Conversations With Myself - 19. Discovery

September 1983 — Chris 17

I awoke to see the smiling face of my boyfriend in front of me. When he saw that my eyes were open, his smile turned into a grin, and then we briefly kissed each other on the lips.

“Been up long?” I asked.

“Just a few minutes, Mr. Morning Breath,” he answered, “but I was sooo enjoying watching you sleep, and thinking about last night.”

A smile overtook my face as I thought of our lovemaking the previous evening, which lasted well into the night. Our camping excuse had been accepted completely by our parents throughout the summer, giving us nearly every weekend together. Unfortunately all good things eventually come to an end and when each of our families took their summer trips, it was like going through withdrawal. I imagined my parents thought I was just nervous about starting college, but although that was true to an extent, the real reason I moped around through the entire vacation was that I was missing my Frank.

Classes started up in late August for me at the University and high school was about to resume for Frank. We had the three-day Labor Day Weekend to celebrate our post-vacation reunion, but then after that, our opportunities to be together would be few and far between. Fortunately, his eighteenth birthday would be in January. Just in time for him to join me at the University for the spring semester. His parents wouldn’t be able to stop him once he was an adult, but we would need to be careful until I reached my eighteenth birthday as well. There was the problem of overlap between the end of the high school semester and the start of his college classes. He would have enough credits to graduate, but would have to find some way to finish his finals and still start his college classes on time.

The bigger issue — one he wasn’t sure how he would work out, was financial. The University was an elite private school with outrageously high tuition. If his parents cut him off for finishing high school a semester early against their wishes, or particularly if they realized he was in a gay relationship, there was no way he would be able to afford to attend without assistance. Unfortunately, the financial aid criteria didn’t take into consideration being estranged from your parents. If it came down to it, Frank and I might both have to work.

One of the strangest curiosities was that Frank and I still had no recollection of having been together in our junior high and early high school years. Our memories of the entire period were somewhat hazy, which suggested a very high degree of uncertainty about what would happen with the changes made to the timeline, or the alternate realities created by our interventions, as Frank would say. From our continued contact with our younger selves, we knew that our relationship at the age of twelve was still going strong, but I still remembered not meeting Frank until I was seventeen, which was incredibly strange.

Looking at the boy lying next to me, I answered him, “Speaking of morning breath, yours ain’t so hot, either. Must be all the jizz we swallowed last night.”

“Yeah,” Frank smiled back at me. “We were really in the groove when we made love.”

“For sure,” I agreed. I reached out with my hand to touch Frank’s face, then moved my hand down his torso, grazing his nipple as I went. When I got to his groin, I lovingly cupped his sack, then stroked my hand up his raging hard, pulsating member.

“I really, really need to piss,” he interrupted, and I told him that I did, too. There was a small bathroom right off the bedroom Professor Dawson was letting us use, so we didn’t bother to put anything on.

With raging erections that wouldn’t go down, I suggested we just jump in the shower and take care of our business there. It wasn’t that we were into piss or anything, but we were just too aroused to let go. Once our bladders were empty, our foreplay in the shower did indeed lead to more, and we were soon in the throes of another incredible climax. I loved Frank sooo much and could never get enough of him.

Once we finished washing and drying each other and brushing our teeth, we got dressed in our usual summer weekend attire of skimpy shorts and nothing else, and headed downstairs. We could already hear the chatter of the professor’s other boarders and smell the frying bacon. We entered the kitchen to find Professor Dawson at the stove, frying bacon and sausage links, and simultaneously making pancakes for everyone. When we offered to help, we were rebuffed as apparently everyone else had been. It was his treat, as he put it, for the holiday weekend.

We weren’t the only shirtless students that morning, but most had shirts on. There was also a girl present, which was unusual. She was a new freshman at the University and was in most of my classes.

“Good morning, guys,” Marisa said to us, and we replied simultaneously, “Good morning,” as we slipped our arms around each other.

