Love's Battlefield - Volume 5
Love's Battlefield: Volume Five - A Shoulder To Lean On, A Muzzle To Kiss
By Joseph Raszagal
After several seconds of standing silently in the crisp night air, the cerulean canine, uplifted and somewhat awed by Dex's very forward generosity, eventually decided to shake his head clear of its fog and make his way towards the house that loomed behind him. As much as he'd have liked to run away from it instead, or more likely from the person waiting for him inside, Thomas begrudgingly trudged towards it, stalking up the front steps as though they lead to his prison cell or his execution chamber. A brass nameplate inscribed with the name 'Quinton' hung precariously by two thin chains over the porch and swung to and fro with every other breeze. Just below the machine-pressed print on the nameplate was another name scribbled and scratched into the tarnishing metal: 'Rayne'. Smiling at the memory of editing the small sign to include him, the hard metal stubbornly resisting his stubby little pocket knife, the tired teen turned to face the front door and put a paw to the knob, turning it and pushing the heavy oak door inward. Though the lady of the house often complained to her partner in crime about safety and the like, it was never locked and probably never would be. The cramped hallway was dark and quiet, a poor welcoming at best, but sounds of life echoed from beyond the top of the stairwell that sat opposite of the entrance on the other end of the house. An older model television hummed and crackled from a few rooms away while a single leaky pipe somewhere hammered out a staggering single drop of water every three to four days. The ambient soundtrack would have been an annoyance to anyone else, but to Thomas is sounded much like a soothing lullaby; it sounded familiar and friendly.
"I'm home." Said the Lucario very quietly.
Creeping around as quietly as he could in an effort to avoid waking anyone from their nocturnal slumber, Thomas skillfully avoided tripping over every long since memorized obstacle and boobytrap; creaky floorboards, rusty door hinges, and poorly placed furnishings all carefully bypassed along the way. Though as dark as the bottom of a well, he had little trouble navigating around the messes and clutter spawned by Adam's prepubescent siblings, although a comically placed rollerskate at the very top of the stairwell did come close to making him laugh. Mouthing the words, 'might as well have been a banana peel', he slid silently around it and continued to slink soundlessly towards his destination. The light from Adam's room fled into the upstairs hall through his door, left conveniently ajar for the easy access of any canine intruders, and the few remaining hurdles that still stood in Thomas's path steadily became visible and much easier to maneuver around. And without so much as knocking, the navy canine simply waltzed right into the room and flopped down on Adam's king-sized, patchwork of a bed, startling the unsuspecting bat who'd been intently reading a rather sizable book at his desk in the room's furthest corner. At one point in time, the idea of sneaking into Adam's room would have seemed a ludicrous, daunting challenge, but a few years worth of covert practice had remedied that little problem; not even the brown bat's acute sense of hearing could pick up on his sneaky friend's movements before the base of command had been entered and every top-secret, confidential plan thoroughly compromised. Shaking his head, apparently quite used to the Lucario's extreme nonchalance, Adam closed his book, a musty old tome baring no markings with which to distinguish it, and went to sit down beside his purposefully fallen comrade. Smiling lopsidedly, the bookish bat flicked Thomas upside the head in a false gesture of scolding. Almost instantly, two blue paws returned the flick doubly.
"Nice to see you too." Smirked Adam with a grin.
Grinning right back, having reassembled some of his brash, assertive personality upon setting foot inside the home-away-from-home, Thomas replies, "You're welcome."
"Work must have been rough tonight. Is that smell what I think it is?" Mused the winged mammal.
"That all depends on what you think it is."
"I'm thinking it's semen. Yeah, definitely semen."
Cocking one eyebrow, the blue dog retorts, "It's good to know that your nose hasn't failed you."
"I'd like to think it still works well enough." Agreed the bat.
Nodding in agreement as well, Thomas proceeds to inquire, "I smell pretty bad, huh?"
Shrugging his shoulders, the brown bat stands, stretches his arms above his head, and then states, "It's not quite bad, at least not painfully bad. Well, it's not good either; more or less just kind of overpowering. The kind of odor that clings and seeps, but annoys more than it disgusts." Upon taking another additional sniff, Adam made a show of wincing and gagging intentionally as he amended, "It smells like jizz, man; what more do you want me to say? I mean, it's nothing compared to an unwashed gym bag or really rank pile of dishes."
"So, do you think I should shower or something?" Questioned the Lucario as he sat up.
"Kinda late, Blue; you should have thought about that earlier." Replied Adam bluntly.
Scratching his chin, Thomas retorts, "True, though the offer was mainly for you. The smell, as you might expect, doesn't bother me. In fact, it wouldn't be much of a stretch to say that I kind of like it."
"No, not a stretch at all." Said the bat as he rolled of his eyes. "But still, as nice as the offer was, it would probably be in our best interests to make as little noise as possible; and you know just how loud that damn shower can get."
