I come back in bits and pieces. Strange flutterings of insight rummaging around my short-circuited mind.
My mother's voice: 'How's he doing?'
My father's: 'It was a bad one this time. But I think he'll be okay.'
Again, my mother: 'It was supposed to go away, John. He was supposed to be over this. I thought . . .'
A pause.
Then: 'I thought we'd done everything we can exposing him to us, to how sex is supposed to look. To normalise it for him. I thought that we'd done the best we can given what that bastard had done to my little boy.'
And then my father's snarl and grumble at that statement. At the mention of the bastard.
A white-washed room. A single drain at one end. And there was a man there, wasn't he? Yes, there was a man. And he was in robes akimbo, and he was standing in front of me, and I was there, in that room. The cool air drew pebbles around my naked skin, and . . .
my naked skin?
I must have made some kind of noise. A wounded noise. Because the talking ceases immediately. And my dad's arms tightens around me, his body plastering itself to my behind.
I can smell him. Smell his cologne. Mixed in with the day's accumulated sweat. He must have just come in from work then. His shirt collar digs into the exposed skin of my neck, above my tee. And I am -
Burning up. It is hot (in that room) in my bedroom, and my skin is crawling, and I thrash, pushing at the materials, pushing at him, begging at him, at my mother, to please, please, please cool me down. I don't wanna be hot again. Because if I am that means I'm ready. My body's ready. For him. For that bastard . . .
They must have understood then, what I was trying to say, trying to do. My parents. One second the air in front of me was empty, the air behind stuffed with the cocoon of my father's quiet wrath at being helpless in regards to his son. To what is his.
And then my mother's there. Her quite strength displacing the molecules of the air with their wrath. With their determination. And she reaches out, lilac and jasmine, my childhood and my future, all that I am, all that I'll ever be, is granted by that strength, by that smell, and she reaches out, puts a hand on my head, and . . .
She sings then, my mother. A lullaby of woe. She used to sing that one when I was a child, in her arms, as she lulled me to sleep. A sense of security that's more ingrained in me than anything that bastard might have ever been able to ingrain.
Her voice is a quite whisper, a misplaced breath of air against my bruised conscience. And it calms that part of me that has reverted back to being in animal mode. Flight or fight. Survival.
As I calm a bit, my father reaches from behind, and with one swipe eases the tank I'm wearing off my head. The warmth of the fading summer sun and the coolness of the approaching night causes a juxtaposition of sensation that is like a balm to my hypersensitive mind. Coupled that with the quite strength of my father's body (in some corner of my mind I register that he too has lost his shirt, his bare skin against mind harkening back to a time when he used to nurture me growing up, used to play with me whilst I ran around, his hug being the reward for my winnings), and it helps calm me down further.
'Sleep,' a gentle, female voice croons from somewhere above as the arms around me tighten further. As the hand on my forehead caress my face, my neck. 'Sleep, my child.'
Helpless to do anything else, I follow that voice's command. I sleep.
The next time conscious returns to me, it returns all at once. One moment I'm in a blissful emptyness, an everlong dark. The next, sensation returns. The whisper of a wind through an open window, the feel of the bedsheet against my (naked?) skin. And -
The heat of the body engulfing me from the back.
I open my eyes. The light's are turned off, illumination barely recognizable through the street lights kaleidoscoping in though the frosted window panes of the half closed windows. The curtains fluttering sets the lights dancing.
A heavy weight is ensconcing me. A hand drawn over my waist, the other under my head. I'm basically propositioned onto their lap, but just in a more horizontal direction.
And. I'm confused. The moments of the past few hours are blurry. The last thing I remember was the call with Kevin. Him teasing me. And then -
A blur. Bits and pieces. Fractal pieces of memories both inside and outside my head.
I block my dry eyelids. Try to turn, get on my back. The arms around me tighten, pulling me harder into the depths of another body. Strong, muscular. Male.
A grunt of air whooses past my ears. And I know that grunt. Know the hands that encircle me. The light hairs on them drifting across my flushed skin like silk sheets across highly sensitive skin.
'Ash,' the voice says, sleep gruff.
I turn, and this time the arms loosen, giving me the space to turn around, get on my back. But not very far. My head is still comfortably on his arms, his other hand still around my waist.
My father looks down at me with worry, love, and desperation in his eyes. His face is drawn, tight. His body is held, brimming with something dark, something distant, coiled. Ready to spring into action, quiet strength serrating the muscles putting them in sharp relief against the light/darkness of the room.
And . . . he's half naked, only a pair of black boxer briefs fit snugly against his skin. The hair of his chest tickling against my arms.
'Hey, dad. Wassup, dude.' My voice is hoarse, even more so than a normal sleep should make it so. I scratch and shift through my scattered memories, trying to come up with a reason why. Draw up empty.
He lets loose a long drawn breath, body slagging. His head comes down, loosing it's fight against gravity, lovingly caressing the air near my ear, my neck and he settles fully at the crook of it.
I don't know what to do with this. With any of it. It's been a long time since I've woken up like this, with my dad behind my back, holding me tight, keeping my head up from the depths of the thrashing, roaring waters that is my past. A past I've buried so deep even I forget its existence most of the time.
'How bad was it?' I ask quietly, drawing up a construct based on facts I can gleam in my immediate periphery: my dad, the night outside when it was late afternoon last, my naked skin, the lower portion of my torso crested with what can only be dried cum.
