Date: Tue, 8 Mar 2005 13:42:40 -0800 (PST)
From: Mickey S <njmcmick@yahoo.com>
Subject: Summer At The Shore, Chapter 6

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sex between males is illegal, or if you're not into this type of story,
please leave. The author retains all rights.  No reproductions are allowed
without the author's consent. Comments are appreciated at
NJMcMick@yahoo.com.


Chapter Six

On the way back to our place later, Mom and I were both withdrawn, off in
our own worlds, trying to absorb what had happened. Poor Walter. He'd spent
most of the evening just sitting on the sidelines, watching Mom and Michael
talk. And man did they talk. After the shock and initial awkwardness wore
off, they were off and running. Sitting there watching them, I could
imagine what they'd been like as teenagers. There really did seem to be a
special connection between them, even after all the years.

Even though Mom and Walter had to be at work in the morning and I wasn't
working until evening, I went to bed as soon as we got back to the house
and they stayed up. I was physically and emotionally exhausted. Too many
changes in too short a time. I was having trouble processing everything.
Mom had just as much to absorb but she was dealing with it better. She and
Walter were deep in conversation when I drifted off to sleep. In the
morning over breakfast after Walter left for work, I finally got to ask Mom
some questions.

"Why didn't you ever tell me what happened, Mom?"

"What was I supposed to say? When you were little, it wouldn't have been
appropriate. You would have had no idea what I was talking about. As you
got older and I assumed you were straight, how could I tell you that about
your father? How do you think a straight thirteen year old would react
finding out his father was gay?"

"Lots of kids have gay fathers or mothers. Some handle it better than
others, I guess."

"Maybe if I'd known you were gay I would have said something, but then,
I've obviously had issues with the subject. You can see why now."

"Yeah, your experience with gay men has been pretty repetitious. I can see
why you freaked when you walked in on Luke and me. Deja vu and all that."

"Images of Mike and that guy kept flashing through my head when I saw you
and Luke. That had been the worst moment of my life, and it came back so
vividly. All these years I've made it a gay thing in my mind. What it was
really about, though, was a sense of betrayal."

"Well, he did betray you, but it was still a gay issue. From what little I
know of him, and from watching the two of you last night, I don't think
that if Michael were straight he would have ever cheated on you with a
woman. But I think he'd been trying so hard to be something he wasn't, to
be what people expected him to be, to not hurt anyone, and it blew up in
his face."

"In everyone's faces. I suppose, somewhere deep down, I've realized
that. That's why I agreed with you last week when you talked about not
living a lie. I've seen the damage that can do."

"So you were living with Michael's parents when he left. What happened to
them? I don't remember any grandparents."

"Mike's mother handled it all worse than I did, though she was always a bit
of an hysterical person anyway. I think today's term for it is drama
queen. She had a breakdown of sorts. I moved out as soon as I could find a
place for the two of us that I could afford. After all, they weren't my
family and it was an unpleasant situation all around. Not long after the
divorce, Mike's father had a chance to transfer to his company's Chicago
office. Mike's sister and her family lived near there, so they moved. They
came back once to visit you and kept in touch for a while, but we were a
part of their bad memories. Besides, Mike's sister had a whole slew of kids
out there for them to dote on."

"Did you ever try to keep in touch with Michael?"

"I was hurt, angry and humiliated, Bry. He'd offered and I'd taken every
penny he had in the divorce, although it wasn't much. He pretty much gave
me whatever I wanted, including full custody of you. I didn't want him to
have visitation rights, didn't want him anywhere near you. He had loved you
so much but he didn't fight me. I realize now he was just as humiliated as
I was but I wasn't thinking about him back then, only what he'd done to
me."

"How does Walter feel about all of this?"

"He's being very supportive. He knew that my marriage to your father had
broken up due to infidelity but I had never told him any of the details. I
never told anyone."

"Well, I don't know about anyone else, but as far as I'm concerned, this is
going to take a lot of getting used to. I was just getting to know John and
Michael as friends. It's hard to think of Michael as my father."

