Vadim
"Oh, come on, you fucking motherfucker!" I yell, jumping onto the couch, fists clenched in the air.
Marek glares at me then snaps his neck to his three kids sitting near him.
"Sorry, sorry, sorry."
I sit my ass back down, my eyes wide in disbelief as one of our strikers squanders yet another opportunity for a goal. Our team is down three-one. There's still time left to recover but not if we keep making stupid mistakes like this.
I crane my neck out toward the back patio.
I feel bad for leaving Preston. I know he's with Ellie, but I feel like I should go and check on him.
I get up. My father does the same, following a few steps behind me.
Once we're out of the media room, he gestures toward his home office. Damn. Of all the times, he chooses now to talk.
I peer outside again. Preston and Ellie are at the table, chatting away. Ellie is somehow still eating.
"Go," my father says, correctly sensing that's where I'd rather be. "I just wanted to tell you you did a good job."
A good job. He means dealing with Farkas. Of course that's what he wanted to talk to me about.
Work. Business. It's all we ever talk about.
"Thanks." I keep my eyes fixed on Preston, happy that he's finally safe, that I ended a nightmare I should have never allowed to drag on for as long as it did. "It took longer than I would have liked, but I got it done in the end."
My father hesitates.
If his forehead wasn't stretched so hard after his latest round of Botox or filler or whatever the hell it is he gets done to it, I suspect he might even be frowning.
"That's not what I'm referring to." He moves to stand beside me and gazes through the floor-to-ceiling windows toward Preston and Ellie. "I'm talking about you and Preston. You've found a good man to be with."
"Well, actually, he found me."
My father looks at the ground for a moment then steps in and does something he hasn't done since the day Mom died.
He hugs me.
"I'm proud of you, son. And I wish you both a very long, very happy life together."
I'm glad we're hugging so he can't see my face because, holy shit, who is this man and what has he done with my father?
It's scary that the possibility he's cloned himself in some dystopian science-fiction experiment is something I actually entertain for a solid few moments.
But when he pulls back, braces my arms, and stares into my eyes, it's him. My emotionally distant father, who I'm maybe more similar to than I care to admit, telling me he's proud of me, his gay son.
I, in turn, call him something I haven't since I was a kid. "Thanks, Dad."
He stares at me for a beat then clears his throat, snapping himself out of whatever sentimental wormhole we've fallen into, and points to Preston. "Id? do niego."
That's exactly what I do, stepping out onto the patio to be with Preston.
"It's just me," I say, announcing my arrival from a distance in case he and Ellie were in the middle of a private conversation.
Preston's face lights up, and he turns his whole body my way. "Hey, you."
Ellie doesn't sneer at me, so that's a good sign.
An even better one is when he stops eating, gets up, and excuses himself to use the bathroom.
I tell him where it is, and when Preston and I are alone, I ask, "Still want me to take you to my old room?"
"Absolutely."
"What about Ellie?" I ask.
"There's food on the table, right?"
"There is."
"He won't even notice I'm gone."
I snicker as I clasp my hand around his and guide him through the house to my old bedroom.
"What kind of teenager were you?" he asks as we enter the anteroom that leads to my wing of the house.
"I don't know." I move us closer toward the door and lower my voice in case any sneaky nieces and nephews are around with their prying little ears. "Pretty much the same as I am now but younger."
Preston chuckles. "That's such a you thing to say."
"My teenage self agrees with you."
Still grinning, and with his hand firmly in my grip, I open the door and guide him through the space.
"This is where the wing starts," I say. "Sitting room. Allegedly. I barely spent any time in here."
Preston lets out a quiet laugh. "I'm already loving this."
"I already love you."
I give him a slow, tender kiss then move the tour along.
"Bedroom," I announce, steering him through the door to the left and into the room. "King-size bed, ten steps ahead and slightly right."
Preston sniffs the air in front of him.
"What are you doing?"
"It doesn't have that funky teenage boy room smell I was expecting."
