The Kiss Principle (Hazardverse: Sidetracks)

14

The first kiss wasn’t, maybe, my smoothest move. We bonked heads—only a little. And our mouths didn’t quite line up. He was off balance because he tried to move back as I moved in. And I tried to catch him, only he was taller, and then we both almost went down.

But then he caught his balance, and I slid an arm around his waist, and my other hand was at his nape. The second kiss was a lot better. By the third kiss, when he made a little sound and moved into me, I was hitting my stride.

We stumbled across the room—being as careful of his knee as I could while we moved, locked together, through the dark. When we reached the bed, Zé sat, and I sat next to him. He took my head in his hands and kissed me again, and this time, his tongue pressed against my mouth, and I let him in.

He’s a dude, a part of my brain kept saying. His hair, his mouth, his skin, his size, his strength. This running catalogue of his maleness. I was used to being the assertive one (well, back in the day, when I’d had time, I’d been the assertive one)—and while that was probably some patriarchal bullshit, and there was no reason the girl couldn’t be the assertive one, that wasn’t how it had happened for me. So, this, with Zé moving me closer, his hands strong and possessive on me, was new. And there were no boobs to play with; that was new too. And the way he thrust his tongue into my mouth, the demanding certainty of it, was like being fucked, and a part of my brain lit up as the words played in my head, He’s fucking you. He’s fucking you with his tongue.

Maybe Zé sensed it because he eased back from his next kiss and considered me.

I tried for a smile and landed somewhere near nervous desperation. “So, uh…”

“Oh. Oh! Oh God, Fernando, I’m sorry. It’s your first time?”

“It’s not my first time, donkey-cock.” But I had a hard time meeting his eyes. “It’s my first time with a guy.”

The silence stretched out.

“If that’s—” I began.

“That is the hottest fucking thing of my entire life.”

I wasn’t used to Zé swearing. I definitely wasn’t used to the heat in his voice, the gravel, the unabashed desire. The way he looked at me, like he was eating me with his eyes, was something I’d gotten a few times from Augustus’s friends, and I’d gotten it in clubs back when I still went to clubs, but I’d never needed to acknowledge it.

“Sorry,” he said almost immediately. “I’m not trying to fetishize or objectify or, um, I don’t know. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“No, I like it. That you like it. I mean—I don’t know what I mean. I’m sorry if I’m making this weird.”

“You’re not making this weird.” He ran his fingers through my hair and gave me the slow smile. “And I definitely don’t want to spend all night apologizing to each other. How about this? What would you feel comfortable doing?”

“I thought we were doing pretty good making out.”

The corner of his mouth twitched. “We were doing great.”

“Let’s try that again.”

Zé went slower this time. He didn’t grab me. He didn’t haul me around. His tongue touched mine, but the demand was gone.

“Are you kissing me,” I asked, planting a hand on his chest, “or your grandmother?”

He burst out laughing. “I’m trying to be a gentleman.”

“I liked how you were kissing me before. And I liked that you were handsy. I mean, I’m not used to it, so maybe go slow, but I liked it.”

Zé nodded. “Are you not comfortable touching me? Because you keep putting your hands on the wall.”

“Well—” I had to think about that. “I mean, normally I’m touching boobs.”

He wasn’t much of one for rolling his eyes, but right then, he made an exception.

“Then tell me what to do, you horse’s ass.”

He shucked his shirt and leaned back. Then, taking my hands in his, he brought them to his chest. That was all: he spread my fingers and pressed my palms to his pecs. He was warm and solid. Velvet skin and dense muscle. He had a little bit of hair around his nipples, which I hadn’t noticed when I’d seen him naked before. More hair at his happy trail.

“Okay, I’m figuring out one downside to being gay is the comparison thing.”

He slid his hands to the small of my back. “What?”

“Zé, you’re like, jacked.” I wasn’t ready to move my hands, but I flexed my fingers against his well-developed chest. “God, I don’t think I could look like you if I tried.”

“I thought Augustus was gay?”

“Yeah, so?”

Zé brought one hand around to caress my stomach through the shirt. I was painfully aware that there was, uh, some excess there. “You’ve got no idea, huh?”