"A thunderstorm."
"Exactly."
"A thunderstorm in a metal box."
"I'm looking for a word that means 'more exact than exactly'."
Snickering, Thomas sighs, "At least you're putting up with me well enough."
"Trust me, if seed stink was all it took to scare me away, I'd have flown for the hills a long time ago." Laughed Adam heartily, jabbing his friend in the arm. "You came in here smelling like a tree full of raccoons once and I still stuck around somehow."
"What about your parents?" Questioned the Lucario seriously. "If they get a whiff of me before a good bath or three, there'll be a slew of uncomfortable questions, none of which I fancy the idea of answering."
Standing up and making his way over to an overstuffed, overused dresser, Adam removes a stick of incense and a flint lighter and replies, "I'll make sure to cover it up with a healthy dose of Midsummer Mist and Coastal Tide, alright?"
Smacking his forehead with his own palm, the cerulean canine chuckles, "You sure you don't have anything in there named Cinnamon Adventure, Pomegranate Paradox, or Grandmother's Bakery?"
"Fuck you too." Smirked the bat in return, his smile widening. "I'm sorry I don't have a glycerin based lube scented one for you; I know how much you like your environment smelling like porn and throaty moans."
"I wasn't aware that moans had their own specific smell."
"Well, if they did I'm sure you'd be quite keen to it."
Minutes passed and sarcasm continued to pour like water from both teens' mouths. Eventually, a pair of downy pillows found their ways into two opposing sets of paws and then subsequently flew, several times, into two separate faces. An explosion of feathers erupted as the azure dog's fluffy comforter tore entirely down one side; a grave wound received from colliding into his friend's muzzle one too many times. They fought giddily, still as quietly as they could manage, until the energy left their systems. With no more fuel pumping through him, Adam crashed like an injured jet into the mountainside that was his bed and Thomas soon followed, laying down alongside the rust-colored bat. Silence festered in the moments that followed as both boys prepared to dive into the deep end and somehow start the conversation that had been weighing heavily on their minds from the very beginning. Each tick and each tock of the room's wall-mounted clock boomed with no opposing sounds to drown it out.
"This has to do with your condition, doesn't it?" Asked Thomas at long last. His eyes were closed as the words came out and it didn't look like he would be opening them any time soon, almost as though he were afraid of somehow SEEING the dreaded answer.
"It does." Replied Adam firmly. "Things have gotten... complicated. Ever since I had that attack at school last month, my parents have been worried that simply going to school is in some way a danger to me too. They took out another loan; they're going to use it to place me in a hospital for an extended period."
Jutting up instantaneously, the Lucario exclaims, "They can't do that!"
"Shut up, smart guy, unless you'd like to pull the pin on the clusterfuck grenade." Hissed the featherless flier as he put a paw over Thomas's maw and muffled the cobalt fur. "If you wake my dad up, I swear to Krishna, I'll pluck the hairs from your tail one by one."
"Fine, fine, I'm sorry." Whispered the blue boy as he flattened his ears. "But seriously, they can't do that, Adam, and you fucking know it. You guys are already in the hole deeper than the Russian government; another loan will just ice the cake and drive the last nail into the coffin and a whole bunch of other euphemisms for extreme debt that I'm too considerate to use right now. Are they trying to find the easiest way to lose the house or something, because if that's what they're going for then this hospital plan of their's will certainly do the trick. I mean, I know they've paid the price before, but do they even realize how much a single day costs for an uninsured patient? It's like losing on a big lottery ticket and somehow being forced to pay the amount that would have been won; it's ridiculous."
Shaking his head frustratedly, Adam growls, "I know it's stupid and I've tried talking to them, but they just won't listen. Unless an IRS agent actually approaches them with a briefcase chock full of undeniable, irrefutable proof that they'll be running headfirst into a brick wall made entirely out of debt, I doubt that they'll reconsider; they'll just keep sprinting until they hit that wall, get the eviction notice, and lose the house."
"Dammit." Snarled Thomas lowly. "Six kids to keep clothed and they wanna do something as idiotic as this? There's just no telling what might happen if you guys get put out on the street; no one would house a family of eight with a negative number for their credit score."