"I know. You may never have a traditional kind of father and son
relationship, but he's a good man, Bry. He's missed out on everything as
far as you're concerned and I think he'd like to be a part of your
life. You two just have to build a relationship that works for both of
you."

"You say he's a good man, yet all my life you've called him a jerk. I think
he's a good guy from the little I know of him, but what changed your mind?
A couple of hours of talking last night?"

"No, Bry. I guess I never really stopped loving him but I was hurt. I
blamed him for ruining my life and yours by being gay, like it was his
fault, like he'd done it deliberately. I never tried to look at it from his
point of view. It never occurred to me that he was hurting as much I
was. It was nobody's fault. It's just the way things were. We all handled
it very badly. Maybe after all this time we can be a little more mature
about it."

After Mom left for work I had all day to kill before I had to be at work
myself. I really didn't feel like spending the day lying on the beach, but
what else do you do when you're at the shore? I went to the beach, but
decided to walk. I had a lot of nervous energy and needed to do a lot of
thinking. I went down to the edge of the water and walked along the wet
sand where it was firmer and easier to walk.

When I was a kid I'd spent a lot of time fantasizing about having a
father. I'd never been able to have any kind of clear idea of what he was
like. Mom didn't have any pictures of him and never talked about him. I
guess I dreamed up someone who was a cross between my friends' fathers and
the guys Mom dated. Michael wasn't anything like any of them. I still
thought he was a hot guy, even if he was my father. While John was a hot
stud, Michael was more of a sweet, gentle sexy man. I liked both of them so
much. I hoped they'd be willing to let me be a part of their lives. I loved
the few times I'd been with them and now we were family.

I thought a lot about Mom, too. She'd been a hot babe as far back as I was
aware of those things and she'd had quite a few boyfriends over the
years. None of the relationships were very serious; none lasted very
long. Sometimes I thought she just wasn't interested in something
serious. Sometimes I worried that I was in the way; that maybe one of her
relationships might have developed into something more if I weren't
around. She had been an amazing mother, always there for me, always putting
me first. We'd had lots of financial problems over the years and I knew how
much she'd sacrificed for me. It had never occurred to me that her
relationship with my father had been as deep as it was. I had thought of it
as just the first in her long string of short-term, casual relationships. I
never realized that it had been her great love, and that she'd been
grieving for it all these years.

On the way back down the beach, I thought about Luke. I'd only had brief
glimpses of him now and then over the past week. He didn't seem happy. I
wondered how I could get an opportunity talk to him. I couldn't go over to
the house and I didn't have his cell phone number. I'd been hoping to run
into him somewhere all week, but the only time I saw him was when he was
working on the beach, and at least one of the others was with him then. Our
'relationship' had ended before it even began and I wasn't sure there was a
way to revive it. I wasn't sure there was anything to revive.

I got back to the house in time to take a nap before work. When I got up,
Mom was home but was getting ready to go out.

"Where are you going tonight, Mom?"

"Walter and I are going out to eat with John and Mike. I suppose I should
try to get used to calling him Michael since he seems to prefer that
now. We thought it would be a good idea if we all got to know one
another. Your father and I have so much catching up to do, but we want to
make sure Walter and John are a part of this new friendship, or whatever
this is, as well."

"What about me? Shouldn't I be a part of things, too?"

"Of course, baby, but you've got to work tonight so this dinner is just for
the grown-ups." I stuck my tongue out at her. She stuck hers out right back
at me. "There will be lots of time for you to get to know John and Michael
better. We'll have to make sure of that."

Walter came in and got changed for dinner while I got ready for
work. Although I usually had fun at work, I wished I was going with them.

When I was behind the counter at work, I could see the lifeguard's house as
well as my own. I'd see them all coming and going but it wasn't like before
Adam had walked in on Luke and me. Luke was always on his own and didn't
seem to spend much time at the house. Tony and Jared still hung out
together, but not always with Adam. Their whole little group seemed to have
fallen apart. About the only thing they all did was avoid the
pizzeria. None of them wanted to see me, or be seen with me, I wasn't sure
which. Probably both.

A little after eleven I saw Mom and Walter get home from their dinner. As
soon as I could get away, I ran across the street and went inside to see
how things had gone.

