My Image of You
Morning came too early. Lyn wanted to groan and complain, but Alexander had been clear enough: the moral dilemma in question was his and his alone. He’d have to figure it out, and preferably before the wedding came and went.
There was no easy way to do this. Lyn stared at his phone, waiting for a sign. But Brad had no reason to call him, busy as he was with the wedding preparations. Well, not completely busy if he still had time to get together with his future brother-in-law for a quickie.
Were they also fucking? Like anal intercourse? Lyn ran one hand through his hair, pulling it hard, although he knew very well how difficult the damage would be to correct. It shouldn’t matter to him if they drank each other’s cum and fucked each other in the ass and engaged in rough play or whatever.
Yet, somewhere inside Lyn’s mind a fat worm was gnawing its way through the grey matter with the voracity of a parasite with no other purpose than to eat itself to death. Alexander had stated the other part of the dilemma even without knowing he had done so. If, during college, Lyn had ended up fooling around with Brad, how would that have changed their relationship? To be treated like someone to have fun with and then discarded…
Lyn had agreed with Alexander that he would’ve never survived that. His feelings for Brad had always gone beyond mere physical attraction. It would’ve been so much easier for everyone if he only felt that and nothing more. First of all, he could’ve cured it on the spot by getting freaky with other guys, maybe guys who looked just like Brad: blond, tall, handsome, cheerful and sunny weather all the time.
But in all his sexual history, Lyn had stayed away from that particular type. Inside his heart, there was a shrine with Brad’s name on it – and now it had been tarnished in a single afternoon.
With a huff aimed at himself and his indecisiveness, Lyn flicked through his phone until Brad’s number appeared on the screen.
“My man Lyn,” Brad drawled playfully, “what’s up?”
“Hey, I know you’re like super busy, but do you think we can meet? Alone? There’s something I want to talk to you about,” Lyn said quickly before he could change his mind.
Brad paused for a moment. “Wow, you sound so serious. Is this about Alexander?”
“No,” Lyn replied. “Why should it be about him?”
“I dunno,” Brad said, and Lyn could envision him with the eyes of his mind the way he must be shrugging his shoulders right now and pursing his lips for a moment. “There’s this weird tension between the two of you. I mean, I know you two have always competed against each other, but there’s nothing here to compete about. Is there?”
“There’s no tension,” Lyn said quickly. “Just friendly banter. As usual. Anyway, can you spare a few minutes? It won’t take long.”
“Sure. Anything for my ride or die,” Brad joked. “In about two hours? What do you say?”
“Perfect,” Lyn replied.
“Okay,” Brad said slowly. “Is there something the matter, though?”
“There is, but let’s talk face to face,” Lyn said. “I don’t want to do this over the phone.”
“Now you’re scaring me. Should I be scared?” Brad asked playfully.
“No,” Lyn lied. Was he lying? He didn’t know. He didn’t know Brad like he thought he knew him.
Alexander hugged him as soon as he finished his conversation and stood there, staring at the phone as if it could offer him a better solution than the one he was contemplating.
“Did you listen in?” he asked.
“I did,” Alexander admitted. “Do you think you’re doing the right thing?”
“Why are you phrasing that as a question? Shouldn’t you be the one to assure me that I’m doing the right thing?”
“You know I’m not anything like a fortune cookie. What matters to me is how you feel about it.”
“You seem to have a lax approach to morality and its consequences,” Lyn reproached. “Don’t tell me you have skeletons in your closet as big as Brad’s.”
“You’ll have to take a look in my closet and decide for yourself,” Alexander offered a prompt reply.
“Okay, weird, but okay. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to rehearse my statement before confronting the accused. Forgive me if I’m not going to be much fun for the next two hours.”
“I could make it fun,” Alexander offered.
“I’ll take your word for it, but not this time. I wouldn’t be fully into it, and I’m not going to use you as a distraction.”
“For the record, I wouldn’t mind you doing that.” Alexander kissed his cheek, and Lyn felt tempted, even if only for a moment to turn his head and make it a full kiss.
Later. Right now, he needed to put his head in order before meeting Brad. He’d be direct and firm. If there was an explanation, he’d listen to it. But he couldn’t imagine what it could be. A reasonable explanation at least.
“You’re not going to be bored, right?” he asked.
Alexander was already busy with his phone. Lyn leaned over to take a peek playfully. Of the little he could read, he only make out that he was staring at a medical text of some kind.
“You’re on vacation, you know that, right?” he teased Alexander, placing a small kiss on a perfect naked shoulder.
“Yes, but I never neglect keeping up to date with the new developments in my field.”
“That’s so like you. But thank you for being you,” Lyn said, earning a sharp glance from Alexander.
The demon had his glasses on and looked too edible to ignore.
“You’re so sexy in glasses,” he whispered, moving closer to steal a kiss.
Sharpness faded from the astonishing blue eyes. Instead, warmth took its place. Alexander let his eyes close as he accepted Lyn’s soft kiss.
