How Matt Became My Lover

"Pour some of this down your throat," I said to Matt. I placed an opened can of beer on the coffee table in front of him.

"It's small isn't it mate?," he said, picking the can up off the table before wrapping his lips around the oblong shaped hole at the top.

"What is?"

Matt tilted his head back, his fluctuating adams apple showing as he took a long, thirsty swig. He placed the can back on the table and breathed a satisfied sigh. Then he sat back in my old, worn armchair and surveyed the room. "Your apartment man."

I nodded. "Yea, I know."

My apartment was a bed-sit. This room was my lounge, dining and bedroom. A tiny kitchen was partitioned off and one door led to a bathroom. Functional. That was my apartment in a nutshell.

I had bought all my furniture on the cheap from a second hand mart when I moved in earlier in the week. The brown chair Matt reclined in had a tear in the upholstery, which I covered with a pillow. The armrests were worn, almost to the wooden frame. The other chair was beige, at least on the surface. It could have been a faded orange. Brown and beige. That was about the extent of my colour coordination. That's a farm boy for you. At least the coffee table between the two chairs offered some variety, despite the cup stains.

Matt's presence sure made a difference to my décor though. Freshly showered, his skin glistened like a baby's. I reckoned he could make a prison cell look like Buckingham Palace.

I stood by the bed and surveyed the room too. I shrugged my shoulders. "I know it's a bit of a mess. At least it's a roof over my head. Beggars can't be choosers."

"Yes they can," he said dryly. "Dumpster or shop doorway? Cigarette butt or someone's used chewing gum?"

I laughed. "True." I walked to my dresser and opened my socks and underwear drawer. "Make yourself at home. I'm just gonna pop into the bathroom. Won't be a minute."

I needed to change my briefs. They were still damp and felt uncomfortable, especially between my legs, some moisture also soaking through my pants. I picked out a new pair, the turquoise ones, from a budget packet of five and hid them in my fist. "Grab another beer from the fridge if you want."

He grinned. "Jeff mate, didn't your old lady ever warn you about wearing your undies in the shower?"

I laughed, but more in embarrassment that he had worked out what I was doing than any spontaneous approval of his joke. It got worse when my undies drawer got stuck as I went to close it. I wrestled with it, trying to force it.

Meanwhile, Matt sat forward, picked up his beer, and polished off what was left before placing the empty can back on the table while watching me thoughtfully. "You know mate? There's no need to go out of the room to change. You saw us all in the showers before, didn't you? It's good for team bonding mate." He kicked off his designer sneakers and pushed them backwards under his chair, with his feet.

"Good for team bonding?" I grunted, putting my body behind the drawer. It didn't budge. I gave up and left it half open.

"Yea. Being naked man. Seeing each other naked. There's no better way of getting to know someone than hanging about with them naked."

I stood upright by my dresser and looked at him doubtingly. "Yea, well, I know one or two people who would disagree with that?"

"Like who?"

"Doesn't matter."

"Just change your undies here man. I won't look. Are you shy?" He stood and sauntered to the fridge.

"It's not that," I said to his back.

He bent over and grabbed another can of beer from the fridge before slamming the door shut with his foot as he turned. He pulled the tab, spraying some foam onto the bare, wooden floorboards in front of me. "What is it then?" He took a drink, placed the can on the table and flopped backwards into the chair.

"I need a leak?"

"A leak mate?"

"Yea, a piss, you know. May as well get changed while I'm at it. Kill two birds with one stone, so to speak."

Matt shook his head and looked at me disbelievingly. "Man, you're ..."

"... crazy." I interrupted, finishing his sentence, then I pulled a face as I walked back past him and into the bathroom.

I quickly changed into the new undies and refastened my pants before stopping to look at my reflection in the mirror. My hair was damp and scruffy. I combed it, making it stringy so I grabbed a towel and ruffled it up again. That was better. I took a bottle of aftershave from the cabinet, unscrewed the cap, hesitated, then dabbed a drop under each earlobe with my finger. I walked back to the lounge, trying to look handsome.

"Cool! Cards!" I reseated myself in the chair facing him and watched him for a minute. "You're good. How do you do that?"

"Easy." Matt was skillfully shuffling a pack of cards, repeatedly cutting them, and then fanning them back into a single deck like a pro. "Does that feel better mate?"

I laughed unconvincingly. "Yea."

"Sweet." Matt placed the cards in a pile on the rough table surface. "Do you know truth or dare mate?"

