Between the Shadow and the Soul - 25. Not Even Close

December 19, 2016

I found myself approaching Keigan's door a little before midnight. I knew he was home because he'd told me his schedule. Well, that and I saw his car in the lot.

I'd pulled my shirt out of my slacks and started unbuttoning it before I reached his apartment. The cold air raised goosebumps on my exposed flesh. It felt good, that feeling, that sensation. My nipples, always hard, seemed to pebble into stone from the chill.

Why are you doing this? It's a bad idea. You could ruin whatever promise there is here.

I'm responsible for the greatest loss I've ever experienced and now, with Kyle moving away, I'm suffering another huge loss. I feel desolate. I need to feel something else, something better.

I need to feel ...

I rang the bell and waited, pulling my jacket closed over the open shirt beneath. After a minute the locks clicked and the door opened. Wearing nothing but a pair of pajama bottoms, looking like sexual candy waiting to be unwrapped and enjoyed, Keigan rubbed his eyes clear of sleep as he asked, "Hey, Greg. What's up? Is something wrong?"

"Can I come in?" My voice was husky yet subdued, a whisper of anticipation.

"Yeah ..." he muttered, pulling the door wider and gesturing me inside.

As I passed him I pulled off my jacket and shirt in one move and tossed them toward the couch, though they landed on the floor instead. Then I swung around and stepped up behind him as he locked the door.

He'd barely turned in my direction when I bracketed his face with my hands and captured his lips with my own, using my body to pin him to the door. Too shocked to respond and too unsure to participate, Keigan stood frozen in place.

Turn up the volume.

So I did. Still kissing him, I slipped one hand behind his head as the other slid down his neck to his chest. At the same time I pushed my crotch into his, slowly gyrating my hips, letting him feel my need, my desire.

A sharp bite of his bottom lip followed by a soothing lick caused him to gasp and shiver. I exhaled as he inhaled, slow and sensuous. My tongue accepted the unspoken invitation of his parted lips by slipping into his mouth, touching gently as it delved deeper, exploring with increasing fervor when he responded in kind.

I poured all my want and need into the kiss even as my hands began painting his bare torso with gentle touches, drawing a path of goosebumps as I traced my fingertips along the canvas of his warm skin. Finally reaching one of his nipples, I began lightly brushing it with my thumb. When he moaned into my mouth, a desirous yet desperate sound, I knew he'd make me feel.

Keigan's hands gripped my shoulders. At first he pushed. But it was a weak move, his fingers trembling against me, his resolve waning. A second ragged moan rumbled from his mouth into mine as my fingers began gently pinching and caressing his nipple.

His tongue slithered and tangled with my own inside his mouth. Tentative at first but with growing certainty, he pushed it past his lips into my mouth. His hands slid from my shoulders down to my chest, grabbing handfuls of muscle, rubbing, caressing, beginning a wanton exploration of my bare torso, touching everywhere, touching everything.

My heart raced with anticipation. So did his, if the drumming I felt as I played with his nipple meant anything.

I sucked his tongue fully into my mouth before snaring it with my teeth. I suckled it, teased it, massaged it with my tongue, then I allowed it to slide away as my teeth gently scraped it, my tongue chasing it with playful caresses and prurient licks.

Pulling away from his face, I licked and kissed down to his neck. He threw his head back against the door, arched his spine. I attacked his throat, nibbling and sucking. He writhed beneath the onslaught, throwing his chest out to increase my access. Giving his nipple an especially vigorous pinch and twist caused his entire body to jolt.

I slid my tongue up his throat, over his Adam's apple to his chin. He watched me with hungry eyes. A chill of excitement swept over me as he brushed his lips against mine, feather light at first, immediately followed by a sultry exchange of saliva as our tongues fenced with flick and thrust and parry.

"Jesus Christ you can kiss ..." he groaned as I nibbled beneath his ear, an action that elicited a shiver and goosebumps.

I knew I was drawing blood to the surface when I sucked the spot I'd nibbled. I couldn't help it. I needed to feel connected. I knew he'd help me. I intended to push all the right buttons to make it happen.

When he groaned, the hint of rumbling words reaching my ears, I reclaimed his mouth and swallowed the next sound he made. And the one after that. Then finally the long moan he couldn't contain.

