Bird Came Down

Theme Song: Song 2 (Woo Hoo), Blur

Elias Anderson was blessed with a gentle waking and thought of slipping back into slumber. He always slept naked, and treasured the feel of the mattress and the covers against his body. But he had to pee, no doubt about that. He climbed out of bed and opened the door to head to the little bathroom. Lance or Dylan always put on shorts or underwear to walk out of their rooms, but Elias never did, saw no need. Dylan’s room was across the hall, and the door was closed, but on the other side of it he heard the stifled moans and then the sharp outcries of morning sex. By now he knew the difference between his lovers’ cries, and though he wasn’t entirely sure what was happening, he knew Lance was doing it to Dylan, and Dylan was crying out, possibly planting his hands in Lance’s hair. He pressed his ear to the door, growing a little stiff, and then the need to urinate overcame his need to listen. He came back a few minutes later just to press his ear to the door, just to hear the bed moving, to understand that someone he loved was fucking the other someone, to hear Lance cry out in shock. And then Elias thought it was best to go back to bed. He left his door cracked.

Elias had known he was in love with Dylan when he was fourteen years old. At the time Dylan had been a year older and Lance was sixteen. Part of him was in love with both of them, with the way they looked together. Once upon a time he’d seen them kissing in Dylan’s house though none of the grown ups had. Dylan had gotten up to close the door and Elias, child that he was, wanted nothing more than to open that door, to be part of them.

But Dylan and Lance had not lasted. Dylan had gone off with someone else and that hadn’t lasted either and, at last, Elias was with Dylan. Dylan wasn’t the way he was now. He was an easy target. He wanted intimacy and friendship with other boys and the only way he knew to reach it was through sex, and so he had been easy to seduce. The first time Elias had maneuvered Dylan into bed, though it had caused him pain—he was a virgin—there was a tremendous sense of triumph, of release. Above him Dylan shuddered and came, and the whole weekend he kept asking Elias if he was alright. Elias wasn’t as alright as he pretended. It hurt to shit. It hurt to wash his asshole. He hadn’t quite known how to have sex in the normal way let alone that way. But he knew he wanted Dylan. The three or four times he, with increasing difficulty, got Dylan to have sex with him it hurt at least twice until he and Dylan began to learn what they were doing. But in the end Dylan couldn’t help but feel like he was ruining a friendship, and with the sense that he was ruining Dylan, Elias had allowed things to end.

Lance was not much different. Lance was his chemistry partner, and they had hit it off and become fast friends. They’d ended up making out over chemistry books in Lance’s bedroom, and though Lance broke that off, he had still invited Elias over to stay the night. When things had happened with him Elias knew what he was doing and even though Lance was much bigger than Dylan and had refrained from having sex much longer, he could take Lance better. It was a year after that they had finally come together as a trio, and though the struggle to that was lengthy, once they had settled into life it had never been very difficult living together.

“Ohhh my God!” he heard Dylan shout from the other room.

People never understood how the three of them lived, or how it felt for Elias to be with Dylan and Lance. He knew he was loved. Under the shadow of either one of them he knew he was the cherished object of affection. To Elias Anderson what caused him inexpressible joy was the certainty that Lance and Dylan loved each other, that they were, indeed, a tightly woven three ply knot, that love existed and would exist between the two men whom he loved and who loved him. And it was that love that had drawn him to them, for he had wanted to be a part of it consciously and unconsciously since he was very young. The thought that right now both of his boys were with each other, in the aftermath of lovemaking, holding and stroking each other, laughing together, was to him the happiest thought in the world.

Aside from loving them, Elias loved the certainty of the schedule, and he loved his own space. This apartment was much like the one they’d had in Chicago. Dylan had his room, and on certain nights Lance stayed there. Elias had his room, and this was where Lance stayed on his nights. The living room, especially the television, was the six foot four inch two hundred pound Lancc Bishop’s domain. Elias prized his space and his solitude, and it was only in this relationship he could have it. Some might picture the three of them in endless sex, always sitting together, legs linked, finishing one another’s sentences, and this could happen. But for Elias what he experienced was a great freedom to be on his own, and to let the others be on their own. With couples each always had to be there. In their home you could drop out and let the other two be present for each other. Or, when one was feeling distant, needing to be distant, the other two could be fine, for a time, on their own.

