Rock and a Hard Place

by Hans Schreiber

Chapter 30

Hard Places – Soft Places

Warning! This story is a work of fiction written by a legal age adult. Any similarity between the fictional characters and any live person is purely coincidental. This story contains fictional descriptions of sexual activity between consenting minor youth. If you are under the age of 18, and/or if you are offended by this content, and/or if it is illegal in your jurisdiction to possess or read such material, please leave now and do not read this story as neither the internet host nor the author can be responsible for your actions. Please, always practice safe sex; no momentary thrill is worth your life.

All rights reserved. No part of this story may be transmitted or reproduced in whole or in part in any form or by any means, mechanical or electronic, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the Author or Publisher, except where permitted by law. Copyright © 2012 by Hans Schreiber.

Special thanks to my editors, Pablo, Flip, Smallfox, and Lisa for their valuable help and input.

I need to extend a special recognition to Lisa's son Zach for the contribution of his wonderful poem.

Part 1

We walked into the judge's chambers and the attorneys for both parties slapped backs and inquired into each other's families. It seemed so odd to me that guys on opposite sides would do that. When we got into the stately room, the judge was already sitting behind a large desk made of expensive looking dark wood. He was a distinguished older man with mostly grey hair. He sat in a large maroon leather chair, flanked by the American and state flags. His face was worn and his mouth was drawn tight, but there was a kindness in his eyes that belied his stern exterior, as they locked onto mine. He immediately took charge and asked Revered Rick and my mother to please stand back up until he asked people to be seated. The two attorneys apparently already knew to do that, as did Officer Milsap.

"You are obviously the mother," Judge Tennyson said with a nod. Then he added, looking back and forth between the attorneys, "And you two scoundrels I already know, so who is the father?" My dad raised his hand. The judge asked, "Then who are you other two gentlemen?"

"This is Reverend Rick Chandler, your honor," my mother explained almost proudly.

"Ma'am, no offense, but I didn't address my question to you. I was speaking to the two gentlemen. Let's be clear on the process here. I ask the questions and whoever I address my question to, gives me the answer. No one else speaks, ever." My mom shrunk back and scowled. The judge then asked, with a nod toward Officer Milsap, "And who are you then?"

"I'm Officer Peter Milsap, assigned as police security escort for Kyle Davis, the child in this matter." I flinched at being labeled a child. But I realized that in this setting, a child is what I was, and there had been no disrespect implied in Peter's voice when he used the term.

"Oh yes, I read your filing on the case and I appreciate what a wonderful job you did. You were concise, comprehensive and informative. Very unusual in comparison to what I usually get from non-attorney types. To think of it, it's much better than I get from most attorneys, who mostly tend to bloviate. Please take a seat in the back, Officer." Then turning to Reverend Rick, the judge asked, "And why are you here?"

"I am Ms. Leach's spiritual adviser, your honor. She requested my attendance for moral support and spiritual guidance in these important proceedings." Reverend Rick was pouring on the charm but it was clearly unimpressive to the seasoned judge. I watched the two attorneys fight off snickers.

Judge Tennyson's lip curled upward betraying his stern expression and he said, "I assume that Leach is your maiden name that you have prematurely reverted to." When my mother nodded to indicate he was correct, he added, "How appropriately inappropriate." I had to put my hand over my mouth to stifle a laugh. Then the judge turned to my father's attorney and asked, "James, you have any issue with the preacher being present?"

Reverend Rick bristled and spoke up, "Excuse me sir, but I am not a preacher, I am an ordained reverend."

The judge snapped his attention back to Reverend Rick and said, "Excuse me, reverend, were you not listening earlier when I explained this process? I was speaking to the father's attorney. You will not speak unless I ask you a direct question, which is highly unlikely. Are we clear?" The reverend pursed his lips and nodded. I loved it. I liked this judge. He didn't take shit from anyone.

My dad's attorney spoke up and said, "No, your honor, we have no issues with him being here, but we agree that his participation should be limited to something very close to zero." The judge smiled.

"Second order of business is Kyle's presence. The mother has petitioned for him to be included. Normally, I would not consider having the child present in this type of hearing. However, given his age and the exceptional circumstances, I have decided to permit him being here as long as you are in agreement, James."

"We are okay with having the boy present. He could provide valuable information and it will likely expedite the process," my dad's attorney answered again.

"All right then, please sit where I direct you. Kyle, please sit in the center directly across from me." I moved to the chair in the middle of the judge's chambers and the judge directed my father to sit next to me on the right and my mother on the left. Each attorney was next to their client and Reverend Rick sat behind my mom in the second row, much to his annoyance.

"In my many years as a family law judge, I've had a few cases that stand out. Mostly, they're a jumble of one sad story after another. This one has a new twist. Let me be clear about what we are doing here today. This is a preliminary hearing in the divorce proceedings called to determine the custody issue of your only minor child, Kyle. The decision made here is binding, but temporary. Final custody will be determined as part of the ongoing divorce settlement. We are meeting because of the unique and highly unfortunate circumstances Kyle finds himself embroiled in. My understanding is that the FBI is recommending Kyle and one parent enter the witness protection program. Has there been any preliminary discussion between you regarding this?"

My father's attorney cleared his throat and responded, "Yes, your honor. We have had extensive discussions and while both parents want to take custody, neither is anxious to enter into witness protection. Of course, we are not yet sure that witness protection will be offered in this case, but it is a possibility under discussion. My client wants custody of the child, but does not wish to put the child at risk. He is offering to move to an east coast metropolitan city where he would be able to continue his important medical research and take the child with him for his security but not enter into witness protection. The restrictions on witness protection would essentially preclude my client from furthering his highly valuable medical research. We are therefore petitioning for award of sole custody with permission to leave the state."

The judge contemplated what he had just heard and then said, "And what happens to Kyle while the good doctor is arranging all of this?"

The attorney started to answer again, and I could see out of the corner of my eye that my mother was dying to say something. The judge had scared her out of running her mouth off out of turn, so she held her tongue.

"Well, your honor," the attorney began, "the police have arranged a safe house for the child until final custodial determination is made for him."

Turning to my father, the judge asked, "Mr. Davis, why is it that you are unwilling to enter into the protection program?"

"I am in the middle of some very promising medical research on cancer. I am the senior oncologist at the Good Samaritan Medical Center and the witness protection program as it was explained to me is so restrictive that I would not be able to continue in that capacity due to its high profile nature. I realize my obligation to my son's safety, so I am willing to sacrifice my current position and research team to relocate far away from here. However, I think the extreme conditions of the US Marshal's witness program are unnecessary. If I do take this on, I want sole custody and permission to leave the state, naturally."

Then turning to my mother, he asked, "Mrs. Davis… or Ms. Leach, I suppose, why are you unwilling to enter into the witness program?"

"My goodness, it's all such nonsense. I am involved in very important work in building the Kingdom of God with the reverend." She turned and smiled adoringly at Reverend Rick. "No one will ever know we're there in our apartment. I've used a different name since I moved to Campbell. I am definitely opposed to his unfit father stealing my son away. He is not fit to raise a puppy, let alone a teenager. It was under his watch that Kyle got into all this trouble. When Kyle lives with me, I will see to it that his behavior is corrected." Dad shot daggers at Mom, but held his tongue.

The judge sat back looking sad, "My first obligation is the health and safety of the child and whenever possible to award joint custody unless there is some overriding reason not to do so. I'm inclined to wish I had a third option in this case. I'm strongly disappointed in both of you as parents."

"Your honor," my mom began, raising her hand, "None of this mess would have happened if Kyle hadn't meddled into other people's affairs. He has brought most of this difficulty upon himself and there is consequence to that. His father failed to show any responsibility for supervising Kyle and is not a fit guardian. I will keep him safely hidden in my apartment and he can be home schooled. When he is eighteen, he can go wherever and do whatever he likes. I only ask that I be given a fair amount of support from his father to compensate for taking on this chore of raising Kyle and correcting his errant behavior."

"Oh my God, Clovis. You are a such a conniving bitch." The judge scowled at my father and his attorney grabbed Dad's arm and pulled him back into his seat.

"If you have something to say, Mr. Davis, you will ask my permission to speak," said the judge sternly.

"Sorry, your honor. Yes, I have something to say." The judge nodded for him to continue. "She abandoned both of us, just walked out. Not that we minded. She'd become a cold, miserable witch to live with long before she left. She's already shacking up with the 'spiritual adviser', Reverend Rick here and I don't want Kyle exposed to that kind of inappropriate sexual behavior. As for Kyle getting into trouble, it was under her care that Kyle got into this last bit of trouble. He tricked her the same way he deceived me. Kyle is responsible for a lot of this mess, I agree, but I'm the one who stayed and supported Kyle. She left. I took care of him and I am completely capable of continuing to do so. I'm not giving her a bunch of money like she's asking for because it will just go to the foolish crusade she and the so-called reverend have concocted. I'm making a huge sacrifice here and I'm not going to be made out like some incompetent fool, incapable of taking care of my boy, even if he is a difficult boy."

"I am not sleeping with the reverend! That's a lie."

"Ms. Leach, do not speak out of turn!" The judge growled.

"Stop it!" I cried out. The judge looked at me and I thought I was going to get yelled at for talking out of turn, but he motioned for me to go on. "I'm sitting right here. You're talking about me like I'm some kind of family pet that pees on the carpet and you're all arguing over which one of you is going to get stuck with me. I hate it!" I said with a demoralized look toward each of my parents. Then, I continued my rant, "Parents are supposed to love their kids even if they screw up a little and not just abandon them when it's inconvenient. I get it that neither of you wants me. I get it that I created a mess by trying to do something good for William. I know I did things I shouldn't have, but I did them for good reasons. It turned out they all needed my help and because of it, horrible crimes are getting stopped. You walked out on us, Mom. You just left. But you'd disappeared long before you went off with Reverend Rick. You got all wrapped up in those phony charities that Reverend Rick was running and you ignored me and Dad. I missed you. And Dad, I missed you too. You still had your clothes and toothbrush at our house, but you were hardly ever there. Your life became all about your research and your patients. I sometimes wished that I actually could get cancer in my balls, just so you'd pay some attention to me. So I get it that I'm a nuisance. I'm sorry for living. Just stop fighting over me. I cant stand it anymore." I broke into sobs and hid my face in embarrassment. I hated that my emotions were so close to the surface.

There was awkward silence. Except for my muffled sobs, there was no sound in the room. Finally, my father reached over and put his arm around my shoulder. My mother, not to be outdone, jumped up and knelt in front of me and stroked my arm, cooing, "Oh Kyle, we're so sorry. Of course I want you and of course I love you." She was pouring on the good mother act and that just made it worse.

"Your honor," spoke my mom's attorney. "If we could have about an hour in a side conference with Mr. Davis and his attorney, I think we could sort this out."

"That would be wonderful. Is Kyle to be included in this sidebar or excluded?"

"I think excluded would be best."

"All right. There's a conference room just outside the doors to the left. One hour. Kyle, I'd like you to remain here. I want to speak with you privately. Officer Milsap, will you please stay in here with Kyle and myself?"

"Yes, your honor," answered Peter. "I'd be happy to."

They all filed out while I fought to regain my composure. I didn't look up at any of them until the door closed and the Judge came around his desk to sit next to me. Peter came up and sat on the other side. Peter pulled me into a tender, caring hug and without speaking a word, told me he was there for me. I sort of wished he was my dad.

The judge tried to explain the problem he was having with putting me with either parent. Neither situation was ideal, but of the two, he felt that my mother actually offered more protection than my father. Officer Peter Milsap agreed. He said it would be important that I be confined to the apartment and lay low for a long time – probably until I was eighteen and could enter into the witness program myself if the danger still seemed imminent. I told them I preferred to take the risk with my father. As bad as he was wrapped up in his career, it was still better than going with my mom and that reverend asshole. I told them I knew they were having an affair.

"Your honor," I said, "what if I went into witness protection on my own? Or, what if I went with Scotty's family? They'd let me live with them, I'm sure."

"Who is Scotty?" asked the judge.

"He is the other boy that was with Kyle at the crime scene and will also be testifying against the gang members and cartel members. His entire family has applied to go into the program for safety. I suspect it will be granted," Peter interjected.

"They're the best family ever. They all totally love each other and I know they'd love me like their own son. Please."

"I would have to order some investigation into them, and both of your parents would have to sign off on that. I can't just go giving children away unless the parents are completely unfit, which yours, believe it or not, are not. It is certainly a possibility we should explore."

I spent the rest of the time filling the judge in on the events in pretty good detail from the time I was assigned to be William's debate partner. He listened with fascinated interest, asking questions along the way for clarification whenever I got a little fuzzy. He was very empathetic. Finally, the others all filed in and my father looked like he'd been given a death sentence. My bitchy mother was gloating.

When everyone settled back into their places, the judge looked to my mother's attorney and asked, "So what have you got for me, counselor?"

"Your honor, we have reached an agreement. Not only regarding the temporary custody issue, but on the divorce proceedings as well. We have outlined the terms for an uncontested divorce and the child will be awarded to his mother with full custody. The father will relinquish all visitation and other rights to the child and provide funds in a lump sum for child support, in advance, at the time the divorce is finalized."

I fell into shock. I looked around my dad's attorney into my dad's face, who had chosen not to sit next to me when they all returned. "You're just giving me up? Not even visits? Why?" He didn't answer, he just looked away.

"Well, this development seems a little suspicious to me. I don't suppose you plan on telling me why you've had such a severe change in position, are you Mr. Davis?" My father didn't look up. He simply shook his head no.

"I had that sense," the judge continued. "So then, how will you assure the safety of your son, Kyle? Will the mother enter into the witness protection program?"

"No, your honor," my mom's attorney responded. "We do not consider it necessary to enter into that program. In order to assure the child's security, we will provide for home schooling. We have already approached the local police department to provide a monitoring device to be attached to the child so that if he leaves the area of the apartment, it will send a notification and he can be tracked. If he is abducted, it will be immediately known and the police will respond. We will legally change his name and have it sealed. Following his testimony, we will release information that he has died of his injuries. If there is any credible evidence that he is in danger living with his mother, witness protection can be an option, or when he turns eighteen, he will be free to pursue witness protection at that time on his own. Under his mother's supervision and with the police monitoring, the child's recent dangerous behavior will be corrected and we all consider this to be in his best interest."

The judge contemplated what he'd just been told. Speaking to my father's attorney, "Is that correct? You concur with this?"

"Yes we do, your honor. We are all in full agreement on this."

"No! No way! I don't agree on it. You're talking about making me a prisoner. You're saying I'm going to be stuck in a tiny apartment like I'm under house arrest. I'm not the bad guy, I'm the victim. There's not even a TV. Isn't there something about cruel and unusual punishment being illegal? This just isn't fair. How could you do this to me?" Kyle burst out. "I want to go live with Scotty's family. Please your honor. Please."

The judge frowned. "Kyle has approached me during your break regarding both parents turning custody over to the family of his friend, Scotty, who is most likely going into witness protection. I would support this resolution based on the less than enthusiastic attitude I am getting from all of you. I think that if we can vet the family through social services, and if the family is willing to take Kyle in, and if both of you parents approve, we could grant that family a custodial position. I'm sensing that would make everyone happy, including myself and certainly Kyle. Officer Milsap, do you have an opinion on this?"

"Your honor, I have met the family and was impressed as first impressions go. I'm a fairly good judge of character and they seem to be a very good choice for Kyle. It would certainly be the safest option as far as gang retaliation risk is concerned, provided their application for protection is approved."

My father perked up and raised his hand. When the judge acknowledged him, he said, "I am definitely in favor of that. I know that Kyle has a fondness for this family and they have treated him well. I would contribute money to a trust fund for his care."

My mother and Reverend Rick were about to crawl out of their skin. "Ms. Leach, it appears that you have something to say, so please go ahead."

"I am absolutely opposed to Kyle going there. That Scotty is a bad, perverted demon and a very immoral influence on my Kyle. He has perverted my innocent boy. Do you know that boy was with Kyle both times he had run-ins with the police? He's in that awful, brutal wrestling sport and encouraged Kyle to hold an underage booze party at our house the same night they were arrested together. There is absolutely no way I'll authorize Kyle going to that perverted family. They all run around naked at home and even exposed themselves to my poor son. Kyle needs my parental direction to straighten him out. His father is only in favor of this to try and save some of his precious money." She folded her arms and sat defiantly back in her chair. I was shocked that she knew Scotty's family practiced nudity and was disappointed that my father must have confided that to her.

"I am loathe to make any decision here, but something has to be done. I could put Kyle in the foster care system, but that would be more dangerous than any of the other options. I'm not going to rule here without some idea of why the father has so abruptly changed his mind. Kyle, will you and Officer Milsap step out for a minute, please?"

I got up and shot my mother an angry look and walked out sadly. Out in the foyer, Peter pulled me into a hug and apologized. "Why are you apologizing?"

"Because someone needs to. Your parents aren't likely to, I'm afraid. If they could just step away from it and see how stupid they are behaving, they'd be embarrassed."

"No they wouldn't. Don't give them that much credit." Just then, Reverend Rick stuck his head out and said we could come back in already.

Judge Tennyson looked suddenly tired. "Well," he said, "I guess that's that. I hereby rule for custody to be granted on a preliminary basis to the mother subject to my review of the conditions noted. I want a copy of the conditions that you outlined and any others you may have left out, signed by both parties, on my desk by noon tomorrow. I further order that Kyle remain in the protective custody of the police until they deem it reasonably safe for him to move into his mother's apartment with proper monitoring. I want to be notified when that move is made." Judge Tennyson sighed deeply and looked me in the eyes, "Kyle, I'm sorry. Make the best of this difficult situation. Now, all of you please move out quickly into the foyer, as I have another case that is 15 minutes behind schedule already."

The two attorneys hung back and began their small talk again as if they were old buddies discussing their high school glory days. What really pissed me off was that my father's attorney was giving my mom's attorney props for pulling off the coup over my custody.

I got in my father's attorney's face and said, "What? You two are all buddy buddy? Was it his turn to win? I thought you were supposed to be fighting for me to go with my father." I was red faced.

"Kyle, I did all I could for your father. They had an insurmountable argument. And Tom and I see each other all the time on family law cases and we are friends. That doesn't make us any less determined to win for our clients when we come up against each other."

"Bullshit." I stormed off toward my father.

My father was making his way toward the door. I went after him, grabbed his arm and spun him forcefully around to face me. "You're planning on running out just like that? Not without an explanation, you don't. Why'd you just give me up? Why do you hate me? Am I really that bad that you don't even want to visit me again? What about all the fucking promises you made about always being there for me?"

My father was tearing up. "No. I'm not going out without an explanation. I have no choice here Kyle. You took that choice away from me with your behavior." Total confusion mixed in with my indignation. Turning to my mother, he demanded boldly, "Clovis, if you want the money you have to let me show Kyle what you just showed me. Alone."

Her first reaction was clearly to oppose his request, but then she smiled slowly, almost wickedly. "Certainly. I think it might be beneficial for Kyle to see it." She turned to her attorney and asked him to let me see it.

We went into the small conference room off the foyer and my mother's attorney set up his laptop and showed my father the files to play. My father insisted everyone leave except for me and him. When the door was shut, my father wiped the tears from his eyes and said, "Kyle, I want you to know that I want you to be with me. I want you to be a part of my life, but you have made that impossible. Just watch and you'll see why I had to give her everything she demanded."

