Linchpin

Mary Calmes

 

For Patric Michael

 

One

 

My mother could never just leave things alone; she had to do something. It was her way. The something normally translated into pushing when she should have backed off. So this was why she had called in the cavalry in the form of my sister Trish and her husband, Ethan. Because I hadn’t done what my mother wanted, she’d sent them to intercede on her and my father’s behalf. When that didn’t work, they all got on a plane—my parents from Ocala, Florida, where they had retired, and my youngest sister, Deb and her husband, Alex, from Boston. I was the only one who had left the East Coast; the rest of them were all still there. I had gone west and stayed. College in San Diego had translated into a new home. 

“Mark, you need to listen to me.”

They were trying to triple-team me in the kitchen—my mother and my sisters. I turned my head and looked at my mother over the rim of one of the large café au lait mugs that the love of my life had brought back from Madrid the last time he was there.

“Your brother needs help,” she told me.

I grunted.

She sucked in air through her nose. “He needs to talk to someone. He needs to be medicated.” She ran down the list for me. “You don’t just go through what he did and just set your life back on course. He needs to be committed.”

Or not.

“Mark!”

“Mom.” I tried not to chuckle as I put the mug down beside me on the counter by the sink. “I love you so much, and you’re as cute as a button, and I’d love to shrink you down and carry you around in my pocket all day long.” She was starting to smile, unable to resist her oldest child. “And I’m not trying to downplay your concern, but in this instance, I think you’re still freaked out about what could have happened instead of what actually did, and that’s coloring your perception.”

All her emotions were sliding across her face because she’d sort of been rolling around in the catnip of my obvious adoration, but then I had smacked her with the truth.

“God, I’m starving.” I yawned loudly before I turned to yell at my father over my shoulder. “Dad, where’s T?”

He moved the paper away from his face to look at me. “He and Ethan should be back from the store soon.”

My sister Trish’s husband, who had started out his life in our family as a homophobic jerk, was now running errands, on purpose and without the buffering presence of his wife, with my partner of sixteen years. And I knew the reason. There was just no saying ‘No’ to Tai Yosuke. He roared into your life atop a steamroller of warmth and charm and followed it up with sincerity and a wicked sense of fun. No one ever stood a chance, and especially not Ethan. He was overwhelmed from the beginning as Tai had chosen to sit next to him at his first Christmas dinner with our family. I had warned Tai—told him the guy was an ass—and so, of course, my boyfriend took that as a personal challenge.

Ethan had done the slow pan to my boyfriend as my family (not me; I knew better) held their collective breath.

“Hi.” Tai had smiled at him with his liquid black eyes. “You look like crap, man. Later on, you wanna take a run with me? Get out of here?”

Everyone but me was surprised when he nodded, but Tai was irresistible, and soon, he and Ethan were like twins separated at birth. And I knew people who saw them out and about—the six-foot-three, covered-in-muscle blond guy walking around with the six-foot black-haired, black-eyed manga character—wondered about their relationship. Friends? Lovers? They looked good together, but then, Tai made everyone look good, even my brother Frank, who was currently sleeping in my guest room for as long as he wanted.

When Frank had finally agreed to leave the house after a week, it was for Tai that he had moved, not me. And when they were at the store, Frankie shuffling along behind him, everyone was looking at my boyfriend instead of my obviously sleep-deprived little brother. If you wanted to stay in the shadows, Tai was the man to travel with.

“Mark!” My mother screeched at me.

“Oh,” I chuckled, turning back to her. “Yes, dear?”

She growled at me, which I loved, and I leaned in and kissed her cheek.

“Darling, stop being adorable and listen to me. Your brother almost overdosed on drugs.  He needs to see someone.”

“Please. It was stupid, yes, but not premeditated. He doesn’t want to kill himself; he succumbed to peer pressure because he’s an idiot. But being resuscitated, having your stomach pumped, and then having to submit to a psych eval will help you get your priorities in order. His brain didn’t get fried. It just got scrambled a little, and now he’s fine.”

“The psychiatrist at County Medical said he needs to be committed.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I want him in a hospital until I see the boy I know.”

“Really?”

“Mark!”

I hopped up on the kitchen counter, glad that Tai wasn’t there to see me do it, crossed my arms and looked at her. “Hey, remember when Nana had her stroke and you said,” I pointed at her, “that she would never come back from it because your doctor told you so and that she should be put in a nursing home?”

Second growl.

“And I told you I would move her in here with me and T, and we fought and fought until you gave in, and like a month later, she called you on the phone and asked you for the recipe for Chicken Divine?”

“Mark, this is different.”

I arched an eyebrow for her. “It’s about unconditional support, and you know it. He doesn’t need to be in some psychiatric facility; he needs to be here with me.”

“Mark, you––”

“And Tai.”

“Mark––”

“For a while,” I told her.

“Will you please just lis––”

“And,” I cut her off, “if I had listened to you about Nana, she would have gone from the hospital to a nursing home, and I would have missed out on all that time with her.”

“Yes, honey, I know, and you were right and I was wrong, but this is a totally different situation.”

“I disagree.”