"Tell me about it; if only we had the money t~
Adam's words trailed off into nothingness as his whole body stiffened sharply, arms and legs suddenly as rigid as steel beams; his jaw dropping open to reveal a nearly completely closed-off throat as his breathing became audibly faster and painfully more hoarse. His eyes shot open, wider than golf balls but focused on nothing in particular, and darted wildly in every direction around the room. Shaking violently, the mahogany bat wavered for a moment and then fell back into the pile of blankets covering his bed, fidgeting and squirming like a fish out of water while his t-shirt covered chest heaved up and down at a frighteningly fast pace. Both of the bat's paws curled and clenched, trapping loose wads of bedsheets within them and soon tearing them as a series of unnaturally fast, jerking motions rippled through his tensed frame. But Thomas was less than a heartbeat away and caught the brown bat in the middle of his tremor, before his head even hit the mattress, holding the writhing boy tight in his arms while frantically searching every pants and shirt pocket in sight. When the Lucario's paw met with the vague, unseen shape of the spare inhaler that Adam always kept on his person, he hastily removed it from its denim prison and applied it immediately to the bat's quivering lips, pressing the button and releasing a swift jet of chemical spray into Adam's spasming, suffocating esophagus. Tossing the inhaler aside, Thomas deftly jumped up onto the bed and pulled the suffering bat into his lap. With his chest pressed firmly to Adam's back and his arms wrapped entirely around the trembling teen, he steadied his own breathing and took several slow, deep breaths. Pressing two blue paws to his friend's chest and pumping them up and down upon the bat's fur-covered ribcage, Thomas silently urged Adam to mimic his rhythmic, metronome-like pattern of inhaling and exhaling; the two boys breathing in unison in what was otherwise total silence. After a minute or two passed, every second feeling as though it were an hour longer, Adam eventually ceased his shaking and instead flipped immediately to the other extreme; motionlessness. But this was, for all they knew, the way in which the attacks flowed; as eerie as it looked, Adam's lack of movement meant it was nearly over. Shutting off every other sense that dared to interfere, the cobalt canine focused only on the winged boy resting in his lap and his lungs as they gradually re-assumed their natural pace and sucked in increasingly greater amounts of air. The winged mammal's paws released their fabric hostages and gradually came to rest upon the Lucario's paws still pressed to their owner's chest. If only for a short while, fingers interlaced.
Though the sudden attack was over, the brown bat having struggled through victoriously once more, the tears that had since begun trickling down Thomas's cheeks didn't stop or slow on their own; the Lucario had to shut his eyes and clench his jaw to force the emotions back into the recesses of his mind. It wasn't easy but it had to be done; Adam still needed him to be strong and breaking down into tears wouldn't assist or comfort anyone.
"...Thomas..." Whispered Adam an eternity later, his voice weaker than a butterfly's wingbeat. "...I-I'm so sorry..."
Rather than voice his reply, the azure dog chose to instead lay down completely flat, pulling the captive caught in his tight embrace down with him, as he tugged one of the bed's quilted blankets into place atop them. With Adam still positioned snugly in his lap and now sprawled across him like a sheet, beneath several thick layers of cotton quilt and woolen cover, Thomas simply stroked the bat's rusty hair gently and whispered soothingly into his ear. No real words were spoken, but none were really needed; the soft reassurance of the Lucario's voice, regardless of what was said, was enough to comfort the creature clasped between his arms. That was all that the bat really needed, a friendly, caring voice to reassure him that everything was going to be okay; that everything would be alright. Though proud of his stoic nature and his ability to more often than not refrain from displaying any emotion, Adam found himself crying not too long into the warm, insulated hug. The tears only served to make Thomas hold him that much tighter, nuzzling his cold lupine nose through the bat's bark-colored coat and against the slender neck and shoulders underneath. As the night progressed, the quiet sniffling escalated into genuine sobbing and from there was joined by a long series of hushing, shushing sounds as Thomas tried his best to calm the young man. In an effort to console him, the lazuli lupine gritted his teeth and prepared himself to let the bat know that he wasn't the only one in the world feeling pain, feeling hurt, and feeling afraid. It wasn't the best subject to bring up, but it would be a new subject in general, something that the bat clearly needed, and it was something that Thomas felt he should share with the one person closest to him.
After all, regardless of what anyone might say or do, no one really wants to suffer alone.
"Forrest and Danni." Whispered Thomas softly, piercing the quiet in the gentlest of ways. "You know what I did to them, right?"
Hesitating for a long time, seeming as though he might not reply at all, Adam somberly answers back, "Just like all the others. You fucked 'em up the ass then fucked 'em over."
Which was partially wrong but also partially right at the same time.
"They probably hate me for it." Said the Lucario, stronger this time.
"They probably deserve to." Added Adam sadly. His voice grew weak again and Thomas's expression became strained as a result.
'Perhaps,' thought the dog, 'this really was the wrong subject to start things back up with.'
Begrudgingly shaking his head, deciding that they both needed to talk and that Adam deserved to know some of his more inner working, the blue boy sighs, "There's no 'probably' about it. Yeah, they definitely deserve to hate me; a whole bunch of people deserve to and I'm sort of surprised that they haven't risen as one to slay me yet. I've screwed, literally and metaphorically, a small army by now." Clearing his throat, he continues, "But that's not what I want to talk about, not tonight anyway."
"No?" Questioned the brown bat as he brushed his last few tears away and blinked his eyes several times. "Then what?"
