Chasing Peace (10 page)

Boston pummels furiously as I hurtle over the edge,
spiraling into the abyss and landing in the crashing waves. He slams into me—thrashing—his
cock powering the waves washing over me. They’re relentless as I drown in the
sensation, wanting out yet unable to stop the pounding until I’d rather stay
right where I am. My muscles clutch at his mass, grasping with every jagged
pulse, bursting with sensitivity. I feel his cock swell within me as my muscles
tighten again. He groans under my grip, expanding and throbbing as he comes,
yet still he pounds into me, surging, amplifying my response and threatening to
devastate me every time he slams home, pulling away, but always coming home,
until he goes deep and stays, refusing to leave. Boston collapses on top of me
as my world goes dark, my mind spinning somewhere, reveling in the sensations,
but gone from this moment, at least for now.

When awareness slowly returns, I realize the futon is still
folded in the seating position. I scoot sideways to reach for a blanket, Boston’s
now flaccid cock slipping from me.

“Don’t go,” he mumbles, thrusting fingers into my hair to
hold my head steady as his lips move over mine, gentle and spent. Boston’s kiss
slows and goes slack as sleep takes him, leaving nothing but breath against my
lips.

With one hand, I lift the lid on the coffee table and drag
the blanket free. Pulling as much of it as possible over the top of us, I drift
off to another place, the dim light from my desk wrapping us in a warm glow.

I don’t know what I expected, but I guess I’m let down that
I didn’t wake with Boston by my side. Instead, he’s in my kitchen wearing boxer
briefs and nothing else.

He looks my way and smiles. I’m not sure whether I made a
sound or whether he’s just checking. “Morning,” he calls before turning back to
his task.

I struggle to put sleep behind me while trying to make sense
of another person in my home. I pull on my clothes and stumble to the kitchen.
Boston pulls out a chair for me.

“Sit.”

Straightening my tee and pushing my hair from my eyes, I sit.
“I can’t believe you found this much food in my kitchen.”

“As long as you have the basics, I can make something.”

He made pancakes and scrambled eggs. I could smell coffee
too. I don’t drink coffee, but I like the smell. Boston must have found some in
the cupboard left over from Brock.

The table would never be big enough for the both of us.
Hell, who am I kidding, my kitchen, my whole apartment, is much too small for
Boston. He’s tall and lean and commands attention. I can feel his presence
dominating my space. I try to keep our knees from touching, but I understand,
after only three bites that he’s trying to do just the opposite.

I look at my plate, uncertain and uncomfortable once again
about making eye contact.

Sharing a meal in our night clothes, or in Boston’s case
underwear, is somehow more intimate than if we’d both been naked. Sitting
together over breakfast, we face a deeper intimacy that isn’t at all sexual,
but so easily could be. His very presence in my kitchen makes me hum, until the
moment screeches to a halt, a crunching, disintegrating, shivering halt.

“Why do you sleep on the sofa? Isn’t there a bedroom in this
place?”

An innocent question and my middle twists into knots. He’d
opened my bedroom door. My heart raced; my respiration kicked up a notch. He
knows my secret, even if he doesn’t understand it. Chagrined, I’m not sure how
to answer. I don’t want to talk about this. I can’t talk about it. I’ll become
a blithering idiot if I do. I have too much history. I’m just beginning to like
this guy and I cringe at the censure I am sure to see in his eyes, the
condemnation and the rejection.

I’ve learned that everyone judges, usually within their own
frame of reference and rarely by putting themselves in another’s position. I
can’t lie if he’s already seen the bedroom, but I can’t tell him, not yet.
Maybe he’ll judge me less harshly after we get to know each other a little
better. Isn’t that part of the reason we save our secrets for later. We present
ourselves as an enigma cloaked in the safety of ignorance, all to preserve our
virtue.

One hand rubs over the other, applying just enough pressure
but not yet going the distance as I hang my head in the misery of indecision. I
have to say something, but what can I say? My wrist gives way and a soft crack
fills the air.

“Forget I asked.” His fingers slide under my chin, his thumb
caressing below my lips, fingernail grazing the fullness in the center. “I don’t
need to know.”

My downcast eyes watch the base of his thumb glide back and
forth. I am mesmerized by the movement and bemused by how he brushes off the
question. I didn’t say anything and he’s prepared to let it go, prepared to
wait.

“It holds too many memories, reminders of what can never be.
I can’t go in. I haven’t been in there since.”

“Hey, it’s okay. I get it.” My eyes meet Boston’s as his
fingers drift along my jaw, his thumb now stroking the corner of my mouth. I
lean into his palm drinking in the comfort, the reprieve I find in his eyes.

