Date: Sun, 3 Aug 2014 01:55:56 -0400 (EDT)
From: Erik Pruett <erik.pruett@aol.com>
Subject: Please Don't Go 11 (Young Friends)

	The regular warnings apply, blah blah blah.

	This is usually my hello section where I give my little bits of
pre-story banter and make excuses for the huge gaps between my chapters
that my more dedicated readers have come to loathe. All I can do is
apologize. I always mean to write consistently, but then life
happens. Truth be told, most of the time recalling the memories that become
this story simply requires more strength and integrity than I possess. At
any rate, moving and adapting to a new environment has taken up most of my
time over the past year. I'd like to promise that now that I'm settled in,
I'll be able to write consistently... but just to be on the safe side, I
don't think I'll be making any such promises. Lord only knows that my life
isn't know for stability. But what I can promise is that I'll always
respond to emails, especially to the friends I've made through my time
writing this story. Anyway, enough ranting from me. On with the show.

---

	I wake up the next morning in much the same way I had earlier that
night. I'm nude, as is Jaime, and my nudity is cuddled atop his. There's a
blanket over top the two of us, his arms are still around me, my face is
snuggled into the space between his neck and shoulder. I can't recall
having ever felt more comfortable in my life. I close my eyes, preferring
not to let the moment end, but then his alarm clock blares and ruins it.

	"Good morning", I whisper into his ear as I slap the top of his
alarm clock. It goes silent and Jaime stirs. His eyes open, he rubs the
sleep out of them. They clarify and focus on me, the morning light catching
them perfectly and bringing out every beautiful emerald hue. Once he
realized what he's looking at, he's quick to press his lips into mine.

	"Good morning yourself", he replies after a few seconds of
kissing. I sit up and roll onto my butt beside him, feeling impossibly
whimsical.

	"Jaime?..."

	"Hmm?"

	"Am I awake?"

	He laughs, gives me a soft shove. "Yeah goof, you're awake."

	"You sure?"

	"Not positive", he muses. He reaches into the blanket and grabs my
morning hardness, elliciting a gasp from me. "I think you're awake", he
replies with a giggle. He starts jerking me slowly, full strokes up and
down, until I've stiffened fully.

	"We've got to get dressed, dummy!" I whimper, attempting to sound
urgent. I've never been one for self-control when it comes to him, but I do
what I can.

	"And?"

	"And your mom's gonna' be knocking on your door any minute. I don't
think she'd care to see my dick first thing in the morning!"

	Jaime pouts, quits jerking me. "Oh, come on. She's seen bigger."

	"Jerk!" I blurt, smiling despite myself. I shove him, the two of us
laugh.

	He reaches back down, plays with my head between his
fingertips. Part of me wants to protest again, but the sensation feels so
nice.

	"You sure you want to rush to get dressed?" he asks with a
seductive tone, his fingers slowly wrapping back around my shaft. I bite my
lip, almost tell him to go on when his mother suddenly bangs on the door.

	"You boys hurry up and get dressed! We're fixin' to miss our flight
if we don't make for the airport soon!"

	The look on Jaime's face is priceless, a blend of disappointment
and hilarity. I try my best to suppress my giggles. He gives me a shove, I
give him one back, and the two of us rush about dressing ourselves. I throw
on tiny black trunks, some white shorts cut above the knee and a dark grey
tank top, slip my feet into my black Vans, still the only pair of shoes I
own. Jaime just pulls on some plaid boxers, some Hollister sweatpants and a
red tank top of his own. Within ten minutes we've shoving our bags into his
parents' minivan and heading to the airport.

---

	Whenever I would travel with Jaime's family to the beaches in
Southern California, we would always go by car. The road trips were almost
as much fun as the actual vacations themselves. We would drive through the
vast open plains and rocky desert terrain between central Texas and the
SoCal coast, watching movies, singing to the radio, eating terribly
unhealthy gas station junk food along the way whenever we'd stop for gas or
to use the rest room, and at night I'd fall asleep leaning against Jaime,
staring hazily out over sublime scenery breathing in the crisp desert
air. Each trip was filled with happy memories, but none of those memories
involved planes. Truth be told, the only plane ride I ever took was the
flight from Hawaii to Texas when my father decided to move us, so as I
arrive with Jaime and his family at the airport, I feel a bit intimidated.

