"We shouldn't be doing this," Mr. Young kept mumbling under his breath. Still, he made no move to remove my head from his lap.
Freshly twenty-one, I was back home for the summer, and I had planned to catch up with Cole, my best friend since childhood who I hadn't seen since we graduated high school. But Cole wasn't home when I stopped by his house; instead, his dad, Mr. Young, had answered the door.
"Andy!" Mr. Young smiled as he greeted me. "Are you back from college?"
"Yessir, just for the summer," I replied.
"Come inside," he beckoned. "Cole should be back soon, he just ran out to run some errands."
I followed him into the house, taking the chance to admire how he looked. In the time I'd been gone, Mr. Young didn't seem to have changed one bit. Now in his forties, he was still as handsome as ever.
My parents divorced when I was pretty young, so I'd spent most of my time with Cole and his family. Cole's parents had always looked after me, and over time they became my de facto godparents.
As I came to terms with my sexuality in my teenage years, Mr. Young also became the chief object of all my fantasies. At six-foot-one, he cut an imposing figure that left an impact on my imagination, and he was probably integral to my realization that I was attracted to men. Throughout the years, he'd maintained a relatively active lifestyle and kept in good shape. But it was the way he would smile at me, his hair falling into those warm brown eyes, that would always make my breath catch. He cared about me.
"Are you allowed to drink yet?" He winked at me.
We were in the kitchen, where he pulled out two beers from the fridge and passed me one.
"I'm legal somewhere," I joked, opening it and taking a swig.
Mr. Young led me around the house, showing me anything and everything that had changed or been replaced while I was at college. We made small talk as we reached the spare bedroom, which had been converted into an office space for him to work from home, furnished with a desk and a leather chair, where the talk turned to my love life.
"Have you been dating any good guys?" He asked me.
I'd come out when I was a teenager, and Cole's parents were cool about it, unlike my own parents.
"I was hooking up with someone but it was just casual," I said.
I explained to him about the few guys I did manage to date, but they usually wanted nothing more than sex. As I spoke, I became aware that he was looking me over. Was he checking me out? I wasn't overly muscular, but I was proud of my physique. I'd been working out with my friends for the past year, and my lanky frame had managed to pick up just a bit of bulk. Nah, I thought to myself. I was just projecting.
"And you're okay with that?" He asked me, his expression inscrutable.
"I guess guys mostly just want to have fun," I replied. "But you're a man too, Mr. Young, so maybe you already know that."
