Crying (1)

Rob tried to turn in his sleep but he felt a dead weight stopping him. Without opening his eyes he reached out to see if his dog Lucy had decided to join him in bed. What he felt was an arm; a smooth yet strong arm.

Rob’s eyes sprang open. The darkness of the room only added to the confusion that whirled around inside his head, but slowly understanding dawned.
Padric groaned a little as Rob made an effort to move once more. Turning his head and forcing his body to follow, Rob lay face to face with Padric O’Casey. Almost despite himself, Rob smiled. He had little or no liking for O’Casey, but the angelic peacefulness of his sleep seemed to bring out all the attractiveness of his features.

Rob drew back a little, just to peer at Padric through the gloom. Again a smile trickled over him. Padric was turning into a really handsome man. Almost unnoticed, he had just seemed to bloom from a right sulky oaf into - well, into the man whose eyes were flickering open and who was giving him a winning grin.
‘Hello Podge,’ Rob whispered within kissing distance of Padric’s lips.
‘Hello Sweetness,’ Padric mumbled, his mouth not quite so awake as his morning boner. Padric placed a hand behind Rob’s head and pushed it to him, then with his eyelids closing again, he moved into a drowsy kiss.

Rob also closed his eyes and surrendered completely to an awareness of the man beside him. Padric’s cock pressed against Rob’s groin, stiff as a pole nestling over his balls but under his semi-flaccid dick. With a tender grasp, Rob reached down to stroke the hard shaft as they kissed. It repaid his attention by swelling yet further in his hand.

He wriggled in as close to Padric as he was able, so that he could feel the rub of Padric’s cock against his belly. He moved closer for other reasons too. The sensation of Padric’s warm thigh stretching out to embrace Rob’s chilled legs was amazingly satisfying - and the touch of his chest as it filled and emptied seemed to affect Rob’s own breathing, as though drawing him into a new and different rhythm.
‘You want to know something,’ Padric said, more as a statement than a question. Then he leaned over Rob’s ear and told him, ‘I loved having your fingers up my arse.’ As though he were shocked by his own admission, Padric rolled on his back pulling the covers with him. Looking up at the ceiling with laugh, he shook his head, ‘I did too!’
‘And I like having this piece of meat,’ Rob teased at Padric’s cock, ‘inside me.’

Rob slid over Padric, to sit on top of his cock and massage it between his butt and Padric’s body. He stared down at Padric, who lay arms spread over the bed in a cross, and he ground on Padric’s groin.
A great sigh rose from Padric’s chest. He had shut out all vision but his own mind’s eye, trying to hump at Rob with each grinding circle.
The pot of Vaseline they had used more than once during night lay near to Rob’s hand, so he stretched over to the beside cabinet and unscrewed its lid.
Padric returned from his own little world with the sound. ‘What again?’ he asked. ‘Isn’t your arsehole sore, mate?’

Rob pinned down Padric’s chest with one hand, as he smeared the petroleum jelly over Padric’s cock with the other. A great smile beamed on Rob’s face when Padric dipped two fingers into the pot and started introducing the jelly into Rob’s rectum. The sensations made Rob cast his head back in pleasure, then wince forward in pain.
Pulling up from Padric’s fingers he angled the throbbing cock beneath him up toward his hole. ‘You’ll need to help it in,’ Rob commanded.
‘But my balls are empty, man,’ Padric laughed, ‘serious, you’ve drained me. There’s more of my seed up your arse than’s left in me.’ Padric groaned aloud when his cock finally found Rob’s asshole then slipped in with a tight sucking crack. ‘Awh! Fuck me,’ Padric cried out beneath Rob’s slow writhing twists. ‘Fuck me!’ His cries became longer and rose deeper from his throat when the writhing turned to pumping; at first slow, then faster as Rob opened to the joy of riding a thick chunk of prick. ‘Jesus!’ Padric blasphemed, throwing his hands away from Rob’s body and once more into a cross of abandonment. ‘Bloody fuck!’

The pounding his cock was taking, as Rob drove onto harder bursts and ever more frequently, forced Padric to bend up and try to catch at Rob’s legs or his chest. But each time he rose, Rob forced him down again. ‘Fuck me, Fuck me, Fuck me!’ he screamed. Yet once a prolonged trembling took hold of his body, he fell silent.
Rob’s hardening cock no longer slapped against his chest but sat rigid before him, so he took hold of it and wanked at it with great force in an effort to concentrate. ‘It’s no good man! Can’t hold it. Jesus! Fuck!’ Padric’s trembles turned into one whole-body muscle-wrenching quiver and once more he exploded cum inside Rob.

The force of this orgasm and the encouragement Rob laid on Padric’s hands, made Rob’s dick swell up with completion too, and he released another euphoric spurt of watery seed from his wrenching bollocks.
Breathless and sweating from head to toe Rob sank down on Padric. His head was swimming, so he was glad to have Padric wrap his arms around him in a controlling hug - and to lay a gentle kiss on his lips before they both drifted into one more doze.

