Page 29 of After His Eulogy
“No.”
“Okay.”
He pulls me down. He kisses me. His hand goes between us and undoes my belt. He undoes my jeans. He gets his hand inside and around me. The sound I make is not a sound I planned to make. He has not let go of my mouth. He is kissing me through it. His thumb moves over the head of my cock and my hips go forward without me telling them to. He makes a sound into my mouth. A small one, low, satisfied, like he is finding out a thing he wanted to find out.
“Yeah,” he says against my mouth. “Yeah.”
“Griffin.”
“Get the rest off.”
I get the rest of my clothes off. I get them off without making a thing of it. He gets his off too. He has decided we are going to do this and the clothes are going to be off because they need to be off. He is not performing for me. He is preparing the room for what he has decided is going to happen.
He lies back. I look at him. Because I get to. I’m over him on his bed in the lamp light and he is naked and looking back at me. His hand on my thigh. His cock against his stomach. I haven’t seen him like this in two years. He’s letting me see him.
“Stop staring,” he says. Soft.
“No.”
“Reed.”
“Give me a second.”
He gives me a second. He gives me the second and then he reaches over to the side table. He gets the lube and the condom and puts them on the bed next to my hand. He has been planning. I see it. I don’t say so. He sees that I see it. We don’t need to talk about it. We are in agreement that he planned this.
“Have you,” he says.
“What.”
“Done this. With anyone. In the two years.”
“No.”
“Okay.”
“You?”
He looks at me.
“Once.”
The word lands. I had not asked. He is telling me anyway. I sit with it. I do not let my face do anything. There is a part of me that wants to count back. Last spring, where was I last spring, what was I doing the night he was doing this. I do not let that part of me have the floor. He is telling me. He has decided to tell me. The least I can do is let him.
“Okay,” I say.
“It was bad.”
“Okay.”
“I am telling you because I do not want there to be a thing you find out later.”
“I know.”
“It was a person from my cohort, last spring, and it was once, and it was bad, and we did not do it again.”
“Okay.”
“Are you mad.”
