Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 23:53:44 -0700
From: Hobbyboy <hobby391@att.net>
Subject: Boy From The High Country, Chapter 15

BOY FROM THE HIGH COUNTRY - 15

by Hobbyboy

hobby391@att.net

DISCLAIMER: This story depicts a sexual relationship between an
underage boy and an adult male. If you are offended by such
material, or if it is illegal for you to read such stories in
your state or country, consider this your warning. You are
solely responsible for the consequences if you continue
reading. This is a work of fiction. The narrator is a
fictionalized version of the author. Everyone else is a
complete fabrication.


CHAPTER 15: SEATTLE

Weekends at Thousand Trails were wonderful for the lazy camper.
>From Friday night through Sunday noon there were meals
available at reasonable cost either in the club house or at the
barbecue pit. Although there were more people on weekends, that
also meant more variety of conversation and more choice of
companionship for children. Members almost automatically
trusted one another. It was hard to hide any skullduggery in
the fairly close quarters of the resort.

Kelly and I had bacon and eggs and pancakes in the clubhouse,
then dawdled over an extra cup of coffee for me, chocolate for
him. He was happy and relaxed, not yet anxious over the noon
arrival of the Watsons. It was as good a time as there was
going to be to bring up one more concern of mine.

"Kelly, what if Freddie were a girl."

He looked at me incredulously. "Hunh?"

"No, what I mean is, what if the Watsons had a daughter instead
of a son, and they adopted you, and you fell in love with her.
What do you think they should do?"

"About what?"

"Well, do you think that they would expect that you would sleep
together? Would they want their teenage daughter and her
boyfriend to be having sex in their house?"

"I don't think so." He gave the verb particular emphasis.

"Okay, Kelly, you're a smart kid. What is my next question?"

That puzzled him for a moment, but he was indeed a smart kid,
and it did not take long for the penny to drop. "Why should it
be different for me and Freddie?"

"Freddie and me," I corrected him.  "Exactly. Why should it be
different for you and Freddie."

"But that's... But we already... I mean... I don't know."

"Well, let me ask you another one. The first night we were
together you stripped naked in front of me before we went to
the showers. Would you have done that in front of Joyce?"

"No way," he laughed, blushing at the thought.

"Why not?"

"Because she's a girl, I mean a woman, and you're a man."

"In other words, it's more natural for two men to get naked
together."

"Of course it is."

"And that's part of the reason it seems easier for you to have
sex with Kelly than it might be if you were a straight boy and
they had a daughter. Before you can be physically intimate you
have to get over your natural modesty. With two boys, that
isn't such a problem. Pregnancy isn't a problem, either."

"Okay, I get it. But what are you trying to tell me?"

"I'm not telling you anything yet. But I want to ask you
another question. I'm sure you've heard about AIDS, Kelly."

"Of course, who hasn't?"

"Do you have any idea of why a lot of people think of it as a
gay person's disease?"

"My step dad says it's God's punishment on people for being
gay."

"Oh, shit. Of course he would, that bastard. I'm sorry Kelly. I
tell you to watch your language, and then I can't watch my own.
Kelly, God doesn't work that way. Diseases have been around as
long as there have been people. People get sick and die. Your
father died of cancer. Do you think God was punishing him for
something?"

"My step dad said he was punishing me."

"He what? He said your father died because you were a bad
person?"

Kelly nodded, and his eyes were beginning to tear up. I just
lowered my head into my hands. The depth of human cruelty could
sometimes still astound me.  I looked up into Kelly's eyes. "Do
you believe that, Kelly?"

"I don't know."

"Let me tell you a story. You know, Jesus had some followers
who were just as dumb as your step father. One day they were
walking down the road and they came across a man who had been
born blind. So one of Jesus' friends said, 'Whose fault is it
that he's blind, himself or his parents?' And Jesus said,
'Neither one. Did you hear about those men who were building a
tower in the next town, and it collapsed and killed ten of
them? Did you think those men were more wicked than other
people? That is not the reason people die.' So if your father
knew his Bible the way he thinks he does, he would never say
what he did.

"Shit happens, Kelly. People get sick. People die. Sooner or
later, we all die. That's the way it is. Some diseases you get
from germs in polluted water, some diseases you get from people
who coughing aroundyou. There are several ways to get AIDS, but
the quickest is directly into your blood stream. You bled when
Jason raped you, especially at first, didn't you?"

Kelly nodded, obviously uncomfortable at thinking about this
again.