“You’re being stupid,” my sister Trish said, joining the conversation, stepping closer to my mother in solidarity. “Frank is sick, Mark, and he needs to be in a hospital.”

“He’s not sick.  He just needs more sleep.” I yawned. I needed more coffee. “And so do I.”

“Mark!”

“He’s just young,” I assured Trish. “He still has time to straighten up and fly right.”

“Dad!” She yelled over at my old man.

“I have no say, Trish,” he called back, involved with both his newspaper and Sunday morning NFL games. “Ever since your brother talked me out of investing with Dan Sanders, I don’t question him.” He turned and looked at me. “You saved my ass, kid. You know that.”

“I was just thinking of my inheritance.” I smiled at him.

We shared a long look before he simply nodded and went back to reading the paper. It was enough. At one point in time, I had wanted a big gesture from him over the fact that my background in finance, that he had not helped me pay for, had saved his and my mother’s life savings. It was Tai who had told me not to be a prick. This was my father we were talking about: I needed to get a life. In the end, Dad and I both acted as if nothing had happened, right up until he grabbed me at Thanksgiving the same year Dan Sanders, his army buddy, disappeared with the five million dollars all the rest of his friends had risked on an investment property that didn’t exist. And at that moment, as my father spoke a litany of praise and appreciation into my ear, I was glad I had listened to my boyfriend because really, it was more than enough.

“Jack!” The sound of my mother yelling at my father brought me back sharply to the present.

“I think Mark’s right,” my father said, looking back at us. “I know Frankie looks bad, I know he does, but Sara, honey, he’s going to be okay. He just needs a little time to––”

“It’s already been two months!” She insisted. “He needs to feel better.”

“He is feeling better,” I told her. “He’s running every morning with Tai now, and on the mornings that Tai is flying, I run with him. And yesterday, before you guys got here, I made him grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup just like you did when we were little, and we talked for like three hours. You just, you gotta let him deal with his stupidity, Mom, and when he’s done, he’ll get a job and go back to school and be himself again. He’s young, he’s only twenty-three, he’ll do everything he should, but you have to let him…what, grieve, I guess, for the loss of his sense of immortality. He thought he was bulletproof because he’s young and stupid, and he thought nothing could really hurt him, but now he knows better. Now he knows he’s got to be careful. I think he’ll be reinvested in school when he goes back. I think you’ll see a lot of changes in him.  I just…he needs time, and he’s got that. Not everyone is so fortunate.”

She squinted at me, and I looked over at Trish. My mother was smart and saw everything. Between Tai’s sudden change in his flying schedule and me working from home, she knew something was up.  She just wasn’t sure what.

“Trish,” I barked out.

“Oh, God, what?” She gasped, startled.

“Remember when you got shit-faced in Vegas for your twenty-first birthday and married Aaron Rayburn?”

“Mark!” She yelled at me. “We were never to speak of––”

“And you were so drunk that I had to fly to Vegas to bring you home, ‘cause you got alcohol poisoning and they wouldn’t let you get on a plane alone?”

“Mark, you shit!”

“What?” My mother shrieked, and I thought her head was going to explode.

“You married Aaron Rayburn?” Deb was giggling. “The guy with the weird eye that sort of rolled back in his head all the time?”

“Ohmygod, Mark, I can’t believe you just––”

“People who live in glass houses,” I reminded her.

“Mark,” my sister Deb got my attention. “We were all at the hospital together, and Frank was––Frank looked so lost and small, and he needs professional help to––”

“He just needs to sleep. End of story.”

“Listen,” Deb said, and I heard her teacher voice kick in, the one she used on all the third-graders. “Frankie should be––”

“Hey,” I cut her off, “remember when you shaved your head because you fell in love with that roadie from Red Alarm and decided that you were gonna drop out of school?”

“Mark!”

I crossed my legs because I didn’t want to get a ball smack, and I shielded my face as she hit me in the bicep really hard. “But I never said you were crazy. I just came and bailed you out of jail in El Paso and brought you home.”

“You were in jail?” My mother was turning a very lovely shade of crimson.

Deb smacked me really, really hard on the thigh before she pinched the same spot with every drop of strength she had.

“Owww,” I laughed, as Trish interrogated her about her night in the slammer and my mother yelled for my father.

“Mark, you asshole!” Deb wailed, before suddenly moving between my knees and leaning her head against my stomach.

“Stop,” I chuckled, holding up my hand at my mother and sister. “Deb’s off limits now, all right?” I told them, lifting my little sister’s face so I could look down into her eyes. “My point was only to say that Frank did something dumb, just like you. And at least he never went to jail with people named Big Mama.”

She slapped my leg again.

“Shit,” I laughed as she growled at me, moving away. I made all the women in my family insane.

“Mark,” Trish said suddenly, her red-rimmed eyes swallowing me. “How can you think that Frank overdosing on drugs is okay, or normal, or anything else? How can you?”

“Because it was an accident,” I told her pointedly. “He didn’t mean to, and now, because of other considerations, he’s thinking a little bit too much about the responsibilities that he has to other people.”