Grinding my body against his, my cock against his, I ravished his mouth until only ragged moans and rapid breaths escaped his lips. His hands roamed freely, touching here, caressing there. One eventually ended up in my hair as the other worked a nipple.

That should have elicited moans and bodily shaking and intense desire in me, but it didn't. Each of my actions felt mechanical, my reactions machinelike. Not that carnal want didn't play a role; it most certainly did. But overriding the physical sensations and primitive cravings was a robotic plan designed to make me feel that for which I most hungered.

Releasing his mouth and withdrawing my tongue, I kissed and licked and nibbled my way down to his chest. I really wanted to get my mouth on one of those sinfully hot nipples he sported. And when I did, it was like lightning struck him. Keigan's back arched, he muttered and moaned—the word fuck was repeated a few times—and his hips thrust toward me looking for friction.

Turn up the volume.

As I gently clamped my teeth on his nipple and waggled my tongue against the captured toy, one of my hands circled around to his back as the other fell to his crotch. His moans grew needy, full of desire. He bucked and writhed the moment I gently bit the other nipple before sucking it into my mouth, caressing it with my tongue.

When I was sure he was a wriggling mess of want and lust, I stood upright. That's when I felt the press of his lips against mine, the urgent push of his tongue into my mouth. I grabbed his head, held our mouths together. I was lost in the feeling of such profound mutual want, the feeling of another man who I knew and trusted, another man touching me with the same salacious designs I had.

I separated our lips for just a moment, long enough for me to get one arm solidly behind his back and the other behind his knees, after which I lifted him into my arms. Before he could say anything, I had our mouths once again busy with other matters.

"What are we doing?" he asked between urgent kisses as I carried him down the hall to the bedroom, his hands holding my unshaven face to his.

"Just go with it," I murmured.

"Should we be doing this?"

"Yes," I answered gruffly, then I laid him gently atop the bed.

Before he could react, I stripped him of his pajama bottoms. With the bedside lamp still alight, I had a clear view of him in his unclothed glory.

"Fuck ..." I mumbled when I caught sight of his cock, hard and throbbing and leaking. "You're beautiful." And he was. Seeing him naked for the first time tripped all my switches.

Not the biggest dick I'd seen, but certainly one of the more beautiful examples of manhood in my experience. Maybe seven-and-a-half inches long and thicker than average, certainly too thick for my fingers to touch when wrapped around it. And uncut ...

"You're so fucking hot ..." I mumbled before I took him into my mouth, into my throat, swallowing around him as I worked to get my shoes, socks, pants and underwear removed. Not an easy feat when you can't move your head, but I managed.

"Christ!" he shouted, hips bucking and back arching. His hands gripped the sides of my head as I slowly bobbed up and down, pushing him into my throat each time, swallowing, covering him with saliva.

I need him wet.

Using my tongue to caress and tickle, using my lips to stroke, hollowing my cheeks to add stimulation, using my throat to squeeze and massage, he was a writhing and bucking mess of nerves and desire and moans and groans by the time I'd freed myself of my clothes.

I came off his dick and stood, readying myself to climb his body like Mount Everest.

"Oh God ..." he groaned. I glanced up and realized he had a dazed, overwhelmed expression as his eyes devoured me.

Ignoring the blush he caused, I slithered up his body like a leach, using my mouth to suck here, nibble there, lick everywhere. My hands glided along his smooth, muscular body, playing with each sensitive spot my mouth discovered, my fingers wet with the saliva I was leaving behind.

As I worked each nipple with teeth and tongue and lips, Keigan moaned and pressed his chest into me as he pulled my head against himself. Then, as if to decapitate me, he pulled my head up until we were face to face.

Before I could think of my next step, our lips pressed together, our tongues danced, our legs intertwined, our hard cocks rubbed. He wrapped his arms around me as I cupped his face, each of us holding us together in our own way.

"I've wanted you since I first saw you," he groaned before turning his head so he could suck on my neck, first biting it, then licking it, and finally sucking gently enough not to draw blood to the surface.

