9.11 - 13. Chapter 13

July 8, 2001

I woke up and felt my stomach churning, along with my bladder. Most of my body wanted me to stay in bed, but I knew I had to head up to the bathroom, like it or not. I looked over at Tony’s sleeping bag and it was empty, which did nothing to improve my mood.

It took me a few minutes to dig out my toiletry bag and find a towel, but I finally got my shit together and stumbled out of the tent. They were making breakfast: I could smell it, and I could see Carla running around, directing people to get shit done. I managed to slink away without anyone seeing me.

I walked along, enjoying the cooler morning air, noting the isolated signs of life from the various campsites. I was almost to the bathroom when I saw Tony and Rick walking out, both of them looking freshly showered and glowing.

Tony saw me and got a guilty look on his face. “Hey, you’re up,” he said pleasantly.

I so wanted to rip him a new asshole, but I wasn’t going to do that in front of Rick. It seemed to me like that would be an admission of defeat, that Rick had managed to steal my man away and fuck around with him, if I let him see that it bothered me.

“Yeah, I woke up and you were gone, so I got my shit together and thought I’d take a shower,” I said. Rick probably thought things were fine, but my words were clipped enough that Tony knew better. He hesitated, as if he was trying to decide whether to stay and talk to me or go back to the campsite. “You should get back there. Carla was looking for both of you guys, and she was pissed off that you’d been gone so long.”

That was a blatant lie, but it freaked both of them out. They were both probably nervous about Carla, but Tony was really nervous about what I thought about him being gone so long. He should be. “Fine,” Tony said.

I strode confidently away from them, not looking back once, and went to the bathroom first to clear out my bladder. I walked out and went to the showers, which were pretty nasty, just as Mason came walking in. “Morning,” he said cheerfully, with that asshole attitude people who don’t have a hangover use on people who do.

“Morning,” I said back, being just as chipper, to pretend that I didn’t have a massive headache. “Nice showers.” He laughed at my sarcasm.

“This place is a dump, but they like it, so what the fuck,” he said, referring to this group of people. I pulled open a shower curtain and walked in, getting organized. The only thing to commend this thing was that it was big. “Shit. I forgot soap,” he said.

“You forgot soap?” I asked, shaking my head at him like he was an idiot.

He looked frustrated. “I’ll have to go back and get it. Son of a bitch.”

I was pissed off and horny, so I put on my game. If Tony could run off and fuck around with Rick, I could fuck around with Mason. Hopefully. “Well, you’ve got two other choices. You can wait for me to finish up and use my soap, or you can share with me,” I said, gesturing to the shower, all but inviting him in.

He looked around, as if to check to see if someone else was there, and then raised an eyebrow. “What the fuck,” he said as he walked in and closed the curtain behind him. I turned on the water to let it warm up, and then we stripped off our clothes, facing away from each other. We finished at almost the same time and turned around to face each other.

Our cocks rose as if by magic, and almost in sync, so choreographed that it made me chuckle, and that made him laugh. He had a nice dick, about six inches long, and pretty thick. It reminded me again of Gathan’s cock. I moved forward and gently stroked it. “Nice,” I told him, to stroke his ego, and because it was.

“Dude, you are fucking hung,” he said to me softly as he grabbed my dick.

“Soap,” I said with a smile, and got my hands soapy, then handed the bar to him. He did the same thing, and we started out jacking each other off, then he moved his hand away and started jacking himself off. His eyes didn’t leave my dick once. It was really erotic, for some weird reason, to be jacking off with this dude in a campground shower, and the eroticism fueled my orgasm. “Gonna cum,” I muttered, and then blasted my load, hitting him with the first few globs, while the rest fell on the floor.

He picked up his pace, but I moved around behind him, remembering this maneuver from the past, and lodged my dick between his ass cheeks. I reached around and took over, stroking him just like he’d been stroking himself. He ground his ass against my dick while he moaned softly, and laid his head back against my chest, surrendering to my touch. “My turn,” he all but grunted. I felt his cock swell in my hand, and looked down to watch it pulse as it blasted all over the wall and the floor.

