Mending Wounded Hearts

With Kelly’s laundry dry, I headed back to the suite and tapped on the door. I heard the knob being unlocked and the door was gently pulled open. Kelly’s sweet face smiled at me and said, "Hi Rob, we’re just watching TV, I forgot to unlock the door, um… can we talk to you?"

"Sure, what’s up?"

"It’s about what we’ve been doing together. Does it mean we’re gay?

"Not necessarily, most boys do some exploring with other boys. Do either of you have any interest in girls?” Both boys shook their heads, indicating a negative. "So what do you think of when you masturbate?" Both agreed that they pictured other boys that they knew or someone from television or movies. "Well that sounds like for now you’re into other boys. That might change or it might not. But either way, you can still be very happy.”

"Um… I really like to do what we were doing when you saw us," Danny confessed.

"A penis has a great texture to it, I rather like it myself. Don’t be ashamed that you like to do oral sex; it seems to really turn you on. You guys are so young and there is so much to experience and you’re just getting started. Take it easy on yourselves and don’t worry too much; and stay sweet.”

Danny smiled up at me, "I could do it for you if you want," he offered.

"That’s a very kind offer Danny, but I only have sex with other adults. And you should probably stick to guys your own age for now. Adults might have evil intent or diseases that can shorten or ruin your life."

Danny blushed, "Oh yeah, you mean molesters and AIDS and VD right. But you’re not like that, I understand what you mean. Thanks for telling us the truth, most adults never want to answer really important questions like that."

He wrapped his arms around my neck and kissed my cheek. "Thank you," he said.

Kelly came over and did the same, "Can I talk to you some more about this later?"

"Sure, we’ve got a long drive ahead of us, you can ask me then."

I kicked off my shoes and stretched out on the bed and dozed for a while. When I woke, Kelly had my left arm again and he was snuggled up against me like a kitten. When I woke again, the boys had gone to the living room and were entertaining the younger kids.

The dads appeared shortly after I stepped out and rounded their little ones up to get them changed.

Dale had gotten word from the airline that they would be on the eleven o’clock flight to Logan.

Stan had heard from his wife that she would be on time since her flight wasn’t even full.

Forty-five minutes later Kelly and I were alone. I received thanks and kisses from all the kids. Daniel remembered something he left in the bathroom and he and Kelly disappeared for a few moments. It was a tearful goodbye no doubt. Both boys had red rimmed eyes when they returned. Dale looked sympathetically at his son and Kelly hugged Danny tight as they went out the door.

Our new valet, Jesse, was every bit as efficient as Jeff had been. He hustled our luggage down to the front desk and I handed him two envelopes. One had a large tip for him and Jeff to share. The second held my Springsteen tickets. Those were for Jeff; he went above and beyond and I had heard The Boss’ music coming from Jeff’s earbuds. I hated the idea of letting them go to waste and reselling them is a pain, and since Jeff had been great at his job above and beyond the call, I gave them to him. I gave the envelope to Jesse and asked him to make sure Jeff got it. I told him I left a message on Jeff’s voice mail about it, just to keep him honest.

The parking attendant took my ticket and the twenty folded up next to it and told me my truck would be right down. True to his word, one of his drivers rolled up in it within ten minutes. Pretty good considering the throng of shuttles, and other people waiting for cars.

Kelly’s eyes bugged out a little when he saw the truck.  “Whoa!” he exclaimed.

I tipped the kid who drove it down and hopped in. I tossed my bag and laptop on the back seat and told Kelly to do the same. He climbed in and the look of excitement on his face was obvious.

"This is a cool truck, I like trucks especially off-roaders. It sure is dirty though."

"I don’t wash it a lot. And the carwash guys don’t like it because they skin their knuckles on the Linex coating. So usually I use my pressure washer to blast the mud off and wash it myself, just not very often.

I made my way down Century and hit the 405 North; it was a ghost town. Usually it’s busy on the weekends, but that day very few cars were making use of it. This continued all the way to the I-5, which was about average for a Saturday morning. Traffic moved along smartly with the usual slow down near Magic Mountain. The SR126 was a bit more congested and slowed to a crawl in several places. It had only taken an hour and change to get that far, so it wasn’t a big deal. I expected it to be busy due to the 101 being closed at the pass. I wasn’t disappointed. Kelly finally roused himself as he had been dozing against the window since we passed the Getty center. I asked him if he had spoken to his mom this morning; he indicated that Lyle didn’t like anyone to call before eleven unless it was one of his friends.

"Can I ask you about some stuff?" he asked.

"Sure Kelly, ask away."

"Are you gay? You said you had a wife but she died and then you had a guy named Maurice, I don’t understand."

Well, I’m probably not gay in the traditional sense. I don’t pay much attention to gender when I fall in love. Some people call that pansexualism; I don’t really care about the label. And I’m comfortable being identified as gay," I told him.

"Are you with someone now?" Kelly asked.

"Well, I have been seeing a College student, his name is Wyatt and he’s just twenty-two. But he digs me for some reason and I think the world of him. I know it’s temporary, he’ll find someone his own age and fall truly in love and that will be that. Until then he brings out the kid in me."

"Do you guys have sex?"

"Yes we do, and it’s wonderful. Did you think I’d given it up?" I laughed.

"Do you think I’m gay? I heard his voice falter a bit.

This was a watershed question and I didn’t want to hurt him.

"That’s a question only you can answer Kelly. If you’re asking because of what you and Danny were doing then you should know that most boys have experiences like that with a friend or sometimes a boy at camp, or like you and Danny, just by chance. Let me ask you, if Danny hadn’t been so horny, do you think that you might have tried to get something going?"

"I don’t know, maybe. He was really nice looking and I liked his eyes. He was really cute too." Kelly blushed.

"Before you met Danny, who did you think about when you masturbated?" I asked.

"I don’t get to do it much, Lyle is almost always home when I’m there. There’s a field I can go to and I do it there but I have to be careful. But I think about Ronny a lot when I do it. But he moved away. So does that make me gay?" he asked again.

"Was Ronny a friend? Did you get a good feeling from him?"

"Yeah, but Mom ruined it. He rode his bike over one Saturday and Mom answered the door in just her panties and yelled at him for knocking. I saw him at school but he was different. He finally told me what happened and I cried and he held me. He said I should call the cops or somebody after I told him how I live."

"I told him I couldn’t do that to my mom. She was different before Lyle and the drugs. I keep hoping she’ll stop and be my mom again. That’s when he told me that they were moving to Santa Paula."

I saw a side road up ahead and turned off. I drove a quarter mile and pulled over. I popped my seat belt and put my hand on his shoulder. He released his and buried his face in my chest. I let him cry it out. He really hadn’t let loose since the crash and he needed to vent. We sat there about twenty minutes. He had stopped crying but he seemed unwilling to break the contact. I leaned down and kissed the side of his head.

"Are you feeling a little better now? I’d say you’ve been storing that up for a while." He rose up and I handed him the tissues and he wiped his face and my shirt which was pretty soggy by then.

"Kelly, how old are you? I’m terrible at guessing so help me out." I said.

"I’m twelve, my birthday was in January." He said. "Um… how old are you?"

"Fair question, I’m about to turn forty-nine."

"Cool," was all he said.