Date: Tue, 17 Dec 2013 02:08:21 +0700
From: Robert Glass <robxglass@gmail.com>
Subject: The Virgin Joseph part 10

All right reserved. Any unauthorized use is prohibited. This is a
fiction. Any resemblance to people and/or events is coincidental. If
reading this deemed illegal to you, I implore you to stop. If it offends
you, please do not read on.

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You would want to go to that link.

PART 10

Party after party after party. There was Joe's birthday, and then the
Halloween, then Nick's birthday, then Thanksgiving, now Christmas, and
there would be New Year in a week. What's with this people and parties?
They're obsessed! Joe was trapped inside the circle. He didn't grow up with
the need to celebrate everything. Just a dinner would be fine for him.

The Christmas party was actually just a casual dinner. The whole gang was
there, not including the bosses. Alice' parents were in town so they were
in. Tom invited his sister Anna, his brother Garry and the girlfriend. Jake
brought his wife Erin and Nick called some of his friends from the youth
center. Amy had her band with her. Everybody had guests. Joe had Sam to
drag in. Thankfully, Sam wasn't being weird with Joe at all, even after the
last unfortunate event.

Joe was reluctant to come to this kind of social gathering but he thought
Sam probably could lighten his mood. That did not mean that Joe would enjoy
it very much, he was flat-lining throughout the event, neither cranky nor
delighted. He did not engage with anyone other than Sam. Unfortunately to
him Sam was a social butterfly. He mingled. For someone who was more of a
nerd than Joe was, Sam was exceptionally outgoing and sociable. Sometimes
Joe envied that quality. At that moment he was content that he had no
tendency to make any friends. The party blows. His life blows.

"I take it you don't enjoy the party," Sam asked Joe once they stepped
aside to the open kitchen. Joe was busy with his phone.

"I'm doing a research, on things I'd rather do tonight. For instance, buy a
new laptop."

"Wow, a new phone and a new laptop. You got a good bonus, didn't you?" Joe
only gave Sam a death glare for that remark. "Come on, these are your
friends. Why do I enjoy this more than you?"

Joe leaned back to the counter table and sighed. "I guess this is better
than everything else I've been in.  Usually it's blindingly dark or
blindingly bright, with deafening music. This is not horrible."

"Not horrible? Okay." Sam settled. "Nice place though. Classy décor."

"What can I say, I was involved," Joe said smugly. "I can decorate the shit
out of anything."

"You're so gay." Sam laughed. Joe too.

"Are you sure you absolutely have to go home on New Year?" For Joe the
party was bearable because he was not absolutely alone. At least he had
someone who wasn't his coworker at this one.

"If I don't go my mom will kill me. I missed one Thanksgiving and she
already gave me hell. Now I'm missing Christmas too," Sam scuffed.



From across the room Tom lurked. He had been spying on the two since they
arrived. The object of his affection seemed to be getting very comfortable
with his competition. A little too comfortable if you ask him. Tom
recognized the situation he was in, it was jealousy. Not his first time,
but his biggest one yet.  Joe wasn't even his anything and he already felt
horrible.

"So that's Sam, huh?" Alice startled Tom.

"Yeah. I really hate them together."

"Settle down, tiger, and ease up on the drinks. You don't want to make a
bad impression tonight."

Tom looked down on his glass of scotch. "You're right."

With eagle eyes Alice studied the two from afar. Joe and Sam seemed really
getting along, perhaps to the point that Tom should worry; she couldn't
tell. "Do you really think he's a threat?" she asked.

"I don't know. Maybe. Joe's is usually easy to read but lately I can't
tell. My... thing clouded my judgment," he said quietly.

"Well, let's find out." Before Tom could stop her, Alice marched gracefully
across the room, like the holy hostess she was. Her stature was elegant;
her sparkling golden dress amplifies the effect. Behind her Tom followed
much more clumsily. "Hi," she extended her hand. "I believe we haven't
met. I'm Alice."

"I'm Sam. Nice to meet you," he replied politely and shook her hand. "Joe
has been raving about you; he told me how great of a mentor you are."