"Yea, of course," I said, squinting worryingly at him.

"Take a card," he said, pointing to them.

"Isn't that a kids game?"

Matt laughed. "Not the way I play it."

"What do you mean?"

"You'll see. If you want to play, take a card. Otherwise we can do something else."

"Monopoly?"

Matt shook his head. "Nah."

"Do you really want to play truth or dare?"

"Yea. I don't want to sound like a blowarse, but I've never lost mate."

"Never? How many times have you played it?"

"Might as well tell you now, I'll win," he said, not answering my question. When he caught my eye, he smiled. "I always do. I'll beat your arse mate."

Matt picked up his beer several times, taking short, sharp sips, while impatiently tapping the fingers of his other hand on the table. He wore a pair of faded Levis and a blue and white, short sleeved rugby shirt, fitting tightly around his biceps, although not in a body builder type way. He was fit, but naturally fit. He never owned a gym membership, consequently his arse was more prime beef than hard muscle. Just how I liked it.

Before long, he picked the cards up again, shuffling them without looking. He smiled at me, highlighting his most handsome feature, his twinkling, brown eyes. They were the first thing I noticed about him. They emitted a healthy sparkle and they smiled at you, permanently.

I hadn't even agreed to play, but before I knew what was happening, I had taken a card in my hand. I slowly turned it face up on the scarred table top in front of me.

"Bad luck mate," laughed Matt. "A six." He took a card now and placed it in his palm, hidden from my view, and he looked at it secretively. "Shit," he cursed. He threw the card down on the table, skidding it off the edge and onto the floor.

"What was it?," I asked, scrambling for it.

"A three."

I looked at the card and tossed it on the table. I laughed. "Is this where I say truth or dare?"

"Yea mate, but I wouldn't laugh too loud if I were you."

"Oh yea? Why is that?"

"You'll see." He leaned back, letting his shoulders sink into the back of the chair. He gazed at me. There was silence.

"Well?," I said, after a while.

"Truth mate," he replied quietly, in a monotone.

"A truth? Ok." I thought for a minute with a smile on my face and remembered one from playing the game in my youth. "Have you ever stolen anything?"

Matt suddenly laughed now.

"What? What's funny?," I said.

"Is that the best you can come up with?"

"Why? What's wrong with that?"

"Everyone asks that. It's dumbarse mate."

"I don't think so."

"You've got no idea, have you Jeff? Things I've stolen. Ok. Where do I start?" He took a deep breath and steeled himself. "I stole twenty dollars from my old man's wallet once."

I laughed.

"I was going to spend it down at the pool hall with my mates but my old man drove past in his ute and saw me. He came right in, no shame or nothing, and dragged me out of there by my ear. Man, it wasn't pretty. He got me to the back of the building and kicked me right in the arse with one of those steel capped workmen's boots."

"Shit! I'm sorry." I felt awful for laughing. "Did it hurt?"

"You should have seen the bruise mate. He whacked me across my back with his belt too. I was a real mess."

"Didn't anyone stop him?"

"Nah. They would have if they could. My mates heard me screaming and came running out. He just ignored them. Man, they were just too scared. I told them not to tell anyone."

"But why?," I asked, as if pleading for sanity.

"Because of the old lady mate. The old lady, you know."

It was a game but I felt like I was intruding. I didn't need to know that. I bowed my head. "How old were you?"

"Eleven." Matt seemed to take this revelation all in his stride. Perhaps he had played it over in his mind so much he was numbed by it. Or worse, perhaps he thought he deserved it.

"Oh shit, I'm sorry."

"That's ok," he said. "My old man's a wanker."

"Yea, but that's no excuse."

He laughed. I hadn't intended to make a joke of it. Before I had time to reflect on what he had told me, Matt continued.

"Another time, same age, I was at the pharmacy getting a prescription for my old lady filled. The chemist had to go out the back or something and I stole a packet of condoms from the shelf and threw them to my mate outside on his bike."

"You were eleven?"

Matt laughed. "Yea. Man, I was dumb. We went back to his place. I tried one on but my cock was too small. My mate laughed his head off. I had to double it over."

I laughed, covering my face bashfully with my hands.

"The rubber, not my cock, I hasten to add."

I hadn't expected either of these answers. I squirmed in my chair and smiled awkwardly at him.

"So there we are mate. A couple of things I've stolen. You'll have to try harder. You're too easy." He pointed to the cards on the table. He suddenly sat up, looking eager. "Your turn."

