18 Weeks of Twoey - 7. Week One Sunday, September 7, 2014: Thinking

My Weekly Curse was now about to start. Let me explain how this works. First there is a family breakfast ...together ...at the same time ...everybody ...around the same table ...together! Tommy's mother makes pancakes or eggs or something new I’m sure she or Gary's mom find in some woman’s magazine. Poor Gary has to endure it too. Sometimes we compare notes to see if they both cook the same thing! And they usually do. Such unimagination!

Then after that, we get all dressed up and go to CHURCH! And we can’t get out of it. At least Gary gets to go to a Catholic church where they pretty much do the same thing every Sunday. But not us. Oh no, not us! We go to the church of some kind of over-righteous, fire-breathing, hate-spewing evangelical preacher who shouts and sings and dances like the frickin' fake he is. I call it The Church of Everybody’s Going to Hell.

I’ve explained to her that all this guy has ever done is make me sure there is no God. At least not his kind of God. But she won’t let me stay home. Unfortunately, Dad just goes along with it. I’m sure when he sits in the pew he just blocks it out and does ...idk ...engineering problems or something while the jackass prances. But, if you can even believe this, it gets WORSE! She must have talked to that creep about me ...because every time he professes that some group or other is going to burn for eternity, that asshole Pig-Fucker looks right at me! There are hundreds of people in this cuckoo church! Why does he pick me to be the target of his sinner-of-the-week club?? It’s actually beginning to make me paranoid!

At least today, taking a cue from my father, I decided to zone him out and think of something else. Engineering problems are not high on my agenda this month, so I chose to fantasize about Lanni and tried to work myself up. But no boner yet. Ha! If I did get one, I think I’d have stood up so he could see it and really make him shout and send me to hell with the mastra-baters, forny-caters, and homy-sexshals. Of course his God must surely go crazy counting how many times a fifteen-year-old jacks-off. I mean, I do it a minimum of 3 times a day and how many of us are there in the world? Billions? That’s like a thousand billion times a year! With all that mastra-bation to wade through, that asshole's God wouldn’t have any time left to even think about those forny-caters and homy-sexshals!

After the show, I mean service, she meets the slimy creep at the door to heap praises on him, as I slink out and escape to the safety of our car. Then, before they disentangle themselves to join me, I’ve had enough time to exorcise myself from my personal demon: Pastor Enos Johnson.

Finally, after Tommy's mother tortures us on Sunday morning, she turns the rest of the day over to my father so she can gossip on the phone, while making Sunday Dinner. At least Dad just makes Tommy and I watch whatever sport is in season with him--it’s football now. That’s okay with me because during the school year he lets us do our homework while we’re watching. And my sister Liz gets a pass on the sports, so she just does her homework and listens to music in her room. I guess sometimes it pays to be a girl!

This afternoon, having already suffered through Enos Johnson, I had finished my homework and was staring at, but not really watching TV. I sorta did a little mental recap of this crazy week.

The droning of the play-by-play guy, the giggling of Tommy and my father as they sat side-by-side on the other couch ...playing the tickle game, the repetitive cackling of Tommy’s mother as she jabbered away on the phone in the kitchen, the rhythmic humming of the overhead fan, all these sounds formed a perfect white noise which allowed my mind to run amok in random thoughts.

You must realize by now that I’m sort of a plain vanilla kind of guy. My life follows very predictable patterns. I’m always in control. It’s sort of boring, but simple, safe, and secure. I have a group of great friends who live close by. I get along with practically everybody at school. Lots of people seem to like me, or ignore me. Either one is perfectly fine with me. I’m in a couple of sports, but neither cross country nor baseball have lots of fans or draw big crowds. So I’m not really considered a jock. I do well in school, but declined to take the advanced courses the counselor was trying to sell me. So I’m not really considered a nerd. I’m not the type of guy all the cheerleaders swoon over, so I’m not considered a player. I don’t have raging hormones or anger issues or other teen problems, so I’m not considered a rebel. I control my life. It’s as simple as that. My ship sails in quiet waters.

Or it always used to.

This week sorta caught me off guard. It was something like being sucker punched. First that weirdness with Twoey--the baffling attraction to him through those mesmerizing green eyes. It still deeply troubled me, although I’m smart enough to realize it was my problem and not his. I now realized that I must become his friend, and probably a good friend. So I somehow needed to work out my own issues.

Then this new conflict with Tommy’s mother. She’s spreading rumors about me. I could even feel it in the way my best friend looked at me. I could certainly feel it in the way Enos Johnson looked at me. She thinks I’m gay. When you combined that with my attraction to Twoey, I now understand why I reacted the way I did. Poor Twoey, he had no idea what was going on in my mind. In fact, even I had no idea. My subconscious was on autopilot. I was just beginning to grasp it all now.