"If he had HIV, you would have gotten it too. Anybody can get
HIV, Kelly. Most of the people in the world who have HIV are
women. A lot of them are prostitutes, who have sex with a lot
of men for money. But in this country, HIV and AIDS spread
faster among gay men because a lot of them had decided that
being gay was a good excuse for having a whole lot of sex with
a whole lot of people. The more people they had sex with, the
higher their chances of getting the disease.

"Here's my point, Kelly. You don't have any control over
whether you are gay or straight or whatever. But a gay person
has just as many decisions to make as a straight person about
when and where and with whom to have sex. Now I'm going to tell
you what I believe. I believe that God intended sex to be
something special between people who really love each other. I
don't think that being gay is an excuse for adopting what some
people call a 'gay lifestyle,' any more than being a straight
woman is an excuse for becoming a slut ^Ö I mean, for having sex
with every man who comes along.

"I'm a teacher, Kel, and I know a number of my former students
who are gay, and I'll tell you what I hope for every one of
them ^Ö and this is what I have said to them. I hope every one
of them finds one special man to love and cherish for the rest
of their lives. And if you truly are gay, Kelly, that's my wish
for you too."

I paused a moment to see if any of this was sinking in. I knew
it was too much all at once, but I hoped that this would not be
the last chance we would have to talk. "Now I'm going to ask
you one more question, Kel. I asked you yesterday morning, and
now I'm asking again. Do you love Freddie?"

"Yes," he said without hesitation.

"So once more I ask: do you really love him? Or do you just
love having sex with him? What would you be willing to give up
to be with Freddie? Or would you just take Bryan instead and
forget him?"

Kelly's eyes were growing moist. "I don't want to ever be away
from Freddie. If Bryan came to this resort I would never do
anything with him. I only want Freddie."

"Okay, Kelly, here comes the big one. What if the Watsons said
that you could live with them, but only if you and Freddie had
separate bedrooms and agreed not to have sex together. What
would you say?"

He began to squirm in his seat. This was not the kind of forced
choice anyone likes to make. "You mean if I could only have
Freddie as a friend?"

"That's exactly what I mean."

He stared at his nearly empty cup, and ran his finger idly
around the rim. Finally he looked up. "I would rather have
Freddie as just a friend than ever be away from him." The tears
were welling up in his eyes again, threatening to overflow the
rim of his lower lids. "I love him, Uncle Art," he said, and
when he blinked, a tear did overflow and run down onto his
cheek.

"I guess you do, Kel," I said. "I guess you really do. And I'm
glad, because I have a feeling that is exactly what Bill and
Joyce might ask you to do."

It was a very quiet Kelly who left the club house, clinging to
my hand like a much younger boy.

I had thought of taking Kelly to church. I had visited a nearby
small, friendly church on a previous visit to this resort, one
where I knew Kelly would near none of his step father's bigotry
and rage. But considering his past, going to church would
probably be a stressful occasion for Kelly, and he needed to
relax. Instead I signed us up for a trail ride. There were two
spaces available for the ten o'clock ride. It was a child's
type of ride really, a dozen horses loosely connected into
something like a pack train, taking a leisurely stroll through
the national forest land that abutted the resort. It was not
what a real horseman would have called riding, but this was the
closest Kelly had ever been to a large animal, even counting
the elk that sniffed his arm at Mammoth Hot Springs. He was in
awe of the big chestnut gelding that was to carry him, and once
in a while he just shivered with delight between chatty
commentaries on the passing landscape.

The trail ride left us a bit dusty, so we showered and changed.
Kelly donned the shorts he was still using in lieu of a swim
suit. He wanted to be ready for a swim as soon as Freddie
arrived. During the last half of our waiting time, he was a
study in perpetual motion.

Freddie was cute, there was no denying that. Not stunning, but
cute. He was almost exactly the same height as Kelly, and
although he was a year younger, he looked the same age. He had
a mop of blond hair that hung down nearly to his eyebrows, and
on the sides was cut short only up to the tops of his ears, so
that from the front it looked like the cap of a mushroom. His
mouth was a little too wide so that when he smiled, which was
often, it appeared to stretch from ear to ear. He had light
brown eyebrows over sparkling hazel eyes. His nose was a bit
too large, but all his imperfections worked together to give
his face an elfin appeal. Only the pointed ears were lacking,
thank God. The golden bronze color of his skin belonged in a
tanning lotion advertisement. His boyish chest showed little
muscular definition, and his belly button was ^Ö well, I had
seen innies, and I had seen outies, but Freddie's lay atop his
perfectly flat abdomen like a miniature life ring, or a wide
Cheerio.

