Simply Red

Max’s Perspective

“Bubba just called me and said he came out to finish up the barn this morning before he went to another job and snuck into the house to use the bathroom. He said he found you sleeping on the couch with some guy. What the fuck, Maxwell.” Brody asked over the phone

 I was still half-asleep, a little hungover and Brody’s call caught me completely off guard. I was silent for a minute while I tried to collect my thoughts “wait, wait, wait… what? Bubba was in the house?”

“That’s yer fuckin’ takeaway from that statement? Bubba was in the house?” Brody said in a tone that was both angry and hurt. “Were you sleepin’ with another guy, Maxwell?” he asked sternly.

Still stunned I answered as best I could, “no… I mean yes. I was asleep on the couch with Harris, but it was totally innocent. I didn’t sleep with him, we fell asleep…” I started to explain as I tried to regain my composure.

“I can’t believe you would…” Brody started.

“That’s because I fucking wouldn’t” I interrupted with a bark. “You know I would NEVER do anything like that. It was totally innocent, two friends hanging out watching TV and drinking wine while our husbands were away and we fell asleep.” I was pissed and getting defensive. Here I was so happy to have someone to hang with while Brody was gone and it was getting twisted into something it wasn’t. “The gayest thing we did all night was binge watch Sex And The City – we’re both Charlotte’s by the way… relationship people!!” okay, that sounded really gay, but it was true. I would NEVER cheat on him, I thought we were past this bullshit after Eric kissed me on New Year’s Eve. We talked a little more rationally and he believed me. I mean, I got it… he never met Harris and Bubba woke him up in the middle of the night with an accusation. I was still pissed off when we hung up, Brody probably was too. By the time I finished listening to my husband accuse me of cheating, the coffee was done and I took a cup into the living room for Harris who was on the phone in a fight of his own.

“We were just watching TV and drinking wine… we both fell asleep on the couch” He said into the phone. “It was completely innocent…” and he went on to have an argument that sounded very déjà vu. After he hung up, he said, “Terrance came home from work and freaked out when I wasn’t there.” Then I told him about Bubba coming into the house, seeing us, and calling Brody. We talked as we drank our first cup of coffee. We were both so happy to find a new friend to hang with when our husbands were gone, we both loved our husbands and would never cheat, and… now we felt guilty about something that never even happened. We agreed that we had a lot of fun together and weren’t going to let this stop us from hanging out.

“Next weekend the four of us will get together, once we all know each other things will be fine” I said. Harris agreed. We had a lot in common and we both needed a friend; we were going to pursue this. After we talked a little longer, me and Zoey walked Harris to his car and said goodbye. I saw Bubba’s truck by the barn and was tempted to go talk to him, but I decided to take a shower and cool down first.  After a nice long shower and another cup of coffee, I put on my paint clothes and headed out to the barn. Bubba was still there working, I decided to talk to him. “Hi Bubba” I said in a civil tone although I was seething inside.

“Hi” he said quietly as he continued to work, not making eye contact with me.

“Brody called and told me you saw me on the couch with Harris. He’s another teacher from school, he’s just a friend. His husband was working third shift at the ER and Brody’s in Phoenix, we were just hanging out binge watching and fell asleep” I explained.

 “uh-huh” he said in response as he continued to caulk the windows.

“It was innocent as shit” I said, starting to get angry. “If you thought something was going on, you could’ve just talked to me.” My voice was getting louder, “I consider you a friend, you know me. How the fuck do you think I could ever cheat on Brody?”

“He’s blood, Max. I was just lookin’ out for ‘em” Bubba said as he continued to work.

“I’m family too, and I’m pissed that you think so little of me after all this time” I said, then turned to walk away. “Fuck this” I muttered under my breath as I walked over to the old barn to start moving Jimmy’s stuff out. Maybe it was wrong of me, but I was pissed and did my damnedest to avoid Bubba. I moved the hay bales and Jimmy’s blanket and made him a bed in one of the two stalls in the new smaller barn. I moved his food and other supplies into the little storage closet, I even moved one of the goat cams so we could still watch him. It was a nice set up and it took Witchy no time to find herself a perch in the new barn. Witchy used to be an outdoor cat until Jimmy moved into the barn, now she spent most nights hanging out with him, watching over him.