She took a breath. “What considerations?”

I just looked at her.

“Mark?”

I was saved from speaking because I heard the garage door go up and scrambled off the counter before Tai made it inside.

Our garage was connected to the kitchen, and seconds later the door opened and I smiled too big.

“Why do you look guilty?”

I made my eyes round and smiled at the love of my life. “What?”

He squinted as he crossed the floor to plant one on me. Always, always, he kissed me when he left the house or came home. From what his mother had told me, it had been me, Mark Gabriel, who had brought that loving creature out in him. He was, as a rule, not demonstrative to anyone. He was warm, yes, charming, certainly, but the come here and kiss me, got to have my hands on you guy had been, for her—for sixteen years now—a new development.

People remembered Tai because he was witty and beautiful and smart, but as nice as he was, as much as he could make you laugh, as much as he put you at ease, he was definitely a look but don’t touch kind of guy. His friends, other pilots at the airline, flight attendants, and just people he saw every day were all crazy about him, but they knew that touching him without an invitation was bad. I had never asked. He was the one who pulled me into his life.

I was at my friend Matt’s birthday party, and I saw Tai come in. He lived upstairs, and when I asked my buddy who he was, he had exhaled his name. Matt had been surprised that he was even there. Tai was a pilot so he was always gone, and not on short hops, like from California to Texas or Hawaii, but to New York, where he was officially based, and from there to London or Paris or Rome. He was the long-haul guy, and so Matt had been shocked to see him. Even more shocked that the god he sometimes passed in the hall or stood beside in the elevator was taking him up on his party invitation.

“How do I look?” he asked me nervously.

And Matt normally would have never cared, much less asked the question, because he was, as a rule, always confident, but when I saw Tai Yosuke, I immediately understood. I was easily looking at the most beautiful man I had ever seen in my life. The dark eyes, long lashes, the smirk, and the thick glossy black hair had me mesmerized. His face, coupled with his long, lean muscular body, had taken my breath away.

“Mark?”

“Sorry.” I came out of my trance, “you look great.”

“You sure?”

“Absolutely,” I assured him, because he did, and I settled back against the bookshelf and watched.

All night long, I kept my eyes on Tai and saw him smile and laugh and be the life of the party with his stories from work, even while he hid behind a mask of impenetrable charm. He was engaging, and so everyone wanted to take him home. But one after another, every man who went near him was turned down with a quick, kind, shake of Tai’s head. He wasn’t mean about it, but his eyes left no room for argument. I wondered what he was looking for.

When it was time to present Matt with his many birthday gifts, everyone stood around him to watch as he opened up dive gear. He was going on a snorkeling trip for his thirtieth birthday and so that was the theme, and everyone had bought something in line with his wishes. It was smart, even though I could have never done it. I was just happy to have people show up to buy me drinks on my birthday.

So the size of my gift was strange. All the rest of the packages were large, and only mine was the size of a DVD, which is what it was.

“Open Water?” Matt said as he opened my present.

The room turned to me.

I did the lazy smile because it made sense in my head.

“A cautionary tale,” Tai said from the other side of the room.

I looked over at him and saw his eyes narrow.

“Mark!” Matt’s roommate Tim started laughing. “What the fuck, man? That movie is about people who go on a diving outing and get eaten by sharks!”

“Because they weren’t careful,” I explained. “I want Matt to be careful.”

“That’s disgusting,” one of the girls closest to me said.

I shrugged.

“It’s inspired,” Tai told her, and I realized he had moved to a spot on my right. Close on my right. He must have moved pretty fast to get there.

My snort of laughter made him smile, as did the waggle of eyebrows. As Matt returned to opening gifts, I felt Tai’s hand close on my bicep. I turned my head to look at him.

“Will you come upstairs to my place so I can talk to you a minute?”

“I’ll go upstairs with you if you promise to have dinner with me tomorrow,” I countered, turning to face him.

His scowl was endearing. “Why would you want to do that?”

“Because as much as I want to get in your bed, I want to talk to you too. So I figure this way, I get both things I want.”

The startled expression was even cuter than the scowl.

“‘Cause right now you’re thinking I’m funny but not hot, so you’re thinking you might screw me, but that’ll be it. But just watch, you’re gonna fall for me.”

He shook his head. “I don’t fall. I just fuck.”

“So you say,” I grunted, looking into his big, onyx eyes, sounding so much more confident than I felt.

He trembled, which I took as a very good sign, and laced his fingers into mine. “Dinner tomorrow’s fine. Come with me.”

I waved to Matt as I was tugged behind Tai, and he mouthed a word that had me flipping him off.

How? was mean. How? implied that I was completely lacking in pretty. And I wasn’t. I was in good shape for twenty-six. I ran and swam and played soccer with a crappy team on the weekends.  My sandy brown hair and blue eyes had gotten me laid more than a few times. I was taller than Tai, six-two to his six feet, but that was about all I had going for me. None of it mattered, however, because at least for the moment, for this man, whatever I looked like was enough.

