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i collapsed into the cab and said my address, then repeated it louder when i had evidently merely mumbled it. i relished closing my sore eyes once the engine started, but got very little respite as the driver started swearing at another car and i thought i better keep them open in case i needed to keep an eye on the roads for this guy. god, a flight across the country didn’t kill me but the 15 minute drive back to my apartment might. somehow New York was hotter than Los Angeles while remaining as grey as it had when i left at the end of winter. the few weeks difference had no bearing on the daylight but a helluva lot on the sweat that was starting to form under my uncomfortable wool blazer.
any other day i wouldn’t have minded being dropped off a little further down from my building considering the late afternoon congestion, but i was weary from travel and pissed off at the weather so there was no tip in the change i handed over and when retrieving my bag i probably slammed the trunk a little harder than i aughta. i was already fantasising about falling into bed as i lugged myself up the street to my door, but was mentally and physically stopped in my tracks by what was standing under the streetlight just outside it.
he was squinting, like he always did because he couldn’t see for shit, but also because the sun had found a gap in the clouds and had chosen him, in this spot, outside my goddamn apartment to illuminate. hands clasped behind his back and slumped forward, it could have looked like he had been waiting for nothing in particular if it weren’t for those narrowed eyes looking right at me.
“what the hell do you want?” i grunted, unsure if i should drop my bag to ease my cramping back or if that would be taken as a sign of a willingness to stop and chat at length.
“ouch” Jim said, face betraying no sign of hurt feelings and breaking into a grin. “just came by to greet you after your trip to Hollywood and this is what i get?”
i tongued the inside of my cheek, sour from dehydration and fatigue and coffee. i knew i should have asked how he knew when i was getting back or how long he had been waiting here but i didn’t especially want to know. i found it a little nauseating how eager he could be.
“well are you coming up or are you gonna wait around out here some more? i’m surprised the cops didn’t move you on” i mumbled as i turned away from him towards the door, but he nipped past and got the door first, pushing through it without as much of a backwards glance at me.
he went up the stairs two at a time while i panted, my blazer scratching the back of my sweaty neck and my bag threatening to trip me up. he stood annoyingly close to the door as i fumbled with the key and pushed past me again, instantly making himself at home in an apartment i hadn’t been in in five weeks.
it felt weird, after being away for so long. it was absent of the usual smell of cigarettes or coffee or general body odor and had taken on a sparse, stale smell of nothing much. Jim wondered around, carelessly picking at my belongings as if any of them were things he hadn’t seen before or even worth inspecting if he hadn’t. i watched him at it, hoping he would look at me so i could scowl again but he seemed to know and was purposefully avoiding my eye.
i had no hope of unpacking, or doing anything i’d much like to do while he was here; the hurricane in human form. i resigned my bag to the floor of the hallway before i wrestled off my blazer and threw it onto the back of my single, solitary chair. i then ruefully gathered it up and took it round the corner to my bedroom to hang in the closet; concern for wrinkling defeating any attempt of mine to be casual.
Jim smiled as he followed me in, again carelessly poking the pictures on my wall, picking at my sheets, before his eyes landed on the book i had been keeping on the bedside table. he squeezed behind me where i was hanging up my blazer, the two of us trapped in the small space in my small room between my small bed and my small closet.
“While England Slept: a Survey of World Affairs, 1932–1938? god, you’re a bore” he drawled, turning the book over, opening it, glancing over it without reading a word and then snapping it shut.
“gimme that” i snarled, or halfheartedly so, trying my hardest to respond to anything he did with something other than staring. “you find anything aimed at the over-twelves boring, don’t you?”
Jim’s lips twisted into a reluctant smile, and i could tell he was glad i had remembered. he theatrically pulled the book out of my reach, though i hadn’t lunged for it, then slid down the closet to sit on the floor and pretended to read. at a loss for what to do next, and with my exhaustion threatening to make my knees buckle, i sat on the side of my bed and waited for another jab at my taste in literature to land.
instead he looked up at me earnestly and asked “do you have anything to drink?”
“no” i answered honestly, as i knew didn’t have anything in the house. the prospect of leaving the house to buy food later filled me with dread the second the thought occurred to me.
Jim sighed, annoyed like he hadn’t invited himself into the home of someone who hasn’t been there for five weeks. he turned the page, as if he had read all that text in five seconds or if he could read any of it at all without his glasses, and continued the charade, to what end i wasn’t sure.
well, i was far too tired to play the game of giving him any type of reaction, so i just watched him, suddenly appreciating him sitting still for long enough for me to get a good look at him. he didn’t look much different from the last time i saw him, still very tired looking and a little on the thin side. i reached out and lightly brushed the back of my hand against his face just on instinct. it’s hard not to when he’s right there and he’s so still and quiet. i wanted to touch him before he did anything stupid like speak or move, before he could anger me to touching him less gently than i’d like to.