The feel of his skin against mine, his naked body against mine, pushed me toward a sexual frenzy. I needed him to make me feel, to push me past the biggest barrier Richard had erected. If my life was going to fall apart, damn it to hell I was going to overcome the most horrific phobia my assault caused.

"You're so fucking sexy," he whispered in my ear. "Christ, Greg, this is a fantasy come true."

I stopped any further words by claiming his mouth again, working the kissing magic Marc taught me. Keigan moaned into my mouth, a ragged, sensual sound full of want. Through the kiss I communicated everything I couldn't say, everything I was feeling but couldn't share with language.

His response was to deepen it, to pull me tighter against him, to buck and gyrate his hips to increase friction between our cocks.

"I've wanted this for so long," he mumbled as I began working my way back down his body. "Greg ..." he purred softly.

The bedspread bunched in his fists while his eyes rolled back in his head, his mouth open and his breathing ragged. I'd learned all of his sweet spots on the way up, so I visited each one on the way back down, leaving him a squirming, incoherent mess by the time I took him in my mouth again.

"Are we really doing this?" he muttered on an exhale, little more than breathy escaped words before he groaned, throwing his head back while I swallowed and swallowed.

Wetter.

I let saliva flow freely, not swallowing it. Bobbing up and down, I cupped his balls in one hand and gently rolled them.

"God damn!" he exclaimed as I pushed him rapidly and repeatedly into my throat, focusing my muscles on the head.

"I can't believe I waited this long ..." I mumbled when I came off his shaft, licking down its length, dribbling spit the whole way. And just before I started in on his balls, I pulled the packet of lube from my slacks, ripped it open, and worked it into my hole.

I need to feel.

The sensations made me shiver, though not entirely from pleasure. When I collected the precum pooled in my foreskin and running down my shaft, I added it to my already slick entrance, working it inside.

Another tremble coursed through me and I thought, I can't do it.

But I need to feel. This will get me beyond Richard's reach, help me overcome, help me feel.

Keigan squirmed with pleasure as I moved from one ball to the next, showering each with gentle, careful attention. His legs trembled as I licked my way back up the underside of his shaft. I worked him into a bucking, writhing, sweating, unintelligible mess, his moans and groans interspersed with a word salad, his hands flailing or gripping the bedspread or holding my head in an attempt to slow down the onslaught of sensations.

Leaving behind his slobbery wet cock, I worked my way back up until I straddled him, pushing his dick into my crack. Though the sensations were phenomenally wonderful, I was shaking noticeably.

His glazed stare roamed my naked body until he saw my cock, throbbing and hard and bobbing between us, a pool forming on his abs from its constant leak.

"Fuck you're big ..." he groaned. His hips started rotating, moving up and down, his thrusts meeting my own efforts. "Are you a bottom?"

"Versatile," I breathed out before kissing him deeply.

Is that true? You've never bottomed ... except when it was taken from you.

I have fingers and toys. I enjoy them. This can't be different.

Oh but it is when there's another person involved.

Despite the increasing trembles wracking my body and the lightheaded feeling and the clammy sweat covering me, I knew I could do this, I could cross the barrier Richard had erected, I could feel.

He won't get you over the hurdle.

Throwing his head back as I stretched my spine to increase pressure between his cock and my ass, he mumbled gibberish for a moment before looking back, grabbing my face, drawing me in for a kiss full of rampant desire and unadulterated lust.

"I've always fantasized about fucking a guy with a big cock," he murmured against my lips. "And any sex with you is at the top of my list."

"I need to feel," I told him, "and I want you to make it happen."

You can't do this. It'll never work.

I'll make it work!

I increased my movements to hide the constant earthquake rocking my body.

Keigan ran his tongue across his lips before saying in a desperate tone, "I want to taste you."

Even as I worked my hips to keep his cock sliding up and down my crack, playing catch and release against my entrance, I reached down and squeezed a sizable dribble of precum from my cock. Once I had it on my fingers, I wiped it across my lips before leaning down and kissing him. His moan reeked of ecstasy. He licked and sucked my lips while trying to maintain the kiss. It was raunchy and passionate and nasty and good.

I was jarred by each catch of his head at my entrance. My body would jerk and my mind would panic. In response I'd move enough to slide him further along between my cheeks. With his precum and my saliva and the lube, there was a wet mess going on back there. I hoped it would be wet enough.