His apartment was dark and cavernous with exposed pipes in the ceiling and wooden floors and those windows that push out to an angle but don’t slide open. The place smelled like sandalwood, and I saw the incense holder above the mantle of his fireplace. I took a deep breath.

“What are you doing?”

“I want to remember the smell of your home.”

He trembled, and I got it, because sometimes it takes me a minute. When I reached for him, I didn’t tear his clothes off; instead, I wrapped him up tight in my arms.

“No, don’t,” he protested, wiggling in my embrace. The lust he could deal with; my desire to hold him was a whole other ball game.

“Baby,” I breathed over his skin, kissing the side of his neck. “It’s okay. I got you.”

And he thawed and melted and was suddenly holding on for dear life. When I was making him an omelet half an hour later, he was quiet, just watching me as I moved around his kitchen and kept up a running monologue. When I got to the stealth mode on my car, he interrupted, laughing.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Sometimes,” I explained, “I accidentally put my car into stealth mode when I’m driving, which is why no can see me and I nearly get killed.”

His eyes were sparkling. “And how do you make your car invisible?”

“I think there’s a button on the dash somewhere or by my gear shift, but the button’s invisible too, so I can’t actually vouch for its whereabouts.”

The laughter that came out of him, husky and deep, was the sweetest thing I had ever heard. He was magic, and I was thoroughly enchanted.

“God, you’re cute,” he said as he wiped his eyes,

“And I’m housebroken,” I assured him gamely.

“Come here and gimme a kiss.”

I shook my head and fed him instead. After our impromptu breakfast for dinner, he washed the dishes while he told me all about being a pilot and how proud his folks were, even though he rarely got to see them. His family lived in Japan, and Tai had dual citizenship, which he enjoyed. When he was almost done with the cleaning up, he ordered me to the couch to wait for him. It was still early, not quite eleven, and I asked him if he wanted to go catch a movie.

He wasn’t talking; instead, he turned off the lights in the kitchen, filled the room with John Coltrane from his very impressive-looking sound system and took a seat beside me. In his bare feet and jeans, tousled hair, and heavy-lidded eyes, he was the picture of heat. When he lunged at me, pushing me down under him on the couch, I didn’t offer any resistance.

“Please.”  His breath caught. “Fuck me.”

The pleading tone, the look I was getting…I was done. Sort of. “How ‘bout I kiss you first?”

I reached up for his face and gently, tenderly drew him down to me. When our lips met, I felt him jolt against me. Apparently, he was not treated to slow very often. My tongue pushing for entrance was greedily accepted, and as I tasted him, I felt his swollen groin shoved hard against mine.

Normally, I would have been all hands, but he tasted so good, and my kiss was returned with such ravenous need that I couldn’t wrap my brain around any other desire but the devouring play of tangling my tongue with his. He tasted so good, like beer and salt, and my fingers sank into his hair and held him tight so he couldn’t move.

I kissed him until I could feel my head pounding and had to lift my mouth from his to drag in air.

“You,” he gasped, licking his lips, “come get in my bed and––”

“Can’t I just kiss you some more?” I almost whimpered with desire.

His melting eyes got huge. “You don’t want to fuck me?”

“Oh, God, yes.” My breath hitched. “But can you just let me kiss you some more? Please?”

I felt the shudder run through him as he was basically draped over me between my spread legs, pressed so tight that I could feel his heart hammering in his chest.

My fingers massaged his skull, and I leaned him forward.

“Why are you waiting?” he whispered, his lips hovering over mine as we shared breath.

“Because you’re worth it, and why do I have to rush? If I rush, you can make me like everybody else, and that’s not what I want to be.”

“So it’s a game you’re playing.”

“It’s not a game, T. It’s just me showing you that you might be the one, and if you are, I don’t want to mess it up by putting you over the back of this couch.”

“T?” He smiled down at me.

“Shut up,” I sighed, and when he sealed his mouth over mine, I let him feel the whole of what I could provide—the heat, the safety, and the hope. I kissed him with everything I had because my heart had fluttered when I first laid eyes on him and not, I realized, just because he was pretty. I could see plainly that he was what I needed—the movement that I wasn’t capable of alone because I was far too grounded. I was solid and constant; he was like a breath of fresh air. I could be the guy he counted on; he could show me how to truly live. We could balance each other out perfectly, and I wanted him to know it, believe it.

We kissed for hours, and when his lips were swollen and his eyes were flooded with the desire to submit, I got up and walked painfully to the door. I was hard and aching, but I would not screw up my chance for a happily ever after just because I wanted him more than I had ever wanted anyone in my entire life.

“If you leave,” he snarled at me, “I will go downstairs and pick up someone, anyone, to bring back up here and fuck me. Is that what you want?”

Oh, he was mad, and I felt the wave of anticipation roll through me.

“If you think that’s best,” I said, opening the door to leave.

The whimper was good, and he was at the door before I could turn away. My hand was grabbed and then held flat against his heart. His eyes were there when I raised mine to meet them.

I swallowed my worry. “Can I come here tomorrow and pick you up at seven to––”

“Yes,” he cut me off. “I’ll be ready at six-thirty, so you better be here.”

