eyed guy in baggy jeans and a green hoodie sat on the other side of Swann. Of course, Swann remembered, he had been there. They had all three of them been together last night. He had lain in the bed between them and now Sal rested his chin on Swann’s shoulder.

“Both of you?” Swann lamented. “You’re crushing me.”

“Love hurts,” Sal said, squeezing him. “Haven’t you heard?”

“Not when it’s done right,” Swann returned, poking Sal in the gut so he yelped and relented.

“Easy! I’m still kind of messy in the stomach. How are you guys not constantly shitting?”

“Frankly it hit me all at once,” Swann said, “And now it’s over.”

Joe did not answer.

Sal’s long arm reached across Swann so that he squeezed Joe as well.

“Are we alright? The three of us?”

Joe nodded.

“No matter what?”

Joe nodded. Swann did not feel the need to.

“Doug is pretty certain that we should eat. Should we?”

“Yes,” Swann said.

“Then let’s.”

HAVE AN EXCELLENT FIRST WEEKEND OF 2025!

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was a well done long portion! Lots of heart to hearts with Swann and people are being more honest with themselves. Chuck seems like a good guy. Great writing and I look forward to more soon!

 

[ChrisGibson]

Chapter Fifteen






Mike Buren had enjoyed Jack’s company, but there was, in the end, something sad about it. Also, and he didn’t want to say this to Ben, he felt as if Jack’s presence had robbed him, just a little bit, of time with a boyfriend he didn’t get to see as much as he wanted.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Ben said, and Mike knew that he did.

“Woody’s coming home. What if we go down to your place and spend the day and the night together. That way we have privacy and you don’t have to worry about traveling to Chi in the morning.”

That more than made up for things. Mike was sorry for being such a baby, at least in his head. He stood there in the living room and hugged Ben, caressing his back and he felt so good.

“I prefer Lincoln Park anyway,” Ben said.

When he said those things, Mike wanted to say, “We should move in together,” but they hadn’t been together that long, and Mike understood himself well enough to know that his thoughts were all over the place.

“Should I drive or should we take the El?”

Mike got real tired real soon of the El, and he said, “Drive.”

Who knew where they might want to go?



“I will be so glad when it’s spring,” Mike said, looking out over Lake Michigan as Ben drove.

“We should have a cook out,” Ben said.

Mike laughed. “I’ll have to learn to cook…. Out.”

“Poor Jack,” Ben said.

“Whaddo you mean, poor Jack?”

“You know,” Ben said.

“You think he’s still really hung up on Swann?”

“He said he was.”

“That was like…”

“Six years ago. Almost seven.”

“It’s sad,” Mike said. “But it’s his own fault.”

“That’s harsh, Mikey.”

“I know, but look, I own my own shit and other people should too. It’s his own fault. You should stick by the people you care about, and when you fail them you should apologize. And not take seven years to do it.”

Ben said nothing, but kept driving.

“And I only say that because I know what it is to do the wrong thing. You don’t get it, Ben, Cause you don’t let people down.”

Ben sighed from his nose. He kept driving as they approached the turn off for Lincoln Park. He squeezed Mike’s knee.

“I’m not as perfect as you think I am, and you’re not as bad you think you are.”



In Mike’s apartment, Ben sang while he showered. He’d wanted Mike to shower with him, but Mike said, “All that talking I did reminded me I need to make a phone call.”

“Can it wait?” Ben asked as he stripped in front of Mike, looking thin and shadowy like a nude El Greco.

There was little Mike wanted more than to be in the shower with Ben, run his hands over his long tall body, the concaves of his ass and his stomach, the strange beauty of his thinness, stroke the heaviness of his dangling cock.

“No,” Mike said.

He wanted to say, “But you can,” but he needed a little privacy. Ben nodded and turned for the bathroom, allowing Mike to treasure the back of him. When he was done they could shower again, or not at all, and make love on the sofa or on that bed or under the table. But for now, this.

“Yes?”

“Doug?”

“Hey, Michael.”

“How are you?”

“I’m good.”

“Are you still coming next weekend?”

“That was the plan. Today, Ben’s at my place. We’re probably just going to order a pizza and watch Star Trek.”

“Star Trek. I wish I watched Star Trek.”

“What?”

