The Good Doctor 19

Pete takes a deep breath and then lays his head against the back of the sofa and stares for a moment at the ceiling.

“I had a patient ask me about us today. Well…….he didn’t really know that we were an us he had just seen us together at the mall and he asked me about you, asked if you were a doctor too.”

Uh oh, this can’t be good. “He thought that I was a doctor?” Nobody had EVER made that mistake before. My god, a doctor of what?

Pete smiled and then wrapped his arm around my head and pulled it to his shoulder. He laughed. “I didn’t know what to tell him. I mean should I tell him that I’m gay and that you’re my lover? Should I just let him believe that you’re a straight buddy, a casual friend? For a minute I was like frozen, you know, all the old, don’t tell anyone that you’re gay crap was running through my head………and then I thought of Jase……how he hugs me really hard before he goes to bed each night and I thought how crazy this was……how crazy that I was even thinking about pretending that this didn’t exist.…that this wasn’t the most important thing in my life.”

Pete reached over with his left hand and pulled my legs up onto the sofa and simultaneously stretched out next to me with his left leg between my legs and the side of his face resting lightly on my left shoulder. His left hand was gently cradling the right side of my face, he spoke softly with a husky intimacy.

“I want us to do something………..I dunno…………ahhhhhh, public I guess. Would that freak you out?”

“Public?” I lifted my head and whispered. “You mean like sex?” Okay, so it takes me a minute to catch the drift.

Pete closed his eyes and groaned. “Eric, I think that your office in the warehouse is probably about as public as we need to get……………well………..unless maybe we go camping or something.” Camping? “No, what I meant was……………well………..I know that we’ve only been together for a few months but we both know how we feel about each other and I think that we should make it official, or at least public.” He lifted his head and looked down at me. “So whadya think? More than you wanna get into? Am I being pushy?” He stared at me for a while. “Eric? Whadya think?”

“You mean like a commitment ceremony? Yeah, that’d be good.” I rolled slightly towards him and buried my face in his neck. “What kind of a camping trip were you thinking about? I mean where would we go where it would still be a camping trip and still be somehow public?” Okay so this is like a semi-sick fantasy of mine.

Pete slid his mouth over my face until our lips met and his tongue pushed into my mouth. Commitment. Commitment! Commitment?

I broke the kiss. “Where would we do it?”

Pete smiled at me. “We talking camping sex or commitment ceremony?”

“Commitment. It seems like we got three choices if we’re thinking of an at home kinda thingy. Either we do it here, at your mom’s or at my parent’s house. If we do it at my mom’s we got a nutcase on our hands and if we do it at your mom’s we end up with the same nutcase just moved to a different location.”

“Eric, you’re being unfair. I’ve never seen your mother behave like that.”

“Yeah, I know. She still wants to make a good impression on you. Believe me, in a year or so she’s gonna be telling you how to treat your patients. But the lunches will be great.” I disentangled our legs and straddled his hips while my head was lying on his chest and his cock was getting hard under my butt.

Pete put his hand on the back of my neck and kissed the top of my head. “So you’re okay with this?”

So am I? How the fuck do I know! I do know that I love him and not just some kinda half-assed love but the total real thing. The thing is that there are some things that you gotta be ready for even when you’re maybe not totally sure. Some things you just have to say, “Sure I can do that!”, even when you’re not really positive. And that’s not even taking into consideration the whole Jase thing. Cause it’s like I’m saying yes for him too and it’s a decision that he’s gotta live with for a long time.

I lift my head and look into his eyes. There’s no deceit in those eyes, there’s kindness, intelligence and something more, what my Grandpa Corsini used to call a standup guy. That’s the best description of Pete, a standup guy. Not to mention that something else would be standing straight up if I wasn’t sitting on it.

I smile down at him. “Yep.”

 

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I finish my laps and swim over to where Jase is sitting at the edge of the pool with his feet in the water. “How many, Kiddo?”

Jase holds up his fingers but they bear no relation to the figure he gives me. “I think fifteen, Dad.” That sounds about right. “Can I swim now, Dad?”

I hold out my arms and Jase takes a firm hold of my hands and then jumps in and wraps his arms around my neck and lies against my chest as I swim backwards.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, Dad.” The water is like warm silk and swirls around us. His black hair is plastered to his head and he’s blinking away the water.

“Wanna try swimming on your own?”

“Okay.” He looks worried. “You’re not gonna just let go of me are ya?”

“Nope, my arms will be pretty much around you all the time but just enough so that you don’t sink. If you can swim on your own that’d be best though.”