'What do you remember?' he asks, voice muffled against my skin.
'I was . . . talking to Kevin? About Leslie. Yeah, about her. How I was supposed to meet her tonight - guess that ain't happening anymore - and then we talked about how I'm missing him, and so he put up a show . . .'
After I pause, indicating that's all I remember, my dad picks up the slack.
'I was returning from work when I got the call. Kevin called me in downright panic. Told me that y'all were fooling around and that . . . that you came without his permission. And that you were having a panic attack regarding it.'
I close my eyes. Gulp. Bits and pieces returning to me, slowly. Kevin. His body. His piss filled bottle, ready for me once he comes back to me. And me, not being able to hold it anymore. Not . . . being able to follow orders anymore. And the near blinding panic following it.
'It struck me badly, bud,' he continues. 'I drove down the last couple of miles in blind panic and anxiety. Made record time too.' A dying laugh. 'And then when I finally arrived, I came in to find you near hysterical, your bedsheets tangled around your body. Your -'
He takes a breath then. Resolutely he says, 'Your penis was hard, cum leaking in a steady stream out of it. And what Kevin had said finally clicked. You had cum without his permission. And you never did well when you couldn't follow the orders from someone you've decided to follow.'
He looks up at me, eyes red rimmed. I've seen my father cry three times in my life. And all three of them have been moments about me and/or surrounding me. 'I felt so helpless.' His voice this time is quiet, defeated.
'Here he was, my boy, my soul. My everything. And I couldn't do anything. I was shocked, Ash. Shocked and repulsed. And no, no, Ash. Not of you. Never you. But at him. At that bastard. That motherfucking turd of a wasted breath.'
His voice now holds a barely constrained anger in it. Anger that has never fully faded. Never really had an outlet to disperse. I close my eyes, my body shifting till I am lying on my side again, my head resting against his defined pecs, my nose pressed soothingly into the crook of his arm.
The smell of him, the feel of the hair on him has always been my oasis, my lifeline in the shit show that is my life.
There's a pause then. Both of us lost in our own paradise. Him having me back like this, in his arms. Rightfully back to where I belong. And me. Just being.
After a while I say, 'How did ya get me back?'
He turns his head, his 5'o clock scruff grazing against my temple as he places a gentle kiss.
'You're mine, Ash. No matter what, or where you go, who you give yourself to, no one will know how to handle you better than me. How to bring you back from the edge better than me.'
And when I look up at him, I only find unhinged possession exuding from his face, as he whispers, 'I brought you back.'
And that's it, isn't it? It is just that simple. I was lost. And he brought me back. My father, my hero. The person from whom I came. The person, no matter how far I go, I'll always come back to. An island in the vast expense of the ocean, with a lighthouse atop. Always revolving. Calling me back. Calling me home.
I press up on my side, muscles bunching, as I bring my face closer to him. As I look into the darkness of him, of what he had to do to bring back his son to him -
I press my lips against his, body going pliant. Giving myself permission to do the one thing I was made for.
Giving myself to him.
He's reluctant at first. I can feel how tense he holds himself up. His hands are fisted at his side. His lips in a thin line, still not giving himself into it.
So, this is how ya wanna play it, old man? Game on.
I sidle up, a hand beneath me in support, leaning over him. Our lips unattach themselves, and as soon as he presses himself to the bed as if to get as far from me as he can, I unwind my body on top of him, half atop, half on the bed.
'Ash,' he grounds out, voice gravel. 'This is . . . we cannot,' he stops, collects himself, 'We cannot do this again.' He finishes, a finality to it.
Well, fuck that.
I bit my bottom lip in a truly unruly manner. His eyes zero on it, body tuning in. Time and space may just be words in a page for how much his reaction has changed overtime as to when we first started doing it, a month after I'd turned 18. He was very adamant about that, this man. Very big on autonomy, and you first have to know what it is to be an adult, Ash.
Well, boo-fucking-hoo. Lesson learned.
'But daddy!' I literally moan the words, making my eyes wide, lips wobble a bit. And the hunger in his eyes at that tone, at the raw need in it that I do not try to hide. 'It's been so long . . . So long since I've felt daddy's cock in me. Since I sucked on your nipples to bring me to sleep. Since you fed me your cum?' I end the sentence in an infliction, leaving it open.
I have gotten pretty adept at this game, if I do say so myself.
'Ash.' There's a warning in his voice this time. A tightening of a leash. But. A leash can only get so tight before it just rips off the post it's been attached to.
I lower my head a bit, my lips a hair's breath away from his nipples. His chest hair tickle my eyes, my temple. The scent of him enveloping me. And when I say, 'Please, daddy. Please,' I make sure that the breath ghosts over his nipples, hardening them to a diamond point. I lick my lips, making sure it grazes the nipple, just to sign the deal.
And he -
Have you ever seen one of those mountain lions pounce? In discover channel? Or out in the nature? After so long hunting for its prey, being patient, lulling it into a false sense of security, the mountain lions pounce on them out of wherever they were hiding. The poor prey don't even get a breath away before they are caught in the trap.
So, yes. That.
That's what it felt like when the leash snapped, and my father pounced, like a rabid, hungry mountain lion, and I was the sacrificial prey, all too ready to get fucking devoured.
TO BE CONTINUED