Doug said: “My mother always watched. Every time I see people who are into it, they’re like this big community that knows about something. I kind of envy it. I wish I watched it.”

“Which one?”

“The Next Generation.”

“Best Generaton,” Mike said. “I still like to do the Riker.”

“What the hell is that?”

“When you straddle a chair. That’s what Commander Riker did.”

“That’s just called straddling a chair,” Doug said.

“But you did do that. I guess I would know about that if I watched.”

“It’s an attainable goal,” Mike said.

“Huh?”

“Watching Star Trek. It’s an attainable goal. I mean, you could watch Star Trek.”

“I don’t think I could,” Doug said.

“It’s literally as easy as turning the TV on.”

The shower water was running, and Ben was singing tunelessly.

“Well, yes, but… I want to be the person who wants to watch Star Trek. Does that make sense?”

“No,” Mike said, “And I’ve given up on you making sense. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“No, listen,” Mike said. “I love you.”

“Well, listen to me,” Doug Merrin said. “I love you too.”

“Jesus, you’re frustrating!”

“Okay…”

“I just saw someone who failed the person they loved, and who is still in love with them even though it is too late, and I don’t want to be that. Maybe I am that, okay? I mean, I know you’re with someone and I’m with someone. But Doug, you have to get this: I never stopped … I…. fucking…. Love you.”

Doug didn’t say anything right away and then he said, “I know. We love each other.”

“You remember that first time you kissed me—”

“You kissed me.”

“You’re so difficult.”

“No, you’re difficult, and yes I remember.”

“I never stopped,” Mike said.

“Neither did I.”

“I’m gonna go now, okay?”

“Yes, and thank you motherfucker for making my life confusing.”

“Sorry only I’m not,” Mike said.

Then he said, “Before I saw you again my life wasn’t confusing at all, and ever since you’ve come back into it, I’m confused all the time. And I realize every time I was with you I was confused. I didn’t get up from down. I thought if you were gone the confusion was gone and I realized that I’d rather be two steps behind you than without you.”

Doug said nothing for a while and then he said, “That was…. Good. It was poetic.”

“I rehearsed it a bunch.”

“Ah! Yes…. I…. you know exactly how I feel.”

“Yeah,” Mike said.

“You’re coming next weekend.”

“Of course.”

“One of us should probably hang up the phone.”

“I will,” Mike said.

“Right,” Doug said.

Mike hung up.

“Fucker,” he murmured to the receiver, because it sounded a lot less corny than telling it, “I love you.”









Chuck, Chuck. Chuck.

Charles.

The color of beach sand with the sunrise.

Or of caramel.

Or of good coffee with cream in it.

More irreverently, less poetically, the golden, golden brown of the perfect fried chicken.

And that’s even better to say because the mouth waters at the thought of it, the smell, the heat of it, the steam from flesh, of my God, the thought of putting one’s mouth down, of biting, but this flesh does not yield, not that way.

All night his mind moves between two boys who are men, and he tosses and turns, well, really tosses and turns as much as you can toss and turn in a bed when you’re best friend is sleeping in the bed next to you on the other side of a partition. Stiff as a board he rises to go to the restroom, but puts his ear to the locked door and hears struggling, frantic bumbling. For some time he hears a frantic rhythm, breathing through the nose, catching of breath, the sound of steady fucking Swann remembers too well. He puts his hand over his groin to shield his boner. It sounds almost violent, but Swann feels like he is violating this space. A cry, thumping, more rapid sounds. It ends with a strangled moan. A whispered apology, a bit of a laugh. He looks around the sleepers in the room. Under the moonlight, Pete is laying naked on his stomach, face down, arms sprawled out, snoring, his blankets thrown off. Swann could look at him forever, but he is aware that someone who is not James, for James is sleeping on his back, mouth open, snoring, is in the bathroom. Swann retreats to the common room in time to see the door open and Brad come out of the bathroom, linking hands with Annette.

 

[ChrisGibson]

But, what the fuck? Brad’s fifteen. Just like him. Brad’s the head of the Young Republicans. Brad is serious, and serious about God, and… The fact that several of these things apply to Swann don’t seem to matter. Brad’s eyes are burning with boy love and his mouth is half open as he leads Annette into the common room where the main door is. He bends down and kisses her savagely for a long time, like he’s devouring her, and she almost slumps into his embrace, and then he opens the door and leads her down the hall.