I smile. "I'm glad they've aired it out. I used to jerk off so much in here that our housekeeper, Marta, would make jokes about my bedsheets being stiff enough to use as an ironing board."
That makes Preston laugh, and I can't help puffing my chest out a little, determined to keep saying as many silly things as I can come up with to continue eliciting that sweet sound from him.
"The bathroom connects directly off the right side of the room," I say as we walk together in that direction.
"Marble everywhere," I say, my voice reverberating off the walls as I switch on the light.
"Floor, walls, shower, all of it. My father loves it.
His philosophy is that if a surface can be marble, it should be marble.
I used to find it excessive." I pause for a beat, scrunching up my face slightly.
"But now I have a marble bathroom and a marble coffee table in my apartment, so… "
"So you're saying you're becoming your father?"
"Probably yes, but I'm not ready to deal with that yet, so let's move on."
"Fair enough." Preston's mouth curves. "Did you use to jerk off in here, too?" he asks before we leave.
"I was a teenage boy," I reply. "I jerked off everywhere I could."
Preston laughs. "You were a horny little thing."
"Still am." I grab him around his waist and thrust my thickening cock against him. "Weren't you?"
Preston lifts a shoulder, easing out of my grip. "Not really. I'd jerk off maybe once or twice a week."
"A week? Sheesh." I drag my free hand through my hair. "I beat off at least three times a day."
"That's intense."
"Would you expect anything less from me? Come on."
I take him by his hand and lead him to the kitchen area next. "And, no, before you ask, I never jerked off here. I do have some standards."
"You do?" Preston quips, his lips still stretched.
I bask in the sight of his boyish grin as I escort him to our next stop.
"And, finally, the gym. I push the door open and steer him through. "This is where I developed my discipline and an arguably unhealthy relationship with pull-ups."
"Unhealthy how?"
"I once did four hundred in a single day to win a bet with Marek."
"Did you win?"
"I could barely lift my arms for a week." I pause. "But yes."
"Of course you did."
I take a look around.
Everything is where I left it since Dad has his own gym and man cave on the other side of the house. The weights, the bench, the cable machine, all of it preserved like a museum.
Maybe I downplayed it before, how I haven't changed since my teenage years. Because the truth is, I am different. I'm no longer the same emotionless, bored, restless kid I was back then.
For many years afterward, I was a grown version of that person.
For many, many years.
Until Preston.
I never want to be that guy again. It's no way to live.
I used to see being that way as a sign of strength.
Now I see it for what it is. A kid who lost his mother and was afraid the world would hurt him putting up barriers and trying to convince himself he was above petty things like having emotions, that they were for weak people, when the reality is it takes strength to put yourself out there, communicate honestly, and be truly who you are in front of someone.
Preston made me strong, and I'm going to keep being strong for him.
For us.
"I hate the term, but this used to be my safe space. My refuge from the world and everybody in it."
"That makes sense. Exercise floods your system with endorphins, and cortisol drops afterward. Your body was essentially self-medicating. And, as far as coping mechanisms go, exercise is one of the healthier ones."
"Does that also explain why I masturbated so much?"
"No." He shakes his head, biting his cheek. "You're just a sexual freak."
"I'll give you sexual freak."
I tug him into me and devour his mouth, my hands running up and down his gloriously toned body until I can feel his hardness pressing into me.
As we kiss, I can't help a thought from bubbling up, a thought that tells me he's who I want to be with. Forever.
Is it too soon to be thinking like that? Maybe. I don't care, though. We've been through more in under a year than most people go through in a lifetime.
"Lucky for you," Pres whispers against my lips, his palm cupping my protruding bulge. "I'm a freak, too."
And with that, he drops to his knees and fumbles around with my belt.
"What are you doing?"
"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm about to blow you. Wait. Unless you have cameras in here, too? I know how much you like those."
"Very funny. There are no cameras."
"Good."
He undoes my belt, lowers the zip, and slides my pants halfway down my legs. Wrangling my curved cock out of my briefs, he opens his mouth and starts giving me head.