Aaron (33 page)

The pride and love in Spencer’s heart faltered, making it plummet into his stomach.
Please don’t let him be upset. Please, God. He’s been through so much.

“Aaron., I…,” Spencer started, but nothing else came to him. Embarrassed, he sat there with his mouth hanging a little open. He wanted to tell Aaron he didn’t expect anything from him. He wanted to know what Aaron was thinking. He wanted to kiss Aaron again.

A
ARON’Shead was spinning. He’d just had his very first kiss, with a guy,

and he wasn’t freaking completely out like thought he would. The kiss hadn’t triggered any flashbacks or anxiety, just a nervous kind of butterfly feeling in his stomach. The reality of kissing Spencer made his dream dull in comparison.

“Wow, that was—”
Amazing. Incredible. More than I dreamed it would be.
“—nice.” Aaron felt stupid, stumbling over his words, but Spencer still appeared a bit shell-shocked.

“It. Was. Really. Nice.,” Spencer murmured as he reached over to take Aaron’s hand, where it rested on the cushion. He stopped just inches above, waiting for permission, waiting for Aaron to put his hand in Spencer’s. With a tingling sense of fear and excitement warring inside him, Aaron lifted his hand, nestled it inside Spencer’s larger one, and entwined their fingers. He’d held hands with Juliette more than a few times, just out of friendship and love, but holding hands with Spencer felt different. It felt more intimate, more personal—special.

“I. Do. Not. Know. What. To. Do. Now.,” Spencer said to their hands. Aaron could understand his fear. He didn’t know what to do either. He’d never been in a relationship and wasn’t even sure he was capable of it. For God’s sake, he couldn’t even jack off in the shower. What kind of relationship could he offer someone? But he liked the way his hand felt inside of Spencer’s. He didn’t feel safe, exactly, but he felt content, like someone turned off the screaming in his head, at least for a little while.

“I think your dad is right. I don’t think I’m ready for… for….”

“I. Am. Not. Asking. For. That., Aaron.. I. Would. Never. Ask. You. For. That..” Spencer turned so he faced Aaron completely, but didn’t let go of his hand. “In. The. Last. Three. Months. You. Have. Become. My. Best. Friend.. I. Would. Not. Do. Anything. To. Hurt. You.. We. Can. Just. Be. Friends., Or. We. Can. Do. Something. Else., Something. We. Define.. I. Will. Not. Take. You. Farther. Than. You. Are. Willing. To. Go..”

“That’s just it. I don’t know what I
can
do. I… I don’t want to keep you from having a relationship with someone that can give you what you want.”

“I. Just. Want. You..”

Spencer’s sentiment made his heart race, and not in the normal terrified kind of way. The contrast made him dizzy. He needed to be away from Spencer for a little while to think about the monumental shift in their relationship. In two and a half years, he never considered he would ever want to date someone. The idea that he did, and more importantly, that someone wanted to date him, just knocked his whole world off balance.

“I can’t believe this is happening. I never thought I would find someone to look past the scars. I want to try, if you do,” Aaron told him, his voice full of hope that Spencer could not hear.

But his eyes lit up like maybe he understood what it meant to Aaron. Maybe something in Aaron’s face showed it, or Spencer merely sensed it, because he smiled softly.

“Then. We. Will. Try..”

T
HE screen stayed resolutely blank as Spencer watched, hoping Aaron would come online. He felt alone, and couldn’t even explain to himself why. Dad was upstairs in his study, and he’d just seen Aaron at school a few hours before. The empty feeling in his chest had grown steadily through the afternoon until he couldn’t stand it and got onto the computer, hoping Aaron would be there. The solution stared at him from behind the laptop screen. He could just text Aaron and ask him to log on, and he knew he would end up doing that eventually.

The screen blinked and he looked up. A smile played at the edge of his mouth until he saw that the message was from one of his online fuck buddies. He couldn’t have picked a worse time to start that conversation with Spencer.
[MARK]: Hello?

[SPENCER]: Hey, man.

 

[MARK]: Hey, there you are. You haven’t answered the last couple of times I pinged you. Everything okay?

 

[SPENCER]: Yeah, I have been busy with school.

The screen stayed clear for a moment, and in the silence, Spencer considered talking to Mark about what bothered him. Mark was a friend, right? They’d exchanged pictures and fucked around online dozens of times. The next message made him sigh in frustration.

[MARK]: I’ve been hard for you for days.
[SPENCER]: I am not in the mood.

[MARK]: Maybe I can get you in the mood. My dick has been in my hand since you came online.

[SPENCER] Seriously, I met someone.
[MARK]: Really? He can play too. I’d love to watch you guys fuck.

Spencer slammed the laptop closed in disgust. He would go in later and clear out all the people from his chat list he no longer had any interest in chatting with. How could Mark even think he’d let that prick anywhere near Aaron? The thought nauseated him. Why did Spencer ever think fucking around on the Internet would make him feel better? He felt good with Aaron, even without the sex. What he had with Aaron was real, more real than anything he’d ever had before. He wasn’t going to fuck that up by playing with guys on the net.

S
PENCER’S lips felt warm and soft on Aaron’s as they kissed slowly but

deeply on the couch in the rec room. He didn’t know where Dr. Thomas was, but got the impression that he and Spencer were the only ones in the house. Aaron’s arms rested lightly around his boyfriend’s neck. His boyfriend—he never thought he’d use those words, but in his heart, and in the dream, that’s what Spencer was. Spencer’s shaggy curls tangled in Aaron’s fingers as he pulled and brought him closer. God, he wanted to crawl in Spencer’s lap and never leave.