Then there was the inkling of unease with Mr. Burch, the social teacher. The guy creeped me out. He always stared at me. It’s like Tommy’s mother was communicating with him too! Did I mention paranoia?

Then being thrust on Kathy. I thought Greg just wanted me to cheer her up; to help her get over that asshole Cal. I didn’t intend to make it a romance. I mean, I like her as a person, but she’s not going to be my girlfriend--never. The only reason I even agreed to go to the movies with her next week was because of Gary. I knew he’d heard Tommy’s mother’s gossip and I had to show him I could take a girl out. Of course I can take a girl out! Just not that girl!

Speaking of which, sometime during this week I developed feelings for Lanni! I didn’t see that coming either. So here I am, in daily conversation with one girl, a girl I have no feelings for other than friendship, and I’m being forced to do with her what I’m yearning to do with Lanni. This sounds like a fucking soap opera, doesn’t it?

Then the coups de grace! Sam’s little bombshell about Twoey in Syracuse! I had finally devised a plan for dealing with my weird attraction, and this totally blew it out of the water! Now I had to look at him not as supple and feral and feline, but as injured and abandoned and apprehensive. I was back to fucking Square One!!!

One after another, things battered me. If it was just one thing, I could have worked out a resolution. This week I didn’t have enough time to develop a defense for one problem when the next one smashed into me. I felt like I was losing control of my life. This was so unlike the way things have always gone for me. It was like I didn’t feel safe or secure anymore. Like I couldn’t call this my home anymore. And that made me shudder. I simply leaned over on the couch and soon slipped into a restless sleep. Tommy woke me for dinner.

Dinner--gasp! Tonight's dinner was fried pork chops, some kind of vegetable and fried potatoes. I vaguely remember enjoying Tommy's mother's cooking when I was lots younger. Either she cleverly got worse at it, or I became pickier about what goes into my mouth. The chops were fried so long they were hard. I could barely even cut mine, let alone chew it. The fried potatoes had a similar texture. I mean, hard on the outside and soft on the inside I could live with, I suppose. It was just that tonight, there was no soft on the inside!! The vegetables were the only things soft, and they were like MUSH! I think it was a carrot I was eating, but it could have been squash. Fuck! It takes her all afternoon to come up with crap like this? I hardly ate anything.

I think, maybe ...she should let Jesus do the cooking.

Finally, Sunday seemed to be over, except that tonight I decided to call Kathy, but that was a big huge mistake on my part. She talked like forever! I had a hard time going to sleep because my ear was too sore.

Twoey

During the run this morning, David was complaining about his church. I asked him if he wanted me to go with him, to keep him company and take his mind off the service. The poor kid gave me a horrified look and made me promise to never ever entertain that thought again ...hehe. But he talked to me!

I did my homework, did a little internet research, spent some time thinking about Erik ...sweet thoughts too. I texted him off-and-on all day, which must have been difficult for the poor guy because he was visiting his grandma. All his aunts, uncles and cousins were there too. But he wanted me to text and keep in contact whenever I could.

I spent some of my time thinking about David. Not for any special reason, it's just that I can't go any day without thinking of him. Why was I doing this to myself??? I knew it couldn't be going anywhere! But I just could not help it. I had it bad for him. And usually when I thought of him it ended with me jacking-off. Jesus, I needed help!

And NO! Forget it! I am not asking her for help!!

Finally, I decided to go for a walk. It was a nice day and I needed to get my mind off these Daleville Dudes. I was just sort of half-jogging along when I noticed Gary walking in the same direction, but across the street. So I angled over and came up even with him.

“Hey Gary, where you off to?”

“Oh Twoey! What! Are you doing an afternoon run today too?”

“Nah, just bored in the house and thought I’d get some air.”

“Cool. I’m just headed over to Mel’s house. We’re sorta working on a little secret project.”

“Oh?”

“I can’t tell you cuz it’s secret.” I could see from the grin on his face that he was gonna tell me.

We walked in silence for a few more minutes. He was busting a gut trying to hold it in. Finally, he exploded. “Shit. I gotta tell you. But before I do, you hafta promise never to tell David.”

“You? A secret from your best friend?”

“Do you promise?”

“He never talks to me anyway, haven’t you noticed?”

“Do you promise?”

“OK! OK! But we really don’t communicate.”

“I’ll hafta kill you if you tell.”

“I promise! I promise! ...Jeez!!”

“Well, OK. If you insist. You know how he’s been lately?”

“Lately? I thought maybe he was always an asshole.”

He stopped walking an gave me a not-nice look. “NO. He’s not. Something’s bugging him.”

“OK. So is this secret project magically and mystically gonna transform him?”

“Maybe I shouldn’t tell you. Maybe you don’t want to hear.”

