Unexpected Liaisons - 3. Afterwards

“Fucking hell Zu.” Issac was staring at him, mouth agape, “I had no idea you had it in you after all these years.”

“I knew I should never have given you his number.” Bay was staring at his friend in shocked amazement, “Way not to lead him on huh? You’re going to have to tell him.”

“Tell him what?” Zupan watched as his best friend answered for him.

“Er… he’s straight?” Bay glanced between his friend and his lover, “Or are you not now?”

“Bi?” Issac volunteered, “Zupan?”

“Hmm…” Zupan had been thinking about the kiss, the soft warmth of Zander’s lips. It had been almost, but not quite, entirely unlike kissing a girl in many ways. Zander’s lips were soft, pink, delicious. But the directness and the power in his narrow frame, the hard lines of his shoulders and hips, his square jaw… he was a guy all through, even if Bay still teased him for dressing like a fairy in a jovial sort of way.

“Did you like the kiss?” Issac asked again.

“I think so. I have no idea.”

“You’d better find out then.” Issac said.

“And fast,” Bay stood and across the room to slip onto the sofa beside Issac, “Can I go back to the cuddling now?”

Zupan cuffed him around the head.

“You’re still a cheeky little shit aren’t ya?”

“Eighteen. Get out clause.” Bay stuck his tongue out.

“One shot per year on your next birthday. You’ll be regretting that.” Zupan smiled at his friend, and showed himself out. Bay was right though, he needed answers quickly.

The flat he shared with his twin was a short roll across town and rather uphill from where Issac lived. Zupan had no idea what he was going to say to his brother when he rolled up. They’d moved after the accident, or rather, Zoltan had moved them. Zupan had been renting part of a flat with some guys who he knew from dirt biking and Zoltan had been living with their parents just outside the city, saving up money for a decent place of his own. And while Zupan had been in hospital all that had changed. Their parents had wanted them to move home, but his twin had bought him out of his share of the house he was in, packed up his stuff and invested a big chunk of money in a ground floor flat right slap in the centre of town and spent a lot having it converted for Zu.

“I’m back!” Zupan tossed his keys onto the low side table. That had been specially made too, the surface made of rounded sections to hold different things; keys, wallet, phone, gloves. The flat was open plan, with custom wide doorways, very few actual doors, a wheelchair suitable wet room attached directly to his bedroom and a kitchen with half low countertops. Not that Zupan could actually cook of course.

“In the lounge bro!” Zoltan called out, “Beer in fridge!”

Zupan rolled himself into the kitchen and opened the big fridge. Zoltan always left the stuff that his brother wanted in the lower half of the fridge, and the custom handle made life that little bit easier. Zu wasted a few minutes wrestling two beers out of the fridge, popped them in his lap with the bottle opener and rolled on through.

“Game on?” Zupan handed his brother a beer and pulled up next to the couch. Zol took the beer and raised an eyebrow.

“Putas versus Cherry Bombs. Just started. You want me to get that?”

“No.” Zupan grunted as the bottle opener slipped again, “Stop offering to help me.”

“I forget. Shut up and watch will ya?” Zoltan sipped his beer, “Bad date then?”

Zupan finally got his beer open, took a swig and set it down. The process of getting from chair to chaise was not necessarily easy or fluid, but Zupan had his system. Like most of his solutions, it involved an old skateboard deck and lots of shuffling. On the chaise, Zupan grabbed his beer and relaxed with his twin so that they could holler at the TV and the ability of the players to take and throw their hits.

“So who was she?” The space between rounds Zoltan put up his feet and grinned over at his brother, “This bad date. You looked all fired up before you left.”

Zupan watched his brother peel and pick the label from his beer bottle. It had been a habit they’d shared, bald bottles and bits of paper lying around the place, but Zupan could no longer manage that sort of grip, or the fine motor skills involved. He no longer owned any clothes with buttons which he actually had to undo.

“I went for a drink with Bay’s mate, Zander.”

“So not a date then. No wonder you came home so early. Not like you.” When his twin didn’t respond Zoltan looked over at the slumped shape of the brother who had once looked exactly like him, and reached out a foot to nudge him, “So not a date then.” He repeated.

“Might have been a date.”

“Oh.” There was silence for a long moment, “Sorry, what?”

“It might have been a date. There was a drink involved.”

“Jesus Zu,” Zoltan stood and stretched, “You do know how to have fun. I gotta get to work. You want a hand to bed?”

“No.” Zupan sat up, abandoning the dregs of his beer, “I can do it.”

“Fuck sake bro,” In two big strides Zoltan had crossed the room and scooped up his twin, “You are allowed to have help sometimes.” Zoltan carried him to his room, dumped him on the bed, and went back to fetch the chair. “See you in the morning?”

“Yeah, alright.”

The problem with people helping you was that they didn’t always knew what they were doing. Zupan slid from bed to board to chair (the house one which was thin, with a short back and no arms) and wheeled into his little bathroom-cum-wet room to brush his teeth, wash his face and clean up the edges of his beard with the automatic trimmer. After that there was the turning the lights off and the getting naked shuffle, and finally back onto bed, and then into bed.

Zupan lay in his bed against a mountain of pillows with the sheets up around his chest. He liked his body. Well, he liked his body from the waist up anyway. Legs that had once made him as tall as his twin and put him head and shoulders above most other people, now served no other purpose than to get in the way and be used as canvas for tattoos. Zupan ran his hand down his side, tracing the lines over his ribs which he knew so well: his own name, that of his brother, and that of his friend. The rugby player played his hands over his torso, tensing and flexing the muscles of his pecs and abs, stroking the head of the phoenix that curved over his shoulder.

Zander… Zander who was sweet and smiley, Zander who tasted like white wine and pink lemonade, Zander who wore his hair in a massive sculpted fringe and had sparkly eyes, Zander who kissed him, who was a guy.

He’d kissed a guy. How was this supposed to go? Boy meets girls, boy sleeps with girls, boy has a decent life and fun in bed. Boy meets twink… crap. Zupan lay back against the pillows and stroked lazily at his erection. Getting out of hospital and into rehab pretty much the first thing Zupan had trained himself to do had been to jerk off. With his reduced grip it required different techniques, and plenty more visualisations. Zupan blamed his expanded imagination on his accident, that was for sure.

His last girl… damn what had her name been? Shelly? Sandra? S-something anyway. All tiny waist and that fabulous curvaceous figure. Tiny shorts, even in the winter, hanging around the bar in skimpy t-shirts and eyeliner. Zupan gritted his teeth as he worked over his cock, rubbing the length in his fist as he thought about the girl with the fabulous arse. Girls liked to sit in his lap, squirming against him to see if he still worked.

‘So just how quick can you take your clothes off Zupan?’ Zander’s voice from across the table, the beautiful lust in his bright blue eyes. Zupan found his breathing coming short as his imagination took the reins and lurched him sideways. Zander standing up, coming around the little table, peeling out of his shirt. He was so thin and wickedly sexy when his bit his lower lip, glanced up through his thick fringe and flashed that little even toothed smile. Zupan was panting, the muscles in his hand clamping up as his wrist shook.

“F-fuck-!” Zupan grunted as he came, all over his hand and chest. The vision of Zander smiling swam in his inner vision as he panted. Zupan rested his other hand on his forehead and sighed. For the first time in a long while, he had no idea what the fuck he was doing.