Date: Sat, 31 Aug 2002 10:08:09 -0400
From: Tom Cup <tom_cup@hotmail.com>
Subject: Terms Of Living - Chapter 6 Gay/Bi - A/Y

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Terms of Living
By Tom Cup
Chapter 6
Where Fools Tread


With the warmth of spring came a new sense of life in the Major home. Andrew
and I had settled into a rather stable and scheduled relationship -- he still
had his school work to attend and I would not allow him to neglect his
parents -- and the mood of the house was light and ... well, to use the term of
my generation ... gay.

Sheryl insisted that I sit at the dinner table and enjoy the evening meal
with them. I was uncomfortable with this and fidgeted embarrassingly for the
first week or so but the new familiar feeling won my affection. Other
changes also caught me by surprise. Sheryl would walk with me with her arm
wrapped around mine. In the past, we had a casual yet professional
relationship. She now treated me as an approving mother lauding over her
son's lover. It was strange to me to be in that position.  I felt some guilt
over the shower of affection. The old box that I had lived in for much of my
life provided the framework for my view of the world. The new paradigm of my
life was Andrew. Understanding the world through that paradigm never ceased
to astound me.

"What's the matter John," Sheryl asked; her arm around me. We had been
discussing plans for Andrew's upcoming thirteenth birthday party. "You look
as if you have bitten into a lemon."

"Don't you ever wonder if I am doing right by Andrew?"

"He's happy John. He's truly happy; and so are you."

One could not deny that Andrew and I were happy with the situation. But I
still wondered if one day his parents would wake up and say to themselves,
"Oh my god! What have we allowed to happen here?" I wondered if I might
awake with the same expression. Happiness by no means guarantees security.
Andrew would turn thirteen, fourteen and then fifteen. Time would continue
to press forward. So I wondered what the future held. Yet, Sheryl was
correct. Andrew was happy. So was I but that did not lessen my concern.

"OK," Sheryl confessed, "I worry a little. But John, you have been good to
him. Craig and I know that. We knew this would be difficult on all of us but
it's Andrew's happiness that concerns us the most. Please don't think we're
bad parents John. We couldn't bear that."

I must admit to laughter at the statement. Sheryl and Craig were afraid that
I thought ill of them was far removed from my thought processes. I was
impressed by their willingness to allow Andrew to explore his sexuality with
me. Craig, Sheryl and I were conscious of the legal complications that our
actions afforded but it was, indeed, Andrew's happiness that bound us to the
conspiracy.

There was another fact that was brought to my attention during that
conversation with Sheryl. Andrew and his parents were now freer in showing
affection for one another. Sheryl considered it a by-product of my
relationship with Andrew. I began to notice Andrew and Craig hugging
unrepentantly, kisses between Andrew and Sheryl, and communication between
the family flowing in an easy and relaxed manner. Spring came and with it
bloomed unity and love. Not just between Andrew and me but between Craig and
Sheryl -- Seeing the love burn between Andrew and me ignited the embers of
their love for each other -- passion stirred in us all.

"So stop worrying so much," Sheryl chastised, "A man that get two chances to
love deeply in his life should not pout. Be thankful."

So once again I refocused the lens through which I viewed my life. I
accepted my dual roles, as some time advisor to Craig and Sheryl in matters
of household management and as their beloved pseudo son-in-law. But most of
all, I accepted that I was happy.

*********

"John," Andrew asked, "Why didn't you and Connie have any children?"

We lay lazily together, naked, our bodies entangled. I was still radiating
from the satisfaction of our lovemaking. Andrew's ability to switch
conscious gears so quickly was a measurement of his youth. I wanted to
wallow in the after glow of bliss. His needs satisfied he was ready to move
on to other conquests. I sighed.

"We decided that children would interfere with our chosen professions."

Andrew sat up and studied me. "But Connie loved children," he said.

"Yes, and so did I. We gain satisfaction from raising others' children. We
had no regrets."

"John?"

"Yes, Andrew."

"I want to have children."

I stared blankly into his eyes. He nodded. I thought that he meant that he
would one day marry and raise a family of his own. It seemed reasonable to
me. I had long suspected that our sexual activity would one day end. Still,
the preparation of thought did not stop my heart from aching. Andrew sensed
my hurt and began to laugh.

"You're not getting rid of me that easily," he said.

"I don't understand."