“God, why is it the best looking guys are always gay?” she asked out loud with a smile on her face. Damn if that didn’t make me blush, and Frank, too.

It was wonderful to be able to be ourselves in the professor’s home. Everyone knew about our relationship and either didn’t care or were outright supportive. There were a couple of other gay couples in the house who stayed there full time, so we were far from the only ones like us.

Each of us grabbed a mug of coffee and sat down at the long bench-style table that was in the kitchen while we waited for our pancakes. We again put our arms around each other and Frank rested his head on my shoulder. Damn, it felt good to be in love. We were both gonna really miss these weekends.

Since it was the last weekend we could go swimming for the season, one of the guys suggested we all go to Shaw Park. Shaw Park was near the University, and it had a very nice swimming pool as well as picnic grounds and other recreational facilities. At first Frank and I were gonna beg off, but then the professor said he thought it was a great idea and that he’d go, too, so of course we decided to go.

After we all pitched in and cleaned up from breakfast, Professor Dawson grabbed a couple of ice chests and filled one with soft drinks and he filled the other with several pounds of ground beef and several packages of hotdogs from the freezer. Ketchup, mustard, relish and a large bag of charcoal and lighter fluid were added to the supplies.

We didn’t have our swimsuits with us, but our shorts would do, so we slipped on our sandals and were on our way. We all carpooled, and we ended up riding with the two other gay couples and since I was the one with a decent car, I drove. We made a stop along the way for hamburger and hotdog buns, potato salad, coleslaw and baked beans, as well as for paper plates and plastic utensils. When we got to the park, we staked out a group of picnic tables and a grill and set our stuff out. Professor Dawson volunteered to stay with our stuff while we all went swimming. We were more than happy to take him up on his offer. He told us to be back by two, when he’d have the meat on the grill.

Because Frank and I had spent all our weekends with the professor over then entire summer, and I’d spent my weekdays working for the professor as well while Frank worked as a bag boy at a grocery near his home, neither one of us had been swimming all summer. This was therefore our first, as well as our last swim of the season. Neither one of us had anything remotely resembling a tan, so we borrowed some suntan lotion from one of the other guys as soon as we got to the pool.

As Frank was applying lotion to me, which perhaps I was enjoying it a little too much, I heard a voice behind me. “Frank?” the boy called out.

I turned around to see a kid around my age whom I didn’t know. “Hey, Jason,” Frank replied. “What brings you to Shaw Park?” he asked.

“My younger brother wanted to go to the zoo,” the boy explained, “so we decided to spend the day in Forrest Park, but with it being so hot, we decided it might be nice to cool off a bit first, especially since the pools’ll all be closed after Labor Day. Forrest Park doesn’t have any swimming, so we came here. How about you?”

Now this was dangerous territory. Frank and I were supposed to be out camping — not at a swimming pool in the city. If this Jason’s parents were with him and saw us, and then mentioned it to Frank’s parents, we’d be dead for sure. I could only hope that Frank would act as casually as possible, and avoid tripping himself up in a lie.

“Well I’m here with my friend, Chris, who’s just starting school at the University. We’re best friends,” and then Frank added, “Oh, by the way, Chris, this is Jason Russell. Jason, this is Chris Michaels. Jason’s family and mine go to the same church. We’ve attended Sunday School together like, forever.”

“Nice to meet you, Jason,” I said.

“Anyway,” Frank continued, “We’re here with a bunch of students from the University.

“So,” Jason said as he got a strange look on his face, “are you guys queer or something?” The question struck us like a body blow, and was totally unexpected. I felt myself blushing and didn’t even dare to see if Frank was. Why’d I have to look so damn guilty?

“The reason I ask,” Jason continued, “is that I saw what you guys were doing, rubbing suntan lotion into each other’s skin like that and, man, you guys had hard-ons!” Shit, he’d noticed! “Not that I understand it, but I don’t get upset about it, either. In any case, there are some really hot girls here and I was gonna ask you if you wanted to check them out with me… but if you’re not into girls, then I guess there’s no point.” He actually smiled at us when he said that. He didn’t seem to be upset at all.

