Date: Wed, 06 Aug 2003 21:20:26 +0000
From: X plicit <x_plicit33@hotmail.com>
Subject: Dreamcalledreality/chapter8

  The walk home felt like the longest I've ever taken in my life. I'm not
sure if it's because I was walking baby steps as I tried to organize my
thoughts, or because the distance between my house and the movies increased.
I'll get back to you when I know for sure. I love Andy. Since the day I met
him, he's the only person I enjoy being with any time of the day and just
sharing feelings and stories and stuff like that. But then there's Mark; the
hot guy that I always dreamed of getting together with. Confused as hell, I
decided to just try and forget about this and let things happen on their
own. It was almost 4pm though. Do I show up online? And if I do, would our
conversation be the same as it once was? It felt kind of obvious it wouldn't
be possible and that all the other lies he's told would come out. But then
why do I want to go online so bad? I didn't fail to mention I'm fuckin'
confused right now, right?

  The clock struck 4:00pm and I made my way to the computer. I sat down and
signed on; but he wasn't online. I figured he's maybe a little late or
something so I just started talking to other friends from school waiting on
his ass to show up. But even at 4:30, it never did. That's when a pop-up
message appeared telling me I got mail. 'Yay, another god damn chain letter'
I thought to myself as I went to open it. Surprisingly, it wasn't a chain
letter. It was an e-mail from Johnny....I mean, Mark.

Hey Ricky,
Listen okay. I know it was a real bad thing I did and I fucken hate myself
right now for doing it to you , but I couldn't risk anything. I'm sure you
feel differently about me now and it pisses me off a lot. I won't be on
today, but you most likely won't show up either since I'm sure you don't
wanna talk to my sorry ass anymore. But Ricky, if your to believe anything I
say, believe that I have this strange feeling in my gut every time I think
about you. I get butterflies in my stomach every time I talk to you. And
when we spoke at the movies earlier, it was one of the greatest times I've
spent with someone. I just really wanted you to know that. Anyway, I have to
get going. I work as a lifeguard at the Wave Pool and my shifts almost
starting. If there's anyway for you to forgive me, please e-mail me back. If
it's possible, come by the pool later today. I'll be working from 5 'till 9.
I'm sorry Ricky,
Bye

  I read the e-mail as my eyes watered a bit. I felt betrayed by him, but he
seems so remorseful about the whole deal. And he says he thinks about me.
Mark Spencer things about me! I never thought this day would ever come. But
now that it has, in a way, I wish that it hadn't. I have to choose between
two guys. From a kid that had no one to call his own, I now have a selection
to choose from. And when I choose, one of those guys are going to be hurt
whether I like it or not. I thought about the issue for a long while; about
half an hour or so. I came to the conclusion that I wont just chose one of
the guys randomly. I'll test both guys out at the same time, even if it
sounds dishonest of me, and chose the best one of the two. Yeah, that's what
I'll do. Neither one of them have to know.

  I decided I'd take a trip to the pool instead of emailing Mark back and
talk to him there. Tell him everything's forgotten and if he wants to have a
try at a relationship, I'd be more than willing to. I would have went to
grab a towel and my bathing suit since I'm going to a pool and you know,
it's a place to swim and all. But I'm terrified of swimming. Back when I was
around 7 years old, I had a bad incident where I almost drowned. Ever since
then, I never went into beaches or big pools. I never even learned how to
swim because of it and my family is always on my case about being
chicken-shit.

"Where you off too?" Mom asked as she saw me heading for the door.

"Oh.." I mumbled, "I'm just goin' out. I'll be back in a little while"

"I asked a simple question, Can you just give me a simple answer for once,
Ricky" My mom said in an annoyed tone.

I sighed softly to myself. "To the pool. I'm goin' to the Wave Pool to meet
up with some people, okay?"

Nick overheard the conversation from the living room and started laughing.
"When did you learn how to swim?" He teased.

"Screw off jackass" I said giving him an evil eye.

"Hey! Hey! That's about enough of that. I'm really proud your going to face
your fears and swim Rick" Mom said with a gentle smile on her face. I
flashed her back a faint little fake smile. "You know, I was afraid to go in
the water as a child too. I only learned how to swim when someone took me
out to the lake and threw me off the boat".

"Ma, I don't think they were trying to teach you to swim" Nick answered
trying to hold back a laugh. I couldn't manage it though and started
laughing a bit.

"Yeah well.... I learned didn't I!?" And with that, she went back into the
kitchen where she first was. I reached for the door knob and made my way
outside.

  The street was empty as I walked the block to the pool. Not much of a
surprise since my streets quiet all the time anyway. As I walked, I looked
over at Andy's house to see if he was around at all. But he wasn't to be
found. It's probably for the best anyway since he'll probably ask to come
with me.

  After about a 10 minute walk, I made it to the pool. I stood in front of
the building and took a deep breath before approaching the doors and going
in. Even though I didn't have any intentions of going in the water, just the
thought about being near water freaked me out. I asked the front desk if I
get into the pool without payment since I wont be going in the water anyway.
The secretary, who was a young cute girl probably around the age of 19 with
blond hair and blue eyes, hesitated at first but then allowed me to go. The
only way of entrance to the pool was through the change rooms, so I made my
way to change room and opened the door. Unfortunately for me, there was no
one in there at the time so I didn't get to see anything 'interesting'.

  After opening the door which led to the pool, my body started to tense up
and my legs began to get weak. I seriously started considering leaving when
I heard a familiar voice call me.

"Hey Ricky!" The voice called. It was Mark as he sat on those chair which
over look the pool. "Come over here".

