Date: Tue, 19 Feb 2002 09:49:45 -0800
From: D S <denis141@hotmail.com>
Subject: ALONE/TOGETHER- Chapter 23 ~ ANNUS MIRABILIS, Part Four: Of Autumn,
     an interlude

Hey, folks, sorry for the delay, but that last chapter took it out of me.
(By the way, thanks to the very few people who sent me emails about it.  I
really appreciated it, especially given how much work went into it.)
Anyway, I had originally envisioned this section of Alone/Together as a
four-part arc, i.e., one section for each of the four seasons.  Well, I
changed my mind a bit, and this chapter is going to be like a "breather"
between the last and the next chapter (thus its title).  It's a bit more of
a fluff piece, but it's kind of nice (I think) and I hope you like it.  If
you want to let me know what you thought of it, you can write me at:
denis141@hotmail.com.  Hearing from you all really does mean a lot to me, so
I hope that you write, especially if you've never written before.  I always
write back.

DEDICATION:  This chapter is for Zack, because his email to me about the
last chapter was much appreciated and really made me happy.  Thanks Zack!

DISCLAIMER:  I don't know any member of NSYNC, and this story purely a work
of fiction.  This story also contains male-male sex (albeit mostly implied),
so, if that's not your thing, or if you aren't old enough to read such
things, you should stop reading now.

CHAPTER 23:  ANNUS MIRABILIS ~ Part Four:  Of Autumn, an interlude.

	SPONTANEOUS me, Nature,
The loving day, the mounting sun, the friend I am happy with,
The arm of my friend hanging idly over my shoulder,
The hill-side whiten'd with blossoms of the mountain ash,
The same, late in autumn-the hues of red, yellow, drab, purple, and light
and dark green,
The rich coverlid of the grass-animals and birds-the private untrimm'd
bank-the primitive apples-the pebble-stones,
Beautiful dripping fragments-the negligent list of one after another, as I
happen to call them to me, or think of them,
The real poems, (what we call poems being merely pictures,)
The poems of the privacy of the night, and of men like me,
This poem, drooping shy and unseen, that I always carry, and that all men
carry,
(Know, once for all, avow'd on purpose, wherever are men like me, are our
lusty, lurking, masculine poems;)
Love-thoughts, love-juice, love-odor, love-yielding, love-climbers, and the
climbing sap,
Arms and hands of love-lips of love-phallic thumb of love-breasts of
love-bellies press'd and glued together with love,
Earth of chaste love-life that is only life after love.
   	--Walt Whitman, Spontaneous Me, Leaves of Grass (1900).


	One by one, Aaron picked up the leaves that had fallen from avocado tree
and lay scattered across the yard.  When he had picked up nine or ten of
them, he ran to Lance and put them into the pile he was building over
Lance's long legs.  It was late in the afternoon, and warm, and the wind
smelled of the ocean and of juniper and sage.  Lance watched as Aaron ran
from leaf to leaf, almost as if he thought each leaf might run away if he
didn't get to it in time.  Aaron laughed as he ran, and Lance smiled as he
watched him, and tugged at the collar of his green t-shirt, loosening it,
and itching a spider-bite on his neck.   This was how a Sunday should be,
Lance thought, smiling even more, and inhaling deeply as Aaron ran towards
him, laughing at the green bouquet of leaves he held in his hands, and
tossing them at Lance's feet, and laughing even more.

	"Daddy," Aaron said, plopping down next to Lance and pressing his bare feet
up against the side of Lance's chest.  "Why are all the leaves falled down?"

	Because it's autumn," Lance said.  "The leaves fall off the trees in
autumn."

	"What's awe-dum?" Aaron asked, unsure of the word.

	"Au-TUMN is a season," Lance said, pronouncing the words slowly. "There are
four seasons - winter, spring, summer, and autumn.  It's autumn now."

	 "Oh," Aaron said, picking up a leaf and waving it at Lance.  "Is that why
the leaves are all falled down."

	"That's right," Lance said.  "And then in the spring they'll grow back, and
there will be new leaves."

	"Okay," Aaron said, looking at the avocado tree and its nearly bare
branches.

	Lance stood up and brushed the leaves off of his legs.  Aaron turned and
looked up at Lance and stood up too.

	"Are we going inside now?" Aaron asked, taking Lance's hand.

	"Uh-huh," Lance said, beginning to walk toward the house. "Josh should be
home soon and we need to get some dinner ready.  How does that sound?"

