A Boy Called Cin (7 page)

*~*~*

"Hey, so…" Tom speaks up over breakfast. He pauses, and Cin takes the opportunity to steal a piece of bacon. It's obvious that Tom's nervous about something, and they've only been here one night so far, so there's only a short list of things that could be.

Whatever it is, Cin's glad his thievery seems to have lightened the mood. "Listen, you said… and I'm not about to dispute it, but it got me thinking. You said about not wanting to be, umm, vaginally penetrated."

Cin forces himself not to laugh at Tom's awkwardness. He's clearly having difficulty expressing himself, but the idea of a grown man not being able to say 'vagina' without getting flustered is hilarious. Hilarious, and kind of adorable at the same time.

"Yeah. And that had you thinking about…?" Cin trusts Tom enough that this isn't about to turn into a debate over the possibility of that happening. He's said no, and he's pretty certain that'll be enough for Tom.

"Could we make touching my dick off-limits, too, do you think?" Tom looks up nervously. Cin makes a soft, sympathetic noise and gets up from his chair to hug him, bending down to kiss the top of his head.

"Definitely. Whatever makes you comfortable." Cin nuzzles Tom's hair. "You don't have to hesitate in asking for what you want, okay? Especially not when it's about something you
don't
want."

"Okay." Tom chews on his own bacon. "Umm, thank you."

"I would like it a lot if you stopped thanking me for not being a terrible person." Cin kisses Tom's lips briefly, and goes back to his breakfast. "But I understand why you keep doing it. So we're going to figure out all the ways we can get you off without touching any
where
or any
way
you don't want to be touched."

"Yeah?" Tom looks a little hopeful about that. He's so sweet, and Cin likes him a whole lot more than he meant to.

"Yep. You know how you're a software engineer?"

"Well, I dunno if I still count as one, but yeah, whatever." Clearly that's a sore point, and maybe something Cin needs to probe at carefully, rather than bringing it up again cold.

"In any case, we're gonna be sex engineers. Finding creative solutions to common problems." Cin reaches out and steals another piece of bacon. It's not normally his thing, but after Tom got around to providing the half-dozen orgasms he promised practically in a row last night, he needs the protein. There's no question that it'll be worth figuring out how to make Tom comfortable in bed.

"I dunno how common it is, but thanks. Seriously. That's not a decent person thing—that's above and beyond. Starting to think you kinda like me."

"You know, I'm starting to think I kinda like you, too."

"So other than waffles, do I need to get anything else? Besides some kind of food we can actually eat for a few days. I'm sorry the place isn't well-stocked."

"If you still want to try butt stuff, we need a water-based lube and a silicone-based lube. You might want a lot of it."

"Sounds ominous." Tom laughs nervously. "Will I be able to identify those by the packaging?"

Cin considers. "Maybe I'll be in charge of the lube. Listen, you don't have to do anything you're not ready to do. But I think it'd be good to have it in on hand if you do decide you're ready at some point. Nothing ruins the mood like having to get dressed and run to the drug store."

Tom laughs again, but he sounds a lot less nervous this time. "Yeah, I bet. Sounds like you're speaking from experience."

"Just the one time. I'm a fast learner." Cin smiles back at Tom. "I want to play with you. You should know that I'm really, honestly going to enjoy this. You don't owe me anything for it and I'm not doing you a favor. I realize this seems obvious, but I think maybe you could stand to hear it."

"Yeah," Tom's voice breaks, and he pauses to clear his throat. "Yeah, I could stand to hear that. Thanks."

Cin picks up both of their plates and kisses Tom's cheek again on his way past to the sink. "Waffles."

*~*~*

Tom had watched in complete silence as Cin unpacked the shoe box of sex toys he'd acquired over the years, and is still staring mutely as Cin sets out the last vibrator on the bed and puts the box aside. He can't help being a little smug about the degree of shock Tom seems to be experiencing over the revelation that the cute boy he'd invited over for the summer has a box full of well-loved toys to his name.

"Sex is really important to you, huh?"

"More like it's important to me that sex is fun. If you told me now that you'd rather not have any more sexual contact with me, I'd be kind of disappointed, because I'm really enjoying sex with you. But it wouldn't be a deal breaker. You'll notice that a lot of these are serviceable replacements for a partner anyway."