While he came down from his post-orgasmic high, I got out my shampoo and washed my hair, then finished washing off my body and rinsing off. “I’ll let you finish up while I dry off,” I said. I looked out of the shower carefully and the room was empty, so I snuck out, a towel wrapped around my waist, and started to get dressed. I finished up, and then went to the sink to brush my teeth and work on my hair. He came out and took the other sink, doing the same thing. “I’ll see you back there,” I said as I finished up.

“Wait up,” he said. “I’ll walk back with you.” I didn’t say anything while he finished up, then we headed back to the campsite.

“What time do we leave?” I asked, referring to the float.

“Probably in about half an hour,” he said, and then got nervous. “Dude, I’m not gay. I’m just horny.” I rolled my eyes at him. Was every gay guy in St. Louis a closet case?

“Glad I could help out,” I said simply, even though I wanted to be more obnoxious. “You didn’t get any last night?”

He shook his head. “Rachel was too fucked up.” I thought that was a lame excuse, but maybe it was true. Hell, didn’t most dudes get chicks drunk so they could fuck them?

“Bummer,” I said, trying to sound sympathetic. We got back to the campsite and I headed to our tent to put my stuff away.

“Hey,” Tony said when I walked in. He was apprehensive, and he had good reason to be.

“So since I cock blocked you last night, you figured you’d wake up early and take care of Rick?” I asked, with real venom in my voice. He wanted to lie to me and tell me that he didn’t, but he knew I’d figured this out.

“I’m sorry,” he said, but I wasn’t in the mood to let him off that easy.

“You could have stayed here and woke me up, but you chose him instead. He blow you better than I do?” I asked, barely keeping my volume under control.

“No,” he said. This was probably sheer agony for him, but he had been a total asshole, and while I wasn’t going to bust his balls for grappling with coming out, I wasn’t going to be lied to, and I wasn’t going to put up with being played.

“Do you remember when we first met? You were telling me about your father, and how pissed off you were at him for cheating on your mom, and not doing what he said. On not living up to his commitments. To not living up to his word. Do you remember that?”

He said nothing, he just stared at me, as that comment, and the pain that went with it seared through his brain. “You told me you would never do that. You told me you were a man of your word. Do you remember that?” I waited for him to say something, but he didn’t. “Looks like that was one big lie. Looks like your word isn’t worth shit.”

“Will...” he began, trying to calm me down, and trying to keep me from freaking out on him.

But he had nothing to worry about. I was pissed off, and that was hiding the pain I felt, but I was also calm, and I wasn’t about to freak out. His actions gave me a whole new direction, a whole new attitude about our relationship. I’d been putting him up on this pedestal as an honorable guy, and he’d just fallen off of it, with his reputation, in my eyes, shattered into a million pieces. “Look Tony, you’re an amazing piece of ass. You take me to a whole new world when we have sex. But I can’t trust you for shit. So from this moment forward, we’re fuck buddies, and we’re friends, and that’s it.”

He was reeling from my comments, both from how I said them and how I meant them, and I reminded myself that he needed some extra TLC. He sat on one of the camp chairs with a thud and put his face in his hands. “I’m sorry,” he muttered. I didn’t realize what was wrong with his voice until he looked at me, tears running down his face. Tony never cried. I felt like shit.

“Look, I’m sorry I brought up your father. That was a shitty thing to do.”

“It was the truth,” he said, almost sobbing. I put my arm around his shoulder and it was like I pulled a trigger. He grabbed onto me and hugged me tightly, crying gently on my shoulder.

“I think you need the freedom to figure out who you are,” I said. “You’re not ready for a relationship. With anyone.”

He looked at me, pissed off at me for saying that because he knew I was right. “It’s really confusing,” he said honestly. “I love you here,” he said, touching his heart, “but I have a hard time honoring my commitment.”

