"Pssst."
The sound is so sharp and surprising that it pulls me out of my dream, but I lie still in bed with my eyes closed. Maybe if I ignore it, I can fall back asleep.
Then, Scotty's voice comes through. "Uncle Ant," he says, pretending to whisper. I merely respond with a grunt to acknowledge him before he says, "I can't sleep."
"What do you want me to do about it?" I ask, forcing one eye open and glancing over at him. Somehow, I fell asleep flat on my stomach, so I have to crane my neck a bit to see him.
"Keep me company," he says.
Little twerp. "What time is it?" I ask with a yawn.
"Like, two in the morning," he says.
I groan. "Scotty," I grumble, bringing a hand to my face and shifting onto my side. "I'm not getting up."
"Then let me in," he says, lifting his leg up and nudging my blanketed body with his knee. "You're taking up literally the entire bed."
"It's *my* bed," I tell him.
"Stop being stubborn and move," he demands.
I sigh heavily but accommodate. I had been sprawled diagonally across the bed, so I shift to make room for Scotty. Happily, he slides in under the covers and immediately curls up with me, making me put my arm around him.
"I regret letting you move in," I mutter, and he just giggles.
A month after that life insurance check cleared, I did something I wasn't sure I'd ever do: I bought a house. It's modest at best, but it's exactly the kind of place I've always imagined I'd end up at. It's a small building with a cottage feel way out in the country. And the best part? I have almost a dozen acres of wooded land to myself, allowing for a significant amount of privacy.
Setting up the house was somewhat therapeutic, too. Save for a few heirlooms and memorabilia, there are none of my mother's things. I have free reign to design, and I spent most of the first week just fussing with different types of decor, getting consistent deliveries of furniture and bric-a-brac and cookware and art, sending things back and trying out new pieces until everything felt right. It almost felt a bit irresponsible of me to toss money around like that, but as Scotty kept (and continues to keep) telling me, this is my chance to really start anew.
Of course, I now also have to consider my new roommate.
When I finally took Scotty up on his offer and agreed to get a place with him, I was incredibly conflicted. I didn't (and still don't) want to be away from him, but it's hard being near him -- and in the end, seeing how excited he was at the prospect of being roommates swayed my final decision. It just feels impossible to say "no" to him at times. Even his parents leapt at the idea before I had even agreed. Eric in particular felt better about his only boy going off to college with someone he trusted to support him. Hearing him say that made me feel a little uneasy, but in the end, it was decided: Scotty and I were going to live together.
I bought this house with him in mind, knowing it'd be an easy commute to his campus, but he didn't move in until after his high school graduation. Then, following a grad party and lots of fussing from his mother, Scotty packed his things in my car and we took the two-and-a-half hour journey across the state to our new place.
Even though I made this place my own in the weeks prior to his arrival, there are already clear touches of Scotty throughout the house: the smaller pairs of shoes by the front door, or the video game console that I'll never use, or the fragrant soaps and shampoos cluttering the bathroom, or the discarded pair of small-sized briefs left on the bathroom floor post-shower. Even though it's only been a short amount of time, I can feel his presence in rooms he's not in. I can smell him in the air.
Just as his bare leg burrows between my thighs, he giggles. "You sleep naked now?"
"I was too tired to change," I murmur. We spent all day setting up extra furniture in his room, like moving in a new dresser and assembling a desk from pre-cut pieces. He needed "someone with muscles," after all.
"Hmm," Scotty hums before sniffing me. "Guess you were too tired to shower, too."
"What?" I ask, glancing down. "Do I smell?"
He laughs. "No," he says, nudging himself under my arm a bit to get another whiff. "I like how you smell."
I smile slightly, happy I'm not putting him off. "What do I smell like?"
"Man," he says, which makes me laugh. "And then... I don't know. You smell cozy."
"Cozy?"
"Yeah, like... the way a fire in a fireplace feels on a cold night."
"Huh," I say, nodding. "That sounds nice." I'll take "cozy" any day.
"What do *I* smell like?" he asks.
"Like a little boy," I tease.
Scotty just laughs. "Be serious."
I snake my other arm around him as well and pull him closer, leaning my head down to sniff his neck. That's when I realize something's off. I grab the collar of his shirt and say, "This doesn't smell like you."
"Yeah, because it's your shirt," he says.
I grin. "Still stealing my clothes?" I ask.
"What?" he asks. "I like it."
Truthfully, I like it too. Already, he's been parading around in nothing but a shirt of mine and a pair of briefs. He's partial to the flannels, loosely buttoning them up so they hang on him like an oversized shirt. I find it to be such a perfect mix of cute and sexy.
I push the shirt off of his shoulder to have better access to his neck, and then I lean in to inhale his scent. He giggles when my beard makes contact with his smooth skin, but I just hum with delight. God, he smells so good. It's hard to describe, but the first thing I think of is a freshly baked good, something sweet and succulent.
"You smell... not sweet, but..." I try to find the right word, leaning lower to smell his pits. As expected, there isn't a hint of offensive body odor. "It's that innocent sort of smell."
"Well, we both know I'm not innocent," he says with a grin.
"Too well," I murmur -- and then, suddenly, his hand reaches down to wrap around my cock. I grunt. "Easy."
"C'mon," he whines. "I'm wired."
"I'm still half asleep," I groan.
"Well, then, wake up," he says.
How do I even explain our sex life? I don't want to say that I feel used by Scotty, because that has a negative connotation, but he is absolutely in the driver's seat. He's always the initiator, and whenever he's in the mood or has an itch that needs scratching, he'll seek me out -- and I wouldn't really want it any other way. I'm already toeing the line between good guy and bad guy just by entertaining anything with Scotty, but it makes me feel better to at least know that he wants it this way and that I'm not just some creep who's coming onto him.
However, my feelings for him haven't changed, and I've still kept my mouth shut. To me, it seems pretty clear that Scotty sees this as a sort of "friends with benefits" situation. Plus, it's even more imperative to keep my feelings to myself because we now live together, because I'm now his only support system out here. He doesn't have his parents to lean on as easily as he transitions to college. In order to keep the peace and make sure he gets what he needs, I'm not going to impose. If it all backfired, I could never forgive myself.
"Maybe I don't wanna do anything with you," I tease.
"That's a fat lie," he says, squeezing my member.
"Don't you just wanna cuddle and sleep?" I ask, eager to wind down.
"No," he says. "I wanna cum."
I laugh slightly before exhaling deeply through my nose. "If I make you cum, will you let me sleep?"