After I finished moving Jimmy, I went out back and worked in the garden, then took care of the bees. I steered clear of the new barn until Bubba finally left. Dammit, I was so pissed at him… how the hell could he think I would ever cheat on Brody. Once Bubba was gone, I went to work giving Jimmy’s new home a second coat of paint. Brody tried calling a couple of times, but I wasn’t in a mood to talk to him so I declined his calls. He texted for me to call him a few times, after the third time I just texted back ‘I need some alone time’ he gave it a thumbs-up, then a sad face followed by ‘I trust you completely. I’m sorry.’ I didn’t respond.  I also got a text from Harris saying he cleared things up with Terrance.

 I finished the second coat on the barn, ate cold leftover pizza for dinner, poured candles until about 10:00PM, then went to bed. Alone. The next morning, I got up early, took care of the animals, showered, dressed, made breakfast, then went off to the first day of school. On the way in Brody called, it was only about 4:30AM his time. I decided to answer.

 “Hi” is all I could say.

 “Hi, I called to wish you a good first day of school” Brody said.

 “Thanks. Is that all?” I asked in a pissy tone.

 “I’m sorry, Max. I shoulda’ trusted you. I DO trust you” Brody said with remorse in his voice. “When Bubba woke me up in the middle of the night with that damn picture, I didn’t know what the hell to think.”

 “Picture? What picture?” I asked annoyed.

“He took a picture of Harris sleeping with his head on yer shoulder” he said, is voice was sadder now. I was starting to empathize with him. He thought I was alone, he didn’t know Harris, he saw the picture and he jumped to a conclusion… in all fairness, it was a reasonable conclusion considering. I forgave him. I also asked him to send me the pic, after I saw it, I understood… the evidence was kind of damning.

That day at School Harris and I talked before classes started. It seemed like we both cleared things up at home and were looking forward to the four of us getting together on Saturday. The other teachers joined us in my room for coffee, like last year. We were all talking and laughing, but Sarah was acting a little cold… she was still dating Bubba and god only knows what he told her about me and Harris. Other than the awkwardness with Sarah, our first day back was great. I loved my new class, and I would be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy the look on Mimi Fargus’ face when she met Willie’s new gay, black teacher… Mr. Harris Daniels. Priceless!

That afternoon I got home from work, changed, then went to check on Ricky and Timmy in the barn. There was a huge flower arrangement sitting on the table by the wax melter with a note that just said ‘I miss you. Love, Brody.’ Ricky had signed for them earlier. After getting taunted by the two teenagers with kissy noises and chants of “Brody and Max sittin’ in a tree. K-I-S-S-I-N-G,” I went out in the yard and called Brody to thank him.

We were both under a lot of stress and clumsily apologized for our overreactions. Brody was travelling more than originally planned, paying his dues, and impressing his new team. I was launching a new business and starting a new school year. We put all the stress aside and just talked like we always did… it felt so good. He told me all about the campaigns they were presenting on Wednesday and I could hear the excitement in his voice… he loved what he was doing again. He hadn’t planned on seeing clients while he was in town and his only suit was at home hanging in his closet, so he had to go buy a new one for the presentation. After we talked about his trip, he asked me about my first day back with the kids, I told him it was awesome and brought up the awkwardness with Sarah. He convinced me to ignore it and let it blow over. He was right, I had enough shit to deal with and didn’t need added drama. It was so damn good to talk to him… god I missed him so much.