All this I saw the moment he emerged from his parents' Ford
Expedition because he had not just brought a swim suit; he had
worn one. It was a black Nike racing suit, but I had already
noticed several other similar suits on boys at the pool.
Apparently boys in the campgrounds were less driven to hide
everything under baggy boxer-type trunks. He was shirtless, and
there was a white towel thrown over his right shoulder. It
nearly fell off when he leaped from the vehicle and ran to
Kelly, unashamedly hugging him in boyish glee. Kelly appeared
reluctant to respond. He glanced anxiously back and forth
between Bill and Joyce, but seeing no open sign of disapproval,
he quickly returned the hug. He immediately moved to Joyce and
they hugged as if they had been separated for months, and he
shook Bill's hand. It did appear that Bill was more reserved
and less given to open displays of affection, which might have
helped create a certain emotional void in Freddie that Kelly
was filling. The greetings past, Kelly  took Freddie by the
hand and led him off toward the pool, the two of them
chattering like chipmunks. I saw Freddie give an admiring touch
to the jade oval that hung from the silver chain around Kelly's
neck.

I would later discover that Freddie was like Kelly in other
ways as well. He was at almost exactly the same stage of
puberty. Like Kelly he was uncircumcised, attributable as I
later learned to the fact that he had been born in Europe while
his father was working for Microsoft's German subsidiary.
Unlike Kelly's contoured penis, Freddie's was as straight as a
frankfurter and equally smooth with a rounded end; no "clam
neck" on Freddie. All this became clear when I changed with the
boys after a later session in the pool.

As the whirlwind passed, I directed my attention to the
Watsons. I judged them to be in their mid-thirties, both trim
and tanned. Joyce was wearing pleated khaki shorts and a white
polo shirt. Her blonde hair was cut to medium length and was
well but casually styled. Her grip was firm and her palms were
dry as I shook her hand. Bill was about my height with light
brown hair and blue eyes. His hairline was not visibly
receding. He wore light blue unpleated shorts and a dark blue
polo shirt. Both Bill and Joyce were wearing Birkenstocks over
bare feet.

I had borrowed two camp chairs from the club house so we did
not have to sit on the hard bench of the picnic table. The
sites on either side of us were deserted, their inhabitants off
on one of the many weekend activities available at Thousand
Trails. We exchanged our vitals, age and occupation, background
and experience, church affiliation and political leanings. I
told them as much as they needed to know about my relationship
with Kelly, how I had found him, why I had taken him with me,
how devoted to him I had become, what I had learned of Kelly's
home life, if life it could be called. I omitted only the
physical side of my love for Kelly.

We circled the runway for quite a while. Finally it was time to
land. I had had plenty of time to think about what I wanted to
say. "Bill and Joyce, here is the situation. Kelly obviously
cannot return to the Fosters. He has no other living relatives.
He needs a home. I have come to love Kelly like my own son and
would give him a home if I could, but I am a fifty-five-year-
old single male and I know the prejudice Oregon's child service
agencies have against single men as adoptive parents. Wyoming
is even more conservative, and we will have to deal with
authorities there also. I believe that Reverend Foster has no
desire to have Kelly any longer. The fact that Kelly was
willing to hitchhike all the way to Seattle to find you is a
powerful recommendation for you. It would probably be better
not to mention the fact that one man transported him across
three state lines. You have a previous relationship with Kelly,
and it is very clear to me that he likes and respects you.
Joyce, the fact that he calls you 'Mom' is not an accident.

"I have seen how you interact with Kelly, and he has told me
how open you were to him those times when he ran away from
Foster. I may be presumptuous here, but I have a feeling you
would do it in a heartbeat, except for one other thing. I think
there's a pretty good chance that Kelly is gay. He has a pretty
mixed-up background, and there's a lot of sexual uncertainty
with young teenagers anyway, but I think he knows who he is.
So there is the situation."

I did not behave like a door-to-door salesman and ask the
leading question. I let them just think about it for a while.
It was Joyce who spoke first. "I just don't know what to
think," she said. "I mean, we're a Christian family, and being
gay just can't be right. I can't believe that God would ever
make anyone gay."