***
He was definitely grateful that Brad had chosen a place where they could be alone. It seemed fitting to take a stroll on the beach, away from the madness of the wedding preparations, since Lyn wanted to pull Brad from there and have him experience a healthy dose of reality. How could he be so cheerful and uncaring, knowing he was cheating on his future wife? Could it be he didn’t see it as cheating? Somehow, Lyn doubted it.
As Brad walked toward him, Lyn studied him carefully. For the last eight years, he had wondered what their lives could’ve been like if they hadn’t wrecked their friendship the way they had. Lyn still blamed himself, no matter how harsh Brad had been. And now, it seemed like all that had been for nothing. Brad didn’t mind having his dick sucked by guys.
Putting the issue in such crude terms helped Lyn control his anger. He couldn’t explain it, not entirely. He was mad for reasons beyond the obvious ones.
Brad looked great in loose-fitting clothes. He was so handsome, yet Lyn looked at him with new eyes. Even so, he couldn’t assign the label ‘cheater’ to the easygoing guy coming toward him, looking as if he could hold the sun in his hand if he so wanted.
“What’s up?” Brad asked with the same dazzling smile as always.
Lyn stared at his friend for a moment in silence. There was no one around, so he could speak his mind freely. Steeling his resolve, he began.
“I’ll cut to the chase, Brad. I saw you. With Luke.”
Brad slowed his steps and narrowed his eyes. “Um, what do you mean?”
Lyn clenched his fists tightly. “You really want me to say it.” He looked Brad straight in the eye. “I saw Luke going down on you.”
Brad’s eyes turned to slits. “You what?” The smile was gone, too.
“Don’t worry. I didn’t stalk you like some goddamn teenager with a crush. It just happened.” Although Luke had proven to be an ass, Lyn didn’t want to throw him under the bus. Not yet, at least.
Brad tsked and looked to one side, averting his eyes from Lyn’s searching gaze. “Fuck,” he said.
“Yeah. Fuck. Seriously, man, is this really you?”
“Hmm, let me think. Yeah, it’s me,” Brad said, suddenly stubborn.
“What the hell, man?” Lyn continued, without hiding his pain.
For a moment, Brad looked guilty. But it passed like it had never been there. “I don’t see what it’s got to do with you. Ah, is it, perhaps,” Brad moved uncomfortably close, leaning over him, “that you wanted to be in Luke’s place? Seriously, by now you should’ve gotten over me.”
Lyn pushed hard against Brad’s chest. “Is that what you think? Really? That I’d come here and ruin your wedding by throwing myself at you? I would never help you cheat.”
Brad seemed to have steadied himself with ease. He grimaced and rubbed the back of his neck, as if he’d just been stung by a dozen insects.
“Yeah,” he breathed out, “you’re not the type. Always walking the fucking straight and narrow, right, Lyn?” The words weren’t said with anger, but rather ruefully.
“What straight and narrow? Let’s not beat around the bush. You obviously know I’m gay, and no, you didn’t forget. Yet, you kept pestering me about hooking up with women. Why?”
Brad stuffed his hands into the pockets of his pants and shrugged his shoulders. “You wouldn’t understand even if I told you.”
“Try me. Come on, Brad, we used to know each other. And I’ve never pegged you for being a callous bastard who’d jeopardize his entire future with the woman he loves, the woman who loves him back just as much if not more, only to get his dick sucked. Wait a fucking minute,” Lyn made a pause in his rant, “do you love Bella? Are you marrying her for money?”
Brad scoffed. “Of course, I love her.”
“There’s no ‘of course’ about it, buddy. Sorry to break it to you. Tell me why you’re doing this. To her. To yourself, ultimately. Since when have you become a cheating bastard?”
The handsome face Lyn knew so well looked conflicted. It felt like Brad was on the fence about something, but he couldn’t bring himself to say it.
“Tell me anything. Tell me you have an open relationship, and that she fools around with your cousins, or I don’t know who. Tell me that she cheated on you first, and this is payback, although if that were the case, I’d seriously wonder why the hell you were even thinking about getting married in the first place. Aren’t you going to say something?” Lyn asked anxiously.
Brad pursed his lips and shook his head, his eyes going blank. “Why the hell do you care, Lyn?”
“How can you even ask that? You’re a good person. You’ve always been a good person. Did that change? When?”
The look Brad gave silenced him. “What’s wrong, Lyn? I don’t fit in your little ordered life because I make mistakes and I’m human?”
“What?! I can’t even begin to unpack what you’re saying to me right now.”
Brad took one step closer and pushed his index finger into Lyn’s chest. It bordered on painful.
“This is all about you. About your perfect little image of me, isn’t it?”
Lyn blinked a few times, hard. His facial muscles hurt from all the tension coiled inside them. “No, what the hell?” he mumbled.
“Yes, it is,” Brad said. “No, I’m not going to give you an explanation, because you wouldn’t know what to do with one if I did. If things don’t go exactly Lyn’s way, he won’t put up with them. Heaven forbid he ever makes a mistake. Heck, heaven forbid anyone around him makes a mistake.”