"Condoms," he muttered with a vague gesture toward the nightstand.

"No ... I need ..."

"What? Tell me what you need."

"I need to feel ... I need to feel you inside me ..."

By then I was trembling so much that I was practically shaking the bed apart. Keigan could feel it, obvious by the concern weaved into his lecherous expression. My kisses had reached a fever pitch, desperate, though not with want but instead with fear, attempts to distract me from what I was trying to do.

I'm teetering on a precipice here. And I'm rapidly losing my balance.

I was pale, cold and clammy sweat covering my body. Every part of me shivered as if chilled. My breathing came in skips and jumps, hitching painfully, a raspy noise typifying ailment more than ecstasy.

"Are you okay?" The husky voice I heard sounded far away, a question meant for someone else.

I nearly screamed when he lodged his cock against my hole and began pushing, lightly at first but slowly increasing the pressure. Every muscle in my body went rigid, even my diaphragm such that my breathing halted. Violent tremors ripped through me, sending droplets of fright-filled sweat in every direction. My eyes slammed shut.

Stop!

Suddenly Keigan grabbed my face as he sat up. "Greg!" he shouted, though for me the sound was distant, at the other end of the tunnel in which I found myself.

The man beneath me wants in but I can't let him. He'll hurt me.

No he won't!

He'll use me and abuse me and leave me a wrecked carcass, too damaged to give a man what he deserves, too dilapidated to satisfy or be satisfied, too derelict to be happy.

My head lolled back, my position causing his cock to press harder against my hole, creating a feedback loop that further sent me in a downward spiral of terror fueled by the dark memories of a barbaric assault. What I wanted Keigan to make me feel had been forced on me long ago, so the attempt filled my mind with visions of blood and violence and the taking of innocence.

I can neither take it from him nor give it to him. What have I become?

"Stop! What's wrong?" Maybe the words were meant for me and maybe for someone else. I couldn't say.

I've fallen, my balance failing me and the precipice becoming too small. I'm falling. What should have been a purely physical act of gratification has pushed me over the edge. I'm falling. I thought I knew what I was doing when I came here; clearly I didn't. I'm falling.

A sound so alien that it seemed I was gargling with gravel erupted from my throat, a guttural wail so crude and visceral that it caused Keigan to grab my shoulders and shake me with furious strength as he yelled my name over and over again.

My eyes snapped open. I cut off the noise emanating from my throat. When I looked down, his face was contorted with rabid fear and incomprehension.

"Jesus, you're as pale as a sheet! And you're freezing! What the fuck is wrong? Greg! What's wrong?"

I rolled off him onto my back, my breathing shallow and ragged and way too fast, my body trembling and sweating, my mind reeling.

Leaning over me, cupping my face and gently stroking my cheek, Keigan's worry came through loud and clear. "What's wrong? Greg, are you okay? What the hell just happened? Talk to me!"

I'm broken. I'll never be fixed. I'll never be normal. I can't even let a man fuck me. I'm broken.

"Fuck!" It was time to tell him a tale, the story of my fifteenth birthday and all that preceded and followed it. "Fuck!" I exclaimed again, slamming my fist into the bed to punctuate my displeasure at this turn of events.

* * * * *

"Jesus ..." Keigan muttered as he swiped a hand over his face. "I mean ... Just ... Jesus ... I'm sorry that happened. I just ... just can't imagine. It's unbelievable that there are people like that in the world."

"I wouldn't call him a person," I grunted.

Sitting naked on the edge of the bed with my hands propped on my knees, not once had I shed a tear while recounting the story of Richard, the whole shebang, everything from start to finish.

Keigan had settled against the headboard, his legs pulled up so he could rest his arms on his knees, his head on his arms. He'd stared throughout the telling, bewildered, disgusted, horrified, tearful, woeful, sympathetic.

"Was it fear that stopped us tonight?"

I glanced at him. He didn't look upset, only sorrowful for my suffering. "Yes. Plain and simple. I hoped I was free of Richard's longstanding legacy. Apparently I'm not."

"Or I'm not the one?"