My father clicked on the first file. My mouth dropped slowly and my eyes widened in shock as the video file played. The first clip showed a picture of my father sitting naked in our kitchen eating Oreos with a glass of milk. The security camera that was in our kitchen captured a side view of him at the table. Then he looked up with mild surprise on his face that faded into a smile. He engaged in some conversation with someone off camera and then I walk into the frame, also naked but sporting a semi-erection. My father didn't react to my small gasp since he'd already seen the video. He just kept staring at the laptop screen.

In the video, we conversed some more and he pointed at my privates and I shrugged. He asked me something and I shook my head, no. He pointed again and I hefted my large balls in my fingers and bounced them up and down a bit, then I shook my head, no again. My father burst out laughing. My erection persisted and even grew a bit. He finished his cookies and stood up and headed toward the back door and walk-in pantry that the camera was meant to monitor. Dad disappeared around the wall into the pantry. Several times he leaned into the doorway with a goofy smile and then popped back out of sight. I had an odd expression and my left hand slipped down to my crotch, obviously fondling myself slowly. My father appeared again with both hands behind his back, smiling wryly and walking toward me. His dick and balls swayed slightly with each step. He tossed a deck of cards onto the table and then an argument of sorts took place. He was obviously angry and I was obviously distraught. I was crying and stood up, displaying a full but shrinking erection. I left the scene. My father shook his finger and was obviously delivering a lecture of sorts. Then he plopped down into the chair I had vacated and slammed his fists on the table. He pounded both fists against his forehead. He grabbed the deck of cards and threw it against the wall. He sat still for several minutes with his elbows on his knees and his forehead resting on his clenched fists. Slowly, the tip of his penis appeared, peeking its enlarged head up over his white thighs. He sat up, then stretched out on the wooden kitchen chair and grabbed his erection in his right fist and began jacking himself off in a furious, almost angry motion. I watched in amazement as his body contorted and stiffened prior to several shots of white cum splashing onto his belly and oozing into his graying pubes.

The innuendo of the video was clear to me. "Did you explain what really happened? Did you tell them that you were making sure that I was checking my balls for cancer? Did you explain about the UNO game?"

"Of course I tried. But a picture is worth a thousand words, isn't it? And a video like that is worth ten thousand words. My attorney, who was only half sure he believed me, argued that the real conversation might be reconstructed by a lip reading expert. That didn't seem to bother your mother's attorney. He just played this next clip."

The next clip showed pictures of me carrying Sam's dead body down the stairs and into the garage that apparently had been recorded on the back hallway security camera. I didn't understand the connection until it cut to an image later that evening as I walked toward the front door. As soon as the door was closed, Scotty dropped his bag and we embraced. Our lips found each other and we kissed tenderly. Soon, we were making out and groping at each other in the front door entryway. At length, in full view of the front door security camera, Scotty and I stripped each other's clothing off and made out while grinding our pelvises together. The camera followed us up the first few stairs until we were out of view. I was thankful that there wasn't a camera in my bedroom to show me taking Scotty's anal virginity that night. The date stamp changed to the following morning as I escorted Kirk inside and we headed back up the stairs. Shortly after that, the three of us emerged into view, fully naked and all three of us completely boned up, laughing and joking. I jumped on Scotty's naked back and made him carry me down the last few steps until we appeared in the back hallway camera and disappeared into my parents' bedroom. It fast forwarded a bit until I emerged from the bedroom, naked, wet, and boned. I peered cautiously into the hallway at first then gingerly ran to the garage door and peeked into the garage. Then I sauntered back into the bedroom. My erection bobbed along the way.

I was extremely embarrassed knowing that not only my father had just seen me do all that with my friends, but also my mom and both attorneys and even, no doubt, Reverend Rick. "Dad, that doesn't prove anything bad about you. That was all me."

"True. But I was supposed to be supervising you, wasn't I? Besides, there's more." I groaned inside wondering what all could be coming next. It dawned on me that when I caught my mother trying to get something off the shelf in her closet, it wasn't the important papers or the box of sex toys. She was retrieving security camera memory disks. That was undoubtedly what was in the bag in her car seat that she was so nervous about me seeing as well. I was pissed at her deceptive bullshit.

The next clip began with me bounding down the stairs with such a solid boner that it didn't even bounce. My balls were bouncing mightily though. I transferred to the hallway camera and entered my parents' bedroom. I knew exactly that was when I was trying out the sex toys for the very first time, watching in the closet mirrors as I pressed the large rubber dildo up into my cherry ass. Fortunately, there was no camera in their bedroom. Then, after a fast forward sequence covering forty minutes, my father appeared in the hallway coming in from the garage. He walked into his bedroom then came back out. His image appeared on the kitchen camera as he retrieved a couple of beers from the refrigerator. He held them both in the fingers of his left hand while he groped his crotch. It was obvious that he was working on a full erection in his pants. He retreated from the kitchen camera's view as the video cut to me coming out of the bedroom naked and still majorly boned up. I stopped suddenly and rushed back into the bedroom. My father appeared in the hallway with his shirt unbuttoned. He removed his shirt in the hallway, draped it over his arm that held the beers and began rubbing and tweaking his nipples. He gripped his bone through his slacks a couple times and pushed his way into the bedroom.

The next image was a smoking gun. My father walked into the hallway, naked and with a complete erection. He walked to the garage door and locked it, then he went to the front door and locked it. Before returning to the bedroom, he went into the family room and he came back out carrying two glasses of bourbon with a look of excited anticipation on his face. I remembered vividly watching from his closet as he pretended to make love to my mother while he fucked his pillow.

I was sick. The implication was clear and pretty hard to overcome. No reasonable person would believe that he and I weren't engaged in sex behind those closed doors. I watched with a sickening realization that my father was right about having no choice in my custody argument.

As if it wasn't already bad enough, the video showed me as I emerged from the bedroom some ten minutes later, semi-boned and holding the rubber dildo. I turned and watched my father thrashing into his linens and saluted him with the rubber dildo in plain view of the camera. I turned and ran upstairs, only to emerge shortly afterward, dressed in running clothes and headed out the back door. The next scene was of me being let in the locked front door by my father dressed only in his boxers. The entry way camera caught our exchange as he asked me if I wanted anything added to the wash. That verbal exchange was of course not available and the silent version showed me as I pulled off my sweats, exposing my naked body underneath them. As I pulled my socks off, my father playfully slapped my bare ass. In retaliation, I grabbed my dad's boxers and pulled them to his ankles causing him to trip. He grabbed his arm and I looked concerned. I knelt beside him and he laughed and tackled me and began to tickle me. We thrashed about until I threw an easy reversal on him and sat on him with his wrists pinned to the floor. My ass was resting against his dick and balls and I jumped up, clasped a hand over my ass and jokingly wiggled a finger at him until I retreated, bare-assed, up the steps. My father lay there a minute, chuckling and playing with his soft, dangling junk until he pulled his boxers the rest of the way off and gathered up my clothes and headed off camera.

"Shit."

"Yeah, shit is right," Dad agreed. "There's more, not that any more is needed." He started the next clip. To my shock and horror, the silent movies had given way to talkies. I was confused how that was possible and then it dawned on me. My asshole mother had put one of those nanny spy cameras in my bedroom. As the clip progressed, I realized exactly where it was hidden.

The next clip started with me and Scotty climbing into bed together, both naked, and talking. I confessed my indiscretion with the cute, ginger haired boy, Tanner at the church youth meeting. I apologized to Scotty for sucking on his balls and jacking him off in the bathroom. Scotty told me it was no big deal and that he had also been sucked in, pun intended, by Tanner at a nudist camp they had both attended with their families. That explained how my mom knew the Simons' were nudists. Dad hadn't blabbed that to her after all.

The following morning, an image of Scotty's naked body appeared sitting upright on the edge of my bed trying to shut off the Mariah Carey song coming from my clock radio. Next, I slipped in behind him and my feet appeared in view as I began stroking Scotty's muscular thighs with my feet and then moved to his drooping dick. I manipulated his dick with my toes until he sprang erect. His banana dick protruded from his gorgeous, sculpted body, arching out in its familiar, gradual, downward bend. I tried to talk him into jogging with me to meet up with Kirk where we could all do our morning jiggle together. Scotty refused my begging because of the wrestling meet scheduled for later in the day and convinced me to get dressed and go alone. Then, Scotty stood up and approached the camera. He was right in front of it and his arms reached out to grab the camera. I was confused at first until I heard Scotty start talking to Mr. Giggles, the stuffed monkey my mother gave me. That's when I knew for sure the nanny camera was in the stuffed monkey. The camera zoomed in and out on Scotty's dick as he pretended to have Mr. Giggles suck on it, saying "Monkeys love bananas. I was furious at my mother's level of deception. I was both angry and embarrassed.

After I left the room, Scotty strained to listen for me leaving, then he laid Mr. Giggles face down in the bed and the video went black. The audio continued though as Scotty cooed in the monkey's ear pretending he was talking to me. He expressed his deep feelings for me. He told me he was falling in love with me and asked if I loved him back. Then he said, "No, don't answer that. I couldn't take it if the answer was no. Just let me show my love for you." He then proceeded to pretend to tenderly fuck me, using Mr. Giggles' ass as a substitute for mine. Tears trickled down my cheeks as I heard him whisper in the monkey's ear, "Oh Kyle, I want you so much. I need you. I need us to be together forever. I just want to make you happy and give you pleasure. You're so strong and bold and brave. Please love me back. Please."

The remainder of that clip was of me wandering about the house naked all day, since I'd been suspended from school over fighting with Tyler because he took pics of William's dick. The video clip ended with my father coming in and surprising me. He sat on my bed next to me and we talked about me being naked. I told him that Scotty's family practices naturism and that I also liked the freedom and simple joy of being naked. He told me how much he liked Scotty and what a good friend he thought he was for me.

Then mysteriously, the sound malfunctioned. My manipulative mother or her bastard attorney had dropped the sound for the part where my father brought up the issue of testicular cancer again. I remembered him telling me about the young nineteen year old patient and asking if he could examine me to be sure I had no issues. I rejected his reach a couple times before relenting. In full view of Mr. Giggles, my father reached over and rolled my balls between his fingers. Out of context, it appeared that he was fondling me. My expression was one of reluctant willingness. The sound remained off as my father told me that Mom was having an affair with Reverend Rick and that she would never be coming back. It showed him crying and me putting an arm around him to comfort him. To the uninformed viewer, it would definitely play that he was suddenly remorseful for fondling me and that I was assuring him I had no ill feelings over it. I wanted to puke. But there was still more. Like a horrible nightmare, it just kept going and going.

The next segment of the nightmare was of me playing around naked with Mr. Giggles. Because I had finished writing my essay about the Greek society, I wrestled naked with Mr. Giggles like they used to do in ancient Greece. I started pretending I was a Greek boy and that Mr. Giggles was my adult mentor, my erastes, who I named Achilles. I pretended he was teaching me about the joys of man to man sex. As I slipped the rubber dildo into my ass, I said some unfortunate things, speaking in a sensual voice, "Oh Achilles, your penis is larger than my father's," I fantasized. I continued to coo, "It feels so good up inside me like his does. I love it when my father fucks me with his big penis. Do it like he does." I looked at my father at this point and the hurt and the pain and the sadness was overwhelming. "Oh Dad, I'm so sorry. It was just a stupid fantasy… I …"

"I know it was of course because I know we never did anything inappropriate like that. But you can definitely emphasize the 'stupid' part of your statement. I'm lucky they aren't sending me to prison. If it weren't for me being the golden goose supplying the money they want, they would. They certainly threatened it.

When the creepiness of the fantasy overtook me and I switched it up to pretend Mr. Giggles was actually Scotty inside of me, the audio conveniently malfunctioned again. It showed me suddenly realizing I was late for the decorating committee and throwing my clothes on but leaving the mess behind. My mother's image was next to appear as she set Mr. Giggles back on the dresser and cleaned up my room. She held the rubber dildo between two fingers with disdain as she dropped it back into its box. I'd assumed it was Dad who found it and cleaned up my room, but it was obviously Mom.

The next images were a collage of all the cameras as the party careened out of control. The booze, and the girls and guys making out were so incriminating. There were images of Dig and the slut he took into my parents' room to fuck, disrobing in the hallway before going in. There was a clear shot of him pulling her bra off and sucking on a large tit before he dragged her into the bedroom. I wandered in and out with armloads of my dad's expensive alcohol to protect it from the drinkers in the family room. There was the lovely scene of the drinking and then the barfing in the kitchen. The grand finale was the LAGNAR orgy in my bedroom. Next, the video showed a bunch of naked teenage bodies groping and humping and rubbing in an erotic pile with me and Scotty joining in near the end. In full view of the camera, I was jacking little Willy's giant dick while Scotty was lying underneath me sucking my dick and balls as some unknown chick got herself off on my Achilles heel and rubbed her breasts on my ass cheeks. I reached over and pressed the screen shut on the laptop. "I've seen all I want to."

"Kyle. If this gets out, my career is over for sure and I may go to jail. Even if they let you testify, no one will believe I wasn't sexually abusing you. Your mother wins. I lose. You lose. We lose each other. That hurts the most. But it is what it is. Stop the stupidity and make a decent life for yourself. Deal with whatever you have to deal with until you are of age. Then, when she has no more power and you're no longer a reason to extort money from me, we can rebuild our relationship. Until then, try to stay alive and out of trouble. No more playing superhero."

I stood and my father stood also. Carefully, so as not to injure my healing wounds, we hugged each other. I had no words to offer and neither did he. We walked solemnly from the room and I watched my mother gloat as she took in our expressions. I walked over to Peter and said solemnly, "I'm ready to go now."

Peter sensed my mood and didn't press me to know what had gone on. I could tell he was dying of curiosity, though. I hesitated and then explained, "I guess you're wondering why the fight went out of me and my dad, so I'll tell you. They had videos from our surveillance cameras that were misleading and made it appear like my Dad was abusing me when he really wasn't. It's really fucked up and that's all I want to say about it. Except for I hate my mother and that son of a bitch reverend. Oh, and I hate both attorneys. I thought I wanted to be one of them, but I know now that I for sure don't."

Peter looked at me with understanding and empathy and his look said all that needed to be said between us. It told me he wouldn't pry and thanked me for what I'd told him. "Well at least until the immediate danger is past and the prosecutors give the sign, you get to come home with me. My partner and I run a safe house for the department since we live far enough out of town and have the training."

"Really? I'm going to be with you for now?" I asked.

"Yeah. Hope you don't mind being stuck with me for a while. Actually, I'll watch over you as long as you're in Campbell, even after you move over to your mother's place."

"Cool. Honestly, I'm glad I don't have to go straight to Mom's place. I'd hate that. I need some cooling off time."

We talked comfortably about a number of topics, but mostly about the kind of rules I'd be stuck living under once I went to my mom's in order to be safe. Officer Milsap emphasized the importance of following all the rules to the letter, and his humane side, Peter, told me with a wink if I needed an occasional escape, he'd help me arrange it as long as I kept him informed and involved. I agreed there'd be no more road trips. We pulled into Campbell and drove past the school that I would never end up attending and past the church with the large sign out front announcing the weekly televised cable services on Fridays. We turned and drove to a nice area of the town with newer homes and Peter pulled the car into the garage and waited until the door closed completely before he let me get out.

I got out and followed Peter into the modest home and was greeted by his friend, Mitch. Extending a hand and flashing a wide, warm smile, Mitch welcomed me, "Kyle, welcome to your temporary home. Don't worry about a thing. You'll be safe here with us."

"Us?" I queried.

"Peter moved to Mitch's side, slipped an arm around his waist and said, "Kyle, this is my partner, Mitch. Peter leaned in and kissed Mitch lovingly on the lips. They shared a momentary, cosmic connection, staring into each other's eyes exuding joy and happiness. It was the same sparkle I'd seen between Scotty's mom and dad. It was pure and unconditional love. I was breathless. Someday, I would share that kind of love and commitment with Scotty. Someday, somehow. I had to believe it. I had to believe that somehow we would find each other again and rekindle the spark between us until it grew into the same mighty flame I just witnessed between Peter and Mitch.

"That's beautiful," I said. "When you said that you and your partner lived here in Campbell, I assumed you were talking about your police partner."

"I let people think that until I know they can deal with the truth. I knew you could deal with it and even appreciate it." Peter looked back into Mitch's eyes and they kissed again tenderly. Then, Mitch showed me to my room while Peter checked in with his superior to report on the day's proceedings. I had a bathroom all to myself and a nice double bed to sleep on. Thoughtfully, Mitch had put up pictures of collegiate wrestlers that he apparently printed off the web. One of them cracked me up. It was a middle weight grappler in a white singlet who had just won his match. The referee was raising his arm in victory and his red pit hair matched the flaming red hair matted to his scalp from sweat. The humorous part was the perfectly visible outline of his semi-erect dick straining against the tight stretchy fabric of his singlet.

Mitch had me remove my shirt and lie on the bed and he tended to my healing wounds. He was a trained nurse and worked three nights a week in the local 24 hour urgent care. He was so caring and tender. He was pleased with the way my scars were healing but as I looked down at the gashes across my beautiful body, I was saddened. I had taken great pride in my body and now it was marred. I had little else left to be proud of. I traced a finger along the stapled incisions and I suppose my face spoke my concerns. "They are a symbol of your bravery and goodness. They witness you're willingness to sacrifice for the well being of others. You're a Christian, right?"

"Yes. I've become one. I've felt God's powerful influence enough times to know he exists. When I read the New Testament, I get a sure feeling that Christ is really the Son of God and really did sacrifice himself for us."

"When he appeared to his apostles after his resurrection in the upper room, remember what he did?" Mitch asked.

"No, not really. I remember that Thomas wasn't there. He didn't believe the others when they said that they had seen him. That's where the saying 'Doubting Thomas' comes from," I answered.

"Christ showed them the wounds in his hands. Think about it, Kyle. If Christ had the power to take up his body again and if He had the power to heal all those people like He did during His ministry, couldn't He have healed the wounds in His own hands?"

"I guess so. But what's your point?"

"He chose to leave the wounds as a testament to what He had done for us. They are evidence of His great sacrifice. Don't be sad about your scars; wear them proudly as a symbol of your goodness and the lives you saved." I smiled appreciatively and decided right then not to be ashamed of my scars. Mitch offered me a sponge bath which I desperately needed. He put a towel on the floor and I stripped and lay down on it. He gently washed the grime and smell of a couple days off me with a warm washcloth. It felt so nice to be pampered a bit and I loved the feeling of the warm cloth rubbing across my skin. He asked if I wanted to take over my private area and I said it was fine with me if he was willing to do it for me. It hurt to flex my abs and reach. He removed my underwear and gently washed my dick and balls for me. I thoroughly enjoyed the attention, but it wasn't sensual in any way.

Peter walked in and jokingly asked, "Where does the line form for this treatment? I want to be next."

We all laughed and Peter sat down in the chair at the desk next to us as Mitch patted me dry with a towel. I thought I might have felt self conscious being naked and getting handled in front of two mostly strangers, but it wasn't uncomfortable in any way. Something about the ease between us made it feel natural and good. It was a simple kindness being performed without any hint of sexual intent. I didn't get an erection or even a stirring as I was being washed and dried.

"You'll stay with us until the initial hearing takes place and a couple days after that just to be sure there's no immediate risk. We have a mole in the gang and should hopefully know if they are on to your location or if they are actively searching for you. No guarantees of course. There is a risk. But if you stay mostly out of sight and with the name change, I think it's reasonable that you can actually pull off hiding here in plain sight, so to speak. I would be surprised if the gang would even think to look this close by. They might try to find your mother and they may go after your father, but that is the risk they are taking. How many people know about your situation and who you are at the apartment complex?"