The alien sound of an electric alarm clock buzzed Rob awake. Startled, he cursed it as he tired to find its off switch. But another of Charlie Grayston’s toys attracted him more. The sound and aroma of freshly percolating coffee drifted in from the kitchen below.
His head still felt like lead wrapped in cotton wool, the mix of booze and dope sticking to him like his tongue to the roof of his mouth. And as Rob sat forward, a sick feeling nagged at him. Trying to gather himself, he cradled his head - it was no use. Rob leapt from the bed and headed toward the closet that hid an en suite bathroom. He was just in time; he got to the toilet then emptied the contents of his stomach into the bowl.

He laughed at the face looking back at him in all the mirrors, he felt as green as they looked. And in each reflection his tongue was every bit as coated as the rest, so he grimaced it back into his mouth.
A swift splash of water and a good scrub with a packet-fresh tooth brush made him feel almost human again. Or at least able to smile without pain splitting each muscle. ‘Never again,’ he chided his nearest reflection. ‘Do you hear me? Never!’

Padric lay naked to the world, splayed across the queen size bed in Charlie Grayston’s second guest room. Light snores mixing with grumbles in his sleep.
‘Podge,’ Rob sat beside him and shook him slightly.
‘Hmm? What?’ Padric emerged from his dream in a grump.
‘It’s time to get up, mate. We’ll be late for work.’
Padric turned from Rob with a growl.
‘Come on, mate. Wakey Wakey!’ Rob shook Padric again, but more firmly. ‘There’s bacon cooking downstairs.

This mention of food seemed to chime with a rumble in Padric’s tummy. He rolled back and half-opened his eyes. Before Rob could move from him, Padric grabbed hold of him and pulled him close. He pushed his naked body on top of Rob’s, sniffing the light scent of soap on Rob’s chest. Padric licked one of Rob’s nipples, and despite the mounting protests, he forced his way onto Rob’s mouth.
‘You smell like..’ Padric started to speak, racking his brain for something nice to say. But he couldn’t think of anything except food. He just gave Rob another and yet longer kiss instead.
Before he finally broke free to get dressed, Rob took Padric’s face in his hands, gave him a little smile, and then teased him with a pouting kiss.

Padric lounged back against the bedstead to watch Rob dressing. But just as Rob was ready to leave him, Padric reached out and grabbed him. ‘Tell them two fried eggs and dip for me, I’ll only be a few minutes,’ Padric said. Then snuggling into the flies on Rob’s trousers, Padric told him, ‘I know what you smell like.’ He looked up at Rob and gave him a little bite, ‘you smell just like Christmas feels - even with great little packages all wrapped up, and there’s always a surprise in there too somewhere.’
Rob smacked Padric’s forehead and said, ‘You’d better not be long, there’s still a full day’s work down the salt mine ahead of us.’

‘Wasn’t that Mr Grayston’s car you and Paddy got out off this morning?’ Helen Phillips asked Rob, while snaking slowly homeward in their queue for the bus.
‘Yes.’ Rob decided that truth was the best form of lie. ‘He lined up a demo for us Friday evening, but we had to wait until the early hours for the studio.’
‘You two seem to be doing a lot together these days,’ Helen cast him a glance.
‘Great isn’t it!’
‘It must be exciting, now that the band is taking off.’

Rob nodded. ‘The recording demo’s only with Woolies own label, but if they take us up we’ll get a lot more local exposure.’
Helen soured her face, well aware of Padric’s party piece with his finger poking through his flies. ‘You’re doing Susan’s engagement party,’ she said.
‘Yeah,’ Rob looked at his watch and tried to gee up the next bus.

The conductor shouted out, ‘Five only; three up, two down.’ And his arm fell between Helen and Rob.
Helen called back from the bus’ platform, ‘Will and I’ll see you there.’
Rob nodded and checked his watch again. He had started drifting into a huff when a tap on his shoulder made him leap. He looked round at the elderly couple behind him, and at two of the canteen staff behind them, then he saw him. Georgie Maxwell. Rob rolled his eyes, that was all he needed. Typical, he mumbled to himself, Georgie just had to be working late as well.
Just as he expected Georgie couldn’t keep himself to himself, another tap came to his shoulder. ‘You were great at the Methodist Hall,’ Georgie enthused in a downright girly simper, ‘everybody says so.’
‘Oh!’ one the canteen ladies spoke up. ‘Is that him?’ she said to Georgie. She went on in answer to his nods, ‘My Cynthia was there. Thrilled she was, thrilled! Came home, she did, throat raw from screaming and drifted off to bed in a dream.’
The other canteen girl joined in. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘you can see why.’
All eyes turned and fell to scrutinising Rob.
‘Quite the Mister Sandman, In-ee?, Beryl.’
‘Oh yes, indeed, Maxie.’

