Weeks ago, after hearing John’s concerns about how his friends in general would handle knowing he was diabetic, we were all a bit insulted. Didn’t he, at the very least, respect my professional ability to remain collected in an emergency? And how could he think I’d hover over him constantly or fly off the handle at a glimpse of a potential red flag?
After our first night co-parenting Frankie’s kitten, however, a niggling worry began to grow that I wouldn’t handle it well. What if I overreacted or had some sort of PTSD flashback? I had the occasional nightmare from the night I’d rushed him to the ER — that I hadn’t gotten there in time, or I’d done the wrong thing and actually killed him myself. And then there was the one in which he was fine and banging some random dude on a huge, red, velour-covered, circular rotating bed when I’d burst into his apartment.
And so I sat in the living room, watching Frankie and the kitten sleep and patting myself on the back for having handled things so well, when I heard the clatter of all his bazillion bottles falling, the thud of him hitting the ground, and John groan-shouting my name.
I jumped up and burst into the bathroom, expecting to find him dizzy and/or injured, only to behold… John sprawled on the floor of his shower surrounded by shampoo bottles, sitting on one hand, while the other frantically pumped his swollen, red cock. All displayed behind the fog-resistant glass of his shower, like an X-rated museum exhibit.
Ecstasy etched John’s face. When I met his hooded eyes, it was as though no time had passed and it was me filling him, bringing him to the edge of ecstasy. I found myself taking a step closer but, before I could decide between watching and getting on my knees to join him, his eyes widened and he tipped over the edge.
John gasped, his back arched, and his gorgeously defined abs convulsed as the throbbing cock in his hand pulsed out stream after stream of cum. His eyes stayed locked on mine, indescribable awe filling their depths, until his orgasm subsided and they fluttered shut. He lay there, face flushed, gasping for air, as water streamed over him from the showerhead to rinse away all the evidence of what I’d just witnessed.
I composed myself by the time he opened his eyes and awareness filled them. Had John simply fallen, he would have been extremely annoyed by my intrusion. But, given the circumstances, I was pretty sure he’d never, ever bring this up.
“Are you okay?” I asked calmly, and he blinked at me in confusion. “Did you bump your head or anything when you fell? Maybe… injure your wrist?”
He thought for a moment, removing his fingers from his ass and rotating his wrists, then shook his head meekly. Because he was John, I was slightly disappointed that he didn’t fling his arms in the air, flash jazz hands, and shout ‘Ta-da!’
“Okay, then. Have a good night!” I said cheerfully and walked out, as though nothing had happened. Thankfully, his eyes hadn’t traveled below my face, so he probably didn’t notice my raging erection.
When I sat back down on the couch, willing my hard-on to calm down, Frankie and the kitten picked up their heads to fix me with identical expressions of judginess. I narrowed my eyes at them, but there was no way to win a staring contest with Frankie.
“What?” I demanded. “Are you annoyed that I left you here?”
Nothing.
“That I intruded on John’s shower?”
Still no reaction.
“That I have a hard-on?”
They tilted their heads and the kitten raised a faux eyebrow. Amongst all the shades of brown on her face, the kitten had a single narrow patch of orange fur over one eye that gave the impression of sarcastic patience and condescending amusement. She definitely inherited that facial expression from John.
“Are you actually judging me for not joining him?!”
Frankie grumbled and she meowed.
“We’re not getting back together.”
They again voiced their disbelief that I could be so bull-headed.
“It’s complicated,” I told them, then gave the stock response only fur-daddies could. “Sorry, it’s a human daddy thing.”
The reality was, once he decided he respected me enough to give me a choice in the matter, he would confide in me —which would also show he trusted me— and then we could be together. It didn’t really matter what was medically wrong. Sure, it drove me crazy that I didn’t know, but none of the possibilities —singly or combined— had me heading for the hills. In fact, if they shortened his life span, all the more reason not to waste what time we had.
I gave up arguing with the stubborn duo. My hard-on had subsided, so I scooped up the kitten and sat down on the couch, settling her on the crease where my legs met. Frankie jumped up and lay on the cushion beside me, resting his head on my leg, muzzle cuddled against his little girl. Still feeling restless, I called my best friend.