“I’ve opened it once or twice, looking in like it’s someone
else’s space, like I’m a voyeur, watching from a distance.” My voice is a cold
dull monotone.

“Did Logan live here with you?” I pull away from his palm,
my eyes slump sideways away from the allure of his. Why didn’t I leave it
alone? Why did I respond, continuing the conversation? I know why. I haven’t
talked to anyone about it. Lyla doesn’t even know I’m not sleeping in my own
bed.

My hands are busy in my lap; fingers from one massage the
wrist from the other, not yet applying pressure, but ready. “He never lived
here,” I confess, not meeting his eyes, watching his mouth instead. “We broke
up my senior year in high school.”

“Okay.” He circles my wrist with his fingers, long and
tanned and strong, his thumb stroking the inside of my wrist.

“Pressure builds, making it ache. It feels better when it
pops,” I confess.

“It doesn’t sound like it feels better.”

“Actually, it’s worse in the morning.” I try to tug my hand
away, but he holds firm. “It’ll feel better when I’m moving around.”

“Maybe you need a less violent way to reduce the pressure.”

“I haven’t found anything else that helps.” I try pulling my
hand away again, my wrist tugging against his grip.

Just when I think I’ve misjudged him, when panic begins to
set in at the restraint, he lets go.

“How does that feel?” His lips quirk, a glimmer sparkles in
his dark eyes. He knows I’d been frightened, just for a fleeting moment. I don’t
want to be afraid. I want to be strong, but he pushes my boundaries,
threatening my self-imposed security. He is smiling now, almost laughing. “Better?”

I’d misunderstood his intention. He didn’t mean to restrain
me when he pulled against my hand. I hold up my hand, rotating at the wrist.
The movement is loose and supple. “That’s a lot better.” I smile too, laughing
at myself. “Wanna watch a movie?”

* * *

We spend the afternoon lounging on the futon talking and
searching for weird stuff online. I expected him to leave at any moment, but he
didn’t. We talked about classes and work and the world around us,
inconsequential topics that allowed us to get to know one another without
sharing anything too personal until he made it personal.

“So why don’t you live in the dorms?”

“You should know that I’m not required. Besides, I already
had this place and it’s cheaper.”

“Hmmmh.” He said it like he didn’t quite believe me, but he
didn’t push, allowing me to change the focus.

“Why do you live in the dorms?

“I spent a lot of time alone as a child. Then in the
military I experienced community life and decided I liked it.”

“You served? Which branch?”

“Army. I had to pay for college somehow.”

“Hmm.” I’m not sure I believe him either, but I don’t
challenge, instead changing the topic as I trace the raven’s talons peeking
from below his shirt sleeve. I wonder if he worked in military intelligence.

“Tell me about the raven.” My fingers follow the flaring
wing.

“The raven symbolizes change.”

“I suppose that’s why some people call him the trickster.”

Boston grunted, not commenting.

“Why do you have a raven tat?”

“I like it.” I pause wondering if he’ll say more and he
doesn’t, pushing the topic away. “So, how’d you end up tending bar?”

“It pays the bills and it doesn’t interfere with classes.” I
know full well that the only reason I have a job is because Lyla offered it.

“Oh.”

“What?” I’m suspicious now.

“I got the impression that Lyla looks out for you.”

“I guess she does, but that doesn’t mean I can’t get a job
tending bar.”

Boston laughs at my defensiveness. “Easy now Sterling, I’m
not judging, just wondering. I’m on my own too you know.”

Taking a deep breath, the air flowing in and out of my lungs
audibly, I calm down and take advantage of the opening to find out more about
him. “Why don’t your parents help?”

“I don’t want anything from them.” His eyes go fuzzy, his
lips flat, and his features settle to bleak.

He doesn’t say why, but he’s already said enough. Boston is
a kindred spirit. I recognized it before I even knew him and now I know why.
Like me, he’s trying to make his way in the world using an instruction manual
that’s short a few pages. We’re struggling through as if directions were doled
out like assignments in class and we’d missed a couple days, or maybe twenty.

We’re searching for something as elusive as treasure but so
much more valuable and we haven’t figured out what it is yet. We battle the
snarl that is our life looking for help that never comes or paying no mind to
possible solutions when they arrive because we’ve no earthly clue what we’re
doing or where we’re supposed to be going.

Boston understands me as Brock and Logan never did, or maybe
I understand him when Brock and Logan proved elusive.

Silence settles around us like dread. I crack my wrist
again.