He stopped thinking when he heard the door pushed open. He did not turn around. He played the guessing game. Heavy feet and longer strides said it was Lance. He pushed back the covers and climbed into bed, throwing a great arm over Elias.

“I took the open door as an invitation.”

“It was,” Elias said, turning around. “I miss you when you aren’t here. We need our nights apart, but I miss you.”

Lance said nothing. He pressed his unshaven face against Elias’s chest.

“Where is Dylan?”

“In his room where I left him. Where else would he be?”

Elias shrugged.

“I thought he’d come over.”

“Why, so we could both have you at the same time? I saw your feet under the door, you little perv. I know you were listening.”

“If you think I’m going to deny it you’re wrong.”

“You’d have to have a sense of shame to deny it, and I know you’ve never had one of those.”

“Shame is a waste,” Elias said. “We wouldn’t be here if I had it.”

“Had what?”

Elias looked up over Lance’s shoulder.

“Dylan!” Lance exclaimed lazily.

He came in wearing red Jockeys and collapsed on the bed between the wall and Elias.

“We need a bigger bed.”

“We have a bigger bed,” Elias said, “In your room. It’s always been the bed the three of us stay in together.”

“Well, I’m already here,” Dylan said, pulling a pillow from under Elias. “It’s too late for anything different to happen. I’m not getting up.”

Elias pressed his back against Dylan’s and felt Lance’s face pressed to his chest.

“Let’s not say anything,” he said. “Let’s just savor this moment.

“The only one saying anything is you,” said Dylan.

And so no one said anything for a while, but when they did, it was Elias again.

“What time do you have to be at school?”

“Twelve.”

“Will you give me a ride to my classes?”

“Sure thing.”

Elias pressed his head to Lance’s head and asked, “What about you?”

“I got in late last night. They don’t need me today.”

“You’ll just stay here?”

“Uh huh.”

“Well then can you drive both of us?” Dylan asked. “That way you can get Elias when he’s done.”

“Sure thing.”

“And we,” Elias told Lance, “can have lunch together.”

For the very first years of their relationship, Lance had been off at school and rarely around, and Elias still savored the days he had alone with him. For Elias, Dylan was the constant spouse. He had to admit he took him for granted. He expected him to always be there. Lance was something else, the treat. It hardly made sense. Elias had never learned to explain it either to himself or to anyone else and certainly did not voice it to his lovers.

“I was talking to Dad last night,” Lance said over lunch in the commissary of City College, “and he said he was going to take Dylan’s dad to upstate Michigan for a camping and hunting trip.”

“Which Dad?”

“Does it matter? It would be hilarious either way. But it was Fenn.”

“Oh my God, can you imagine Fenn with a gun?”

“Yes, actually,” Lance said. “I can imagine all the Houghtons with guns. Just not with—”

“Shotguns.”

“No! And he was telling Fenn all about the elk and the open sky and the water, and the deer running free and waking up early in the morning in a tent and the water, and so Dylan’s dad is like—well you know him—he said it sounded strangely exciting and that my dad was awakening the inner hillbilly in him.”

“Well, your dad’s always liked Dylan’s dad.”

“And Fenn has always liked him. They’re a very odd duo. Now if only our parents,” Lance pointed between himself an Elias, “could hang together.”

A few days later, Elias realized that for some reason he always seemed annoyed with Dylan. The unclean kitchen, the soap left out, the hair in the sink was always Dylan’s fault. He realized on his way to pick up Dylan that he was perpetually making a list of what to tell his boyfriend that he wasn’t doing right.

“I’m married to him.”

In a way there was something a little more married about his relationship to Dylan than to Lance. Dylan was the one he nagged.

As he pulled up to Andrews Hall and he saw Dylan coming out with his backpack over his shoulder, on time, Elias realized something in him was disappointed that he would be able to argue with Dylan for being late.

But Dylan argues with me too.