I stood up and began to pace. I always think better on my feet.
"I've been down this road before," I began. "Bill, Joyce, I'm
nearly twice your age, and I've experienced a little bit more
of the history of the Christian church than you have. My dad
was a Baptist minister, and I grew up in that church. When I
was a kid, this was back in the early fifties, people in my
church said the same thing about alcoholics. They said that the
Bible says drunkenness is a sin, and God would never make
anyone a sinner, so no one could be born an alcoholic. They
said that trying to define drunkenness as a disease was just at
attempt to make sin sound acceptable.

"But guess what? Today, fifty years later, even the most
conservative Baptist church is likely to have an AA group in
the basement. So what changed? Did God change? Did the Bible
change? I don't think so. I think we finally just realized that
we were asking the wrong questions. And you know what else?
Those church people back then were partly right. There really
are people who drink too much because they are low down, rotten
scum-bags.

"I think that fifty years from now, maybe even sooner, we'll
realize that we were asking the wrong questions about gay
people too. I know all the Bible verses people quote on the
subject, but the ones they quoted about alcohol seemed just as
clear and definite at the time. I'll tell you the questions I
think we should be asking. We should be asking about love and
commitment and faithfulness. Let's stop telling God how he can
or can't make people."

If Joyce had not been raised to be so polite, I am sure her
mouth would have been hanging open. "Art, we just moved here
from Wyoming last Saturday" she said. "We only knew one couple,
and those were some Microsoft people we knew from Germany. They
were so anxious to introduce us to their church that they came
and took us there the next morning. The sermon was on diversity
in God's creation. He said practically the same things you
said, and it made me a little upset at the time. But now that
I've heard it a second time, I don't know, I guess I'm going to
have to think about it some more." There was a brief silence.
"Bill, do you want to put anything in here?"

He looked a bit startled, as if he had been somewhere else for
a moment. "Not right now," he said, "but Art, could we just
walk around and talk a little bit? Joyce, is that okay?"

"Sure, Bill," she answered. "I have some thinking of my own to
do."

The nature trail through the nearby woods began only a hundred
feet or so away from the camper. Bill kicked a few stones, but
seemed to have trouble getting started. Finally he ventured, "I
suppose you've noticed that I've let Joyce do all the talking
so far."

"Yes, I had noticed you were a bit quiet."

"I'm not usually that much of a talker anyway. But this is even
harder." We walked on in silence for another dozen yards, and
they he stopped and turned to me. "Can I trust you?" he asked.
And then he began to laugh. "That makes a lot of sense, doesn't
it? If I can trust you, you're going to say yes. If I can't
trust you, you're going to say yes. Great question!" Another
pause, and he kicked another pebble. "I guess I'm going to have
to take a chance. If Kelly trusts you, I guess I can too." He
started walking again, and this time he seemed ready to say his
piece. "That question you asked me yesterday. I've tried not to
think about that for a long time. Now with Freddie and Kelly, I
guess I have to think about it. The answer to your question is
yes. I did fool around with another boy when I was young. Only
it wasn't a boy. It was a man, or, well, almost a man I guess.
My father was a college professor. He died when I was seven.
There was a good pension for my mom, but also free tuition for
all his dependents. So after a couple of years, Mom decided to
go back to school. We moved into a university-owned apartment
and rented out the house ^Ö it was quite a ways out in the
suburbs and I think it reminded her too much of Dad.

"Anyway, I was desperately lonely. I missed my dad so much. He
was always the one who tucked me in at night, not my mom. He
was a very warm and affectionate man. When he died it was like
my world ended. There was a graduate student who lived down the
hall from us. His name was Kevin. He used to baby-sit for me
when Mom was at the library or in a class after I got home from
school. I was nine years old. I used to sit on his lap a lot,
and I wanted him give me hugs and kisses the way my dad did. He
didn't really want to at first. Knowing what I know now, I
suppose he was scared spitless. But I would hug him anyway, and
pretty soon he started to hug me back. But you know, he wasn't
my dad, and he was maybe twenty-three or twenty-four years old
and, you know, your hormones are still working real well, and I
think I must have made him horny, you understand. Anyway, one
night I begged him to tuck me into bed, and then I didn't want
him to leave, and I made him stay. That sounds funny, doesn't
it? I made him stay. What was I going to do, beat him up? But,
you know, I was nine years old and kind of cute I guess, and I
just begged him to get into bed with me. It was summer and he
was just wearing some sweats shorts, no shirt or socks or
anything. Nothing under them either, I found that out pretty
quick.