"Why, thank you," she said to Joe. "He hasn't mentioned anything about
you." Uh-oh, there she goes.  "Anyway, how have you been enjoying the
party? I'm sorry it's a little bit crowded, Nick shouldn't have invited as
many friends." Behind her Tom was squirming inside at how fake Alice was
acting.

"It's actually spectacular and intimate at the same time. I don't feel like
a stranger," Sam said.

Joe wasn't hiding his displeasure as well. His massive eye roll was too
obvious. "I'm sorry Sam isn't usually this disgustingly charming."

Crickets and tumbleweeds. It was dead silent for a second. Sam finally
broke the pause. "You have to excuse him. He is usually this abrasive."

"Now that's more genuine," Joe pointed out, joining Sam in laughter.

All the while Alice and Tom were left speechless. Joe and Sam were acting
like an old married couple: hostile but naturally comfortable. Maybe Tom
had something to worry about.

"I'm sorry if I'm being too forward here, but are you two dating?" she
asked, uncharacteristically blunt.

"No, no, no, no. We are NOT dating," Sam clarified.

"You said that like it would be embarrassing to date me?" Joe said.

"I'm not saying that," Sam interjected. Joe cut him off. With that another
argument started. Again, Tom and Alice were left aside. It was as though
Sam and Joe were talking in a whole different language. Yes, Tom had to
worry.

"See? He's crass. I told you," Joe said. Tom and Alice can only whip out
emergency fake laughter.  "Anyway, you look great," he said to Alice. "And
you too, Tom. Not every day I can see you in a suit." Joe reached for Tom's
face and caressed his beard. "You need to lose this, though. Beard may look
good on Jake, but not on you."

"It's warm; more of a seasonal decision." Tom said. Somehow, after almost a
month of letting Joe go, Sam was made jealous by this exchange.

Tom moved to Joe's side, creating a space of their own while Alice took Sam
away for private investigation. They didn't plan this but it just went this
way. Both Alice' and Tom's minds were aligned, clicked, synchronized, so
much that they could tell what the other wanted to do without even talking
about it. Alice took Sam away to dig in deeper while she gave Tom time to
spend time with Joe, just the two of them. That chemistry failed several
times, though, most notably when Alice didn't have a clue that Tom was
bisexual. Well, to be fair Tom didn't even knew it too.

"God, even Amy has started dating. That's her bassist, right?" Joe asked
Tom.

"Yeah. I don't think they're serious, though."

"Meh, doesn't matter; as long as her beaver gets some wood." To which Tom
burst out laughing, so loud that he almost made a scene.

"Your wood needs some beaver too." It was a much too late comeback from
Tom.

"No. My wood needs a bear, or a panda, or a lion, or a wolf. At least an
otter."

Tom imploded again. "Wow, you're dirty tonight."

"Thanks. I'll be here all week," Joe smirked. "I guess what they say is
true. It's sad to be by yourself at this time of the year. Amy, me, and
probably you."

"Why don't you let Jake take you to one of the places?" Tom said.

"Never! I went out with Sam a couple of weeks ago, it was horrible." Oh no,
Joe mentioned Sam again.

"Then socialize... with these people. They're your source." Tom suggested.

"The only other gay person here is Anna."

"Some of Nick's friends might be gay."

"It's Nick. His only gay friends are confused teenagers in the middle of
therapy, and therapists." Joe got a point there. "This year is about to
end. I'm 25 now but I'm moping like a kid. Life is harder and I grow
weaker. What's the point of my life?" Joe started to get emotional, in a
crowd. When the hell did he started to get mood swings like this?
Everything pissed him off; even the fact that Sam seemed to enjoy talking
to Alice more than expected pissed him off.

Tom panicked. He was about to break down on public. He pulled Joe's hand
and yanked him to his bedroom. There he could let Joe break down as freely
as he wanted. He figured that Joe would feel safer here than out there, in
front of everyone. He sighed, somehow relieved that he made it to an
enclosed space.

"Joseph, tell me what's wrong. You almost make a scene and you never do
that."

"I know." Joe let himself fall to Tom's comfortable bed.

"Hey, if you think you're being immature, so what. Life threw you a hard
ball; it's okay to feel the pain once in a while. You can't be strong all
the time."