“Dude, we don’t even have much of a commitment,” I said, not in a mean way, but in a bid to get him to understand me. “You can fuck around with Rick all summer. All you had to do was not do it when I’m around. Even that was too tough.”

“I’m a total asshole,” he said, despondent again.

“That is not it. You just can’t be in a relationship yet. Not with me. Not with anyone. Not until you figure out who you are, and what you want. If you are, you’ll be toxic, to yourself and whoever you’re with.”

“This is like my second break-up in 24 hours,” he said, trying to be amusing. “Maybe you’re right. I’m not very good at this shit.”

I chuckled. “I’m not breaking up with you, and I’m not dumping you, I’m just saying that we have no commitments and no obligations.”

He nodded at me, but he was still really down, so to try and ease his pain a bit, I leaned in and kissed him. I could feel the volcano of emotions inside him, feel it as he let them out. He loved me, but he was confused and conflicted, and that made him dangerous. I got that even if he didn’t. “Tony!” I heard Carla call. “You gonna eat?”

“Fuck,” he said, breaking off our kiss.

“No, we’ll do that later,” I said, winking at him and making him smile again.

“Food?” he asked.

“I’m all over that,” I said. I followed him out of the tent to where Carla had organized breakfast.

“Sit there,” she instructed me, pointing to a spot at the picnic table. She wasn’t being rude; she was just telling me that she didn’t need any help. And she was telling me that she was in charge, like I hadn’t already figured that out.

“OK,” I said, but smiled at her. Tony sat next to me and we started eating. They’d made pancakes, eggs, and bacon, and I was pretty surprised that they were settling in my stomach so well after all that I’d had to drink last night.

I wasn’t really paying close attention to what was going on, since I was focused on food and keeping it down, so I didn’t notice when a couple strolled into the campsite. At least not until I felt Tony tense up, and then freak out. “What the fuck are they doing here?” he shouted, and stood up to go confront these two people.

Carla came running up to him and put her hands on his shoulders. “Tony, calm down,” she said, but it was more like an order.

“Answer the fucking question,” he demanded loudly. His comment was directed more to this couple than to Carla. I had stood up and followed him closely, if for no other reason than to have his back. His shouting, and subsequent loud talking, had caused all of his friends to gather near the confrontation, even though most of them were already eating breakfast and had seen the whole thing.

Tony was really pissed off, so much that even Carla seemed a little nervous about dealing with him. “Tony, can we talk?” the female part of the couple asked.

“I don’t have anything to say to you, Teresa,” he said rudely. I wracked my brain, trying to remember who she was, and then it clicked. Tony had told me about the three girlfriends he’d had before Dana, and Teresa was the last one. She’s the one who’d fucked around in Cancun but he’d forgiven her, only then she’d ended up messing around with the dude who was his best friend. That must be the guy in front of me. “The only thing I’m going to do is kick Mike’s ass,” he said to the other guy, confirming my suspicion.

“Fuck you,” Mike said. “It’s not like you weren’t fucking around on T.” ‘T’ must be his nickname for Teresa.

“What the fuck do you mean?” Tony demanded, really losing it.

“You want me to talk about that?” Mike asked. Tony got ready to lunge forward but I put my hand on his shoulder.

“Chill the fuck out,” I said firmly. He looked at me and exhaled, while Carla gave me an appraising look, since she hadn’t been able to calm him down. But he already knew he was seriously on my shit list, and I figured he’d listen to me so he didn’t blow it any worse. “Did you know they were coming?”

“No, I didn’t fucking know they’d be here,” he spat, and then both of us looked at Carla.

“I figured you could work things out,” Carla said. “It’s been over a fucking year, Tony. Teresa and Mike are our friends too. It’s bullshit that we can’t all do shit together, and that we can’t invite them when you’re around. Or invite you when they are.”

“That’s bullshit,” Rick said to Tony. “Let’s get the fuck out of here.” That really pissed me off, especially when I saw the almost smarmy expression on his face when he said it. He was going to take this chance to drag Tony off. Tony turned away like he was going to go. He was going to go off with Rick and leave me here? He took a step away from me then seemed to think better of it, and turned around to look at me. He must have seen the fury in my eyes. But I was so done with him and this bullshit drama.