"Hey Mom, Walter, how'd it go tonight?"

"Great! Your ears must have been ringing all night. We talked more about
you than anything else."

"I thought this dinner was for all of you to get to know one another."

"Oh, we did plenty of that, too, but you were the main focus. I think
Michael is still having a hard time believing that you're his son."

"Yeah, that makes two of us. I really need to talk to him and John."

"I told him you were working the early shift tomorrow, so he suggested you
go over there for dinner afterward."

Michael and John ended up taking me out to dinner to an Italian restaurant
in Seaside Park near their house. Michael had already told me about the day
Mom found out about him and he didn't want to talk any more about that, so
we pretty much talked about my childhood and his life with John. After we
got back to the house, we talked more in the living room. Both John and
Michael were interested in my college plans. They seemed to be trying to
act like parents, but I still thought of them as the sexy gay couple I'd
met on the boardwalk. Now and then I'd catch myself spacing out and just
staring at Michael. I caught him staring at me with a far-away kind of look
on his face a few times, too. This was all going to take a lot of getting
used to on both our parts.

Toward the end of the evening, Michael got out his wallet and searched
through it a few seconds, then pulled out a small picture that was worn
around the edges. He handed it to me. I recognized the baby in the picture
as me from other pictures Mom had.

"It's the only picture I had of you, Bryan. I've looked at it thousands of
times over the years, wondering where you were, how you were. I thought I'd
never see you again." Tears were streaming down his cheeks. "I loved you so
much. I am so sorry I was never there for you. Can you ever forgive me?"

"There were times when I was growing up when I wondered how a father could
just walk away from his child and never look back. I'll admit I took it
pretty personally a lot of the time. Mom always referring to you as a jerk
helped. It helped me blame you instead of myself."

"It was my fault, Bryan, never yours. You were just a baby. Why would you
blame yourself?"

"Like I said, kids take things personally. We think everything is about
us. Now I can see it really didn't have anything to do with me. I suppose
it helps that I heard your story before I knew who you were. I sympathized
with your situation before I knew it involved me so I guess I forgave you,
if that's what you want to call it, almost immediately. We all got a raw
deal. It just happened that way and there's nothing we can do about it
now. It's in the past. Let's just go from here."

"It looks like Chrissie has raised a pretty amazing kid, Michael."

Michael took me in his arms and hugged me. "Yeah, John, she sure has."

The guys gave me a ride home and dropped me off on the corner a little
after eleven thirty. I waved as they drove off and turned to go into my
street. Just then, the door to the lifeguards' house flew open and Luke
came out and took off up the street toward the beach, practically
running. I glanced at my house. The lights were off which meant that Mom
and Walter had gone to bed. They weren't expecting me at any particular
time, so I decided to go after Luke.

I hurried up the street to the dunes. Once I got to the beach I stopped and
looked around. There was a half moon out over the water that provided just
a little light. I walked toward the water, hoping Luke hadn't gone far. I
saw a dark shadow and headed toward it. It was Luke, standing there,
looking out to sea.

"Hey."

He jumped and turned toward me. When he recognized me he rushed to me and
threw his arms around me, squeezing me tight. I felt wet on the side of my
face. I pulled back and looked at him and saw that he was crying. I put my
hands on either side of his face but he flinched and pulled away.

"Are you all right, Luke?"

"I don't know. I had a fight with Adam."

"What happened?"

"Well, when he and your Mom walked in on us last week, he figured out that
I was gay, what with the kissing and all. I kept denying it for a while but
finally I just didn't care. I told him I was gay and I liked you. He didn't
get mad or anything, but he excluded me from our little group from that
point on. I'd been sharing a room with him and he made me sleep on the
couch after that. It was a really unpleasant atmosphere so I've stayed away
from the house as much as possible."

"So what started the fight?"

"He had a date that didn't go well tonight. He'd been drinking quite a bit
and was pissed and horny when he got home, so he decided that I should take
care of him. To be honest I was surprised he waited this long."

"And you refused?"