	The entire process through to the terminal is a chaotic scramble of
running from this desk to that desk, standing in this line and that
line. In any other case I'd have felt terribly overwhelmed, but with Jaime
by my side the entire time cracking jokes and goofing off, the whole
process isn't so bad. Fun, even.

	"You really woke up on the right side of the bed this morning", I
remark as he and I are putting our shoes back on after passing through
security. Since the moment we woke up, he's seemed different from how he's
been lately. Less inhibited, less serious. I can't quite but my finger on
it, suffice to say that he's more like the care-free, easy-going guy I
became friends with than he's been in a long time.

	"Why do you say that?"

	"Well... you just seem, I don't know, happy."

	He laughs a bit. "Sash... we're going to Spain. SPAIN! Do you not
comprehend how awesome that is or something?"

	Maybe that's it. Maybe it's just the vacation we're a mere handful
of hours from experiencing that's got him so energetic and light-hearted,
but somehow I can't really believe that it's as simple as that.

	"Of course I comprehend, goof. I'm going too! I was just
wondering."

	"Well, going to Spain is awesome", he says with his old signature
smile that I've missed, "but I'm not just going to Spain..."

	"You're... not?"

	He shakes his head, sits beside me and whispers into my ear, "I'm
going to Spain with the guy I'm in love with."

	I blush fiercely, punch his arm. "Stupid." His smile just gets
brighter.

	The wait in the terminal isn't terribly long. Jaime's parents give
us a few dollars and send us off to amuse ourselves while they sit by the
gate reading. Jaime's father, ever the professional, refused not to have
his legal documents on his person for consideration througout the trip, so
while Jaime's mother reads a paperback his father reviews work papers. In
the interim, Jaime and I rush off across the terminal, jog a lap in order
to scope out the potential for food. In the end, Jaime settles on a
mountain of chicken nuggets from McDonalds, far too many for any human to
possibly consume, but somehow he manages. By contrast, I just purchase a
smoothie at Jamba Juice, my stomach already a bit put off by my
nervousness. The last time I was on a plane, I was leaving behind the
ghosts of my old life in Hawaii; being in the airport now, it brings back
those memories and the feelings attached with greater intensity than I had
anticipated. As we're sitting across from one another at a table in
McDonalds, it doesn't take Jaime long to notice.

	"For such a beautiful guy, you don't look so good."

	I blush, eyes downcast. "I'm okay. Just... a bit nervous, I guess."

	"I heard someone say that flying is safer than driving a car",
Jaime offers through a mouthful of chicken nuggets. For all his
consideration, etiquette has never been amongst his strengths. "I think
we'll be okay."

	"It's not that. It's, well, it's hard to explain. Just feelin' a
bit off."

	He looks at me, at first pensively, then his expression softens
into sympathy. He takes a moment to swallow and clear his mouth with soda
before he speaks again, Jaime's version of "being serious". I can't help
but smile a little at how much of a stereotypical guy he really is.

	"I know I've been kind of a... okay, a lot of a jerk these past few
months. With you and Veronica, I mean. It's just so damn complicated."

	"Jaime, it's not that..."

	"I don't want you not to be able to trust me, Sash", he continues
as though I hadn't said anything. "I know I ain't doin' the best job, but
please don't pull away from me, okay?"

	There he is again, the tender, sincere Jaime that I fell in love
with years ago, shining through all the confusion that has defined our
transition into pubescence. He makes no effort to hide his vulnerability,
rather he exposes himself to me as though he were proving something by the
very act of exposure. Maybe he is. At any rate, I can't just leave him
hanging. He's really trying for me. And I've never believed in the mantra
"too little, too late".