“Of course I’ll be here,” I promised him, hand on his cheek as I leaned in and kissed his forehead. “I can barely wait.”

And when I left, I took great satisfaction in hearing the door close and lock and the sound of the deadbolt being turned. He wasn’t going out. He was waiting for me.

I never went back to Matt’s party, even though it was still raging on when I left. Instead, I walked straight passed his apartment and outside to the sidewalk. I was surprised when my phone rang as I started walking home.

“I could drive you,” Tai said, on the other end.

“That’d be dangerous,” I told him.

“Afraid you’ll succumb to temptation?”

“Pretty much, yeah.”

“Let me get my keys.”

I laughed at him and heard him sigh, long and loud.

“I like it when you call me ‘T’ and ‘baby.’“

“That’s lucky, because I don’t plan to stop.”

“Promise?”

“I swear.”

I talked to him all the way home. 

 

 

Two

 

I was there the following night, and the night after that, and the night after that. We dated for a month, and I made certain that I always took him out, treated him right, wined and dined him, and got him home at a decent hour. I kissed him breathless in the car, walked him to his door, and left him panting—and me, barely able to think straight. I wanted to ravish him, but I courted him instead. There was romance instead of fucking, and even though it was killing me to wait, the long unhurried conversations, the laughter, and the slow build of trust were worth it. He liked me; he looked forward to spending time with me; and he enjoyed our talks as much as I did. I listened to him, which was apparently an anomaly, and a quality of mine that moved me to the front of the line. I saw his phone, saw all the missed calls, and watched him delete voicemails without even checking. I really liked his sense of loyalty.

The week before Christmas, I went to pick him up on Friday, and he wasn’t downstairs waiting on the front stoop like he normally did. I called, but there was no answer, so I decided to park and go upstairs. I saw Matt on his way into the building and caught up with him.

“Are you here to see Tai again?” he asked, amazement in his voice.

“Yeah, why?”

“I just don’t––I just don’t get it.”

And again, it was my plainness, so I understood his confusion. I was the extra, the guy in the background; there was no way I could get the star. But as I climbed the stairs to Tai’s door, the usual butterflies in my stomach told another story. After I knocked, I heard the yell to come in.

Inside, it was warm, and that was nice because outside, it was December, cold and crisp. I locked the door behind me and found him sitting on the couch in jeans and nothing else. Billie Holiday was crooning softly in the background and my heart hurt just looking at him.

“Are you ready to go?”

He didn’t answer, just stared at me.

“Why didn’t you answer your phone?”

“Because I wanted you to come up.”

“Why?”

He cleared his throat. “Come over here, and we’ll decide what we’re gonna eat.”

I shed my leather jacket and scarf and started toward what I had already come to think of as our couch. We made out on it a lot. First base was achieved nightly.

When I was close, he slid off the somehow erotic piece of furniture to the floor, spread his legs and patted the space between them.

I gave him a look. “What’re you up to, T?”

“Just get your ass over here,” he said as he graced me with a wicked smile.

“I thought we were gonna eat?”

“Fuck food. Come here.”

The heat in his gaze should have melted me to the floor, as hot as it was. I felt my knees go weak as I moved, momentarily staggering before I sank down onto the area rug in front of him, facing away.

“Lean back,” he said gently, and as I reclined against his bare chest I felt his groin pressed against the base of my spine. “Tell me how your day was.”

I tried to think, but he smoothed fingers into my hair, tipped my head back, and pressed his lips to my jaw. “T…”

His left hand combed through my hair over and over, and his right first pulled my dress shirt from my corduroys before going to work on the buttons. He moved deliberately, all the time kissing a line down from my jaw to my shoulder and back. When his tongue traced my earlobe, I jerked in his arms.

“Oh, he likes that,” he said, and his breath down the side of my neck made me shiver with delicious anticipation. “What else can I do to you to get what I want?”

My head fell back on his shoulder, and he bent to lick my throat before he bit me. It felt incredible. “What do you want?”

Instead of an answer, I heard the jingle of my belt buckle, the snap of my pants, and the clicking sound of the zipper as it was lowered. He didn’t bother groping me through my briefs; instead, he slid his hand under the elastic waistband and took hold of my already hardened shaft.

“Mark,” he whispered, sucking my earlobe into his hot, wet mouth as he started to stroke up and down the length. “I want you. Let me have you.”

He turned my head right and kissed me hard, his teeth cutting my lip with the ferocity of the motion. I opened for him, and he moaned into my mouth as he used the precome leaking from my cock to increase the rhythm of his stroking. I bucked up against him, wanting more of his mouth, more of his hand, more of the heat that was rolling off of his smooth skin.

“Please,” he murmured, shifting around, suddenly straddling my thighs, still stroking me. “Let me have you. I want you so fucking bad.”

I had no words. Faced with my fantasy, I was at a loss.

He leaned forward and from under the couch pulled a condom. “I stashed this here a while ago because I wanted to be ready.”

The man had been planning to seduce me. How hot was that?

“Mark. Please.”

“I could suck you off,” I offered, just to make sure.

His whine made me smile.

“T––”

“I want you buried to your fuzzy balls in my ass.”

