Face the Music, page 12
Jace gasps when I breach the tight ring of muscles, and I still.
“It’s okay; don’t stop,” he assures me, grabbing my ass with his free hand and tugging me forward.
Every inch of velvety heat that encases my cock feels like pure heaven, made all the better by the blissful expression on Jace’s face. When the front of my thighs are flush with Jace’s ass, I still again just to revel in the perfection of it. I tilt my head back and take my hand out of Jace’s to let it roam over Jace’s legs, wrapped around me, loving the feel of the coarse hair under my fingers. Then, to his abdomen and over his chest. I can feel the rise and fall of his rapid breaths as he waits for me to move again, but I can’t rush this moment. Finally, I reach his face and cup his jaw in my hand.
I lean forward, and he inhales sharply at the change of angle. I trace his lips with my thumb until they part for me and then suck his bottom lip between my teeth, gently nibbling until he whimpers.
My tongue seeks his, slowly tangling and caressing it when I find it. I feel Jace’s cock flex against my stomach, and I smile into the kiss.
“Please, Linc. Please, please.”
My cock throbs deep inside him at his beautiful pleading, and I decide to have mercy on him. Leaning over him with his legs wrapped tightly around me, I rock into him, barely pulling out with each thrust. He trembles in my arms as I grind the length of my cock along his prostate, staying deeply seated. His erection is pinned between us, pre-cum making my stomach sticky.
The smooth muscles in his channel flutter and constrict around me. He moans into my mouth as our tongues continue to play. And my heart races as our sweat mixes.
I drag my fingers along his side, loving the goosebumps that erupt under my touch, and then I brush my thumb over his nipple, and he whines against my lips. I do it again, this time pinching just a little, and he shudders, grinding himself against me, meeting every one of my thrusts.
“Lincoln, oh god, Linc!”
I open my eyes to watch as his face flames bright red, and his eyes roll back with pleasure. His hot release coats my skin, and he constricts tightly around me, sending me over the edge. I growl deep from my gut as my balls draw tight, electric heat exploding from my core. And I pump my release into the condom.
Jace
My hands tremble as I run them slowly over the hard planes of Lincoln’s once familiar body. A tear streaks down my cheek for each patch of rough skin I encounter. Our lips move lazily against each other, our tongues occasionally slipping out to join the mix, slowly coming down from the high of our orgasms.
“I’m ready,” I whisper after an eternity.
“Ready for what, Freckles?” Lincoln brushes my hair off my forehead.
“Ready to talk about it.”
Lincoln looks equal parts relieved and nervous, but he nods resolutely.
“I’m sorry for the way I hurt you. If I lived a million years, I couldn’t possibly regret anything more than I regret that decision.”
“Why’d you leave that night? Why’d you lie and promise we’d be together forever and then leave me alone without an explanation?”
“If I could turn back time, I would do it differently. You have to know how much I hate myself for that. I was a coward, and I handled it badly. At the time, I didn’t see any other solution.”
“If you had a do-over, you would still leave?” I ask, realizing Linc said he had regret about how he left, not that he left.
“I don’t know, I’d like to think I would.”
“Why?” I demand. “You were always the one promising forever and painting pictures of a perfect future together. You made me believe in forever and then you left.”
“You were going to throw your life away to come on tour with me. You were going to give up that scholarship and follow me out to New York. I couldn’t let you give up on your dream like that. And I couldn’t see a way we could both have our dreams and still have each other.”
“You stupid, stupid man.” I sigh, shaking my head and crawling on top of Lincoln, straddling his hips and placing my hands on either side of his face. “We could have figured it out together. We didn’t have to go through all that hurt. We could have found a way.”
“Is it too late?” Linc asks.
Desperate hope burns in my chest, threatening to consume me. I study his face for several seconds, brushing my thumb along his jaw and furrowing my brow.
“I don’t know yet. But I don’t want it to be too late, if that counts for anything?”
“It counts for everything.”
After what feels like an eternity, Linc climbs out of bed and goes to the bathroom. He returns a minute later with a damp washcloth to wipe the cum and lube off me, then he tosses the rag near our clothes on the floor.
“Will you play me a song?” I ask.
He pauses but then turns and picks up his guitar. I scoot over in bed, so he has space, and he settles against the headboard with the blankets pooled around his hips and his guitar in his lap. I prop myself up on the pillows to watch.
I was always mesmerized by the way his fingers move over the strings. I can hardly remember a time Lincoln wasn’t playing music. He bought his first guitar at a garage sale, for twenty bucks, the summer when we were nine. I can’t even remember where he got the money, certainly not from his parents. He spent the entire rest of the summer practicing. He was terrible, but I loved sitting on the pier or in his room and watching him try. His eyebrows would scrunch together, and his tongue would peek out between his teeth as he concentrated. By the following summer he was able to play a handful of songs expertly, and he only got better from there.
“What do you want me to play?” he asks, his gaze holding mine as he strums lazily. My heart aches with the beauty of him. I wasn’t lying when I said I didn’t know if I could trust him again, but that doesn’t seem to be stopping my heart from going all in on certain doom.