"When I was in the middle of blackmailing them tonight, still in the thick of my twisted fun and not yet having gotten to the parts that could get me arrested and tried in court, the big bad wolf asked me something; he asked me a simple question." Answered Thomas with a befuddled look about him, almost as though he couldn't quite grasp at the emotion that he felt he himself should have been feeling. "He asked me why I'm so messed up, why I'm such a bastard, why I'm so fucked up in the head. I could have told him anything that I wanted; I could have said something shocking and jarring just to make myself seem that much scarier. I could have replied with something really esoteric and confusing just to mess with him and not really answer the question at all. I could have manipulated the question somehow and reversed the psychology back upon him. There's a never-ending list of things that I could have done to avoid what I DID do. But I didn't pussyfoot around. No, I told him something way too close to the truth; I told him that my daddy didn't love me enough." Covering his face with one cobalt paw, he repeated in a whisper, "I told him that my daddy didn't love me enough."
There was no hesitation as Adam tightened his grip around the canine beneath him. Again, no words were relayed; no words likely carried the proper weight or strength to comfort either fur as they shuddered and suffered together. Either way, Thomas had been right, or mostly right at the very least. In an odd way, Adam was comforted in knowing that he wasn't hurting alone, but judging by his expression and his ears as they folded back completely, his own hurting had been instantaneously replaced by that of his lupine friend's. Rather than actually finding solace in the knowledge that someone else was suffering too, Adam seemed spurred on more by the need to care and comfort Thomas; almost entirely ignoring his own stresses and worries as a result. Whether or not that had been the Lucario's intent, whether or not that had been his desire, they pressed in closer to each other and kept each other warm with their unified arms, their intertwined legs, and the weight of their combined emotional burdens. Though he'd cried weakly before, great streams of salty tears had begun flowing down his cerulean cheeks at this point. However, he maintained his stark, stoic expression and didn't budge an inch as each droplet trickled down to his neck and then down to the bed below. It was all too obvious that he wanted to break down, he just wouldn't allow himself to, and if anything, the fact that he struggled to compose himself when it took so much effort to do so only made the situation seem that much sadder.
"He wasn't my father." Hissed the navy dog, biting his tongue to keep back what must have been a sluice of insults. "He wasn't even close to being my father."
"I know." Cooed the bat hugging him.
"We weren't related."
"I know."
"We weren't; not even a little."
"Not at all."
"But that didn't stop him from taking it from me." Growled Thomas indignantly as more droplets fell from his face. "Stepfather or not, absence of shared blood or not, he had no right to do it... so many goddamn times."
"No right at all." Stated Adam assuredly.
With more puzzlement wrought about his face than an actual puzzle, the azure dog asks, "Then why did he do it?"
"I wish I knew. I wish I could have stopped him." Answered the winged boy.
"Who marries someone just so they can get a shot at their stepson?" Snarled Thomas as his lip began to quiver and his claws tore into the already injured bed.
"If I would have known, I would have done something, Blue, please know that." Murmured Adam despondently.
"Who takes their son's virginity?" Asked the dog, steadily losing control of himself. "W-who rapes their son then beats him with a belt? A-adoptive son, son by marriage, true son, or otherwise; th-that's just not something that someone does."
Shaking his head, the brown bat hugs Thomas even tighter and mutters, "No, no it's not. You're absolutely right."
"I-I wanted to give myself to someone, I wanted to give my virginity to someone special, b-but he just up and stole it; h-he made me bite down on a rancid sock and watch him in the mirror as he fucked me." Cried Thomas, some words coming out muffled as Adam buried the canine's muzzle in his chest and cradled him. "M-my mom knew the whole time, I know she did; she had to have known. No one takes th-their son into the bedroom, locks the door, then lectures them with their dick. W-why didn't she stop him? D-didn't she care? I-I even told her once and she just ignored me; t-told me that I was imagining things and that Jeff would never do that to me. She believed him over me... She believed a f-fucking child m-molester over her only child..."
Cutting off the azure dog as all of his remaining control was lost, Adam pulled the crying boy's head further into his chest and held him there, gently stroking his thick mane of dreadlocks and quietly shushing him, just as he had been shushed minutes earlier. It took time, but Thomas's defenses eventually failed him entirely and his emotions broke free from the prison that he'd tried so hard to keep them locked up in. Rocking back and forth, it looked as though the bat was coddling an over-sized baby; Thomas's arms wrapped around his knees and his body bunched up into a tiny sphere while he sobbed uncontrollably.