"Well, really only this kid, Justin and his friend Adam. I told them about going to Juvey and my first problem with the gang in there. And I'm pretty sure Justin told his mom about me and I met her. Then the maintenance guy who helped me fix Mom's car when I took it to the dance. He knows I'm Ms. Leach's son. That's it."

"All right. Tomorrow, I'll check them out and if they can be trusted, I'll brief Justin, his mother, and Adam on your situation. It's a risk to involve others in the circle of trust, but if they already know that much, it's better to include them rather than have them inadvertently say something. I've already given your mother and the reverend the complete hellfire and damnation lecture on keeping their mouths shut about you. I'm pretty certain that I've scared the hell out of them both over it so they'll keep quiet. I'm building a false wall inside your mother's closet. If someone is trying to break in, you can hide there. Finally, we need to implant the tracking device in you. Mitch will take care of it."

"The hiding place is kind of cool. That's like the hiding place in Corrie ten Boom's book. But I have to say, that microchip thing bothers me that I'm being tracked all the time. At least, I'm not on camera. Are you sure that's necessary?" I asked.

"It's important for your safety. If you're abducted, it could save your life," Peter answered.

"How does it work?"

Mitch walked out and returned with a small, half inch square chip enclosed in a clear silicone bag. He held it up and said, "We implant this just under your skin in your armpit. It sends a signal every fifteen minutes to a satellite and as long as you're in your programmed area, nothing else happens. If you are out of the area, it starts sending signals every minute and an alert is sent to Peter on his tracking device. He can pinpoint exactly where you are through GPS technology."

"How long does the battery last? And how do you change the battery? Do you have to cut me open each time?" I asked.

"No, its power supply is recharged each night by this pad that plugs into a wall socket. You simply plug in the charger and hold the charging pad over the device in your armpit and it charges it back up. The charge is also lengthened by your body heat. That's why we put it in your armpit. So raise your arm up."

I raised my arm and Mitch made a small slit in my skin and slipped the unit in. He put some antiseptic on the tiny cut and butterfly bandaged it. "It will be a little annoying at first then you'll forget it's even there," Mitch said.

"This is weird," I said as I rubbed my finger over the raised bump. Peter went over the long list of do's and don'ts for me while I got dressed. No social media on the internet was allowed and no phone calls in or out besides the preprogrammed ones in the phone Peter handed me. It was an old fashioned, flip phone and could only call out to Peter and my mother. No one else was allowed.

We had a large pizza delivered and I devoured half of it myself. We watched Nitro Circus on MTV together and laughed at the crazy stunts they pulled off. "Travis Pastrana is crazier than I am," I said. Mitch agreed but Peter wasn't too sure. We all agreed that Travis was one hot looking stud.

The next week was comfortable and easy at Peter and Mitch's place. I loved watching them interact and my days were full of reading, watching television and chatting with Mitch and Peter. I chatted with Mitch mostly since Peter was gone a lot. I asked lots of personal questions about their lives together and some of the good and bad parts of being a gay couple. I found out each of their personal stories of growing up gay. Mitch's family was very accepting but Peter's was not. They never visited Peter's family as a couple, but Peter went alone to family gatherings. I asked if that bothered Mitch and he said it didn't. He understood that it was better to let Peter have his family connection without the tension of being with his partner and though not ideal, it was working. Someday, they both hoped that Peter's family would allow Mitch to join him. I was impressed with the realistic approach they took to many things. I was also impressed that they attended a church with a gay minister and that gave me hope that I might someday be able to follow Pastor Morgan's example and become a mentor and a spiritual advisor for others.

One evening as I was sitting at dinner with Peter and Mitch enjoying a nice piece of salmon grilled over mesquite with steamed vegetables on the side, I brought up my question about why I hadn't died from the poison gas that William's old man had given me. "I asked a guy at the coroners about that." Peter answered. "It was too complicated for me so I wrote it down and gave it to Mitch here," Mitch swallowed his broccoli and jumped up to get his paper on it.

"This is fascinating," he said. "I looked this all up last night. Apparently, liver donations in many cases can now come from live donors. In order to get the livers extracted without them being damaged by the anesthesia, they have developed a special drug cocktail of fentanyl, sodium pentothal/etomidate, low dose non-depolarizing muscle relaxant, and succinylcholine. It is administered by injection into the humidification system of the respirator. In your case, however, nothing was administered because before that creep injected the solution, Peter and his police buddies showed up. So all you were ever breathing was pure oxygen."

I started to laugh. "You mean I was freaking out, holding my breath, and praying to God to help me not breathe all the while it was only oxygen flowing? Oh my God, do I feel stupid." They both laughed along with me as I reenacted holding my breath and then sucking in what I thought was poison gas expecting to die.

The second week was more stressful as I had to go testify. I was hopeful that I would see Scotty when we testified in front of the grand jury. They had us go at separate times, though, and I didn't get to see him or William. Peter found out that Scotty and his family, and William and his mother along with Pablo and Bull all had gone into witness protection. Their locations were secret and I feared the possibility that I would never find Scotty again. He would assume that I was in the program also and would never come looking for me here. Neither of us could use social media, so there seemed no hope. Still, I held out hope. I resolved to find him and prayed that when I did, he would still want and need me in his life. The biggest risk was of him moving on and building a relationship with someone else. I struggled with that fear and at times it would overwhelm me with sadness that I just could not shake. Mitch and Peter understood and gave me my space when it overcame me.

My name was legally changed but I refused to take Leach as my last name. I wanted Simons, like Scotty, but Peter discouraged that. He suggested I retain the same initials but change both first and last names. I struggled and struggled to think of a name and ended up choosing Cody after my friend Dig, and Newman for my last name since it was like I was becoming a new man with a new life and a new name. Cody Newman was born and Kyle Davis, the Rock, passed away. It was a strange and melancholy experience to lose my identity. I sulked over it for days. In less than a month I had lost everything. I remember that night as I knelt by the bed after giving Mitch and Peter our nightly hugs.

"Dear God, I'm a new man tonight. I'm no longer Kyle. I'm Cody Newman. But I'm still your child. I can feel that you haven't abandoned me and that you still love me. Even in the darkest times, I've felt strength from you. I've lost my home and my family and I've lost my friends and my sport. I've lost my school. I lost my dearest and most faithful friend, Sam, and the biggest loss of all, is losing the one I love most, Scotty. Now I've even lost my identity. I don't think I've much left to lose. I still have you, though. I'm so thankful William led me to you. Stay with me. Don't abandon me ever. I could not go on if you do."

I knelt there a long time and basked in the warm glow of His love. I felt wrapped in it. I sat on my bed and opened my bible to Matthew 27:46 and read "And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? That is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" I pondered the power of this plea from the Son of God. I realized that Jesus' Father must have pulled His spirit from His Son and abandoned Him in this darkest hour of His ordeal. The thought came to my mind with powerful clarity that Jesus had to do what He did on His own without any support from His Father. He walked the final steps of His dreary journey alone but He completed His task and because He did it, I could do whatever was asked of me. I could stand up and be the kind of person God wanted me to be. I had been shaped by all these experiences to become a better person because of them. I closed my Bible and lay in my bed determined to live well no matter what else came my way.

I reflected on something I'd read in Corrie ten Boom's book, The Hiding Place . She had written, "This is what the past is for! Every experience God gives us, every person He puts in our lives is the perfect preparation for the future that only He can see." I determined I would read her book again starting the next day.

Peter had already spoken with Justin and Adam and their parents. They had all agreed to be in on protecting my safety. They realized that by doing so, they also were at some risk and if they ever said anything, they increased that risk. Justin's mom, Mrs. Dearborn, would be my teacher for home schooling. I would study on my own over the internet and in the evenings, she would review my work. At Peter's recommendation, I began growing my hair out longer to change my appearance. It was at an awkward stage and I didn't like the way it made me look. I liked my old look better, but like everything else in my life, I accepted this as one more necessary change. I was nervous the day we loaded into Peter's car with my meager belongings in a single bag and headed to the Campbell Village Apartments.


Part 2

I felt like I was being escorted into Juvey again as we walked through the corridor. Peter activated the tracking device and set the parameters. He lectured me again on the importance of staying out of sight as much as possible. As we entered my apartment, my mother, the new warden, and her sidekick, Reverend Rick, were there to process me. I half expected to have to strip and shower with lice shampoo again. Mom gave me an artificial hug but I didn't hug back as she pretended to be glad to have me home. Reverend Rick made no attempt to show any appreciation for my invasion of his sex den. It occurred to me instantly how my presence was cramping his style and the freedom to show up anytime he wanted to get a little action. It was a small victory for me and in a strange way, satisfying. I sneered at him and he sneered back. "Good," I thought. We already understood each other and were clear on our positions.

Peter sat everyone down and went over the rules for my safety. He lectured my mother so strongly that she threw up her defensive barriers and by the end, she was sitting stiffly on the couch next to the reverend with both arms folded and her lips tightly pursed. She was staring right through Peter and I don't think she was listening any longer. After the lecture to us three, at about 4 pm, Mrs. Dearborn came over with Justin and Adam. Peter went through all the lectures with them and deputized them to rat me out if I ever got any wild ideas about stealing cars or chasing down gang members or getting on any social media sites. They both smiled and agreed to their assignments gleefully. He warned everyone again of the great potential danger involved with the cartel and the gang. Peter had me practice getting into the hiding place he had built in the closet.

Mrs. Dearborn left me with a packet of material to get started on for schooling and Justin and Adam promised to come see me as often as possible after school. I was unbelievably grateful for having at least two friends. I'm sure without them, I could have never endured my confinement.

That evening, after everyone had left and it was just my mom and me alone in the apartment, I set out to seek my revenge. I had contemplated it long and hard, and though violence was repugnant to me, I had to exact my revenge. It was premeditated and deliberate. I had it planned out to the last detail, including the exact weapon I would use. My mother was sitting in a chair in the living room next to my bed/couch reading over a biographical manuscript that Reverend Rick was writing titled, Good God What a Life . Quoting Judge Tennyson, "How appropriately inappropriate," I muttered to myself.

My heart was racing and my hands were trembling as I opened the kitchen drawer and pulled out the large butcher knife. My terse, determined scowl reflected in the shiny blade. I gripped it in my sweating palm and walked, full of determination, into the living room. My mother didn't even look up from her reading. I stood there with the knife, growing angrier with each passing second. I stared at my mother engrossed in the vain scribbling of that bastard reverend she was sleeping with. I thought about how she had ruined our home life and been so cruel to Dad. I thought about how manipulative she had been bringing that damn monkey into my room to spy on me. As I thought about how she manipulated the video to frame my father and steal him away from me, my anger exploded into unavoidable rage. "Fuck the consequences," I muttered.

Swiftly, I raised the butcher knife and plunged it with deep satisfaction into the neck of Mr. Giggles. I jabbed and sliced and furiously cut the shaggy fur until the head came off. White stuffing flew all over as I violently shook the camera out of the head. Then I commenced to pound and throw the body around, screaming obscenities, until stuffing was scattered from one side of the room to the other. My mother was yelling at me to stop and retreated to the kitchen dining area clutching the manuscript to her breast with panic in her eyes. When I had exacted my revenge on the traitorous monkey, I walked calmly back to the kitchen with the knife in my hand. My mother shrieked and ran to her bedroom. I chuckled to myself over it. I heard her talking on the phone to Reverend Rick and telling him to come over right away. She remained locked in her room until he showed up.

By the time he did show up, I had picked up all the mess and tossed the remains of the fucking monkey into the trash. I hid the camera above the water heater, though. I had other plans for that. I was watching ESPN when the reverend showed up and let himself in with his own key. I was pleased that Reverend Rick started his cable gospel hour because it prompted my mother to order cable service so she could watch the episodes on Sunday mornings. Reverend Rick burst in through the door like a SWAT team. It was comical to watch as he took in the scene. I'm sure he expected to find Mom lying on the floor all bloody and covered in stuffing from the stupid monkey. Instead, he found everything calm and spotlessly clean. I'd vacuumed up what I wasn't able to pick up with my fingers.

He called out to my mom and she came rushing out and fell into his arms. She glared at me and burst into a fitful description of my uncontrolled rage and violent attack with the butcher knife. I listened to her rant without interruption, but she was wrong about my rage. It was very controlled and very deliberate. It was also very therapeutic. I felt better than I had expected, once I'd gotten it out of my system.

The reverend suggested that we go for a walk and we went to the pool area and sat in the worn out lounge chairs and chatted. "Kyle," he began, but I interrupted him.

"My name's Cody now. You need to start using it."

"Sorry. I forgot," he apologized. "What went on here tonight? Were you deliberately trying to scare your mother?"

"My mother tends to exaggerate things."

"Well, that's true, and you also tend to manipulate things and people, I believe."

"I guess all three of us share that trait, don't we, Reverend?" I shot back.

He smiled and asked, "What was your real purpose for tearing up the monkey in front of your mother? Do you need some counseling? I'm starting a foundation with a very good Christian psychologist and we will be co-authoring a book on changing errant behavior and healing emotional wounds through Christ. I would like to start with you and meet twice a week to help guide you back to a stable, Christ centered life. It will help you understand why you did what you did in there."

"I did what I did because I needed to vent a lot of pent-up anger and the stuffed monkey seemed like a better choice than either you or my mother to vent on. I won't deny that I made a little statement at the same time. I want Mom to give me a little respect while I'm stuck living here. I don't intend to be treated like a little child and definitely not like a prisoner. I've been giving it a lot of thought and I think we can all get along with some ground rules."

"And what are those?"

"First one is that you can take any ideas of rehabilitating me with your Christian psychology bullshit and stuff them deep into a place where the sun never shines. Our conversations need to consist of hello and goodbye. But I'm smart enough to know that you still want to come around and fuck my mother like you've been doing." The reverend bristled but he didn't deny. I continued, "I'll suggest some evening when you're over working late on the cable show or the missionary trip to Mars or whatever grand scheme for the redemption of the universe you're cooking up, that you should just stay over and sleep on the floor of my mom's room. No sense driving when it's so late. She'll pretend it's all on the up and up and think I'm fooled while you sleep in her bed and fuck her brains out. In the morning, I make no snide comments, share it with no one that you're doing it and smile and act pleasant. In exchange, you support me in three demands of mine."

"What are those?"

"I want some exercise equipment, especially a treadmill to run on and a set of weights for lifting. Secondly, I want the internet in our apartment, and most importantly, I want a sizable trust fund set up in my name for when I turn eighteen from the money you're extorting from my father."

"The first two are easy, but what exactly do you consider to be a 'sizable' amount for the trust fund?"

"Depends on what you're getting for me. I want to see the divorce documents and then I'll tell you the number. I'm not stupid. I know the only reason either of you want me here is so you have an excuse to get a lot of money out of my old man. You're using those videos to hold over his head. I would be a very hostile witness toward your side if you ever did try and release those videos. So what do you say? In fact, I'll even show you a good faith deposit by saying I'd like to go visit Justin for a couple of hours right now if you'd like to get started with my part of the bargain."

Reverend Rick looked at me and said, "You have to let me counsel you, or pretend to. You also have to tell your mother that I have cured you of your deviant sexual behavior. She's fixated on that. I need to have her believe that I have that ability for the mental health center she is donating to."

"I don't know if I can pull that off. That's so incredibly hypocritical on your part. You two are the ones with deviant sexual behavior. I should be counseling you. But if you want me to play that game with Mom, then fine. Deal?"

"Deal, but depending on the amount you want for the trust fund is reasonable, of course."

"Okay. The trust is to be managed by Officer Milsap, by the way, so no one can get their slimy paws on it until I turn legal age." Then I spread a sly smile across my face and asked, "So, are you horny? Want me to disappear for a couple hours?"

"You don't need to be gone for that long. Just go visit your friend for an hour while I discuss these conditions you've proposed with your mother."

"Sure, whatever you say. Later then." I got up and walked over to Justin's apartment. He welcomed me in and we went to his room. I helped him finish up his math homework and then we played some RPG for about half an hour. When I returned home, Mom was sitting at the table with her arms folded. I peeked and sure enough, her hair was flat in the back. True to my word, I didn't make any snide remarks.

"Kyle," I stopped her and reminded her of my new name. "Oh yes, Cody. I can't believe how manipulative you have become. You must have learned that from your father as well as his sexual perversions."

I burst out laughing. When I got control, I said, "Oh no, mother dear, you get all the credit for that trait. That one definitely came securely attached to the X chromosomes you passed on to me."

"Well you might as well know I don't plan on being manipulated. I'm the mother and I'll make the decisions around here and I'm not putting any money in your name. If either you or your father gives me any trouble, I'll release the videos."

"Okay. I'll just roll down the concrete steps of the two story apartments and then describe to Officer Milsap and Judge Tennyson how you beat me up at night. They'll pull me and the money that comes with me so fast it will make your head spin. I'll pick out several treadmills that I want and I'll let you make the final choice. You will show me the divorce documents and you will give me a trust fund. If you release the videos, then Dad gets fired and maybe arrested, but either way the golden goose is dead, meaning you get no more money for my support. Let's not pretend you want me here. I know better. I'm just a necessary nuisance. But if we stop pretending, we'll all get along better. You and the reverend can do whatever you want in the privacy of your bedroom. Just leave me alone and I'll leave you guys alone."

"There goes your dirty mind again."

"Whatever. I'm tired and want to go to bed."

So ended my first day at home. I never really thought of the apartment as home and doubted I ever would. It was just a better decorated prison cell as far as I was concerned.

The next morning began with my mom puking in the bathroom again. I convinced her to get medical attention and she agreed she needed to. When she came home the following day after visiting the doctor, she had a confused look. I pressed her to know what was up but she just went to bed. I heard her crying but she simply ignored me when I knocked and asked if she needed anything. She didn't come out all day, not even when Mrs. Dearborn, or Mrs. D as she asked me to call her, came by to check on my homework. Mrs. D gave me an English assignment to write both an essay and a poem to evaluate my creative writing skills and my research abilities.

The following day, I contacted the cable company and found out they could add internet to our television service and charge a bundled rate. I handed the phone to my mom and she gave the okay for it. She still refused to speak about her doctor's appointment. The atmosphere hung heavy with the unspoken news. I knew something bad was up but had no idea what. My mind ran wild with everything from cancer to diabetes to AIDS. That evening, Reverend Rick came over and we said our cursory hello to each other. The two of them went into my mother's room and I sat watching the Discovery Channel. I was amazed to learn that the endangered blue whales are the largest mammals to ever live on Earth and that they eat from four to eight tons of krill per day. "Imagine that grocery bill," I thought. I learned that their bellies are yellowish in color from the millions of microorganisms that attach themselves in the whale's skin. I thought about William's comments about his father being like a barnacle. He was one barnacle that had gotten scraped off. I wondered how William was doing. I imagined that he missed Brenda as much as I missed Scotty.

The conversation in the next room was getting louder and more stressed. I tried to concentrate on the blue whales and ignore what was going on in the next room. The information in the television show was getting more interesting as they reported on the reproductive habits of the species. I was shocked to learn that a blue whale's penis measures up to 16 feet in length and its testicles weigh in at around 25 pounds apiece. I imagined what it would be like to be packing something like that around. I had big ones for a human male, and sometimes they were annoying. There was an internet hoax that claimed the reason the ocean was salty is because the blue whale produces 400 gallons of semen when it ejaculates and only 10% actually goes into the female. That was pretty funny, even though it was obviously absurd. They debunked the ridiculous myth that any creature could generate 400 gallons of semen. What was equally shocking to discover was that a newborn calf is about 23 feet long and weighs up to 6,000 pounds.