“Play one of my songs?”
His hands still, and he studies my face for several seconds before he starts to play a new melody. I close my eyes and let the soft beat wash over me. It reminds me of a heartbeat, slow and sure. When the words start, he’s singing about freckles. A smile tugs at the corner of my lips as the intensity builds, the words telling a story of a man who’s memorized every freckle on his lover’s body, and as his lover sleeps, he plays connect the dots, drawing pictures of their future in the marks. My own heart beats heavy, breaking for the man in the song…for Linc.
Linc never held back his feelings from me, always quick to tell me how much he loved me or how he saw our future. I never doubted him for a second, which was why it hurt so much when he left.
Over the past ten years, I’ve tried to convince myself that Lincoln couldn’t have loved me as much as I loved him. But I never really believed it. I couldn’t make it add up—how he could love me so intensely and still leave the way he did.
The song fades to a close, and my eyes drift open.
“That was beautiful, Linc. Thank you.”
“It’s not enough to make up for how I hurt you, but I’m trying. I’ll do anything to set things right.”
“I know.” I pat the pillow beside me. “Lay down, let’s sleep.”
“You’re staying?” he asks with unrestrained hope in his voice.
“I’m staying, baby. Sleep.”
He puts his guitar away and climbs into bed beside me, wasting no time wrapping me in his arms and holding me to his chest like he’s afraid I might vanish. If anyone should have that fear, it’s me. But here I am.
Track 21: Side B
18 Regrets
Lincoln
I pounded at Jace’s front door, bouncing on my toes, about to burst from excitement. When he finally opened the door, I swept him into my arms and spun him around until he laughed with the same joy I felt. I was eighteen years old, and that was the last time I could remember being truly happy.
“What’s up, baby?” he asked when I finally set him down.
“Something amazing happened; you’ll never believe it.”
“Tell me already, the suspense is killing me.”
“You remember when I told you that record producer guy happened to be at a bar we played at a few months back?”
“Yeah,” Jace nodded, his eyes lighting up in anticipation of my big news.
“He listened to the demo we sent him, and he just called. They want to offer us a contract. This is the real deal—we’d start recording an album as soon as next month and go on tour as the opening band for Last Weekend starting in a few months.”
“Oh my god!” Jace screamed, jumping up and down with me. “My boyfriend is going to be a rock star.”
“This is crazy; I can’t believe this is happening,” I mused, tugging Jace’s hand and leading him down by the lake so we could sit down and talk about everything.
“I can believe it. You guys are amazing,” he boasted. “Wait, where are you going to have to go to record? And how long will you be on tour? Are you still going to go to college in Michigan with me?”
I blinked in surprise at his question. I hadn’t even thought of those things; I’d been so caught up in the thought of getting signed by a real record label.
“The recording studio is in New York, so we’d have to go there, and then the tour is eight months long. I guess college will have to wait? It’s not like I need college if I’m a rock star, right?”
Jace’s face fell for a moment before he recovered his smile.
“Sure, of course. And it’s not like we don’t have practice spending long stretches apart.”
“Right,” I muttered, my good mood souring quickly. “But we were looking forward to being together for real after this summer. I made so many promises to you…”
“Hey, I know; I can come with you. How cool would that be to go on tour with my rock star boyfriend? I’m sure it won’t be long before everything settles down for me to go to school.”
“But, you want to be a doctor,” I argued, feeling sick to my stomach at the thought of him giving that dream up. Jace was going to cure diseases and change the world. He couldn’t give that up to listen to me sing some stupid songs.
“I don’t want to be away from you again so soon though. I’ve been looking forward to having time together. It’s okay, school will be there.”
“Jace—” I shook my head, but he put his hand over my mouth to stop what I was going to say.
“No arguing, I’ve made up my mind.”
The creak of my window opening put a smile on my lips and made my dick hard. But then reality washed over me. This would be the last night I’d have Jace in my arms, the last time I would kiss him. My mind was already made up, and even though my heart was in pieces, I knew there was no other choice.
My decision was solidified earlier in the night when Jace told me he would put off college to come to New York with me. He’d said it might be fun to go on tour with the band. He’d go to college in a few years when things settled down. School will be there; this is your big break.
I rolled over and held the sheet up for Jace to slip in beside me. The moonlight streaming through my bedroom window danced over his skin, and the smile on his lips was like a knife to my gut. He climbed in beside me, and I shuddered with pleasure at the feel of his heated skin sliding against mine beneath the cool sheets.
My lips sought the curve of his neck, the spot that always made him shiver and whimper. I gathered every breath and moan that fell from his lips that night, hoarding them away greedily, knowing I would need them to get me through the rest of my life.
I know most people have many loves throughout their life. Few people end up with the person they fall in love with at fifteen years old. But as Jace always said, I have a sensitive, artist’s soul. I knew from the moment I gave my heart to Jace that I’d never get it back. Not whole or otherwise.
