Furlough

By Mark Arbour

February, 1917

I woke up in a cold sweat, hoping that I hadn't been screaming too loudly, pausing to listen, to see if anyone was at the door of my room anxiously pounding as they'd done last night. There was no pounding but I got up anyway, looking at my legs, still scarred from the bites of the various insects that I'd carried with me on the front lines. As if it received a subliminal message, my hand habitually ran through my clipped light brown hair to scratch at the lice that were no longer there.

I sighed and looked out the window. I could see the Eiffel Tower off in the distance, standing there proudly as the sun began to set. This must be Tuesday then. I'd slept restlessly now for the past 36 hours, trying to let slumber block out the horror of the battlefield, the sheer gore that no one should ever have to see: The carnage that was the Somme. My mind went to the memory of seeing my best friend obliterated by an artillery blast, a thankfully brief ending compared to some of the other men, who had their limbs blown off, or even worse. Or those that hadn't gotten their masks on in time and had been gassed, and spent the last hours of their lives coughing their lungs up. The young faces, some barely 17, cannon fodder for idiotic generals and politicians. No one seemed willing or able to stop the madness. Maybe those that were already gone were the lucky ones.

My stomach rumbled, a reminder that I was desperately hungry. Somehow I'd managed to dodge the dysentery that plagued most of the men in my unit. I got up and put on the new uniform they'd given me when they pulled us off the line. Our other clothes, caked with mud and blood from the fields in Flanders, and crawling with parasites, had been burned while we stood there, stripped naked, and went through our own delousing process. At the end of it, they'd handed me new clothes, smaller than the old ones to fit my emaciated body.

This hotel had been commandeered by the military to provide lodging for men like me on leave from the front, and to their credit, they did everything they could to make us comfortable. But while they could wipe off the sludge on the outside, the gunk on the inside, the ghosts that haunted us, remained. I made my way down the stairs and passed another hollow soldier. We didn't speak; we didn't even make eye contact. Why make a friend, when he'd most likely just be blasted into atoms when he went back to the front?

“Any messages for me?” I asked the front desk clerk brusquely. She was a nice lady, but I wasn't in the mood to be nice, to flirt.

“Name?” she asked.

“Jack Masterson,” I said.

“You're English?” she asked politely.

“Canadian,” I said as if she'd insulted me. I had nothing against my English brothers, but I didn't want to be lumped in as one of them.

“Of course. One moment.” She scanned some boxes then turned back to me. “No, no message.”

I nodded and walked out into the Paris streets. Paris had survived the Kaiser's initial onslaught, but there was an apprehension that hung in the air. I wandered around the city, going nowhere, everywhere, not looking at anything, not seeing anything, which was how I ran into him, quite literally.

I felt my foot kick something. “Hey!” shouted a voice below me. “Watch where you're walking!”

“I'm sorry,” I said sincerely, and reached down to help him up.

“Sure you are. Piss off,” he said to me in French.

“No really,” I said, kneeling down to help him upright. He glared at me, eyes full of fire and anger, a look I recognized. He wasn't mad at me, he was just mad. I paused to look at the man I'd treated like a soccer ball. Young, very young, like the raw recruits that we saw on the line. If this kid was 17, he just barely was. Dark hair, brown or black, it was hard to tell in the twilight, with pale skin and fine features, features so fine they made him pretty in a feminine way. But the most predominant feature was his eyes, as dark as his hair, but flashing with emotion. “I'm just in a bit of a daze. I just came off the line.”

That mellowed him. “It is alright. I have suffered worse.”

Now was the time that I should walk on, the incident over, only I didn't want to. “I'm Jack,” I said, holding out my hand.

He looked at me oddly. “Gabriel,” he said, shaking my hand.

I held his hand, not wanting to let go, that little bit of human warmth so overwhelmingly restorative. He looked at me curiously, then knowingly. “Uh, I was, uh, I'm hungry and I was going to eat. Will you join me?” I asked. What the fuck was I doing? Asking some street waif to eat with me.

“If you will pay,” he said, and flashed a smile. He had a nice smile, his teeth only slightly yellowed, with playful dimples in his sunken cheeks.

“I will pay,” I said. I expected him to jump up, but he didn't. Instead, he put a hand on the ground and moved his right leg into position, then grabbed a cane to haul himself up. I didn't offer to help, sensing that he'd resent me for it. He stood up and his coat opened, revealing a tattered French uniform, and also revealing that his left leg was gone.