“No idea about what?”

“How hot you are. When you told that twink to move today, the one who was blocking the sidewalk, you didn’t hear him say, ‘Yes, Daddy’?”

“He was—I mean—” I stopped. “He was being sarcastic.”

“No, he wasn’t. Jesus, Fernando. When I saw you in those booty shorts with those daddy thighs…” He made a sound like he’d tasted something he liked. Then he smiled again and rubbed my stomach again. “So, the comparison thing happens, sure. But I’d recommend not making that a big part of your focus. On the one hand, it’s not healthy. On the other hand, you don’t know what your partner likes. For example, I like you. I think you are, without exaggerating, the most attractive guy I’ve ever met. And I want you to take your shirt off, and I think I’m showing a lot of restraint by not tearing it off you right now.”

“A lot of restraint, huh?”

“I don’t want to rush you.” He wrapped his hands around mine again and, his voice lowering, said, “We’re spending a lot of time talking, Fernando. I want you to touch me. And I want you to kiss me.”

“I can do that.”

We went slow, and he let me take my time exploring his body. I knew part of that was because he was Zé, and he was so easygoing and comfortable, but I’d never gotten to do that with any of the girls I’d hooked up with—probably because most of those encounters had been so rushed. With Zé, I took my time. I traced the definition of his chest. I ran my hands over his back. He let me touch his arms, following the swell of his muscles. He flexed, and he looked like such a goof, but God, the man had arms. He liked when I touched his nipples, arching his back and making a low, guttural noise. And slowly, minute by minute, I started to feel—well, comfortable wasn’t the right word, but relaxed, maybe. Or more relaxed. Because yes, his body was different. But he was still a person. And he wanted to be touched and admired and caressed.

When I kissed a line up his neck, he made this broken, yowling noise, and I thought, for a moment, I’d hurt him. I pulled back and saw the glazed look in his eyes, and I realized he’d liked it, and a swell rose in me because I’d made him make that noise, I’d made another guy make that noise, and I dove down again and made him make it again.

“Fer,” he whispered shakily, pawing at my chest. “Oh shit, oh God, that’s too much, that’s too much.”

When I pulled back, he was trembling, his chest rising and falling rapidly. His nipples had hardened, and his pupils were huge.

I turned myself out of my shirt. I wasn’t thinking about it; I was ready to have it gone, and as soon as I tossed it on the floor, Zé’s hands were all over me. His mouth too, latching on to my nipple a moment later. None of the girls I’d messed around with had ever done that, but I’d seen it in videos, and I heard my own shocked exhalation of breath, and it sounded like somebody else said, “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

When my back started to hurt, I leaned against the wall and pulled Zé onto my lap. He grinned and rocked against my dick, and I swatted him on the ass. This position made it a lot easier to touch him wherever I wanted, and more importantly, it gave me easy access to his neck. I never lingered, but I went back again and again, leaving hickeys, chafing the sensitive skin there until it was red from my stubble. A few times, Zé took the initiative, but more and more, he seemed happy to let me lead. I was sucking on his neck when he brought my hand down between his legs.

His dick was hard and hot even through the board shorts, and he moaned as he wrapped my fingers around the fabric-clad length. I’d never touched another guy’s dick, but I figured they all worked on the same general principles, and I stroked him through his shorts. We did that for a while until he reared back, breaking the kiss with a gasp, and said, “Help me.” I figured out what he meant when he started fumbling with his shorts, and together, we got them down around his knees. I pulled them the rest of the way off. He was commando underneath, big surprise.

For a minute, I looked. He had a great dick; I’d seen enough in porn to have something of a scale, and his was a ten out of ten: long, thick, straight, foreskin already pulling back slightly to reveal the purplish-red head. I’d handled my own equipment enough to recognize somebody who was close. He had big balls, no surprise there either, and as he noticed me looking, he spread his legs. The smell was dick and balls, but somebody else’s dick and balls. A dude smell. But not, like I had been half-expecting, a locker room smell. Zé, but a more intimate part of Zé. I didn’t think I’d catch myself sniffing his shorts anytime soon, but I liked the smell, and more than that, I liked that it was Zé’s smell, liked the intimacy of it.