I gently pulled Jase’s arms from around my neck and positioned him so that both of my arms were under his outstretched body as he began trying to swim. Of course I don’t know what I’m doing! This is just the way that my dad did it with me.

There’s not all that many things that I’m really good at but swimming is one of them. I swim backwards under Jase and ahead of him. He seems to feel freer and if he sinks he’ll just land on me. We make it about half of the length of the pool and then Jase is getting that, I’m worn out get me the hell outta here, look on his face and I scoop him up and walk to the end of the pool and climb out with him in my arms.

He’s breathing strongly and I whisper in his ear. “You did good, Kiddo!”

“I did, Dad, didn’t I? I was swimming, Dad!” Jase is so mine right now, I mean at this age. I know that he won’t stay this way and that makes this time with him all the more important.

We shower together and wash off the chlorine. I dry him off and comb his hair. The other guys at the gym keep coming over to say what a nice boy he is and how much he looks like me.

In the car Jase throws his arms around my neck and tells me that he loves me. It’s one of those little boy declarations that appear suddenly for no apparent reason except the joy of being alive. I pull him against me and kiss the side of his head.

“I love you too, Kiddo.” I want to talk to him about the commitment ceremony. I want to know how he feels about it, how he feels about Pete and I in general and if he wants to be a part of it.

“Soooooo, Jase.” I ruffle his hair. “You know how much I like Pete don’t ya?” He knows nothing of non-sequitors and I add quickly. “Well, you like him too. You told me that, right?”

“Yeah, Dad, I like Pete a lot!”

“Well, the thing is, Jase, that I like Pete in kind of a special adult way.” Then quickly. “He likes me too…………..in that way.” We’re still in the parking lot of the gym and I finally put the key in the ignition. “And the thing is that when you like somebody like that you want everyone to know……………..well, at least your family and your friends.”

Jase has gotten a kinda worried look on his face and says. “Do you still like me, Dad?”

I pull Jase over to me so that he’s sitting on my lap. I run my fingers through his hair and stare into his eyes. “You’re my son………………my little boy. I love you more than anything, more than anyone, more than myself. That won’t ever, ever change, Jase. No matter what happens between Pete and me or between me and anyone, the one thing that won’t ever change is how much I love you. Understand?”

Jase nod solemnly. “Does Pete like me too?” He likes to cover all bases.

“Jase, Pete loves you! He loves you just like you were his own little boy. That why we want you to be part of this……well, this kinda party that we’re gonna give. It’s just a thing where we tell everybody how much we like each other and then we get to eat a really good dinner.” I can’t help it. I’m Italian and food is really a big deal to me.

 

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My dad has a den, or, well, an office, you maybe could even call it a library. Anyway the totally cool thing about it is that my mom never, absolutely never, goes in there. This all came about because of her wildass cleaning of the office twenty years ago when she not only cleaned it but tossed out a lotta things that looked like crap to her but that my dad treasured. The result? A sanctuary. A mom free zone! Apparently there was a knock down battle with threats of divorce flying. Mom now treats this room like it no longer exists in her house.

My dad is sitting in his ratty old recliner that’s surrounded by a spreading pool of old and older Field & Stream magazines. The walls are lined with bookshelves filled with every conceivable type of book and dozens upon dozens of little things that have meaning only for my dad and, well, maybe me. Things like the lure that he caught his nineteen-pound Northern Pike on, and the ticket stubs from the first ball game that he took me to. If I leave Jase anything I want it to be this room. Nothing else in the world will tell him more about his Grandfather than this room.

“You look good, Dad.” Geez, he looks like crap!

He looks at me for a moment, raises one eyebrow and smiles. “Thanks, Son. The doc says that I’m doin fine….all things considered.”

There’s an old leather side chair next to his desk and I pull it over I close as I can get to his recliner without having to kick aside magazines.

“You walkin okay, Dad?”

“As long as I take my pills.” He’s got a drill bit in his hand and he’s turning it over and over. “They seem to help.” His glasses are down near the end of his nose and he’s looking at me over them.

Sometimes my dad is really easy to talk to and we just fall into this rhythm of conversation and it’s really great but other times, like now, it’s like I’m dragging every word out of him. He knows somehow that I’m here to talk about something that he doesn’t want to hear or at least that he doesn’t want to have to discuss. Why is it that I always feel like I’m ten years old when I’m around him?

“Dad……………” But he interrupts me.

“Your mother told me about the ceremony.” That drill bit just keeps turning in his hand.