	"Good. Good. Good," Aaron said.  "I like dinner."

*	*	*	*	*

	JC was in the bathtub and his eyes were closed.  The water was hot and it
smelled like eucalyptus and lime.  He slid slowly lower into the water so
that he was submerged except for his upturned face which seemed now like an
island.  Moving his arms and legs made small waves move across the surface
of the water and across his face. It felt good to feel the water trickle off
his forehead and cheeks and lips and chin.  He licked his lips and tasted
the water.  It was sweet and pungent and bitter and warm.  The bathroom was
dark except for the two candles burning at the end of the slate black ledge
that surrounded and encased the tub, making it seem like an altar almost -
dark and rectangular and imposing.

	It was quiet except for the nearly silent sloshing sound of the
water	slowly lapping at the edge of JC's face and ears.  Pressing his hands
flat against the bottom of the tub, JC raised his head up out of the water
and rested it on a folded white towel he'd put there to use as a pillow.  JC
opened his eyes and watched the flickering candle-shadows dance high on the
wall next to the door. Then the door opened, and he could Lance's silhouette
there, like a shadow too, but not, because JC knew that it was him.

	Lance said nothing as he walked toward the tub and stepped into it and
lowered himself into the water, opposite JC, so that his legs extended on
each side of JC's legs, and his feet were pressed up against the sides of
JC's chest.  The water had made a noisy sloshing sound as Lance slid into
it, and it lapped up JC's neck, and splashed against his chin and wetted his
lips.  Lance could see JC in the candlelight and he watched as a smile
played slowly across his lips.  JC took hold of Lance's left foot and he
rubbed the sole of it with his thumb.  He could feel Lance shudder and then
softly laugh and shudder again.

	"That tickles," Lance said, pulling his foot away and resting it between
JC's legs and gently nudging him there.

	"So does that," JC whispered.

	"I know," Lance said.

	Lance could feel JC's penis grow hard beneath the sole of his foot, and
marveled at the thrill of touching it, still marveled, as if after nine
years of touching it, he was still thrilled by it, at the gift of it, at the
sweet sweet gift of it.

	"You're all mine," Lance said, sliding through the water, over and on top
of him and then next to him, and pulling JC into his arms and kissing him
three times on the check, saying each time:  "Mine.  Mine.  Mine."

	"Yours. Yours. Yours," JC said, whispering it into Lance's ear.

	Lance grasped his hand around JC's erection, rolling the foreskin back and
feeling for the tip of it and the moisture there; it was always there; and
he found it each time, and finding it sighed and ran his finger down the
hard ridged underside of it, that ridge right there, with no curve to it at
all, not like his, with its steep-sloped curve, so much so that when he was
hard the head of it touched the lower slope of his stomach just above his
pubic hair.  JC always kissed that spot, and always licked the liquid he
found there, which was always there, except tonight, JC didn't lick it
because his face was pressed into the bend of Lance's neck, and he was
licking there.

	Lance listened and heard JC's soft gasps, and felt him suck and lick and
nip at the taut tendon on the side of his neck.  Lance's hand slid slowly up
and down the full length of  what he held, gripping it tightly, not wanting
to let lose of it, wanting to hear the wail of JC getting to the brink of
it, and then feel the thick liquid of it leaking down across his fingers.
He loved the feel of it, the convulsion, and to hold JC against him, holding
him as he slowly convulsed and whimpered, thinking: Oh my god I love that
whimper, and that gasp, and how he holds to me, holds on to me.

	JC didn't resist it.  He couldn't.  And he didn't try to struggle free, to
struggle for a turn to touch Lance.  He knew (and loved) Lance wanting to
touch him, just him, and not be touched, except for him holding him, holding
onto him, clutching him as the water sloshed and splashed against his face
and he could hear it hit the floor too, the sloshing water, as he held to
Lance, and held his face in his hands and moaned into his lips as he kissed
him and said: Yes. Yes. Yes.

	"Oh Josh," Lance said, feeling the swelling that told him the whimper was
near.

	JC pulled away from the kiss and pressed his head back against the towel,
now wet from the waves of water that had hit it, drenching it.  Lance could
see JC open his mouth, as if to gasp, but saying nothing, nothing at first,
and then: Yours. And Lance kissed him as he squeezed hard at the base of
what he held knowing it was near, his coming (and the convulsions and the
whimper) and not knowing whether he wanted it to end yet but then knowing it
was too late to not end it now because he felt it stiffen and throb and he
heard JC begin to whimper, and they both said, Yes, Yes, Yes, as JC's semen
floated to the surface of the still warm water like the tendrils of a white
plant growing up from the depths of the sea to seek the surface and the sun.