Tom picks up an intricate, glass dildo that's more sculpture than toy, though Cin's definitely tried it out a few times. Most of his toys are on the cheap side, but there's one or two that were rewards to himself for good grades or doing difficult things. They're noticeably nicer than the others, but not necessarily more fun to use.

"That said, I would probably still want to look at you naked," Cin adds belatedly. "You're gorgeous, naked or otherwise."

Tom keeps his eyes on the dildo, but blushes. "I was thinking the same thing about you. And I'm not about to start refusing sex. I want you to teach me how to touch you."

"And I want us both to learn how to touch you." Cin spreads his legs so one is sprawled out over the mattress and the other is folded under him. "But we'll start with me in the hopes of expanding your vocabulary and making you a little more confident about things."

"I'm all ears." Tom looks up again.

"Okay, well, first, parts-naming." Cin reaches down between his legs and traces his outer lips. "I have almost no doubt that you've seen this arrangement before, but I
do
doubt you know what any of it's called. These are the outer labia. You can call them lips, which is probably what you already do if it's ever occurred to you that there would need to be a word for that."

"It actually hasn't." Tom blinks. "Wow. I'm an asshole."

"You just never had the opportunity to learn. Anyway, moving on, inside here." Cin spreads them gently and moves his other hand down to point. "I know you know which part the clitoris is, because you have the practically unique skill of being able to find it."

Tom blushes again. "Yeah, well. I know that's a fun part."

"Most of this is actually pretty fun. These are the inner labia." Cin traces them to illustrate. "Also fun parts, definitely for me. Beyond here is where my vagina starts, which I imagine you know. I'm not going to show you, because I don't especially like looking at it."

"Fair." Tom nods. "And that's where the no-go zone starts?"

"Correct. I'm not going to kill you if your tongue or a finger slips; I know that's a possibility, so don't worry about it. Just don't do it on purpose and we're cool. Everything else is fair game, butt included, but please warn me first."

"I wouldn't do it on purpose," Tom agrees.

"You might have noticed that I've stopped wearing a binder all the time around you. My breasts are sort of a permit-holders-only area.
You
can touch them, if you want to. That's not permission I extend to everyone. I'm trusting you."

By now, the tips of Tom's ears have gone bright red. "That actually means a lot. Not that I was desperate to get my hands on your boobs, but… you know what I mean, right?"

"I do." Cin nods. "So. Questions? Comments? Revelations you might have had about your own body?"

"I still kinda have trouble believing that you could be sexually attracted to me," Tom confesses softly. "Despite the evidence."

"Well, I am. I imagine you've internalized some bullshit about your twenties being your prime and everything going downhill from there, and I can't offer you personal experience on that front, but I
can
promise that I'd rather fuck you than any college-aged boy on the planet. Not just because I like you, either."

"But you
do
like me."

"I think the fact that I agreed to spend the summer with you proves that. I try to avoid spending extended periods with people I don't like."

"Weird." Tom wrinkles his nose. Cin darts in and kisses it, because Tom's cute and he hasn't had the chance to touch him in a minute or so. When Tom giggles, Cin switches to kissing his mouth instead and crawls into his lap.

There's a moment of hesitation from Tom's side, like he's still not totally convinced Cin's into this, but he relaxes once Cin's on top of him and lets Cin kiss him, responding just enough to make it obvious that he wants to keep going. Cin likes kissing in a general sense, but he especially likes kissing Tom. There's something about him, and Cin couldn't name it if he tried. He thinks that, maybe, not a lot of people have bothered to see it.

"I
was
gonna show you how to shove all manner of things up my butt, but I'm suddenly way more interested in making out with you."

"As much as I wanna learn about that, I really like kissing you. We've got a whole summer."

Cin laughs happily and curls his hands over Tom's shoulders, folding his legs around Tom's waist at the same time. "You have no idea how happy that makes me right now."

*~*~*

Cin watches Tom eat carefully, not sure if he's imagining that this is the driest chicken he's ever eaten. They've mostly been living on pasta and things that can be cooked in a frying pan or come pretty much pre-prepared. Cin was starting to understand why, even though Tom had insisted that he more or less knew how to cook.