“The word is ‘gay’, my boyfriend countered.

In response Jason said, “Yeah, I guess ‘gay’ does sound better than ‘queer’. It’s just what I’m used to. I still think of gay as meaning ‘happy’. Anyway, it’s all cool.”

With the most serious look I could muster, I told Jason, “Listen, Jason, my parents don’t know, and neither do Frank’s. They would not be pleased. In fact, we’re not even supposed to be here. Frank and I told our parents we’d be camping, so that way they couldn’t check up on us.”

“You both still living with the old folks, huh? Sure, I’ll keep your secret, but don’t let my parents see you. If they recognize Frank, I can’t exactly tell them not to talk to his parents about it.”

“Thanks, Jason,” I replied.

After Jason walked away, I asked Frank, “Did you want to leave?”

“Not if I can help it,” he replied. “After all, there are four other kids depending on us for a ride back to Professor Dawson’s house. Tell you what, let’s just lie in the sun for a while here on these loungers. I can drape a towel over my face so Jason’s folks won’t be able to recognize me, even if they walk right by. We can hit the pool later, after they’ve probly left. Actually, I guess there’s no reason you couldn’t go swimming right now if you want to.”

“Nah,” I said, “I’ll stay here with you. We can cool off later.”

As we lay side-by-side on adjacent loungers, Frank started to speak. “You know, Chris, I’ve been giving some thought to how we might be able to get out of this OTT mess. Even if we create the perfect timeline, we’ll still need to find a way to merge the others with it, or it won’t make any difference… all of the alternate realities will be obliterated when the black hole forms.”

“That’s assuming you’re right about time splitting into alternate realities,” I countered.

“I know I’m right,” he challenged. “I can feel it. Just as I can share your dreams, I can sense my existence in the other realities. Like I said, there are now hundreds of ’em. We have to find a way out of this madness.

“My initial thought was that maybe if we could somehow separate the Earth in space from its location in the other realities, the black hole wouldn’t affect us.”

Laughing, I said, “Do you realize how far you’d need to move the world to keep it from being swallowed by the black hole? This whole region of space is gonna collapse into it, right? We’d have to somehow be able to move the entire friggin’ solar system a matter of light-years to escape, and we’d have to do it very quickly.”

“Yeah, well, like I said, that was my initial thought, but I quickly rejected it for the reasons you stated. Plus if we could move the solar system that much, the alternate reality created in doing so would spread out at the speed of light and affect much of the galaxy, rather than just our local corner of it.

“No, separating the ideal reality from the others is not a viable option. Therefore I figure we need to find a way to repair the damage… to stitch the timelines back together again.”

“Some of those timelines have significant differences from the original,” I pointed out. “We didn’t originally even know each other.”

“Unfortunately, there’s a chance we may have to go back to not knowing each other.”

“ What? ” I practically shouted as I sat bolt upright on the lounger.

“Relax, Chris,” Frank said soothingly. “I only said it’s a possibility… a remote possibility, and I would only consider it if it were the only way to save the Earth.”

I lay back down and he continued, “Anyway, when I started thinking about TTT and how it works, I realized that we’re making use of a natural phenomenon. Although we generate pairs of particles that have temporal variations, these particle pairs do occur spontaneously in space, and probably not infrequently, either. There are bound to be situations, however, where large numbers of temporal quantum variations are generated, resulting in regions of space with significant temporal distortion.

“If we could somehow figure out how to locate such a region and study it, we may have a way to figure out how to fix our problems here on Earth.”

“That’s an interesting thought…” I responded, “but I’m not sure even how to go about measuring temporal distortion on Earth, let alone remotely, and figuring out if there’s a natural way that it resolves itself? How do we detect evidence of that?”

“Maybe it’s not so much a matter of where as it is when,” Frank suggested. “There are two situations in which I would expect large numbers of temporally variant particle pairs to be generated. One is a massive supernova… the kind that leads to the natural formation of a black hole, and the other is…”

“The Big Bang itself,” I said, completing his sentence for him.