He saw me studying his disability and got a defiant look. “Do you still want to eat with me, now that you know I am not a whole man?” He was so bitter.

“Missing a leg does not make you less of a man. I'm still going to buy you dinner. Where shall we go?”

He smiled again to thank me, and pointed to a café down the street. We headed down there, his pace slow as he hobbled along. He was remarkably short, shorter than 5'5” at most. They frowned at him at the café, but grudgingly led us to a table. “Your credit is no good here,” the waiter said rudely to him. “You still owe us 10 francs.”

Rude waiters in Paris were the norm, so that bothered neither one of us. “You can add the 10 francs onto my bill, monsieur. Your courtesy to your veterans is most reassuring.” The waiter scowled at me as he gave us menus, while Gabriel smiled at me.

“You do not have to pay my debts,” he said then, shifting to an indignant posture.

“Where did you lose your leg?” I asked, ignoring his comment.

“The Marne. At first I thought I was lucky that it was just my leg, that nothing else vital was removed,” he said, smiling at me. “But who wants to be with a legless man anyway?” I just shrugged. “Where were you?”

“The Somme,” I said. We just looked at our menus then, neither one of us wanting to talk about the horrors of the battlefield. After a little more than two years of war, we'd all had enough.

The waiter returned and we ordered a ton of food. He gave us a wry look, as if wondering whether we'd actually pay for it, until I took out 20 francs and handed it to him. “You see, my money is good,” I said in a snotty manner to match his. He nodded and left.

“You’re not supposed to pay until after we eat,” Gabriel said playfully.

“I'm too hungry to have them screw around, wondering if I've got money to foot the bill,” I said back. And then he did something that totally surprised me. He laughed. And then I laughed with him.

Our eyes met and our laughter stopped. “I didn't think I'd ever laugh again,” I said.

“I am glad you did. You have a nice laugh,” he responded. Was he flirting with me? Did he think I’d picked him up and brought him here because I wanted to fuck him? Did he think I was a queer? I found myself retreating from him, fleeing from the intimacy and contact. I wasn't queer. He sensed the change in my mood and he withdrew too, and I missed our personal connection.

“Thanks,” I said in a friendly way, trying to repair the damage. “You have a nice laugh too. It goes with your smile.” Why did I say that? Did I just raise the ante, throwing in a comment on the smile right after the comment on the laugh? He looked at me curiously, as if I was an enigma. I didn't blame him one bit. I wasn't sure what was going on inside of me either.

“So you are from Canada?” he asked.

“How did you know?” I demanded, wondering if my horrible Quebecois French had given me away.

“The maple leaf buttons,” he said, pointing at my uniform.

“Oh,” I said sheepishly. “I thought it was my horrible French.”

He laughed again. “Your French is not bad. Your accent is odd though, and your grammar is different. I think it is interesting.”

The waiter came and set the food down with his surly attitude, but we didn't care. Conversation ceased as we dove into our supper. It was obvious that Gabriel hadn't eaten in quite a while either. We indulged ourselves in a gastronomic orgy until there wasn't a crumb of food left on the table. He looked up with a twinkle in his eyes and we laughed again.

The waiter brought our check, as if to hurry us on our way. “After your meal, and his debts, you have five francs left,” he said.

“Keep it on credit for my friend here,” I said.

“You are one of his clients then?” the waiter sneered. And then something snapped inside me and I was up out of my chair with my hands around his neck.

“Jack, let him go,” Gabriel yelled. I felt him smack me with his cane, and the physical contact brought me out of my rage. I let the waiter go, watching him as he staggered away from me, coughing and struggling to regain his breath. “I think we should go,” he said.

I glared at the waiter as we walked slowly out of the cafe, pausing only to snatch the five francs from his hand and give it to Gabriel. He looked uncomfortable, but the reality of his situation was such that he took it and pocketed it. “I'm sorry about that,” I told him.

“Thanks for sticking up for me,” he said.

We walked down the street to a little park, one of the many little oases in the city of Paris, and sat next to each other on a bench. “What did he mean by client?” I asked.

“He was trying to insult me, implying that I am a male whore,” Gabriel said, irritated.

“Are you,” I asked indelicately.