“Stop talking in circles and making this about me,” Lyn protested. “So what if it’s about how I see you?” he revolted right away. “Is it that bad to have someone who sees you as the great person you are?”
Brad’s smile was so thin it could cut ice. “Apparently, I’m not so great. I’m a cheating bastard.”
“You say that as if you’re proud of yourself.”
“Maybe I am. Maybe that’s how I choose to live, and it’s none of your fucking business.”
“If it’s not, why the hell am I here? Why did you come looking for me after eight years of fucking radio silence?”
Brad barked out a short, humorless laugh. “That’s so rich coming from you, Lyn. You ghosted me first, you fucker.”
There was real pain behind those words, throwing Lyn off balance for a moment.
“Yeah,” Brad continued. “I called like a thousand times after to apologize. But you had to make it into this big thing. What the hell did you do? Did you throw your phone away? Because that’s the only explanation I could think of why I couldn’t reach you anymore. I was so damn pissed at you because you wouldn’t even let me apologize.”
Lyn worked his jaw. He didn’t want to relive that night. But it looked as if Brad was trying to pull him back into that darkness, and his words, although they spoke of pain which seemed so damn real, were callous and rough.
“My mom gave me so much shit when I got home,” Brad continued, oblivious to Lyn’s growing discomfort. “Even my dad, who’d never said one critical thing to me in my life until then, was mad at me. He was so sure that the perfect little Lyn he’d come to know couldn’t have been the asshole in what happened between us. I was the guilty one before I could even open my mouth. It doesn’t matter. It’s not like I’m a kid, and I wasn’t one back then, either. So, after feeling like crap for weeks, trying to reach you while you seemed to have fallen off the face of the earth, I decided that it was okay not to give a damn.”
“You still tracked me down to invite me to your wedding,” Lyn said in a low voice. His stomach felt as if he’d swallowed a boatload of needles and he could barely speak. “Did you wake up one morning and just remember me?”
“No, you conceited asshole. I knew you were okay. For years. I just wanted—ah, fuck, what I wanted doesn’t matter.”
“It does. Say it.”
Brad remained stubbornly silent. “Are you going to tell Bella? About seeing me with her brother?”
“You should be the one who does that,” Lyn replied. “You have to be honest with her. She loves you. Don’t ask me how I know. It’s everything you guys have been showing to the world everywhere you go and with everything you do. Give me a good reason to think otherwise. Call off the wedding if you have any doubts. It’s not only because she doesn’t deserve this. You don’t deserve it, either. If you’d rather be with Luke--”
Brad’s harsh laugh stopped him. “No. He gives great head, and he’s an all-around great buddy, but I’m not like you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? That you’re not gay like me?” Lyn said, scrutinizing Brad’s every expression, which changed rapidly, going from pained to defiant in the blink of an eye.
“Yeah, I’m not gay like you. I don’t get hard for guys like I get hard for women.”
“Still, you’re obviously bisexual.”
“Don’t label me. And that’s a bit of a stretch. Getting head is just getting head.”
“This isn’t you,” Lyn said, shaking his head. “I refuse to believe this is about sex.”
“Well, it is,” Brad said.
Lyn didn’t need a lie detector to know that was bullshit. “Fuck you, Brad.”
“Yeah, right. Hey, by the way, did you tell His Majesty about your sexual orientation?”
“That’s none of your business,” Lyn sputtered, surprised by the sudden change in the flow of the conversation yet again.
“You know, he used to be so damn sure you were straight in college. Even when it was obvious you were drooling over me like a puppy with a bone.”
Lyn ground his teeth together. Brad was trying to rile him up, and it was working. This whole conversation had gone wrong. From the get-go, Brad had refused to regret his mistakes and turned everything back against Lyn instead.
For a moment, he wanted to shake Brad and tell him Alexander was fucking him but thought better of it.
“Tell Bella and ask for her forgiveness,” he said in a dry voice. His throat was closing up, muffling his words, and he needed to get out of this conversation before he suffocated.
“Or else what?” Brad asked.
Lyn turned on his heel without answering.
“Are you going to tell her?” Brad shouted at his retreating back.
Lyn still didn’t reply.
“If you do that, I’ll never forgive you,” Brad continued, making Lyn speed up.
It had gone so wrong, he repeated to himself. Was he mad at Brad only because his friend’s mistakes didn’t belong in his ordered world? That made his anger feel so useless, petty even.
Brad had to be a complete asshole about it. Lyn hated him right now. And his moral dilemma had just gotten deeper.
Would he be able to tell Bella about Brad and her brother? Those last words his best friend had thrown at him weighed heavily on his mind.
If he kept his mouth shut, would it be so bad?
TBC
Thank you for reading!
@Derek - I totally agree. Lyn is entering a difficult phase in his life, and he'll have to navigate some troubled waters from now on.
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