his eyes flicked up at me and his eyebrows drew together like he was annoyed. like he wanted me to look and not touch, he moved from sitting upright and cross legged at my feet to lounging on his side, propped up on an elbow. the floor creaked where he settled, the only thing between his bulk and his delicate elbow skin and the awful old floorboards was the runner quote unquote Persian rug i rescued from being thrown out by a neighbour. i yearned for the slightly shabby hotel room i’d been set up in in LA; up in the hills a little. it had been away from the noise of the streets and everything there was cheap but had that new smell and my room was deathly quiet. i wanted to hear the sound of my hand rasping over his cheek and i wanted him to hear the minute exhale out my nose when he shifted his hips to get comfortable. the floorboards, the neighbours and the humming from the street provided an obstacle for any real intimacy with Jim when it felt like the slightest sound would spook him and have him leaping to his feet, reminding him of somewhere he needed to be and out of the door.
“you sleep around a lot in LA?” he asked, looking up through his eyelashes like he had undoubtedly rehearsed.
“no” i lied. “did you miss me?”
“no” he lied. he tried to be callous about it but couldn’t; his mouth quirked up into a grin after a beat. i grinned back. i wasn’t naïve enough to think him missing me meant i was anything special to him. i was just another completely replaceable admirer, but one of the favourites in his roster; i could allow myself that small victory. even when stretched to breaking point my patience with him far exceeded that of some of his more sensible girlfriends and boyfriends. did he piss them all off before he decided to camp outside my building all afternoon? or did my return offer a break in the monotony of pissing off the same people for the past few weeks?
i snorted with laughter and fell back onto the bed, finding the ceiling easier to look at than him. i shut my eyes and heard the floorboards creak again. Jim presumably had moved from lying the floor because his big hot hand was on my thigh, then my cock, then into the pocket of my slacks and plucking out my cigarettes and matches. that made me laugh again and amazingly, he did too. i smelt him smoking for a while and then heard him pad around my room to prod things a little longer, then he left the room. i briefly wondered if he would steal something, but my exhaustion, lack of any decent possessions and potentially misplaced belief that he liked me too much to do that relaxed me enough to doze off.
his hand was on my cock again when i woke up, and i can’t have slept for long at all because he was still smoking, the cigarette nearly down to the butt now. or maybe he had smoked the whole pack. i didn’t especially care either way because he was with one hand unbuttoning my slacks. he took one last drag and stubbed it out in the ashtray on the bedside table then both his hands returned to my hips, rucking my pants and underwear down my thighs before he got on his knees.
my already dry mouth felt drier. he scowled with my cock in his mouth when i propped myself up on my elbows. well haha kid, you’re not long for this business if you can’t stand someone watching you when you suck a cock; not when being watched and sucking cock is everything you need to be equipped to do to make it.
i gave him brief reprieve of my gaze when i sat up to unbutton my shirt. i was happy to be casual now and let it drop to the floor. “take yours off” i grunted and he pulled off me, for a second still connected by a string of spit and oh god is it possible to envy your own cock? his big wet mouth and selfish tongue would feel like heaven on mine right now. i hoped i could steal a kiss from him after, when his mouth was red and swollen and he was panting.
he wrestled his tshirt off and took me in again with more vigour than before, his arms snaking up my thighs and moving from sitting on his heels to kneeling upright to bob his head better. how i was expected to last an acceptable amount of time under these conditions i didn’t understand. no doubt i’d get a good ribbing about it when i finished.
i lay back and ran my hands over his forearms for a while and tried to think up a shopping list to calm myself. there’s a masochist in this room and it ain’t me, and i certainly don’t escribe to denying myself pleasure, but my pride had me planning if i should buy tomato or cream of mushroom soup.
when i did come it was in his hand, and i was too euphoric to care when he wiped it on my shirt. my dumb mouth failed to emote anything and all i was fit to do was watch him lean back against the closet still between my legs, and pull two cigarettes out of my pack.
both were in his mouth, lit, then one was in mine. he looked so good on my floor, slouching against my furniture.
“when d’you get those?” i grunted, pointing at the angry purple marks on his ribs.
he’s the only person i ever knew to be able to do such a thing with his face like he did then; a scowl, sultry bedroom eyes, shyness and a bit of a scoff all in one expression when he shrugged and grunted back: “before you went away”
i wondered if he was lying. in truth i didn’t fully remember the last time i saw him or if he had taken his shirt off. they looked like must still be sore, but then i suppose cigarette burns stay sore for a while.
“what do you get out of it when he does a thing like that?”
“not a lot… suppose i get off on lettin’ him. you’d have to ask him what he gets out of it” he mumbled, looking up at me through his lashes and smirking.
for some reason that made me very angry all of a sudden. was i supposed to be impressed by his lack of self preservation?