"Anyway, the truth is that I really loved him. He was good to
me and he never hurt me. I think he loved me too. Heck, I know
he did. He told me once that I had spoiled him for all the
girls on campus. I didn't really know what he meant, but I
thought it was a compliment. By the time Mom got her degree and
Kevin got his Ph.D., I was thirteen. It was really different
when I was thirteen because, well, you know, I wasn't just a
little boy any more.

"After Spring vacation of his last year he started telling me
that we had better start doing things less often, I mean the
sex things, you know, because he was going to graduate and Mom
and I would be moving back into the house. He said I should get
used to being alone more because soon we were going to have to
say good-bye. And then he told me that he loved me. That was
the first time he actually said it. He said he would always
love me. And the funny thing is that I was almost ready for him
to go away. I was never really gay, you know. I just loved this
man. But by that time there was this girl, her name was Bridget
of all things, that I was sort of starting to like, and Kevin
told me that was a good thing. He even showed me a few things
to do on the dance floor so I wouldn't be too embarrassed when
I took Bridget on a date.

"So it finally came to an end. I was really sad, but Kevin said
he would come and see me once in a while because he still loved
me. And he did, too. He even came to my high school graduation.
But we never had sex again after that. Later on, after I became
a Christian, I thought I ought to feel angry and guilty and
everything, but I didn't. I just remembered that Kevin loved
me, and he was there when I needed him. I gave up a long time
ago trying to fit that into my theology.

 "So I understand Kelly better than you think. I know what it
is like to be lonely and to not have a man in your life that
you can trust. He also needs a father, and that's not
necessarily the same thing in his case. I think I could be a
good father to Kelly. But I can't be ^Ö anything else. I can't
be what Kevin was to me. I just can't. I won't. I couldn't do
that to Joyce." Bill stopped walking again and turned to face
me. "I watched him watching you when we first arrived. He
wanted to see Joyce and me, and he was overjoyed to see
Freddie, but he adores you. I think Kelly has already found the
man he needs. Hasn't he?"

I looked at him levelly. "You know I can't answer that
question," I said.

He smiled. "Thank you," he said. "That was the right response."
He turned and moved down the path again, a little more briskly
this time. "That brings us to Freddie. Do you think Kelly
really loves him? I mean, not just a schoolboy crush or
friendship getting maybe a little to intimate. I mean love?"

"I think he does," I said. "As much as he knows his own mind,
he does. He told me he would rather have Freddie just as a
friend than be away from him."

"I don't think boys their age should be having sex all the
time, do you? I don't mean just with each other, I mean with
anybody."

"Honestly? You heard me say it a few minutes ago. I think it's
better that they learn something about love and commitment
first."

"Yes, and I'd like to see them keep their options open.
Especially Freddie. I think he loves Kelly in his own way, but
he really hasn't had much social contact with girls either. I'd
hate to see him just assume he was gay because that was what he
was used to." I said nothing, sensing that he needed to talk
this out rather than get my advice. "And besides, how many men
do you know who married the girl they were in love with when
they were fourteen?"

"Two," I answered.

"Really?"

"Yep. So it happens. But you're right, not very often."

"I doubt it happens any more often for someone who's gay."
There was another lengthy pause. "Still, boys will be boys,
won't they?" I was amazed at how calmly he was taking all this.
I supposed he had to be somewhat tolerant, or deny a whole
period of his own life. "We couldn't afford to be suspicious
and refuse to ever leave them alone together."

"That's probably wise."

"And they might sometimes do things we had asked them not to
do."

I shrugged my shoulders. "They are thirteen, fourteen."

"I wonder what I would do if Kelly were straight and Freddie
were a girl."

"Good question."

Bill stopped in his tracks. "You're good at not answering
questions, aren't you?"

"Who, me?"

He laughed. "Let's get back to Joyce and the boys," he said.
"Just one thing. I've never told Joyce about Kevin."

"She won't hear it from me."

"I actually knew that. Come on."

Joyce had apparently gotten a Coke from the vending machine,
and I apologized for not offering her one. "Did you boys have a
nice walk?" she asked, with no apparent hidden meaning.

"We did," I answered. "And now, if we don't get over to that
barbecue, we're going to get awfully hungry. The cupboard in
the camper is bare."

"Just one thing," Joyce interrupted. "I know this is going to
sound strange under the circumstances, but ^Ö I mean, we don't
want to be presumptuous, but Freddie and Kelly are going to
want to talk. Just in case it would be all right with you we
brought a pop-up tent and a sleeping bag. We thought Freddie
might be able to spend the night up here, and then Bill and I
can talk without worrying about little ears hearing too much."