Just then, my mother cried out, "I didn't miss any pills. I wouldn't do this on purpose. I'm not manipulating you. It just happened. Don't be cruel. I want you to be happy about this." She was crying. I wanted to go smash his face in.

My stomach churned as I realized what was going on. My mother was pregnant. Unless she'd been swimming in the ocean and gotten some of that leftover whale sperm in her, she was growing a little Reverend Rick inside her womb. The concept of having a miniature reverend for a sibling disgusted me. I'd prefer a whale. I turned down the volume on the TV and strained to listen to the rest of their conversation. The jackass reverend was pressuring my mother to abort the fetus and I grew furious at his immense selfishness. To her credit, my mother stood up to him. When he realized he wasn't going to bully her into it, he switched on his charm. He stroked her ego and lied to her about his intentions to marry her as soon as it was possible to do so. He said she needed to have the baby on her own so that it wouldn't appear that he had been engaged in sinful practice with her since that could damage the important work they had done together. He told her to claim it was a parting gift from her estranged husband and then when they married six months after the child was born, it would appear that he was the rescuer instead of the perpetrator. "You have to do this for the sake of the mission we have undertaken together to spread the good news of Christ. I will support you behind the scenes, of course, and we will get through it together." I wanted to vomit. I wondered if morning sickness was communicable.

My mom fell for his line and begged him to hold her and make love to her. I knocked when it fell silent and opened the door. I walked in and they broke quickly from their embrace. I walked to the edge of the dresser and nonchalantly placed my hand on the glass vase full of decorative marbles. I told them I wanted to go spend the night over at Justin's place and asked if it was okay. My mom halted her initial scolding over barging in and instead gave immediate permission for me to go. I waved my hand across the front of the vase before heading out. Rick followed me to the door and locked it behind me. Justin was surprised to see me on a school night and Mrs. D agreed to let me spend the night when I told her that my mom was sick and didn't want me in the house. Justin and I promised to go to bed and not stay up late since it was a school night. It didn't bother him that I didn't have PJ's since he said he slept in his boxers anyway. That night as we lay in his queen size bed next to each other, I told him what was really going on. He wasn't at all surprised. I swore him to secrecy. In turn, he shared a significant secret with me and swore me to secrecy. We fell asleep right after crossing hearts and hoping to die.

I woke from the sound of Mrs. D's voice calling out to us to get up. She actually told me I could sleep in and go home whenever it was okay with my mother, but I said I'd leave with Justin. Right after she woke us, she left for school. I was a little nervous because I had my usual morning stiffie. I sensed that Justin was having the same issue since he had his knees bent and was holding the covers up against his chest. "Why don't you go ahead and use the bathroom first and I'll make the bed while you do," he suggested.

"Okay, don't take this wrong, but I get wood every morning so if you see my tent, it's not meant for you." I said.

"Yeah. Okay. That's cool, because I actually get wood almost every morning too. I'm pretty sure my mom's seen it before when I've kicked the covers off in the night. It's so embarrassing."

"I bet. I always just woke up by a green eyed monster."

"That's not a very nice thing to call your mom," he said.

I laughed out loud. "Well if she had green eyes, it would honestly be a pretty true thing to say about her, but I was actually referring to my radio alarm clock."

"Oh." He laughed. "If you want, I'll cover my eyes while you get up and go pee."

"I'm not that shy about it really. I honestly don't care if you see it hard or soft. I used to hang out with a really good friend's family and they were nudists, well they prefer the term naturists, but anyway, we all went naked around their house whenever I visited."

"No shit? Like the mom and dad and everyone?"

"Yeah, and he even had a little brother and a big sister in college and everyone went naked. The sister hit on me and got me boned once and to be honest, the friend and I got boned on purpose together once in a while, if you know what I mean." I couldn't believe how much I was exposing to Justin. It was a huge risk since I desperately wanted and needed his friendship. I decided I better back off.

"Wow. That's insane. Did you like it?"

"Not at first. I mean it was really hard to get used to looking naked people in the eye and to not walk around with my hands in front of my goods, you know? But after a while, I got over it and to be honest, I really enjoyed it. My Dad and I started doing it around the house some after Mom left us. I kind of like the freedom of it. I hope you don't think I'm weird."

"No. I don't think that. I think it might be kind of cool to try out. What was your friend's name?"

"Scotty."

"Oh. The one you were with when you got into all the trouble?" he asked.

"Yeah, him," I said with enough sadness for Justin to detect it.

"You miss him, don't you?"

I hate that my emotions are so close to the surface. I started to cry in spite of trying hard not to. I shook my head to answer because I couldn't speak. My throat was constricted. I put my hand over my eyes and convulsed from the waist up as I suppressed my tears. Justin slid over and slipped his long thin arm over my shoulders and said, "It's okay if you need to cry. I cry a lot too - especially over my dad, but over other things too, like what I told you about last night. It's okay for boys to cry when they need to." So, I did. I cried freely while he held me. I needed to cry. I needed to grieve the loss of Scotty in my life. Between sobs, I poured out my fears that I'd never see Scotty again and expressed how much I loved him.

When I was done, Justin wiped my eyes with the sheet, then, he turned my face to his and leaned in. I didn't pull away and he kissed me tenderly, gently on the lips. "You'll find him again. Don't worry. I'll help you. I'm going to be a high tech spy for the army. No one will be able to hide from me." Then he added, "I gotta get going or I'll be late and my mom will kill me if I am. I guess we can go pee together now our secrets are out."

"Yeah. I guess we can." I'd gone soft and so had he, so it didn't really matter anyway. We power walked to the head and pulled our dicks out. We both started flowing immediately and went so long that we started cracking up. We wagered who would go longer. Our dicks appeared to be very similar in size. The pubes that peeked out of his fly were jet black and appeared thick like his pit hair. I won the bet and was still dribbling piss after he had shaken off and gone to wash his hands.

"So is Adam your boyfriend?" I asked, expecting the obvious answer.

"No. Adam's straight. He's just horny and uses me to get off with. He's got this massive dick and I honestly think just because of that, he's got sex on the brain constantly. I can't blame him really, that monster in his pants is pretty hard to ignore. He's too shy to get any girl action, and going to an all guy school doesn't help any, but fucking girls is all he ever talks about even when we mess around together. He thinks I'm straight like him and that we're both just using each other for some 'no strings attached' sex play."

"Oh. Wow. I didn't see that coming. Does that mess with your head?"

"Not really. I'm not in love with him or anything. I guess I'm really using him for some free sex play, same as he is. I just get more pleasure out of it than he does. At least, I guess I do since I'm into guys. I love playing with his body, but we're not kindred spirits and I really don't have any emotional attachment beyond our normal guy friendship."

"I'll make your bed and pick up your room if you want me to so you can head out."

"Thanks. It sucks when your mom teaches at your school because all the teachers tattle on you. I owe you one," he called as he grabbed a Pop Tart and headed out the door.

"I'll think of a way for you to repay me then," I called back. He smiled and disappeared with gazelle-like grace. I turned his computer on, thinking I might be able to access Facebook and search for Scotty's page in hopes I could leave him a coded message telling him I was looking for him. I knew it was a long shot, but I felt like I needed to try something. To my disappointment, his computer was password protected. I powered it back off. It was a pretty stupid idea anyway and I was sort of glad it didn't work. I had to be patient.

I started making his bed and when I tucked the sheets between the mattress and springs, I felt some papers. I pulled them out and started to read them. It was a suicide note addressed to his mother.

Dear Mom, This is not your fault. You were a great mom. I just couldn't live with myself anymore. It's because of me that Dad got injured in the war. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean it to happen like it did. It wasn't what I meant.

I have to confess something to you. I'm gay. I knew Dad hated gay guys and he would never love me if he knew I was. He was always telling me not to act like a fairy and stuff like that. I prayed to God forever to make me ungay but it never changed at all. So the night before Dad got injured by the car bomb I prayed to God and told him I couldn't change and said he had to figure out a way to deal with Dad. When I found out that he'd been injured the very next day after I prayed, I knew it was because I was so weak and told that stuff to God. I didn't mean for God to hurt him. I just wanted God to help Dad understand me. I hear you crying at nights when you think I'm asleep. I know you won't find another husband if you're stuck with a gay son, so it's better for everyone if I'm just gone. I want you to do some things for me now that

It ended abruptly. I wondered if he had been interrupted. I put the papers back and finished making the bed. The burden of the knowledge constantly bothered me. I didn't know what to do. I wondered about telling Peter about it. I thought he could help him. I thought about telling his mother about it, but I didn't know Justin well enough to know whether that would push him over the edge, if she knew his secret. I wished there was a way to get him to talk to Pastor Morgan. He obviously couldn't talk to Reverend Rick. I struggled with the dilemma all day and into the early evening when Mrs. D came over to review my homework. She asked if I had my outline for my research paper and I hadn't even worked on it. The truth was, I'd been preoccupied worrying about Justin. So I pulled off the outline I'd done for the paper on Ancient Greece and the mentoring process that young boys went through in that society. She was impressed. I felt a little guilty, but I had actually done the work myself, just for an earlier assignment. I wasn't sure how she would react to the subject matter.

I hadn't done much on my homework because as soon as my mother left the apartment to go help prepare for that evening's taping of the World Ministry of Reverend Rick, I went straight to her bedroom. I broke in and pulled the camera out of the decorative, glass marbles in the large vase. The lens, that was formerly a blue monkey eye, had appeared similar enough to any other marble to avoid notice. The motion activated sensor had started the recording and I watched in awe as my mother serviced Reverend Rick. It was more than I'd hoped for as I had a clear recording of her undressing him and coaxing his rather chubby dick into an erection. She sucked his balls and his plump dick according to his various demands and whims. I gagged when he asked, or more like commanded, her to lick his pucker.

I was admittedly a bit grossed out when she greased up the dildo and slid it up his ass before straddling him and guiding his thick, unprotected pole into her dripping vagina. It never occurred to me that I had been sharing a sex toy with Reverend Rick. It did occur to me that since she was already preggers, there was no need for a rubber. I presumed she'd already quit taking the pills as well. It was disturbing to watch my mother having sex. I didn't think I could dislike the stupid ass reverend more than I already did, but this took it to new heights. He fondled my mom's breasts while she rode him. He stiffened and squeezed my mom's tits so hard she winced while he shot his demon seed into her. While he jerked and twitched, he called out "Save me Jesus!" When he was finished with his sermon, he said, "That was good Clovis, now you take care of your needs."

Mom pulled off of him and moved down to get herself off on his kneecap. After her quick episode, she left the room and came back with a couple of small towels and cleaned him up. There was no afterglow party. He sat up and made one more hint about aborting the fetus, but quickly changed his tune when she reacted badly. He said he was just kidding and said it was a bad joke and he was sorry. He kissed her, rolled over, and was snoring in two minutes. "Wham, Bam, thank you Ma'am," I muttered, then added, "What an asshole." I saved the video in several places on my laptop. I hid three DVD's around the house. I walked down by Justin's apartment and logged into his wireless, and then I made up three new email accounts and emailed the video to myself. Now I had leverage.

When our mom's left to go to the taping, Justin came over to my house. It was Friday and he could put off his homework. I was nervous around him and second guessed everything I said and did. I worried I might say the wrong thing and he could run home and blow his head off with an AK forty something or other. He sensed my discomfort and finally asked me what was up.

"Sorry dude, I'm just worried about a friend."

"I didn't think you had any," he joked.

"Thanks a lot."

"No really, I thought you couldn't have any besides me and Adam."

"Well, I can't I guess. I'm just worrying over an old friend."

A knock at the door interrupted us thankfully and it was Adam. He just added to the awkwardness of the situation. I was a third wheel in what he really wanted to do and he kept looking at the clock to see how much longer before the moms would get back and he could retreat to Justin's bedroom and get his jollies. I distracted him by showing him all the documentation I had on the debate topic. It's the same topic nationwide for all high schools and he was ecstatic over it. He began making a file with all my best stuff on it. He copied my and William's argument outlines and soon forgot about his big aching dick. When the moms did come home, he had a nice thick file that I copied onto a CD for him to take home. He kept thanking me until I suggested that I spend the night over at Justin's and got approval from everyone except him. His mood turned immediately sour.

I packed a little bag and we all headed over to Justin's place. We played some RPG and wrestled a bit. I naturally dominated that and showed them some cool moves to pull on others. Justin wanted to learn as much as possible about wrestling. He said his dad thought cross country running was gay and wanted him to play a man's sport like football or at least basketball. He was certain that his dad would have approved of wrestling. I didn't know what to say to that so I just stayed quiet.

"Did you guys ever get boners in those tight suits you wear?" Adam asked. "Rolling around with sweaty guys in those stretchy things seems kind of gay to me."

"No, it's really not. You're not thinking about sex stuff when you're wrestling. It's man against man in a very physically demanding contest. Sometimes you get boned, I'll be honest, but usually it's in practice and not in the meets because you're concentrating so hard to win in the meets."

"Isn't that embarrassing?" Adam asked.

"No, everyone knows it happens sometimes and there's a sort of rule that you just ignore it. Sort of like we've been ignoring that big bone in your pants right now. Did the wrestling get you all worked up?"

"Shut up. I'm not boned."

"Yes you are, unless you've got a salami in there for a midnight snack" I said. "Hey, it's no big deal. I used to go do a triple J every morning with a couple of my wrestling buds, so I'm not freaked out about someone popping a boner around me.

"What's a triple J?" Justin asked.

"Every morning, we'd get up early, pull on some running gear and jog to the foothills. We'd meet up at this dirt road and then run up it to a trail that was all overgrown. About a mile off the road there was this clearing with a stream running through it and a big fallen log. The three of us would strip down and jiggle our pickles until we shot our pickle juice and then we'd clean up and jog back home. Triple J stood for jog, jiggle, jog. Man, I miss doing that. It was my special place where I'd go whenever I needed to think or just get away. That's where I was the first time I ever jacked off."

The two of them were busting up laughing. Adam didn't know whether to believe me or not and wondered if I was just messing with him because he'd gotten boned. I could tell he was trying to figure me out. We broke the awkward sexual tension by watching a Fast and Furious movie and then went to bed. "Where are we all going to sleep?" Adam asked.

"In my bed. We'll all fit. Kind of," Justin said. I found myself wedged between two mostly naked boys and our arms and legs rubbed and brushed against each other. I was long overdue for a cum draining and I boned up quickly. I hoped I would fall asleep last so I could cop a feel of Adam's big boner and then jack myself off into a sock or something.

Adam spoke after a long stretch of silence in his melodic DJ sounding voice, "Cody, were you serious about doing that triple J thing?"

"Totally. Why?"

"And it wasn't like gay? It was just like having fun with your buds, right?" he continued. Justin rolled over and leaned up on one arm to watch us and see where this went.

"No it wasn't gay. No emotions tied up in it at all. It was just about getting our rocks off in a cool way. Jacking your own is cool and all but if you ever do it with someone else, it's totally amazing." There was a long pause so Justin lay back down. Then I asked the elephant in the room question, "You think you might want to try it? You know, jack off together now? I'm really horny because I haven't had a chance to jack it for a while."

"I'm in," Justin said a little too quickly. So as not to seem too eager, he added, "If you guys are."

"I'll try it, I guess," Adam said.

"Cool. Let's do it." We kicked the covers off and I pulled my boxers off quickly. There was a soft glow of light from an aquarium in Justin's room and it cast a sexy, purple lighting effect over us. In the purplish glow of the light, I could see Adam's enormous boner. Justin was right that there was no overlooking that bad boy. I wondered what it would feel like up my ass, but quickly dismissed the thought, feeling guilty about it. That territory was reserved for Scotty. Even if it took a lifetime, I would save that part of me for him alone.

At first, we each stroked our own dicks while watching each other. They both complimented me on my chiseled body. I truly did have the best body of the bunch. Justin reached over and traced a finger across my scars. I started to push him away but then remembered what Mitch told me about being proud of them. Instead of pushing him away, I reached over and lightly stroked his ribs and tiny nipples. I tugged at the little hairs he had growing around his nipples and on his thick, black pit hairs. Adam watched a bit jealous at us stroking each other's bodies and so I let go of my dick and reached over to him. I cupped his balls that were drawn up tight into a ball. For as big as his dick was, his balls were smaller than mine. But then, mine are exceptionally large. I glanced at his face to make sure he approved and when he smiled, I began fondling and tickling his ball sac while he jacked the upper third of his massive dick. It was even larger than Little Willy's from the wrestling team. Up to now, Willy's was the biggest one in real life I'd ever seen. Adam had a three hand pump handle on him.

Soon, I was stroking his bad boy while at the same time jacking Justin off on my other side. Justin was playing with my big balls while Adam stroked my dick keeping time with my motions on his. All three of us were leaking a little pre-cum and I used it to smear around Adam's large dickhead. His breathing got shallow and ragged and he started making little grunting noises with each upward pull of his foreskin over the bulbous head. His body started twitching and that sent Justin into the final phase of his orgasm. Justin turned out to be a whimperer, sounding like a small puppy. I squeezed Adam's dick tighter and picked up the pace and he moaned out loud as the first shot of hot cum landed on his chest. Justin whimpered louder as he erupted with rapid bursts of cum. That was all I could take and even though Adam had stopped jacking me when he tipped over the edge of orgasm, just the feel of his hand holding my shaft and Justin's grip on my balls was enough to send the familiar wave of tingles and shivers through my body. I was so horny, I spilled a gallon of cum it seemed like. I had so much need built up. When it was over, we just lay there panting and holding each other's dicks and balls. In the aftermath of the experience, I felt guilty.

I felt guilty for messing with other guys when I had promised my love to Scotty similar to how I felt after messing with Tanner in the bathroom at the church. But Scotty was gone away, probably forever, if I allowed myself to be honest. This wasn't cheating, I told myself. It's not emotional. It's not even gay sex. It's just a convenient way for three buds to get our rocks off. I also felt a wave of panic that I may have triggered more gay guilt in Justin and what that might do to his head. It took some of the fun out of it. Not all the fun, but some of it for sure. I was struck by how we were all busy trying to deny what we had just done was gay - Adam because he wasn't gay, me because I didn't want to cheat on Scotty, and Justin because he couldn't bear the implication of responsibility for his dad's injury. I thought how complicated life and sex both are.

The next day, I returned home around ten o'clock. The reverend was just getting out of the shower and the house smelled of bacon. Mom was cooking breakfast. That was a first. I opened the bathroom door to put my toothbrush away and Reverend Rick quickly hid his privates behind the towel. "What's the big deal? It's not like I haven't already seen your little chub." Then I realized, I really shouldn't have seen it. He looked at me quizzically and I recovered with, "I mean it's not like I haven't seen naked guys before and we all pretty much got the same equipment, you know?" He grunted and told me to leave. I shrugged and suggested he lock the door in the future. Before leaving, I grabbed my toothbrush back from the rack and said, "I better not leave this here unattended. You might do something disgusting with it." As I walked out, I reached behind myself and made the motion as if I was shoving the toothbrush in and out of my ass. I couldn't believe the pleasure I got out of his facial expression as the realization dawned on him. I swear I heard him dry heaving after I closed the door.

After breakfast, Reverend Rick excused himself and left. I helped clean up the kitchen while my mom downed some pain pills and went back to bed with a splitting headache. I was excited when the knock on the door wasn't the reverend coming back, but rather the installer to hook up our high speed modem and wireless internet. By 1:00, I was surfing the web and retrieved the video from all three email services and tested out the video. They all worked.