Now Swann remembers the bathroom and the pressure on his bladder. Not even the presence of Pete can stop that. He runs in, hits the flusher and washes his hands, coming out as Brad is coming back in.

They greet each other in the manner of sleepy boys in the night, grunts, taps on the shoulder, both heading back to bed.



The next morning, as they dressed, breakfasted, then headed to English class, Swann kept looking at Brad.

“What in the world is going on with you?” Chris asked.

“Am I obvious?”

“To me. You’re staring at everyone. Pete. Brad. Chuck. And then you’re just staring at walls.”

“Must be because it’s almost Christmas.” Swann said.

He was surprised when Chris left it at that and didn’t press any further. That wasn’t like Chris at all.



“So, I didn’t tell you because I wasn’t sure what it was,” Jill said.

“Jim?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s fine,” Swann said. “It’s not my business. You do what you want.”

“Then you don’t care?” Jill raised an eyebrow, offended.

“I mean, I care, but still, you do what you need to do. You don’t have to run it by me.”

“But I want to run it by you.”

“But you didn’t run it by me.”

“But…” Jill sighed. “Look, do you like him or not.”

“I do. He bullies Jack Polcyn and wears that ugly plaid jacket, but otherwise he’s good.”

“He bullies someone?” Jill sounded upset. “I don’t like that. And I don’t like not knowing that. Maybe my judgment’s off.”

“Just tell him to knock it off.”

“You think it’s that easy.”

“I actually do.”

“But he’s going to wonder how I know. Maybe he’ll think that Jack Polcyn told him. Then that would make things worse for him.”

“Tell him that I told you,” Swann said. “Since he seems to give such a shit about getting my blessing. Tell him I told him, and he should stop being a dick. And perhaps stop farting over the Bunson Burner in chemistry.”

“I’m starting to regret my choice of boyfriends.” Jill said.

Swann said, “In the end most of us do.”



But Swann was not looking for a boyfriend. He wasn’t even looking for anything remotely complicated, so after history, when he knew Chris was in a double math block, he walked Chuck back into the dorms and into the suite. He locked the door to the rest of the suite and he locked the little door out into the hallway. He went into the sunlight, by the radiator where his bed was and pulled the partitions over that little area.

He’d had all the conversations.

“I like girls. I’m bi, probably, but I’m not gay.”

“Great.”

“I can’t date another guy.”

“I don’t want to date.”

“I actually have a girlfriend.”

“That’s even better.”

“I just need this some time. I just want to try this.”

“That’s the reason you’re here, Charles.”

They had a reiteration, almost wearisome of this again while they undressed and Swann placed Chuck’s jacket on his nightstand and then stood up and was surprised to be kissed on the mouth, surprised at the softness of lips, the greediness of this mouth that wasn’t gay, was touched by the feather adolescent moustache of this boy who had a girlfriend. He jerked down his tie and unbuttoned his shirt, and taking it down from him was against surprised at the marvel of his body at the sudden gentle smell like sea salt and brown sugar. Overcome, they rushed out of pants and underwear and linked quickly, Swann amazed by Chuck’s greedy kisses, suddenly understanding this wouldn’t be quick and over in a moment. This was going to take some time, that when Chuck said he wanted to try… this…. He wanted to try everything. After the months with no one, after Jack fading from his mind, after the horny dreams of Pete and listening to Brad fuck, Swann sighed with more than relief, almost wept as he rubbed his hands in the soft red curly naps of Chuck’s hair and opened his legs to Chuck’s head, crying out as Chuck swallowed him and his tongue lapped up and around his cock, stretching it, caused him to swell, thrilling him even as his mouth began earnestly to suck…

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was a great weekend portion! The characters are realising a lot about themselves and I think that is a good thing. People should explore their sexualities and make sure they know what they want. Excellent writing and I look forward to more soon!