“i don’t wanna talk to that bastard” i grumbled, pulled on my cigarette then snapped, “do you think you’re on your way to bein’ a star when he does that? if you just let him hurt you a few more times he’ll give your name to an agent?… ‘gee kid you’re a born performer, howling in pain like that’”
then i got a real scoff. “it’s just nice to be with someone who feels things, ya know? actual emotions, not just the faces you pull for the camera”
he was like a child when he acted like this, anything to avoid an actual conversation. i always went along with it so easily.
i dropped from the bed, my knees caging his legs as i straddled him and i gave him a second to react. he spread his legs, puffed his chest out, and took my wrist, guiding it towards his body. i pressed my cigarette into his skin, on his ribs on the opposite side to the other marks in a spot he could hide a bit easier. i wondered if the last time this happened to him he had asked for it so nicely.
he hissed through clenched jaw and when i tried to pull away he held fast, smiling darkly at what i presume was my slightly alarmed face. when he let go of my wrist i stood up and threw the cigarette into the ashtray as if it was me it had burnt, and when i turned back to him i realised we were both panting hard.
i licked my lips, saliva had finally flooded my mouth. “lie down” i whispered, trying my chances to see if he would actually do it.
he did, moving himself to lie on his back on the narrow rug, the space too short to stretch his legs fully so he bent his knees and let them swing open. the look on his face dared me, like it always did, like he didn’t believe i had it in me.
petroleum jelly was in my suitcase in the hallway. with anyone else i would have run out the room to go get it but something in James made people want to hurt him and despite my best efforts i was not immune to it.
i was mad when i pushed into him; spit, sweat and all that i had been leaking while i burned him easing the way into his warm body. mad with myself for letting him make me mad, mad at him for letting me get mad at him, mad at the sonofabitch that he lets do god awful things to him.
he jutted his chin out indignantly while i fucked him, still daring me to do it as if i wasn’t already. maybe he wanted me to go further, but i’m not interesting enough for him and i couldn’t think of anything further than this. i kissed all over his shoulders and neck, even stopped fucking him for a while to kiss all down his chest, over the burns on both sides, his stomach, his cock, his thighs, his knees, his hands, his ass, his ribs again and even his face in lieu of an apology. he let me indulge for a few pecks, even opening his mouth slightly for my tongue but grew tired of it and turned his head away.
after that i got him on his hands and knees and we finished that way, both of us coming on the dirty rug. James helped himself to my hot water and towel and had a bath, and i didn’t have the heart to bitch about it since at his building he had to share one.
i had dozed on my bed for a while, and when i woke it was darker. i got up and peered into the bathroom to see if he was still there. i was surprised when he was, lying back with his eyes closed and arms folded. his skin was pink from the heat and his knees were red from the rug. at first i thought he was asleep, i had never seen him asleep before. but he was humming something, and opened his eyes the second he heard me creek on the floorboards. he watched me with his lips slightly parted while i pissed, and i wondered if he would open them more if i turned and channelled the stream into his face. the thought made me throb and my flow interrupted slightly. i bet he would.
“let’s go eat, i’m starving” i said, echoing off the tiles.
he smiled languidly and shook his head at me like i should have known better. “naw, i gotta see someone, i better leave” he said as he sat up, as if he wouldn’t have spent all night in my bath if i hadn’t reminded him i was still there.
“fine” i shrugged, not knowing what else i expected and went back to my room to get dressed. he joined soon after, dripping all over my floor and collecting his clothes from the corner he had kicked them into. i sat on the bed and watched him pull his jeans over his ass. i felt angry again, or maybe sad, and i had to put the heels of my hands into my eyes for a moment to collect myself.
“can i have this?” he said, and i looked up to see him fully dressed holding the book.
“it’s pretty dull” i warned. “there’s a reason i didn’t take it with me to California”
“dull, huh? it’ll remind me of you when i head out there”
“what? when are you going?”
“next week. i booked a few movies so i’ll be out there a while… might stay there if it goes okay”
i spluttered at the news, thought about it for a second, then decided i didn’t have a reason to argue with him about it. “that’s swell… i’ll come visit you sometime”
“sure” he said with a smile that didn’t meet his eyes, turning over the book in his hands.
we were in silence for a while, James idly running his thumb over the corner of the pages and me sitting in my trousers and holding my socks like an idiot.
“did you ever hear about the two brothers in Harlem that had so many books they suffocated under ‘em?” he drawled, not looking up at me.
“yeah it was-“ i cleared my throat, “one of ‘em was taking care of the other ‘cause he was sick. he got crushed to death and his brother starved”
James hummed and said “well i’m doin’ you a favour then, taking this off your hands”
“thanks” i said with a smile that didn’t reach my eyes.
he clapped me on the shoulder to say goodbye and i grabbed his wrist. his smile reached his eyes then, and he was quiet as if he expected me to speak. i couldn’t think of anything to say at all, so i twisted my head to kiss the back of his hand. he slid it up to cup my face and for half a second i thought he was going to kiss me. he looked like he thought he might too, but patted my face gently instead.
“i’ll send ya a postcard”