"As terrible as that man was, he's gone now." Spoke Adam, his tone gentle and soothing and wracked with more sorrow than a room full of funeral mourners. "What he did was awful and I can't tell you how much I wish I could have done something to stop him, to hurt him, to kill him even, but he'll never do anything to you again. He can't touch you at all anymore; he can't do anything from inside of a concrete cell. Remember when I did find out and I told my parents? Remember when my dad went and beat the shit out of him, almost getting hauled off by the cops himself? Remember when we took him to court and had him thrown away? We saw to it that he wouldn't touch you or anyone else ever again. He's gone and you're here. You're safe; you're safe with me." Shaking his head furiously, possibly at himself as well as his words, he whimpered, "I'm so sorry; I'm so so sorry, Blue."
A whole ten minutes later, the clock's tick-tocking resonating through the atmosphere like impossibly thunderous, stamping footfall, Thomas summons the strength to mutter almost too quietly to be heard, "He can't get me anymore. He really can't get anyone anymore."
"Damn right, he can't." Assured Adam instantly. "And even if he could, even if he came back from prison with a grudge and a weightlifter's set of arms, I'd still beat his ass into the dirt somehow. I'll never let anyone do those kinds of things to you again. I'd bring a knife to his gunfight and still win, I swear."
In a laugh that had too many tears behind it to sound like true laughter, the canine replies meekly, "You'd protect me, huh?"
"If he came back around again, I'd show him just how hard a soccer player can kick." Responded the bat with a grin as he nuzzled his slender muzzle against his friend's. "And trust me, he wouldn't be able to touch you or even lift a single finger; my aim is good, my legs are strong, and my footpaw is well-trained. I'd end up driving my toes completely through his balls and into his fucking pelvis."
"Yeah, I think that would be the deal breaker." Laughed Thomas, genuinely this time as he gulped down the phlegm caught in his throat and wiped his watery eyes. "I know I'd run away."
"He sure wouldn't; not with a pair of shattered stones and my heel imprinted in his kidneys." Smirked Adam as he thrust out his chin like a stereotypical tough guy.
Sniffling less and less, the collared canine smiles with closed eyes and says, "I almost wish he'd come back then, just so I could see you smash his face in for me."
"Can't say that it would be much of a face by the time I got done with it." Remarked the brown-furred teen.
"Can't say that it was much of a face to begin with." Added Thomas.
"And I can't say that I disagree with that statement." Chuckled the bat in return.
Over time, the laughs returned in fuller force to the room and the smiles brightened along with them. The golden rays of dawn crept through the blinds blocking a majority of the windows as the sun dutifully made its way over the horizon. Both boys poked their heads free of the covers and shook them unanimously, surprised at themselves and how late they'd managed to stay up. But however tired they might have been, they'd already reached that special 'second wind' of sorts that always seems to occur at morning and therefore needed another hour or two to pass before sleep could have any chances at setting in. Rolling onto his side and then onto his back, Adam stared nervously at the ceiling in a clear attempt to avoid eye contact; his facial features becoming flustered and the Lucario laying next to him noticing immediately, if not sooner than that somehow.
Scratching his chin anxiously, wondering what might have gotten his friend so uncomfortable again, Thomas felt a need to start talking.
"You know, I'm really sorry for changing the subject back there and then subsequently falling apart on you as a result." Said the dog with an embarrassed blush. "You were crying and, well, you're just not someone that I ever want to see crying, so I thought I could switch the topic to something else. I had no idea, I guess, that my own topic would do that to me or that it would sound like such a pathetic sob story once said. I took Forrest's little question pretty well back when he asked it and hardly even thought about it until I mentioned it to you. Maybe all of the stress had piled up over the course of the night or something; I was thinking about you and your condition during the entire ride back here and that was messing with me too. I just feel like an idiot for trying to help and then accidentally ending up as the one in real need of being helped." Sighing, Thomas covered his face with his palm and chuckled dryly, "Guess I'm a terrible shoulder to cry on, huh?"
To which Adam quickly answered, "No."
"Huh, what?" Sputtered the lupine, a bit surprised.
"You might have been a bit clumsy with how you swapped subjects, but I snapped back to my senses pretty fast as a result." Replied the bat, still staring at the ceiling and watching as the shadows gave way to the light.
Shaking his head, the cerulean canine sighs, "But only because you had to; I just kind of imploded emotionally back there and needed a babysitter to help tape and staple my broken pieces back together. Had I tried to pull you out of the trauma with a joke or something, kinda eased you out gently, none of that shit would have likely happened."
"Oh, big deal." Spat the bat as he waved a paw through the air. "You meant well to begin with and that's what matters to me. Besides, you can fuck up as many times as you want and fail with each and every word; you'll never screw up enough for me to just write you off as easily as that. No one else has ever held me the same way as you have during one of my attacks and stayed with me to make sure that I was alright. The doctors and nurses only ever stayed long enough to ensure that I wouldn't die and that my parents would still have a reason to pay more bills; they certainly never cried over me or lost a night's worth of sleep." Rubbing his forehead as if a headache had wormed its way in, he exclaimed, "Dammit, that's why all of this is so fucking hard to say." After a few seconds of awkward silence, Adam shakily asked, "Blue, you told me some pretty personal stuff back there; it was all stuff that I already knew, sure, but all particularly painful to bring up nonetheless. Can I tell you one more thing in return?"