Joe sighed and eyed the man standing before him. "Why can't you just be a
regular guy friend? You're all huggy and fatherly and
heart-to-heart-talk-y. It's like you're enabling me to be a pussy." Tom
just laughed. Joe had no choice but to give in. "I never have this before I
move to Chicago. I mean, I never, ever talk about feelings and shit to a
stranger. Only Justin and Norah. Now it seems like I can't stop. I keep
complaining and you keep on listening to me. I can even trust you
now. Chicago ruined me."

"You trust me?" Tom smiled in glee.

"That's not the point, Tom," he said with an empty voice. "Sam made a move
again a couple of weeks ago. I said no again. It was his last try. Now I
can't shake the feeling that I've let my last chance of happiness go. I
still don't know how I feel about him, Tom, but he's moved on."

Tom sat down, next to Joe's limp body. He slapped Joe's knee. "You can move
on too. There's no need to dwell in your uncertainty when everything else
is already certain."

Logic. That's the only thing Joe could always depend on. His logic now told
him that Tom was right.  "Look at you being philosophical, and being
right." Joe rolled his eyes. Tom knew how Joe's mind worked, just like
Justin did. Everything reminds Joe of Justin. "I hate you," Joe sulked.

Tom sniggered, amused by Joe's behavior. He rubbed Joe's knee saying, "You
don't hate me."

"No I don't," he mumbled. He stretched his arm, asking Tom to pull him. He
was ready to go back to the party. Tom was right behind him, patting Joe's
back. Joe took a glance at the center of the room to find a view that
exasperated him further. "They are dancing? Oh my God!" Joe epically rolled
his eyes at Sam and Alice who were gracefully waltzing together.


***


"Okay, happy New Year. Bye." Joe ended his conversation with Sam. Twenty
minutes into the New Year he didn't feel any change at all, not like
everyone else in the party. They seemed to be stoked about the promised
change and their fresh resolutions; ones which no one would fulfill. Tom
was right, Joe missed Justin. He wished it was Justin he was calling
instead of Sam. He also wished Sam didn't have to go home to see his
parents and be there with him instead.

"He called Sam," Tom reported to Alice. "He told me that Sam moved on and
he's moving on too. Why is he still calling him?"

"Relax, he'd call you if he wasn't spending the New Year here," Alice
replied confidently.

"He didn't call his brother, and his brother means the world to him. That
means that Sam means more than his brother," Tom reasoned.

"You're being paranoid." She brushed Tom's conspiracy theories away from
the conversation. "Calm your ass down and execute our plan as scheduled."

'Our plan'. Tom hated Alice sometimes. Sure, Sam moved on but was Joe STILL
in the process of moving on? Tom was still Joe's friend, and as far as Joe
knew, his straight friend. He wanted to change that, letting Joe know that
he was not entirely heterosexual and that he loved Joe. But what if Joe
thought he was joking? That would ruin their friendship. Losing Joe was the
last thing he wanted to do. Tom drank his anxiety away, hoping that the
cute drunken Tom would come out instead of the annoyingly confessional
Tom. He better not make a fool of himself.



"Come on, get a drink or something," Nick urged Joe. "You need to live a
little."

"I just punched you in the face. How's that for living a little?" Joe
snapped. It now seemed like a habit, every time someone tried to kiss him,
he throws a fit, and a fist.

"Yeah, that hurts." After kissing Alice at zero, Nick tried to kiss Joe,
probably from pity. He saw that Joe kissed no one at all at the end of
countdown even after the gay quota to the party was raised. He didn't even
have any clue how offensive it was. Volunteering at a local gay youth
center didn't automatically make Nick smarter. "We're cool, right?"

With a face palm, Joe sighed. "Why can't I just get a normal friend?" he
said to himself. First there was an overly cuddly Tom, then there was the
overly sexual Sam, and then there was this overly sensitive, totally
clueless handsome dumb jock slash smart artist Nick. Also there was this
not terribly handsome but extremely attractive, nice, kind, funny,
adorable, super-straight, super-married Jake that Joe just could not handle
being friends with. His female friends were much more normal, although one
was desperately single songstress and the other was an upcoming interior
dictator.

