Sex & Sourdough (34 page)

Kevin stared at him with a mixture of concern and pity. “I suppose it would be,” he agreed. “It wasn’t so bad, meeting your family. I’ve always been the big brother, you know? Being on the receiving end of the overprotective threats was kind of weird.”

“Well, I’m still sorry.”

Kevin settled back down. “Kind of makes me miss Jen,” he admitted.

“Why don’t you just call her?”

“No,” Kevin insisted. “No phone. No idea what her number is.” He took a long chug from his beer. “No idea what I’d say.”

“‘Hello’ would be a good start.”

“I know, but….” Kevin took another drink. Just the idea of talking to his mom and sister again left him petrified. “I’m more worried about what comes after that part. I can’t. I want to, but just… not yet.”

“Okay,” Anders said. “I’ve got a phone, you know. In case you change your mind.”

“They’re better off,” Kevin insisted.

“You’re wrong.” Anders slouched down, dropping his head back against the couch. “You’re so wrong. You didn’t shelter them, Kev, even though I know that’s what you were trying to do. You put them in a position where they’ve spent every moment of their lives mourning you. They can’t grieve because they know you’re alive. They can’t move on. And until they found out you were sick, they couldn’t stop wondering what they had done to drive you away. If I had to choose which would hurt more, five years of grief watching you die or the lifetime of pain I’d feel thinking you hated me—” Anders shook his head dramatically. “There’d be no contest. I’d gladly take five years of absolute hell if it meant I had twenty years with you to look back on. You’re not sparing them any pain. You’re making it a hundred times worse.”

“I….” Kevin swallowed hard and shut his eyes. “They’ll be angry if I tell them the truth. They’ll be furious.”

“Yeah, they’ll be angry. They love you. They’re allowed to be angry. And when they’re done being angry, they’ll still love you.”

“You don’t know that….”

Kevin felt Anders’s rough fingers on his jaw. “I do know. If they didn’t love you, they wouldn’t care enough to be angry, and you wouldn’t be
you.
”

“You always make everything sound so simple….”

“Everything is simple. It’s all just sex and sourdough.” Anders grinned and gently poked him in the ribs. “Or it can be.”

Kevin tried to shake his head, but when he felt Anders’s lips on his own, his brain shut down. “Do you have any idea how much I want to be inside of you?” Kevin whispered, before dropping his head down to nip at the tender skin over Anders’s collarbone. He felt Anders shiver beside him.

“Things don’t hurt anymore?” Anders asked. He reached across and gently caressed the denim over Kevin’s upper thigh, where the fist-size bruises on each side of Kevin’s groin were still tinted a sallow gray-blue.

“If we’re careful, if I’m on top of you, I think it’ll be fine.” Kevin ground his hips until Anders grazed the fabric over his cock with his hand. Kevin kissed his way along Anders’s jaw and up to his ear. “Want you.”

Anders reached up and wrapped one arm around the back of Kevin’s neck. “Right here on the couch?” he gasped.

“Hmm. The couch. The bedroom. The shower. I don’t care where.”

“Why weren’t you this eager when we got back this morning? I was planning on molesting you as soon as we got out of the car, you know.”

Kevin whimpered and went back to trailing his tongue over Anders’s neck. He let his fingers find their way to the button of Anders’s new jeans. “You should have said something.”

“I….” Anders shut his eyes as Kevin licked his bottom lip. “Didn’t
I?”

“You fell asleep.”

“Sorry.” Anders lifted his hips and Kevin pulled his jeans down, followed by his briefs.

Kevin settled one hand on his hip and the other on his shoulder, urging him to roll over and lean over the back of the couch. As Anders’s bare ass brushed against the bulge in Kevin’s pants, the couch suddenly seemed like the perfect place for this. Kevin kissed his way down Anders’s neck and down to his shoulder blade. “Take off your shirt,” he whispered. Then Kevin stripped off his clothes, shoving his pants and boxers all the way to his ankles before toeing out of them carefully.

“You sure you’re up for this?” Anders’s breath caught as Kevin nipped at his neck again.

“Yes.” Kevin lined his hips up with Anders’s ass so Anders could feel just how up he was. He leaned over Anders’s back and went back to kissing the soft skin in the crook of Anders’s neck. Kevin sucked a bit of Anders’s already abused skin into his mouth.

Anders shoved his hips back, and Kevin felt his cock slip against Anders’s crack, nestling perfectly. “Hurry up, already!” Anders rasped.

Kevin let go of Anders’s skin and squeezed his eyes shut tight. He knew laughing was a bad idea, but the frantic need in Anders’s voice, the desperate way he kept rocking his hips back against Kevin, was just too much. He couldn’t help laughing, and he was relieved when Anders laughed too.

Kevin licked his own fingers quickly and slipped one digit inside of Anders.

“Lube?” Anders asked.

Kevin worked his finger in deeper, rubbing soft circles around Anders’s hipbone with his right hand. “Would you smack me if I suggested we use whipped cream?”

Anders leaned forward on the couch to brace himself. Kevin wondered if Anders was so drunk that amused chuckles would be his only answer, but when Anders stopped laughing, he turned his head over his shoulder. “Whipped cream?”

Kevin slipped his finger out of Anders’s body and grabbed the aerosol can of whipped cream. He shook the can quickly and then spread Anders’s cheeks wide.

“Were you planning this?” Anders asked. He yelped as the whipped cream sputtered against his spine. Kevin left a trail of icy whipped cream all the way down his spine to his tailbone. Kevin hesitated for a moment, kept a firm grip on Anders’s hips to hold him steady, and then sprayed a trail of whipped cream all the way down to Anders’s sac. Kevin slipped his finger back inside of Anders, gliding in easily. He licked and lapped his way down Anders’s spine, scooping up the trail of whipped cream with his tongue. He angled his finger to massage Anders’s prostate and licked his way down slowly. Anders let out a choked scream as Kevin followed the whipped cream trail all the way down, circling Anders’s entrance while he slipped his fingers in and out.