"Anything you want." Replied the Lucario softly. "But if you wouldn't mind, could you try to make a little sense?"
Trembling a bit, the winged mammal states, "I know, I know, and I'm sorry. It's something else that I mean to bring up... before that whole mess back there. I was going to try and tell you after we finished up everything involving the whole money and insurance issue. Actually, it's something that I've been meaning to bring up for a long time."
With a slow roll, Adam carefully rotated himself until he faced his lupine friend, the two boys now laying chest to chest against each other again. Staring into Thomas's crimson eyes, as bold and beautiful as the planet Mars on the clearest night, he felt safe, secure, and protected. This friend of his was a degenerate, a swindler, an extortionist, a liar, and a cheat, and yet he was also the last person in the whole wide world that Adam felt would ever betray him. The Lucario looked deep into the eyes opposite of his in return, twin lavender seas that he felt he might drown in. Thomas had an idea, a strong feeling, or perhaps a hope as to what the bat wanted to divulge to him, but chose to keep his words to himself and simply wait with bated breath for Adam to continue. Rushing things, or what he though these 'things' were, would only make the situation that much more awkward and uncomfortable for the brown-furred boy, and that was the last thing that Thomas wanted to do.
"Cynthia, Marie, Debra, Emily, Lisa, Becka." Said the chocolate bat after a second or two of hesitation.
On the ball almost immediately, Thomas retorts, "All of the girls you've slept with?"
"Almost." Amended Adam with an unsteady laugh. "All of the girls that I SAID I slept with."
"Say what now?" Questioned the Lucario, looking understandably befuddled.
Resting his head just below Thomas's chin, the fruit bat sighs in return, "I held each one. I kissed each one. I copped a feel on each one too. If I was much of a drinker and by that I mean not a total lightweight, then maybe I'd have gotten a bit further on accident, but I never had sex with any of them; not a single one."
"Not even Becka?"
"Closest I got was with Becka, but no, not even her."
"But, dude, she's a total slut. Even if you didn't want to initiate things, she must have wanted to, even if only to brag to her equally slutty-slut friends about how badly she rocked your world."
"She did want to and I turned her down as nicely as I could. She still called me a wuss after that though."
"So then you're~
"Yeah, I'm a virgin." Confirmed Adam, finishing the cerulean canine's thought for him.
"That doesn't make any sense, Fly Boy." Spouted Thomas with a lopsided grin. "You used to be a jock; there's no denying that. Jocks get laid; that's just one of life's universal truths, kinda like how things going up must always come back down, how all moving objects must eventually stop, and why southern states never support the Democrat over the Republican. It's one of the natural laws that keeps the planets aligned and whatnot."
"The truth is the truth, what more can I say?" Chuckled the bat anxiously.
Raising a single finger into the air as if to announce the arrival of his question, Thomas inquires, "How about why you never boned any of them? That's a good start."
"That's complicated."
"I'll bet it's not."
"Not for you, no. This is easy for you. It's hard for me."
"The hardest things to say are the things that usually need to be said."
"Who the fuck told you that?" Smirked the bat, but just barely.
Scratching his head, Thomas chuckles, "I read it in a book somewhere; one of yours probably. Does it really matter?"
Taking in a deep breath, Adam asks nervously, "If I say this, I can't take it back, okay? As cheesy as this might sound, please promise me that you won't laugh or make fun of me for it, alright?"
"Out with it, Watson!" Exclaimed the Lucario with reckless abandon, too focused on the conversation to bother with keeping his voice lowered any longer.
Lowering his ears and biting his lip, Adam gulps once and then quietly mutters, "I... I don't think I'm a perfectly straight shooter."
The smile on Thomas's muzzle couldn't have gotten any wider.
"Y-yeah, laugh it up, asswipe." Stammered the brown-furred bat with averted eyes. "Look, I don't think I'm either completely gay or totally straight, but I~
Laughing outright, the blue boy cuts his friend off by retorting, "They call that bi, idiot."
"I know they do, dammit, but that's just the thing. I've never felt like this towards any other guy; never ogled any of my teammates in the showers or enjoyed the view of the track team as they jogged in circles around us while we practiced our dribbling." Stated Adam firmly, his tone strong enough despite its shakiness to assure a certain level of truth. Through the thin cover that the nocturnal mammal had chosen, Thomas could see him fidgeting and squirming nervously. "I dunno, I guess I always assumed that if I was even slightly queer, even a little, that those guys would have been my first tipoff. A perfectly straight guy could even say, from an objective standpoint at least, that they're all extremely hot."