“Touch me,” he whispered hoarsely.

I chafed his thigh and nudged him to slide off me.

With a groan, he did, rolling to bury his face in the pillow. He had a full, muscular ass, by the way. Not much hair. Another learning point: apparently, I liked a guy with some junk in the trunk. As I scooted off the bed, I slapped his ass, and he squawked and flopped onto his back to scowl at me. If anything, though, his dick looked harder than ever.

I stripped: jeans, boxers, socks. It should have been nerve-wracking, I guess. I should have hesitated, felt awkward about being in front of a guy like this. But by that point, my dick was screaming to be free from my jeans, I was so horny I would have gotten naked in front of the Pope. Zé lay there, drinking me in. He reached up to touch my belly again. Then his hand slid down, skating over my thigh. He cupped my balls and then tightened his grip and used them to tug me forward until my knees hit the bed. Propping himself up on one elbow, he brought his face to my cock and inhaled. When he looked up at me, his eyes were hooded.

“I want to suck you off,” he said in that throaty whisper. After a beat, he added, “Please?”

I must have answered—technically, making a whimpering noise in your throat is an answer—because he pulled me forward again. He brushed the head of my dick against his lips. They were soft and wet, and I was wet, and my dick glided across them. I’d had blow jobs before, but not all that many; lots of the girls I’d hooked up with either hadn’t been interested in doing it or hadn’t enjoyed it. I’d always taken it as a stereotype of porn that gay dudes loved sucking cock and got off on it, but for Zé at least, stereotype or not, it was true. He was lying on his side, legs stretched out because of his knee, still rubbing my cock back and forth, back and forth, and he didn’t seem to be in any hurry to get it over with.

When he opened his mouth, I thought he was going to take me down, but instead he started licking. Little licks at the head, where I was sensitive enough that it was almost too much. Longer licks from the base to the tip. He took my balls into his mouth, one at a time. He tried to do both and couldn’t, and when he finally gave up, he shot me a sheepish grin and went back to my dick.

For some reason, that grin made me relax. I eased my weight forward, one knee on the bed, bringing my dick in closer for him—and at a better angle. I planted one hand on the wall for stability. The other, without letting myself think about it too much, went into his hair. I’d had fantasies, literally, about this: his mouth on my cock, my hand in his hair. It was softer than I expected, but the texture was exactly what I’d imagined—slightly coarse from salt and sun and whatever he styled it with, and so abundantly thick that half the pleasure was sinking my fingers into it, gathering a handful of his mane, giving the slightest tug to control his head. He moaned the first time I did that, and his lips opened, and I slid inside.

Hot. Soft. Wet. He bobbed up and down frantically, continuing to moan. He had a lot of sharp teeth.

I tried to ignore the teeth. I tried to think about how this was Zé, how I’d fantasized about this, how that young guy had looked in what had quickly become my favorite video—drunk on cock. But the reality was that plenty of girls, interested or not, had given me better BJs than this. Mostly because it hadn’t felt like I was going through a meat grinder. It was almost like—

Almost like he’d never done it before.

Using my hold on his hair, I eased back. His lips were puffy. Saliva slicked his chin. But he didn’t look blissed out. He looked frustrated. And then, to my surprise, like he was about to cry. “I’m sorry.”

I hadn’t thought about the fact that, although Zé might have had more experience with guys, he didn’t have much experience in general. Especially not outside of frantic, secret hookups. And while, admittedly, I’d been going through a dry spell (I could hear Augustus laughing halfway across the country), I’d done all right for myself before, well, I’d stopped taking care of myself (if anything, Augustus was laughing harder).

“Don’t be sorry,” I said. I sat and pulled his head onto my thigh, and he rolled onto his back and looked up at me. I finger-combed his hair.

“No, that was horrible. I could tell.”

“Zé, stop.” I gave another little tug on his hair, and he looked at me. “I’m here. With you. I want to be here with you. I’m enjoying being with you. In case this hasn’t made it clear.” I pulled my dick and let it slap against my belly. “I’m enjoying it a lot.”