“ Exactly! ” Frank continued. “At that instant, the universe was without form. It was infinitesimally small, suffused with energy, devoid of the particles that comprise matter and devoid of time. Time as we know it didn’t exist at the moment of the Big Bang, but the expansion of the universe couldn’t have taken place without the existence of time…”

“If time even exists,” I interrupted. “Perhaps what we perceive as the passage of time is an illusion. Shit happens,” I said with a giggle, “and we perceive that as the passage of time.”

“Shit happens, huh?” Frank asked. “Where in the world did you hear that? ”

“I don’t know,” I replied. “I just made it up.”

“It’d be a great slogan for a bumper sticker,” Frank added, “at least until you got pulled over by the cops.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. We were having so much fun. Finally, I continued, “Anyway, what I’m getting at is that time may be more of a phenomenon than an actual dimension or property. We already know time is local… you can’t compare time at two distant points in the universe without actually traveling between them. Objects that are at the most distant reaches of our telescopes appear to be moving away from us at several times the speed of light, but this cannot be. The universe is expanding rapidly, the dimensions of space are expanding along with it and the very passage of time is distorted as a result. But if instead we look at time more as something we perceive than as an absolute property…”

“Then temporal variations wouldn’t exist,” Frank interrupted.

“I dunno,” I replied. “It’s just an interesting idea.”

“Interesting’s the right word,” Frank agreed. “Getting back to the Big Bang, however, the particles that comprise matter precipitated out as the universe expanded and cooled. First came the quarks, which suffused the universe more or less randomly, and then the elementary particles… protons, neutrons, electrons, positrons, neutrinos and so on. It wasn’t until the forces of nature… the strong force, the weak force, electromagnetism and gravity… separated from each other that they could combine into atoms.

“Either matter or antimatter could have formed from this, and some say that both did… that the reason there are large voids in space between superclusters of galaxies is because these are boundaries between areas of matter and antimatter. The two formed strictly as a result of statistical variation, but should they ever meet, they would obliterate each other, which is why there are voids.”

“But that would mean that matter and antimatter did obliterate each other, where there are voids,” I pointed out. “However, if that had happened, the universe would be filled with gamma rays and life as we know it wouldn’t be possible.”

“There are any number of ways the gamma rays coulda disappeared,” Frank countered. “They coulda been absorbed by whatever it is that makes up the dark matter, for example. Or maybe the speed of light has changed since the time of the Big Bang.”

Sensing my unease, Frank put up his open hand to keep me from sayin’ anything and continued, “I know it’s heresy to suggest it, but there’s nothing that precludes a change in the speed of light with time. A faster speed of light in the early universe relative to today could result in early gamma rays being Doppler shifted to the radio spectrum, right where we measure the background radiation of the universe, but I digress…

“Anyway, with all of this going on, of course the generation of paired particles would have happened in vast abundance, and temporal variations should have been as common as spatial variations.”

“Frank, are you suggesting that the entire universe began with alternate realities? Perhaps a vast number of them?”

“That would be the logical conclusion,” he stated.

“But how would we even be able to verify that… how would we perceive it, and what would it mean?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” he answered, “but if there’s way to study it, it would be in what we see in the most distant reaches of the universe, cause what we see at the fringe of the universe with our telescopes happened not long after the Big Bang itself. The farther away the objects we look at, the more back in time we’re seeing, ’cause of the time it took the light from them to get here.”

“I realize that,” I said, “but what we need to see may have happened before there were stars and galaxies and other objects in the universe to see with our telescopes.”

“True,” Frank agreed, “but perhaps there will still be residual effects to be found in the visible universe, or in the background radiation of the Big Bang. The question is what exactly do we look for?”

“This way of thinking combined with the heat is making me dizzy,” I commented. “What say we go for a swim? It should be safe by now.”