This was an unexpected development. "Are you sure about this,
Joyce?"

"They have a chaperone, don't they?" Beyond Joyce's back, Bill
waggled his hand back and forth in a gesture that said, "I'm
not so sure."

We got the boys out of the pool only by solemnly promising that
they could go back after lunch. We made it to the barbecue pit
five minutes before the scheduled closing time of two o'clock,
but the salad and baked beans had not run out, and the steaks
were excellent and grilled to order. By three-thirty, the
Watsons were getting ready to go.  Bill was going to use his
flex time to spend the Monday at home, and we were invited to
their home in suburban Bellevue for dinner.

"Aw, Mom, do we have to go?" Freddie asked in an almost- whine
that he seemed to have honed to perfection.

"We do," Joyce replied. "You don't."

Freddie's smile was like the sunrise. "Really? I can stay
overnight? I don't believe it!"

"Well, believe this," Bill said as he pulled Freddie's gym bag,
pop tent and sleeping bag out of the back of the Explorer.

They kissed their son good-bye and drove away.  Kelly and
Freddie looked at each other. "Pool!", they said at the same
time.

"Come on, Uncle Art," Kelly said, beckoning to me with his
hand.

"Yeah, come on, Uncle Art," Freddie repeated with another wide
smile.

We swam for at least an hour, and then pretended that Freddie
was fourteen, the minimum age for the giant hot tub. After five
minutes, we decided to come back when the air was cooler.

We didn't bother changing, because we knew we would be back. I
put on a T-shirt, partly because I burn so easily, and partly
because I believed that my fifty-five- year-old body did not
improve the scenery very much. We played miniature golf and
then, still somewhat satisfied from a huge lunch, went to the
club house for hot fudge sundaes. A few hands of gin rummy
degenerated into War (the card game, not the real thing), by
which time the shadows were growing long. I had managed to get
through the entire afternoon without telling the boys about the
video game arcade in the basement of the club house.

The weekenders had pulled up stakes and left by the time we
arrived back at the hot tub. Kelly and Freddie dared each other
to go naked. They compromised on pulling their suits down to
their ankles after they were in the tub, so a quick recovery
could be guaranteed. Kelly could not resist coming to periscope
depth, and Freddie followed suit. That is when I first thought
of the frankfurter analogy. Freddie was very uninhibited in
front of me. It occurred to me that Kelly must have told him
more than I would have liked.

It didn't take long to set up Freddie's pop tent and spread out
his sleeping bag. I did the work while he and Kelly whispered
and giggled together. I made up Kelly's bed in the camper. I
had made no specific promises to Bill, but I was not
comfortable bedding them down together. Besides, there was only
one sleeping bag, and that would be just a little too cozy.

The boys asked if they could stay up and talk. I had Bill's
implied permission. He had said they it would not pay to be too
suspicious and never allow them to be alone. I lay in the
queen-size bed clad only in my T- shirt, alone for the first
time in nearly a week. I could hear the boys continuing to
whisper and giggle in the tent outside, but they were not
causing a disturbance. Sleep eluded me. There had just been too
many events packed into this one day.

I must have dozed off, because it was darker when I heard the
door of the camper close. I heard a giggle in the darkness.
"Good night, Kelly," I said. The only response was a shushing
sound, much louder than intended I was sure. I felt rather than
saw a body climb up and over me to the far side of the bed. I
was just turning toward him when I felt a second body climb up
onto the near side. Two bodies slithered into the bed beside
me, and both bodies were quite, quite naked. Two arms moved up
over my chest, and the two hands intertwined.

"This is not a good idea, boys," I said. "I don't think you two
should sleep together tonight. I more or less promised Bill
that you would not have sex together."

"We aren't going to have sex with each other," Kelly assured
me.

"No," Freddie said from the other side.

"We're going to have sex with you," Kelly added, and the hands
moved downward together.

And, God help me, they did. We did. I had the right ideas, I
thought. I had the right words. What I apparently no longer had
was the will to do the right thing.

It was gentle, it was intense, it was, ultimately, messy. It
was glorious, and it was wrong. Of all the things that had
happened since that day in the rest area outside of Sheridan,
Wyoming, this was the first of which I was genuinely ashamed.
The boys apparently felt no shame at all. They simply went to
sleep.

When I woke in the morning, I was still the filling in a boy
sandwich. I got a good morning kiss on the cheek from each side
of the bed. In the years that followed, the events of that
night were never mentioned, and were never repeated.