"Huh?" I gave him an inquisitive stare. Then: "Oh. I get it. Maybe you're right. I guess it's a trust thing." Apologetically I added, "It's not like I don't trust you, K, so I don't get it. I don't understand what my problem is."

In a clear attempt to change the subject, Keigan asked, "So you haven't bottomed since then?"

"Not before and not after, and it wasn't by choice when it happened."

"I know. I'm not saying that. But when you came here, that's what you wanted, right?"

"Yeah."

"How do you know you'll even like it?"

"Fingers. And toys."

"Oh. Right. Ever top?"

"Every time I've had sex since then if it was more than oral."

"Well, with the equipment you have, it would be hot if you were a total bottom, but it would also be a waste."

I blushed profusely, ducked my head, squeezed my eyes shut with embarrassment.

"See, that's it right there. That blush, that sheepish reaction."

"What?"

"No wonder I was willing to break my rule."

Turning to look at him, I asked, "What the fuck are you talking about?"

"You."

"What about me?"

He shook his head dismissively. "Nothing," he mumbled with a flutter of one hand. Then with distinct curiosity he asked, "So how did you know?"

With an inquisitive glance I responded, "Know what?"

"That I wouldn't turn you down, that I wouldn't put a stop to this before it started."

Dropping my head, trying to hide the burning in my cheeks, I quietly answered, "I've seen the way you look at me."

He bumped me with his foot. "But I told you I don't do one-night stands, I don't do hookups."

"I know. But I've seen it. I couldn't have seen it a month or two ago, and certainly not before that—"

"Blind spot?"

"Yeah, blind spot. Anyway ... I couldn't have seen it before, but over the last month or two ... Well, I see the way you look at me every time you see me. Pure hunger and want. I didn't think you'd deny me. I assumed you'd bend your rule for me."

"Bend it? Hell, Greg, that wasn't bending it, that was shattering it!"

We laughed.

"So why didn't you?" I asked, my voice soft with trepidation.

He cocked his head slightly. "Why didn't I what?"

"You know ... Why didn't you turn me down? Why didn't you stop me?"

Keigan took a deep breath and let it out slowly, the exhale loud, perhaps too loud. Then he said, "You're oblivious."

"What?" His words shocked me. Blind spot notwithstanding, I wasn't known for being oblivious. Willingly dense, sure, but not oblivious.

"Look at you," he told me as he gestured toward me, waving his hand slowly up and down in my direction. "You're almost always the hottest guy in the room, you're a walking wet dream, sex on two legs, whatever you want to call yourself."

"Hardly ..." I muttered.

"Exactly!" When my dumbfounded gaze met his he explained, "You're unbelievably hot, yet you either don't know how hot you are or you don't care that you're drop-dead gorgeous, and that makes you even hotter."

"I'll be gracious and say thank you, but know that flattery doesn't do a lot for me."

"Greg, be serious and listen to me. I've never seen anybody so comfortably sexy and so physically perfect. From the first moment I saw you I've fantasized about you even though you're not really my type. I've never broken my rule about no-strings sex before, but I was willing to do it with you the moment I first laid eyes on you."

"No strings, huh?"

Why do you sound disappointed? You didn't come here for a marriage proposal. You came for carnal release from the prison Richard put you in, nothing but skin-on-skin sex to break the lock.

"Hey." He bumped me with his foot again. "I like my strings. That's how I'm comfortable, that's how I'm happy. But I'd get attached to you. And you ... you wouldn't. It's a good thing it fell apart because I'd probably be hooked from the physical pleasures alone, not to mention from knowing my biggest fantasy had come true. Meanwhile you'd walk out, having overcome the obstacle you came here with, and I'd be left alone."

I was appalled and it showed on my face when I stared at him. "Why, Keigan? Why do you say that?"

You know why. He does, too. What's with the rhetorical questions?

"It was a setup for pain for me, that's why. I'd be invested and you'd be gone. I've seen it coming, although I didn't think it would reach this stage."

My voice was becoming strident, urgent, but like my expression, it was also becoming sorrowful and tinged with unfulfilled longing. "Why does it have to be that way? Why can't I be blown away by you? Why can't you and I be more than this?" My frantic gesture looked silly trying to encompass both of us and the bed and the room and things in general and the universe and whatever.