He could do what he wanted to, but I’d learned my manners from Grandmaman, Grand, and Aunt Claire, even though two thirds of those people were mad at me. Those manners were ingrained, and they kicked in. I walked up to Teresa. “Hi. I’m Will Schluter. My family’s been good friends with Tony’s family for years.” From the corner of my eye I saw Tony staring at me, amazed and confused.

She shook my hand and smiled. She was really pretty. “Nice to meet you, Will.”

“I’m Mike,” her boyfriend said, and shook my hand too. He was one handsome dude. He wasn’t Italian, though. His features looked more like those you’d find on a Northern European. If I had to guess, I’d say he was of German descent. He had a nice firm handshake.

I turned to face Tony. “Go talk to her,” I told him. I normally wouldn’t have done that, but he carried these grudges around, and it was pretty unhealthy. Besides, based on what Mike said, I was betting that Tony was sneaking off and fucking around on her while they were together. If not with Rick, maybe he was messing around with Mike? Only Tony really knew. Rick was standing next to him, all but ready to drag him off. “You’re not fucking perfect either,” I spat at him. I might as well have slapped him when I said that, reminding him of our earlier conversation, and how he’d been totally untrustworthy.

He looked over at Teresa and I could see the pain in his eyes, but there was only one way for him to deal with that. “Come on,” he said to her. He led her over to a picnic table far enough away from everyone so we could see them but not hear them. Rick gave both me and Carla dirty looks, and then took off, presumably to go back to his tent. I sat back down and decided to eat while I glanced at them, then Carla did the same thing, which led everyone else to follow her lead. Mike just stood there, looking like an idiot “Sit down and eat, Mike,” Carla said. He did, and joined us as we devoured more food. No one talked about Tony and Teresa; the only conversation was about the float, or the food we were eating.

“Tony doesn’t listen to many people,” Carla said to me.

“I’ll bet he listens to you,” I teased, getting a laugh from those who heard me say it.

“That’s why I said ‘many’ people,” she said.

“So was that an engagement ring on Teresa’s finger?” Carmine asked. He was the loud guy. How ironic that he was the only one who’d seen that.

“Yeah,” Mike said, grinning. He seemed genuinely happy about it, which was nice, but it explained a lot about why they were here. They probably wanted to work things out before the wedding. It would suck to have your friends divided when you wanted to throw that kind of party.

Everyone congratulated him, even me, but I remained surreptitiously focused on Tony. I saw him talking to her, saw Teresa take his hands in hers, saw her put one of her hands on his cheek, and saw her hug him, and give him a kiss on the cheek. It would have freaked me out to be them, to have everyone staring at me like that, but they seemed totally focused on each other. They must have talked for about half an hour when they stood up together and started walking back. She said something to Tony and he smiled shyly and looked down; God, he was adorable when he did that.

I wasn’t sure what Tony would do now. He walked toward the table with a real purpose, and headed straight to Mike. Mike stood up, which was a smart move. I wouldn’t want a guy like Tony who was pissed off at me coming up to me while I was sitting down. “Congrats,” Tony said, and held out his hand.

Mike smiled at him and shook his hand. “Thanks.” Tony had said that he and Mike had been good friends, best friends, so this must have really bugged Mike. He looked pretty relieved. Everyone else was shitting a brick, totally blown away that Tony had done that, but not me. I was proud of him. His eyes met mine and I smiled at him, getting the slightest grin in acknowledgement.

“Congrats on what?” Carla asked to bait them, since we’d all already figured it out.

“We’re engaged,” Mike said, and put his arm around Teresa. Everyone got up to congratulate them again since Teresa was there now, while Tony worked his way out of the whole picture.

“That was a classy thing to do,” I told him.

“Thanks,” he said. “We need more ice. Let’s go.”

“Fine with me,” I said.

