Boys Will Be Boys - Their First Time (45 page)

I found a good piece of Conte and turned to him.

“
Head and shoulders, only,
”
I said.
“
I won
’
t go any lower.
Andrea
’
s here, so you know I won
’
t try anything else.
”
And that was my tacit acknowledgement that I knew he knew I was out to sleep with him.

Man, I was feeling bold, all of a sudden (or maybe it was desperate) but I
had
to break free of this growing feeling that I was an abject failure, and maybe this would help.
It couldn
’
t hurt
,
and no one was going to expect anything from it, anyway, not even me.
“
She can even blindfold me, to make it all correct.
Think of it as a magic trick
.
..
or stunt.
”

I wish I could have thought up a better argument, but hey – he cast a glance at Andrea, who was not looking too pleased then he slipped me that little grin, again, and said,
“
Should I sit back in the chair?
”

“
No, the stool,
”
I said, and I popped my art table stool right beside my easel.
Then I grabbed a paint cloth from the table and offered it to Andrea.
“
Will you do the honors?
”

“
Why do I feel like this is something David Copperfield would pull?
”
she asked as she came over and took the rag.
Not a great joke, but not a bad one.
Dammit.

I propped my sketchpad on the easel, again, and readied the Conte pencil in my right hand.
Aaron sat on the stool, just inches from me, his wary expression still riding his face.

“
Just be careful,
”
he said, only half joking.

I spread my fingers and positioned them atop his left eyebrow
,
then Andrea blindfolded me.
And
,
she did it tight, too
,
the bitch.
I took a couple of deep breaths
,
ripped the realization that I was actually fucking
touching
Aaron Friesen
’
s face out of my mind
and made myself focus.

Okay
,
left eyebrow.

I ran my fingers over it, light and gentle, trying to translate what I felt with my left hand into what I was drawing with my right.
Let
’
s see
,
nice arch to it.
Hair
’
s smooth, not bristling.
Neatly follows the shape of his eye socket.
Not bad.

Slowly on to his left eye.
Good form.
Smooth flesh above the eye, and not too much, either.
Lid creases back with a fraction of the lid remaining.
Soft eyelashes in good order, too.

“
This tickles,
”
said Aaron.

I shushed him then followed the top eyelid around to the bridge of his nose.
So far, he was perfect and smooth and felt exactly
as
I thought he would feel.
And the bridge of his nose was no different.
A small round dip from the forehead down to the top of his perfect straight
–
wait a minute
!
His nose isn
’
t straight.
The bone bulges a bit at the top then curls down in a slope
,
and the dip is more of a sharp circle that
’
s been sliced into it.

I stopped and felt the sheet of paper
,
found the smooth waxy line of the pencil and made an adjustment where I thought I had drawn the bridge, then my left hand drifted over to his right eyebrow.
It felt the same as the left.
Nice arch to it.
Hair
’
s smooth, not bristling.
Neatly follows the shape of the socket and
–
wait
! I
t angles down more sharply than the other.

I stopped and let my fingers play over his skin, trying to get a better feel for the shape of his skull.
Then I noticed the hairs on his eyebrow curled into each other more
,
and there was a slight crease running at a slant through them at the point where they danced down around his eye
,
and the texture of them changed, slightly.
I stopped.

“
You have a scar,
”
I said.

I felt his face turn to me, just a bit.

“
Yeah,
”
he said.
“
You can feel it?
”

I nodded.
I heard Andrea come over.

“
Where?
”
she asked.
I could picture her bending in close to look.
Get the fuck back
.

“
Right eye, where his finger is.
Josh and me had just seen
The Three Musketeers
and we were havin
’
a duel with butter knives
,
and he got me, good.
But that
’
s back when I was seven.
I thought it
’
d all healed.
”

“
There
’
s just a hint of it,
”
I said.
But it was something I had missed just by looking at him.

And then I started to understand my problem – I hadn
’
t really been looking at him.
I
’
d just been gazing upon him, like you do with a statue or some piece of installation art shit.
I wasn
’
t seeing him because I thought I already
had
seen him and had already formed him in my mind (if that makes any sense).
He was cast in stone
,
and I was trying to translate something cold and impersonal into something alive
,
and that
’
s not right.