“Fuzzy?” I teased him.

The moan came up out of his chest and was possibly the sexiest thing I had ever heard. When I felt his fingers slide over my testicles, I almost swallowed my tongue.

“No more foreplay. You understand?”

I did.

I saw the predator for a moment as he shucked me out of my pants and underwear, at the same time wriggling out of his, until all I was still wearing was my open shirt. The condom was rolled on with practiced ease, and even though it was lubed, I was still surprised when he lifted up and lowered himself down over me, inch by clenching inch. It felt incredible for me, but I was worried about him.

“What?” He gasped as I fisted his dripping cock in my hand.

“Go slow, baby,” I pleaded, my other hand smoothing over his cheek. “Please.”

“Slow?”

“Yes,” I managed to get out, and my voice sounded strangled, guttural, as he took me inside until he was impaled on the long, hard length of me. 

He was so tight and so hot, and when he rose up only to push back down onto me, I felt the slow sizzling heat start in my balls.

“Ride me,” I ordered him.

He sucked in a hissing breath as I tightened my grip on his leaking cock and began to jerk him off.

“Mark,” he whimpered, “I need hard…and deep. I need––I want…”

I knew what he needed. And when I lifted him off me, strong enough to move him, and shoved him face down on the couch, his firm round ass in the air, he cried out in ecstasy.

“Where’s your goddamn lube?”

Beyond words, he pointed at the end table. The top opened up, and I found the tube and had squirted out a generous amount before I returned to him. I slid first one finger and then another into his quivering, greedy hole to loud, lusty cries of pleasure.

“Mark!”

I spread his cheeks and plunged to the hilt in one powerful, hard thrust.

My name had never sounded so good. The man himself felt incredible. Just looking at my dick sliding in and out of him, seeing the perfect ass swallow me, suck me in deep, I was mute. I had an overwhelming urge to bite down in the tender flesh of his shoulder just to leave a mark for everyone to see. I wanted him to be mine.

I held onto his hip with a hold that was certain to leave bruises and bent forward and took the length of him in hand. I felt his clenching channel tighten and massage the length of me, and then felt the muscles clamp down as he rode the wave of a roaring orgasm.

I was seconds behind him, pumping him though the aftershocks as I filled the condom. When I collapsed on top of him, driving him down onto the couch, I heard him grunt with my weight.

“Sorry,” I apologized, lifting up.

“Wait,” he sighed with a sound I thought was maybe, possibly, contentment. “Don’t move.”

“I’m crushing you.”

“No, and I can feel your heart beating in your cock inside me. I like it.”

“T––”

“I love it,” his voice broke. “Okay, are you happy? I fuckin’ love it.”

I was thrilled, but not because I had won in some way. His confession was what pleased me. I was happy because I had just made love to the only man I ever would again. He belonged to me already, whether he knew it or not.

I eased gently from his body and watched as he hid his face from me, covering his eyes with his arm. I got up and went to the bathroom. I ditched the condom, grabbed a washcloth and a hand towel and cleaned myself up before heading back out to Tai.

He was quiet through my ministrations, and when I didn’t return after several minutes, he came looking for me. I was in his bed under the covers flipping channels on his TV. His expression was priceless.

“Order in, Chinese or pizza, but do it from bed,” I said, flipping back the covers so he could join me.

He stood there, staring, and then suddenly, he was beside me, cell phone in hand, as he wrapped around me, head on my chest. I think I heard him order pepperoni pizza—I wasn’t really paying attention—but when his leg slipped over my thigh and he snuggled in tight, I put an arm around him to anchor him to my side.

“Stay here, okay?”

“I was planning on it,” I assured him.

“No, I mean stay all weekend.”

“If you insist,” I chuckled, bending to kiss the top of his head.

He lifted his face at the same time so my lips met his instead. The kiss was lush with promise and slow with meaning, and when I pulled back I saw it for the first time—his eyes, filled with me.

“I like you in my bed,” he told me.

“That’s good, ‘cause I ain’t goin’ nowhere.”

And my words soothed him in ways I didn’t know about at the time.

People disappointed Tai and left Tai, and because I didn’t—because I stuck around and never, ever threatened to leave him and never got bored and laughed at his jokes—I became the one. I became the guy, his guy, and I loved it.

“Mark?”

I was brought from my daydream to face a scowling Tai.

“Sorry.”

“What’s wrong?”

I smiled at him. “Do you remember the first time you told me you loved me?”

“No,” he told me, as his eyes filled.

“Stop,” I said, reaching out to draw him in close to me. “I was just thinking about you is all.”

I heard his breath catch right before he turned in my arms and grabbed me hard. His face was buried in my shoulder.

“Mark?” My mother said slowly. “What’s going on?”

 

 

Three

 

“I can’t do it,” my brother Frank had said as he walked beside me back from the basketball court at dusk three days before.

I turned my head to look at him. “What can’t you do?”

“I can’t be you for them, Mark, I just can’t.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You saw what happened. I made a mistake and almost died, and everyone is on their way out here now to try and talk you into letting them commit me.”