I slipped quietly into my mother's room and retrieved the camera for the sequel movie starring Mom and Reverend Rick. I was way shocked to see that they had engaged in some extreme sex this time, complete with role playing where he was a cop and she was a whore. I laughed out loud at the ridiculousness of it. The best part was a conversation they had after they both reached their orgasms. They talked about the big money coming in the next day. They laughed at how they had manipulated the video they made to incriminate Dad and how they knew he hadn't really done anything improper with me. When I'd seen and recorded the entire video, I saved multiple copies of it and stashed the camera for future use if necessary.

When I grew bored of watching the reverend screw my mom, I went to the kitchen counter and picked up the thick, legal sized, manila envelope that came by messenger. Figuring that forgiveness would be easier to get than permission, I got the butcher knife out and slit the envelope open. I read through all the legal crap skimming through page after page until I found the exhibit with the cash settlement. My jaw dropped and bounced off the table, well almost. I blinked several times as I read there was to be a one time, final settlement amount of 3.4 million dollars, five hundred thousand of which was attributable to my support. Now, I knew what to ask for to be put in my trust fund.

Eventually, towards evening, Reverend Rick showed up to look over the divorce documents with my mother. When they found them already opened, they lashed out at me. I calmly took it until they asked me to leave the apartment. "No need. I already know what's in the papers. It's all pretty boring until you get to Exhibit 4. Here's the deal. I get $250,000 put into a trust fund in my name with Officer Milsap as the trustee."

They both gasped. "A quarter million? You're crazy. I'll give you $25,000 tops and you'll be grateful for it," Reverend Rick informed me.

"You'll give me? You have nothing to do with it. Mom will give me the $250,000 and not a penny less. You know one thing that public education did for me? It taught me all about history. I learned all about the Cold War and you can think of yourselves as Russia here and you can think of me as the United States, forced to maintain nuclear weapons as a deterrent toward the evil empire's nuclear capability," I said.

"What in the hell are you talking about?" asked Reverend Rick.

"Let me spell it out for you Comrade. What I'm talking about is this - I possess a weapon of mass destruction. So I can annihilate you the same way you can annihilate Dad and me. It's called a mutual deterrent. Check this out." I'd taken both videos and merged them into a highlights clip, which I played for them on my laptop as they watched in shock and awe. I was amused as my mother's embarrassment and anger grew increasingly evident.

"You have no right to secretly tape us. We are consenting adults. What we do behind closed doors is no one's business. This is a violation of our privacy and it has nothing to do with the court's decision about your custody or your father's responsibility to pay for you. You'll pay for this little stunt, you little shit," she spouted. Reverend Rick just watched with calculated calmness and an obvious clarity of understanding.

"Payback's a bitch, ain't it, Mom?" I said smugly. "Of course, I was able to locate the email address of the director of the CBN and I think he'd be interested in this, don't you, Reverend? That is your goal, to get your little hallelujah hour picked up by the Christian Broadcasting Network, isn't it? I particularly like the part where you two gossip about the gullible people who believe that you really healed the fake veteran you planted in the audience in the wheelchair. All for the good of promoting the good word of Christ of course, since the end justifies the means, I think you said. I don't recall that teaching in the New Testament, but then I haven't studied it as closely as you have. I bet the local governing board of Campbell Christian Academy would also be interested in seeing this video, don't you, Mom?" I asked.

"You wouldn't dare," she seethed. "You little brat."

"Oh, don't like the taste of your own medicine, do you? The last little tidbit is the discussion you two had about aborting the love child you've created. That's a gem. The whole plan to claim it's my father's baby is pretty weak. But since your followers are all so weak minded, and need your guidance and direction, I'm sure you can pull it off. That is, if I keep quiet. I didn't get it on video, but I did get it recorded." I lied about that part, but they had no way to know that.

My mom sat down and burst into tears. "You'll ruin everything. You don't know the damage you'll do. We're building schools in Africa and a rehab center right here in our community, the Clovis Leach Mental Health Center. You don't want to be responsible for destroying all of that, do you?"

"First of all, I doubt any of that will ever happen. Second of all, I'm not responsible for anything on those videos, you two are. Honestly, I don't really care. I really don't. What I do care about is not getting screwed out of my fair share of my inheritance while you two screw each other. If you want this kept quiet, you put $300,000 in a trust fund managed by Officer Milsap that reverts to me when I turn eighteen. That way, you can't touch it and I can't touch it and no one can make me draw it out and use it for anything stupid until I'm an adult and can legally manage my own affairs. One more thing, the portion of the settlement that is for my support, the $500,000, will be paid in monthly installments while I'm living here. That way, you can't just throw me out. I'm not sure the courts would let you anyway, but just to be sure."

"You said, $250,000 earlier," Reverend Rick corrected me.

"Yeah I know, I just increased it $50,000 for an aggravation factor since Mom called me a brat. It will increase by another $25,000 per day if it isn't done and in place on Monday. By the way, I think you're a disgusting, fucking hypocrite and you give clergy a bad name. Just to go on record, I hope there's a special place in hell set aside just for scum like you. And Mom, I pity you. You don't even realize you're just another one of his weak minded minions that he's playing. He's not planning on marrying you after the baby's born. Wait and see."

"Get out!" My mother yelled at me. "Just get out!" I closed my laptop and stood up. Mom grabbed my laptop and tugged at it. "You give me this. You can't have this anymore." I jerked it free of her grasp.

"You don't tell me what I can and can't have. I tell you from now on. Don't be stupid, I have lots of copies of what I just showed you. It's not just on my laptop." I stormed out and went to the pool where I sat in the wobbly lounge chairs and cried over the whole fucking mess my life had become. The cold war had begun.

On Monday, Officer Milsap showed up at our apartment and signed the documents setting the full $300,000 up in a trust fund in my name. Peter and I talked on his way back to his car and he was proud of me for getting the trust fund. I didn't exactly tell him how I coerced it out of Mom and the reverend and they certainly didn't say anything. I wanted to tell him about Justin's note but the words stuck in my throat. I somehow felt it wasn't right. It bothered me that I didn't tell after he left and I prayed again to know what to do. I didn't get any clear answer. I felt like I was between another rock and a hard place with Justin. I didn't think I had a right to betray his privacy and his trust in swearing me to secrecy about being gay. I also couldn't just stand by and do nothing when I knew what he was contemplating. I struggled every day over it.

Cold was the correct word for the atmosphere that prevailed between Mom and me after that. Mom didn't speak to me unless she wanted something done. She picked at every little thing I did. If there was a crumb on the counter or a scrap of paper on the floor, she screamed at me to clean it up. I simply obeyed without any other response. I never gave her the satisfaction of drawing me into an argument. I'd gotten what I wanted and now I just had to do my time. Whenever Mrs. D came over for my schoolwork, Mom hid out in her bedroom.

I spent as much time as possible over at Justin's place. I grew ever needier of his friendship and companionship. I could tell that he cherished my friendship more and more as well. It wasn't about sex stuff, even though we enjoyed some of that, it was about male bonding, guy to guy camaraderie that is so essential to a guy's psyche. Without his place to escape to, I could not have endured my plight. I started to worry that if I told anyone about his note, he might end up being sent away somewhere, like a mental hospital or something and I'd lose him just like I'd lost everything else. But, if he killed himself I'd lose him that way too, only in a much worse way and I'd never be able to forgive myself. Finally, I settled on a plan and I prayed about it and felt good about it.

Since we'd broken the ice with Adam, he was anxious for me to join as many sleepovers as possible and we expanded our sex play to occasional blow jobs. Adam struggled with giving them, I could tell, but he made the sacrifice in order to get them. He refused to swallow though and that kind of sucked when he'd pull off right at the best part. His signal that he was in need of one was to bite on the end of his index finger and flash a seductive smile. I carefully watched Justin's reaction after we messed around together and when we were alone, I'd quiz him sometimes.

I had a hard time reading Justin. He seemed very eager to join in the play, but he always got very pouty afterwards. I feared the worst was going on in his head. I secretly checked for the note and found it in the same unfinished state it had been in before. I thought it was a good sign that he hadn't added to it. Still, I worried myself sick over what to do. He made the comment once that we had to be sure his mom didn't catch us doing gay stuff because he'd just die if she found out. That comment freaked me out for weeks. I analyzed it to death, replaying his voice and evaluating any hidden meanings.

As for me, the guilty voice in my head that used to berate me about being gay returned to accuse me of cheating on Scotty and putting Justin at risk. I wondered if Scotty had found a new sex partner to replace me. I often wondered what he was doing at any given moment. I didn't see how I could go for years and possibly a lifetime without any sexual interaction in hopes that someday I'd find him. He'd surely understand that. I suppose it was possible to go without sex and there were probably a few Catholic priests who actually did stay true to their vows of celibacy, but I doubted there were many.

The way boys do, we gave each other nicknames. We started calling Adam, Eve which really annoyed him and made it all the more fun to call him that. I went back to being called Rock, which I really liked, and we called Justin, Time. That started up when we were all over to my house just two weeks after our first three-way sex in Justin's bed. I introduced them to the rubber dildo. Adam passed on the idea, but Justin wanted to experiment. I told him it was possible to cum just from rubbing the special spot up inside your ass even without touching your dick. He wanted to try it. I was working it for him on my couch and he was oozing cum into his thick black pubes but hadn't reached orgasm. It was getting late and I knew Mom would be home soon. "Dude, you need to cum before my mom gets home and catches us," I told him. Adam was stroking his big dick and watching in fascination while I worked the dildo in and out of Justin's virgin ass. Justin's expressions were priceless. He was lost in an alternate universe of perpetual bliss.

Finally, I motioned for Adam to take over the dildo action and I sucked Justin's dick into my mouth and swallowed him whole. He immediately crested into a mind blowing orgasm and unloaded his cum down my throat. I swallowed the last of it and Adam pulled the dildo from his ass just as Mom's key turned in the lock. We all scrambled to hide the dildo and lube under the couch and pull our shorts back on hopping on the couch next to each other. We acted absorbed in the television with our hands draped over our crotches, as Mom walked in and set a bag of groceries on the kitchen table. She impolitely instructed my friends that they needed to leave now that she was home and went straight to her room. We broke out in nervous laughter and Adam said, "We need to start calling you Justin Time. That was fucking close, man. My heart's still racing." From that moment on, Justin became Justin Time, only we often shortened it to Time. Every now and then we would relive the experience and start giggling.

The problem was that Justin started pressuring me to try anal sex with each other after that experience. I tried to explain to him that I couldn't do that with him. I tried to help him understand that I needed to hold on to that as something special just for Scotty and me. If I gave in and did that with Justin, or anyone else, it would be like admitting that I'd never see Scotty again and I wasn't ready to do that yet. I liked Justin a lot, but I did not love him. I didn't think he was in love with me, but he was hard to read. I worried that the demons were now working him over. After sex play, I could read the guilt that was overwhelming him more and more.

The following Monday when Mrs. D came over to collect my research paper on Men in Greek Society about the need for male role models in young boys' lives, I handed her a separate note to read after she read my paper. In my note, I told her that Justin needed a male mentor like an erastes in Ancient Greece, but not to teach him about sex, but instead to help him understand that you could live a good and productive life as a gay man. I told her about the suicide note under his bed and asked her to read it. I told her I knew someone that could help Justin if she would let him. I had already called Peter on my special flip phone and he gave me the okay to let Mrs. D know that he was in a gay relationship and was willing to help Justin in any way he could.

I also gave her this poem. When I told her I didn't know what to write about for a poem, she told me to choose something that had meant a lot to me in my life and write about that. This is what I came up with. I let Justin proof it before I gave it to her and he loved it.

Monday is here, it came all too soon,
Luckily I have more energy than the Bugs Bunny cartoon.
I ate on the weekend, but now the cycle begins,
The treacherous weight cutting that never really ends.
12 pounds by Friday, seems impossible to most,
But not to the wrestler, who knows what it costs.
It's Tuesday now, the hunger sets in
What I do to my body, it feels like a sin.
3 hours of practice, 2 more at the gym
I understand that this is the price to win.
Hoping for a granola bar, or 4 oz fruit at best,
Knowing that in a few days will be the real test.
Wednesday comes slowly, and school drags on.
My backpack now feels like it weighs a ton.
Practice on practice, forced down to weight
Thinking of wild food dreams that my mind creates.
I keep pushing on, to my diet I stay true,
And nobody knows what I'm really going through.
Thursday arrives and it's one day to the meet,
But honestly, I don't know how I'm still on my feet.
The thirst is unbearable, as the hunger can't compare,
That everyone else can be fat just doesn't seem fair.
My mouth's as dry as a desert, I can't even spit,
I get no help, hell, it's been a week since I've shit.
Finally Friday, now it's a waiting game,
All this to get my hand raised, for the fame.
Too thirsty to sleep, I stayed up all night,
48 hours since I've eaten, just doesn't seem right.
Then out on the mat, to attack is the key,
I've gone through this shit for the sport nobody comes to see.

She read it twice and then took out her red pencil and marked a big red A+ at the top. "This has such a sense of honesty to it," She said. "Why would you put yourself through such torture for something nobody comes to see? Except, I suppose, the parents who come to watch."

"Not mine. My mom thought it was a stupid sport and uncivilized. She refused to support it. My father tried to show up a few times, but he was always so busy at the hospital. My friend's father was always there and he cheered for me as well as for his son, Dig. He'd been a state wrestling champion himself, though."

"So why did you do it?"

"For me, it was about testing limits and willpower. It was about overcoming my own weaknesses and then pitting myself against someone else to test my preparation. In the heat of the match, it was about using your skills and watching for the slightest mistake on your opponent's part to gain a small advantage. It was about not letting your opponent find an advantage point in you. Especially when you were locked up in a hold, each of you struggling with every ounce of strength you can summon to either get the pin or escape the danger of being pinned. That's when you found out what you were made of. My friend, Cody, was nicknamed Dig because his dad would start yelling out 'dig, dig, dig' when he'd get in one of those situations, meaning to dig deep and find the will to overcome. He usually did, and so would I. Honestly, I think learning to sacrifice and struggle against seemingly impossible odds without expectation of any real recognition or attention for it, helped prepare me for what's happened in my life recently."

She asked if she could keep the poem and share it with her classes. I said she could as long as she didn't tell where she got it. Naturally, she understood and wrote at the bottom, "Anonymous."

Later that night, I had already settled in under my covers and was mindlessly stroking my balls when a knock came at my door. I quickly searched for some shorts and a t-shirt to put on and peeked through the peephole. It was Mrs. D. I unlocked both deadbolts and let her in. She had my research paper in hand along with my note and Justin's suicide note. Her eyes were red and puffy and she clutched a handful of tissues in the other hand. She wrapped her arms around me and hugged me while she cried. Even though it felt sort of awkward at first, I put my arms around her and held her until she gained composure and motioned for me to sit on my fold out bed. She sat next to me and she thanked me over and over.

"Cody, I'm so thankful you let me know what Justin was going through. I knew something was not good with Justin since his dad's accident, but he would never open up to me. I'm somewhat shocked that Justin is taking this situation with his Dad so hard. Gordon, my ex, was mildly abusive to me and Justin, yet I guess Justin idolized him. It's hard for a woman to judge the bond between a father and a son no matter what the father is like."

"I know. It's hard. I get so mad at my Dad sometimes but I can never fully hate him."

'I want to know about this man who you think could help Justin."

"It's Officer Milsap. He lives here in town with his gay partner. They are both really wonderful people. I know he could help Justin the same way they helped me. I'm gay too, in case you hadn't figured that out already." From her reaction, I could tell that she hadn't guessed it.

She was grateful for my intervention and I called Peter right away on my flip phone. I passed it over to Mrs. D and they talked a long time. They arranged for Peter to meet with Justin and to have me along at first to make it more comfortable. The plan was for Peter to become a solid male role model for Justin and to get him to accept some good counseling from a trusted and qualified person.

After Mrs. D left, I slipped to the edge of the bed and thanked God for his help and direction. I felt His warm peace and knew that Justin was going to be okay. The meeting with Peter went really well and Peter had done some research into RPG and that became their common ground to get started. I slowly bowed out of the meetings and soon Justin was spending time over at Peter and Mitch's place. I didn't mind sharing his time with them since I could see a whole new Justin emerging. His mother never let Justin know that she read his suicide note, but we were both relieved when we discovered that it had disappeared from underneath his mattress. Justin stopped pressing me about anal sex after a while of meeting with the counselor and told me he understood my commitment to Scotty. He did occasionally take advantage of the big rubber dildo, though. I was relieved to see him start to smile and glow after our sex play instead of scowl and pout.


Part 3

Things remained icy cold between my mother and me. I didn't really care. We conversed as little as necessary and she grew ever more pregnant. Her vomiting quit and she felt pretty good after that as the child grew within her. Still, she continued having pounding headaches that grew more severe until she finally went to the doctor over it. I assumed they were just from being stuck living with me. When she returned home from the doctor visit, she was a mess. I tried to comfort her and ask what was wrong, but our relationship was so badly damaged that she just shut me out. I could tell that she was severely upset for several days until she received a phone call from the doctor telling her to come in and speak with him about her tests. She immediately phoned Reverend Rick. When the reverend showed up, he looked equally pale and distraught. They left together without telling me where they were going but from eavesdropping, I knew they were headed to see the doctor and I was sure whatever it was couldn't be good.

I ran five miles on the new treadmill and did some work on my upper body with the free weights. The workout equipment filled the living room. I'd insisted on upgrading the couch to the style that folded out into a real bed with a mattress on it. I was sick of sleeping just on the cushions. When it was folded out, there was just barely enough room to squeeze by the TV. I took a steamy hot shower and crawled into bed. It was past midnight when my mother finally came home and tried to make her way in the dark around my bed. She was about seven months along and very pregnant. She tripped on a weight that I'd accidentally left lying on the floor and crashed her shin into my bed frame. She let out a shriek of pain and plopped down onto my bed.

"What's wrong?" I asked as I shook myself awake.

"Everything! Everything's wrong." She broke down and started bawling, "Why can't you clean up after yourself? You leave things lying around and I could have seriously injured myself or I could have injured your little brother." I slid down toward her and cautiously put my hand on her back. She didn't reject me, so I expanded my reach and wrapped my hand around her arm and pulled her into my side.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you. I'll be more careful about what I leave lying on the floor." I marveled that she revealed I was getting a brother. Up to that minute she had refused to tell me what sex the baby was. With as much tenderness as I could muster, I asked, "Mom, what's really wrong?"

Her sobs increased and she revealed that she had brain cancer, very advanced. The news clobbered me. I felt like I'd been illegally slammed to a cement floor. "Oh dear God, Mom. Are they certain?" She nodded that they were. "So what do you need to do for it?"

She just cried. "There's not much I can do until the baby is born. They'll do more tests, but they doubt I can even be operated on. It's too intertwined in my brain. They'll take the baby by C-section as soon as it appears safe to do so. There's an experimental procedure that might be useful once the baby is born, but County Medical doesn't provide it. I'd have to go to the hospital where your father works and I don't have any insurance."

"What do you mean? Just use the three million dollars you got from the divorce. That would cover it."

"Oh Kyle, that money is long gone. I donated it to the ministry. I don't have anything left. I pay for the rent from the amount you demanded to be paid monthly and the rest of that goes into the ministry as well." She said it so matter of fact. I was speechless.

"You mean that you gave Reverend Rick three million dollars?"

"Of course. We need it to build the schools in Africa and the Clovis Leach Hospital. That's not cheap."

"Mom, you didn't. Tell me you didn't."

"Of course I did. I didn't know I'd need health insurance until after you left at age eighteen and I could marry Reverend Rick. So when the divorce happened, I didn't have any. That's why I've put off going to the doctor for so long."

"So just have Reverend Rick give you back the money you need for the treatment."

