SLASH BACKSLASH ONE-SHOT CONTEST
Story Name: Modern Affairs
fPen name: NeuroticMuse413
Pairing: Jasper/Edward, J/E/A
Disclaimer: Don't own Twilight.
To see other entries in the "SLASH BACKSLASH" contest, please visit the C2: http ://www. fanfiction. net/c2/74941/3/0/1/
SUMMARY: A drunken night in Rome breaks up a lifelong friendship. Four years later, Jasper is about to get married and asks his once best friend, Edward, to be the best man. Edward's refusal leads to a life-altering revelation and sparks a dangerous affair. M.
WARNING!MATURE READERS ONLY. It deals with homosexual sex between men and offers ridiculously descriptive sex scenes. There's also a slight rape scene, though not really. No one is being forced and there's no violence. They're just… well, not aware it's happening until a bit later and join in. If you are uncomfortable with any of these situations, PLEASE DO NOT READ FURTHER.
-----
"Love who you're with because of who they are and who they aspire to be, not what they can do for you, where they come from, or how well they can love you back."
-----
It was easy to share my life with Jasper. He'd been my neighbor, my friend, my brother to some extent. When my parents died and we were cast off into the adult world, we became the only family each other had. And while I understood why Jasper never took the role on quite as seriously as I did, I never felt more hope than that week we spent in Italy just after our first year of college.
It wasn't an exchange program or study abroad or anything. It was two guys who worked their asses off (in my case, quite literally) to save up enough money for the trip. He asked me once, over tequila shots, where the money came from. I never answered and he never asked again.
We were 19 and still beautifully naïve, Jasper especially. He'd never been in love and was looking for some Italian jailbait to pretend for a night. He could have gotten any of the girls at Roamina with a wink and a drunken smirk but he didn't know these things. I'd never taught him and, as always, he never asked. He thought that if he sat at a bar and looked sullen and lonely, a girl would just naturally walk up to him and ask him back to her place.
There was no mirror behind the bar so he couldn't see what I was doing to ensure such a miracle didn't happen. He was hunched over the bar on his little stool, but I stood beside him. I leaned my body into him so my crotch was just up to his hip and even went as far as resting my chin on his shoulder for a few seconds under the guise of a noisy room. He wouldn't be able to hear me if I didn't lean in, or see the way I looked at him with lustful eyes. He didn't notice but every girl who even glanced at him got the hint.
Jasper was taken. He just had no idea.
I practically force-fed him three more vodka tonics and a rum and Coke. I had twice that but alcohol didn't hit me like it got to him. The boy was so country-fried steak. I had never grown accustomed to Texas life, no matter how long ago I moved to Dallas. I was a New York fag and damn proud of it, to anyone but the only person who really mattered.
My eyes told my whole life story, and they were aimed lovingly and passionately at the side of Jasper's face as I carried him back to our hotel room.
I'd managed to get enough money to rent us a moderately-sized room, a palace compared to the hostels I'd seen on the way there. For a couple of broke college kids, we were doing more than okay. I'd asked for a single king-sized bed and told Jazz all the other rooms were taken. Tourist season. I wondered how many more opportunistic lies I could get away with before Jazz realized the plan brewing dangerously in my mind.
I set him down on his side of the bed and backed away. I sat in a chair on the other side of the room and stared at him from afar, leaning forward onto my knees as I waited for him to fall asleep. Jazz was a heavy sleeper (had to be with all those kids running around his house growing up) and all the drinks had him in a semi-catatonic state by the time I dropped him on his pillow like a sack of potatoes.
I could have had my way with him two hours prior but I just sat in a chair, looking on as he stirred and mumbled incoherently about groceries and bad chess.
The first night, I just couldn't do it.
The plan had been simple, subconsciously in the works since I was a twelve-year-old perv wanking in my room. It was always the same fantasy, playing in my head like a movie. I'd drug him somehow, undress him in some dark basement somewhere, fuck him, and leave forever. I didn't expect it'd be so hard. I couldn't do it because he was also my friend, an unexpected and beautiful byproduct of my lustful teenage years.
And, even though I was 19 and lived in a world where sodomy no longer had such a negative connotation, I always felt like a monster for wanting someone so desperately when I knew he would only reject me if he knew the truth.
We had five more nights in Rome and every night, I tried again. Every night, I failed, and it became more and more evident that Jasper didn't deserve someone like me in his life. He deserved the miracle girl in the bar, the ones I'd been fending off with body language and deathly glares behind his back.
It was on the final night before we headed back to Dallas, after a week of museums and bars and museums and bars and museums and bars, that I heard the disappointment in his voice as he slept. By then, I had raccoon eyes and a lagging shuffle where a confident strut had once been but it didn't matter. He'd said my name in the most loving, drunken voice I had ever heard. I was by his bedside before I could even command my feet to move. I thought he'd woken and wanted something but he was just murmuring.
I began to fantasize as I'd done for so many years. I ran gentle fingertips around the edges of his face and over his lips. He smiled and his hand flew blindly to my knee on the bed. I whimpered uncontrollably. I'd always been told I was a loud fuck but I didn't really take much stock in it before that point. The whimper could have woken a dead man but not my Jasper, not after all that tequila.