	"Jaime... you're sweet. And, well... yeah, I guess it's no secret
the way I feel about things, but in this case it really has nothing to do
with that. Airports, they just give me bad feelings, remind me of things
I'd rather forget."

	His eyes brighten with realization. Jaime is the only one of my
friends that I ever explained my past to, the only one that knows how I
came to live in Austin from Hawaii in the first place. Without a word, he
gets up, walks around the table and sits himself beside me. He wraps an arm
around me, and my first instinct is to lay my head upon his shoulder and
cuddle myself a bit closer.

	"Guess I really am egocentric", he begins. I open my mouth to
protest, but he shushes me and continues. "I can't imagine how you're
feelin' right now. I'd be lying if I said I could. But I do know how I'm
feelin'. Sash, you know why I never even once tried to beg my parents into
letting Veronica come with?"

	A moment of silence passes. I suppose he wants me to respond, so I
make a little inquisitive noise. It hadn't really occurred to me before
now, but he's right: not once throughout the weeks leading up to this
vacation did he so much as mention the possibility of Veronica coming
along. Sure, his parents probably would've said no anyway - not for lack of
funds so much as for the fact that they considered the idea inappropriate -
but that doesn't change the fact that he never made the attempt. Despite
myself, my heart races just a bit. He continues.

	"I never asked because, to be honest, I didn't want her to come. I
know what I'm doin' is wrong. I ain't gonna' pretend that I'm noble or
decent---"

	"But you are decent!" I cut him off quickly, to his
surprise. "Jaime, I don't like what you're doing. And I wish more than
anything in the world that you could just let her go and choose me. Not
just for your virginity, not just in secret, but all the way. But that
doesn't mean that you're not decent!"

	"Sash... I've made you cry half a dozen times this summer..." he
says, tone sombre. I don't think it necessary to amend his statement. He
doesn't need to know how often I've actually cried over him.

	"Sure you have", I admit sheepishly. "But who was there for me when
half the school was bullying me every day? Who was there for me when I had
no friends or social life? Who was there for me when my dad beat the hell
out of me?" I realize that I'm actually out of breath, though I haven't
been shouting. The intensity with which I come to his defense against his
own self-deprecation surprises me, but it just flows so naturally from
me. "I guess what I'm trying to say is that... sure, you can be an
asshole... but you're still a decent guy, Jaime..."

	His face doesn't seem to know whether to contort itself with
surprise, bashfulness or elation. Suddenly, right in the middle of public,
he leans in and presses those velvety lips of his directly to mine, holds
them for a second before pulling away again. I could faint.

	"I love you, Sash." Those words cut into me, just as before. They
eviscerate any semblance of composure or restraint I may have had, rend at
my heart. And for the millionth or perhaps even the billionth time, Jaime
has brought me to tears.

	"I love you too", I whisper. He wraps me in his arms, athletic and
sun-kissed, and tightens them around me.

	I'm certain that we've attracted more than a few stares from some
of the people around us. Some of them perplexed, some of them concerned, a
few of them smouldering. But whether because of the tenderness of his words
or the vulnerability being in the airport inflicts upon me, I don't feel
capable of mustering any concern. I'm so far passed caring what the
strangers around us think of me snuggled in the arms of another boy. It
just feels nice, so nice. That's enough for now, I think. Propriety can
wait.

	"I didn't get to finish", Jaime finally mumbles to me.

	"Hmmm?"

	"About why I never asked for Vee to come, I mean."

	"Oh. Right..."

	He clears his throat, looks directly into my eyes. "I didn't want
her to come because I wanted this to be our once chance to be completely
and totally free, you know? No girls, no baggage, no worrying about this
and that. Just you and me being you and me. Together. I know it isn't a
solution, I know it's just for while we're in Spain... but I think it's a
start. And if you're willin' to bear with me, well... who knows! Maybe it's
the start of something big."

	I haven't even finished with my last fit of tears when a new wave
hits me. I shove my face hard into my neck, breathe in the scent of him and
fasten my own arms even more tightly around him than his are around me.

	It's a long time before he and I are able to return to his parents
in the waiting area.