“Promise we’ll be together forever,” Jace gasped as I wrapped my hand around his erection and pumped it slowly.
The shattered pieces of my heart wept at his request. I’d never lied to Jace, and I wasn’t going to start now.
“I love you,” I whispered because it was the truth, and it was all I had to offer him in this moment. “I will always love you.”
Jace
I woke up with a smile, stretching my pleasantly sore muscles and thinking about Lincoln’s hands and mouth all over me last night. There was never a time when we were together that wasn’t filled with passion, but last night had been a whole new level. Lincoln made me come over and over, whispering an endless stream of love as he did it.
I shivered with pleasure at the memory, wondering where Lincoln was this morning. When I woke, I assumed he had run to the bathroom, but after a few minutes, I was starting to wonder if he was coming back at all.
I got up and pulled on my clothes, putting my ear to the door to see if I could hear Lincoln or his parents. When I didn’t hear anything, I decided to climb out the window and go knock at the front door.
I stood on his porch, goosebumps on my skin from the cool morning air, waiting for someone to answer. When they didn’t, I walked home, confused and starting to worry. Did Lincoln’s parents take him somewhere for some reason? When would he be back?
“Where were you this early?” my mom asked as I walked inside, in too much of a daze to remember to climb in through my window so she wouldn’t know I was out.
“At Lincoln’s.”
“Lincoln’s? But they left hours ago.”
“What?” I gasped, certain I misunderstood.
“I saw all three of them pack up the car and leave about two hours ago.”
I shook my head, refusing to believe Lincoln would leave without waking me. He said he wasn’t leaving at all. Yesterday, we talked about going to New York together in two weeks when he was supposed to start recording. We were going to look at apartments together.
I pulled out my phone and dialed Lincoln’s number. It went straight to voicemail. With shaking fingers, I typed out a text message to send.
Jace: Where’d you go? You’re worrying me, please call me ASAP.
The text message was never answered and a week later the number was disconnected. The next time I saw Linc was on T.V., playing “Cherry Lane”, and I hated him.
Track 22: Side A
Bathroom Blowjobs are the Handshakes of Our Generation
Lincoln
It takes me a few seconds to figure out what roused me from such a peaceful sleep. I had been dreaming of Jace—nothing new there—but waking up to find him sprawled out beside me makes my heart swell almost painfully. How is it possible to love someone this much?
I reach out and brush a strand of dark hair off Jace’s forehead, and he sighs happily in his sleep. That’s when I hear the sound of a car door slamming shut just outside.
“Mother fucker,” I mutter, rolling out of bed and tugging on the jeans I left crumpled beside the bed last night.
“What’s wrong?” Jace asks in a sleepy voice.
“I think I’ve been found.”
“Found by who?” He sits up and cocks his head to one side, his hair sticking up in a million odd angles, his eyes still squinting from the assault of the sun through the bedroom window.
“Paparazzi, gossip rags, anyone who wants to sell a picture and a story about what a fucking loser I am for a million dollars. Get dressed, I wouldn’t put it past them to start peeking through the windows.”
Still looking confused and half-asleep, Jace stumbles about, trying to get dressed.
“I’m going to have to create a diversion, so you can sneak out the back without them seeing you.” I pull back the curtain and glance outside to find four vans and a dozen people with cameras milling about outside.
“What about you? Are you just going to be stuck here with cameras in your face for god knows how long? You’re supposed to be here taking some time away to recover mentally; this can’t be helping.” He waves at the window, and I could kiss him for the concern etched on his face.
“Don’t worry about me.”
“I am worried about you. As much as I would love to not worry about you, I don’t think that’s ever been an option. How about this—I don’t have anything here that I need back home, do you?”
“I only need my guitar and you need the songs I wrote for you. Why?”
“How about I create a diversion and you take my car out the hidden back driveway? I can walk to town and meet you in a few minutes, and then we can go back to my place in Seattle to hide out.”
“You want me to come to your place in Seattle to stay?” I ask in surprise.
“If you want,” he says, less sure of his proposal now that I’m questioning it.
“I definitely want,” I agree.
“Here are my keys. Meet me outside the coffee shop.”
“Be careful, those assholes out there are brutal,” I warn before grabbing Jace around the waist and hauling him against me to claim his lips. If I live a thousand years, there’s no way I’ll ever have kissed Jace enough. “See you soon.”
For a second, a look of uncertainty passes behind his eyes before he hands me the keys. My heart breaks a little knowing I put that distrust there and not sure if there’s any way I’ll ever be able to fix what I broke between us.
Jace
Linc grabs his guitar, gathers the music he wrote for me, and shoves his phone into his pocket. Then, he gives me one more kiss before slipping quietly out the back door. I go to the front door, ready to distract the vultures so they don’t notice Linc. I fling the door open, and a dozen cameras swarm me instantly.
“Is Lincoln Miller here?”
“Is it true he tried to kill himself again?”
“Did the tour get canceled because the band is breaking up?”
“Is it true Lincoln is checking into a mental health facility?”
Questions are hurled at me left and right as flashes nearly blind me.