I went back to running my fingers through his hair. After a while, he said, “I’ve never sucked anybody’s dick before.”

“I’m honored.”

He slapped my side.

“I’m serious, Zé.” But I did press my tongue against the inside of my cheek so it bulged out. He slapped my side again, and I laughed. Some of the tension in his face eased. “I love that you wanted to try that with me. I’m trying a lot of things tonight too, and I’m grateful you were willing to be vulnerable.”

“What’s going on? Why haven’t you called me a turkey turd or a dick bobbin or a blue-balling jackass?”

“I’m being a good sexual partner, pecker-lips.” Sliding out from under him, I eased his head down onto the mattress. Then I moved down the bed. As he propped himself up onto his elbows, I spread his legs and knelt between them. I ran one hand lightly over his scar. I thought that knee still felt hot, inflamed from the strain of the day and the fall. But maybe that was my imagination. I felt hot all over. I felt like I was burning up, actually.

“What are you doing?”

“We’re breaking a lot of new ground tonight, bozo.”

“No, Fernando, don’t. Please don’t.”

“Why not?”

It was hard to concentrate on his words when I was staring up the length of his body: his hard dick, his defined abs and chest, those powerful arms and shoulders, and then his face. In porn, there was never this much talking, so how could this be so much hotter?

That was why it took me a moment to process the words when he said, “Because you’re more, um, straight, I guess.”

“I’m straight?”

“Well, you know. This is your first time with a guy, and I don’t want you to do anything that’s going to freak you out or that you don’t like or…” His voice faltered. “I want it to be good for you.”

Because if it wasn’t good, what? I’d give up on him? I’d fire him?

I slapped the inside of his thigh. Hard.

He let out a noise that wasn’t quite a shout and sat up on his elbows, eyes wide.

“The internalized homophobia is a real boner killer, okay?”

“Fernando! Caralho!”

“Don’t be a baby.”

“That hurt!”

Rubbing the sting out of the red mark on his thigh, I eyed his dick. “Mr. Happy seems like he’s doing okay.”

“What is wrong with you?”

“What’s wrong with me is I don’t like hearing bullshit. I’m here with you because I like you. I’m not here because I expect five-star servicing. This is not a fucking car wash, and it’s not a fucking Taco Bell, and you’re not some escort I hired because I can’t get laid.”

“You think Taco Bell has five-star service?”

I smacked his thigh again, but more lightly this time. “No more bullshit. Do you hear me?”

He was trying to glower; he had the right bone structure for it, and I remembered those dramatically brooding pictures of him framed against the ocean. But now that I knew the goofball inside, it wasn’t effective.

“Good,” I said. “Now give me that dick.”

“There is something seriously wrong with you.” But he spread his legs and lowered himself to lie on the mattress again. Then he raised back up again. “Fernando, you don’t have to—”

“Jesus Christ,” I said and pushed him back down.

I lowered my head between his legs. The smell was familiar—sweaty dick and balls. I’d smelled it on myself before. But it was different. It was Zé, and I recognized his body as part of the mixture. Maybe raunch wasn’t my thing because the smell wasn’t a huge turn-on, but I didn’t mind it either. Dudes smelled like dudes. That seemed like Gay Shit 101.

I slid my hand under his dick, and Zé shivered. I wrapped my fingers around it, and his whole body tensed. He was definitely hard. I mean, this was the first cock besides my own I’d touched, but I’d had a lot of boners in my life, and Zé’s fell in the drill-through-concrete category. I slid my hand down his length, rolling the foreskin away from the head of his dick. It was reddish-purple, nicely shaped against the long shaft. He shivered again, and I used my free hand to stroke his thigh. I bent and licked the tip, and it tasted salty, a little bitter. Zé moaned.

Well, I thought with something like a hysterical laugh growing inside my head. Here we go. All those jokes about swinging on knobs. Get ready to watch me swing like a motherfucker.