“Okay, tell Greggie what he did this time,” he said, because ‘hello’ was too boring.
“Everything's fine! Maybe I just wanted to say hi to my BFF, ever think of that?"
“What did he do?”
“Nothing! I’m just bored!” I winced. My voice was doing that high-pitched, I’m-totally-lying-but-please-believe-me thing again, so I took pains to lower it and asked, “How long has it been since we've hung out outside of work?"
Greg gasped. "Do I get to pet the kitty?!"
"Only if you bring me sour gummy worms," I sang.
"Candy for kitty. Gotcha! See you in 5!" Greg let out a little squeal as he hung up. But, as his best friend, I was duty-bound to deny that such a sound ever escaped his lips.
The night passed quickly as we gossiped and watched movies and cooed over the kitten. Greg left shortly before dawn and John stumbled into the kitchen to get some coffee just as Frankie and I were celebrating yet another developmental milestone.
“What’s going on?” he asked once we finished singing this morning’s improvised kitty ditty.
“She ate a little of the slurry!” I announced. The formula-wet food mixture was the first step toward eating solid food. She had sniffed and touched her nose to it yesterday, but was uninterested in trying more.
“Is that what you’re all covered with?” he asked.
I was so excited that the story tumbled out of me, “Well, Frankie and I tasted some to convince her it’s delicious and when that didn’t work, he tried to encourage her, but wound up shoving her too far and she tumbled into the food. He was horrified and immediately picked her up and plopped her onto my chest, thus the mess. But it was totally worth it because then she licked it off her paws and that totally counts as eating!”
“Wow! So she ate AND managed to clean herself!” John said, properly impressed. She’d been hit-or-miss trying to groom her paws and tail. “Well, kind of.”
“I know, right?” I scrunched my nose as I took in the mess covering the three of us. Then I had an evil little idea. It was a bit passive-aggressive, but I couldn’t help myself. “I could really use a shower. Could you clean the two of them?”
I handed him the messy kitten, her fluffy, long tortie fur matted with drying tan mush, and he just stared at me. I headed off to the bathroom asking, “You don’t mind if I borrow a towel, do you?”
“No, no. That’s fine. Umm… You know where they are,” he said before I closed the door behind me, leaving it a few millimeters open. I didn’t hold back my groan when the hot water hit muscles I didn’t know were sore, and hummed quietly as I washed with products I’d assumed he’d gotten rid of months ago. I remembered vividly the sight of him lying on the floor right here and the look in his eyes just before he came, giving myself a light tug before I moved on to other body parts. Was John picturing me sudsing up, pleasuring myself? Could I make him picture me that way?
Then I remembered an iconic 80s Meg Ryan movie and a shampoo commercial that was nearly as old, and decided to take this to a sillier level. It would tease him about last night’s incident and might also make his pants fit a little tighter. I took a dollop of shampoo and, as it lathered, built up moans and shouting to a comical degree. Perhaps due to the echoing against the tile walls, I was far more over-the-top than Meg Ryan could ever have been in a diner.
“Oh yes, Vanilla-strawberry shampoo! Right there! Oh, yeaaaah! Your bubbles are soooo huge! Wash my hair! Wash it! Oh! Ohmygod, I’m almost there! Just a little sudsier… yes! Yes! Yeeessssssss!!!” I breathed hard, rinsed, and read the bottle, “Lather, rinse, repeat? Oh, you naughty boy…”
When I finished —showering— a short time later, I found a t-shirt and pair of sweatpants just outside the door. They were far too big for me and smelled like John, and I tried not to enjoy it quite so much. What had been my goal, to shower like that? To tease him into not being embarrassed for what I witnessed last night? To taunt him sexually and push him to do what was necessary to win me back? But I wasn’t sure he wanted me back. And, regardless of what he wanted, I still wasn’t sure what I wanted.
I emerged from the bathroom smiling and he treated me to some amused side-eye and handed me a plate of blueberry pancakes. We sat and chatted about introducing Frankie and the kitten to Chance’s family the next evening (or, for him, ‘tonight’), before I went back to my boring, petless apartment and went to sleep for the day.