"He says he can't. He says the IRS won't let him give donations back. Besides, most of it has been spent in the ministry already."

"That son of a bitch. Mom, he's just using you. Don't you see it?"

"Don't Kyle. You don't know him. I know we've sinned together, but the flesh is weak. We have a great work to do together. Once you turn eighteen, we're getting married and going to Africa to open the schools and do missionary work among the people turning them from their heathen ways unto Christ. And there's a magnificent psychologist who is working with us to open the Clovis Leach Mental Health Center. That all takes money."

I didn't bother arguing. She sincerely believed the bullshit line she'd been fed by that evil wolf in sheep's clothing. I just held her and pitied her.

The next month was a living hell. Mom was ordered to strict bed rest. I waited on her hand and foot. We called a détente to the cold war and the tensions thawed a bit. We spoke respectfully to each other for a change. Some days were hard on her and she would get cranky with me when she was in serious pain. She endured as much as she could to protect the baby. I had to respect her for that. I was wearing down since she would need me throughout the night and I'd get bits and pieces of sleep but was never fully rested. That wore on my nerves and I struggled to stay calm and understanding when Mom would get demanding or snippy. The first two weeks, the reverend came by and they closed the door and locked it while he was in there. They spoke in hushed tones so that I couldn't hear them. On his last visit, he cleaned out his clothes and shoes and took his toothbrush, his new toothbrush that is, he'd tossed the old one I messed with right after he'd used it.

Mitch came over once a week and spelled me off during the night and I got to go over to Justin's place and spend the night. He'd listen patiently to my whining about how hard it was. Then he'd usually take care of what else was hard for me. Caring for Mom pretty much nixed all opportunities for any other sex play. Now and then, Adam was there and begged for a blowjob from me. I accommodated him and enjoyed sucking on his massive dick, but I preferred it when it was only Justin and me sharing the bed. I slept better for one thing and Justin was better at sex play. With him it wasn't just about getting off and falling asleep. Justin and I teased and caressed a while before the main course. He liked having his earlobes nibbled on and ever since he came to terms with being gay and not blaming himself or God for what happened to his Dad in Iraq or Afghanistan, or wherever it was, he got better at sex play. He was more open and relaxed about it and didn't get weird and sullen afterwards. We did limited kissing, because of me mostly. That too, like intercourse, seemed like it should be reserved for someone I was totally in love with and I was still very much in love with Scotty. I thought about him constantly.

My favorite thing to do with Justin Time was to get a full body massage. He was amazing at them. By the time he finished kneading me all over, I was so boned that I could barely stand it. Then, he would gently stroke my dick with his fingertips, just slightly brushing them over the soft skin. Next, he would start tapping his fingertips all along the rigid shaft of my dick as if he was quickly fingering a clarinet. It drove me wild. He always concluded with squeezing my sizable balls with one hand and wrapping the other around my shaft, squeezing it nice and firm and wildly jerking me off. I would cum in seconds and the waves of pleasure were always strong and exhausting. He'd learned to appreciate the taste of cum and would lap up my offering from my abs and groin. Afterward, we'd lay next to each other, usually with our legs draped over each others, just enjoying the touch of another human being and shoot the shit. He would often ask me about Scotty and wonder to himself what kind of guy he'd find to fall in love with. The morning would always come much too soon and I'd have to trudge back to another week of vomit, bedpans, feedings, bathing, entertaining, crying, whining, medications, and hardest of all, pitying.

At last, the time came for them to take the baby. Peter came to the apartment along with the medical transport crew. I made the mistake of asking why Reverend Rick wasn't there and my mother burst into tears. Peter explained to me later that Reverend Rick was in prison under indictment by the IRS for violating tax laws and laundering money through his phony charities. He tried to flee the country right after he last visited my mom, but he was apprehended at the airport. Later I asked Peter how he got caught and with a fair amount of satisfaction, Peter explained how my descriptions of the reverend's phony charities and the way he bilked the three million out of my mom raise his suspicions. He tried to get the DA to investigate but when he was unsuccessful, he tipped off a friend of his who was in the tax fraud department of the IRS in Fresno. It turned out that the schools in Africa were really just large bank accounts in the Caymans.

The rest of that day was nerve wracking. I paced the floor when I wasn't running on the treadmill or working out with the weights. I watched the news for a while only because the trials for the cartel and gang members had begun. They mentioned that the local teens who were key witnesses had entered into the witness protection program. That relieved me and I supposed was part of the reason there had been no indication that the bad guys were on to my location. Neither my father nor my mother had seen anything suspicious. I'd be testifying soon and I hoped with all my heart that I would see Scotty and even William there when I did. I desperately wanted to see Scotty and arrange a secret place to meet someday in the future.

Finally, my flip phone rang and Peter said, "Listen to this."

I broke into joyous tears as he held the phone up to the little infant boy and I heard my brother's newborn cries. "That's wonderful. Is he healthy? Is Mom okay?"

"Yes," Peter said. "They are both doing fine. It took a lot out of your mother, but she is stable and will recuperate. They won't leave the hospital for a while, so you'll be on your own there. If you need anything, just call me on this phone. Your mom wants to know if you have any suggestions for a name?"

"Tell her anything but Rick." He laughed and said he didn't think that would be a problem. "Seriously though, I want his name to be Peter for two reasons. The main reason is because I want him to grow up to be as kind and caring as you are. Second, and Mom will like this reason, Christ gave that name to his chief apostle, Simon and it means Rock, because he was solid and immovable. So in a way, the little guy could be named after both of us."

"I'm touched. I'll let her know."

The next day, big Peter brought pictures of my little brother, little Peter, and showed them to me. He looked a little like me, I thought. He was so cute. I couldn't wait to hold him in my arms and look into his eyes. I wrote my mom a letter and told her I was proud of her for standing up against the pressure to abort her child and to give him life at her own peril. I told her that I was sorry for all the bad blood between us and hoped we could repair things. I told her that I still loved her and hoped she could still love me. Parts of the letter were splotchy where my tears dropped onto the paper and smeared the ink. I left it unsigned because I didn't want to sign it Cody, and I didn't dare sign it Kyle.

I invited Justin over as often as possible during the next three weeks while my mom was recuperating. On weekends, he spent all day and night with me and one of the weeks was his spring break from school. He stayed the entire week at my place and Adam came over quite a bit. We slept in my mom's bed together every night and at Justin's urging, we hung out naked around the house. He wanted to try out naturism. Even Adam started getting into it. I loved it and so did Justin.

I got on internet and did some research and found out there were nudist groups of all sorts, even in our area. Justin and I became big fans of the naturist websites and sat together often surfing them and sharing in a fantasy of joining one of the clubs someday. We agreed to stay friends forever and be naturist buddies. I found a wonderful website called "Naturist-Christians.org" and it was all about Christian based naturists. The articles were wonderful as they explained how naturism didn't conflict with Christian ideals and in fact were strengthened by it. They talked about how naturism wasn't about sex, but rather, about acceptance. Stripping away clothing with all of its pretense and status symbols put everyone on an equal basis. No one was better than anyone else. I think that is a big part of what appealed to me about it. I hated lies and pretense. I hated hypocrisy. It was cool to read about and even see pictures of entire Christian families like Scotty's enjoying the naturist lifestyle.

During this time, I turned sweet sixteen and Mitch surprised me with my favorite cake, German chocolate. Justin and his mom came over and sang Happy Birthday to me. It was really nice. I was happy that they thought of me. I'd almost forgotten it was my birthday. I reminisced on some of my parties of past years and the whole experience left me a bit melancholy.

Justin and I developed a powerful friendship and while we still enjoyed some occasional sex play, it was secondary to the camaraderie that we shared. I was a friend for him that he could tell anything to. I was one of very few people on the planet who knew his big secret and he was the only one on the planet my age who I could really call a friend and talk openly to. I leaned on him when I needed to vent and he leaned back on me when he needed a listening ear.

When Peter called and said they were on their way home, I was so excited. With the monthly check that came from my father, I made a few changes in our lifestyle. I had Peter get the check cashed after having Mom endorse it. I spent hours reading websites with advice for parents of newborns. I upgraded our apartment to a larger two bedroom unit in the same complex. Peter bought us a crib, some clothes, and all the things we needed for a newborn, including diapers. Justin helped me move everything into our new place. I was ecstatic to have my own room and get off the folding couch. The rest of the monthly payment that was left over was nearly $13,000, and I put it into a savings account. I also bought a big screen TV and a new gaming system. I was still a kid after all and the money was meant for my support. I actually broke down and bought a WWE Smackdown vs. Raw game for the PS3. It was the closest thing to a real wrestling game I could find. I picked out some toys for Petey online and had them delivered by UPS. Everything was ready for their arrival.

Justin and his Mrs. D saw them coming up the walk and walked out to join us where I had been nervously waiting out by the pool. Justin was smiling almost as big as I was over the excitement of seeing my new little brother. Mrs. D gave a knowing look at my mother expressing the joy only a mother knows about having a new baby. She kneeled and whispered something in my mom's ear that made her smile.

I was shocked to see how drained and weak my mother was when Peter wheeled her into the apartment holding the small bundle in her arms. Her breathing was labored and her eyes were glassy. From her reactions, it appeared she was heavily medicated. Once inside, I reached out and took Petey into my arms. I uncovered his little face by pulling the yellow receiving blanket up away from it and he smiled at me. His little face was red and wrinkly. He was squinting and had lots of light brown hair. He had the cutest little button of a nose and a small dimple in his pudgy chin. The dimple he got from his sperm donor, but his eyes, cheeks and smile all resembled me. I fell instantly in love with the little guy and committed to God right then in my heart to take care of him and raise him to have a happy life. I would be the replacement father to him that his sperm donor could never be. I lifted him and kissed him softly on the forehead. He smiled again at me and noisily filled his diaper. Maybe he wasn't really smiling at me after all.

"Might as well get started learning how to take care of him," Peter said, handing me a diaper and wipes from the bag. I took Petey over to the couch and laid him on it and unwrapped him. His tiny hands and fingers and cute little toes were amazing. How could anyone look at the miracle of a newborn baby and not believe in God? I reached down and touched my finger to his palm and he clutched it and kicked his legs. I thought my heart would burst with joy.

Then I got to work and opened up his diaper. I was pleased to see that Mom had chosen to leave his little foreskin intact. That would have been my choice as well. I made a face and gagged slightly when the smell hit my nostrils and everyone laughed. I lifted his legs and wiped up as much as I could with the diaper then cleaned the rest of the gooey mess up with the wipes. It was an indescribable color not found in nature. Peter showed me how to fold the diaper up and add powder to Petey's little bottom so it wouldn't chafe or get a rash. I was about to put the new diaper on when Petey's little penis perked up and shot a stream of yellow pee right in my face.

"Aaaahh!" I cried out. I tried to put my hands over it to avert the flow and that made it go everywhere like a wild garden hose that had gotten loose. Everyone broke out in uproarious laughter at that. The little wart finally finished his business and I started wiping up the mess. "That's no way to treat your big brother," I said, tickling his pudgy little belly. This time he actually laughed. It was the most joyous sound I ever heard.

Life settled into a routine after that. My mother went for treatments on a regular basis and each time she came home ill and miserable. The radiation caused her hair to fall out and the chemo made her violently ill. Mrs. D brought her a variety of hats to wear. I replaced her bed with the hospital style to make it easier to get her in and out and to allow her to adjust into different positions since she spent so much time in it. I put a television in her room and she got hooked on daytime soaps. She would fill me in on all the details of the actors' sordid lives and I would pretend to be interested. Once in a while, I would read to Mom from the Bible which we both enjoyed. I took over the primary care of little Petey and was unbelievably bonded to him. Each day held new and interesting developments as he grew and learned and progressed. I loved feeding him most of all, except at two in the morning. Between caring for my mom and caring for Petey, my days and most of my nights were filled. Mitch continued to come over once a week and spell me off. I needed the break and was extremely grateful for it. Often, I was too exhausted to even be interested in sex play with Justin. Just lying together and holding each other was therapeutic. Being able to talk to another human my age, who didn't need his diaper changed or to be fed by me was a welcome relief.

I took an online driving course and either Justin or his mom tended my charges while I took the driving part. I forgot about my tracking chip the first time I went out and Peter called the flip phone immediately. I told him I was just testing to see if he was still paying attention to me and he told me that wasn't the least bit funny. After that, I always notified him before I left my little prison yard.

"You drive really well," my instructor commented on my first outing. "You must have some driving experience."

I chuckled and said, "Yeah, I used to steal cars." He looked at me odd and then laughed with me.

Once I had my license, Peter expanded my zone to include the Ralph's Market so I could do the grocery shopping. I loved the small amount of extra freedom. One day, I was standing in line with my cart and I noticed the same gang tattoo that Renaldo and his thugs displayed, on the neck of the guy in front of me. My heart nearly stopped. I backed out of the line and slipped into the frozen food aisle. I watched him pay for his cigarettes and beer then leave the store. He paid no attention to me whatsoever, but it left me seriously freaked out. I waited ten full minutes before I got back in line and I looked over my shoulder all the way to my car. I felt foolish for being so paranoid, but on the other hand, I had so much more to live for now. I didn't want any more involvement with those scumbags. Little Petey needed me.


Part 4

About a month after Petey and Mom came home, I had to go testify. It was a frightening experience. Peter had me shave my head again, so I looked like I did before. Afterwards, I would let it grow back long to alter my appearance once more. I'd just gotten used to it being long and started to like it. Petey looked at me strange when he first saw me after Mitch gave me the buzz cut. When I spoke to him, though, he smiled in recognition. I spent the first full day at the courthouse, meeting with the prosecutors. I was in a small room with a wooden chair. The prosecutors strolled around in front of me as if in a courtroom setting and grilled me. Every time I fumbled or hesitated, they berated me and made me rehearse the correct answers over and over until I pulled the information off the top of my head. It had been so long, some things were fuzzy. They warned me that the defense was going to try and trip me up, so I should pause briefly and think about each question and stick to the facts. That's all I wanted to do anyway.

I slept fitfully that night in the small room in the basement of the courthouse under protection of the US Marshall's office. They escorted me everywhere as if I was in the witness protection program. I inquired about Scotty, but no one could, or would, tell me anything. I woke and showered and dressed in the blue suit they provided me. When they escorted me in, all eyes turned to look at me. I went straight to the witness stand. I surveyed the jury and the crowd. It was obvious who the reporters were and who the gang plants were. The prosecutor's questioning led me down the path we'd rehearsed, letting me tell the whole story. This particular trial was against the old man with the accent, Lenny, and two other defendants that were involved in the body parts harvesting. They chose to have their trials simultaneously with one defense. I would have to return for the gang members' trials.

The defense attorney's first question floored me. "Has it been difficult for you being in witness protection?" My mouth gaped open and before I could answer, the prosecutor objected on multiple grounds and the judge sustained and scolded the attorney.

Next he started in on Scotty and William. "Tell me, did you know the man who attempted to perform surgery on you prior to the evening in question?"

"Yes, I explained all that already. He was William's father."

"Would you describe this William boy as normal?"

There was another objection, but the judge overruled this time. "Depends," I answered.

"On what?"

"Your definition of normal."

"I see. Did he behave differently from the majority of your other acquaintances?"

"I guess." I sensed he was trying to build a case that William wasn't a reliable witness because of his Aspergers. I wasn't going to let him get away with it.

"In what ways?"

"He was more honest and truthful than anyone else I know. He simply never lies. Because he takes everything so literally, it's hard for him in social situations sometimes. But, he is very perceptive and very bright." The look on the attorney's face was delightful. I caught the judge suppressing a grin and the prosecutor was beaming at me. The attorney changed the subject right away.

After it was over, the prosecutor said I had done a magnificent job and that I was very compelling. He thanked me for my bravery and willingness to testify. They were able to crack the codes to the foreign doctor's computer and found evidence of hundreds of murders and harvesting of organs from homeless people. It was going on in other locations in the country as well and they were able to shut down those operations. I was a bit of a hero at the US attorney's office. I pleaded for a chance to see Scotty or at least leave him a note, but they wouldn't even entertain it. The ride back to Campbell was long and sad. The only bright spot was that Petey would be there.

Life fell into a new routine with Mom improving a bit as the tumors shrank some. She started helping out with Petey more and it really lifted her spirits. Dad reluctantly agreed to help consult on her cancer and was very helpful to her doctors at County. After our basic expenses, the remainder of our money went to the County to help cover the cost of Mom's treatment. Fortunately, they couldn't touch my trust fund.

One evening, I had just settled back down in my bed after getting Petey back to sleep. Even though he slept through most nights now, he still occasionally woke around 2:00 am. I heard a noise. It wasn't a normal night sound. My heart started to race and I attempted to convince myself it was nothing when I heard it again. I bolted upright and tuned my ears. I crept into the hall and peered around the corner into the kitchen. My heart nearly stopped. A young man in a dark stocking cap was trying to force entry through the dining area window. Fortunately, Peter had installed locking devices in them. I hurried back to my room and lifted Petey from his crib. I grabbed my phone and rushed into my mom's bedroom. She was out cold from the sleeping pill and I heard more deliberate attempts by the intruder to get through the window. I slipped into the closet, trying to keep Petey from waking and pulled the false wall panel open. I crawled inside and pulled the panel back in place. I slumped to the floor and pressed my back against the wall and clung to Petey while I prayed to God. Then, I dialed Peter and whispered into the phone what was happening.

I sat there for what seemed like the longest time waiting. I was scared and thoughts of the worst ran through my head. I worried Petey would wake and cry and the gang would find us. I worried they would harm my mother and I couldn't help her without risking Petey's life. I imagined what it must have been like for the Jewish people that hid in the wall of Corrie ten Boom's house to escape the Nazis. I wondered how people like Nazis, gangs and drug cartels could become so wicked and callous toward their fellow humans. I didn't understand cruelty and prejudiced hatred. I desperately wished Peter would show up. Then I heard the front door fling open. I held my breath. Petey stirred and I worried he was going to wake at just the wrong moment. My mom's door opened. Then, the closet door slid open and someone rapped on the wall.

"Cody. Are you in there?" I breathed.

"Yes. Oh God, thank you." I stood and crawled free from my hiding place. I fell into Peter's arms and shook. He held me until I calmed down and I put Petey back in his crib. Peter explained that he'd sent a unit out to check on me as soon as I'd called. They caught the perpetrator trying to break into the apartment and he ran and jumped the block wall. They pursued him and he was caught two blocks away, hiding in some bushes. It turned out, he was not a gang member and was just a simple burglar with an eye on my big screen and gaming system. He'd been hitting apartment buildings in the area over the past months. Still it was a frightening reminder of the potential danger I was living in.

As he grew, Petey started rolling over and sitting up. He babbled up a storm and told me wonderful stories, in his own language, of course. He was more and more fun to play with since he interacted and communicated his wishes. To bathe him, I sometimes drew a warm bath and climbed in the tub with him. After washing, I'd dry us off and then hold him to my chest with his little head nestled in the crease of my neck. I'd talk to him and promise him a lifetime full of love and caring. I'll never forget the day he started to crawl. I was on the computer surfing my nudist group sites when my eye caught movement. I watched as Petey rocked back and forth and pushed himself over onto his front side. First, he put one hand then the other up under him and pushed up and back. He slid one hand forward, then the next and collapsed on his face. He started to cry, but I didn't rush to his aid. Again, he put his hands under him and this time, he synchronized a knee with each hand and he started to crawl toward his favorite, multi-colored ball. He squealed with delight when he reached the ball and grasped it, causing him to fall on his face again. Only this time he didn't cry. He had accomplished his goal and he knew it and I could see his excitement over it. I shrieked with delight and ran in to tell Mom about it. As usual, she would reminisce about the time I started crawling. Whatever Petey did, reminded her of when I did those same things. I grabbed the camcorder I'd ordered online and started recording. His life was going to be extremely well documented, that was for sure. Naturally, I made certain to get some good naked shots of him in the tub to embarrass him with in front of his friends when he became a teenager.