	*	*	*	*	*

	Aaron was sitting on the edge of the bed in the main guest room.  His feet
dangled high above the floor.   He watched as Justin folded clothes and
added them to the pile he was making next to the black leather duffel bag
that sat open on the bed.  It was just past eleven in the morning, and Aaron
had just gotten back from the pediatrician's office.

	"So A," Justin said, stuffing the clothes he'd folded into the duffel bag.
"Did you say hi to Dr. Mel for me?'

	"Yes," Aaron said, kicking his feet against the edge of the bed.  "She said
hi too."

	"Right on," Justin said, zipping the duffel bag and setting it on the
floor.

	"Dr. Mel likes you," Aaron said, giggling.

	"Now what makes you say that, A?" Justin said, sitting next to Aaron on the
bed and leaning against him.  "You ain't holding out on me, are you?"

	"No," Aaron said, bouncing on the bed as he said it, and continuing to
bounce.  "She. Told. My. Dad. You. Was. Nice. And. She. Said. She. Likes.
You."

	"She did?" Justin said, standing up and plunging his hands into the back
pockets of his jeans.  "She said that?"

	"Yes. She. Did," Aaron said, still bouncing on the bed.

	"Wow," Justin said, looking up at the ceiling and closing his eyes for a
moment.

	Aaron stopped bouncing on the bed and looked up at Justin.  His upraised
face was held now at the same angle as Justin's face, and it caught the
light, and they seemed to be staring at the same thing now, as if standing
outside in the sun and watching a bird fly by, or looking at the sky through
the crooked fingers of bare tree branches.  Justin pressed his lips
together, trying to contain the smile forming on his face, and he opened his
eyes and helped Aaron off the bed.  The sound of Aaron's bare feet hitting
the floor sounded like two hands clapped together.  Without any thought as
to why, or perhaps because the sound that Aaron's feet had made prompted him
to do it, Justin clapped his hands together as he and Aaron walked out of
the room.  He did it three times, and tilted his head back, and each time
clapped his hands together and laughed.

	*	*	*	*	*
	JC watched Lance appear at the back door and walk towards him from the
house.  The floodlights were on and his shadow stretched for at least twelve
feet before him.  He carried a bottle and two glasses.   It looked like
champagne, but JC could not tell for sure, not at first, and then he saw
that it was champagne, and he smiled and stood up.  When he arrived at the
gazebo, and climbed its three small wooden steps, Lance handed JC a glass.
It was chilled, and touching it prickled the skin on JC's right arm.

	"What's the occasion," JC asked, smiling at Lance and watching him fill the
glass with champagne.

	"I don't know," Lance said, shrugging and filling his own glass too.
"Maybe just getting back to normal, and having things settle down."

	"Yeah," JC said, tipping his glass toward Lance.  "Normal is nice."

	Lance clicked the edge of his glass against the glass that JC had tilted
towards his own, and then he took a long slow sip of champagne, letting it
play across his tongue, and holding it in his mouth before he swallowed it
in three small gulps.  JC watched Lance take that first long slow sip of
champagne, and watched the rise and fall of his neck as he swallowed it.  He
took a sip himself, swallowing it quickly, and he reached up to touch the
soft pale skin at the base of Lance's neck.  It was soft, and warm, and he
could feel his pulse there.  Lance set the bottle down, and his glass down,
and he pulled JC toward him - eagerly, smiling, and not wanting to wait, and
not waiting, to kiss him.

	*	*	*	*	*
	Aaron lay asleep, clutching the stuffed velveteen rabbit that was his
favorite.  His room was filled with moonlight that seemed to shimmer on the
walls, like the way water does when lit from below.  It was quiet except for
the sound of his slow steady breathing.  JC and Lance stood silently in the
doorway to his room, arm in arm, Lance's head resting on JC's shoulder as
they both watched Aaron sleep.  They had been standing there for only a
minute, or maybe three, having just come in from outside and upstairs.

	Standing there, it seemed to them like more than a minute, and more than
three.  It seemed to them like all the time there'd ever been, and ever
could be.  It seemed to them like a moment outside of time, of all time.
And it seemed to them like all the time they ever wanted, or would ever
need.  It was their time, the three of them, together.  And it was so good.