After my conversation with Brody, I went back into the barn to check on progress. Damn, those guys were getting it done. They’d only been working a couple of hours and had already met the quota I had set for the day, shipped out all pending orders (including several cases of candles, some business cards with our website, and a BroMax banner to Seth for his first Soulard Farmer’s Market). Timmy was a doer and Ricky knew how to motivate him; they made a great team. While I was out there working with them, Jordan called and we finalized the details of the contract for his hotels over the phone, his office would send the final contract later that week. I was having an oh shit moment! It was a huge order and a lot of work. The good news was that we had until after the first of the year to finalize the packaging designs and wouldn’t start production until after that. Plus, the farmer’s market would be closing for the season at the end of October so we could slow down a little over the holidays while Bubba finished the barn conversion. I shared the news with Ricky first, he was beside himself with excitement and instantly went into project management mode. He started calculating how many candles we’d have to pour each day in order to keep up with demand and fulfill the new hotel order. Would we need to hire more people? Would we need another wax melter? Shit, he was more on top of this than me. “Max, we need more help to make this happen” he said, I agreed. While Timmy continued to pour candles, Ricky thought through how we could upscale production, and I called Brody with the news. He was excited and started talking about package design.

The next few days went by quickly. The permit for the barn renovation came through and Bubba started work. He put up a temporary wall between the candle making area and the old stalls so that he could work without disrupting the business, when he finished up with that side, we’d move our operations there so he could renovate the other side.  Bubba had a good plan to keep us working while he renovated… we still weren’t talking.

Brody stayed in Phoenix after the client meeting to debrief with his team and caught a flight out the next morning. He arrived at the Wilmington airport late Thursday afternoon and I picked him up from the airport after school. I pulled into the arrivals area just as he was walking out, I hardly recognized him! He was dressed in new clothes and had a haircut that seemed to transform him from country bumpkin to big city professional. Damn he wore it well. He saw my car and broke into a huge smile as he picked up his pace and made his way to the red Camaro. He opened the door, threw his bag in the back, and jumped into the passenger seat. He threw his arms around me and my hug-hating husband hugged me so damn tight. “I missed you so much, Maxwell. I’m sorry we faught, I was being stupid.” I basked in the warmth and strength of his embrace… damn I missed him and felt like shit about our long distance fight. We just sat in the car hugging; I was so fucking happy he was home. All was forgiven.

“I’m sorry too. Damn, you look good” I said.

He smiled and laughed “this is my big city look. Kevin dressed me.” He talked about his trip the entire ride back to the farm. He kept apologizing for staying so long, and I kept telling him that it was fine, he did what he needed to do. It was clear he loved his new job and it was important to him, so it was important to me to support him. He was still giving me details when the Camaro roared up the gravel drive. Zoey could hardly wait for the car to stop he was so excited to see his daddy. Brody left his bags in the car and walked out towards the new barn, “Day-um, this looks great. And Jimmy’s all settled in?” He said inspecting the new outbuilding.

“Yup, so is witchy” I replied. When we were done inspecting the building, Brody went to take his bags inside and I went back to the old barn to check on things.

When I entered the barn, Ricky and Timmy were hard at work as always with the music blasting. The two of them were dancing as they poured candles; I just stood there and watched, getting a big kick out of it. “Hey guys how’s it going?” I shouted over the music.

They both looked up at me… Timmy stopped dancing, while Ricky kept shaking his 17 year old booty and shouted back at me, “hey Boss, what’s up?”

“I just picked up Brody from the airport, what’s going on here?” I asked. Ricky updated me on what they had done, as always, he was ahead of schedule. “I think I’m going to take the afternoon off and make Brody dinner, if you guys are good.” I announced. I didn’t need his permission, but I felt guilty leaving the two of them to work without me.

“Go for it. We got this” Ricky said as the two continued to work. Confident that Ricky had things under control, I went into the house to make dinner. I passed Brody on my way in, he was headed to his office to do a little more work before dinner. By the time dinner was ready, he was done and the guys were heading out for the night. I set the dining room table, lit the candles, and put on some mood music. We were finally sitting down together for the first time in over a week.

“I’m sorry I had to stay so long” Brody said, I just shook my head. It wasn’t his fault; I knew he’d be travelling for this job. “and I’m sorry for… the whole… you know… Harris, Bubba thing.”

