Happy

“Good boy,” I murmur as I look up at the man riding my cock.

Every time I say these two words, I get the same action. His brow contracts and furrows as he stares at me as if he hopes I’m telling him the truth. It’s as if he can’t believe anyone would ever call him a good boy. Then the truth sinks in, and his eyes light up as he begins to believe it. It thrills me, that play of raw emotion on his face. It’s why I say the words again. “Yes. Good boy!”

He tilts his head, looks at me with those glowing brown eyes, and melts.

He’s got stuff on his mind. I knew it when I came over, though I offered him the opportunity to decline spending the afternoon with me. He said he needed the company, though. He needed the cock. So here we are out on the deck of his house in the back country on a perfect August Sunday. Maple trees grow high in the ravine behind his home; they lean in an shelter us from the summer sun. For over two hours we’ve fucked and sucked back here, our naked and writhing bodies seen only by birds flying overhead. He’s thrown a comforter down on the wooden planks, and nestled a pillow beneath my head. Then he’s ridden me relentlessly until I’ve blown my loads into his guts.

“Do I really please you?” he asks.

Fuck. The words are almost a knife to the heart. As if he has to ask. “Absolutely,” I say, with the same hushed reverence I might display in a museum or a church.

“Do I make you happy?”

His look of worry is almost tangible. As our hips gyrate slowly I reach up as if to wipe it from his face. “You are so extraordinarily beautiful,” I tell him, staring into his eyes. He truly is. I’ve had the good fortune to attract the attention of many good-looking men, but even the prettiest of them would feel threatened by this guy. He’s in his thirties—in his prime. He’s got a boyish and masculine face that’s rendered movie-star handsome by a firm jaw covered in dark stubble. His chest is muscular, deep and tanned. My praise makes him flush. He’s not being falsely modest or coquettish. He genuinely is tickled to hear it from me. “You are so sweet.” Still raising and lowering himself on my stiff cock, he tips his head to one side, basking in the praise. “And you love my cock,” I whisper, making it sound nasty.

“Yes,” he nods. “I truly love your cock.”

“I know. And you make it feel so, so good. That’s why I call you a good boy. I mean it. Yes. You make me happy.” I pull myself up to my elbows, and guide his mouth down to mine. When we pull away from the long, deep kiss, I nod. “You’ve made me very, very happy all afternoon.”

“Fuck,” he says. He reaches into the white jock he’s been wearing. It’s all askew now. His junk has been hanging out the sides for a while. But he hasn’t yet touched himself. All the focus has been on me. “I think I really need to come. Please?”

There’s a whine of need in his voice I can’t deny. I nod, and he grabs furiously at his dick. It doesn’t take him long to shoot. Six strokes. Seven, maybe. Then I feel hot wetness flying onto my chest and face and over my shoulders. His body spasms. He’s suddenly heavy on my pelvis, and his hole is squeezing my dick so hard I’m half-worried he might take it off. His head flies back with such vigor that I worry he’ll crack his skull on the deck railing behind. But instead, he grimaces, bucks, and holds his rictus of pleasure and pain until at last the wracking sensations ebb from his body. “It’s not always like that,” he says, panting and looking at me with worry.

“It has been, both times I’ve seen you,” I say. I’m sliding out of him, letting my dick flop wetly between my thighs, as I maneuver him down.

“I needed that so much,” he says, once he’s spooned his back against my chest, and I’ve wrapped my arms around him. “Not just me cumming . . . the whole thing.”

“I know, sweet man,” I say into his ears. I wait a few minutes until his breathing has subsided into a normal pattern. Then I ask, “Tell me about your mom. When did she pass?”

“Last September,” he murmurs. “I know I should be over it by now, but earlier today, when I was spreading her ashes with the family. . . .”

“It’s okay,” I say, holding him tight. “Tell me about her.”

“I never knew my mother growing up,” he said. “She left when I was a kid. There wasn’t any big fight, no messy divorce. One day she was just gone, and I didn’t know why. My dad wouldn’t talk about it at all, and I got scared to ask. It was like she vanished completely.

“Then one day I was sitting in Madison Square Park and a woman sat on the bench with me. She said—“ He takes a deep breath, and the following words tremble. “He said, ‘I know this is going to sound like a strange question, but is your name Bobby?’ And I looked up into this stranger’s face, and I knew, I just knew it was her.”

“Wow,” I say. “How did you feel about that?”

“It was amazing,” he says. “Ever after that we were like this.” He holds up his index and middle finger, crossed together. “We went to my apartment and talked and talked into the night. It wasn’t until it was late when I asked why she left. She said, ‘Son, what would you think if you found out your mom was gay?’ And I just hugged her and smiled and said, ‘Mom, have I got something to tell you.’”

He’s curled a little further in on himself, into a near-fetal position. I hold him tightly, and he takes my fingers in his hand. We’re silent for a little while, then he speaks again. “My mom lived in Peru for several years, I found out. There was a period three years ago when I was unemployed, and the family she lived with while she was down there came up here to visit. They heard I was unemployed and taking time off between jobs. ‘Come spend a month with us!’ they said to me. ‘Spend two! Spend three!’ They were so, so sweet. I ended up living with them in Peru for three months. It was amazing. The mountains, the forests, the sheer beauty of it all. And the last month I was there my mom came down. She’d been sick for a while, but she was feeling well enough to travel for a change. We made the most of it. We hiked. We camped on the mountains and saw the places she remembered. It was a gift. The last good time, really.”

His voice grows raspy. “So there’s this drink they have down there that they serve with every meal. Chicha morada, it’s called. They don’t drink water with meals. They drink this chicha morada. Every table has a pitcher of it at mealtimes. I found a market here that sells the purple corn you use to make it, and I boiled it with apple peels and pineapple rind. Cinnamon. Cloves. Sugar. Lemon. We toasted my mom with it as we scattered the ashes, earlier. It seemed like the right thing to do.”

There’s a lump in my throat that I try to clear before I say, “Aren’t you glad you sat down in the park that day?”

Suddenly he twists on the blanket. The days are shortening, and the last few honeyed minutes of daylight before dusk are slipping away. He takes both my hands in his. His eyes glisten with tears, but they’re bright. So bright, and so alive. “She would be so happy that I did this,” he tells me. “She would be so happy that I’m with you, on this beautiful day. Celebrating life. Living it, while I can. She would be so happy.”

We look into each other’s eyes for a long, long moment, both of us grinning like fools through the tears. “Come here,” I say at last. “Let me give you a hug.”

He falls into the embrace like a lost little boy glad to be found. I hold him long and hug him hard, wishing I had the power to ease his pain. Together we lay on the blanket and gaze at the sky, our flesh glued by sweat and semen, happy to be among the living and the feeling.