Chapter 9
THAT REVELATION was more than a little shocking. Conrad had dated guys before, and most of them wanted to be the one doing the driving, so to speak. “You don’t mind being the one…?”
“Doing the catching?” Forrest asked. “You know, we all like different things, and some of us are tops and others are bottoms. But some of us are both, and I think we should all worry more about making our partner happy. So stop worrying about all that and just be happy.”
Conrad threw himself into that. Forrest was huge, and yet he was gentle, though strong.
It was plain to him that Forrest could easily take over what happened between them, but he didn’t.
He took his time and seemed to know exactly how to stoke Conrad’s desire until he could hardly breathe.
And when Forrest hugged him close, their kisses turned magical and lovemaking lasted for hours until they both fell asleep in a heap with blankets strewn all over the bed.
It wasn’t until Conrad woke feeling cold that he managed to straighten the covers and they fell back to sleep. He woke again with a start a bit later, the house otherwise quiet and Forrest sound asleep next to him.
“What is it?” Forrest asked.
“Lizzie,” Conrad said.
“She’s at your mother’s, remember?” Forrest told him. “I don’t know what time you expect her home, but it’s not that late.”
“Yeah.” Conrad’s head cleared, and he remembered what was happening. “Mom will give her breakfast and take her to Sunday school. So we don’t need to worry about anything until after noon.” He sat up, and Forrest held him around the waist. “I can get up and make us some breakfast.”
“Or we can stay here in bed.”
Conrad laughed. “Dude. Your stomach is already protesting.” As if to accentuate the point, Forrest’s belly voiced its emptiness. “Come on. Let’s get dressed, and we can make something to eat. Then maybe we can see what we can find on Lester.”
“Good idea. It’s time we figure out a way to get that guy off your back.”
Conrad pulled on a pair of light sweatpants and a T-shirt before heading to the kitchen. He left Forrest alone to dress and started breakfast.
Forrest joined him a few minutes later in just a pair of pants.
He slipped his arms around Conrad and nuzzled the back of his neck.
Conrad stopped what he was doing and just went with the moment.
It was wonderful to have the time to just be together.
He didn’t want to worry about deadlines or accounting stuff, and Forrest didn’t need to worry about kids or classrooms. It was just them.
“I need to get cooking.”
“I thought we already were,” Forrest murmured. Conrad turned and forgot about pans and cooking as Forrest pulled him against his chest, held him in his strong arms, and kissed him into near-complete oblivion.
“You have this thing with getting me going in the kitchen, don’t you?” Conrad asked.
“Sure. But we could move to the living room. You know, christen every room in the house,” he whispered as footsteps sounded outside. Forrest stilled, and Conrad straightened his shirt and hurried to the door.
“Mom is here with Lizzie,” he told Forrest, who hurried out of the room. He opened the door to his mom holding Lizzie’s hand.
“What’s going on?”
“She woke up with a fever this morning and hasn’t been feeling good, so I thought I’d bring her home,” Mom said seriously. Lizzie came in, sniffling, and Mom sat at the table. “No coffee?”
He cleared his throat. “I haven’t had a chance yet.” Movement in the other room told her that he wasn’t alone.
“I see. You used the time to move things along. You should have said something. Lizzie could have stayed at my house. She just asked to come home, and since she was sick….”
“It’s okay. Of course she should come home.” He lowered his voice. “Forrest and I slept in a little.” He patted Mom’s shoulder and then went into the living room, where he got Lizzie settled under a blanket and promised her some juice to drink.
Forrest came out fully dressed and managed to stay out of Lizzie’s line of sight. “I should probably go.”
Mom shrugged.
“I’m sorry,” Conrad said.
“No. It’s best we keep this from her if we can.” Forrest kissed Conrad and went out the back door. Conrad put on coffee and sat with his mom at the table.
“This sucks,” he whined.
Mom smiled. “I take it you really like him.”
“I do. But Lizzie seeing him could get Forrest in trouble, and I don’t want to do that.
Things between us are going well, and he’s nice and makes me happy.
But we agreed that Lizzie is the most important thing, so we’re keeping her mostly in the dark.
I feel a little like I’m sneaking around, and I don’t like it.
But I’d rather be careful and see him than have to break things off. ”
“Hey. Lizzie is only in his class for a year, and then she moves on, and the two of you can date if you want. Heck, it’s only nine months, and one of them is nearly over.