 

[ChrisGibson]

An homage to Chuck, and on the way home from high school things happens that aren't supposed to.....
Some things are more poetry than prose. Some moments are music…





























The warmth, the warmth, the heat, what happens when he goes, when he goes, when his mouth, goes, his mouth going up and up to kiss my belly, kiss my nipples, kiss my mouth, suck on my tongue with that taste of what coffee and milk and lunch and my own cock, and down and down and down and naked body like God stretched over me, those arms, those swimmer’s arms, that sweet, salty body like the fancy caramel they sell on Randolph, that bobbing penis in the scented bush of hair, him in my mouth, me in his. Thoughts of… no thoughts. Only this. Only the heat.































Only this bed and these covers and the memory of Pete’s body in the night, Pete in the red Speedo, only not enough, not enough not enough, got to have this, got to have all of him, wrap my thighs around him draw him down,

draw him down,

draw

him

down…



Open my mouth for his mouth, be invaded by his tongue,

my hands, such little hands, they feel like such small hands, splayed across the broad back…



The back with the spine like dragon spikes, the long dragon winding to the perfect brown sugar hills of his ass, his ass, his… the aching in my ass…



The way I sit him down on him, ache as I encompass him, and he looks at me in amazement, blinks up with those hazel eyes…

And he is younger than me, he’s still a boy…































This dick in me, this hard thing, I sit down, and down on, that hurts so and makes me eyes water is younger than me. His eyes open as I open, as I feel the dull hurt of him in my ass

when I sit down slowly, I feel him retract and open his mouth in a soundless cry

while I

slide down,

down

all the way

down

and neither of us says a word...































When Chris comes back into the room I am only surprised by remembering there is a world outside of this room. How often have I seen him fuck other girls? I’m not even remotely worried. I hear him shuffling off his clothes for his afternoon nap. He knows I’m here, but assumes I’m sleeping, which I have been. The sun is no longer beating on my arm, or on Chuck’s back. Evening is near. We must have been here longer than I imagined.

When Chris finally tips around he doesn’t looked shocked at Chuck sprawled across me like a giant child, or at out legs and arms locked together and me stroking his hair. In fact, Chris pulls up a chair and sits down, and almost hypnotically begins running his hands over Chuck’s calves, the back of his hand over his buttocks.

“I only came to say,” he whispers, not looking at me, but looking at the crack of Chuck’s ass where his finger now moves up and down, “that it’s almost time for dinner. You should wake him up.”

Now Chris is looking at me. His blue eyes, Chuck’s brown back, Chuck throbbing inside of me, the thought of Pete. I am sated. I am over Jack and the old life, but I am open to something else. I motion with my hand to shoo Chris away, and squeezing Chuck’s ass so that he wakes up.

I say: “It’s almost six, Negro. It’s time to eat.”



They were all getting ready to leave the next afternoon. Jill was headed back to Indianapolis and Pete was her ride which meant she’d have to put up with James and Harry for the next several hours. Jim was in a multicolored Peruvian hat with ear flaps, and he’d gotten one for Swann and one for Chris who’d pulled it down tight over his golden curls. Mike, Vinnie and Varlon came to say goodbye, and then they were off. The Brothers in their habits all looked visibly relieved about semester’s end and Prynne, from the warmth of the vestibule, was chatting with whatever parents wanted to come up and introduce themselves.

Pete left a gift that Swann was afraid to open and said, earnestly—he was always so earnest and always so well dressed and smelled so good—, “I really hope next year we can get to know each other. I would really, really like that.”

Peter Agalathagos was almost seventeen and had been driving a while, He and his friends climbed in his old Buick with Jill, and then they were gone too.

Brad, however, was ecstatic with his new license, and he and Annette left the same time as Chris and Swann. Chris was glad to finally have his license and the huge SUV his parents had got him, and so was Swann because it meant no more buses. After all the honking and shouting goodbye, they were finally speeding down the road in silence. Swann had shuffled off his coat and thrown his bookbag in the back. Chris turned on the radio and shuffled through stations.

“There we go,” he said.





“Well, I'm a standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona

And such a fine sight to see

It's a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed Ford

Slowin' down to take a look at me—”

They both laughed and sang:





“Take It easy, take it easy

Don't let the sound of your own

wheels drive you crazy

Lighten up while you still can

Don't even try to understand

Just find a place to make your

stand and take it easy!”

They drove on and Swann said, Can we stop there?”

“At the turn in the road?”

“Yes. Where it’s headed off into that town.”