“Dramatic much?” I asked him.

“It’s true, and we both know it.”

I walked silently beside him.

“I just––I feel like shit that I put everyone through that, ya know?”

“I do.”

“And now I’m the crazy guy you have to hide the razor blades from.”

When I was quiet again, he turned to look at me and found me with my eyebrow raised, staring at him.

He laughed in spite of himself. “Shit, you know what I mean.”

“I guess,” I shrugged pointing the way home for him even though he probably knew. It was engrained in me to lead; I was his older brother, after all.

“I just,” he grabbed me suddenly, making me stop and look at him. “Are you sure?”

“Sure about what?”

“Fuck you, Mark,” he snapped, pushing me back. “Are you sure you’re gonna fuckin’ die?”

“Yes, honey,” I soothed him. “I’m sick, and I’ve been sick for awhile, and now it’s time to tell everyone so they can wrap their brains around it, because I’m gonna stop being this pretty fairly soon.”

He sucked in his breath. “Does Tai know?”

“Yes, he does.”

“Then why is he still flying?”

“He’s actually taking an extended leave of absence in the next two weeks. He just needed to clock a few more miles to make him eligible. You notice he’s not flying out of the country anymore, though.”

Frank was on the verge of tears. “It’s not––it shouldn’t be you, Mark. You’re the guy who holds everything together. You’re the one everyone will come see when they’re pissed at everyone else. You’re the one who…I mean, if you’re not here, everything will fall apart.”

I shook my head, pulling him forward, sweat and all, into my arms. “You don’t have to be me, Frankie; you just need to be you. You just need to stick around and take care of Mom, and back Dad up when he gets buried in estrogen and give the girls shit, so they don’t forget to laugh. Trish and Ethan are having a rough time right now, and Deb and Alex are trying to have a baby. You need to check in with everyone, and help if you can. You need to be a part of team Gabriel. The family needs you.”

He grabbed me tight. “What about Tai?”

“It’s not your place to worry about Tai; you have your own life to live.”

“But he––”

“I’m putting Dad in charge of watching over him.”

“Dad?” He was shocked.

“Yes, Dad,” I sighed. “Dad will make sure he’s okay, and because Dad is Dad, Tai won’t be able to say no when the old man asks him to come visit. He can say no to all the rest of you, but not him. It’s engrained too deep.”

He nodded as he eased out of my arms. “All that good Japanese upbringing, huh?”

“That’s right,” I said turning for home.

Frank rushed around in front of me, and I saw, for the millionth time, a younger, more handsome, version of myself. Same blue eyes, same brown hair, but where my features were broad and plain, his were fine and chiseled. My parents’ genes had been mixed up great in him.

“You really dug me out of a shithole this time, Mark.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“I just wanted to tell you that I appreciate it—you believing that I’ll be okay.”

I tousled his sweat-dampened hair. “Of course you’ll be okay. You’re gonna be great.”

He pulled in air and was suddenly there, back in my arms, having lunged at me.

I knew I would have to get used to it.

 

* * * *

 

I was sitting in the living room looking around at the faces of my family. My father had his jaw clenched tight, and he was squinting so he wouldn’t cry. My mother was weeping and holding Tai’s hand tight. Trish was leaning into Ethan’s arms, and Deb was wrapped around Alex. I rolled my eyes.

“Don’t you dare do that!” My mother snapped at me. “It’s not fair, Mark. We get to be sad, goddamnit. It’s our fuckin’ right!”

The room was still and silent, and I knew why. My mother swearing was an event that happened maybe once a decade. It just wasn’t her way. 

Tai shot me a look, and I deflated. “Sorry.”

“How long have you had it?”

“Three years,” I told her, sinking down into the chair.

“And when did Tai know?”

“Last year,” I told her.

She turned to look at him. “Oh, honey, I’m so sorry he made you keep it from us. To have to carry the burden alone must have been exhausting.”

My mother was amazing. She didn’t attack him for not telling her; she went right to what it meant for him instead. When he leaned sideways into her arms, I saw how pleased she was. The woman had wanted to mother him since the moment they met, and it looked like now she was finally going to get her chance, sixteen years later.

It took hours to get it all out, the diagnosis and the chemo and the remission that had not lasted and the more chemo I now needed. I had to explain about the first doctor, and the second, and the godsend I had finally found who insisted on meeting Tai immediately, no matter what kind of hurt locker that put me in.

There was the grief to explain, and anger, and how I had almost pushed Tai away before I decided on being selfish and pulled him back to me with a ravenous hunger. I had to have him; he was necessary. I had not wanted him to suffer, but it turned out that me trying to put distance between us had nearly carved out his heart.

I told my family everything, explained what had happened and what would, and about the trip I was taking to Paris with the man I loved. We would be back for the holidays, and we had rented a cabin in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. I wanted a white Christmas, but I wanted it away from any of our homes. I would not have any last memories of me cluttering up the places where they lived. I especially didn’t want that for Tai, even though for him, really, there was no getting around it.  

There was crying and hugging, and my father just holding my hand nearly did me in. When I finally got up and stumbled into the bedroom, I fell face-first down on the bed.