“Goin’ to get some ice, Carla,” he said to her. “Be back in a few.”

“Perfect,” she said, then went back to bubbling over Mike and Teresa.

We got in the car and Tony negotiated his way out of the campground. I didn’t say anything, just waiting for him to talk. “She asked me if it was a bad thing to be dumped for her soul mate,” he said, shaking his head. “I guess not.”

“That makes sense,” I agreed. “I mean, if she’d dumped you for some dude and then dumped him a month later, that’d be kind of worse, wouldn’t it?”

“Not always,” he said thoughtfully. “If you want to get back together with someone, you hope that it doesn’t last.”

“I can see that,” I agreed. I guess I’d looked at this the same way I’d looked at Ryan and Shiloh, where he’d totally blown me off for her. That had pissed me off, but I was happy for him anyway. This would be totally different. “But you don’t want that.”

“Nope, I don’t,” he said. “Now that I think about it, I wasn’t really all that upset about us breaking up. It was just pretty fucking humiliating to be dumped for my best friend. It made me look like shit.”

“I can see that,” I agreed again. That would be pretty raw, especially since all of his friends would have been talking about it. “But now you look pretty good, being such a gentleman about it.”

“Right,” he said, unwilling to admit to doing anything noble.

“What did Mike mean when he said you were fucking around on her?” I asked him.

“What do you mean?” he asked belligerently, because he didn’t want to answer the question.

“You know what I mean,” I snapped back. “Were you fucking around with him?”

“No, I wasn’t fucking around with him,” Tony said dismissively. I said nothing, just waiting for an answer, but he tried to change the subject. “Weather looks good for the float today.” I said nothing. We got to the store and he parked, and made to get out. “Let’s go.”

I sat there, staring at him, watching him try to avoid the whole thing, and then he sighed. “Mike knew Rick and I fucked around once in a while.”

“He busted you,” I said, but it was more of a question.

“Yeah,” Tony admitted.

“He ever tell any of your friends?” I asked, trying to figure this Mike guy out.

“No!” Tony snapped.

“Not even after you guys hated each other?” I asked.

“No,” he said. “I don’t know if he told Teresa or not.”

“Dude, that’s pretty honorable of him,” I said. He nodded. “So you were all pissed off at her for blowing your friend, when you were doing the same thing?”

That hit him hard, way too close to home. He gave me a foul look, grabbed his keys, and walked into the store. But that was the deal with him. That’s exactly what he’d done to me. He’d been with me, but then he’d snuck off and blown Rick. And he didn’t really think that was wrong, or if he did, he just didn’t care about it. He needed a slut on the side. He needed a male mistress. When he was with Dana, I’d been that guy. When he was with me, he’d been with Rick.

Suddenly I felt trapped. I so didn’t want to be here with him. If I stayed, I’d just be miserable, and I’d make him miserable. I looked in the back seat, and as if to validate my course of action, my backpack was sitting there. I could do without the shit I’d left at the campsite, but I couldn’t do without my backpack. I heard him open the trunk and toss a bunch of ice in, and with every thump, I felt more and more trapped. He got back in the car. “I think I got enough ice.”

“I’m going home,” I told him as I reached for my backpack.

“What?”

“I’m going home.” I started to open the door but he reached over and grabbed my arm.

“You’re just going to get out of the car here in the middle of Missouri and leave?” he asked me.

“Yeah,” I said. There had to be an airport near here somewhere. And someone would give me a ride there. There weren’t many places I’d end up where I’d be trapped.

“I told you I was sorry about this morning. I thought you were over that.”

“Only it’s not like that, Tony. When you were with Teresa, you fucked around with Rick. When you were with Dana, you fucked around with me. And when you were with me, you fucked around with Rick again. I can’t trust you.” I opened the door and got out.

“Wait!” he said loudly.

“What?”

“At least let me drive you to the airport,” he said.

“You’ll miss your float,” I told him.