“What the heck for?”

“One, because I’m from a big city and like country stuff, and two because we need a conversation, and you just got your license a month ago.

Chris nodded, and they turned off the highway onto the little state road, and they stopped in the lot a little ways from what looked like a Mexican restaurant in the woods because this was one of those towns so under peopled it seems more a collection of trees with the occasional house than anything else.

Chris stopped the car, licked his lips, and said, “So, talk.”

“You asked me why I was strange, but why are you strange?”

“You got what you needed,” Chris said. “You and that Chuck, finally.”

“Yeah,” Swann said, because that was the best thing to say when you didn’t know what to say.

“You know I haven’t had any sex since…” Chris estimated. “Last summer?”

“No?”

Chris, his legs wide apart in their joggers, pulled his wheel free hand over his head so the chullo cap came off and all of his blond locks were a mess on his head.

“I’m just so fucking horny. Fucking horny.”

Swann nodded.

“All the time,” Chris said.

“That’s why when you saw me with Chuck… you stayed.”

“Maybe,” Chris said.

Then, “Yeah.”

“Are you hard?” Swann asked him.

Chris laughed.

“Yeah. Maybe. Yeah?”

“Show me.”

Chris Navarro just obeyed, taking his joggers down, his cock rising up hard and full and visible for a moment before it was hidden by being grasped in Swann’s fist, and then swallowed in his mouth.

For the next five minutes, while the occasional car past, and now again a soft clump of snow fell from the trees above onto the roof of the SUV, there was almost no noise, and then suddenly Chris gritted his teeth and groaned and he tried to move away from his best friend, but Swann held onto him and he cried a little as he came in Swann’s mouth.

Neither one of them said anything as Swann sat back up and Chris put his still swollen penis back in his pants. Swann strapped himself in and Chris sat their frowning.

“Why did you just do that?” he said, at last.

“Because you wanted me to.”

Chris felt the way you can after some sex, when you’ve wanted it so long and the desire for it has colored your days, the energy for it coursed through your body and then it happens, and there you are again, with all of your thoughts, in a world much bleaker. He felt confused and hollow, a little worried.

“Swann, that’s not a fucking good enough answer.”

“Because I wanted to,” Swann said.

“Fuck!” Chris shouted. “This is fucked up! You’re my best friend and my dick was just in your mouth.”

“You’re my best friend and you were just feeling up the guy I fucked last night. And incidentally, you’ve totally had sex in front of me.”

“That’s different.”

“How the fuck is it different?”

“It wasn’t on purpose and it wasn’t us with each other.”

“Didn’t you say last year that you wanted it to be us with other?”

“Eventually,” Chris said, smashing his hand into his hair.

“It was supposed to be… romantic. It wasn’t supposed to be you blowing me because we needed to get our rocks off… And I did need to get my rocks off. It’s not supposed to be like that. We’re not supposed to use each other. It’s supposed to be….”

“Suppose to be what?”

“I dunno… Holy.”

Swann blew out his cheeks.

“Well, you didn’t stop me—”

“I know that.”

“And I refuse to feel bad for doing with my best friend what I really wanted to do.”

Chris started to put the key in the ignition, but felt strongly that, no matter how cold they were getting, before they kept driving, he had to say something.

“We haven’t even made out yet! I want things with you too, but…. I want it to be right, and… proper… and I want to be ready for it.”

“I respect that, but it honestly doesn’t work that way.”

Then Swann said, “I’m cold.”

Breathing out his nose, and then sighing, Chris Navarro started up the car and they turned back onto the road.

Next time, the conclusion of our book......

 

[ChrisGibson]

and now the conclusion of swimming in basements
Joe Stanley asked Doug if he wanted to do anything. Doug said he didn’t really want to do anything at all. They’d been doing nothing for six years. They were good at it, and Joe suddenly understood Doug needed to be a lone. Doug had that witchlike quality where even when he was next to you, he seemed a thousand miles away and you knew he needed nothing more than to put on a bulky coat and do walking and walking till he disappeared to the edge of the earth. Partially, Joe wondered if it was because Doug knew about him having sex with Swann and Sal last night, but better, he knew it had nothing to do with any of them.