"This is really bad, isn't it?" Tom looks up, face apologetic.

"I wasn't going to say anything. It's not inedible."

"I think that's an overly generous assessment." Tom wrinkles his nose. "And I'm going to order pizza, because this is painful."

Cin gives an internal sigh of relief and subtly pushes his plate away. "I do appreciate the effort you went to. Honestly."

He really does appreciate it, and he hopes Tom believes him. Cin's getting the impression more and more that despite his status and achievements, not many people stop to appreciate what Tom's done. He knows he's guilty of that himself, but he's trying to make up for it now.

"I'd like to learn to cook, though. I mean, I wouldn't die if every restaurant in the world shut down tomorrow or anything, but I'd like to learn to cook
well
."

"I understand they have classes for that now. Not that you're obliged to take them, but if I had the kind of money you do, I'd probably spend a lot of it learning new things. You only live once and all." Cin picks up his glass of wine. Until he met Tom, he wasn't really a wine drinker—other than the kind handed out at gallery openings—but he's starting to get used to it. He's even starting to think he can detect notes of licorice and hazelnut and raspberry and whatever else you're supposed to taste in something made from grape juice and fungus.

Tom's already tapping away on his phone, but he nods in response. A few more taps and he looks up at Cin again, smiling wryly. "Pizza's on the way. Couch? We can take the wine."

"You always know exactly what to say to me." Cin stands and clears the table, trying not to be too enthusiastic about it. Tom's already moving to the couch, wine glasses held like a man who's waited tables before. Cin's never thought about it, but Tom wasn't born into money. That probably means he's been a broke student as well. Maybe not
as
broke as Cin, since they've got a twenty-year age gap between them, but still. Even if he doesn't have firsthand experience of everything, he hasn't lived his whole life with a silver spoon up his ass.

"You're right," Tom says when Cin sits down next to him. "If I wanna learn new things, there's really nothing to stop me. Guess I'm just used to thinking there'll always be time later."

"Well, it's not as if you're gonna up and die any time soon. I'll be very upset if you do. And you've got your whole life to learn things, and figure things out, and you should be a
very
different person on your deathbed than you are now. So you've gotta go out and
do
." Cin picks up his wine glass. "But what do I know? I'm twenty years old."

"I think you know a helluva lot more than you let on, actually." Tom shifts on the couch, goes to pick up his own wine glass, and then hesitates. "Can I ask you something? Something really personal."

"You can ask. No guarantee I'll answer." There's very little he wouldn't share with Tom, but there's always the possibility he'll ask about something Cin doesn't want to talk about
right now
. Tom's always been considerate of that kind of thing, though.

"I would totally understand if you don't want to, and I'm really sorry if this is badly worded, but…" Tom takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. "When did you know you were a boy?"

"Wow, umm." Cin looks at Tom, then reaches out to take his hand. "It's absolutely not that I don't want to answer this; it's just that it's complicated. I'm gonna try, though. Just don't take anything I say as automatically being my final word on it, all right? Because I change my mind about exactly how I feel all the time and I don't think I'll ever have a fixed answer."

"Okay." Tom nods and curls his fingers around Cin's hand. "Anything you're comfortable telling me would be great."

"I know it's not just idle curiosity or I'd probably have reacted differently. Umm, so. I'm always tempted to say that I didn't really think about it until I was in my mid-teens? Maybe fifteen or sixteen. But I think it's more that it didn't seem like an urgent question until then. I always felt like
girl
didn't really describe me. I could never put my finger on why. And for a while, I rejected all things girly, even things I really did like, in a huge push against femininity. I was just so
uncomfortable
. I wasn't definitely sure—or maybe I just didn't have the vocabulary or confidence—until I was sixteen.

"Rachel was the first person I told. Actually, well, she told me, in tears after school one day, that she thought she probably liked girls as well as boys and her parents were gonna kill her. As it turned out, they were cool with it, but there's no way she could have been sure of that. Anyway, to make her feel better, I told her that I was pretty sure I was actually a boy and we both cried and ate a lot of ice cream. She's been there for me ever since, and I like to think I've been there for her. But I'm probably a little more needy than she is."