Nevertheless, Joe spent the rest of the party with Nick. It was much like
his first encounter with the inner Nick, the one with a dream of a better
world for his fellow homosexuals. Joe could not handle that side of
Nick. It's not that he didn't like the guy, but Nick was just too much. How
did Alice manage? To tell the truth, Nick really was a sweet guy. After
knowing that Nick went from being a bully back in high school to being a
volunteer counselor at a youth center, he was convinced that Nick was
simply a sweet guy. Maybe too sweet.

The party died down eventually, like it always did. Tom was shitfaced
drunk, like how it supposed to be.  Sadly Joe had to sleep with him. They
arranged to have Joe to sleep in instead of going home at 3 in the
morning. It was planned that Joe would sleep on the couch, but someone
spilled vodka and vomit all over it. That someone was Nick, naturally, and
Tom, obviously. That left Joe no choice but to sleep with a nearly
paralyzed Tom. He just hoped that Tom was not going to vomit on him; or pin
him down with a mountain Tom called his body.


***


Noon was as cold as a homicidal bitch's heart. The city was dirty and quiet
and fucking cold. The office was open the very next day after New
Year. Nobody, absolutely nobody, liked going back to work for the first
time in the year. Not even the ever elegant and gracious Lucy. She was a
mess. Her face looked like whiskey, her breath probably smelled like
vomit. Paul acted more refined that day; he did not come at all. Eventually
Lucy let everyone home, merely one hour after the entire team
arrived. There wasn't anything urgent to do anyway; none of the clients
needed an update that early in the year. She also relieved everyone from
work for the next day as well. After mumbling about Paul' absence and
telling Amy to set up an auto-reply, she was off. So did everyone else.

Alice was tact, she knew what Tom wanted. With an invitation for shopping,
she led Nick and Amy out of Tom's way to spend time alone with Joe. He
thanked her without words but in a language that only both of them
understood.

"You shouldn't skip breakfast." Joe noticed the vicious growl from Tom's
stomach.

"Yeah," he mumbled, "Hangover."

"Wow, look who's grumpy," Joe said gleefully. Tom laughed, disproved Joe's
postulate in a single swoop.

They decided to have lunch at a place called 'E.D.C.', a local sandwich
spot that also served great coffee, which previously known as a local
coffee spot that also served great sandwiches. Nobody knows what 'E.D.C.'
stands for, except some speculation that the C stands for coffee. It was
also the place where Tom first bonded with Joe, right after Joe's first
day. Tom considered it as his de facto first date with Joe.  He thought it
would be cool if he could relive that memory again now that he acknowledged
his feeling towards Joe.

Of course Joe was oblivious, and Tom was a great pretender. Tom wanted the
lunch to be more romantic but not obviously so. He chose a table with two
seats instead of four, he mimicked Joe's order with an excuse of being
curious, and lightly punched Joe's arm several times because touching was
supposedly too romantic.

Later he took Joe window shopping for laptops. Joe was looking to replace
his, and he was obsessed. He considered using a tablet since he wasn't
going to work much with it, but he decided to go against it. A few laptops
later he still hadn't make any decisions yet. He was just there to see the
thing in real life. He also slammed the sales person who didn't master the
product, like it was his hobby. Tom had fun watching it.

"Wanna go?" Joe suggested after they had a wonderful serving of Thai food
for dinner.

"Yeah, sure."

"Let's take a cab," Joe said.

"Nope, we're taking the train," Tom suggested.

"But it's cold."

"Don't be such a baby."

"I grew up where the equator ran over me. I'm going to freeze my balls
here," Joe complained. "Besides, it's going to be dirty and wet and ugh..."

The snow offered sparkles to the night. It looked romantic. That was Joe's
second week into experiencing heavy snow, but as usual he didn't embrace it
with childlike curiosity. All that he expressed was negativity. He worried
about being frozen the next morning, or getting muddy shoes, or falling
down due to the slippery sidewalks. Even that attitude melted Tom's
heart. Grumpiness strangely suited Joe; it made him cuter if that was even
possible.

"Come on, this looks beautiful," Tom insisted.

"You live here your whole life and you like this." The statement was
actually a question that was not articulated in that way.

"Why not? Let's worry about the muddy shoes at home."