He said my name against and his hand started to creep up my leg, towards my crotch. I covered my mouth to keep from squealing with a mix of happiness and surprise. I had held him before. I'd even playfully tackled him during a game of flag football and held his hand at high school graduation to give him the courage to walk across that final stage. I should have stopped there, should have cherished those moments when they were still beautiful and stolen. But I didn't.
He scooted over in bed, his eyes closed, and started to undo his belt with one lazy hand. I moved his hand away and undid the big Texas-shaped buckle myself, smirking. He wouldn't be caught dead wearing that in Dallas but he thought Italian woman needed more reason to pay attention to his crotch so he brought it along. Being the last night, he thought he needed the extra help. He hadn't. It was clear in those tight, low black jeans that he had all the extra equipment he needed to make a girl happy.
I ran my hand over his crotch just to feel the shape of it under the thick denim. He moaned softly and I almost came in my pants. I quickly withdrew my hand and waited another moment. Maybe I wouldn't get my fantasy but I could still get a modicum of fun out of the evening. I unzipped his jeans and started to pull down his pants. He seemed half-awake and began to complain but I just shushed him as though he were a child and told him, "Don't worry, Jazz. I'm just trying to make you more comfortable. You can go back to sleep now."
He nodded, hid his beautiful blue eyes with the back of his arm, and lifted his hips up so I could slide the pants off. They were tight and it took a bit of painful pulling but he didn't seem to wake, not even after that. He trusted me too much.
I sighed deeply and stared at his white boxers. They had little red polka-dots throughout and I couldn't help but chuckle softly. I thought it was just ridiculous that my own dick would spring to action so quickly when I had seen him in considerably less clothing in our high school locker room. I suppose, back then, I had only been allowed to look, not touch. Now, there was no one to stop me and tell me I was wrong and sick and perverted for wanting Jasper so much.
I ran the palm of my hand over his crotch gently, testing my own strength to stop. He didn't even murmur. I ran it again with more pressure. He was still asleep. It felt even more wrong with every layer of clothing I pulled off and every caress I was able to get away with.
My fingers played with the rim of his boxers, pulling down to catch a peek of the goods. Again, I gritted my teeth until my jaw ached. I straddled him carefully on the bed and pulled down down down until they were at his ankles. From there, he kicked them off himself and I took it as a tiny incentive to continue.
I ran my hands up the inside of his thighs, craving the feel of his skin under my fingertips, and pulled his legs further apart. He smiled but didn't move. I wondered if he thought he was dreaming, of whose face he put on my body. I didn't care who he thought about. I just prayed he didn't remember and, if he did, that he would one day find the strength to forgive me for my one offense.
I plunged into the act and gripped his shaft in my fist. He jerked suddenly. I paused again before starting to stroke up and down his length, slowly at first. With my other hand, I began to unbuckle my own pants. I stopped to throw off my t-shirt and it quickly dawned on me that we were both naked, in our bed, and that I was going much farther than I originally intended.
The feel of his slowly-growing erection wasn't enough for me. I wanted to taste him. I cupped his balls with one hand and, kneeling in the space between his opened thighs, bent down to lick his tip. It was a timid taste. After all the liquor he'd had, he wasn't going to stay erect for very long, if at all. His blood was probably 60 percent alcohol.
He tasted salty and smooth, though he hadn't even begun to leak anything at all. What I wouldn't give for a wet dream so I could really taste him. I hadn't hoped for much. I waited another moment, constantly looking up, trying to spot changes in his smile. There were none, he still smirked sadly and it broke my heart but I kept on.
I wrapped my lips around the head of his penis and waited another second before sliding down. I was careful about teeth. I knew how much that shit hurt but I didn't stop until I could feel him in the back of my throat. I gagged a little but quickly pulled back up. That's when he shivered and gave a gentle thrust of his hips, insisting I take all I could. My lips couldn't reach the base but that didn't stop me from trying.
I began to suck and lick and my left hand reached down to my own cock, now in full salute. I could feel my orgasm coming and I liked to think Jasper could feel his in some part of his unconscious mind. I wanted to give him the release he'd come looking for, even if I wasn't what he wanted. I reached into the bedside drawer for the box of condoms I'd hidden and took a moment of attention off his dick to rip one open with one hand and my teeth. I slid it expertly over my own cock just in time for my release.
Kneeling on the bed, it was hard to keep my balance and I leaned my hand on his hipbone, now positive he wouldn't wake. I jerked and groaned at full volume, followed by a laugh. Maybe I couldn't get Jazz off but just being so close and so naked with him made up for a lot. A part of me never expected I'd get this far.
I certainly never expected his hand would reach for the wrist of the hand upon his hipbone. I didn't think he'd have such a grip left in him but I had a way of underestimating Jazz. I always thought he was the innocent little boy I was taking advantage of, a thought that had made me hate myself for years prior. Before I could even revel in my release, he had rolled me over and rested atop me. His eyes were half open, delirious, but certainly intent on mine. His expression was so tranquil and yet so sad that I felt like crying.
Still, he reached over to the box of condoms spilled all over the bedside table and slipped one on, ripping the package with his teeth as I'd done. I smirked, trying to convince myself that he was truly awake and willing. I slipped it on quickly. It was lubricated but I knew it wasn't going to do much. We'd need more if he was going to pummel into me the way I'd imagined but it didn't matter. I wasn't saying a thing. I was just going to stare up at him like the horny, lovesick idiot I was and wait for him to find my asshole.