Keigan grabbed my flailing hand and gripped it with both of his. As his expression softened with regret and understanding, he said, "I think we both know why, Greg." When I said nothing, he added, "Because I'm not the one for you."

"So apathy is the conclusion?"

"Apathy for everyone else, just not for him." In a lighter tone he continued, "Which is a damn shame, too."

"Why do you say that?"

"What you can do with your body, your mouth ... Jesus, Greg, where'd you learn to kiss like that? You literally took my breath away. It was like you were talking directly to my soul every time our lips met." I was blushing profusely and ducking my head, yet he kept going. "You expertly discovered every one of my sweet spots and knew exactly what to do with them. And I've never had anyone work my dick like you did. People pay good money for that kind of service!"

"You're sounding grossly sycophantic." Admittedly my tone was meek and abashed. I was comfortable with my body and comfortable with my sexual skills, but I wasn't arrogant or haughty. I was just me.

"But I'm right! Man, you'd make one hell of a rich rent boy."

Yanking my hand from his, I smacked his arm as I turned away. "Fuck you ..." I mumbled, too embarrassed to say more.

"It's a compliment. As fantasies go, you're the one that's better than the imagination ever conceived. Seriously, Greg, what's up with that? I thought you haven't had a lot of sex since ..." His tone became a touch more serious. "... well, since your assault."

"I haven't been a monk. I just haven't bottomed. I'm observant; I pay attention to every reaction and sound and expression and every bit of somebody's body language. And maybe I haven't slept around every night for the past sixteen years, but I guarantee I learned from every man I've ever been with, even if it was learning what not to do. Flying fuck, K, I even learned from Richard no matter how unpleasant the experience was."

A salacious grin accompanied his words as he said, "You definitely learned."

I fell back on the bed and covered my face with my hands, rubbing my eyes and groaning.

"I used you." The thought disgusted me, left me with a bad taste in my mouth.

What have I become?

"Not really," he said dryly. When I gave him a curious glance, he added in a softer tone, "You can't rape the willing."

His admission was not so much sad but disappointed in himself, upset that he couldn't refrain from letting me have my way despite knowing I couldn't be what he sought.

Misery. That's the name of the game I'm playing. A hot naked man beside me that I don't love and can't have full sex with because it terrifies me, a hot ex-best friend out there somewhere who I love more than words can describe but who doesn't love me the same way, and I'm scampering about looking for satisfaction where I can't get it and hoping for something I'll never have and trying to fix something that maybe can't be repaired.

"I'm a fucking mess ..." I moaned.

The bed stirred and the covers rustled, then Keigan nestled in beside me, his head on my chest. Tapping my sternum lightly he said, "You're not a mess, Greg. But you're definitely in love and you definitely have residual issues from what happened to you back then. I can't help you with the issues and only time or the object of your affection can help you with the love."

He leaned up on his elbow and stared at me. I dropped my hands onto my abdomen and turned to meet his gaze.

"We're friends, you and me," he began softly, and already I feared what he intended to say, "and I think that's all we'll ever be. I'm really interested in you physically, but other than that I've kind of come to the conclusion that you're out of my league."

"K ..." My voice was charitable yet regretful. He used his free hand to cover my mouth so I couldn't speak.

"Emotionally you're off-limits, Greg. I thought the physical attraction would be enough, a stopgap to get over that hurdle. But it's not. I like you as a friend—hell, I love you as a friend. If it was all physical with me, I'd jump your bones several times a day for the rest of my life. It's not all physical with me, though; I suspect it's not with you either. I want—No, not want, want's too weak a word. I need more, the emotional attachment, the undiluted love."

He leaned down and kissed my forehead without uncovering my mouth.

"I can't get that from you," he continued, "at least not while the ghost of your love for Nate haunts everything, casting shadows over every interaction, every feeling. And even if you were to overcome that love, I'm sorry to say you're really not my type for a longterm relationship and I'm not the type to do empty sex." His hand came off my mouth without warning just as his lips met mine in a soft, gentle, platonic kiss. "Not even for somebody as incredibly hot as you," he whispered against my lips.

I shut my eyes and breathed deep.

I came here because I needed to feel something. Now I do, only it's not what I expected to feel. Not even close ...