“Why, is that why you bought me dinner? So you could fuck me?” he demanded defensively. He made to get up but I held him down. “Fuck off. Fucking let me go!” he yelled.

“No. I didn't mean to insult you; I'm just not always too good with words. I did not buy you dinner because I wanted to fuck you.”

He relaxed. “You do not want to fuck me?”

I chuckled. “No.”

“Is it my leg, because I'm deformed?” he demanded, angry and sad again.

“No, it is because you are a man,” I said. I'd never really thought about being with a man before. Hell, I'd only been with women, two to be exact, and one of them had been a whore. I thought about it, about being with him, about feeling his body next to mine. I waited for the revulsion, the disgust that was supposed to follow. It didn't. Why? “Do you sleep with men?”

He eyed me, the myriad of emotions flying across his face were too confusing to follow. “Sometimes,” he said softly. “Sometimes human contact, any contact, is all that is important.” I nodded, understanding.

“Um,” I said, starting a sentence that was probably ill-advised. “Um, would you like to sleep with me?”

He eyed me strangely now. “I thought you did not want to fuck me?”

“I don't want to fuck you,” I said, and then began to wonder if that was true. “But I haven't been able to sleep. I was thinking, hoping that with you there, the demons may abate.”

“You are having the dreams?” he asked sadly. I nodded. “They are the worst. I do not know if I can help, but I will try.”

“Thanks,” I said, gazing into his eyes. I felt an almost uncontrollable urge to kiss him, but I resisted. Where were these desires, these feelings coming from? I stood up and held my hand out to help him up as well.

“I can get up on my own,” he snapped. I took his cane from him and then held my hand out again.

“A shoulder is easier to lean on, and walk with,” I said, pulling his thin frame against my right side. His warmth, the feeling of him next to me, began to elicit an entirely different reaction as I felt my pants start to tent. I willed my dick to go down. Gabriel looked down, and I felt myself blushing, but he said nothing.

We got back to the hotel and I helped him up the stairs. No one noticed us. No one cared. “Nice room,” he said as we hobbled in and I closed the door. He noticed that I had a bathroom, with a bathtub. “Having your own bathroom is quite a luxury. There is nothing as relaxing as a warm bath.”

“Take one,” I said. He looked at me curiously, and then shook his head. “It's in my own interest,” I told him. “If I'm going to sleep with you, I'd prefer that you smell a little better.”

He laughed at my lame joke and took off his coat, hanging it up on the hook next to the door. “You get ready, and I'll run the water,” I told him helpfully. I went into the bathroom and turned on the faucets. It took an eternity for the water to warm up. It was February, and thus frigid, so I made the water nice and warm. I heard a noise and looked up to see him shuffling in with his cane.

He smiled at me nervously, his discomfort at being naked in front of me obvious. I lowered my eyes to take in his young torso, his muscles visible through his young flesh, and his stomach sunken way too much. He didn't look like he was starving, but he did look like he'd gone hungry too many times. The only hair visible was a little bit peeking out from under his arms. My eyes moved lower, to his groin. He had a small pubic bush too, the whole look made him seem more of a boy than a man, but the nice dick hanging over two big balls gave away his more advanced level of maturity. His right leg was huge, with massive calf and thigh muscles, but with remarkably little hair as well. I guess it had to be muscular to compensate for the loss of the other one. He had the slightest hint of a stub where his left leg once was. I realized I was staring, and I looked into his eyes and knew that he'd seen me take him in. He'd seen the reaction to his lack of a leg, and he'd interpreted it as revulsion. His face showed that he was trying to be angry, but he was nearer to tears.

I stood up and walked over to him and picked him up, shocking the shit out of him, and then carried him over to the bathtub and put him in gently. He gazed into my eyes and, again, I wanted to kiss him, but I resisted again. “You embarrass me,” he said.

“Why?”

“The way you stare at me. The way you looked at my missing leg,” he said sadly. “The fact that I am naked and you are fully clothed.”

“I never thought I could find another man to be beautiful, but you are,” I said to him, knowing that I was taking this to a new level, and knowing that I wanted to. “I'll be right back.”