"Adoption John. I'm talking about adoption. When I'm older of course."

"Of course," I echoed.

He laid his head on my chest and caressed my stomach. "You'll make a
wonderful father. I know."

I marveled that Andrew's thoughts ran so far ahead into the future. I
marveled that they included me. I told myself that I needed to maintain some
perspective. But what perspective could I maintain laying in bed with a
thirteen-year-old boy that had just proposed that we raise a family
together? Like "Alice Through the Looking Glass"; sizes, shapes, colors, the
very world itself was in flux. I could try to regain control but everything
I thought, said or did sent me reeling in an unexpected direction.

There was no way to get back to the familiar world that I once knew. Even if
I could that world would not be there; or if it were still there I would not
view it the same. I had changed. I had become an alien among the species of
my birth. I rose from the primordial ocean and stood on prehistoric land,
wondering how I ever thought the slippery wet reasons of my prior existence
were stable or life giving. I could return to the ocean and swim within but
the environment was no longer mine. It was hostile to me. The creatures of
that world would view me as strangely as I now viewed them. So there was no
return. I could make camp, halt  further advancement, or move forward into
the tangled jungle of an unknown existence. I laughed.

"What's so funny?" Andrew asked.

"There is an old saying, `Fools go where angels fear to tread.'"

"Do you think we are fools John?"

"I think you are young, bright, beautiful, impetuous, and a hundred other
wonderful adjectives that would bore you to hear. And me, yes; I am an
impetuous old fool about to tread where angels fear to go, all because of a
boy that has captured me."

"I don't think you're an old fool, John."

"Huhn, no?"

"No, I think you're in love."

"That goes without saying. Those in love often do foolish things, things
they otherwise would not."

"Do you regret we're together?"

"How could I regret such a thing? Is this what I expected of my life? No. I
expected to grow old with Connie. I expected that she would be by my side
when I breathed my last; and if she left before me, that I would soon
follow."

"John."

"Yes Andrew."

"I'm thirteen and you're fifty-eight. One day, I'll have to bury you."

"In all likelihood."

"In fact, we don't really know how much time we have. Do we?"

One doesn't like thinking of one's mortality. Andrew had more years ahead of
him than I. If I had twenty years left, I would count that as a blessing.
Andrew would only be thirty-three, still a young man with the future ahead
of him. I nodded.

"You see," Andrew whispered, "When I turn eighteen, you'll be sixty-three.
I'm afraid to wait John. I'm afraid of losing you. I'm afraid that we will
never get to do the things I want to do with you."

"We've done quite a bit already."

"No, I don't mean in bed. I mean, the things that ... that really matter."

Andrew fell silent. I felt rebuked in a fashion. I always thought of what
losing Andrew would do to me. I had never considered that he felt the more
likely possibility that I would leave him. Of course, the longer our
relationship lasted the greater that possibility. I think his mortality was
still foreign to him but mine was not. He had witnessed Connie's death. She
was younger than me. It was reasonable for him to consider I didn't have
much time left. Whatever that meant, whatever Andrew's understanding of its
meaning, it pushed him to cling to our remaining time together. He knew that
one day we would part. He would have to find a new life, a life containing
only the memory of the love we once shared.

"What kind of things?" I asked.

Andrew smiled. "Do you know what Connie's favorite memory of you two was?"

"Our wedding day, I suppose; or perhaps the day we first met."

"No, it was when you guys were dating," Andrew said, "Connie finally talked
you into ice-skating. She said you were always so prim and proper, reluctant
to do anything just for fun." I began blushing at the recollection of that
day. Connie laughed till she cried at my fumbling and falling. I never put
on another pair of those accursed skates. "It was one of the best times of
her life, she said. It was a day that she realized how much you loved her.
She said you really made a spectacle of yourself just to show her how much
you loved her. That was her favorite memory."

I nodded and began to weep. I understood what Andrew was telling me. He
wanted to look back over our time together and find it not full of
reservations but of the spontaneity of love. There were so many reasons to
be reserved concerning my relationship with Andrew. I now had three reasons
to break camp and run into the wilder lands: Andrew loved me, I would not
live forever, and I was in love with him.

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This story is part of the Tom Cup Library

To support this and other stories by Tom Cup, or to view the list of stories
featured in the Tom Cup Library, visit our website at http://www.tomcup.com

************************************************************************