Oh! Is this good or bad? Maybe it’s that he’s so English/Irish and I take sooooo after the Italian side of the family, it’s like there’s this gulf. It’s not that he doesn’t love me because I absolutely know that he does and I love him but well it’s like I want, even need, to be physical, to touch and that’s something that Dad’s not good at. With Jase, even if I’m mad at him and telling him that he’s done something wrong, I’m always touching him, holding him, letting him know by my physical touch that I’m there for him.

“Ma did?” How the hell does she know? I purposely didn’t talk to her about this because I wanted to talk to Dad first. She’s probably got the freakin house bugged!

I gave a short laugh. “I’m surprised……………..surprised that she even knew.” I was chewing on my thumbnail. He was smiling.

“Jason……he’s an innocent, at least when it comes to your mother’s questioning.” Shit! It’s not like I can tell him not to talk to his grandmother.

“Ahhhhhhhhh so,” I inhaled deeply, “how do you feel about it?” I don’t like the way that this is going at all.

“Well, at first I thought that it was a bad idea.” He saw the look that I must have had on my face and hurried on. “Now calm down, I said that was what I thought at first but the more I thought about that the more that I realized that what I really had bouncing around in my brain was the thought that maybe you would still turn out to be straight and I didn’t want you to jump into anything that might stop that. Dumb, huh?”

I was beginning to get aggravated. “I’m not straight, Dad!”

He waved me down into my chair. “Calm down, Eric, I know. And though you may not totally believe me, it’s fine with me that you aren’t. That is after all, who you are. The problem here has never been who or what you are. The problem has been with my thinking on it.”

“Really?” I didn’t expect this. He’s not normally like this. Normally I’m to blame………..for something.

“Course you’re gonna go to hell……but……I guess there’s not much that we can do about that now.”

“Dad!!!!” He’s laughing. Laughing!

“Kidding, Eric! Good Lord, Son, you got no sense of humor at all.” Stroke? Heart attack? Stroke? Heart attack?

 

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“They’re all crazy!”

Pete pushed my hair off of my forehead and kissed me. “I’ll take care of you, Babe.” He moved his right leg up between my legs until my balls are resting gently on his upper leg. We were lying in bed and turned towards each other, his right hand was moving steadily over my body, light touches, reassuring.

“I mean she’s nuts in her way and he’s nuts in his way and they’re both nuts in different ways. A person doesn’t know which way to turn.” I push my forehead against his shoulder and he licks the side of my neck. Ummmmmm. We’ve had sex so many times this week that my cock hurts and my butt feels like it’s…..well…..gotten a lot of attention.

Pete pulls me close and then rolls slowly onto his back pulling me along and I curl up with my head on his chest and his left arm around my shoulders. He kisses the top of my head. “You can always turn to me.”

“My mom wants to cook for the commitment ceremony. She wants us to have it here. God only knows what she’s planning!”

Pete’s thumb is gently rubbing the back of my neck. “Well………..is there gonna be that many people to cook for? I mean I guess that I hadn’t thought about it.”

“There’s your mom and dad and my mom and dad and, of course, Jase.” I moved my left leg over Pete’s right. “But…….I mean the thing is, if you’re gonna have this ceremony it seems to me the whole point of it is to let as many of your friends and associates know as possible. Like the people at your clinic, shouldn’t they know, shouldn’t they be invited?” God! Did this mean the people from my office too? I mean they know that I’m gay and they know that Pete and I are lovers; it’s just that who the hell wants to see em when you don’t have to. “Have you talked to your mom about it?”

I could hear Pete thinking. “No……………………but she’s gonna wanna bring my Aunt Grace too…………….and maybe a few others.”

Is this whole thing going to be embarrassing? I got a feeling that maybe it is, well…………..on some level anyway. For one thing, Pete’s Aunt Grace is like a society type, something I definitely am not. You might even say that I’m an anti-society type. Well, there is an antidote who’s just choppin at the bit.

I lift my head and look at Pete who I can’t really see anyway because it’s dark. “Pete………..why don’t we just let my mom take care of the whole thing? She’s dying to do it and it’ll make it a hell of a lot easier on us. Besides neither one of us has the time it’ll take to do justice to this.” One of the advantages of mom is that she has a way of kinda molding things to the way that she likes em.

I gently thrust my cock against Pete’s leg and kiss his chin. “Whadya think?”

Pete pulls my face to his and buries his tongue in my mouth while he slowly rolls me over and pushes my legs apart with his. He murmurs into my mouth. “Yeah, Babe……..that’s fine.”