“Let’s just forget about it. I probably would’ve jumped to the same conclusion given the situation” I said, “especially since he woke your ass up in the middle of the night.” That was the last we spoke of it. Frankly, the only thing that mattered was that Brody was home.

“Fuck this” Brody said as he pushed his chair out and got up from the table. He walked around the table and stood behind my chair, wrapping his arms around me, and kissing my neck. I had only taken maybe two bites at most, but dinner was over… we were both starved for dessert. I pushed my chair back while Brody pulled it away from the table. Within seconds we were standing face to face. I leaned down while he put his arms around my neck and pulled himself up, bridging the couple of inch gap between our lips. It was game on.

We had missed each other so much and his lips felt so damn good against mine. We made out with abandon as we stripped each other naked right there in the middle of the candlelit dining room. Before long, Brody pulled away, spun me around, and pushed my back so I was bent over the table. He went to work on my neglected pink pucker. Oh my god! His warm tongue felt amazing as it breached my tight hole. His tongue darted in and out of me as if it was trying to fuck me. Brody was lost in my ass and gave it a big smack that echoed through the little dining room. I grunted in response… the pain, the pleasure… damn! Brody stood up and rubbed his cock up and down my ass crack. The difference in our height was never more obvious than it was at that moment. He wanted so bad to fuck me while I was bent over the table but even on his tiptoes, he couldn’t quiet do it. I moved my body off the table and bent over one or the dining room chair.

“There we go” Brody said in a breathy groan as he moved behind me and lined himself up. I felt the bluntness of his cockhead pushing against my tight entrance. “You ready, baby?” he asked as he bent over and whispered in my ear before shoving his tongue into it.

“God, yes. Fuck me” I involuntarily responded. I wanted him… every fucking inch. He pushed hard and this cockhead begrudgingly slipped in. “Fuck… wait, wait, wait” I cried, there was no lube other than Brody’s saliva. He held himself there for a moment and then I reached back with both hands and pulled his ass forward giving him the greenlight. He slowly entered, the friction was strong and raw as flesh met flesh. He leaned in and shoved his tongue into my ear again before I turned back and our lips met in a passionate kiss. Still reaching back, I moved my right hand from his ass cheek to his head and tangled my fingers in his newly cut hair. Our love making was always hot, but this was raw passion at its best. Two sex-starved lovers reunited. Our week and a half apart seemed like an eternity thanks to our fight. Brody pumped in and out of me slowly before pulling out.

“Let’s move” he said then led me to the living room. We kissed as he pushed me down onto the couch, he leaned down and pulled me by the legs, throwing my ankles over his shoulders, then lined up and entered me again. He was looking down at me and our eyes locked as he pushed his way into me until his balls hit my ass. He leaned in to kiss me as he pulled out of my ass then pushed in again, then again… slowly. As raw as it was, it was twice as passionate. We were two lovers reveling in our carnal desire for each other. I spit in my hand, reached down, and stroked myself as Brody pounded me harder and faster, pushing me over the edge.

“I’m so fucking close” I growled with my eyes locked to his.

“I wanna cum together” he said picking up his pace as I slowed mine down. Within a minute he wailed “I’m gonna shoot!” I stroked faster until I was past the point of no return. We tied it perfectly as my load shot out of my balls with such force that it hit us both in the face. At the same time, my ass was filling with Brody’s warm swimmers. His grunts and groans were music to my ears, goddammit I had missed him so much. Brody was a man possessed and kept pounding until he finally collapsed on top of me in a sweaty, cummy mess. It was fucking wonderful. With both panted and heaved trying to catch our breath from the best sex we’d had in a long time. “Damn I missed you” Brody whispered in my ear.

“I missed you too” I whispered back. I loved him more than anything and our argument just seemed so stupid now. After a few minutes we went up to the shower and cleaned ourselves off. Eventually we made it back to the dining room. I put our cold dinner in the microwave and we ate in silence, holding hands across the table as we did. After that we sat on the couch and watched a movie, then up to bed. We made love one more time before we went to sleep.