“Looks more like habit than need,” he says, taking my hand
in his and wrapping the fingers from his other hand around my forearm to gently
tug on my wrist. He circles it and cautiously bends it without pushing far
enough to crack.

“Maybe.”

“How’d you break your wrist?”

“It’s nothing I want to talk about.”

“Okay, then tell me about your family.” It sounded like a
command, but it came out softly with honest interest.

“I was an only child.” Our eyes catch and I look away
self-consciously, afraid that he might catch on to the past tense, might see I’m
not being completely honest.

“I’m sorry. It’s hard to grow up alone.”

“You already know my mom never met a drink she didn’t like.”

“Yeah,” he responds cautiously as if uncertain about where I’m
going.

“She never met a man she didn’t like either.”

“What does that mean?”

I clarify, my voice halting and shallow. “I never knew my
dad and I never got a chance to know the guys my mom paraded through my life. I
guess I don’t really know what a relationship looks like.”

“It sucks when the people who are supposed to care the most
don’t act like it,” Boston commiserated.

“Yeah and fair warning, I haven’t done very well with men
myself and I don’t drink, so it can’t be all about the drinking.”

“A woman with a past I see.” He smiles, waggling his
eyebrows and lightening my dismal mood.

“Don’t you dare!” I hit him with a pillow. “You don’t get to
hear about my exes yet.”

“Don’t want to scare me away, huh?”

“What about your family?”

“Changing the subject just as we get to the juicy parts? You’re
a tease Sterling. That’s what you are.” He smiles when he says it, eyes
sparkling as he leans into me, nudging my shoulder with his. My feet fall from
the coffee table with a thunk.

My cheeks are hot as I turn toward him on the futon, pulling
my knees up and tucking my feet under my butt. I collect my wits, “Don’t avoid
the question. I told you about my family, now do you have any brothers or
sisters?” I push, but I know better than to ask about his parents.

“I have an older brother.”

“Oh … I thought you said you were an only child.”

“I said it’s hard to grow up alone.”

“Where was your brother?” This is like pulling teeth.

“He’s a lot older than me and he died just before my fourth
birthday.”

“I’m sorry Boston.” It’s my turn to reach out. I squeeze his
forearm where it rests against his thigh, his hands dangling limply between his
knees. “The raven?”

“Yeah. It reminds me of him. It’s been a long time now, so
no big deal.”

For some reason, I didn’t believe he’d put it behind him. “Long
time ago or yesterday, it’s still part of who you are. Why did he die?”

“First he had leukemia, then aplastic anemia. He was sick
all the time, from before I was born until the day he died. He spent most of
his time in hospitals and as much as I wanted to help, I turned out to be no
help at all.”

“You were a child Boston.” I defend him, surprised that
after all these years it still bothers him.

“You’d be surprised.”

“What could you do but be the best brother you could be.”

“That’s one of the nicest things anyone has said in a long
time.”

“No way. Who would say anything bad about losing your
brother?”

He shook his head in the negative. Leaning back, his head
thumped into the futon behind him before dropping, his chin nearly reaching his
chest as he said nothing. I didn’t think he would continue and then he did. “The
last time it came up, some buddies and I had been driving for quite awhile. We
were on an assignment and we talked about family to pass the time. I told them
about Cody. They were mostly quiet, almost reverent, until one said, ‘more
ladies for the rest of us.’”

“Seriously?” My gaze zeros in on his, testing the truth of
his statement and finding honesty. “Some people are assholes.”

We’re out of conversation, he still in his boxer briefs and
undershirt, me still in my yoga pants and tee. Noontime had turned to evening.

“I should probably get going.”

“Yeah. I have homework,” I say, awkward now.

I watch as he moves to the kitchen, his presence commanding
attention in the tiny room. Muscular legs, long and lean disappear into jeans.
Biceps skim into shirt sleeves, the raven disappearing. Abs surge and swell,
partially hidden by his tee shirt, but the topography is still visible and
peeking through with every movement. Bulges are separated by dark chasms like
islands divided by murky waters. I am pensive, pulling my legs to my chest,
wrapping my arms around and settling my chin on my knees as I watch him
preparing to go.

He sits to slide on his socks and shoes before pulling the
sides of his shirt away to button his jeans and buckle the belt.

My eyes follow as Boston moves to the desk chair, something
that feels like tension building within me and tingling through. I look away as
he buttons his shirt and shrugs on his jacket. When his hand appears in my
view, I look up, with reluctance.

“Come, say good-bye Sterling.”

I take his hand, standing from the sofa. His warm fingers
envelope mine, his warm scent surrounds me.