"Wow, then you really might not be gay." Smirked the lupine sarcastically. "Because yeah, you're right, those guys are TERRIBLY hot; they wear the tightest freaking shorts I've ever seen and they're made of some kind of spandex material too; it always looks like the seams are just gonna fly apart at any second and give anybody currently onlooking a nice view of some athletic cock when it comes flopping out. If those aren't a bunch of furs worth drooling over, then I don't know who is; they're even nice enough to run in complete circles, so every time they pass you by there's always the comforting knowledge that they'll just be coming right back around. The teases."
"Exactly." Said the bat too fast to stop himself. Mental self-chastising likely followed. "Er, what I meant to say is, um, that's what I mean by gay standards. I don't think I'm a flamer, like with rainbow-colored, glittery blood and all, but I'll be damned if I haven't thought of... certain things before. Like some of the times that I made out with Debra or Lisa, the two that I was with the longest; my mind wouldn't always be thinking of them, you know? Sometimes I'd imagine another muzzle linked with mine; I'd imagine another tongue lapping against the roof of my mouth. Whenever my mind drifted like that, it was always a vision of the same person." Sucking in a sharp breath, Adam shut his eyes and forced himself to say, "Christ, it was you every time, Blue."
"Whoa." Replied Thomas in shock, eyes widening instantaneously. He'd been expecting something similar, true, but not the power of the bat's delivery and it had caught him off guard. "Lisa was at least three years ago. That long? Really?"
"Would I lie to you?" Asked Adam earnestly.
"No, no you wouldn't." In turn answered the Lucario.
"I've always known you; you've always been my friend, way before you ever took to the streets and started selling yourself." Explained the brown bat in thorough detail. "When I hit the ground for the first time and started choking on nothing and convulsing, a bunch of people just stood around staring like they'd been hypnotized or something. They just watched me writhing and twitching; some of them even continued about their business like I wasn't even there, like I wasn't really dying. You didn't. The moment you spotted me, you ran to my side faster than an Olympic sprinter and stayed there beside me until the whole ordeal passed. Then you picked me up, gave everyone on Earth the evil-eye, or maybe we should rename your variation the 'evilest-eye', and carried me all the way to the nurse's office. If I remember right, you refused to go back to classes and waited for me to snap out of the aftershock too." Pressing himself to his friend's chest again, nuzzling a cheek into the firm, cobalt warmth, Adam whispered almost inaudibly, "What I've been trying to say, or what I think I've been trying to say, is that although I might be gay, I don't feel like this towards any and every attractive stud; I only feel this way towards you. It isn't something as simple or straightforward as an admiration for the 'perfection of the male body' or the alluring idea of 'wild sex with other men'; none of that shit has ever been what's bristled my fur and dried my mouth out. It isn't the musky, pheromone rich male scent either. Heck, I pretty much hate the way I smell, let alone every other guy on the planet. No, no, there's only one pup on this spinning rock that I can whiff and then find myself suddenly speechless from. You see, Blue, you could be covered head-to-toe in raw sewage and chemical waste and you'd still smell perfect to me. Granted, I'm just a bat, so you have to be within an arm's length or closer in order for me to catch your scent, but that doesn't change the fact that it's always been something that I could take comfort in; the pungent, undeniably male fragrance of my best friend and closest brother, someone that I've never stopped wishing could something just a little bit more to me." Resting his chin on a steeple made up of his own chocolate paws, Adam sighed and concluded, "I'm just sorry that it took me this long to say it. I love you, Thomas."
In the seconds that followed, Adam's face went from its normal coloring to the brightest shade of red imaginable. The Lucario beside him, at a sudden loss for words having heard the confession he'd been waiting years to hear, just sat there with an open mouth as he fumbled through his mind for the correct assortment of letters and punctuation needed to properly reply. The many syllables necessary for intelligible speech, however, seemed far too complicated at the time and continued to escape him, his only response being the anxious licking of his lips. And although incapable of talking at the moment, Thomas's eyes alone spoke lengthy paragraphs and could have filled books upon books before the day's onset and the rush of traffic as the city's early risers scampered off to work. Too bad that Thomas couldn't yet find the voice needed to read those books.
"I-I can't... I can't believe I just said that." Stammered Adam quietly.
"Neither can I." Concurred the canine in an equally hushed tone.