"Not exactly, Bryan. You've got to understand that he was been my best
friend for years and I always thought he was so hot but couldn't let
on. Under other circumstances, I would have loved to have had sex with
him. Even as things were, I couldn't resist. I'd dreamed about his dick for
so long so I decided to give him his blow job. I'd sucked a few guys in
high school and college, but no one as big as him. Apparently, he didn't
think I was very good at it so after a few minutes he told me to just
slobber all over it to get it good and slick so he could fuck me."

"Just like that? No lube? No condom?"

"He was drunk. I don't know if he would have gone through with it, but I
panicked. I bit him."

"You bit his cock?"

"Yeah, it was in my mouth and I freaked out at the idea of him fucking
me. I bit down real hard. He screamed and slammed his fist against the side
of my head. I let go and fell over on the floor. He ran into the bedroom
and I got up and ran out as fast as I could. I really didn't mean to bite
him. It's just, all I could think about was that big dick ripping up my
ass, fucking me the way I'd seen him fuck you." Luke looked down and his
voice got quieter. "I've done stuff with a few guys, but I've never been
fucked. I was scared."

"So now what are you going to do?"

"I don't know. I can't go back there and I've got no where else to go."

I thought about John and Michael. They had plenty of room at their
place. Unfortunately, their place was over three miles away and it was
after midnight.

"Come home with me. I've got an extra bed in my room."

"And have your mother walk in on us again? Are you nuts?"

"We're not gonna fuck tonight, Luke, just sleep. If we're real quiet and
you stay in the room until after she leaves for work in the morning, she'll
never know. Maybe we can figure out something more permanent tomorrow, but
tonight you need a place to sleep."

We snuck into the house as quietly as we could and went right to my
room. There was a second twin bed in my room, but I didn't want to use
it. I thought that Luke might feel better if he wasn't alone and I knew
that I would. We undressed but left our boxers on and got into my bed. We
kissed for a while until we were both so hard I thought we'd explode. I
knew there was no way we could do anything in complete silence and I wasn't
sure Luke was up to it anyway, so we reluctantly pulled apart. Luke turned
around and we lay on our sides with me behind Luke and I put my arms around
him.

The next thing I knew the room was bright with sunlight, we were still in
the same position and I had to pee worse than I could ever remember. I
eased out of the bed. Luke moaned, turned over and opened his eyes. I
leaned over him and whispered in his ear.

"Just lie there and be quiet. I'll be right back."

He nodded and I slipped out the door, closing it behind me. I could hear
Mom in the kitchen as I headed into the bathroom. When I came back out, Mom
was standing a few feet from the door with her arms folded across her
chest.

"What is HE doing in your room?"

"You went into my room?"

"I knocked on the door earlier to see if you wanted to get up for
breakfast. When you didn't answer, I stuck my head in. You were both
sleeping. I told you I don't want you seeing him. I certainly don't want
you spending the night with him, not in my house or anywhere else."

"He didn't have anywhere to go, Mom. He had a fight with Adam."

"That isn't my problem or yours either. He's not exactly your friend, you
know."

"He's a good guy, Mom. Can't you try to get to know him, to give him a
chance?"

"What do you really know about him, Bry? That he was the nicest of the guys
who were sexually assaulting you? That's not much of a recommendation."
She must have seen the pleading in my eyes. "Okay, Walter has a dinner
meeting with his lawyer after work so he won't be home until late. Invite
your 'friend' to supper and I'll give him a chance."

"Thanks, Mom. You're the best."

I kissed her on the cheek and went back into the bedroom. Luke was sound
asleep again so I carefully crawled back into bed behind him and fell
asleep. I awoke to Luke gently shaking my shoulder.

"I've really got to use the bathroom. Can you check to see if the coast is
clear?"

"Go ahead. Mom's probably gone to work by now but it doesn't matter. She
knows you're here."

"She knows? It's okay?"

"No, it's not okay but maybe it will be."

Over breakfast I passed along Mom's invitation to supper. Afterward, we
took separate showers. Mom wouldn't know the difference but I would. While
Luke was in the shower, I noticed the lifeguards pass by on their way to
the beach. Luke went next door and changed into his swim trunks, then
brought over a change of clothes for later. He also brought some bathroom
stuff just in case Mom let him stay over again.

To be continued...