I went back into the hotel room and carefully took off my uniform. The beefiness that had been part of me for all 21 years of my life was gone, with a more firm, thin body. I looked in the mirror, admiring my six feet of height, my best feature. Compared to Gabriel, I would normally look like a gorilla; only most of my body hair had been trimmed or shaved during the delousing process, so I looked slightly ridiculous. I stared at my groin, noticing that my encounter with Gabriel had plumped up my dick. My second best feature, it was big, almost eight inches long, but not too thick. Just staring at it was causing it to swell even more, so I shook my head as if to reset my libido, and headed into the bathroom.

Gabriel turned as soon as I walked in and I saw him smile, then his mouth hung open as he stared at me, raping me with his eyes. Standing there nude, with him probing me with his eyes, was erotic, too erotic, so I hurried over to the bathtub and knelt next to him, my cock now out of his direct line of site. “Wash my back,” he ordered, handing me the soap, and rotating his body so his stomach was facing the bottom of the tub. He draped his arms over the back of the tub, and stretched out languorously.

I began to soap his back, kneading his tense muscles, feeling him relax with my touch. His skin, so soft, seemed to merge with my calloused hands, almost like they were physically sinking into him. My eyes weren't focused on his back though; they were focused lower, on his adorable little ass. An ass so small and so cute it almost seemed lost in his body, but it was too magnificent for that, too glorious not to be noticed. He squeezed his cheeks slightly, exposing his dimples, one on each side. I looked down at my cock, now fully engorged and throbbing, and stared back at his butt. I licked my lips involuntarily.

I moved my hands down to his waist, wanting desperately to go lower, but not sure if it was OK. “Lower,” he said softly. I moved my hands down lower, to the top of his ass. “Lower,” he said again, and I knew now that I had my invitation. I ran my hands over his cheeks, caressing them, enjoying their softness. He spread his legs, well, his one leg, apart, exposing his crack. I willingly ran my hand up and down, grazing his hole. My whole being was transfixed by his body; my sole goal was to plunge my cock into his sweet ass. He moaned and thrust back against my fingers, so I probed his hole, pushing a finger in. “I thought you did not want to fuck me,” he said in between moans.

“I thought so too, but I changed my mind.” I felt his hand brush across my cock, and then grab it.

“You are a big boy,” he said with a smile. “You need to use more fingers to loosen me up.”

“You mean you're going to let me fuck you?” I asked, thinking this was too good to be true.

“Oh yes,” he said, as my second finger pulled him open. I wasn't sure if it was supposed to be this easy or not, but I put that aside. After I managed to cram three fingers in his ass, and after his panting subsided, I figured he was ready.

I rubbed the soap on my cock and pulled him out of the tub, carefully putting him against it so his body was against the side and his head was hanging over the soapy water. I moved up to him and pushed my dick in slowly, feeling his resistance, then feeling his ass relent, and then feeling him welcome me in. “Ahhh,” he cried softly.

It was an amazing feeling, the most amazing feeling, his tight warm ass wrapped around my dick as I plunged into him. I went slowly, savoring every inch, every millimeter of him.

“Come on, fuck me,” he said roughly. I felt a primal surge, a surge that pushed the gentleness I'd shown so far into the background. I slammed my dick into him and grabbed his hair, hair that was greasy, and plunged his head under the water, only for a second. Then I pulled his head out while he spluttered for breath. Then I plunged him under again, and again, feeling his ass quiver around me. Then I slowed my pace and grabbed the soap and began massaging it into his hair, working it into his scalp. Then I forced his head underwater again, rinsing his hair out, and did it again and again and again, all the time picking up my pace, until I knew I was getting close.

I felt the orgasm surge and put both of my hands on his hips, holding him steady while I really pounded him. I saw him lower his right hand to his own dick and begin to masturbate furiously, sensing that I was close and wanting to bring himself off with me. I still came first, blasting my load into him, and a huge load it was. I hadn't jacked off in a long time. I lost myself in my own orgasm, conscious only that he was moaning and writhing under me, busting his own nut. And the orgasm wasn't a simple orgasm; it was wave after wave after wave. I noticed that Gabriel had stopped moving, clearly finished, but I didn't give a shit as I plunged on and on and on. Finally, spent, I pulled out of him abruptly, my cum pouring out of his ass.

He pulled himself back into the tub to rinse off, facing away from me. I turned on the water to warm it up and got a carafe to pour fresh warm water over him, and my groin, as the dirty water drained from the tub, slowly removing the soap from our bodies. Then I got a towel and dried myself off first, and then began drying Gabriel. He lay there in the tub, face down, letting me work the towel into his crevices. Then I turned him over and looked at his face, the first time since I fucked him, and saw tears pouring out of his eyes.