“Sounds good to me,” he agreed, and then he literally leaped off his lounger, ran to the edge of the pool and cannonballed into it, earning a loud whistle blow from the lifeguard nearby. I walked to the edge and simply jumped in, and we spent the next hour-and-a-half wrestling with each other in the water, and just having a good time. The whole time I wanted to kiss him, but that would have definitely drawn attention.

When it got to be close to two, we got out of the water, dried ourselves off, reapplied suntan lotion to each other, which led to the expected result, slipped on our sandals and headed back to the picnic site. When we got there, several of the other students were already there and lined up for their burgers and dogs. Professor Dawson was hard at work, tending to the meat that covered every square inch of the grate, which unfortunately wasn’t all that big. Marissa was tending to a second grill about twenty feet away, which was also filled to capacity.

Walking up to her, I asked, “Would you like a little relief with that? We could all take turns,” I suggested.

“Aren’t you sweet, Chris, but I’ve got it covered,” she answered. “Dawson offered me some additional one-on-one sessions if I’d help out with the grilling. At least I don’t have to worry about him hitting on me,” she added with a smile. Apparently, we weren’t the only ones he’d told he’s gay.

Two burgers, two hot dogs and a slew of coleslaw, potato salad and baked beans later, I was beyond stuffed. While we ate, we bantered back and forth with the other students and had a great time. Later on, after we’d had time to digest our lunch, we all played a game of touch football. Usually I didn’t like sports, ’cause I sucked at them, but we were among friends — friends who accepted Frank and me for what we were. In fact, I couldn’t remember ever having had so much fun.

Eventually, Frank and I had a chance to get Dawson alone and we talked to him about what we’d discussed at the pool.

“Hmm…” he said when we’d finished telling him our thoughts. “ If there are multiple realities, then you’re undoubtedly right, assuming, that is, that time even exists in the first place,” he added with a nod to me. “If there are multiple realities as you suggest, they’ve been around since the very beginning of the universe, but they wouldn’t have had any meaning until the universe had expanded enough for matter to start precipitating out. And as you noted, time is a local phenomenon, so we’re not talking about multiple, separate universes then, are we? No, we’re dealing with multiple pockets of reality spread throughout the universe. I’m not sure I even want to know how that would work, and I sure as Helldon’t know what to look for.”

<<<<<<<<·>>>>>>>>

July 1979 — Chris 13

“Happy anniversary, babe,” I said just before I planted a kiss on my wonderful boyfriend’s lips. It was Monday morning, July 9, and today Frank and I had been together for one month. It was a day to celebrate. They even had fireworks last night for us. OK, I think there was also something about a national holiday going on last Wednesday too.

Coming up for air, he said in return, “Only you could make morning breath seem sexy.”

“Such a dubious compliment,” I replied, “but I love you anyway.”

Our lips came together again and our tongues danced in each others’ mouth. Sure the taste wasn’t exactly pleasant, but the wonderful sensation of kissing the one I loved more than made up for it. Frank was my life.

Coming up for air once again, I asked, “Are you ready for your anniversary blow job?”

“Oooh, I’d definitely like the sound of that, but I think if you try it now, you’ll just end up with a mouth full of piss.”

“Ewe, gross,” I frowned.

“Let me just go empty my bladder, and I’ll be right back,” he promised.

“Actually, I’ll join you,” I said as I got up with him. We stood side by side at the toilet bowl, relieving ourselves and just enjoying being together. When our streams crossed, we got into a bit of a sword fight with our piss, but we quickly ran out of ‘ammunition’.

Grabbing the bottle of mouthwash while I was up, I quickly rinsed and spat, and then handed the bottle to Frank for him to do the same.

Back in bed and under the covers, our mouths joined again as we enjoyed our shared passion. “Mmmm… much better now,” Frank said after we broke our kiss. I wasn’t sure if he was referring to having an empty bladder, fresh breath, or both, but it didn’t really matter. We were together, and that was the most important thing of all.

