Authors: Chris Scully
Tags: #Is closeted Greek-Canadian Peter willing to sacrifice his happiness with Louie for family duty?, #Dreamspinner Press; gay romance; Chris Scully
Happy |
Chris Scully
19
was a dimly burning porch lamp. He stumbled once, but didn’t go down.
At the door he fumbled in his pocket for a long time, and then he bent over.
After that, he didn’t get back up.
With a sigh, Louie turned the engine off and got out to help.
He found Peter seated on the ground in front of the door, half his face
hidden by shadows and the other half looking dejected under the glow of the
lamp. “Wow, you’re really in bad shape, aren’t you?”
“Can’t find the keys,” he said, sliding his hands uselessly over the
dark pavement. Louie used the glow from his cell phone to promptly locate
the missing key chain amid a scattering of old leaves. After a couple of tries,
he found the one that unlocked the door.
Peter didn’t budge from the ground. Instead, he held out his hand
expectantly, and Louie hauled him to his feet, stumbling a bit under the
weight. “Demetra so owes me for this,” he muttered. But as he draped
Peter’s heavy arm over his shoulder and hooked him around the waist, he
was smiling. He’d be lying to himself if he said he didn’t enjoy the grappling
just a little bit. It wasn’t every day he got to feel up his teenage crush. Peter
felt nice and solid in his arms. Even his cologne, which had seemed so
overpowering in the car, smelled just right now. At this rate, he wouldn’t
need the porn at all when he got home.
With a little maneuvering and absolutely no help from the dead weight
in his arms, he managed to get them safely inside. He smothered a nervous
laugh as Peter’s hand fell from his shoulder to skate down his back and
graze his ass. “Jeez, Peter, you move pretty fast for a straight guy.”
The hand quickly vanished.
Louie felt along the wall until he located a light switch. When he
flicked it on, light flooded a basement. A well-appointed basement. The
space had been converted into a fully contained apartment with a kitchen
and everything. He gave a low whistle. “This is a sweet setup. No wonder
you’re in no hurry to leave.”
“Yeah?” Peter’s hot breath blew against his ear. “I’ll trade you.”
“Careful. I’m homeless at the moment, and I might take you up on
that. Where’s your bedroom, big guy?”
Peter’s body suddenly stiffened. He took an unsteady step away to
stand on his own. “I think I can take it from here.”
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“Are you sure?” Louie reached out instinctively when Peter wobbled—
saw the way Peter flinched and drew back from his touch in a panic. His
face burned as though he’d been slapped.
“I’m good.” Peter wouldn’t meet Louie’s eyes. “I don’t need your help.”
Anger, hot and heavy flooded his veins at the telling reaction. Peter
was nothing but a fucking hypocrite—surrounded himself with gay friends
but got all freaked out when another man touched him.
“Suit yourself.”
Calmly, far more calmly than he was feeling, Louie set the keys down
on the nearby coffee table and let himself out.
THREE
Peter woke up horny—not an unusual condition for him, especially
when he’d been drinking, but this morning he was dreaming about strong
arms and hard, muscled bodies. An exotic scent he couldn’t quite place—
like sandalwood and oranges—teased his senses. A small part of his foggy
brain knew where this was going, and for a second he considered forcing
himself awake, but his dick had other ideas.
Still half-asleep, he rolled onto his stomach and ground his hips in slow
circles against the mattress. Somehow he’d managed to undress himself the
night before, and now he hummed at the pleasurable friction against his
naked skin. He reached down and wrapped his fingers around his length….
“
Panagiotis
?” His mother’s strident voice cut through Peter’s hangover
haze like a chainsaw cutting through a rotten tree branch. “
Panagiotis
? Are
you awake?”
He stopped his thrusting but didn’t release his grip. “It’s Peter, Ma,”
he mumbled in English, turning his face into the pillow. It didn’t matter if
she heard it or not. For as long as he could remember, he’d been repeating
the same thing, and she never listened; both his parents persisted in calling
him by his Greek name.
“It was good enough for my father,” his dad would say. “It’s good
enough for you.”
“You’ll be late for church,” she hollered, now outside his bedroom
door, still speaking Greek. Thirty years in this country and she stubbornly
refused to speak English unless dealing with customers at the restaurant.
How much was an act and how much was real, he never quite knew. Most
of the time she seemed to understand him just fine when he spoke English—
unless of course she didn’t
want
to understand him, and then she feigned
ignorance.
“I’m not going?” Peter muttered.
“I did not hear you.”
“I said I’m not going. I’m not feeling well.”
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The door to his bedroom flew open. “Ay,” she said, seeing how he’d
dropped last night’s clothes on the floor. “What a mess.”
“Ma,” he cried in horror, flipping over and jerking the covers up to his
chin. He cupped himself for added protection. His morning wood wilted.
“You can’t just come in here.”
“
Pfft
,” she said, ignoring him. She carried his freshly laundered
clothes, which she hung in the closet before bending to pick up yesterday’s
pants, clucking her tongue as she neatly folded them over her arm. “Who do
you think changed your diapers?”
“It’s not the same,” he insisted to the back of her blonde head. “I’m an
adult now. What about privacy?”
“Why do you need privacy?” Tina Georgiou swiveled her head to
squint at him. “When you have a wife and a house of your own, you can
have privacy. Are you sick?”
“I have a headache.” That much was true.
“Your father always gets those too after a night at the social club. Too
many late nights,
Panagiotis
,” she scolded.
“I was with Demetra.” It was a lie, but he’d learned that he could get
away with almost anything if he blamed it on Demetra.
His mother’s harsh face transformed with a smile. “Good, good.
Things are going well? She’s a good girl. Don’t let her get away like the
others.”
