Boys Next Door (21 page)

‘Do you forgive me for being an asshole?’

‘You weren’t an asshole. You reacted like a normal guy,’ I sighed. ‘I think I expected way too much out of all of you and your massive amounts of testosterone.’

‘It probably makes it worse that once upon a time we were all friends,’ he said, still confining me within the loop of his arms. I liked it – him looming over me, keeping me here, making me present and aware.

‘You’re still friends,’ I said, touching one of the three buttons on his thermal pullover. Dragging my fingers slowly down the row of shiny buttons.

‘Don’t touch me if you don’t want to fuck me, Farrell,’ he whispered, his face as serious as a heart attack. ‘Whether you like it or not, you’ve gotten under my skin and these days …’ He shook his head, jaw flexing and looked away.

‘These days?’ My heart quickened and my blood followed suit.

‘Just thinking about you gets me hard. And it makes me want you in a way I can’t remember wanting anyone else. The only comparison I can think of is how you want air. But you don’t really want air, do you? You
need it
.’

My face went hot and I toed a patch of dirt with my boot. ‘Thank you for letting me kick you out.’

‘What was I gonna do?’

I shrugged. ‘I don’t know. It was all very overwhelming and I like you all and I –’
Like you the most …
I heard it in my head but didn’t say it. I wasn’t ready to say it. What if I was wrong? What if it changed everything? What if it ruined everything for all of us? I had just started my life here. I liked it so far. I was still blindly feeling my way through the sharp hills and deep valleys of establishing myself.

Maybe I’d kicked it off wrong. Maybe I hadn’t. But I could not complicate it to
that
degree just yet.

‘You smell like a vacation,’ he said, pushing his face to my neck.

‘Oh?’

‘And funny thing is,’ he whispered, pulling back to look at me, ‘Coop smelled very “beachy” this morning too.’

I shook my head. ‘I didn’t fuck him,’ I said. It was the truth.

‘I didn’t say you did. And I get it, you come here and you start fresh and it’s this wild thing where you run around and claim the bits of life you want to claim. And you toss the bits of life you don’t want. And you do what you want and fuck everyone else.’ His dark eyes bored into me and I chewed my lower lip – suddenly nervous.

‘But?’ I barely said it aloud, my voice was so soft.

‘But some of us will still be here when you’re done being wild. When you’re done claiming, and figuring, and plotting, and wrestling life into submission. Some of us will still be here and we’re very willing to have you in our lives. Possibly permanently.’

I nodded, my tongue too small and too fragile to work.

‘And by some of us,’ he said, taking my face in his hands and kissing me, ‘I mean me. I don’t speak for those monkeys. I mean me. Me, Farrell. I dream about you. And when I see you in person, I still feel like I’m dreaming.’

I couldn’t seem to swallow or speak. I was nothing more than a giant heartbeat while he pressed his lips to mine.

One simple kiss, almost chaste, and then he pulled back and kissed my forehead. ‘I’m looking forward to your show.’

I groaned, letting my head tip back and clunk the tree trunk. ‘My
show
.’

He grinned, white teeth flashing in the golden fall sun. ‘You can do it, Farrell. Sweetheart, haven’t you figured out yet that you can do anything?’

He raised his coffee cup in a silent ‘cheers’ and said, ‘Now I’ll let you get back to shunning me.’

And then he was gone. Clomping through the shallow woods in his work boots. His buffalo plaid jacket turned up at the cuffs, his dark hair still damp, the smell of him lingering on the soft wind.

I tried the burlesque thing. I did. But, Jesus. It’s a whole art form and judging by what I was reading in Joy’s book, one I would not be mastering in twenty-four hours.

Firstly, I had zero props and zero costuming that would work. I sighed and let my head thump to the book.

The doorbell rang and I groaned. ‘No!’

Who would it be? Which one of them? Or maybe the mailman? My new boss? The surly sidekick? I only truly knew a few folks and for God’s sake, I was still getting to know them for real.

I peeked through the peep hole and smiled.

‘Hi, Donna.’

‘Miss Farrell,’ she said, nodding. ‘I brought some help.’ She held up a garment bag and I stepped back to let her in.

‘What’s all this?’

‘Gear.’

‘For some reason that scares me.’

I shook open the garment bag on the back of my inherited sofa.