It was pure hell getting up on Friday morning. I didn’t want to get out of bed and go to work, I wanted to stay there in the arms of the man of my dreams. I trudged through my day… my god no day of my life had ever lasted longer! I just wanted to be home with Brody. I solidified our plans with Harris and Terrance for Saturday night at our place. Gina overheard me and tried to invite herself and Dylan… I know this sounds stupid, but as much as I loved them, I just wanted to be around gay friends for a change. In college I was surrounded by gay guys, but here I was the exception. I missed having gay friends around. I mean yeah… there were Tommy and Darius, but their relationship was still new and they were off doing their own thing, I rarely saw them anymore. I think Gina understood but you know her, she still pushed until I just said, “no. not this time.” I felt a little mean-girl-esque, but I really just wanted the four of us to get to know each other, especially after the misunderstanding while Brody was gone. I wanted our husbands to be comfortable with our friendship. Straight guys had it easy, if they wanted to hang out with another straight guy it was no big deal, in fact it was encouraged. But two gay guys hanging out came with a million assumptions. Anyway, that was my Friday at work… long.

When I got home, Bubba and his crew were working in the barn, Ricky and Timmy were blasting the music, dancing and working their butts off, and Brody was up in his studio painting for the first time in a while. Brody yelled something down to the boys and they laughed. Ricky yelled something back up to him, the three of them all seemed to be having fun together… even Brody. The two teenage rednecks that tagged our barn several weeks ago were growing on us… they were good kids who just followed the wrong leader… and I’ll say it again, I couldn’t have done any of this without Ricky. I went up to the studio to say hi to Brody, “Hey how’s it going” I asked as I snuck a peek at his painting (he hated that. He never wanted me to see his works in progress).

“Good, I had a lull in work while we wait for client feedback on the final campaign, so I thought I’d paint” Brody said as he kept painting. “Hey, go down and look at what Bubba’s doing on the other side of the barn, he’s really moving along.” I really didn’t want to see Bubba… we were still avoiding each other. So, instead of going to the other side of the barn, I just looked down from the loft and could see the progress from there. Things were really moving forward. I kissed Brody goodbye then went downstairs and went to work. The guys had gotten a lot done and were working on fulfilling orders from Stella and online after they poured some candles. All in all, our operation was working like a well oiled machine. We had the initial order for The Resort done, plenty of candles made to handle current and future orders and were ahead of the game. I was proud of us. The guys stayed a couple more hours. After they left, Brody kept painting and I called Seth to make sure he was ready for his first day at the farmer’s market. He was so excited, and that got me excited, he promised to call in the morning and send pictures. I hung up about 8PM and we ordered our usual Friday pizza, then just hung out on the couch, and fell asleep.

Saturday morning Brody went with me to the farmer’s market since Gina ditched me so her and Dylan could check out some wedding venues. Seth and Zach facetimed us from the Soulard Farmer’s Market, the place was packed and they had a lot of traffic, things were going great. Back in Wilmington… as always, Zoey was the center of attention, everyone we knew stopped by, and we went to the diner with the J’s afterward. After lunch we went home and Brody unpacked the truck while I made dinner and got ready for Harris and Terrance.

The four of us had a great night together and got along so well, talking, and laughing all night. God, it felt good to be around gay friends again… I know that sounds stupid, I loved all my friends, but there was something about hanging out with another gay couple that was so… so… comforting I guess is the right word. Terrance was about ten years older than Harris, he loved our place and said they wanted to find a place out our way with some land, Brody promised to help them look. I learned that both of their kids were teenagers… I don’t know, but for some reason I assumed they were younger. Their oldest, Trey (Terrance the third) was 17, had a car, and was looking for a part time job. I agreed to talk to him on Monday.

Brody loved his new job, I love my job, the business was taking off, we loved our home, and we were surrounded by family and friends. Life was good.

 

To be continued…