I felt my chest swell with love as I reached over and picked him up and carried him to the bed, gently laying him on it. I moved up next to him and kissed him, the first kiss, and it was magical. He smiled up at me and pulled my head in again, our lips meeting, locking, and I felt his tongue probing so I opened my mouth, letting it in, meeting it with mine. I pulled away from him and ran my hand across the side of his face lovingly. “Why were you crying?”

He smiled. “It was really intense, more than I expected. Quite frankly, I never thought I'd feel like that, I never thought anyone would make my whole body quake.”

“Me too,” I said, smiling at him. And then I pulled him to my chest, and for the first time in as long as I could remember, I slept soundly.

I woke up the next morning and found myself alone. I began to panic, not because I was worried Gabriel had taken my money and left, but because I really wanted him to be there. I got up and found him in the bathroom peeing. I joined him and we got playful, using our streams of urine like swords. Giggling and laughing, I picked him up and threw him over my shoulder, giving his amazing ass a playful slap as I did. When we got back to the bed, I tossed him back on his back and landed on top of him, kissing him, rubbing against him, thrusting against him.

“You're like an obsession,” I cooed into his ear as I kissed and sucked on his neck. “I can't get enough of you.” I moved my mouth and lips down to his Adam's apple and then his chest, kissing each part of his body, enjoying his tastes and his smells. Finally I made it to his groin, where his raging erection poked up toward his belly button. I ran my tongue along the length of it, all five or six inches, and then engulfed him in my mouth. The first cock I'd ever touched that wasn't my own, the first I’d ever sucked. And I loved it. His moans and sighs, the way he tried to thrust into me using his only leg as leverage, were driving me wild. I moved over to where his left leg had been and began kissing the stump, running my tongue over it, lovingly, and then kissing it again.

“You do not have to do that,” he said.

I looked up and saw the tears in his eyes. “I want to. It is part of you, and I love every part of you. I think it is amazingly sexy.” I kissed it again, looking at him, and got a smile and a look from him, a look of appreciation that was priceless. Then I moved my mouth down to his balls, sucking on them, finding, much to my surprise, that his taste and odor were an aphrodisiac, not disgusting. I went lower, then, to his perineum, where the odor intensified and so did my desire, and finally to the hole that had given me so much pleasure the night before. I licked and probed it, and felt his hands urgently pulling my mouth and tongue into him, urging me on, begging me to go on.

He handed me a jar that looked like some kind of lubricant. I took the hint, slathering it in and around his hole, and then on my dick. Then he turned to his side so he was lying on his right leg. I smiled. This was something I'd never be able to do with someone who had both of his legs. I moved into him and felt his warm ass wrap around me willingly and began to plunge into him again and again. With each thrust my pelvis slammed against his stump, so I altered my rhythm and motions so my pelvis actually ground into it, enjoying it. He gave a little shriek and reached his hand up to play with my nipples while I fucked him, and that sent me over the edge way sooner than I wanted to. I shot another load into him, feeling those same waves, that same intense emotional and physical feeling that I'd felt the first time.

I finished and he reached up to stroke himself off, urgently needing to cum, but I pushed his hand away and replaced it with my mouth. It took no time at all for him to cum, shooting his load down my throat, and introducing me to another new, favorite taste.

I collapsed on top of him then, my head on his chest right over his heart, which was beating frantically. His fingers stroked my hair lovingly, caressing me, the kind of touch I hadn't experienced since I was a boy in my mother's arms. The kindness, the love, ignited my demons, and I found myself crying, sobbing, with no real thoughts as to why, only a sharp, anonymous pain in the back of my psyche.

“When do you go back?” he asked me.

“Tomorrow,” I responded sadly.

“Can I spend that time with you?” he asked softly. I moved up to kiss him again, relishing the love that passed between us.

“We can spend the rest of our lives together as far as I'm concerned,” I said without thinking, but discovered that I meant it.

He smiled sadly. “We may not have forever, but we at least have today.” I nodded at him, and made love to him again, and again, and again, savoring our day together, and making the most of it, before I was sent up to the meat grinder again.

© 2009 Mark Arbour

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