"I don't know whether I want to keep playing after listening to all that."

"It's the game mate." He nodded at the cards. "Your turn to shuffle man."

Somewhat reluctantly, I picked up the cards and ponderously shuffled them. Then I placed them back on the table. Matt cut the deck and placed his chosen card in the palm of his hand, as he did before. I chose a card and turned it over on the table. It was a ten.

"Not bad," I said. "What have you got?"

Matt smiled. He took the card from his palm, put it gently down next to mine and tapped it once with his finger. "Well, look at that. A king," he said, smugly. "Do you want a truth or dare then? Don't think about it too long because either way it ain't going to be pretty."

"Ain't going to be pretty? What do you mean?"

"You'll see. You'll see mate. Choose one. Truth or dare?"

"Dare," I mumbled.

He grinned.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" I shook my head and smiled. "I know. Reverse psychology."

Matt laughed.

"You're trying to get me to change to truth."

"Not at all mate. You're crazy. If it was reverse psychology and I wanted you to change to truth, I'd be trying to make out a dare was easy."

I thought for a minute. "Not necessarily," I said eventually. "Double bluff. I'll do the dare thanks."

"Ok mate. If you're sure." Matt shook his head, leaned forward and rested his forearms on his knees. He lowered his head downwards, focusing on the coffee table between us. "Ok, your dare is ...." He hesitated and then glanced up at me, chuckling. "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure."

His giggle faded and he looked away at the wall. "You do know that if you don't do the dare, I win?"

"Yep. I know the rules."

"Ok then. Well, it's like this, what I want you to do ... mate ... if you want to stay in the game, it's just that ... well ..." He looked me in the eye. He rubbed down the side of his nose with a finger, then he grinned. "I want you to show me your arse."

I laughed.

For a moment, Matt joined in. As he did so he said, "Did you hear me?"

"I think so. Did you say I had to show you something?" The laughter quickly subsided.

"Your arse," he replied, looking back at me. "You have to show me your arse mate."

"That's what I thought you said. But I thought you were joking."

"It's no joke. I'm serious. It's the game. I warned you it wasn't going to be pretty. The dare is for you to show me your arse."

My hands started to sweat. I gazed at him in mild shock.

"But that's too easy," he added. "There's something else."

"Something else?"

"Yea man. Something else."

"Isn't that enough?"

"Mate, you have to let me do it."

"Do it? Do what?"

"Pull your pants down. You have to let me pull your pants down."

I swallowed nervously. When I shook my head, he looked to the television, which wasn't even turned on. My groin stirred ominously.

"So that I can look at your arse," he added.

"You really are serious?," I asked forlornly.

"Deadly serious mate. It's the game." Matt relaxed back into his chair, and lifted his beer to his lips. "That's the dare. While you're standing with your back to me, I will pull your pants down."

"Surely you don't expect me to do that Matt."

"Why not?"

"It's stupid."

"Well. That's the dare. Sorry, you either do it, or I win the game. It's really not that hard. It's a piece of cake man."

"You'll laugh," I said.

"No I won't," he said, laughing.

Matt rolled forward in his chair and gathered the can from the table as he stood up. He tipped his head back and he placed the can to his lips, causing his shirt to ride up his abdomen, exposing the downy tufts of black pubic hair just below his belly button and gaining my admiring attention.

Matt skulled what remained of the amber liquid. Then he casually put the empty aluminium can on the wooden floor and stamped on it, crushing it flat, as if it was in a compacting machine at the car wreckers. "I need a piss," he announced. "Don't go anywhere. Back in a minute."

He walked briskly to the bathroom. He stopped at the doorway and turned to speak to me. "Mate, no one will find out," he said sincerely, as if trying to reassure me. Meanwhile, I picked up the crumpled can from the floor and threw it, frisbee style, towards the kitchen, where it landed in the sink with a metallic rattle. Then I listened as Matt peed straight into the water at the bottom of the toilet bowl, the sound loudly reverberating through my tiny apartment. "Mate," he yelled, before his stream tapered off, becoming short, intermittent bursts.

"What?," I shouted back.

He appeared at the doorway, pulling on the zipper of his faded, blue jeans. "It's no big deal. It's just the game."

"I know." As I said that, I wasn't really sure I believed it. Then, as I watched Matt walking back to his chair, I said, "I was going to ask you something."

Matt checked his fly one more time, and sat down. "What?"

"My underpants?"

"Your undies? Your undies mate?"

