Summer Sweat (Spruce Texas)

Another day: “Hey, Harrison, can you check this out? Thing’s making a weird noise.”

“Harrison, I want to show you somethin’. Got a minute?” he says yet another day, throwing a thumb over his shoulder.

“Hey, Harrison, I did that thing you asked me to do. Can you come make sure I did it right?”

“Hey, Harrison, I’m out of fuel. Where do you keep the gas?”

“Hey, Harrison, the sprayer is acting up. Can you help?”

“Hey, Harrison …”

“Harrison …”

And every single time, with a totally put-on, lame, casual tone of voice, I answer: “Sure thing, be there in a sec.”

Then we’re in the dark behind some closed door, and the ever so comforting sound of his jagged breaths and mine fill the space as we go to town on each other, losing ourselves to the passion.

I can’t say there’s any known part of me that could’ve possibly predicted that this is how my summer would be spent: running off with an eighteen-year-old, keeping shameful secrets, experiencing a long-overdue sexual awakening, and discovering more about myself than I ever thought I would.

And every night after the lights go out, we have a routine. My stomach fills with butterflies of anticipation as I put on something nice, yet easy to take off—sweats, shorts, t-shirt, whatever I have. I double-check myself in the mirror. I smile giddily despite myself. Then I take off across the long field, practically on my tippy-toes.

To our special, secret spot in the horse barn.

He’s always there first. “Hey, pretty,” he greets me each time, then tugs on my shirt, dragging me to our clumpy, makeshift bed, and down we go to try something else with each other.

I get used to the sound of his soft voice in my ear, whether he intends to whisper and moan into it, or it’s just by chance. It has become an aphrodisiac to me, listening to him get so turned on by each and every little thing I do to him. His whimper. His groan.

And he is insatiable.

Every little bit I give him, he wants more.

The boy has got limitless energy and limitless stamina.

“I swear,” he says after another aggressive make out session, “I could probably come twice tonight if you give me, like, maybe a good fifteen between. Hell, I’ll probably only need ten.”

I laugh and shake my head. “You gotta learn to pace yourself, Hoyt. You’re a machine.”

He turns onto his side and faces me with dreamy eyes. “What do you masturbate to?”

I lift an eyebrow at him. “The hell …?”

“Just curious.”

I chuckle. “Really? I don’t know. Hot guys …?”

“C’mon. I know you have a fantasy or somethin’.”

I consider it for a moment, my eyes dancing across the dark, oaken planks of the ceiling high above us, barely lit by a single lantern we put on just inside the stall. “I always had a secret lover fantasy. Someone no one knows about. Someone who’s all mine.” I chuckle. “I just dunno if I can handle the whole ‘audience’ thing that being a couple seems to include. I’m a private person.”

“So … you mean you are literally living out your fantasy … with me?” He lets out an excited chirp. “Am I gettin’ that right??”

I roll my eyes. “Don’t go getting all full of yourself now.”

“No, no, no. This is awesome. I fuckin’ love it. I always wanted to be someone’s fantasy. I mean, not to sound all egotistical—”

“You do.”

“—but it really turns me on a lot, to be the object of someone’s obsession. Makes me feel special. Needed.”

“Good.” I consider him. “So what do you masturbate to?”

Hoyt shrugs. “Lots of things. Sometimes weird things. I kinda like feeling a certain way when I masturbate.”

“A certain way?”

“Yeah. Strong. In control. Yet also kinda … being watched and admired? Okay,” he says quickly as I stare at him, “don’t judge, but I got a fantasy, too. Sometimes, I jerk off thinking about myself … fucking someone. I don’t know who it is. I think I used to imagine it was a girl in class, but it wasn’t ever about who I was fucking. It was about how it felt … and how I looked in the mirror next to the bed we were fucking on.”

Now I’m thoroughly lost—to the point of laughter. “What in the fuck, Hoyt?”

“It’s not that weird!” he cries out, joining in my laughter. “I wonder sometimes if it’s even me doing the fucking, or if I’m just watching somewhere. Like … as if I’m someone else. The guy in the mirror isn’t always me. Or he doesn’t quite look like me. He’s just big and strong. Confident. Gets what he wants. And when he looks at himself in the mirror, checking himself out, that’s the point in which I’d …” He shrugs. “Well, it’s when I’d come.”

I consider him. “Interesting.”

“Maybe I was just jerking off to the idea of a hot guy all this time, and wasn’t sure whether I was getting hot to the idea of him or of who he was fucking.” He shrugs it off. “Never mind.”