He thinks I’m too bossy. He says I’m too bossy. I put up curtains and then he comes back around and puts up shades. Everything I tell him, he disregards.

Dylan was coming to him in old faded jeans and a hoodie, and by the jeans he could see the outlines of strong thighs, athletic calves. Dylan was broad shouldered and a little on the short side. He had the compact body and the dark buzzed hair of a Marine. His face was a little square, his jaw strong. Dylan came to the door and vaulted himself into the truck.

“What?” he said, grinning with his vaguely wolfish face.

“I’m just looking at you,” Elias said.

“You’re a strange man.”

“How’s the rotation chart?”

“What?” Dylan began. Then: “You made it.”

Elias frowned and took up his briefcase, opening the sheet of paper that read:

SUNDAY Lance+Dylan

MONDAY Elias+Lance

TUESDAY Dylan+Elias

WEDNESDAY Lance+Dylan

THURSDAY Elias+Lance

FRIDAY Dylan+Elias

SATURDAY Lance+Dylan

SUNDAY Lance+Elias

“Today is Monday,” Dylan murmured leaning over so that Elias could smell his cologne, the dash of sweet Lagerfeld he always wore. “Lance stays with you tonight.”

“Well tonight hasn’t happened yet,” Elias told him. “And I don’t pick Lance up for another two hours.”

“You wanna go back home for a bit?” Dylan was grinning.

“Yes,” Elias said, touching Dylan’s hand and watching the hair that went up his arm.

“I’m such a bitch. Why do I forget what you are? I think I pick fights with you just so I can have the pleasure of saying I fight with a beautiful man who isn’t leaving me. And I want you so bad right now.”

“You were listening to us have sex this morning.”

“Let’s not bring that up.”

“It turned me on a little. You know I’m weird. Let’s go home, baby.”

Dylan had been about to say, “Let’s go home, like when it was only us.” But even now it was like when it was only us. It was the reason it had taken so long for Dylan to enjoy the few times when all three of them made love together.

They drove home quickly, and Dylan led him by the hand into the apartment, pulling his face forward, inviting him into a world of kisses and sensual delights, taking him to his bedroom and pulling down his jeans and his underwear and taking Elias in his mouth expertly. This was the Dylan he loved. No, he loved all of Dylan, and he understood what Dylan offered here offered only for him, only for the man he was with. He had always been like this with his lovers, but right now he was like this with Elias and suddenly Elias wanted to cry.

“Baby, what?” Dylan said as they were taking off their clothes.

Elias looked up and down Dylan’s body, ran his hands over his hair, looked down his back to his perfect buttocks, so round and firm, to his back, to his gentle eyes.

“All of this?” Elias murmured. “Mine?”

“Of course it’s yours,” Dylan’s voice was a rasp as he licked his nipples, kissed his throat, took him in a wrestler’s grip and turned him around so that now Elias was between Dylan’s legs, looking up and down his thighs and calves. The only thing better than being fucked by Dylan was fucking him, was being brought into this welcoming garden of his lover’s strong hands and firm thighs, of his red lips, dark eyes, encouraging smile, the smile that had first taught him how to have sex, of the lips opening in pleasure, the voice that cried out, and the hot tightness as he entered. Whatever anyone said about the power a man felt when fucking, Elias felt guided, protected, free to let go of all that he held to so tightly as he shuttled between Dylan’s thighs, as he pressed deeper into him, as those strong arms brought him back down to earth and kept his soul from flying out of his body. He let out a high pitched cry that would have embarrassed him by its vulnerability in the presence of anyone else but Lance, and then, sighing, still held safe in Dylan’s body, he shuddered with orgasm.

That late afternoon they lay together, knowing soon it would be time to get dressed and pick up Lance. Dylan pressed himself into Elias’s arms and allowed his lover to stroke his hair.

“I’m sorry about the last week,” Elias said.

“Whaddo you mean?” Dylan turned around for a moment, and then turned back the way he was.

“The last night you were supposed to stay with me, I was just so tired from the funeral and everything.”

“That happens.”

“And then the time before we fought and I was stupid.”

“That happens too.”