  I took a look at him, then a look at the water, and back at him. I tried
to shake off the fright in me and started to approach Mark. His face started
forming into a strange expression when I took a seat behind him against a
wall, farthest away from the water.

"Um.." He started, "...okay. Where ever feels comfortable, I guess. I'm
really glad you came Ricky. Its a big relief"

    We sat there talking about a lot of different things for a long time.
Nothing about the lie came up into the conversation. It was mostly just
about getting to know Mark as Mark and not Mark as Johnny. As we talked, I
thought of the water less and less and eventually found myself sitting right
next to him on the edge of the water. I was just about to get up and leave
since the pool was about to close and Mark had to go change, when a bunch of
people my age started to approach us.

"Oh fuck," Mark whispered, "Move away, now!

I slid back against the wall where I had first sat when I entered the pool
feeling confused. I took a look at the people coming our way and recognized
each and every one of them. They were the group Mark hung out with; those
stuck-up assholes who think their the shits. The four of them started
talking to Mark as they stood there in their 10 sizes too big clothes.. I
stood and watched wondering why Mark told me to get away from him. Could he
have been trying to save me from getting made fun of? Or was he trying to
save himself from getting made fun of for talking to me?

"Oh look guys," the only girl in the group said with a giggle, "its the
class retard". The four of them started laughing hysterically at me as they
pointed and stared. I didn't really understand what made me so funny to
them, but I wasn't liking it. I had a couple things of my own to say since
it was so easy to make fun of these people back, but I decided not to
bother. I started to get up and walk away when one of the guys put his arm
out to hold my chest from moving forward.

"Did we say you could leave before us?" He said.

I pushed his arm away with not a whole lot of force and answered, "Fuck
you". That guys face changed and his eyes became vicious looking as he
grabbed my arm and pulled me into the water. I started freaking out and
pushed myself through the water to hold on to the edge of the pool so I'd
feel safe. All of them started laughing again, including Mark.

"Common guys," The girl of the group said trying to talk and she held back
her giggles, "lets get out of here".
  All five of them, yes, Mark included, started walking towards the change
rooms to leave the building. I was shivering in the water in my soaked
clothes as I couldn't help but realize what Mark had just done to me. But
just as they were walking away, Mark turned his head and mouthed something
to me. "I'm sorry Ricky. I love you".

  I pulled myself onto the top of the edge of the pool to get out of the
water. I looked like a dumbass in soaked regular clothes. I'm going to look
even more retarded walking home in these clothes.

As I left the pool and started walking home, I thought about what had
happened. I'm sure Mark didn't mean to hurt me like that. He's still not
used to the whole 'relationship' thing. And he did say he loved me and he
was sorry so I really can't be mad at him. Can I?  I really just didn't
know.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

   That night at almost midnight, as I sat downloading music from the
computer, I heard a noise coming from the window. I made my way to the
window as quietly as possible without waking- up Nick. Looking out the
window, I saw Andy throwing little pebbles to catch my attention. I opened
the window without making much sound.

"Get down here," Andy whispered loudly with a cute smile on his face.

I flashed him a smile and swiftly got myself out the window and onto the big
tree right in front of it. I climbed down and met up with Andy as he gave me
a quick, yet soft kiss on the lips.

"Wanna come over?," he asked, "I got the house to myself tonight"

"Umm," I pretended to hesitate even though I knew I was not going to say no.
"Okay I guess".

We walked over in the middle of the night across the street and opened the
door. Once the door closed, Andy wrapped his arms around my neck and leaned
in to lock lips. I tried walking backwards as we kissed to find the sofa so
we could get comfortable. After a bit of bumping into things and almost
breaking his mom's favorite decoration, I found it.

We lay together on the sofa as we explored each others mouths with our
tongues. Andy's hands moved around my body and eventually made its way under
my shirt to touch my chest. We unlocked our lips for a little as he took
this chance to remove my shirt as well as his own. As he took off his shirt,
I unbuttoned his jean button and pulled down the zipper. Our lips met again
and we continued to kiss as we maneuvered ourselves to take off our clothes.
We started giggling at some points because it was hard to keep the kiss
going with a lot of moving going on.

  After maybe 5 minutes, we managed to remove everything from our bodies.
Andy moved his lips away from mine and just began to stare into my eyes. His
warm body laying on mine felt amazing. He lowered his head onto my neck and
began giving it soft kisses.
"I *kiss* love *kiss* you *kiss* Ricky * kiss*" He said.

As he continued this way, I began to feel weird. At some points, I started
to imagine Mark being here with me in place of Andy. I couldn't really
understand it. I mean, I know I love Andy. And I know I feel something
similar for Mark too. But why am I thinking of Mark when I'm not even with
him?

  Andy and I didn't end up going all the way. It was cool though since it's
not all about sex. Actually, the kissing and just being next to each other
can be a whole lot better then the sex. There's more meaning to it in a way.
We lay together on the sofa, my arm around his, as he slept with a warm
blanket around us. I couldn't fall asleep that easily. Thoughts still
invaded my mind with a sense of guilt and uncertainty. As I closed my eyes
trying to force myself to give my mind a rest, a tear ran down my face.

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Hey guys, I wont be posting anymore of this story in nifty so if you wanna
find out the ending, you gotta come to check out this site thats starting
up. Its a site with gay stories written by teens...its not even up at yet,
but it'll be up real soon- If ya wanna kno wut it is, ur gonna hafta email
me..So hope u come and check it out. Again, if ya wanna email me, feel free
with ur comments.
My email address is now X_plicit33@hotmail.com
c-ya