On my first try, I took the head and a little of the shaft into my mouth. The taste was stronger—not as bitter, which must have been the pre, but salty and musky, and my brain made an automatic connection to why one of the slang terms for dick was meat. Different from eating out a girl, I thought. Different taste. And definitely different having something inside of me, taking up my body. Again, I thought, this is what it’s like to get fucked. But it wasn’t, not really. I remembered that video, that daddy type railing the younger guy’s mouth. What would it be like to get into that headspace? No control. Just taking that dick as it invaded you again and again.

I closed my lips around the shaft and sucked, but I realized almost immediately that wasn’t what I was supposed to do. I pulled off him and went down again. Too far, this time. He hit the back of my throat, and I started to gag. Okay, I thought, as I fought down the reflex. Okay, he’s got a big dick, and you’ve got a gag reflex like a motherfucker. I tried to remember what I liked. How I liked it. I ran my tongue around his knob. I lapped at that ultrasensitive spot below the head. He was leaking more; that bitter taste flooded my mouth. Maybe that should have grossed me out, but it made things hotter. He was moaning, his hips restless as he tried to lie flat, and he was leaking in my mouth, and I was doing this to him. I was making Zé feel this way.

Reaching out, I searched for his hand. When I found it, I laced our fingers together. His tightened around mine. I picked up the pace, taking as much of him into my mouth as I could, building up a good rhythm, and then breaking to lick and suckle and tease his head. I felt the change when it began to happen, and it blew my mind. His whole dick hardened like it had gone to the next level. I could trace the veins with my tongue. It was insane: like he was steel, like every piece of him had been tightened to its breaking point. He was muttering in Portuguese, sounding like he was stoned, and then his head came up, his eyes glassy and blind, and he made the unmistakable grunt of a guy about to nut and slurred, “Fer! Fer!”

I sat back and pumped him twice, and he came all over himself. A huge load. Thick, white jets of come against the rich brown of his belly and chest. One of his legs jerked, and as the orgasm subsided, I realized he was shaking. I relaxed my grip, released his dick, and took myself in hand. It was easy, looking down at the wreckage of him, to bring myself off. One, two, and my load was flying too, spattering all over his dick and balls and thighs. I rode the crest of the orgasm, and when I came down, I felt like someone had taken me apart joint by joint. I propped myself against the wall and, for a while, enjoyed looking at him.

He had one arm over his eyes, and he mumbled something in Portuguese.

“A little louder,” I said.

When he peeled his arm away, his eyes were wet. His smile was tremulous, and it made me think of butterfly wings, like it might flutter away at any moment.

“Hey,” I asked softly, “are you okay? Was that too much?”

He shook his head.

I rubbed his leg.

“Oh my God,” he whispered.

“That’s me.”

He made a face and tried to kick me, and I laughed and caught his leg and rubbed it some more. His breathing slowed in increments. Then he raised himself on one elbow and said, “Fernando, that should be illegal.”

The embarrassment caught me by surprise; I ducked my chin, shrugged, my face heating.

He scooted toward me, took my head in his hands, and moved in for a kiss.

“I, uh—I probably taste like dick.”

“You’re hot,” he said, “but you’re not bright, are you?”

I had an answer for that, but his mouth was on mine, and after a while, it didn’t seem important.

When Zé finally pulled back, he looked me in the eye, held my gaze until it felt like too much. Then he turned his face into his shoulder to wipe away another tear and whispered, “Thank you.”

It was on the tip of my tongue: I love you.

But I knew it was the rush of hormones, the release, the fact that I’d gotten off with another human being, a real live honest-to-God person, instead of my hand or a toy.

So, when Zé laughed quietly and said, “God, I needed that,” I knew I’d done that right thing, not saying anything. Maybe he saw something on my face because he said, “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Am I okay?” I asked. “You looked like you went into a coma.”

He gave me that slow, beautiful smile. Taking me by the hand, he lay down again, and he pulled me down next to him. He opened his mouth. Then he closed it again. He opened it again, and the struggle played itself out in his face.

“For fuck’s sake,” I said, giving him a push to roll over. I pulled him to my chest, and we squirmed around until we were settled: his head pillowed on my arm, his legs slotted with mine. Maybe he should have been big spoon, but my last thought, as sleep rolled in, was that he fit right in my arms.