When Kevin pulled his fingers out and replaced them with his tongue, Anders’s scream morphed into a ragged, stuttering gasp.

“Oh, fuck…. That’s….” Anders buried his face against the back of the couch, and Kevin felt his entire body convulse.

Anders bucked forward, away from Kevin’s tongue, and giggled. “You have to stop that….”

“You seemed to like it.”

Anders glanced back at Kevin over his shoulder. “I think that might be better than a blow job, but your whiskers tickle.”

Kevin replaced his tongue with his fingers again so he could reach deeper, then licked his way back up to Anders’s shoulders, stretching Anders quickly. He draped himself over Anders’s back and kissed his neck again. Kevin rocked himself inside Anders’s body, keeping his hands on Anders’s shoulders for leverage, and in a few slow thrusts he was fully seated inside of Anders’s body.

“Fuck, I missed this,” Kevin whispered, massaging Anders’s shoulders until the trembling passed. “You okay?”

“I’ll be better as soon as you start moving,” Anders gasped.

Kevin answered him by drawing his hips back, withdrawing until only the head of his cock remained inside of Anders’s body and then snapping his hips forward again. Kevin didn’t quite bury himself inside Anders, stopping just before the bruises on his thighs hit Anders’s ass. Anders gasped as Kevin moved inside him. Kevin used Anders’s hips and shoulders for leverage, pulling Anders back each time he thrust forward, making Anders gasp with each thrust. Kevin snaked one of his hands around Anders’s waist and wrapped his fingers around Anders’s cock. Kevin stroked him in time with his trusts, determined to keep himself contained until Anders was close.

He didn’t have to hold on long. In just a few minutes, Anders came with a shout, spilling over Kevin’s fingers. Two more soft thrusts were all it took to send Kevin over the edge. He slammed into an orgasm that shook his entire body, making him tremble as he emptied himself inside Anders. Kevin caught his breath and carefully settled his weight against Anders’s back, shoving him into the back of the couch.

“I missed you,” Kevin whispered.

“So good,” Anders whispered, his voice still shaking. “I… holy shit, I never…. No one’s ever done that to me before…. Was it gross?”

“Not really. You took a shower, like, three hours ago.”

“Can we do that again?”

Kevin nuzzled Anders’s shoulder and picked up the can of whipped cream. He gave it an experimental shake and dropped it to the floor. “We’re out of whipped cream. So if you want me to do the exact same thing again, we need to run to a grocery store. Or sneak back into the kitchen and grab the chocolate syrup from the fridge.”

Anders’s entire body was limp and relaxed beneath him, and even though Kevin knew he had to pull out, knew they needed a shower and rest, he didn’t want to move.

“Grocery store tomorrow,” Anders agreed. “After the beach.”

“Ah, I’d rather go to the store. I don’t have swim trunks, and there’s sunshine and stuff.”

“It’s the middle of October,” Anders reminded him. “The clothes you’ve got are fine, and this beach is worth it.”

“All right,” Kevin conceded. “I guess I’ve go
t sun block.”

A
N
HOUR
past sunrise, Kevin followed Anders to an unmarked trailhead that looked like it was well used. A three-foot-wide sand path wound its way toward the east. About a half-mile through the oak forest, Kevin noticed a few palm trees began to appear along the path. He rolled his shoulders and began to relax, some of his anxiety fading as his muscles and limbs moved in the familiar rhythm that had become habit after three years of living on his feet.

Not far ahead, the path dropped away. He stood beside Anders at the top of a ten-foot embankment, trying to make sense of what he saw below.

“It’s called Boneyard Beach,” Anders said. “Think you can handle climbing down?”

“I might need a painkiller, but I’m game,” Kevin said, nudging him toward an old wooden ladder. He let Anders go down first and took his time, using his arms to support a fair chunk of his weight as he stepped down to the sand.

Gigantic pieces of driftwood, some entire tree trunks, dotted the shore. The wood was gnarled and bleached of all its color. Most of it was half-buried in the sand, and ghostly white tree trunks snaked their way into the gentle waves. Kevin gaped at the waves themselves. The water was clear, but it was also a dark rich brown. It was the color of weak coffee and as clear as iced tea.

“What’s wrong with the water?”

“Nothing.” Anders chuckled. “It comes out of the Nassau Sound like that. The saltwater leaches tannins out of the plants along the shore.”

“Leaches what?”

“Tannins. The same stuff that makes tea… well, that makes it tea. It’s safe to swim in, but don’t drink it.”

“It’s toxic?”

“No, it just tastes nasty.”

“Is that why the trees are white?”

“Salt-bleached,” Anders confirmed.

With the striking contrast of skeletal trees and dark-brown water, the beach itself felt surreal. Once they were down the embankment, Kevin saw that the sand was as white as the driftwood and it stretched away to the north and south, past the edges of his vision.

“This is beautiful. And we’re the only ones here.” Kevin laughed.

Anders shrugged and led the way through a maze of white tree trunks and branches. Kevin quickly realized Anders was picking out the easiest path, just for his sake.

“This isn’t what people down here do,” Anders said, his voice sad. “People who live here golf. Kids and tourists surf. Hell, most of the tourists only think of Disney World and acrobatic killer whales when they think about Florida. But this”—he gestured toward the oak forest on the crumbling embankment above them—“this is what Florida really is, no matter how hard people like my dad try to hide it. The tourists don’t know this is here and the locals don’t care, so it’s usually pretty quiet. My parents live six miles away and they’d never even seen it until I made them hike out here with me when I was fourteen. They didn’t get it.”