At the exact same time, both furs turned to face each other and stared deep into the eyes opposite of their own. Violets and crimsons met somewhere in the between and were soon followed by two pairs of paws clasping. The cinnamon bat watched as the steadily multiplying rays of light illuminated Thomas's facial features, the rainbow assortment of beads decorating the dog's onyx braids glistening like the stained glass windows in a church while his long lupine muzzle cast a dramatic shadow down his chest. Thomas in return admired the former soccer star seated across from him, the strong frame molded by years of competitive sports and martial arts that, although well behind him now, had honed his body into that of a spry, wiry athlete; flexible and taut and free from the blocky, bulkiness so often found in weightlifters. Though dashing down grassy fields and intercepting dribbling opponents would have probably resulted in some disastrous consequences for Adam in the more recent months, the cerulean canine could still visualize his friend in mid leap, superimposed while wheel-kicking a flying ball aside as it hurtled towards him. The sight had always been an impressive one, daring and heroic even, though Thomas's breath had been taken away by something far more subtle and alluring this time. Their muzzles closed the seemingly limitless gap in a matter of seconds until, at last, not even a hair's width stood between them. Hesitating as their noses touched, Adam squirmed nervously in his seat, inhaled deeply, held his freshly captured breath, then closed his lilac eyes before slowly parting his lips. Realizing that he was being waited on to take the initiative, the Lucario giggled quietly at the sight of the shaking, shivering bat and gently touched a paw to one of the winged mammal's soft brown cheeks, stroking the fur affectionately as he leaned forward. The moment both boys touched lips, every ounce of nagging fear and uncertainty drained away; maws seamlessly overlapping each other while tongues took to exploring the caverns across from them. Adam slid an arm around his partner's waist and placed another along the length of Thomas's spine, gripping down upon the dog's shoulder and holding him firm in his grasp as he absorbed each and every sensation that the oral unity brought to his addled attention. The bat had kissed before, several times with several others in fact, but he'd apparently never become LOST in a kiss before. From the hazy, unfocused look in his eyes, more contented that a child locked in a candy store overnight, this moment had changed that; he was lost and he didn't want to be found. The bat moaned softly into the muzzle adjoining his and couldn't help but revel in the feel of the lithe lupine body pressed firmly to his own; the titillating feeling of the unmistakably male crotch and hips grinding into his thigh. And it wasn't until Thomas finally broke the kiss and sat up some four whole minutes later that Adam realized they'd somehow fallen down into the folds of his bed.
"Sweet Jesus." Gasped Thomas as he caught his breath. He'd been so swept up in the moment that he could swear his mouth was numb, it tingled so much. "I think I can believe you now. Oh yeah, I definitely can."
Nodding his head, Adam sits lazily up and agrees, "Holy shit. Seriously, HOLY shit. Blue, I don't think I've ever kissed a girl quite like that."
With a sly grin, the blue dog replies, "I'm not a girl."
"No, no you're not."
"Care to explain yourself then? After all, that was pretty gay of you."
"I won't deny that."
"Good. I was afraid you'd go into shock after crossing that bridge; it's kind of 'the point of no return' and all."
"Do I look like I'm in shock?" Mused Adam bravely. Apparently, the liplocking had emboldened him a bit.
"Not at all." Answered Thomas with a big smile, the true kind of smile that masked no ulterior motives. "But that's only the first phase. If you can keep this record up, then the Christians won't have a chance at converting you at their devil camps."
Rolling his eyes, the bat smirks, "It might be a bit beyond my time, but has anyone ever told you that you're a real card?"
Drumming a paw full of fingers along his chin, Thomas grins toothily and says, with as much faux-innocence as possible, "Maybe not in those exact words, but yeah, something along those lines."
With another nuzzle, Adam pulled the Lucario down by the ring of his collar and wrapped his arms around him, enveloping the lazuli lupine in a soft shroud of chocolate wings. Thomas replied by licking the bat boy's chin, eliciting a merry laugh in the process. Soon, both were playing and wrestling about just as they been in the very beginning, but this time with much less restraint and inhibition whenever fingers managed to drift, perhaps not by accident, too close to southern regions. Pillows flew once more and yet another burst into a snow-like cloud of puff and fluff. More than once, Thomas attempted to de-pants his opponent, only to find that Adam had chosen a belt based on functionality rather than for its possible use as a weapon in the arena of armed combat. In the end, Adam resigned himself to the arguably merciful fate of being sprawled limply across his bed while running his fingers delicately through Thomas's many braids. Judging by the contented sighing that reverberated from somewhere below his waist, the devious little Lucario having conquered the bat's lap and transformed it into his own personal pillow, Adam assumed with a smile that his affectionate petting was much appreciated.
"I'm about to pass out; I can feel it coming." Murmured Thomas softly. "Do you have any extra blankets for my space on the floor?"
Happily, Adam responds, "Nope, I guess you'll have to take the bed with me."
"What about your parents?" Asked the Lucario as he closed his eyes.
Scooting down to hug his friend tight, the winged teen nuzzles Thomas's fuzzy cheek and purrs, "They'll get over it."
Lacking the energy to argue any further, the blue lupine stayed true to his word and drifted off to sleep. With his arms still around the azure boy and the happiest expression possible stretched across his face, Adam quickly dozed off as well. Soon a whole house of bats would awaken to find the snuggling pair; soon a mother would look in to see the sight, smile warmly, and close the door behind her.