Connected

“I hope your house never sells.” He says it without petulance, without any of that whininess of a restless child unwilling to turn off the lights and go to sleep. The words are flat and matter-of-fact. “I hope everyone hates your house. I hope your stinky house never sells. Then you’ll have to stay here forever.”

Okay, maybe that last part sounds a little bit petulant. And the way he takes a pillow from the sofa and tosses it onto the floor, as if the sloppiness of a single cushion on the floor might scare off potential customers, is a little puerile. This is the same Spencer, however, who a little over an hour ago helped me put some final cleaning touches on the place before we went out to dinner during the house showing. He’s the one who’d rearranged the sofa cushions in a more attractive presentation than I’d ever managed. If he wanted to mess them up a little after strangers had trooped through my house, it was his prerogative.

There’s stuff I have to do after every house showing. I have to turn off the lights in the basement and close the door to my studio. I have to check the locks on the back doors, since the agents and the potential buyers they’re showing around have a tendency—unwitting or not—to leave them undone, which has made me paranoid about home invasions. I check for running sinks and open cabinets on the first floor, and then hunt for the pets to be sure they’re all right on the second. Upstairs, I turn off the lights that are making my home a beacon on my darkened street, pat the cat that’s hiding beneath the blankets, and take a moment to kick off my shoes and the thick sweater I’ve been wearing.

He joins me in the darkness of my bedroom. His hands glide beneath my armpits; I feel his hot breath on my neck and the warmth of his body against mine. “I’m sorry,” he whispers.

“There’s no need to apologize,” I tell him. There isn’t—not for an outburst so minor, nor for wishing our time together was more permanent. He didn’t say anything I haven’t thought to myself, more than once.

“It’s just that—”

I stop him by turning around and pressing my mouth to his. He doesn’t need to say the words. I already know.

There’s a fresh towel I’d stowed beneath the bed earlier that afternoon, when I’d learned that Spencer was planning to give himself a deep cleaning. I use my foot to slide it out, bend down to pick it up, and spread it out onto the bed before I gently settle him onto it. He sighs as I undress him, slowly, and deliberately. I fold his clothing before I place it all, neatly stacked, onto the floor. His dick, large and hard, points in the direction of his left nipple; his balls hang low, almost to the mattress.

He is so beautiful.

I kneel over him as we kiss. My spit-slick fingers are already prodding at his hole. Involuntarily his knees rise, taking his muscular dancer’s legs into the air. Slowly, inch by inch, they straight until they’re pointing at the wall behind his head. He hooks his toes on the underside of my headboard, ceding full access of his hole to me.

I still crave the taste of him, even though I know it better than anything else. I’ve carried that scent, the remnants of the taste, on my beard around my mouth for hours at a time. I’ve smelled it the mornings after we’ve rolled out of bed and he’s brushed his teeth and gone off to one of his jobs. Glorious as it is when it lingers, it’s even better when I can dive in and enjoy it to its fullest, and to make it mine. He gasps for long minutes as I eat and bite at his hole, lifting it up and out. He’s doing it so that I can munch more vigorously, so that I can gnaw at his hole and sate my hunger.

Spencer smells like soap and face wash and the cologne he wears, all at once. I could detect those aromas blindfolded in an exotic market and know he was near me, instantly. If I could bottle that scent, I would. I’d bathe in it.

He gasps when I lower his legs, turn him over and settle, crossed-legged, beside his body. His chest expands and deflates as I pull his legs apart. From the bedside drawer I pull out the tub of Crisco, which I settle at the back of his knee. My index and middle finger dip into the cool, slick grease and withdraw a glob that I deposit directly onto his hole. He gasps at its low temperature, and moans as I work the tips of of my fingers, around, around, in smooth, slow swirls. It’s like I’m icing a cake.

I’m almost reluctant to try this again. The first time I fisted Spencer we both had an enjoyable time. The second time was ill-fated. He’d had difficulties hosing himself out, that afternoon. I’d left on the lights, which made him self-conscious. He’d put on some music I found distracting. Neither of us were really feeling the mood. He limped into the bathroom after feeling ashamed and embarrassed, and I was mortified to think I’d hurt him.

This time, though, I’ve turned the lights off, so that we’re lit by nothing but starlight. His iPod sits in my clock radio, playing something low and sexy. He wants my hand inside him, and I want to be there.

Two fingers. Three. Four. Slowly I open him up, applying more grease whenever I feel the slightest resistance. My hand resembles a bird’s beak, long, pointed, and conical, as I work all my fingers and my thumb into his slick, warm opening. Spencer moves in slow motion, his arms clawing helplessly at the pillows and sheets as his hips gyrate. It almost looks as if he’s swimming at an impossibly gradual speed, just enough to keep his head over water, but not quite enough to escape the threat of drowning.

And he’s drowning now—in waves of sensation and in pure pleasure. Every rasp of his breath, every groan, every cry betrays his need. His hands blindly scrabble for the other bedside drawer, where his bottle of poppers lies. But then he thinks better of it and closes the drawer. He doesn’t need it. My knuckles stretch his outer ring to the widest point . . . and then I’m in.

“Oh god,” he cries. “Oh god.” When I say he’s crying, I mean exactly that. My hand becomes a ball, a fist that’s tight and compact inside his ass. I lean down gently to kiss the lowest point of his spine. And my free hand strokes his hair, calming and reassuring him. When my fingers trail over his face, I can feel the tears, as hot and wet as the hole I’m inside. “I want you,” he moans.

My curled fingers twist slightly, making him groan. Then I do what I know he loves—I piston my arm in and out of his hole, slightly, gently. It’s not moving any more than a quarter of an inch, back and forth. It’s scarcely more than a vibration, really—and it causes his body to react with almost violent pleasure. I can feel from the inside how hard he is. His muscles contract; the prostate bumping against my knuckles presses hard against me.

He’s still talking. “I want your dick inside me. I want your hand,” he begs. “I want you inside me so deep. I want all of you inside me. I want you to fucking live inside my hole.” His lips kiss my hand, over and over. “I need this!”

“I’m here,” I whisper to him. “You’re getting exactly what you need.”

For long, long minutes I keep up the in-and-out motion. Occasionally I vary it with twisting, or simply resting my arm and expanding my fist so that it grows in size before collapsing again on itself. He loves all these things, and lets me know. Through words. Through guttural sounds. Through the grinding of his pelvis into the towel. And by backing onto my wrist, trying to accommodate more of me.

Gradually we turn him onto his side, so that he can masturbate while I’m inside him. He seems reluctant to let the experience end—and I’d be happy to accommodate him for as long as he needs. His dick demands attention, however. As he beats it, his ass spasms. The contractions are so strong that I half-worry he might pinch off my hand below the wrist, or shatter the bones in my hands. When he clamps down, it feels as if he might reduce my knuckles to splinters and dust.

I gasp in something close to pain when he comes. My forearm feels as if it might break as jet after jet of semen erupts from his dick and flies into the air. Gradually, though, slowly the spasms subside. He loosens up again, and I start to withdraw.

I feel his hands on my arm, stopping me. “I don’t want you to go,” he whispers.

He’s not talking about me vacating his hole. “I know,” I tell him, smoothing down his hair. “I know.”

For now, though, I leave my hand inside him so that he can feel the connection. I’m not going anywhere, just yet.