17.I kept on making plans to go and see how he was, but every day I’d wake up and decide not to. Days turned to months, months turned to years. Talena and I went to college, drifted apart, then together again. I almost forgot about Jay, but my artwork continued to trace over his skin and fill notebooks. It scared my roommate and made my room the highlight on the campus tour, but it never let me forget his skin and how it felt after sex, his moans and the way that his hands clutched my back like it was an anchor.
“You’ve got to go and see him. He might still be expecting it.” Talena said one day at lunch. We were both 23, that meant that Jay was 29...it’d been five years. Five years of me being in denial and lying to her. She had decided firmly to be herself, which meant that she basically did what she wanted, fuck everyone else. Nothing illegal of course, she was smart enough to avoid that. We’d both been able to stay on the dean’s list for all five years, though there were a few close calls.
“I think that if he wanted me back he would have called.” I said.
“You’ll never know unless you go and visit him.” she said, nodding her head. “See if he’s been able to move on like you have.”
I knew that I had to see him, I had his address, he’d been kind enough to e-mail me that. A little house out in the suburbs, not far from where Paige had lived. Paige had gone soon after Talena and I had posed, off to New York to show off his creations and make a million from her image. She seemed to be oblivious to the fact that people were still searching for her to ask her to pose.
The front yard of Jay and Bobby’s house had lots of dandelions and looked like it needed to be weeded. There were a few little kids toys amidst the clutter. Had they had a kid? It seemed so totally impossible, but there it was, almost the proof in the driveway. A mini-van with rust marks along the wheel wells. The paint on the house was peeling, the brickwork was old and moldy. I just wanted to run away from it all, but I forced myself to go up to the door and knock. I had imagined doing this so many times and seeing him and fucking him one last time.
The door was painted an atrocious shade of red and the mailbox was overflowing with unopened junk mail. A newspaper flopped out of the newspaper box. I pressed the doorbell and heard the little squeak as it echoed in the house. I heard a muffled, “I’m coming!”
The door opened and Jay stood there looking at me.
The years had not been as kind as they could have been. His stomach protruded a bit from underneath his short grey T-shirt and I noticed a few wrinkles. His hair was limp and lifeless as if he no longer cared. Devoid of makeup, his face would not have been able to fool anyone into thinking he was young. His eyes were myopic and glazed, just like Talena’s mom’s. Yet he was still a powerful figure and I still wanted to fuck him senseless. “Ryan? Um..come in.” he said, opening the door wider. Toys were thrown all over the hallway. He laughed nervously. “I really haven’t had time to clean today, if I’d known you were coming...” He scratched his head helplessly, then looked at me fully. There was still a spark of that minxish Jay there, but it was covered up by more mundane concerns like laundry and washing the dishes.
There were pictures on the walls of Jay, Bobby, and a little kid that I assumed was theirs. It looked like they were happy, going off for weeks at a time during the summer when the company could spare Bobby, having little family vacations to zoos and children’s museums, never ever ending up where they had truly wanted to go...more romantic locations where they could fuck the night away. He noticed that I was looking at the pictures and blushed. “We...a...adopted a few years ago. He’s at day care now.”
“That’s nice.” I said, not caring that it sounded rude. He winced a bit.
“I’m making a cake in the kitchen...is it okay if we talk in there?” he asked.
“Sure, that’s fine. Um, what do you do?”
“I stay at home, fix meals and shit like that. There’s not a great demand for my major out there. I did try, but Bobby makes enough to support us all.” He started slopping cake mix into two pans. A bit splattered on his cheek. I sat down at the cheap table and chairs set and watched him put the stuff in the oven. He still moved the same, I was so thankful that he hadn’t unlearned that.
“You don’t model anymore?”
The light in the oven clicked on as he flipped the switch. He sighed regretfully and looked at me over his shoulder. “It just wasn’t as fun anymore. And there’s no reason that I have to do it anyway.” The splatter remained, I just wanted to lick it off.
“Why do you send your son to day care then? I mean, you’re at home all the time, aren’t you?”
He slid into the chair across from me. “He needs to be with kids his own age and not stuck with me all the time. Bobby said I was smothering him.” And, for a second, I thought I could see how. Jay had probably taken that little kid to all the parks, given him whatever he wanted, and spoiled him rotten. When he talked about him it was like talking about Paige again. Maybe Jay just had the kind of personality that wanted to totally love someone with nothing held back, even if he received nothing in return. It was sad. “I probably was.” he laughed a bit, the laughter of one who’s trying to cover up a crying jag.