‘It should.’ She smiled, walking around and touching things. ‘I haven’t been in this house since Sidney lived here.’ Her hand grazed along the soft-looking wood of the mantel. ‘Such a sad man in the end. Not being allowed to love who you love is a very tragic thing.’

I glanced up, unsure of what to do. For some reason, I felt very protective of Sidney and Maxwell’s secrets. ‘What do you mean?’

She blew out a sigh as I rifled through glitzy, glittery, glamorous dresses, bustiers, teddies and more.

‘By the way those are gathered from a whole slew of folks. I asked for their finest slut clothes.’

I burbled with laughter, trying not to let it out – but finally giving in and guffawing in a very unladylike fashion behind my hand. ‘Oh God.’

‘Anyway, like I was saying, Sidney loved Maxwell.’ She pointed to the tower across the street. ‘Maxwell was responsible for that eyesore. And Maxwell loved Sidney. But honey, back then, no way. Forget it. It would have been a nightmare. And too many people knew they weren’t brothers or buddies or any of the standard cover-ups from back in the day.’

‘You knew!’ I said.

‘He was my friend. Actually, they both were. It made it even sadder when Maxwell died. Because they’d never …’ She waved her hand around. ‘Got to truly be together.’

I waited, fingering bits of shiny smooth bedazzled fabric I knew I’d never wear. I could feel there was more coming if I just stayed quiet.

‘I used to have parties, back in the day, so they could “get drunk and sleep over”.’ She did air quotes and I smiled. ‘Maxie told me once those parties were the best nights of his life. Under the guise of drunkenness they got to spend quiet time together that wouldn’t be examined. Since everyone got good and stinking drunk and stayed at my house.’

I tried to imagine this little dog groomer doing that and could barely manage. But when she grinned at me and winked, I saw a bit of that ornery streak.

‘Anyway!’ She clapped her hands. ‘Here I am taking up your day off and asking favours. Go through the trollop clothes and let me know if any of it works for you.’

I knew it wouldn’t, but didn’t want to say it so fast – sort of dismissing her efforts to help. ‘Will do.’

‘See you tomorrow,’ she said.

‘Tomorrow, the salon is closed on Monday’s … Oh.’

‘You keep forgetting the festival is tomorrow.’

‘You mean I keep blocking it out.’

‘Monday’s a weird day for it.’

‘It’s genius, actually,’ I said.

The whole town participated in some way, shape or form, Deke had explained. So the town held the fundraiser fairs on a week day. Then everyone attended, to either work it, participate in it, or whole companies came on their lunch breaks or shut down early to partake. The perks of small town living. Barring emergency medical personnel at the hospital – which was technically the next town over anyway – everyone showed up at some point.

I was hoping that as few folks as possible would be there when I performed.

‘Don’t count on it,’ she said, reading my mind. ‘You’re the main draw this year, chicky.’

And then she was gone. I gave her offering of brightly coloured shiny bits of cloth one more glance and realised what I wanted to do. And it had nothing to do with hot pink spandex.

‘Stay here,’ I told Brutus and headed across the street.

* * *

Of all the boys, Stephen was the closest to my height. He was one of the least bulky little pigs too. I could only hope that he was home from the bakery. He worked it mostly by himself, but many days he left his one worker in charge and came home for a bit. I thought maybe I was hitting the right window of time.

His wide wooden porch was painted a grass green and my boots clomped lightly on the shiny surface. I wondered if he was taking a nap and hoped I didn’t scare him, but when I went to knock, I saw that he wasn’t napping.

Far from it.

Stephen was participating in what my dad had once referred to as ‘afternoon delight’. Until I’d turned bright red and squawked like a bird and he’d never made that reference again. After, of course, laughing and saying, ‘Oh, that’s right, you sprang from an egg, Farrell.’

The man with Stephen was pretty. He was so fucking pretty I felt dowdy. His pale blond hair was fashionably long, brushing his broad shoulders. He was thin, with high cheekbones and a currently in-fashion button-down plaid shirt. Trim hips were swathed in elegantly faded jeans, and the ass in those jeans – even from the front door – looked downright biteable.

Stephen had him wedged against the kitchen counter, his strong hands holding the man’s face, his long fingers tangled in his hair.