It didn't take him long, which surprised me. Holding the same wrist, he flipped me around and was soon face to face with my ass. He had to know what he was doing, I thought. He had to. But I didn't say a thing. I got on all fours and whispered, "Do it. Just fuck me."
When his strong hands grabbed hold of my ass cheeks and pulled them apart, I thought I was going to come again. The guilt was dissipating and then, he just plunged into me as though to punish me. He didn't even bother stretching me, preparing me for his cock. He just dove in and slowly but surely, he was inside me. All the way inside me. I gritted my teeth again to hide the urge to scream. The pain was only momentary and then it was hard to imagine him not being inside me. He paused as though reconsidering it before pulling out and plunging into me again. This time, I damned my restraint to hell and gasped and groaned and called out his name.
He came and quickly pulled out, collapsing in bed beside me. I fell face down onto his pillow, continuing to gasp madly. I avoided his eyes and faced away, knowing too well the expression I'd find. I finally gulped away all the burgeoning tears and turned my head on the pillow. I came face to face with a pair of eyelids and the gentle rhythm of sleep. It didn't stop me from pretending though. His arm rounded my waist and I smiled the whole night, just watching him sleep.
That was four years ago. It was one of the last times I saw Jasper. When he woke up, he was naked in bed and I was nowhere to be found. I stumbled in later, pretending to have just left the bar. He looked at me wide-eyed and held his head of short, curly blonde hair as though trying to stop the obviously migraine from leaving him blind, deaf, and with permanent brain damage.
"What the fuck happened last night?" he asked me timidly, avoiding my eyes. I wondered if he remembered but I mentioned nothing of the act, not even my usual sexual innuendoes that I managed to fit into every conversation.
"You ran off with some chick and left me there, man. By the state of the sheets, I imagine the Texas belt worked," I answered with a fake laugh. I went to pack what little I'd brought and we left. We went back to school and we kept coming up with more and more reasons not to see each other. We were busy doing this, studying for that… it went on for years and, though we never quite lost touch because such a thing would surely kill us, I had effectively ruined the most loving relationship of my life.
This is why, when I got his email to meet up four years later, I didn't hesitate for the chance of a tiny glimpse of those blue eyes or dark blonde hair again, or the lanky limbs and chiseled muscles I'd looked for in all other men before and after Rome.
I arrived a half hour early to the café. I wasn't the same mess as I'd been in Rome. I didn't show up an hour late to a meeting anymore because I was stoned or hung over and I didn't wear the same ratty old band t-shirts and ripped-up jeans. My hair wasn't long and filthy all the time, though still hopelessly untidy, and my eyes no longer held the puppy dog love I'd once coveted so deeply. I knew very well that after that meeting, I'd be saying goodbye again and it might be another couple years. I'd accepted it.
I was an architect now. I had a little firm I loved and a steady income so I didn't have to depend on my past favors. I knew Jazz was in a competing firm and figured his bosses wanted to get some info from me or he wanted to talk blueprints. We often texted each other technical questions, nothing personal. I didn't know if he'd found someone though I thought I hoped he had. I had a mail boy named Mike who I hated but was good for a Friday-night fuck on top of the copiers. Nobody could say I didn't work late.
I expected Jazz would walk in with tubes full of plans and a large portfolio but he didn't even have his usual backpack full of crap from college. He didn't see or recognize me right away so I used the distraction to straighten out my coat and button-down shirt. I adjusted my black tie and, after a quick clearing of the throat for courage, waved at Jasper to come over.
He took a deep breath when he saw me stand and buried his hands in his jeans pockets. I was happy to see he'd changed too. He was the same tall, skinny thing but with ever so slightly broader shoulders and a neater haircut. No more Kurt Cobain locks. I kind of missed them, missed imagining how great it felt to run my hands through them unabashed.
He smiled at me and walked over, keeping a good two feet away from me as he shook my hand tightly. It already felt impersonal, too manly for my everyday taste. There had once been an era, before Rome, when he would have hugged and done the manly pats. Well, he patted. I'd just hold on a bit longer than I should have.
When he let go of my hand and slipped it back in his pocket, I waved to the little metal seat before mine and gestured him to sit. The silence quickly began but I could see something different already, not just in the physical. This was deeper. It was like his eyes were smiling without his lips' consent and his posture just screamed a sort of self-assurance that only came with a steady relationship.
"Hey man," I finally spoke. "What'd you want to talk about? You said it was big."
Could he be coming out of the closet, maybe? I pondered. It was ridiculous, of course, but I didn't care. One doesn't get that posture from a relationship you have to constantly hide from the public. This was pride on his shoulder, not shame.
"Yea. But first, how are you doing? Still at Buckley's?" he replied lamely, almost all trace of his accent gone.
I rolled my eyes and waved a waitress over. I ordered for us both because Jasper never changed his coffee preferences and turned my attention back to his face. "Spit it out already," I commanded. I didn't like to beat around the bush. "You know I'm still at Buckley's and that I got that promotion last month because I texted you. You wanted to talk and drove half an hour to do so. So spill. You sick or something? You need money?"
He knew I would give him anything he wanted on the spot. He gulped and smiled, an odd combination to me but I could always make him smile even at inappropriate times. In high school, it was half the fun of biology class just to play with Jasper's expressions during bad sex ed videos.