“Are you and Bobby getting along okay?”
“Yeah, we’re fine.” His face flickered with a brief scream of “No we’re not! I’m dying in this hell”, but that expression soon left and he was smiling banally. “So...have you found someone else?”
“Yes.” I said, not wanting to tell him any more for fear that he would use it against me. It wasn’t any of his business and he knew it. Maybe he’d feel a bit let down that he had been so easy to replace in my heart.
“That’s good.” He glanced at the clock, probably counting down the minutes until he could make up some fake excuse for making me leave. There was one more thing that I wanted to do though.
I leaned over and licked at his cheek, letting my tongue swirl in the batter before getting down to his skin. It still tasted the same, still was something I could lick for hours. He moaned and turned his head, grabbed onto my face and desperately kissed me. I stood up and circled around then eased him to the kitchen floor which still gave off a faint scent of lemon cleaning fluid. “Bobby wouldn’t care, would he?” I asked as I ran my fingers up under his shirt and bit at his neck.
“No...he’s cheated on me before. It’s my turn.” he hissed, then grabbed my head with both hands and kissed me brutally, thrusting his tongue in to battle with mine for dominance. I ground my hips down onto his, felt his growing erection...it had been so long since we’d done anything, I just wanted to drown in him. His legs parted and then held me gently on either side. He pulled away from my kiss and snarled, “Fuck me.” I laughed to myself. He hadn’t changed very much in this respect.
I peeled up his shirt slowly, licking my way across his chest. When he was lying on the floor it wasn’t as obvious that he had gained weight. Not that I minded that, I’d always thought he’d looked a bit too skinny. Slipped his shirt completely off and slammed my lips down on his...tweaked his nipples roughly. He was in his own little private hell where I wasn’t going to give him any pleasure unless he begged. His hands were sneaking towards the waistband of my jeans and trying to slip down into my pants. I took them out and shook my head, laughing at his whimpers.
“Please Ryan...”
“What’s the matter, don’t you and Bobby fuck every night? Or has he left you all alone?” I said, hoping I’d hit a nerve.
“We...c...can’t...kid might hear...oh gods, please just fuck me!” he whimpered, bucking his hips.
I slowly unbuttoned his jeans and then unzipped them. He thrashed as my fingers came into contact with his boxer encased cock. It must have been a long time since Bobby had done anything with him, considering how much he was begging. I slipped his pants off slowly, then his boxers. He was completely naked and I was still clothed. That fact hadn’t escaped his attention and he whined louder. “You want this?” I asked, sort of enjoying my power.
“Yes!” he gasped, quivering in anticipation of the pleasure I could give him. I was more in control...I hadn’t gone for months without a fuck. Though I couldn’t deny that I was aroused too, I’d been dreaming of this for years.
I stripped quickly, then spread his legs farther than should have been comfortable. He winced, but didn’t complain. I thrust in hard, rough, fast, he screamed in a mixture of pain and pleasure, rocked his hips up to meet mine. I grabbed his legs to use as leverage as I laid into him as hard as possible. He moaned and whimpered a symphony of restrained passions. I was getting so inexorably close that my hand just reached out and grabbed his cock and started pumping. His arms instantly went around my back and he started kissing me desperately, ripping my lips and his with impatient teeth.
“Ryan!” he screamed as he came hard between us. I came a few seconds later but merely grunted. I pulled out quickly and got dressed again. He just laid there and stared at the ceiling. “Do you ever regret what you did?” he asked.
I looked back at him, the broken and destroyed figment of my lust, and shook my head. “No, I don’t.”
“I regret it every day.” he looked at me with brown eyes weary of being caged.
Amir was still waiting in the car when I got out. “How’d it go?” he asked as I jumped into the passenger’s seat. I kissed him hard and fast, just so he’d know that I’d fucked Jay. He didn’t care. I always came back to him anyway. Jay and Bobby had been so wrong about him.
“Well, have you ever met someone that you looked up to once and realized that they were weaker than you are?” He nodded. “He’s not the same person...he can’t stand up to the image I created.”
“They never do.” he said with the wisdom of age. I leaned my head on his shoulder and he drove us back to our apartment.
ENDE
The title means “Infinite Longing” in German.