“We didn’t get together. We didn’t do this thing we just did, and I was coming to get you, Baby, and I saw you, like I really saw you. And I forget what I have. I forget how lucky I am.”

“Stop.”

“No,” Elias sat up and looked down on him. “You’re hot. I mean everyone knows that. Everyone says that. You on my arm is just like… even the most homophobic people get jealous! But you’re the best person I know. You always have been, and I forget how much I love you.”

“You know I feel the same way,” Dylan said.

“Even when I harp on you.”

“I don’t really pay it attention. You’re just being you. I actually think it’s your way of flirting.”

Dylan didn’t say anything else. That he was attractive was not news to him. His biological father, even in his sixties, was something to look at, and so was Dylan’s twin. He had been a pretty child who had grown into a pretty young man. He had grown up close to pretty people, and saw how far prettiness got a man. Pretty men were like candy and people wanted to consume them. No one cared about them. In those years when his libido was insatiable, his smile, his eyes, his face, his muscles had gotten him into bed with so many boys and often men, often men too old, who didn’t care about him when he was gone.

Elias could not understand, because Dylan had not understood until now, that his complaining and bickering, his pushing him away in bed was almost a relief, because that prettiness, the thing that so many people had loved without loving him, Elias often didn’t see. After a year of psychology Dylan was almost sure that he left his facial hair in the sink on purpose, and he was almost sure that Elias yelled at him because he knew it.

“You know it’s all for you,” Dylan said.

“Huh?”

“Me.”

“Uh… I guess.”

Elias hadn’t understood.

Dylan cleared his throat and turned around, cupping his chin.

“I mean you’re my guy, and whatever anyone else sees when they see me, this is for you. It’s only for you. If I don’t look good to you, then it doesn’t matter. If you don’t… think I’m hot, then it doesn’t matter. I’m yours and nobody else’s.”

A long time ago the three of them had stopped with the awkward, “You are the most important person in the world to me… except for Lance.” Or “I only live and breathe for you… and Dylan.” All of this was understood and to say, I love you and you alone: and the other person you’re in love with too, would not only have lessened it, but made the confession somehow false.

“Are you home?”

“Of course I’m home,” Dylan’s father said, “How else would I pick up this phone?”

“Are you still on the landline?”

“You just called the landline! I’m the one that’s getting old, so why are you being senile?”

“Dad, I couldn’t remember which number was which.”

“Oh. Well, I’ll let that pass. I was going to call you after dinner. You beat me to it.”

“I wanted to hear your voice.”

“You’re the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“What about Thackeray?”

“That boy!” Fenn began. “That boy is going to be the pain in my ass. He’s been asking for a piano in the house for two years and I thought he would go off to school at Curtis, but he’s staying here so we got him one.”

“So he can have one for the house.”

“He has one at Tom’s house.”

“He’d like to be around you more.”

“I…”

“Dad, you fuss just to fuss. I know you do.”

“Well, maybe. Speaking of fussing, when are you all coming home?”

“Uh, the weekend after next.”

“Fine then. I’ll just give the apartment downstairs to Thackeray.”

“Do you want us to come this weekend?”

“I think the sooner the better. Peter looks like a hound dog. He comes by the house everyday, talking about how much he misses Lance. And you know I hate that you keep moving further and further away.”

“Yeah,” Dylan said, feeling suddenly serious. “I hate that too.”

“Your whole family misses you. Thackeray misses you. I miss you. Looking at him just makes me miss you more.”

“You’re starting to make me feel bad.”

“Good, you should. Speaking of making you feel bad, you know Maia just had her first baby.”

“Yeah.”

“That means she has given Todd and Elias’s parents their first grandchild. How long till you give me a grandson?”

“Are you serious?”

“Unless you don’t want any kids. But you’ve been married for years so I thought you might want one.”

“I don’t think that’s so easy to do, Dad,” Dylan said. “You know that, right?”

When Fenn said nothing, Dylan said, “How many people want to give a baby to three men?”

“There was a movie about that in the eighties.”

“I think it was different than our situation.”

Fenn said, “Now, if you don’t have children because you don’t want them that’s one thing. But if you do want them… then you can find a way.

“Just think about it.”