"I've got a favor, yea… I, uh, would like the honor of having you as my best man. At my wedding."
As though that last part wasn't obvious. My eyes slowly widened and my heart felt like it wanted to hammer my ribs to death until one or the other surrendered. "Wedding? What? To whom?"
He smiled brightly as he said her name. "Alice. She's a designer friend of Rose's. We met at a Christmas party. I was Rose's date 'cause sis hates fighting off the drunken married guys at those things and the rest is history. She helped me drag Rose home and she stayed for coffee."
I chuckled. "Dear God, you actually managed to talk to a girl without setting yourself on fire."
He wouldn't it have found it so funny before but he did now. Because now he had Alice and he'd never need me again. He'd never beg for my company on lonely Friday nights or ask me advice or fuck me in his sleep in foreign hotel rooms. He'd have someone who could fulfill his every need, not just his drunken ones.
"Come on, man. I don't have any other guy friends what with all my sisters and my work friends aren't as close to me as you are. I wouldn't even think of asking anyone else."
He was begging. Why was he begging? I would have given him the fucking moon if he asked for it, even if I had to build my own rocket. He should have known that after all these years. I wouldn't have even been in Rome if it weren't for him. He was the one that liked all the old-school architecture. Give me a Gehry any day and I'll come before I even walk in the door.
I was about to say yes when he opened his fucking mouth and continued begging, "Oh and you'll love Alice's roommate. She's the bridesmaid and she's super cute. Name's Bella. She's a librarian from Washington and she looks like a really awesome girl. I think you'd benefit from a girl like that, you know."
I gaped, lips parted. It was insult enough that he asked me to practically give him away to some girl while I was doomed to spend a life of heartache and half-empty relationships. It was bad enough that he was allowed to parade around with the girl he loved, hold her, kiss her, in view of anyone without any fear whatsoever while I resorted to mail rooms and one-night stands.
But he was setting me up with a chick. He had never, in the ten years he knew me before Rome, ever seen me with a woman, never even seen me in a relationship. I knew it was irrational but I was angry at him for not knowing. He, who was supposed to be my closest friend, my brother, my one-time lover…
"Are you fucking serious?" I growled softly. The waitress brought us our coffee, saw my expression of angry disbelief, and scuttled right back to the kitchen.
"What do you mean?" he asked timidly, hiding his lips behind his coffee cup.
I shut my eyes and pretended I was alone, staring at myself in the mirror. It had been a mission to admit it to myself all those years ago. It was natural now. I forgot who I was with and just whispered, "I'm gay, Jazz. Why can't you see that? Why don't you ever see? My secret relationships, the way I fucking look at you, touch you…"
I opened my eyes and found an expressionless mask instead of a face. He set down his coffee and scooted his chair back like he couldn't be far enough away from me. He bit his bottom lip and looked away, cross-armed and shaking his head.
"Fuck you," he whispered and stood up. Before I could even say anything, he had stormed out the door.
-
It was the worst two days of my life. I drowned it in beer and spent the first night sitting on the front steps of my favorite museum before the police showed up and asked me to "move along." The second day, I called in sick at work and spent it curled up in bed in my flannel pajama bottoms. I even pulled out old tapes of us in high school and middle school. I smiled at the sight of us two scrawny little things with our arms around each other's shoulders. I cried when Jazz laughed, revealing a big metal smile. He was the ugliest, most awkward little thing in those braces but I still loved him. I loved him because he was mine and nobody else would ever see how wonderful he really was.
It took me those two days to realize I was being selfish all those years I kept him purposefully naïve, occupying his every free second. I avoided images of Rome, of the length of his cock or the way his hooded, sleepy eyes saw right through me.
I'd run out of beer and junk food so I put a gray old pea coat over my plaid pajama bottoms and slippers and walked off to the little Chinese market down the block. It was raining bullets but I didn't care. I needed it to hurt. I needed to be punished, I knew, for ever closing those eyes and speaking the truth. It had been good, this slight distance. I still had him in my life, even if it was considerably less. Maybe after the wedding, we could have rekindled everything and I would have my best friend back. Maybe I would have found someone else and gotten over it.
When the rain finally slowed down enough for me to cross the street without catching pneumonia, I dragged myself back up to my apartment. The hallways and elevators were eerily empty. Most people were hiding inside from the rain. They didn't see it often so it was natural for them to hide from it. The elevator doors opened and, as soon as I turned left into my hallway, I saw the little black mass huddled in front of my door.
It was Jasper, covered in a black trench coat, his arms hugging his knees to his chest. His hair was wet and stuck to his forehead but only lightly so he hadn't caught the full force of the storm. That meant he'd been waiting outside my door for at least a half hour. I sighed, unsure of how to approach him, and walked slowly towards him. He didn't even realize it was me until he came face to face with my plaid-clad knee caps. His eyes snapped up and I realized that not only had he been crying but he was trembling fiercely. Maybe he'd caught more of the storm than I thought.
I wasn't cruel enough to let him suffer like that, not even after he rejected any shred of identity I had and turned me into this self-deprecating monster once again. We didn't say anything. I furrowed my brow, partly from the confusion of seeing him there at all, and nodded towards the door. He shot right up onto his feet and I slammed my grocery bags into his chest to hold while I opened the door. I walked right in but he lingered in the hallway as though asking for permission to enter. I realized he'd never been in my new apartment. I'd lived there three years and I'd never let him in, always choosing to meet in restaurants and clubs and those ridiculous inauguration ceremonies our firms dragged us to when we first started.