Kissing my way down his chest and his abdomen, I took my time, prolonging his ecstasy as long as possible. My reward at the end was the taste I’d come to love more than anything, and the satisfaction of hearing his moans, feeling the shudder of his release and seeing the look of contentment on his face when we were done.

Afterwards, Frank insisted on returning the favor. I told him today was his birthday and he didn’t have to unless he really wanted to. When I said that, he gave me the most pathetic look imaginable, and then proceeded to bring me to my own climax.

By the time we’d showered and dressed, it was already after noon. Professor Dawson had left for the University eons ago, but there were usually students coming and going all day, so it was no problem to get a ride somewhere if we needed one. As the professor’s house was within walking distance of the University, albeit not through the best of neighborhoods, so long as it wasn’t late at night there was no problem getting to the campus, either.

Although we headed to campus, it wasn’t to study. Today was about celebrating our anniversary and nothing else. We therefore headed back to the scene of the crime, to the Danforth University Center, and ordered the same lunch we’d had a month ago, back when we first met. After lunch we walked to the Hi-Pointe Theater, an old-time theater that was still in operation and was near Professor Dawson’s house, and watched the matinee.

It was as we were exiting the theater to begin our walk back to Professor Dawson’s house that the symptoms began. At first I just felt a little cramping, and then I felt all flushed and had a sudden need to shit. I knew I’d shit my pants if I didn’t get to a public restroom immediately. I looked over at Frank and noticed he was sweating profusely and didn’t look so hot himself. Suddenly, he turned to me and said, “I gotta go to the bathroom… NOW!”

We quickly did an about face and begged to be let back into the theater to use the restrooms. Showing our ticket stubs to prove we were patrons was enough to convince them to let us in. What followed once we got to the men’s room wasn’t pretty to say the least. It wasn’t long before we were both stinking up the place with our diarrhea and our vomiting.

After a while, the manager came in to see if we were OK. He took one look at us and decided we’d better go to the hospital. St. Mary’s was literally a block and a half away on Clayton Road, so he took us there in his car. It was touch and go, however, in terms of our being able to make it there, and we headed straight for the washrooms as soon as we were inside the entrance of Emergency.

Of course the hospital staff contacted both sets of parents, but there wasn’t much they could do to stop the diarrhea. They started IVs in us to treat for dehydration, and they took samples to culture for bacteria to see if we had Salmonella or E. Coli infections that might need antibiotics, and to test for parasites, but otherwise they told us the diarrhea was natures way of getting rid of something harmful and we need to let it run its course. Tell that to our cramping stomachs and sore assholes!

Although the culture results took a couple of days to come back, the final conclusion was that we’d gotten food poisoning from eating undercooked meat. After telling the doctor what we’d had for lunch, we got a pretty stern lecture on the dangers of eating raw or even rare meat. He told us eating rare steaks was generally OK as long as the surface was thoroughly cooked, ’cause that’s where any bacteria would be, although he did warn us that there was a much higher risk of getting parasites from eating undercooked meat in general. The big problem with rare hamburgers was that grinding the meat mixes all the bacteria throughout the meat, so there’s no way to kill them without cooking it thoroughly. No more rare hamburgers for us, damn it!

It took a couple days for my stomach to get back to normal. I felt bad that we’d had such a crappy anniversary, no pun intended, but at least it started out very nicely indeed.

It was on Sunday that my life changed forever. I knew it was something serious when my parents sat me down after church and said they had something very serious to discuss with me.

“We got a very disturbing phone call from Frank’s parents,” Dad began. “They confronted him about why the two of you were seeing a movie on a Monday, rather than being in class or attending to your studies. It may be the summer, but the whole reason for the two of you to live with Professor Dawson is to take college-level classes and to study with the professor intensively. Otherwise, you might as well live at home.

“Frank’s parents were quite upset that he’d lied to them. They threatened to take him out of Professor Dawson’s program and send him back to his junior high, and he begged them not to. He pleaded with them and broke down and cried.”

Sighing deeply, Dad said, “They finally got out of him that the two of you have been in a sexual relationship for the past month…”