“No, I’m sorry. It’s just that he’s really getting to me ...or I’m letting him get to me.”

“Nah ...it’s OK, Twoey. Actually, it’s bothering to the whole gang. And it’s doubly worse for me, because I’m his best friend. That gives me a special responsibility. Best friends are supposed to be there for each other ...no matter what!”

Well, that was like a knife to my heart, but then Gary doesn’t know anything about Mike. He continued to explain.

“He won’t tell me, and I’d never ask. That’s not how we work. But I gotta help him. He needs help. I’ve been thinking. So, Twoey, I think it was around Labor Day that David complained to me about not having a girlfriend. He’s sort of bashful around girls--well you see how dumb he is, he doesn’t even realize Kathy likes him. So I think this thing that’s bugging him has something to do with his mother always poking at him about not having a girlfriend. Honestly, I think some intervention is called for. Mel is friends with Kathy, and so I’m on my way over to Mel’s. We’re gonna come up with something that’ll push him and Kathy together. You realize if we wait for him to do it, it’ll happen sometime during our junior year at college!”

“Yeah, I get it Gary, but be really, really careful. If you aren’t, this kind of thing can backfire--BIG TIME!”

“Nah ...I know my best friend! This is gonna be monster! He won’t know what hit him. Just observe and enjoy!” I had to chuckle at that.

Then at about that time we split. I jogged down to the lake and sat on a bench, enjoying the view and the smells and the quiet. After a while, I decided to walk along the shore a bit. The beach ended, I passed the tree with the swinging rope and then there were rocks and a few more trees. Behind one of the trees there was a little pool where waves were lapping and depositing all sorts of flotsam. An eerie feeling came over me. It wasn’t déjà vu, it was the opposite of that. Like something was going to happen here ...something important, something that was going to affect me!

Not being able to make any sense of it, I decided to sit on a big rock by the tree and do some contemplating. If this spot was somehow going to be important to me, then this should be a good space to think. I stared at the waves coming in from the lake. They were a decent size today. I looked around, but no boats, and there was a pretty good breeze. It was coming from the East. I assumed the wind was making the waves. On the horizon I saw clouds piled high. A storm was going up the Atlantic Coast. That’s why we had the Easterly wind.

You may find it strange that I pay attention to stuff like this. If you do, you probably live in California. When you live in Syracuse, you become a meteorologist by osmosis. The 11 o’clock newscasts are 15 minutes weather, 10 minutes sports and 5 minutes actual news and all the ads.

That meant I knew right away that our weather was gonna be fine but, with the Easterlies, a little cooler. In fact it was already a little nippy, but not enough to make me go home and change out of my polo and cargos. I sat on that rock, absorbing the sun, letting it warm me like a lizard, observing the stuff in the water being buffeted by the tiny wavelets.

I had so many things to mull over. See, I’ve got this nagging worry in the back of my mind that maybe I was too ‘easy’ yesterday. I guess a blowjob was no big deal, but that wasn’t even a first date, if you follow me. I mean, I was so new to all this! I felt like a kid in the very first candy store he ever saw!

But Erik did ask permission for everything he did. He certainly didn’t force me to do anything. He didn’t even let me return the favor. That was probably a good thing, because with the research this morning, I realized mine would have been the most horrible blowjob anybody ever received. I think I’ll be a little more prepared for that milestone now. At least I hope so.

No, the more I thought about it, it was all my fault yesterday. I got completely blown away by the opportunity. Finally, after almost a whole year of knowing I was gay, I actually had a boy in my hands who was gay too ...and who liked me. I just got carried away. OK, now I was comfortable going back to sweet thoughts of Erik.

My first week living here has been a little more than I expected; actually a lot more. My mind went back over my Daleville experience so far. So much had happened to me this week. I had both ups and downs. The ups were really ups and the downs were really downs. Thankfully, the ups far outnumbered the downs ...but the down was David. He sorta counted as much as the sum of all the ups.

Candor made me realize some stuff. I’d met some great guys ...been welcomed into a club called a gang ...met my first actual gay boy, and I think he’s gonna be fun ...got my first gay kiss ...received an incredible blowjob ...and, of course, it all began on that first day, when I met one breathtaking, amazing, confused, intriguing and maddening individual. He was all of those things--still.

But I really did think I was gonna fit in here and actually liked this place. It wasn't quite the sleepy little town I had envisioned when I was up in Syracuse. So I sat there, the sun on my face, a few clouds lazily swimming by and then decided: Yes, I could call this my home!

Continuing to daydream, random thoughts flitted through my mind ...of Erik’s tour...of the enigmatic Danny ...of the amazing day swimming ...of the effervescent David who emerged that day ....and, of course, I thought of Mike.

I always think about Mike.