At one year old, Petey started calling me by name. He knew me by Cody. He also said Mama, which delighted Mom. He called Justin, Jin. He had a small vocabulary and managed to communicate most of what he wanted. He insisted on sitting in his high chair and feeding himself. It was a tremendous nuisance since he would make the biggest messes ever. But I didn't really mind. I could never get upset with him. I soon learned that I had to redirect some behavior though, and Peter and Mitch, as well as Mrs. D, complimented me often on my good parenting skills. That made me prouder than any compliment I had ever gotten.

At Petey's eighteen month mark, Mom's cancer came back with a vengeance. We started the radiation and chemo routine again and life was very stressful. Petey was walking and climbing. I had to baby proof everything and still he managed to find things to get into. One day I heard an enormous crash and rushed in to find he had pulled all the pans from cupboard and climbed into the emptied space like he was in his own little fort. I had to smile and get the camcorder. Everything was a new discovery and everything was a toy to him. I caught him one day, playing with and trying to stick the big rubber dildo in his mouth. Justin had been over and carelessly left it lying on the floor after he washed it. It bothered me to see it, and I snatched it away, causing him to cry. He was capable of little temper tantrums when he didn't get his way, and I learned to ignore the negative behavior even when I wanted to react. After what seemed like forever, he learned that tantrums weren't useful and that behavior subsided.

My mother, however, grew ever crankier and threw a few tantrums of her own. She was frustrated and in pain and horribly frightened of dying. I felt truly sorry for her except when she woke me every hour in the middle of the night. Then I felt extremely sorry for myself. Petey wanted to lay with her and have her read books to him like she used to do, but she wasn't able and he didn't understand why. It was a very hard time. I gained weight and fell out of my usual good shape. I struggled mightily through those months. I lived for the one night a week when Mitch showed up to spell me off. Whenever he couldn't make it, I was on the verge of a breakdown by the following week. I struggled to be understanding and kind to Mom and patient with Petey, but I won't deny that I lost it a few times and allowed some of the old resentment to creep in. I read the Bible every night to my mother after Petey was in bed. It calmed her and honestly helped me as well.

Six months later, we celebrated my 18 th birthday and Petey's second birthday together. Peter and Mitch came over and we had German chocolate cake and ice cream. Mom wanted to try some ice cream to celebrate with us, but it made her sick to her stomach like I knew it would. I cleaned her up and kissed her forehead and turned out her light. We resumed the celebration out in the living room. Everyone came. By everyone, I mean Peter, Mitch, Mrs. D, Justin, Adam and the maintenance man with the ratty old truck. It was quite the party. The highlight was when we laid an old sheet on the floor and set Petey in the middle of it wearing nothing but his pull-ups. We had finally mastered potty training and he was doing really good except at night. We gave him his own small cake and he dove into it. When we all laughed as he shoved it into his mouth with his fist and made a giant mess, he started to clown it up. They all teased me that he learned his acting skills from me.

As the cancer progressed, it became clear Mom wasn't going to live too much longer. She'd cheated death a long time as it was. She was a shell of her former self. She had Peter get an attorney to draft legal documents to make me legal guardian over Petey. It required Reverend Rick's signature, but he refused to relinquish his parental rights. He'd never wanted to admit to being the father until he was asked to give up his rights, then all of a sudden he wanted to assert them. My mom was horribly troubled by this and she worried for Petey's well being if he ever got hold of him. Peter offered to pay a visit to Rick at the prison and he returned with a notarized signature relinquishing all parental rights to Petey. I became Petey's sole guardian. Peter refused to say how he managed to extract the signature, and I thought it was probably better I not know. The day after I became Petey's legal guardian I put him down to bed and read him part of his favorite book, Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. It was his favorite book because it was my favorite book and I read it with great expression.

I went in to check on my Mom and she was awake and more lucid than usual. I grabbed the Bible and opened it to read to her from Mark where we had left off. "Let's just talk tonight," she said weakly, but clearly.

"Okay mom. What would you like to talk about?"

"Do you hate me?"

"What? No I don't hate you. Why would you say that?"

"I wasn't very good to you. I was a bad mother when you got older."

"You were just confused."

She reached for my hand and I took it. "Will you forgive me?" she pled.

Tears trickled from my eyes and down my cheeks. I thought about Corrie ten Boom and the prison guard asking for her forgiveness. Once, my mother had seemed very much like a prison warden. She had done and said terrible things to me. I'd spent the better part of what should have been my carefree and most memorable school years locked in a small apartment caring for her illness. But the service that I rendered, helped heal the wounds. I held no animosity toward her, "I forgave you long ago. I thank you for the wonderful gift you've given me with Petey. You sacrificed your health for his life. It is a great sacrifice."

"Thank you," she said and wept. I held her hand for a long time, gently stroking the back of it. Then she spoke again, so much softer that I had to get down close to hear. "Don't let Petey forget about me. Tell him his mother loved him."

"I will, Mom. I will."

She said, "I'm so tired. I'm so tired." She closed her eyes. In the dim light I felt her spirit depart her earthly remains, free from the battered, withered body that had held her captive for so long. She was no longer it's prisoner. I sat there holding her hand for some time before I opened the flip phone and dialed Peter.

We held a simple service at the funeral home. There was no announcement of her death in the local paper and no relatives besides my father were notified. He chose not to attend. None of her other relatives would have come anyway, so we didn't bother informing them. We had the same funeral guests as attended my birthday except for Mrs. D, who tended Petey over at her apartment for me. I didn't want to confuse him. I cried when they closed the casket and wheeled Mom's body away. Just like at my grandma's funeral when I was twelve years old and knew with certainty that Grandma was not in the casket, I also knew for certain, Mom was not in this one. Her spirit had gone home that night as I held her hand.

Justin made a comment to me that I'd never considered before. He asked whether I thought Mom's brain cancer caused her to go a little weird and change her behavior. I pondered that many times afterward. In some ways, I wanted to believe that. In other ways, I knew she made bad choices on her own accord. After the condolences and people left me alone back at the apartment, I retired to my room and prayed. "Dear God, I have now lost my mom. I'm thankful for the time I've had with her these past two years. It healed so many wounds between us. I wish none of this would have happened, but since it did, I'm glad it got a little better between us. Thank you for sending me Petey. He is my life. Bless me to be a good brother and parent to him. It will be hard, but I'm pretty good at hard things by now. I guess that's why they call me Rock. I hope Petey will be a Rock. Take care of my mom for me. It's all up to you now. My part is done. Amen." I cannot describe the joy and peace I felt at the end of that prayer. It defies mortal words.

Three month's later, school was over for Justin and myself. I'd actually completed my required credits through home school some time ago but delayed getting my diploma until Justin got his also. I decided to stay in the apartment until graduation so I could walk with Justin. Justin came over often after my mother died and we hung out naked most of the time whenever he did. We both joined AANR and made plans for a graduation trip. I had access to my trust fund now and I paid for a weeklong trip to Lupin Lodge several hours away from Campbell. There was a gathering of all the Christian based naturist clubs there and Justin and I were excited to go and actually try out real live naturism with other people around. We were more than a little nervous about it, I won't lie. We told Mrs. D most of the truth about where we were headed, but he wasn't comfortable with sharing his nudist side with her yet, so we left that part out. We told her we were going to a mountain resort in the redwoods. She agreed to watch Petey while we were gone.

There had been no hints of any threats from the cartel or the gang, so Cody Newman was going to graduate with everyone else in a cap and gown from C-CAB. Mitch came by and removed my tracking chip. I called my father and invited him to my graduation.

"Who is this? Do I know you?" he asked.

"Cody Newman is my new assumed name. It's Kyle, Dad. Your son."

"Oh, Kyle. I didn't recognize your voice. It's gotten deeper."

"Yeah, I finally hit puberty," I joked. He didn't laugh.

"So why are you calling? Money?" His tone was edgy.

"No Dad. I don't need money. I'm graduating from Campbell Academy High School and I wanted to invite you to attend the ceremony." I said.

"I thought you were home schooled by a neighbor or something."

"I was, but the school she works for is letting me walk with the rest of the class. Just like a real boy."

"Oh, well when is it?"

"A week from Friday. Can you come?"

There was a pause. It was long, way too long. I braced myself for the answer. "That day's problematic. I've … um … remarried a woman with two children and my stepdaughter has a dance recital that night and I've promised to be there for that already."

"I bet she'll have other recitals. I probably won't graduate from high school again. I'm just saying. You know I'd like you to be there." I felt a little weak spirited for begging.

"I'll see what I can do. It's difficult. I messed up one marriage; I don't want to do that again. I'll try and be there. What time?"

"Five. At the Campbell Christian Academy for Boys."

"Okay. Good to hear your voice, son. I've got to go now, I'm afraid."

"Umm, yeah. Good to hear you too, Dad. See you later then. Bye."

"Bye." He sent a $1000.00 check and a Hallmark card. I tossed the card without reading it and cashed the check.

It was funny to watch the faces of the faculty and most of the students when my name was called. Mitch and Peter cheered as I walked up and across the stage set up on the soccer field and accepted my diploma from Mrs. D and the principal. I felt proud to be wearing the bright blue robes and the four cornered hat. It was like I imagined it would be. Even if my high school experience had been more about changing diapers and cleaning up vomit, than hanging out at the mall and playing sports, the ending was what it was supposed to be. As I sat down and listened to the other names called, including Justin Time's, I wondered what Scotty was doing. Now that I was free to leave Campbell and since Justin was headed off to college, I needed to decide if I would try to locate Scotty or let it go and move on with my life.

Peter had convinced Justin to go to college before joining the military. I knew Mrs. D put him up to it, but since the idea came from Peter, Justin immediately agreed that it was the best thing to do. He would be leaving at the end of summer for Stanford. I had no idea where I would go or what I would do. I knew I had to get a college education, but I really wanted to enter the seminary and study to be a minister. I'd looked into the Theology department of a few colleges and I also considered a degree in Psychology. I thought about contacting Pastor Morgan and getting his counsel.

At last, the final names were read and I pulled my cap off my thick, long, wavy hair and tossed it into the air with the others. I found Justin and we hugged and headed straight home to pack. I picked up Petey from the maintenance man who'd been tending him during the graduation ceremony. I finished packing and got all of Petey's things put together for Mrs. D. I explained to Petey that I was going away for a short time and then I would be back and I'd bring him a surprise. He clung to me and refused to let go.

"You're going bye-bye like Mama?" he asked over and over.

"No, Petey, I'm just going for a long ride with Jin. I'll come back. You're going to play with Mrs. D. Look, she has ice cream."

"I don't want ice cream. I want to go on ride with Cody." He clung to my neck and I finally had to pry him off. It nearly killed me to walk out the door as Petey kicked and screamed my name. The ride was silent and what should have been a fun, exciting time between two recently graduated buddies had a dark pallor cast over it. My phone rang and I flipped it open.

"Cody," Mrs. D began.

"Is something wrong? Is Petey okay? Should I come back?"

"Everything's fine. I just wanted you to know he's settled down and is eating a Popsicle. We put six Popsicles in the freezer and he gets to eat one every day after lunch and when the last Popsicle is gone, you'll be back home. He's watching Sesame Street and singing along. Can you hear him?"

"Yes. Thank you. I really appreciate this. I'll call every day and check on him."

"Okay. You two have fun and keep my Justin out of trouble. Cody, you deserve this time. You need it. Don't worry about Petey, he'll be okay."

"Thanks. I know you're right. I do need this. I've earned a little R&R. Thanks again. Bye."

"Goodbye."

I turned to Justin and smiled. He smiled a relieved smile back at me. "So, everything's okay?" he asked.

"Yeah, your mom's great."

"I know. So she called and talked to you and didn't even ask about me? I swear she likes you better than she likes me."

I laughed with him, "Well, can you blame her?"

"Oh, that's low. I should kick you out and make you walk," he said.

Our conversation lightened up and soon we were two crazy, high school grads headed out for a grand nefarious adventure. When we arrived at Lupin Lodge, it was late. We checked in and showed our AANR memberships. The clerk, who was fully dressed, to our surprise, showed us how to get to the small cabin I'd rented. We drove past the Yurts - small, round structures on stilts - that I almost rented, but I wanted a private bathroom for us, so I splurged on the cabin. We pulled our luggage into the cabin and chose beds. We packed way more than we needed to for a nudist vacation, but we had to give the appearance that we were going to a normal resort in the redwoods.

Justin and I chatted late into the night about our plans for the future and our curiosity about being nude in public the next day.

"Are you nervous about tomorrow?" Justin Time asked.

"Some. It's one thing hanging out naked with your scrawny ass, but there will be strangers out there tomorrow." I answered.

"I know. I'm wondering if this is a good idea."

"We'll just stick together and it will be fine. Trust me, it's great once you get used to it."

"If it turns out to be fun, let's make a pact to meet back up every summer at a retreat like this. It will help keep our friendship alive."

"Sounds good to me Time. Now shut the hell up and go to sleep. I'm exhausted."

"Okay. G'nite Rock."

"Goodnight Time."

The following morning, I got up and stretched. I'd slept well. I opened a window and breathed in the fresh mountain air. It was invigorating, but suddenly, I averted my gaze and spun around.

"What?" Justin asked.

"A naked couple in their thirties with a small boy and small girl just walked over the bridge," I answered.

"So?" Time asked.

"So, they were naked."

He laughed. "Hello, we came to a nudist resort. People go naked here."

"I know, but I don't even know them."

"You're the one with all the nudist experience. I thought you said you hung out naked with that friend's family all the time."

"Not all the time, it was only a few times and it was a long time ago."

"So you still want to do this or not?" Time asked.

"Yeah. I do. It was just a shock kind of. I'm up for it."

"Well you better not be 'UP' for it. That could be embarrassing."

"Shut up, you dork. You'll probably bone up before I do. I hope it doesn't happen though, that would be God awful embarrassing."

"Yeah it would. But the brochure said that if it happens, just cover up with a towel or turn away or get in the water or something until it goes down."

"Yeah. So you ready to go to breakfast?"

"I guess. As ready as I'll ever be." Justin used the bathroom and after washing his hands, grabbed a towel and said, 'Let's go."

I took a towel as well, since the brochure also said that it was recommended to have a towel with you to sit on as a courtesy and a matter of good hygiene. We draped them over our shoulders and headed out to breakfast. We'd slept in and a lot of the visitors were making their way back to the cabins and yurts. We passed a few dozen people of all shapes, ages and sizes. I couldn't help but check their bodies out and they cast a few admiring glances at us. I looked over at Justin and he'd filled out quite nicely and was a very handsome young man. He worked out at my place often and with the cross country running, he was in pretty good physical shape. His narrow waist was highlighted by the patch of thick black pubes topping a reasonably nice dick and set of balls. I wished in a way, I had fallen in love with him and that we could go off to college together and raise Petey as a couple. Mrs. D would make a wonderful grandma for the little guy.

Breakfast was nice. It was buffet style and I overate. It was so nice to have something cooked to eat that I didn't have to prepare. I was sick of cooking and cleaning and all the other chores that came with running a household and tending to a sick mother and small child. I was ready to get pampered.

After breakfast, Time and I went exploring. We took a wonderful nature hike and then came back for a dip in the pool. I pulled my walking shoes and ankle socks off and set them under my lounge chair. "Last one in's a rotten egg." I gave Time a playful shove and ran to the pool and dove in. I surfaced and looked around seeing all ages, but mostly middle age and older people playing in the water. The kids were mostly younger children. There were a few teens but not nearly as many as the number of pre-teens. I presumed the older teens got more body conscious and stopped coming with their families. The ones that were there acted completely natural about being naked and played and lounged around no differently than if they had been wearing swimsuits.

Justin and I wrestled around in the water and then had a diving challenge to see who could outdo the other. We attracted a bit of an audience doing that. We swam some laps for exercise and climbed out to dry off for lunch.

Laying in the sun, completely nude, I closed my eyes and soaked in the warm rays. I felt at peace and happy. I was so relaxed, I nearly dozed off.

"So what do you think? You like it here?" I asked.

I turned and opened my eyes to look at Time. He was lying there naked not yet fully dried, a few droplets of water shimmered on his young body. He was handsome. I wondered why I never allowed myself to become romantically attached to him. I wondered if I was being stupid not to pursue a romantic relationship. We had enough in common. We could talk easily with one another. I instantly knew why I hadn't allowed it. It was because Scotty was always between us, secretly, almost imperceptibly, creating space between Time and me. I wondered if Scotty would worm his way between everyone I tried to become romantically involved with. The thought troubled me.

"I love it here," he answered, "I'm not bothered by being naked in front of others like I thought I was going to be and I don't mind others seeing me naked. I don't sense any judging of my body. I'm not as ripped as you, but I look pretty good, I mean compared to most here."

"That's funny. You were worried about how your body looks? Dude, you're a good looking guy. Don't sell yourself short. You'll find a nice, hot guy to hook up with at Stanford. Wait and see."

"I hope so. I want to. What about you? Where do you go from here?" Justin asked.

"I don't know. I don't want to think about it right now. This week's about R&R. No big decisions, just relaxing and clearing my head."

"That's cool. I'm hungry. Let's check out the chow." We dried off and put our shoes back on. Our feet were way too tender to go barefoot like many of the regulars. We headed from the pool down the sidewalk toward the lodge.

Suddenly, I stopped dead in my tracks. Justin, who had been chatting at me, kept walking until he realized he was talking to himself. He turned around and seeing my expression, asked, "What's the matter, you see a ghost or something?"

"Yeah," I said, "I think so."

I waved at the small Hispanic youth bopping along the sidewalk and called out, "Pablo! Is that you?"

"Heyyyyy Wedo. No way man! Whachu doeeng here?"

"I was about to ask you the same thing?"

"Oh man, after chu saved me an' Bull from the bangers, we gots theese new family, man. Eez so great! Chu gots to meets them. Chu gonna be real surprised." He grabbed my arm and pulled me along. Justin followed grinning. He kept saying how crazy it was that I met someone I knew at a nudist resort. Pablo dragged me through the doors of the main lodge and upstairs to a room. He knocked non-stop until a tall dark haired young man with a pale narrow face opened the door. We both gasped and then we laughed and then we embraced.

"William, I can't believe it." Our naked bodies pressed together and William did not act the least bit bothered or concerned about it. Others came to the doorway and William sensed their presence and released me from the bear hug. To my amazement, there stood Pastor Morgan with his arm around the shoulder of William's mother. Both of them were completely naked. I was uncomfortable with seeing that in spite of all the other naked bodies I'd seen during the day. Somehow, that image just seemed so bizarre that my brain couldn't process it. They sagged in places where old people tend to sag and their pubic hair was mostly gray. Behind them, stood Bull. He was also naked and seemingly unconcerned about the scars that zigzagged over his large torso. We took turns embracing and then I introduced Justin to everyone. They followed us down to lunch even though they had already eaten.

Justin and I went through the food line and selected our food. We sat at a large table and drilled each other with a million questions. I started with the biggest question of all addressed to Pastor Morgan, "How did you hook up with Mrs. Thames?"

"Well, after Mr. Thames was killed in the police raid that you initiated, and it became clear that William and his mother would have to enter the witness protection program, I realized that I needed to step up and do what was right."

