Silver Heat Ch. 01

Neal was the first to awake fully. A strong image of the night before rose unbidden to his mind. Suddenly his attention focused on what his grieving brain had previously refused to see, an illusive image that had tried to surface as he had drifted off to sleep. Imbedded in the image of Lance lying on his side weeping, one thing now stood out clearly. Lance had a very large cock. Impressive, almost fearsome.

Feeling like a schoolboy, Neal rose and placed himself in proper position to the mirror. Lance was obviously awake, his back to the mirror. At first Neal was not sure if his visitor was sobbing or masturbating. Lance rolled to his back and dispelled all doubt. He was working his huge dick with both hands. But he was plainly working too hard at it, having trouble. The look on his face was one of utter frustration. After a few more minutes, Lance rolled over in defeat and buried his face in the pillow.

Neal, watching, while sympathetic to Lance's plight, was hugely turned on by what he saw. His cock, more engorged than it had been in recent memory, was creating a wet spot in the front of his pajamas. He pushed down hard with his palm on the center of his crotch, smiled. "Why do we men always think that particular pressure will relieve a hard-on, when we know the opposite is true?" he wondered for the zillionth time.

Laughing at himself, but also amazed at the length and strength of his erection, he cleared his head and went to the kitchen to prepare breakfast for himself and his new-found friend. Half an hour later, when he had the table set in the sunny little nook off the kitchen, coffee perking, juice poured, bacon and sausage fried and a stack of buckwheat pancakes prepared, he rapped lightly on Lance's door. "Breakfast is ready, good buddy," he called.

"Be right out," was the immediate reply.

"Coffee?" Neal asked.

"Absolutely," Lance called back. "Mind if I eat in my skivvies?"

"S'okay with me."

Lance walked from the hallway, stretching and yawning. His tee shirt rode up to expose his lean abdomen and the very impressive bulge in his BVDs. "Sorry about the skivvies," he said. "I don't usually wear anything to bed, but I slipped these on. I don't own pajamas. You want me to get dressed before I eat?"

"Naw, it's only us guys here. Get it while it's hot."

"By the way, thanks for makin' breakfast. You didn't have to do that."

"Didn't I tell you I was gonna take care of you?" Neal sounded flip, but surprised himself by the depth of his feelings. He truly wanted to help Lance. It had been a long time since he had felt strongly about anyone. Mary's death had been, to Neal, the ultimate betrayal of a life-long trust. She had left him. Alone. "Why?" he wondered. "Why do I feel so attached to this man? This is more than just my penchant for taking in strays." Perhaps he saw in helping Lance, a route to his own healing, a chance to learn to feel again, to trust again.

As they ate, Neal searched Lance's face for signs of the grief and sexual frustration he knew his friend was suffering, but could discern nothing. Lance was obviously very good at the masculine job of hiding one's emotions. Neal thought hard about ways he might help Lance without embarrassing him. His mind came up with nothing. He would wait for an opportunity, hoped he would recognize the moment if and when it arrived.

"So do we have plans for today?" Neal asked Lance.

"What you mean 'we', white man?"

"Hey, I didn't mean to butt in."

"Just kidding. Happy to have you along if you have nothing better to do than tag along with a washed out old writer."

"Why do you do that?"

"Do what?"

"Put yourself down like that. You'll be fine. You. . . "

"I know, I know. I have no choice, right?"

"Exactly." Both men had a good laugh at that one.

"Then, fuck it! Let's go fishin'."

On the way to the convertible with the stupid little trailer behind, Neal says, " Boy I remember. My little Mary, she sure did love to go fishing."

In front of him, Lance makes a gurgling sound and falls to his knees. Loud fierce sobs of anguish pour from him. He vomits profusely, pancakes an syrup and bacon and sausage fly out in a stream and puddle on the sandy lawn.

Neal rushes forward, bends.

"Martha," Lance gurgles.

Neal helps Lance to his feet, tucking his head under Lance's arm. Together they struggle back into the house. Lance's limp form is a heavy burden, but Neal manages, opening the door with his left hand and kicking the screen door with his foot. He guides his friend through the kitchen and down the short corridor where he dumps him on the bed in the spare room. Gently he lifts Lance's feet onto the knitted comforter Mary had made with her own hands. He slips off Lance's Reeboks and covers him with a light blanket. "Stay there," he commands.

In the kitchen, Neal puts a kettle on to boil and prepares a cup for the special camomile and honey blend that Mary had so often used to calm him, and moistens a wash cloth with cool water.

Back in the bedroom he unbuckles lance's belt and slides off his pants, folding them neatly on Mary's rocker. He covers Lance with a warmer blanket and sits on the side of the bed, holding the folded wash cloth against Lance's forehead.

"I'm sorry," Lance murmurs. "I am so sorry."

"Shut up! Don't you dare apologize. You just lie there and relax."

He went to the kitchen and was back in a moment with the soothing tea. He administered it to Lance in small sips while speaking softly to his new friend. "Here's the deal. You are going to lay there and be 'not all right' and I am going to take care of you. Do not argue. If you feel like puking, puke. If you feel like weeping, weep. I have seen it all, done it all myself. Go on now, you just let go. If you need anything from me, anything at all, you just ask, okay?" He grasped Lance's hand in his and held it. Other than the tea, it was all he had to offer.