I went up to him, took the bags from his arms, and said, "Come on."
I had no plans of treating him kindly, not after the last two days of hell. He shut the door behind him and followed me to the kitchen. He sat down at the dinner table while I put away the beer and endless new supply of Pringles. I always got a barbecue-flavored one for him, even though I hated it, and tossed it to him. He caught it but set it gently down on the table instead of eating, completely ignoring the emotional symbolism. He still didn't understand, even then. He knew I slept with, and loved, men. He didn't know I slept with and loved him.
I groaned because I knew this was just going to be another awkward conversation. Then, he finally spoke and I was left speechless.
"I'm waiting for you to apologize," he said and I felt like strangling him.
"You're out of your fucking mind. I am what I am, Jazz. Don't talk to me, run out on me… whatever. But I'm not lying to you anymore," I defended, chugging down on a warm beer. It tasted like shit so I poured it out. I don't even know why I bothered with domestic beer. "I'm not lying to anyone."
He furrowed his brow and his eyes slowly trailed their way to me. "What?" he yelled, standing. I just leaned back against the kitchen counter, the empty beer bottle in hand. "I don't fucking care what you are, you son of a bitch! I cared that you knew. You knew all these years and you never told me! I was your best friend, Edward. I feel like I don't even know you!"
My anger started to dwindle. "You should have known," I replied lamely.
He just laughed with hysterical, bloodshot eyes and shouted back, "Edward, you never once introduced me to anyone you were dating, never even mentioned the word gay! It's not like you're one of those guys on TV that wear the pink shirts and have a shrine to Barbara Streisand!"
I couldn't help the chuckle. "Just don't look at my DVD collection." He didn't find it that funny. I put the beer bottle gently into the sink (loud noises were not the friend of the headache threatening to drive me mad) and said, "Is that what you think a gay man does? Worship Barbara Streisand and wear pink?"
Something flashed across his eyes. A memory. He instantly looked away from me and fumbled with his fingers. He scratched his forehead, a nervous habit of his, and turned around. "I know what you do, Edward. You screw men."
I nodded once. "Damn right. I love to fuck them. I love to wake up to them. I love it when they stick their hands down my pants in movie theaters and I love sucking cock on my knees on the floors of club bathrooms. And I would have given all that up just for you to know how I felt and for you to feel the same!"
I knew something was wrong when he didn't seem repulsed or stormed off again. I wasn't letting him go again without telling him everything, at least confessing my love for him. It had been fourteen fucking years of friendship, fourteen years of pining for a man I could never have.
"I knew," he whispered, looking down at his feet. "At least, I think I did. You see, I had this dream once. Of you and me, and for four years it's all I see when I go to bed, when I'm with Alice. And I need to know—"
I cut him off right there because I couldn't get my hopes up. "Rome," I blurted out, eyes shut tight. I could hear him walk around the dinner table towards me but I didn't move, arms tightly crossed over my chest. I didn't know what to do with them.
"Was it real?" he asked, his voice dangerously close.
I nodded. "I'm so sorry. I knew we'd be parting soon. Look how different our lives are after just four years. But I loved you and I'd wanted you for so long that I didn't care that you didn't want it too. I'm sorry."
A trembling hand rested over my heart. I dropped my arms and opened my eyes. Jasper was standing a foot away, crying. He shook his head and said, "No. That's not how I remember it."
I realized then what he meant, how he finished the act. He must have been awake but posed too many possibilities I wasn't ready for. What if he'd wanted it too?
"I'm not gay," he quickly corrected.
I shrugged. "One night with me doesn't change who you are, Jazz. Even when you thought it was a dream, you still met Alice. You still fell in love."
"Alice…" he echoed. I cautiously put a firm hand on his shoulder and squeezed. "I love Alice."
"I'm sure you do." I was sure. I saw his eyes, his composure in that café. "And I'm sure she'll make you very happy. Just don't ask me to stand up there beside you and watch you get claimed like that. Please. I would do anything for you but don't ask me that."
I must have been crying because my image of Jasper started to fuzzy up. I didn't wipe the tear away. That would mean acknowledging it existed at all and men did not cry. It's how I'd been raised.
"I love Alice," he whispered again, completely ignoring my statement. I realized it was more for him than for me. He reached up and wiped the tear away, bringing it up to his lips to taste. I froze. I'd never seen him quite so open, so close. "I love Alice… but she doesn't know me like you do."
Something gathered at my throat because I couldn't get the words to sound right. "Nobody knows you like I do."
He nodded in agreement. It wasn't just a cheesy line. It was a fact, undeniable. He brought a hand up to caress my cheek and I couldn't help myself. I clutched his fingers with my left hand and grabbed the back of his neck with my right, slamming his lips to mine.
At first, his lips were reluctant, stationary. Then, as though the memory of that night in Rome were coursing through him all over again, he let his hands wander inside my coat and his lips parted, welcoming the kiss. I brought his hand to my heart on my bare chest. He was trembling so terribly that it almost felt like kissing a vibrator. His whole body convulsed against mine and we'd barely moved off the kitchen counter.
I took what little of the kiss I'd expected and pushed him off. "I'm sorry," I squeaked, trying to recapture my breath. "All I ever seem to do is take advantage."