Suddenly, I was noticing the little details that made him human instead of merely perfect.
I drifted my fingers back over to his left eyebrow and felt it, again
,
and this time
,
I noticed the same pattern in the hair – it wasn
’
t straight and smooth, not really; it also curled just a little
,
just enough to give it a wavy depth.
And this time
,
I noticed there was just a bit of sharpness in the bone of his brow, meaning his forehead was not just smooth and even, but had curves and meaning all its own.
Once again, lightning was screaming from my fingertips
,
but this time
,
it danced across my mind.

My hand trailed over to his hairline and along it to his sideburns and caressed the beginning of a sharp cheekbone and drifted down to where his jaw began, just in front of his ear.
His skin was not merely smooth but carried hints of blemishes, still, as it rolled across the formations that build his face.
I traced the line of his chin
and felt the warmth of his breath on my palm as my fingers did their light little dance over the merest of clefts in dead center, directly below his mouth.
His breathing seemed softer to me
,
deeper
,
and that warmth enveloped me in dreams and made me hesitate.
And then I heard him lick his lips.

I stopped.
I couldn
’
t get a sense of where Andrea was, and I didn
’
t want to continue unless I knew.
“
You
’
re not looking at the sketch, Andrea.
”

I heard her move, slightly, behind me.
She was.

“
Don
’
t tell me what it looks like,
”
I said.

I heard her swallow before she said,
“
Okay,
”
in a soft voice that had risen a couple of octaves.

I choked off a scream of joy.
The way she said that one little word expanded reality within me, and I knew the experiment was working
,
and the sketch was evolving
,
and she was impressed
,
which is a good thing, even if it was her.

I drew my fingers up from Aaron
’
s chin to his mouth, felt the hint of stubble peeking from his skin
–
does your beard grow fast or do you just not shave every day?
His lips felt fuller than I had pictured
,
rounder
,
smoother
,
warmer, and then he licked them, again, his tongue glancing off my fingers.

This time, the screaming lightning ripped right down my back and slamming into my thighs.
And this time it took the combination of both my briefs and my jeans to keep my erection hidden.
But this time there was a million times more to it.
Yeah, it was a charge to be touching Aaron like this
,
to feel his reactions to my caress
,
but I felt like it was beyond simple lust.
I was finally connecting to him
,
and that connection was whispering from my left fingertips to my right ones and giving me a view of him I could never have imagined.
Now he seemed to be part of me
,
and he was even more beautiful than before.

My fingers continued their exploration across his face.
I found the tip of his nose has a hint of a point to it and little dents over the nostrils to keep them from being too smooth.
And his left cheekbone curved a bit more than the right one
,
but the skin on his face had filled it in so that you would never notice unless you actually measured it.
And his ears were colder than his cheeks, so they should be a hint bluer.
And his earlobes were soft and rounded and creased under to his jaw.
And his right eye was a bit rounder than his left.
I felt the softness of skin between the prickly hints of beard above his Adam
’
s
a
pple and noticed how sharp was that point in his throat.
And how the muscles of his neck blended together like tiny threads twisted around a straw.
And the pulse of his blood through his veins was in unison with mine.
And the little dip of bone at the base of his throat
(
the sternum?) was a half circle so precise, it could have been measured by an engineer.
And the little hairs at the top of his chest brushed against me as if in welcome
,
and I felt a fullness in my throat and such joy and wonder
,
and I had to step back from the growing overload of sensation.

I yanked the blindfold off in a bit of a fog
,
or trance, maybe; I don
’
t know.
Even with the low light, I had a hard time adjusting them to where I could see.
Aaron was in deep soft focus
,
but I could tell he was looking at me, unmoving.
His breath was still and deep and quick.
And Andrea was behind me, still looking at the sketch.
I finally got my eyes under enough control to view what I had done.

And there he was
in soft black Conte pencil against white paper.
Oh, the lines were uneven in spots, and I
’
d doubled back over his features in a couple of places.
And the shape of his head was indistinct (in fact, I hadn
’
t even really tried to do more than get his eyes, nose, mouth and chin).
But this sketch had captured his look.
It showed his beautiful little
I-know-what-you’re-up-to
smile.
And his eyes were deep with feeling.
And his nose, which I had tried so hard to make straight and perfect, curved a little and became more real than anything I had sketched before.
And the line of his chin was in proportion to everything else.
Even his ears looked just a little bit cold (I know it
’
s crazy to say that, but I really do think they did).
I was stunned into silence.