"Yea, my undies. You know, the dare. What about my undies?"

Matt's eyes darted to my swelling crotch. They stared right through it. "It's obvious, isn't it?," he said.

I shifted my hand to cover my escalating bulge. "Not the way I see it."

"How do you see it then?"

"Well, you didn't mention my underpants did you?"

"No, but I'll be pulling your undies down mate. The dare said for you to show me your arse. I can't see your arse without pulling your undies down," reasoned Matt.

"I don't know about that. I can't see how showing my arse has anything to do with pulling my underpants down. Some people might interpret it as simply turning around and looking at my butt through my trousers."

"That's definitely not the way the dare was meant. It's my dare. I make the rules. No way would I make my dares that dumbarse."

"You wouldn't even consider it then?"

"Consider what exactly?"

"You know," I said, in a frustrated tone. "Looking at my arse through my underpants."

"Sorry," he said emphatically. "Your arse has to be naked. You have to show me your naked arse mate. It has to be nude. Without your undies."

"This is ridiculous," I protested.

"It's the game," he said, matter of factly.

My penis throbbed, wanting to become erect. But the cramped space inside my pants held it in check. It remained curved, but as it swelled, it pushed my pants out at the front.

"This is stupid," I mumbled.

"It's the game," Matt repeated.

I shook my head. "Well, how far will you be pulling my underpants down then?"

"As far as it takes for me to get a good view of your arse mate. It won't be as far as your knees, but it will be further than your arsehole." He smiled. "Are you going to do it?" He waited for an answer, his eyes roaming the room.

My shyness won out. Things like this never happen out in the country. I apologised. "I'm sorry Matt. I can't do that. I guess that means you win."

"Are you sure mate?," he asked, with a hint of dejection.

"Yep, I'm sure." I sat up, shuffled my sweaty butt forward in the chair, and placed my hands on my knees. I paused, thinking he was going to say something. But he didn't. An awkward moment. I stood slowly, conscious of Matt's observant eyes on my mountainous bulge. "I guess I'll turn the television on then."

"Ok mate," he said. "While you're up, can you get me a beer?"

"Sure."

I glanced down at my pants and then over at Matt. He would have noticed what was unfolding inside my undies. I began to stride towards the fridge. He held his arm out like a policeman as I walked past him, stopping me in my tracks. "No wait, sit down," he said urgently. "You're crazy. Sit down."

I stepped backwards, avoiding the table, and I felt for the armrests of my chair behind my back.

"I'm going to change the dare. I want to make it easier for you. Sit down."

Gradually, I sank my butt into the chair, adjusting my bulge inconspicuously, attempting to make it more comfortable, and curious as to what exactly he meant. "Really? You're changing it? Why?"

"I like a challenge," he said, laughing unconvincingly. "You're too easy. So I'm giving you a head start. I've decided to change the dare."

"Good." I nodded and allowed myself a slight smile.

"Good? Hang on. Mate, it still ain't going to be pretty."

"But I thought you said you were going to change it."

"I am. I'm changing it mate." Matt looked over his shoulder towards the kitchen. He got up suddenly and walked to the bench, where I had placed a bag of groceries from the mornings shopping. He peered inside. "Have you got anything to eat mate?," he asked. Before I could answer, his hand disappeared inside the bag and returned with an apple in it's grasp. He rubbed it on his shirt, against his left breast, polishing it. He glanced down at it, inspecting the shiny surface, and then polished it some more. Then he pulled the granny smith to his lips, sinking his teeth into the firm, moist flesh. He took a crisp bite and he chewed noisily as he walked back to his chair.

"Help yourself," I said, jokingly sarcastic.

He sat down, then he took another large bite, his cheeks puffing out like a bullfrog. He had already almost completely devoured it. "Yea mate," he said, his mouth full and with juice spewing out of the corners. "I'm changing the dare. Man, you chicken out so easily." As soon as he had swallowed, he took a last bite of the apple and placed the remnants of the core on the table. "Do you want to hear what it is?," he mumbled.

My erection lost it's momentum. I smiled at him quizzically, shaking my head. "Go on then."

Matt swallowed heavily and then wiped his mouth on his shirt sleeve. He swished his tongue around inside his mouth, pushing bits of apple out from between his teeth. "You can look at my arse first," he said.

"Oh!"

"Yea, you can look at my arse first. It makes it easier."

My receding erection stirred, sparked back into life as if shocked by a defibrillator. "Underpants and everything?"