For the next eighteen hours, Lance slept fitfully, wept, cried out loud, cursed the day and the night. During each short period of wakefulness, Neal had been there: ready with a cup of soothing tea, a warm blanket, an analgesic or a sleeping pill, a thoughtful word, a gentle touch, a back massage. Here, with only his one new friend, Lance had finally been able to let go in a way that had never been open to him among his 'friends' back home. Here it did not matter. If he looked bad in Neal's eyes, so what, in few days he would be gone. He would never have to face the social consequences of 'unmanly' behavior. Neal, non-judgmental, easy going and open, made it easy for Lance to be 'not all right'. He was forgiving, loving without demands, a better friend in one day than many Lance had known for years.

*********

Lance was awakened by a beam of golden sunlight dancing across his face. He had no idea how long he had been incapacitated. Neal sat in a chair next to the bed, bent double, head turned to one side on the soft bed, snoring gently. Gazing at the sleeping form, Lance was grateful beyond words. He felt a tenderness, a kind of quiet appreciation, for the value of this man who could give so freely, so easily, so completely, to another, a virtual stranger. The strange coincidences of their meeting: his impulsive stop at the little bar and grill, the commonality of their personalities and experiences, the common recent loss of a loved one, the strange doppelganger effect of the two Neals, both in Florida, both in periods of extreme uncertainty, their mutual love of jazz and Bob Dylan; all contributed to a sense of kismet. Lance felt as if he had arrived at a preordained confluence of natural and spiritual forces beyond reason or control. Overcome by a surge of emotion, he reaches to gently stroke Neal's face with the back of his fingers.

Neal's eyes pop open. Involuntarily, he smiles, turns his head slightly and plants a sleepy kiss on Lance's fingers. The kiss is like a lightening strike in the placid room. Lance's fingers tighten into a firm caress at the nape of Neal's neck, drawing him closer. Lance turns, moves his face nearer. "Neal, I. . . , he begins. Neal places one finger against Lance's lips, shushing him, rises from his chair to sit beside Lance on the bed. Throwing back the covers, he runs his shaking palm over Lance's chest and belly. "Oh Lance," he says simply. "Oh Lance."

"Yes! Lance answers, his voice quavering. He reaches wordlessly to urge Neal's hand lower.

Neal's fingers slide beneath the elastic pajama waistband, curl softly around Lance's penis, feeling it throb, pulse with hot blood, swell. He strokes inquisitively, unsure of Lance's feelings and his own. "I saw you last night," he tells Lance. "The mirror, it. . . Just a glimpse at first, then I watched. I saw you trying to masturbate, saw your frustration." He pauses, moistens his palm with saliva, grips Lance's formidable cock more firmly, teasing, playing. "I wished last night I had the nerve to come and help you. Can I now? Can I help you Lance?"

"You. . . Are. . . Don't stop. . . Please."

Neal adds his other hand gripping Lance's big dick from both sides, leaning over as if praying before a sacred phallus. His fingers tease and tickle, fondle and squeeze Lance's balls on the down stroke; his thumbs circle over the thick head at the top. As he strokes, he speaks softly to Lance. "It's okay good buddy, relax. You're all right now. Let me do this for you. Beautiful! That's it. Wonderful. Easy buddy, easy."

Lance's legs tighten. He crosses his feet. His hips surge up involuntarily. "Oh Neal. Oh."

Encouraged, Neal increases his activities, gripping tighter as Lance's juices begin to flow, stroking faster and faster, his hands moving in a spiral from tip to balls and back again. Up and down and round and round his hands move in a blur of motion. "That's it, Lance. Give it up buddy. Give it to me. Come on. Oh yeah! He mouths over and over.

Neal's mind flashes to memories of things past, to Joseph, the sometime lover of his youth, to whom he had returned in his time of grief. He felt Lance's massive penis begin to pulsate, knew his new good buddy was close. He himself was aroused to aching hardness, but he ignored his own need. He felt the large vein on the underside of Lance's cock expand, pulse thrumming. He pushed both hands down hard, putting pressure on lance's prostate, bent quickly and slid his mouth over Lance's dick as deep as he could, gagging. Neal began swallowing over and over, massaging Lance's cock with his throat muscles.

Lance twined his fingers in Neal's long gray hair, pressing down gently but insistently. He thrust his hips up to meet Neal's plunging mouth, crying out in a long drawn out, "Oh," as his cum began to spew forcibly. Neal sucked hard on the massive organ that filled his mouth and throat, struggling to breathe through his nose, drawing the cum from deep inside in one long continuous stream,

As very large cocks do, Lance's cock grew softer but not smaller as Neal continued to hold it in his mouth and throat. Lance lay on the bed, his arms thrown wide, panting more and more slowly as his orgasm wound down, murmuring when tiny aftershocks struck from time to time.

Finally, Neal removed his mouth from Lance's penis, grinning. He squirmed around until their bodies were parallel and drew Neal's larger body into his arms, saying nothing, but caressing his back soothingly. He grinned gratifyingly at himself. His mouth and throat and nose were filled with the funky but not-unpleasant scent and flavor of cock and cum as they had been only a few times in his life.

Both men dozed for a time. Lance recovered first. He reached to lay his palm on Neal's cheek, fingers curled behind his ear. "Thank you my friend, my dear, dear friend," Lance murmured softly. "I'll not soon forget what you have done for me."

Neal chuckled. "Believe me, good buddy, the pleasure was all mine. Well," he laughed harder, "maybe not all mine. Wha'dya say now? Ready to go fishin'?"