In the terms of relationships, that’s not very long.
” She patted his hand and got up to pour them each a mug of coffee before returning to the table.
“And I can help. If you want to go out, I can take Lizzie a few nights. She and I have a lot of fun. There’s an art class downtown in the evenings that we can take together.
It’s every Thursday, and that means that the two of you can have a date night. If that works for both of you.”
Conrad smiled and kissed his mom’s cheek. “You’re the best.”
“I know,” she retorted cheekily, and Conrad texted the idea to Forrest.
THURSDAY AFTER work, Conrad hurried home.
Forrest had said that he’d bring dinner, so he unlocked the basement door and hurried down the stairs.
He got a ladder and climbed up to release the bolt that held their previous model in place.
Then he slowly raised the cable before securing it in place once more.
Now it was a foot from the ceiling and well out of the way.
Once he put the ladder away, he heard a knock and let Forrest inside.
“I picked up Italian—I hope that’s okay. I got spaghetti with meat sauce and penne with vodka sauce. I figured we could share.”
“Good idea.” Conrad kissed Forrest quickly and then took the containers. He got out plates and dished up the pasta before putting the salads, bread, and ice water on the table, and they sat down to eat. “Any ideas on what you want to build?”
“Me?”
“Sure. It helps to think of a basic theme. From there you can nail it down. Like, if you want to do a castle, then we can come up with one. But those have been done. I like animals and creatures, things that come from your imagination. If I want to build a replica of something real, then I buy a set, but otherwise, I let my imagination run wild.” He took a bite of the penne and groaned. It was so good. “I love this stuff.”
“Me too,” Forrest agreed and grinned.
“What?”
“How about a dancing cheetah?” Forrest offered. “Or a cheetah dancing with a lion. We would need to create characters that would be doing unnatural movements, but we’d have to make them look like they were supposed to do that.”
Conrad nodded. “Cool. We could try that.”
“You don’t like the idea.”
“It’s a good idea. I guess I was thinking something along the line of a fire motorcycle.
Or a car that flies. But I like what you have.
It’s fanciful, and we could make it funny.
Like, they could be dancing, and cubs are trying to catch their tails or something.
We could even make them move as the whole scene revolved. ” He was grinning now.
“I take it you love gears tech things?” Forrest asked.
“It gives the model energy and adds complexity. Making a static model is cool, but one where pieces move and turn just helps bring it to life. You can also go huge. For a competition, a partner and I once did a retro rocket nine feet tall, and we got it to stand on the fins. It was hollow, with reinforcements spanning the space every two layers. He made the shell, and I did the spacers to give it strength and keep it from getting too heavy. It was stunning and impressive. We even had a window with astronauts inside. That piece is one I wish I had here, but it was too big to bring back and there was no way it would travel.”
“So you didn’t do any effects with it?”
Conrad cackled like a cartoon villain. “Wrong. I had three smoke machines in it, so it made a heck of a show at blastoff. There were also lights, so the smoke really looked like it had fire under it. The piece was amazing, and it won me one of the championship trophies.” He was so proud of that piece.
It was too bad they’d had to dismantle it.
They finished eating and went downstairs, where Forrest started on the cheetah, getting the basic body crafted. “You’re going to have to watch the stud placement, because we’re going to need to add spots. And we want them to be irregular, so look for black pieces you can combine.”
“Cool.”
Conrad got started on the base and decided to make a record player.
That way he could hide the gears and things to make the dancers spin and turn.
What he really wanted was a way to alter the movement so it appeared random instead of completely repetitive, and he devised that by using multiple gears and a transmission to shift between them.
They worked for a few hours and got partway done before Conrad set down his bricks.
“Is it about that time?” Forrest asked.
“Yeah. Time seems to fly so quickly.” He organized what he’d been doing and then set everything aside.
“I’ve worked with a number of partners over the years, but I’ve never worked with someone as easily as you.
I mean, I always had to direct everything, but you just know what to do from what we go over, and you go with it. ”
“I’m still getting the cheetah down right.”
“Yeah, but it’s the right size, and you have some really interesting shapes. The rest we can work with.” He bumped Forrest’s shoulder as footsteps sounded above them. “Let’s go.”