“I won’t, Ma.”
“Soon, I will be too old to take care of your babies.”
“You’re not old.” He squirmed into a sitting position, still holding
the blankets to his chin and covering his bare chest. This was a familiar
conversation. He wasn’t even sure he wanted kids. But he didn’t dare bring
that up.
Peter’s father, Konstantinos, or Kosta to his friends, yelled down the
basement stairs, “Hurry it up. We’ll be late.”
“He says he’s not going,” his mother hollered back.
“Well, tell him not to forget he opens today.”
“I won’t, Pop,” Peter shouted tiredly, wincing at the pain in his head.
In three years he’d never been late opening the restaurant. He turned to his
mother who was filling the laundry basket with clothes from his hamper.
“See, I can’t go to church. I have to open at eleven.”
“You could come for Matins,” she suggested.
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Working at the restaurant usually got him out of the full three-hour
service on Sundays, but he didn’t feel up to even the first half today. The
hammering in Peter’s head worsened. His mouth felt fuzzy. “I can’t, Ma,”
he moaned, falling back against the pillows and making a show of it.
She laid the back of her hand against his forehead. “Fine,” she sighed.
“Shall I make
tiganites
? I have extra batter from breakfast.” The fried pancakes
were his favorite, but this morning the last thing he wanted was food.
“I’m not hungry. And Ma, you know Pop is supposed to avoid fried
foods.”“Bah, a little won’t hurt. Some yogurt, then? With honey?”
“You’re going to be late for church,” he reminded her.
“But you need to eat something.”
He sighed. “Fine. I’ll grab a
koulouri
. Do we have any?” Her homemade
round bread rings covered with sesame seeds made a quick, delicious treat.
She smiled, pleased to have won the battle. “I baked some yesterday.
They are upstairs in the kitchen.”
“Thanks, Ma.”
The minute she left the room, he pulled the covers over his head and
groaned. Jesus, he had to get out of here before it was too late.
He stayed like that, cocooned beneath the covers, breathing in his own
stink until he heard their muffled footsteps overhead, then the sound of the
front door closing. A few minutes later, his dad’s Cadillac fired up. How that
thing still ran, he’d never know. It was just like his dad: old but too damn
stubborn to quit.
Peter flipped back the sheet and took a deep breath. He stared up at
the ceiling. How had he ended up here? Thirty-two and still living in his
parents’ basement. What a loser. Even
he
wouldn’t date him.
He’d almost escaped once. He had a letter of acceptance from an out-
of-town college and everything. And then Ma had broken down in front of
him, begged him not to go. Said that he was killing her. That she couldn’t
bear to live with her only child so far away. In the end he’d relented and
chosen the local college instead. They had refurbished the basement just for
him, and he had settled in without a word of protest.
He got his bachelor’s degree in business and then went on to his
master’s. He found a great job. He met Elena and got engaged. When it fell
apart after a couple of years, he went back to dating the women his mother
set him up with.
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He tried again; lined up an apartment nearby as a compromise. Then
came Pop’s heart attack. It was a big one and took him nearly a year to fully
recover. Peter had been five years into a job he loved in the city’s Economic
Development Office when it happened. He knew what was expected of him;
they didn’t even need to say it this time. Ma just gave him a look, and the
plans to move out were gone. The restaurant was his family’s pride and
joy—open 362 days a year since 1985. Peter quit his job and took over
running the restaurant. He’d been there ever since.
With a heavy sigh, Peter rolled out of bed and stumbled down the
hall to the bathroom. He grabbed two Tylenol out of the medicine cabinet,
swallowing them with a chaser of Pepto-Bismol, and crawled into the
shower where he turned the shower head on pulse in an effort to sober up.
“Are you happy?”
The question made his shoulders tight.
He vaguely remembered Demetra’s brother bringing him home last
night and groaned. He hoped he hadn’t made a fool of himself. He didn’t
need Demetra thinking he was any more of a loser.
Under the warm spray, his muscles relaxed. He soaped himself slowly,
lathering up his penis and coaxing it back to hardness. He usually had to
be quick and quiet, but knowing he had the house to himself, he lingered,
stroking his chest, playing with his nipples until they were hard. With his
eyes closed, he worked his cock, lightly pinching his foreskin together over
the head for added stimulation the way he liked. A familiar fantasy took
root in the back of his mind; his fingers slid over his ass, slipped into his
crack, brushed his hole with featherlight touches. Peter held his breath as
he pressed one finger inside, not penetrating very deep—just enough to
make his erection jump in his hand and his toes curl against the plastic
shower pan. He left it there, gently moving in and out, while he stroked
himself harder, faster. His balls drew up tight; his cock pulsed in his hand
as he came hard. So hard he had to lean against the tiled wall until his head
stopped swimming and he could catch his breath.
By the time he stepped out of the shower, his headache had abated,
and he felt almost human again. With a towel knotted around his waist, he
wandered into the basement kitchen to brew a single cup of coffee.
As he waited for the water to run through, he had a vague recollection
of Demetra’s brother standing right there. And if he wasn’t mistaken, looking
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pissed off too. No wonder. What an ass he’d been. Why hadn’t Demetra told
him they’d gone to school together?
He couldn’t say what prompted it, but coffee in hand, he began hunting
for his high school yearbook from senior year. He found it on the bottom
bookshelf in his bedroom and sat down on the bed with it splayed across his
lap as he leafed through the pages. Louie would have been two years behind
him, so first he went to the class photo section. He found Louie Papadakis
straightaway, looking like every other geeky, pimply faced kid back then.
He wore a white dress shirt, buttoned tight at the neck. His hair was cut
short on the sides with spiky, frosted tips on top.
Peter avoided his own class picture—no need to walk down that