Doug went walking till he was a way from campus, till he was in a field of white under the bruised cigarette smoke colored sky, and he stood watching the black V’s of crows fly.

Stuffing his hands into his parka pockets, and raising his eyes to the cold January sky he said: “I love you, Michael Buren.”





Jill and Swann were in Room 42 late that afternoon and she said, “Your life is so much more exciting than mine.”

“You say it like its something to be envied.”

“Well, it kind of is. I mean, I was staring at the moon last night and you were having a three way?”

Swann put a finger to his lips and Jill shook her head.

“The door is shut.”

“People could be passing.”

“Look, you always sort of knew that Sal and Joe were a package deal. They look like Mutt and Jeff—I mean, a hot version of Mutt and Jeff. Have you noticed how they kind of have the same green eyes and wavy hair.”

“Yes, I in fact have.”

“And they both love, love, love you.”

“Yeah?” Swann said.

“Look, all I’ve had is Jim since sophomore year.”

“Jim’s a great guy.”

“But you’ve got two guys who love you, like for real.”

“And Doug? Remember my cousin: who’s dating Joe.”

“He’s fucking in love with Mike Buren anyway.”

“What?”

“He,” Jill said, exaggerating her voice as if she were talking to a slow person, “is in love with… Michael… Buren.”

“Since when?”

“Since always. So, don’t get too hung up on banging Joe.”

“Goddamn,” Swann murmured.

“Shit, it’s snowing again,” Jill said. “I can’t wait till winter’s over.

“Who the fuck is that?” Swann wondered, taking his cigarettes as he looked out of the bay window to where a car was approaching Dwenger Hall. It was turning into the parking lot and Jill said, “Um, maybe that soccer coach downstairs got a new car.”

Swann’s eyes landed on a photo he always kept on his desk, and he picked it up.

“And then there’s him,” Jill said.

It was a picture of Swann with Chris, and they were laughing. Swann was shaking the snow from his glasses, Chris had that stupid chullo cap half off his head, and the snow was falling on them.

“He loves you probably more than anyone else,” she said.

Swann grunted a laugh. That was the first day of break or the last day of the semester, when they’d driven to Benton after arguing on the side of the road over… things they had done. The whole trip had been in silence, not because of anger but because neither of them knew what to say to each other. Sorry only worked if you were sorry.

Chris’s dad had helped them unpack and set up in the basement, and they’d both gone upstairs to the living room.

Chris’s dad had said, “Help me finish a snow fort.”

And this was so not out of character with Mr. Navarro, that neither one of them said anything. They’d spent until dinner time out there building Fort Mc. Iceberg in the section of the yard just under the great second story deck, and Mr. Navarro had said, “Let me get a shot of you boys.”

He went in and got his camera, and Chris had shouted up, his nose turning red, “Dad, can we come in. Jeeesus, it’s cold.”

Just then, Mr. Navarro came out with his camera and snapping, commented, “Ah, now like that, like that. There! And now it’s time for dinner.”

Swann was heading in first when Chris caught his hand.

Swann turned to look at him.

“About this afternoon…”

“Yes?”

Chris leaned down and kissed him. It was movie perfect, well book perfect, well,, perfect, except that it was freezing but the cold didn’t matter because the two of them held onto to each other in the yard, their gloved fingers holding each other’s faces, Chris’s eyes were smiling into his so he assumed his were smiling back as well. When Chris tells the story it’s Swann who speaks first and when Swann remembers, it is Chris, but in all the tellings they say the same thing:

“I love you.”

Swann is still there, in that moment, in his deep history with his old friend. The cold and snow of today blends with the cold of back then, so when Jill murmurs, “What the hell?” Swann is disconcertingly called back to the present world and the breath flees his body as he turns from the picture of him and Chris to the man standing in his doorway.

Jack Rapp is there, goatee now grown into a thin beard, thick eyebrows still standing guard over his violently blue eyes, and he says, “Swann, can we talk?”







2:26 am

August, 17th, 2023

August 19th, 2024

The Book of Birds and Boys will continue with​

Riding Trains Together​

 

[CharmedFan28]

Sorry I forgot about the Monday portion! Both of these were a great end to this book. I wonder what Jack is going to say? Swann seems to have a lot of people interested in him. Excellent writing and I look forward to Riding Trains Together!