Jazz gulped and brought his free hand to his lips. His eyes were wide as saucers and I couldn't help smooth the sticky tendrils of hair back off his forehead. I smiled at him lovingly, just ecstatic to have him in my arms like that, his hand over my heart. Finally, he could feel how I felt in full force. Well, not exactly. At least, not yet.
"I'm not saying no," he finally managed to blurt out, swallowing down a huge dose of guilt.
"You don't have to. I'm saying no for you."
He shook his head quickly, splashing me with water off his hair. "You don't get it Edward," he said with a new conviction. "You're such a self-deprecating ass that you'd never consider I might want it too. I'm not saying I'm giving up all I have. I'm just saying I don't want to leave this apartment without knowing completely, without a doubt, what it's like to be loved by you."
I knew everything about Jasper. He was an open book, more or less. I didn't expect he'd know everything about me as well. After all, he'd missed the fact that I was gay. But, as I kept reminding myself, that was not all there was to me. I was a maze of emotions and twisted logic. I was self-deprecating, that was for sure, but I was also loving and devoted and I wondered if Jazz saw all that beneath that façade I'd worn for years.
Something about his smile told me he did. It was the way he looked at me, like something had clicked inside him and he could now see all the love my eyes held only for him. And, what's more, his love mirrored my own.
I took his hand like we were childhood sweethearts and pulled him towards the bedroom down the hall. The bed was unmade and still a little warm from all my fetal positioning the last twelve hours. We stood side my side, staring down at the sheets. His hands were still trembling.
I turned to him. "You're cold."
"I'm terrified," he confided with a breathless laugh.
"Of what?"
"Of what this might mean. About me. About us."
I let of his hand and walked up behind him. I pulled his coat off and folded it up a bit before throwing it onto my chair by my architect's desk. He was wearing a t-shirt and jeans below that stuck to his skin with water, tracing all the muscles of his back. I slowly but firmly ran my hands down his back to the rim of his shirt. I slid my hands beneath and started to pull it up over his head. He lifted his arms in the air and the shirt came right off.
It hadn't been this easy in Rome. I didn't have to keep pausing every few minutes. I could be myself, the confident sexual persona I had built after years of anonymous or meaningless sex. I had once blamed Jasper for not being able to find someone to love. I never realized that maybe all those encounters were just meant to prepare me for him. He needed someone experienced to guide him through. It might as well have been his first time and the idea had me smiling.
I wrapped my arms around his waist from behind, going to unzip his pants, when his hands stopped mine. He gulped but I could tell by the way he shoved my hand down his pants to grab his erection that he wasn't afraid of the act itself. After all, he'd done it once before, whether he remembered it well or not. His body never forgot and, unlike me, he didn't hate himself for wanting to remember everything again.
He gasped when I started to caress his cock, not even grasping him the right way. "Go slowly," he pleaded but I knew how fast he liked it. This time, I had no regrets or guilt, not even knowing Alice was waiting somewhere for him to get back, probably worried that he'd gotten caught in the storm.
I pulled my hand from his pants and turned him around, just to see his face again and knew this was real. Every emotion that crossed his eyes was new to me. He was seeing the real me and I was seeing the scared boy I first met in middle school. It was deliciously endearing. I looked down at my coat and pajama bottoms. I gave him a look that begged him to take it all off. He needed to do it for himself, to gain the confidence to come back.
His hands found my collar and pushed the gray coat back off my shoulders. It fell to the ground unceremoniously. Next, his eyes fell on the elastic waistband on my pajama bottoms. His hands slid under the waistband and cupped my ass, pressing my crotch to his. I was just a bit taller so I had to bend over a little to kiss him. This time, it was like a mutual spark was reignited and before I knew it, our pants were puddles on the floor and his erection was rubbing with mine. Our arms were wrapped around each other, touching, exploring… Every sensation felt new and heightened by the emotional intimacy we'd shared all those years.
My kisses led me to his ear and I couldn't help but whisper, "You have no idea how beautiful you are to me."
He didn't say anything, still uncomfortable with such a level of honesty, but grabbed my ass hard enough to draw blood. I must admit. I liked it. He wasn't soft and timid anymore, despite his inexperience with other men. He was methodical but certain of each step once he did it once, desperate to learn. Of course. I had learned my method from him, just applied it to different areas. Like the bit of neck just below his ear which I now kissed and nibbled.
I was tired of foreplay, wanted to dive into the full man. I wanted to tell him but was afraid that such forward instructions might turn him off. He preferred being in control in Rome. He saw my reluctance to speak in my hesitant kisses over his chest and stopped me. He could read me without me ever having to speak, knew every emotion in my book and how to draw out the right ones.
"What is it?" he asked, starting to wonder just what doubts were going through my mind now.
I smirked. "I don't know how to tell you what I want."
"How much communication do you need? Last time you did this, I was drunk shitless."
I laughed and agreed. So, I leaned into his ear and whispered, "I want to wrap your legs around my neck and suck you off till you can't stop the spasms or calling out my name. And I want to ram you and make you come at the same time. And I want you to tell me everything you want and everything you feel, all the time."
His cheeks turned fire red but I'd learn later that it was pure arousal rather than embarrassment. I could have said anything and he would not have been embarrassed. It was just him and me in a room, I reminded myself. The goal was ultimate pleasure. How one got there was irrelevant.