"How about slipping? I want to worry about my muddy shoes at home, if I can
get there SAFELY." Joe gave Tom a good laugh. Tom pulled Joe closer into a
side-hug. "Don't let me go. This is warm." Joe said.  With the snow it's
going to be a lot colder, and Joe was going to need more than a side hug.

They found themselves strolling down the sidewalks of a strangely quiet
street. The streetlights shined brightly, giving the snow a soft glow. The
street was clean, the snow hasn't piled yet. There was no sign of wind, the
sparkling flakes fell softly. See, that was nice. They didn't rush at all;
they had forever before the last train left them. They didn't talk but it
was comfortable. It was all oh so romantic; so romantic that Tom
hallucinated that a love song was playing in the background.

So romantic that it inspired Tom to take a risk.

"What?" Joe said surprised. Tom had suddenly stopped and took his arm.

"Joseph..." Tom's heart was pounding hard; he could almost feel it on his
tongue. It was now or never.  "Joseph, we've known each other for half a
year now. It's not a long time, I know. You... You were once a stranger,
and then we became friends. We got so close that I even consider you my
brother."

"Yeah, me too." Joe cocked his head a little to the right; he didn't
understand what Tom was trying to do, or say. He was startled by Tom's
sudden speech in the middle of nowhere.

"I guess I was wrong. I don't see you as my brother anymore; you mean so
much more to me. I've been feeling this for quite some time now and I've
been holding back. You see, I have changed because of you. Or maybe I
haven't changed, but I feel different. Or actually I realized that I feel
different." He began blabbing, like he always did when he got nervous.

"Tom... what are you trying to say?" Although Joe was worried, he was still
blind. None of the signals were sinking in.

Tom closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "Joe, I think I'm in love with
you." Tom stopped, trying to get himself together. He took a deep breath
and looked at Joe's eyes. "Joseph, I'm in love with you."  With both hands
he cupped Joe's face; his thumbs rubbed Joe's cheek bones that he grew to
love. Then he kissed Joe, full on the lips, not grazing skin, not eating
face, but softly and gently, not demandingly and fiery. It was the perfect
kiss to accompany a confession of love. It lasted for a mere five seconds
but it felt as though they kissed until the last train already departed
from the station to which they had yet to arrive.

Joe didn't punch Tom in the face. Was that a good sign?

For the first time Tom could not read Joe's face. Whether it was a new,
foreign facial expression that Joe was exhibiting as a reaction to an
unfamiliar experience, or it was just that Tom's judgment was clouded by
the delayed second thoughts and inevitable worry of consequences. Joe face
stayed that way, like he saw Medusa. Tom didn't know what to do. He said
what he needed to say out loud only to meet no reply.

The glassy eyes of Joe received more liquid, and soon it trickled with a
steady stream flowing down the cheeks that Tom once rubbed not a minute
ago. He was crying, but still no voice. It was scary! This time Tom, too,
was not moving. He screwed up big time. His mouth gaped, trying to
verbalize the sentence he could not form. He should have listened to Alice,
he thought. Or better yet, don't listen to her and keep the declaration of
love to himself. Just look at what it did to Joe.

Water kept flowing from Joe's eyes but nothing else was moving. That was
until heaved repeatedly, like he had hard time breathing. Then there was a
groan, quiet in real life, loud in Tom's brain. A step backward and Joe
fell onto the sidewalks. He was beginning to cry in mad hysterics. That
triggered Tom to move, at last.


___

Christmas chapter cliffhanger. Don't hate me. Okay, you can hate me. To
everyone who's concerned about Sam I can confidently say that he's moved
on. Or has he? Wait. No. I can't leave you with another cliffhanger. Or can
I? Nope. No, not gonna do that. Yes, Sam has moved on. Now he can find
happiness that doesn't involve Joe. He's still around though, he is after
all one of Joe's best friend and neighbor.  I'm not going to do a spinoff;
it's all going to be here.

Thanks to Arleen, the person that shaped these chapters into a
comprehensible and sensible story.  Without you I wouldn't have made a
comprehensible or even logical story.

You guys have been quiet for the last chapter. Have I jumped the shark with
Tom's coming out? Let me know, please. PLEASE. I'm begging you to
just... email me (it's robxglass@gmail.com) or fill my Tumblr inbox (it's
manlyneeds.tumblr.com), please. Cheers!