“I don’t give a shit about that. Come on. I’ll take you back to get your shit, and then I’ll take you to the airport,” he said fatalistically. He started the car up and waited for me to jump in.

“You can just bring it back with you when you come back to Paly,” I said, not wanting to back down now.

“Come on, Will. You at least need to get your stuff,” he said. “And I need to drop off this ice.”

“Fine,” I grumbled, and got in the car with him.

“You know, when we were hanging out last summer, going to the City, and going to Santa Cruz, we were just friends. I had a lot of fun with you,” he said.

That was before I knew who he was, and what he was like. That was when I believed that when he said something, and made a commitment, he’d live up to it. Now that I knew what he was like, did I even want him for a friend? I rode on in silence, thinking about that, mulling it over in my head. The words that kept ruminating through my brain were, ironically enough, from Robbie. He’d told me once that Tony was a wounded puppy, and that he was going to need some extra understanding. “So you’re asking me to go ahead and just go on this float with you as your pal?”

“Yeah,” he said, and smiled at me.

“Well back then, I had a whole different opinion of you,” I said. “I thought you were a real man. Now I think you’re kind of a piece of shit.”

“I’ll try to do better,” he said quietly, and I saw him wipe a tear out of his eye while trying to look like he wasn’t.

“Let’s go,” I said, agreeing to his plan.

“Thanks, Will,” he said. I realized that there was an ulterior motive for him. If I’d have said ‘no’, it would have looked bad for him, and it would have made it look like me leaving was somehow related to Teresa and Mike showing up. It may make it look like we were together. Did he do anything that was genuine and sincere? Ever?

We got back to the campsite and everyone was loading up their canoes. I felt really lonely and isolated, and I was in a really bad mood. Going on this thing was probably a really bad idea. “You got lots of ice,” Carla said, looking in the trunk. “Carmine!”

“What?” he asked, but without the surliness he usually had since he was talking to Carla.

“Put this ice in the coolers,” she ordered.

“Fine,” he said. Everyone worked pretty fast to get the ice packed away.

“We leave in 15 minutes,” Carla announced. “Last chance for a bathroom break.”

“I’ll be back,” I told Tony, and headed back up to the restroom. I was kind of surprised to hear heavy footsteps behind me, then beside me.

“We gotta hurry,” Carmine said. This dude was huge. He reminded me a little bit of Carullo, this dude that was a friend of Matt, and who I’d blown. He was big, beefy, and muscular.

“Dude, we’ve got 15 minutes,” I said as we walked into the restroom.

“Barely gives me time to fuck you,” he said, shocking the shit out of me. I walked into a stall and he was right behind me, pushing the door closed. “Drop your pants.”

I was going to argue with him, but it was really erotic to have this massive guy see me, want me, and then tell me he was going to fuck me. I dropped my pants after pulling a condom and lube out of my pocket. He ran his hand over my ass, making me moan. He unzipped his pants and I reached behind to feel his cock; it wasn’t all that big, probably five inches long, and not all that thick either. Good thing I hadn’t pulled out a magnum. I turned around to put the condom on him, then the lube, and then he spun me back around, pushed me so I was bent over, and shoved his dick into me. “Fuck yeah. That’s good,” he said. After that, he just grunted and groaned. We were in a hurry, but he didn’t seem to have much endurance anyway. I stroked my cock frantically, trying to bust my nut before he did, but he still beat me to it. He grabbed my hips and jammed his cock into me as hard and as far as he could while he let out a muffled primal moan. I thought I could feel his dick pulsing as he shot his load into the condom. I heard someone else come into the bathroom, and for some reason, that set off my fuse. I blew my wad into the toilet, biting back my moans as I did.

The dude that came in went into the other stall, so Carmine took that opportunity to pull out, rip off the condom, zip up his pants, and all but run out of the bathroom. I wiped my ass off, flushed the toilet, and walked up to the sink and started washing my hands. The other stall opened and Tony came walking out, looking sad and pissed at the same time.

“You ready to go?” I asked him. He nodded and led me back to the canoes, saying nothing.