So, I pushed him back on the bed and kissed my way up from his right knee to his inner thigh to his balls and lifted them up to kiss his opening. He shivered but I only laughed. I remembered he'd never been penetrated and decided to start slow. I got a new condom off my floor because they were always thrown on one surface of the house or the other, hidden in cookie jars and beneath papers and welcome mats. I rarely used the bed.
I slapped one on either of us, not that I wasn't completely sure Jasper was as clean, if not cleaner, than I, and raised a finger to my lips. He saw where this was going and drew up his knees, spreading them. I suddenly had the most beautiful view a gay man could ever want. I licked my finger and walked it up and down his opening before gently running it inside. He let out a low sting of profanities and arched his back immediately. He lifted his knees up even further off the bed, giving me full access. One finger still inside him, I reached for the bottle of lube under the bed and started pouring it over my hand. I wanted at least four fingers in before attempting it with my cock. I was hard as a rock and certainly wider, not longer, than he was.
With the lube, it was easier. I was quickly three fingers in but he had already begun to convulse with orgasm. I sped up my jabbing motions and wrapped my hand around his cock, running it up and down as I entered him from below. He came with only three fingers and I figured that was enough to try full cock. I stood on my knees and hooked his legs up on my shoulders. I moved my cock in place and maneuvered the head in. I pushed in slowly and delighted in the way his cock and balls bounced with my jabbing motions. He reached down and grabbed himself as I began to speed up my poundings. The apartment echoed with the slaps of skin to skin. Faster and faster and faster…
When we both finished, I went to pull out but he stopped me and asked me to wait there for a moment. "I like being filled by you," he confessed.
I quickly regained my arousal but did as ordered and stayed. I lowered his legs around me and fell forward, exhausted, onto his chest. He stroked my hair without a single reservation, smiling all the while. This was the most loved I'd felt since he wrapped his arms around my bare waist in Italy and fell asleep. Or passed out. My memory falters somewhat on the event though the feeling it gave was still crystal clear in my heart.
His breathing was quickened and his abdomen clenched and unclenched beneath me so I asked, "You okay?"
He nodded, staring up wildly at the ceiling. I made a note to myself to put a mirror up there if he ever decided to do it again. "That was… uh, wow."
"Wow? That's it? You're such a product of the nineties. Use your words, love."
He continued to stare up at the ceiling, arms limp on the bed around us, and whispered, "That was the most intense experience of my life."
I snorted. "Might I remind you of the first day you discovered porn. That was pretty big. They had to call your mom to bring you a change of pants at summer camp 'cause you used them all up in like a week."
He burst out with laughter, the most I'd heard from him since long before Rome. "No, jerkward. I meant more like my first kiss or the first time I went to the country with Dad and saw the open night sky."
I smiled, suddenly reminded how much history we truly had and the horrible mistake I'd made keeping my feelings to myself all these years. Even if he was bisexual and even if I only had him for these little trysts, I was fucking content. Or content fucking. Whichever you prefer.
I gave him a moment to rest and control his heart before we started up again. And again. And again. I kissed him for a whole five minutes at the door. The next door neighbor came out walk her dog and caught us. She saw me with a different guy every other week but she saw the difference in this one, in the way we wrapped our arms around each other and smiled and caressed each other's faces slowly as though unsure everything was real.
I expected Jasper to freak out about being seen kissing another man but the neighbor just shot us a smirk, blushed, and went on her way to the park across the street. Jasper soon followed and she held the elevator door open for him. I opened my windows for the first time and realized it was now daylight. I had work to do, people to see, things to sketch, and a man to fuck later that week.
-
Jasper rarely called. He just showed up. He knew my schedule, which rarely faltered, and how long each thing took. He apparently bought books about different techniques and spent a few hours researching porn. He gave up on the porn because he said they took too long to get to the point. I laughed at this of course and waited for him to ring my door at all hours, as usual.
As a result, I really didn't have much time for a social life, not that I regretted it. When one spends one's whole life dreaming about one's best friend, it helps not to complain once one has obtained said friend and is screwing him three times a week. I knew it was wrong. I knew he still went home to Alice every night, especially when he stopped us halfway through a typical romp to go home and finish off with her.
But I never thought of her. I was selfish. I had suffered for too long with my secret desire and thought I deserved this little time of happiness. I guess, in my mind, I always knew it couldn't last. As selfish as I was, I wanted him to be happy above all else and convinced myself that, as long as he was with me, this was true.
Months passed and, even though we never left my apartment, we managed to leave the bed. He always came to me with some request, maybe a toy, but my favorites times were when he said nothing at all and just walked to find me on the couch, tired. When I didn't pay attention to him, he sat on my lap and started flipping channels until I rolled him off me, laughing.
I expected this would be one of those days. It was raining out and he rarely wanted to do anything when it rained, except eat dinner in quiet. I heard a timid knock on the door and figured he had his hands full with groceries. I chuckled and pulled on a pair of boxers in case it was my neighbor's teenage daughter again, asking for her third cup of sugar this week, just trying to catch a glimpse of the two gay nudists next door.
My sordid affair had been reduced to a peep show in a matter of five little months. Fantastic.
I open the door slightly, not even bothering to look if it was him, because the microwave was beeping. "Honey, we should really talk about getting you a key," I said with a laugh, running to get the popcorn out before the beeping drove me mad. It and alarm clocks were the bane of my existence.