Before he could finish, William, in the annoying way only he could pull off, jumped in and took over the story. "Pastor Morgan is my biological father. Mr. Thames was not my actual father although he was married to my mother. My mother and real father, Pastor Morgan, engaged in a sinful relationship and I was conceived as a result. They kept the real identity of my father a secret from everyone so that he could still be a Pastor and my mother could stay married to Mr. Thames."

"Wow, there's a lot of that going around," I said. Then I added, "So I guess old Mr. Thames really was a true barnacle." Everyone except William looked confused.

"Yes and he was scraped off, just like you inferred he would be. I am very pleased with the revelation of my true father. He is a vastly superior parent in spite of his poor judgment in committing sexual transgressions, for which he assures me he has repented."

"So what's up with Bull and Pablo?" I asked.

"Oh man, after chu brung the cops to save us, man, Bull an' me we deedn't have no family to go weeth. Theese nice policeman, he talked to the Pastor an' he became our father an' William's mom, she became our madre. Eez like a real family man."

"Officer Milsap did that?" I asked.

"Yes, he is a wonderful man - a man of God and a very wise person," Pastor Morgan answered.

"You all seem so happy. Where have you been living?"

"Oh, we can't say. Not even to you. Sorry. It seems we are the primary targets of the cartel's anger. William's testimony was searing. But we are making a very nice life for ourselves and are very happy." A spiritual witness of the truth of that sent a small shiver down my spine. I wondered about Brenda and how William was coping without her, but I decided it might just be painful for William, so I let it be.

"I'm so happy for all of you. And how wonderful it is to see you all again." I shared an abbreviated update on my life since that fateful night and everyone was amazed and saddened over my mother's passing. They were equally surprised that I had a little brother that I was guardian over.

"You'll be a marvelous role model for your little brother," Mrs. Morgan said kindly. "You were for my William, I know that."

"Well, William was more of a role model for me. He is so genuine and honest and has such faith. He brought me to Christ and for that I am eternally grateful."

William looked uncomfortable but pleased over the praise. When I reached out over the table, he met me halfway and we gripped hands in true friendship. We released our grip and did a knuckle bump. "Have you initiated contact with your special friend, Scotty yet?" William asked.

"What? Scotty? No, he went into witness protection with his family. Sadly, I doubt I'll ever see him again."

"Oh. Well is it acceptable to you that I inform him of your presence at the resort? I think he would be most interested in remaking your acquaintance."

"Wait. Are you saying, No … are you saying, you know how to contact Scotty?" I could feel my heart pounding against my ribs.

"Yes. I say, 'hello Scotty' and then we do the jock handshake thing. I have an appointment with him, for which I'm somewhat late already, to engage in a tennis competition. I'm actually quite deft at the sport."

"OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD! He's here? Take me to him. Please take me to him now!" I cried out. I held my hand over my mouth and started to hyperventilate. I jumped up and followed William out the door pushing his naked backside to urge him along. We jogged and then ran toward the tennis courts nestled amongst a grove of trees. A parade of the Morgan family along with Justin trailed behind us. I was laughing and I was crying at the same time. We crested the rise in the road and I saw him. I broke into a full on sprint towards him. He was standing there holding a racquet and he took a defensive posture with it at first as I hurled myself toward him. Then recognition poured over him and he tossed the racquet aside and ran to meet me.

"Oh dear God, It's you. Rock! It's really you!" We collided and threw our arms around each other. We pressed together so tightly, I thought for sure we'd have to be surgically separated. We could not speak. We just held each other and wept for joy. I felt his hands move into their familiar positions. One hand was over my shoulder blade and the other in the small of my back in his signature hug I had longed to feel again. He pressed his fingertips into my bare flesh and massaged my muscles in that special way he always had done. It was like putting on a comfortable pair of old shoes. I recognized the fit.

Eventually, we became aware of the crowd of onlookers. We broke our embrace and turned to face them. We kept our hands wrapped around each other's waists and wiped our eyes with our free hands.

"I can't believe I found you again," I said. "I'd lost hope."

"So had I. I assumed you were lost in the witness program the same as me."

"I read in Corrie ten Boom's book, about her experiences in a Nazi concentration camp where she said, 'hold everything in your hands loosely, so it doesn't hurt so bad when God pry's your fingers apart." I looked at Scotty and added, "I'm afraid God's gonna have to pry pretty hard if he plans on getting me to let go of you again."

"I heard another saying similar to that, I like even better," Pastor Morgan began. "God pry's our fingers apart so meaningless things can fall from our hands in order to make room for greater blessings."

I looked at all the people watching us and I turned and grabbed Scotty's cheeks and pulled him into a long, sensual, and way overdue kiss. The crowd actually cheered and clapped. When we surfaced for air, we both had the biggest, goofiest grins on our faces you could ever imagine. I introduced Scotty to Justin, "This is my friend. He got me through all the hard times of the past two years," I said.

Scotty tensed and pulled away, "Oh," he began, "That's very nice. I see."

"No. Oh Scotty, no. He's not that kind of friend. He's just a regular friend."

Scotty breathed a sigh of relief and I have to admit, it pleased me that he was jealous and upset that he thought I might be in another relationship.

Justin couldn't resist the opportunity and said in his best flaming voice, "Uh, you two timing bitch. How dare you?" He flung his head back in indignation.

Scotty stared at me, uncertain how to react. I started to laugh, and Justin couldn't keep it up any longer and burst into laughter himself. He walked over and threw an arm over Scotty's neck and said, "Don't worry Scotty; you're all he ever talks about. It's relentless, really. Besides, my standards are much higher than his sorry ass." He gave me a nod and a wink. Scotty then laughed along with the rest of the group. It made me feel good that Scotty was upset when he thought I had hooked up with Justin. We all walked back to the main lodge and I went with Scotty to see his family. Justin assured me he was fine, and now that he had a group of new friends, he didn't need me to be his security blanket any longer.

Mrs. Simons shrieked and pulled me into a suffocating hug. Honestly, I thought I might actually suffocate in her massive boobs that she pulled my face into. There was backslapping and chit chatting going on. Scotty's little brother had finally started to grow and had a few small wisps of pubic hair above his much larger penis. His older sister wasn't with them. She was traveling the youth hostel circuit in Europe with a boy she met in college. Over coffee, we shared our stories.

They were saddened by news of my mother and startled by the news about Petey. Scotty had wrestled in his new high school and had taken second in the region this past season. He looked good – really good. They all commented on how nice my long hair looked. It was over my forehead and ears and curled at the edges. Mr. Simons picked up on our lagging conversation and our longing looks toward each other and suggested that Scotty and I go find a private place to catch up on things alone. As we walked toward the hiking paths, hand in hand, I turned to watch as Mrs. Simons shared a tender, loving kiss with Mr. Simons. I sighed contentedly. We were barely on the path before we both were sporting erections.

"You still have the most beautiful banana I've ever seen." I said.

"And you're more beautiful than I remembered."

"Where can we go?" I asked. The innuendo was obvious.

"Nowhere here that we couldn't get discovered, I'm afraid."

"Maybe Justin could sleep over with your family tonight and we could share my cabin."

"I can't wait that long, but I just had a brilliant idea. A little crazy, but brilliant," Scotty said.

"Uh-oh, you're scaring me. I'm the one who used to have those kinds of ideas and they never ended well."

When he told me what he had in mind I thought he'd gone really crazy. I agreed to it nonetheless, since I already knew I was crazy. We rushed back and he told his family and I told Justin that we were going off campus for a while. "Do you mind me leaving you here?"

"Hell no I don't mind. God, I'm so excited for you, I can't believe it. It's so … so amazingly romantic, I might cry. Now get going you dork. But I want all the details when you get back."

Scotty and I threw some things in the car and got dressed. Then we headed out in my new blue Mustang. I drove an hour until I turned off the freeway at a familiar spot. When we stopped at the light where we had seen Lenny drive by with Bull and Pablo in the back seat, my palms started to sweat, my stomach churned and my heart pounded. I looked over at Scotty and smiled nervously. I could see he was having the same reaction. The light changed and I sped off straight through it. As I got closer, I recognized more and more of the surroundings as things became as familiar to me as my own dick and balls. I was back home. I turned up toward the foothills and drove to the dirt road. I drove slow and carefully along the dirt road until I found a wide spot to park in. We retrieved our supplies and hiked the mile along the overgrown path to my special spot by the creek.

Scotty spread the blanket on the clearing grass while I admired the beautiful ice plant that had spread all over and beyond Sam's gravesite. The pile of rocks at the head of the grave was barely visible above the thriving plants. Scotty came up behind me and slipped his arms through mine and clasped his hands over my abs. He leaned his head on my shoulder and pressed his cheek against my neck. I rolled my head back and stared up at the blue sky as we pressed our cheeks against each other. Billowing white clouds hung randomly in contrast to the deep blue of the sky. The slightest breeze wafted across my face. I felt Scotty's warm breath on my neck. I sighed contentedly and mouthed the words, "Thank you, God." He pulled me gently toward the blanket. I followed willingly.

I told him to get the food ready and I went over to the creek. I pulled a large, smooth stone from the creek and washed it clean. I carried it over to Sam's gravesite and added it to the pile.

Scotty took two wine glasses from the basket and poured us each a glass full of white wine. I'd never really drank any kind of alcohol and I was intrigued by the sweetness and dryness of it as I sipped. He pulled out cream cheese and bagels and a bag of cut up vegetables and chunks of cheese. We nibbled on the cheese and veggies and talked of the old times. We reminisced over the good times of our lives and especially the ones we'd shared together. We talked about how scary it was to testify against the gangs. He listened in joyous amazement as I described what it was like to be both a brother and a dad to Petey. I told him all about the cute little things that Petey would do and showed him the pictures I had of him.

We cleared the food away and shared a second glass of wine. I felt so relaxed and happy - happier than I had been in a long, long time. We put the glasses away and I lifted Scotty's shirt over his head. I tossed it aside and he took mine off for me. He traced gently over my scars. "I was told I shouldn't be ashamed of those. I was told I should wear them proudly as a symbol of my willingness to help others at risk of my own peril."

"Whoever told you that was right. That's why I love you so much. You are brave in the face of danger. You stand up and take action. You're a rock." We rose up onto our knees and embraced.

"And you," I said, lightly rubbing my finger over his soft, pouting lips, "you are so kind and wise and compassionate."

We slipped into a passionate kiss. I heard the birds chirping away in the trees and the trickling stream flowing over the rocks in the background. Scotty's lips were soft and tender, just as I remembered them to be. I slipped a hand behind his neck and pushed him deeper into our kiss. I nibbled on his protruding lower lip and kissed him fully on both lips while I spread them with my thirsty tongue. I tasted the wine as I slipped my tongue between his delicious lips and met his tongue, anxious to dance. I flicked the tip of mine against the tip of his and we engaged in a little oral rock and roll. Our kissing grew ever more passionate and forceful as our powerful desire for each other intensified. Soon, we were tossing our heads from side to side and alternately shoving and sucking our tongues in and out of each other's mouths. I clutched the back of his neck and slipped my other hand inside his shorts and boxers gripping his firm ass. He had me in his signature embrace and was massaging the deep tissue of my back with his fingertips. I wanted to eat him up and swallow him whole and make him a permanent part of me that could never be taken away again. Love and lust merged into one fiery ball of passion.

At last, little Rock would be denied attention no longer and I leaned to the left pulling us down together onto the blanket without breaking from our embrace or lip lock. I reached down and pushed at his shorts and boxers. He lifted his hips and allowed me to slide them off his ass and down his thighs. We broke from our frenzied passionate foreplay and I moved downward, kissing my way from his neck to his nipples and down to the nub his little outty belly button. I smelled the familiar intoxicating Hugo Boss cologne he always wore. I tugged at the small treasure trail he had grown since we last saw each other naked with my teeth and then buried my nose in his pubes and breathed in the smell I'd fantasized over dozens of times during the past two and a half years. He smelled the same. He smelled like Scotty. Slowly I sampled his bulging banana by licking slowly over its arching length. "Ohhh," he softly moaned as I licked him.

I moved down and pulled his shorts and boxers all the way off and tossed them aside. I took off both shoes and his white ankle socks. I pulled my own boxers and Wal-Mart gym shorts off and knelt at his feet, sitting on my haunches. I pressed his right foot into my dick and balls and took his left foot in my hands and began to rub and massage the underside of it. He wiggled his toes into my balls and rubbed them along the length of my rock solid shaft. I moved to his adorable toes and gave each one a tug causing several of them to pop. I nibbled on the arch of his foot and on his toes causing him to squirm and giggle. I switched and performed the same treatment on his right foot while his left foot stimulated my dick and balls. Next, I moved up to his calves and rubbed and pressed deeply into the flesh of his strong, muscular legs. Then I spent ample time massaging his thick thighs, kissing and nibbling on them as well. I spread his legs and sucked his balls into my mouth between my teeth and swirled my tongue over the soft skin.

Scotty's eyes were closed and he had the most peaceful look on his face. He was transported to another realm. As I sucked on and played with his balls, I rubbed my hands over his rippled, firm abs. My own dick dribbled pre-cum and ached for some more stimulation. Scotty's banana shaped dick bobbed against my eyelids and brow as I sucked and nibbled on his sensitive scrotum. I reached to the edge of the blanket and retrieved the bottle of lube we had brought and smeared copious amounts on both of our groins. I slid further up between his legs and pressed little Rock against his banana. Then, I rested my chest against his. He wrapped his legs around my ass cheeks and slipped his arms underneath mine and spread his fingers through my long hair. I lifted him slightly and wrapped my arms under his back and we began kissing passionately again while we slowly ground our dicks against each other. I wanted to hump wildly against him and expel my seed over his hot body, and it took every ounce of will power to maintain the slow, patient rhythm we were engaged in.

My lust for my reclaimed lover grew stronger and stronger with each pass of my dick against his. "It's time, Scotty." I whispered into his ear. "Our time has finally come for you to take me."

"Yes, it's time." was all he said and he rolled me over onto my back. Scotty moved his legs between mine and spread my legs apart. I bit on his lower lip and quivered in anticipation of what I was about to receive. He pulled free of my nibbling and sat up between my legs. He rolled up our shirts and our shorts and lifted my hips to place the makeshift pillow under my lower back and then lifted my legs so I was bent at the knees. He poured more lube over our dicks and then coated his fingers. He probed gently into me with one finger while he slowly stroked my greased up cock with his other hand. The sensations were magnificent. Then he slipped a second finger into my willing cavern, twisting and turning them.

Finally, he pressed three fingers past my gateway and into my body, then pulled them free and released my bulging dick. "This is it," he said as he pressed the head of his manhood against the ring of my quivering entry. Slowly, while hovering over my torso, supporting himself with a hand on either side of me, he pressed his long, arching dick into my willing body. I believe he'd grown an additional full inch since we last lay naked together. I watched his face as he closed his eyes and savored every sensation of his first fuck. He confessed his celibacy since our absence. I withheld my relationship with Adam and Justin so as not to dampen the mood. I concentrated on relaxing and letting him in as I'd practiced with the big rubber dildo, but it wasn't as easy when I wasn't in control of the entry process. He was a quarter of the way in when I involuntarily clenched down on his impaling member and grunted in slight pain. He immediately stopped and asked, "Is it okay?"

I nodded and reached up and took the sides of his waist in my hands and gently guided him deeper into me. At last, my chosen lover filled the emptiness within me and I was joined to the boy I thought I'd lost forever. We both closed our eyes and held perfectly still as I recorded this moment into my permanent memory banks. The exact sound of the birds chirping and the small stream playing background music for the dance that was about to begin was seared into my memory forever. Both of us were breathing in short shallow gasps and moaning ever so slightly. "We are one. You and I are joined together in body and spirit. I love you Scotty Simons."

"I love you Rock. You are my rock and always will be. I'll never leave you again for any reason. We were destined to be together."

"I have lost so much in the last few years but now I've found that which was lost and the only thing I ever lost that really mattered. I never stopped loving you. I never stopped thinking about you. I never stopped needing you."

"Neither did I, Kyle. Oh Rock, I need to make passionate wild love to you. I can't stand it any longer. Are you ready?"

"I'm way beyond ready, banana boy. Rock me hard. Take me to heaven, Scotty. Fill me with your love."

Scotty pulled out and pushed himself back in, slowly at first, then building to a steady, pounding rhythm. I relished each inward thrust of his arching dick with intense anticipation. Over and over, he thrust himself deeply into my body, sending waves of pleasure through my midsection as he traversed over my prostate. Cum oozed from my burgeoning dick and each thrust pushed my large balls up in my sac to surround the base of my throbbing, rock hard shaft. He laid his body down on mine, gripped my shoulders and pulled himself as deeply into me as he possibly could. "OH. MMM. Oh my God, Rock. Oh, it's better than I even imagined," he gasped.

"Yes. I love it. I love it. Let it go on forever." The stimulation of his firm rippled abs pressed against my lust filled cock coupled with the intense stimulation from his banana shaped dick pounding my love gland within, pushed me into a state of intense pleasure that I never wanted to end. I scratched and clawed at his back as he drove himself deep within me in a frenzied, lustful dance. Over and over, he thrust himself into me in a relentless, mind blowing experience. I was in his control.

"OH, OH, OH" we both cried out. We were each quivering and teetering on the edge of our orgasms and then he suddenly cried out in sheer ecstasy as he drove himself deep, deep into my bowels and held himself in suspension, stiff and contorted, "FUCK YES! OH YES!" he cried for all the forest to hear. Time stopped as waves of passion coursed through my entire body and soul. I felt the powerful explosion of my cum spread its warmth between our sweaty bodies. I grabbed his ass cheeks and pulled and pushed him deeply into me as he unloaded his seed of love into my bowels. Finally, the explosive experience subsided and he fell helplessly onto my body and gasped for breath. I caressed and tickled his strong back and shoulders. I clenched and clung to his slowly retreating dick with my muscular ring desperately clinging to its fullness within me.

Tears of joy tickled my cheeks as they slid toward the blanket. I held Scotty tightly against my naked, sweat soaked body and savored the experience we'd just shared. For the first time in my life, the emotional experience exceeded the physical sensations of my orgasm, culminating in the ultimate human experience of sexual expression.

The sex was better than I imagined to be sure. But what was so much better than I ever dreamed and could never have understood, was that the magnificent afterglow that followed the sex could be so powerfully moving and last a lifetime.

The End

I hope you have enjoyed sharing Rock's journey of self discovery with me. It has been a wonderful experience for me as I have written it. I sincerely appreciate the immeasurable assistance of Pablo, Flip, Smallfox and Lisa in improving and refining the story for me.

I thank the many readers who have taken time to share their appreciation for the time spent in creating this tale. I cherish the comments and the input. I welcome any and all willing to share their thoughts and feelings or comments of any size or type. I truly love to hear from readers. Thank you again for taking this journey with me. May your own journey, no matter how difficult at times, end as well for you as it did for Rock and Scotty.

Sincerely, Hans Schreiber.

Talk about this story on our forum

Authors deserve your feedback. It's the only payment they get. If you go to the top of the page you will find the author's name. Click that and you can email the author easily.* Please take a few moments, if you liked the story, to say so.

[For those who use webmail, or whose regular email client opens when they want to use webmail instead: Please right click the author's name. A menu will open in which you can copy the email address (it goes directly to your clipboard without having the courtesy of mentioning that to you) to paste into your webmail system (Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo etc). Each browser is subtly different, each Webmail system is different, or we'd give fuller instructions here. We trust you to know how to use your own system. Note: If the email address pastes or arrives with %40 in the middle, replace that weird set of characters with an @ sign.]

* Some browsers may require a right click instead