Somehow his hand wound up in Spencer’s. Aaron pulled it down to the open fly of his jeans and rubbed. Never in his life had he been touched like that, with such love and tenderness. His cock dribbled drops of something onto Spencer’s fingers, and then Spencer was gone.

Aaron looked down to see those sweet hazel eyes he loved so much looking up at him through a wisp of brown curls. Oh God, he wasn’t…. Spencer’s beautiful lips, the ones Aaron so enjoyed kissing, wrapped gently around the head of Aaron’s cock, and for a moment, he couldn’t breathe. The sensation, even just the idea of it, sent tingles through his body. He felt them everywhere—in his legs, his balls, his stomach. It was like nothing he’d ever felt before.

Spencer kept his eyes on Aaron’s while he worked his mouth lower, taking Aaron deeper. Spencer’s hand stroked the insides of Aaron’s thighs, comforting him, relaxing him, and he felt desired. Aaron felt wanted in a way he’d never felt before. The tip of Spencer’s tongue traced the contours of Aaron’s dick, and he moaned. Spencer’s free hand rested on his chest, and he wondered at it for a moment. Then Aaron realized that Spencer wanted to hear Aaron moan for him; he wanted to feel it in his fingertips. Aaron tightened his fingers in Spencer’s hair and gave him what he wanted.

Under the blankets, Aaron’s hand rubbed his cock through the light cotton sleep pants. He listened intently, but didn’t hear anyone in the hall through the closed bedroom door. Taking a chance, and without thinking about anything other than Spencer’s face, he pulled the pajama pants down his legs just enough to let his dick pop free of the briefs that trapped it. He spit into his palm and kept his mind completely blank as he wrapped his fingers around the shaft. His harsh breaths sounded loud in the otherwise silent room, and he kept his voice quiet so no one would come to check on him.

The tingle in his cock spread quickly up through his stomach and down through his balls until he couldn’t think of anything else. Twisting his slick fist around the head, he massaged back down to the base. With his other hand, he reached down between his barely spread legs to touch his soft sac, and the tingling promise of an orgasm intensified.
Please. I want to feel it. Just this once.

The decadent image of Spencer on his knees, looking up at him, with his lips stretched around Aaron’s cock, took him over that final edge and dropped him into freefall. Warm spurts of semen jetted onto the sheet as his hips ground up to meet his hand. Harsh cries were muted into ragged breaths as he tried to stay completely quiet.

His body seemed to melt into the bed, and he closed his eyes against the sheer pleasure of the way he felt: sated, relieved, triumphant. In that moment, he felt like maybe he could function like a real person one day.

Maybe, just maybe, there was hope.

 

Chapter Nineteen

 

“MY MOMis going to pick me up at three because we’re going to dinner

for my little brother’s birthday,” Aaron told Dr. Thomas as he tossed his bag next to Spencer’s bag on the desk. He’d been working with Spencer for the last two hours on their new program, and would much rather be adding additional functionality to it than be down here baring his soul. Uncomfortable as it was, however, Aaron knew that this therapy was the key to him becoming a functioning individual. The final walls he had built to surround the deeply hidden hope that he would ever be remotely normal had fallen. While he knew he was setting himself up for a major disappointment if this failed, it had been so long since he’d even dared to hope. Believing in himself, in Dr. Thomas, and in his ability to heal was essential to the success of his therapy, and for the first time, he was going to embrace it. Dr. Thomas was the foremost expert in the country on his type of trauma. If he couldn’t help Aaron, no one would be able to.

“That’s fine. We should be done before then,” Dr. Thomas said pleasantly. “I read your last blog entry, and I think you’re making great progress in describing your reactions since the attack. Once you can really understand your triggers, you’ll have more success in dealing with the more subtle ones. You recognize the obvious triggers, like being touched, the smell of gasoline, and the sight of blood. It’s the smaller, less obvious triggers, the ones that bring up memories without being overt. The sound of the thunder yesterday prompted something, and we weren’t even aware that was a trigger for you.”

“Yes, that explains at least one reason why I don’t like stormy days, and I honestly didn’t remember the sound of the storm during the attack

 

Aaron

 

until you pointed it out to me here,” Aaron said, and rather than being ashamed by his limitation, he was encouraged at its discovery.

“Aaron, let me ask you,” Dr. Thomas said quietly, sitting back in his chair. “How do you feel you’re progressing in therapy? I can tell you all day long what I think of your progress, but it isn’t me that has to live with what you have to live with.”

Aaron sat back in his chair as well. It had taken weeks of intensive sessions for him to feel comfortable with Dr. Thomas, but now, while he didn’t think he could tell him everything about the attack, he felt like his therapist did truly care about him, about his recovery. That, as much as anything else they’d discussed, made Aaron want to work with the man rather than against him, as he had done with so many other therapists that didn’t believe in him.

“The first therapist my mother took me to was so out of his element. I have a feeling he was used to dealing with stressed-out CEOs or couples fighting about money. He had no idea what to do with me, and even a scared sixteen-year-old boy could see that. The reason he had no chance of helping me is because he never believed that he could, and he never tried. Dumping antianxiety pills and tranquilizers on me was his solution, to make me so drugged-out that I wasn’t freaking out, but I wasn’t really conscious either. After that, I had a successive list of therapists, and with each one, my belief that I could ever be anything more than the broken shell of a person that I’d become, faded.”

Dr. Thomas nodded, but didn’t interrupt. That was one thing Aaron really admired about the man: he always heard everything Aaron had to say, and even some things he never said.