A mousy voice came from the open doorway. I quickly realized it wasn't Jasper and snapped around, bouncing the steaming bag of popcorn from hand to hand before dropping it on the counter. At first I thought it was my neighbor but she swung the door open a bit more and I saw her fully then, the little creature in the little black dress with long black hair. She was absolutely gorgeous and, by the color of her eyes and her short stature and the picture in Jasper's wallet, I recognized her immediately.
"I'm sorry. I must be in the wrong place," she said in a soft-spoken voice and began to turn. I ran around the kitchen table to stop her.
"You're Alice," I shouted and she froze. She turned around slowly and her eyes began to water.
"How do you… uhm… They told me at the front desk that I might find Jasper Hale here."
I let out a jagged laugh. She looked me up and down, things starting to click inside her head. I couldn't answer so I just stepped aside and waved her in. After she sat down, I took the sofa across from her and stared, mesmerized by her presence in my inner sanctum with Jasper.
"You're Edward, aren't you?" she asked, her voice breaking ever so slightly.
I nodded slowly and finally regained my voice with a squeaky, "Yes."
"Where is he?"
I looked to the door. "He'll be here any moment. He got stuck in traffic. Are you… Do you know? Did he tell you?"
She shook her head and the first tear ran free. I reached around for a box of tissues and handed it to her. She took a single tissue but just stared at it in her lap, in her trembling hands. "I knew. I saw the bruises. I followed him just to prove to myself I had nothing to worry about but… I never imagined this."
I remembered the other night, the bruises she meant. They were thumb prints on his inner thighs. I was usually very careful. I hadn't left a mark on him in five months, though Alice could surely see every bite, scratch, and even cut on my body.
"He loves you," I told her honestly. "I know you're not going to believe it because of how this looks but he loves you. What he does with me doesn't change that."
Her shoulders began to shake as she held back the tears. "Damn it!" she shouted, the tears flowing freely. "I know who you are! He used to talk about you all the time when we first started going out. You were his best friend growing up. I got one look at you and I knew who you were. He never told me you were—"
I cleared my throat and finished for her. "Gay."
"He never told me he was gay either. It wouldn't have stopped me from loving him. He should have said." Her voice was cracking again. I handed her the box of tissues again and tried to keep my distance. The more I heard her speak, the more I could see the kind person seeping through. "And I wish so desperately that I could be angry with him but maybe I forced him into your arms because I couldn't see that he wanted out. I didn't even have a clue until I saw the bruises. Up until you opened that door, I was happy."
It should have shocked me but I had been expecting this moment for months. I had never expected it to work. It took me five months to even consider the possibility of doing this forever. It's what made every day so special.
I leaned in and explained, "You didn't miss anything, Alice, because he always loved you. He was with me because we had missed our chance when we were younger. It was a different age and society would never have understood. It was also my fault because I was never honest with him, just because I was afraid of losing him. It's the reason he didn't tell you. We owed it to ourselves to try and I regret no part of the last five months. And while I have no doubt in my mind that he loves me just as strongly as he loves you, I know that he would never give us up. I knew it was just a matter of time before we'd have to make a choice for him."
"You mean he doesn't need to know," she whispered, "that I was ever here."
"He loves us both. But he has a chance to live a full life with you. You're good to him, for him. You can leave your damn apartment without fear, hold his hand in public, kiss him whenever you want to… If he had never met you, things would have been different. I would fight the devil himself to keep him but you are the better of us two. I'm sure you understand that all I've ever wanted is for him to be happy."
She nodded and finally wiped away the tears. "He'll never be happy if you disappear," she said, standing. "I think I'd like it very much if you could still come to the wedding."
I was quite sure it would kill me a thousand times over to watch him go off happily without me but I didn't care. Not only had Alice invited me but I couldn't stand it if anyone else stood on his left at the front of that altar. I agreed but she could see the pain just under the surface, making my hands tremble on the doorknob. She leaned up to give me a kiss on the cheek and left.
Though I was selfish, I was not greedy. I always knew I was meant to love one man. I was positive I had found that in Jasper, that I would never find another replacement for him. I would go on as before with partner after partner, a life built on one-night stands. And if I should find someone new, it would never erase what Jasper and I had because what we had was never about the sex. It was the intimacy.
So I waited fearlessly for the end I had foreseen.
I knew that he'd walk in soon with armfuls of groceries and smile at me and I'd have to tell him I didn't want to do this anymore. I'd have to lie and give him a half-dozen lousy excuses but he'd know and, if our plan went well and Alice kept her promise to love him as she'd done so far, he would one day thank me for letting him go.
I'd left the door open so he came right in, humming a silly commercial jingle and smiling just as I'd seen in my head. He saw my expression and the tissues forgotten atop the coffee table and the smile started to dwindle. It broke what little heart I had left but I still gestured for him to sit.
I took a deep breath and said, "We need to talk."
-----
Before you start nitpicking the ending, you should probably know that this is something that happened in my own life. So shush. And yea, I was totally Edward. At least I got a nice angsty story out of it. I hope you enjoyed it.
Reviews are love.
-----
EDIT: Due to various requests and my own fangirlish ways, I have continued this story for a second part. It's posted on my LJ so there's no confusion with the Slash Backslash contest. Link is on my profile.