“Yeah, I remember.”

I rolled my head to the side to look at Tai’s knees, as he had moved over beside the nightstand. “What are we talking about?”

“The first time I told you I loved you.” He took a breath, and I rolled over on my back so I could see his face. I saw immediately how red-rimmed those beautiful eyes of his were. “I remember.”

I could not control my grin. “Yeah?”

He nodded, moving closer to the bed until he touched it. “I came back early from a trip, and since I already had keys to your place, I went there first and found you asleep on the couch.”

“I can’t sleep in bed when you’re not home.”

“Yes, I know,” he said, his voice deep, husky. “And I was standing there, looking down at you, all rumpled with your glasses on your forehead and drooling––”

“Really? Drooling?”

He grunted. “But the point was, you were there, you were always going to be there, and the fact that even after a minute of us being together, you couldn’t even bear to be in your own bed without me…I just knew.”

“You knew because I had told you I loved you a million times by then.”

“And that’s your way; when you feel it, you say it, and you shout it from the rooftops, but for me––you know that isn’t me.”

“Yes, I know,” I teased him, reaching out to take hold of his hand.

“But I was there, and you opened your eyes and looked at me...” He trailed off and then slowly, gently, climbed onto the bed and lay down on top of me, pinning me under him.

“You love me,” I whispered into his hair, my hands siding down his back, fisting the worn grey T-shirt in my hand so I could yank it up and touch his skin.

“I want you inside me.”

But I was a smart man and knew that how he said it was only half of how he meant it. He was hiding again, but it was too late for that. “I’ll always be inside you, Tai; you never have to worry.”

He exhaled sharply, and I was suddenly clutched very tight.

“My family, my friends—when it’s time, think about it, Tai, it’ll be so nice. They’ll all come together, and that’ll be good.”

“‘Cause you’re the glue, Mark. Everyone loves you.”

It was nice of him to say, but there were more important things for us to talk about. “Do you know what the big moment in my life is?”

He shook his head.

“When I woke up from my nap and there you were, standing over me, and you said, ‘Oh.’“

He pinched my side, and I laughed because he felt so good—his weight, the heat from his body, and the feel of his sleek skin. I wanted to lie beneath him for the rest of the time I had left.

“And I looked at you,” I couldn’t stop laughing. “And you said ‘Holy shit, Mark, I think I love you.’”

“Fucker,” he growled, shifting over me so his groin slid over mine.

I arched up into him, and he moaned.

“I’ve never loved anyone like I love you, Mark Gabriel.”

“And it’s been the joy of my life to be loved so hard and so completely,” I said, trying to concentrate as he started to rub his hardening cock over mine, back and forth. I grabbed a handful of his hair to still him, and he froze there, staring down into my eyes. “We’re not gonna do this bullshit where I make you swear to live without me and all that crap. You know what you need, but whatever happens, wherever you end up, just know that you’re the first thing I think of when I wake up every morning and the last thing I think of before I go to bed. I love you, period.”

He collapsed on top of me, arms and legs wrapped so tight, lips open on my collarbone, sucking and licking.

“Sorry,” I chuckled, “way to kill a mood, huh?”

“Mark,” he gasped, lifting up, legs still tangled with mine as he rose up on his elbow to look down at my face. “I love you back.”

“I know,” I told him, with all the conviction I felt. “I do.”

“I’m so scared. I don’t think I’ll still be me without you.”

“Yes, you will,” I promised him.

“Do I belong to you?”

“Yes,” I said gruffly, his words making me breathless.

“Show me.”

And while I still could, I would.

I closed my eyes when his lips sealed over mine. His mouth devoured me, and his hands were rough as he tugged off my clothes, as if he was starving, ravenous, and I was everything he needed. He wanted me there, body and soul, to show him my love and make him feel it. 

“Get on your knees.”

That I could make demands caused instant trembling, and I knew that even though he wanted to be submissive to me, I had to be strong enough to demand it, to force him if I needed to. There was the promise of power in my tone, and his heave of breath told me that my voice alone, ordering and coaxing, could bring him to climax.

“Please,” he begged me, “put your hands everywhere. Touch me.”

When I bent over him, bit down into his shoulder, he shuddered under me.

“I can’t get close enough to you. I feel like I’m going to float away.”

But as the hours rolled by and I rode out the throbbing, pounding need with him, I anchored him to me and to the life I still had, and the one we still shared.

When he was spent and panting in my arms, fighting sleep, his eyes fluttering to stay open, I began stroking his hair.

“It’s okay, baby, go to sleep.”

“I don’t want to miss anything.”

“You won’t, I promise. We’ve got plans to make, and my family to take care of. It’s gonna be a busy week. You need to go to sleep.”

“You always worry about everybody else instead of yourself.”

“I think that’s how it’s supposed to be. You take care of the people you love. You just do. It works for me. I think I’ve done okay,” I said, lifting my bicep so he rolled sideways into my waiting arms.

“You’ve done great,” he whispered, wrapping around me as I tucked the blankets up around him.

As I notched his head under my chin, I had to smile. I certainly had.