I turned to run but when I glanced back, I found I couldn’t, couldn’t look away. It was too – real. Visceral and raw, and in the moment. The way Stephen kissed that boy was like he thought the kiss could save him.

The man plucked at Stephen’s shirt and then pushed his hands up under the fabric to touch him. I could imagine the warm, smooth feel of the skin under this stranger’s fingers. The smell of yeast, sugar and warmth that came off that beautiful baker. I felt doubly bad for some reason with Stephen. As if my harshness had mangled him, which was silly – just me being protective of the underdog.

I knew he was bisexual, he’d been very upfront about it, but seeing him like this – with another gorgeous man – it did something to me. It turned me on in a way I’d never really experienced before. And I wanted to watch.

So I held my breath and for the second time since I moved in, I watched Stephen through a window.

They were a study in light and dark. That sunshine-yellow hair meshing with Stephen’s black locks when they kissed deeper. The fair man clutched at Stephen, weaving his fingers along Stephen’s scalp and tugging enough that I saw the look on Stephen’s face, and imagined I could hear his gasp.

They were mashed chest to chest, belly to belly, cock to cock. The new man in light jeans and Stephen in dark wash. He wore brown trainers with orange stripes, his lover high top Converse sneakers. The tangled together in the sunny kitchen, kissing. Until they weren’t kissing anymore. Until this new angelic-looking man hiked my recent lover up onto the counter and unzipped Stephen’s jeans.

I had to take a breath because my ears were starting to ring. I didn’t want to, though. This was all too fragile a thing, it felt wrong, to do something as noisy and clumsy as breathe. The man sank to his knees, muttering something I couldn’t hear. Something that made Stephen smile that heart-breaking smile of his.

He licked the tip of Stephen’s cock with a rigid tongue and I felt my face react the same way Stephen’s did. A flash of surprise, which then bled into bliss and a lazy kind of pleasure. My cunt was keeping time with my crazed and galloping heart and I wanted so badly to be fucked in that moment of time that I’d have taken any one of them had they walked up behind me. I’d have even bent over and spread my legs for the mailman.

There is a certain kind of freedom in that irrational and all-consuming kind of arousal. It made my face hot – and my cunt hotter.

The blond man sucked slowly, like he had all the time in the world, and Stephen watched the pretty face that dipped and swayed in his lap. He traced one of the man’s high cheekbones with his fingers, said something and smiled, touched the man’s hair.

They had the easy way of lovers who have been together before, and when the man drove his head a bit lower to suckle first one of Stephen’s balls and then the other, I bit my lower lip. He kept his big hands on Stephen’s thighs, pinning his legs to the pristine white counter that Stephen perched on like a beautiful kept bird.

Or an angel.

I pressed my fingers to the cool glass of the door and held my breath again as the newcomer’s head bobbed up and down, up and down, as I watched the telltale signs. The signs of impending orgasm. How Stephen’s head kept lolling back as he thrust his cock up high and into the waiting wet mouth that worked at him. How his fingers curled around the lip of the counter. How his eyes kept slamming shut despite his visible effort to watch.

Then man cupped his balls and sucked him deep before tracing a rigid moist line from the base of Stephen’s hard on to the tip. When he drove his tongue against the small wet slit I knew was there, tasting the salty, sweet drop of pre-cum I imagined he found, and then sucked back down the length with an aggressive kind of pleasure, I heard Stephen’s groan even through the glass of his vintage front door.

My pulse had taken up residence between my legs and I was almost positive that my heart had plummeted into my pelvis and that was why I seemed to reverberate with every beat.

Stephen grabbed the blond’s hair and tugged him up toward him. At first the man wasn’t willing, but then he tipped his head back at something Stephen said and laughed. I studied him, the sway of golden hair, a flash of white teeth, the happiness on his lean face. I envied him, then. Maybe even felt a stab of jealousy. He looked happy and horny and when he stood, I could see his own erection pressing to his jeans.

They were sharing this moment. I wanted to share a moment.

But you went and pushed everyone away, genius – because you got
scared.

I shook my head and watched as Stephen yanked his lover’s button fly and the entire line of copper buttons jostled open for him. He hopped off the counter, saying something, gorgeous mouth moving as he pressed their dicks together in his doubled fists. Cock-to-cock they stood, kissing gently. Soft teasing kisses that made my throat tickle with lust.