The two canteen girls gave the queue a spirited entertainment themselves, with a hand-waving ‘Bom, bom, bom, bom…’ and fingers pointing to Rob at ‘..and lot’s of wavy hair like Liberace..’
A whistle came from further back in the still tailing queue. ‘Ere,’ one man called, ‘d’you do requests?’ And another howled, ‘Pass the hat down, love!’
As the laughs subsided and the little huddles of people shrank back into depressed silence with a sudden chilling wind, Georgie tapped Rob’s arm once more.
‘You’re doing Susan’s engagement party,’ Georgie smiled.
‘That’s right,’ Rob rolled his eyes, and mumbled, ‘If I ever get there.’
‘Ed is taking me and mum, and collecting Susan,’ Georgie beamed. ‘I’m sure he’d be pleased to give you a ride.’ Georgie paused and pursed his lips before he added, ‘There’d be enough room in the back.’
‘I have to go to O’Casey’s,’ Rob called, thanking heaven he had a legitimate reason to escape an evening stuck to the Maxwells. ‘Anyway, I’ll see you all there.’
A bus had pulled up, and the conductor called out three only, then silently foulmouthed the complaints from the line left behind. ‘Oi! You two,’ she called to some schoolgirls in the lower deck, ‘up, let this couple sit down.’ The girls rose sheepishly, then caught sight of Rob and gave a little squeek. The conductor looked at him too. ‘Right, you,’ she said suspiciously. ‘Upstairs. OK. Hold tight!’
Georgie Maxwell waved him goodbye, but Rob pretended not to notice.

Rob still felt hot from his bath as he walked up the rundown street where Padric’s family had lived since leaving Ireland when he was a toddler. The O’Casey household was no advertisement for the area, not even in the gathering darkness, but then no one else seemed to bother much either.

Two waifs sat at the front door as he walked up to knock. ‘No point knockin’ there, mister.’ One of the tatty urchins said. But Rob tapped at the filthy window anyway. No answer came. ‘See, told ya!’ the older urchin said, wiping her nose on her friend’s moth eaten cardigan. ‘Ma’s bingo, and dad’s away to the dogs, mister.’ The younger of the two girls sniffed. Old beyond her years, she went on, ‘There’s no one there, so if-in you’re after money, there ain‘t none.’
Rob bent at the knees. ‘Are you wee Marie or Sinead?’

The girls giggled. ‘Mister, thems big girls, and they’re over there. I’m Breige.’
‘I’m here to meet Padric.’
‘He’s just in, mister. And he’s in the tin bath with the boys.’ The girls giggled again. ‘But you can go round the back, our Mickey’s there.’
‘Ta!’ Rob said. He thought of rustling the girl’s hair, then thought better of what might be in there. He tossed them a couple of coins.
‘Ere, mister, Tanners!’ The girls leapt up excitedly. ‘Is you my uncle, mister?’
Rob shook his head.
‘Then what’s this for to do?’ The elder of the two burned him with a look.
‘Because I’m happy.’
‘Fuck! I wish more folks was ‘appy like that round ‘ere.’ The girls skipped away deciding what sweets to get before Rob had the chance to change his mind about the money. But Breige stopped and turned to say, ‘Thanks, mister.’

Rob tripped over a dismembered ancient parambulator in the yard and landed through the back door without knocking.
A young man stood at the Belfast sink, naked bar his grubby old hand-me-down briefs. ‘I,’ Rob stammered, trying not to stare at the hunk in front of him. ‘I’m here for Padric.’ He tried to look away, but he couldn’t.
‘Sure!’ A broad Irish brogue filled the narrow scullery with a welcome. ‘Have a seat at the table there, man, and pour yourself a cup of tea. It’s just brewed.’ The man bent over the sink to rinse off some soap dripping from his hair.

Rob’s jaw all but hit the table top. The ass that looked back at him was perfect; round and firm. He took a filthy cup and poured out some tea just for something to do.
‘You’d be Robert Neil, Susan’s brother.’ The young man turned to face Rob, blithely ignorant of his own beauty or the effect it was having on Rob. ‘Our Po’s in bathing with the lads,’ a thumb indicated the next room, ‘so I hope you don’t mind me getting on here.’
‘No!’ Rob said rather too enthusiastically. ‘No, you go right ahead.’
‘Toss me a towel there, would ya, Rob,’ Mickey O’Casey grinned at Rob.

A pile of old but immaculately clean clothes and towels lay behind him. So Rob reached for the top hand towel. He was going to lean over to hand it to Mickey, but he thought it might appear too sissy, so he threw it. Mickey caught it in one hand, and gave Rob another of his groin tenting grins.
Wrapping the hand towel round his waist, Mickey eased out of his work-a-day underwear and dropped it on top of his other dirty cloths. Then he went back to washing himself. The tension of Mickey’s muscles played like music over his back as he washed, and when he bent to wash his legs, the tuck of the towel at his hip opened in a split to show the tight pull of his thighs and calves.
Rob was mesmerised.
‘Pour us a cuppa, there,’ Mickey looked over. ‘I’m parched.’
Rob took a mug. ‘Milk and sugar?’ he asked before pouring.

Mickey nodded, now reaching to wash between his legs. ‘Doin’ the bins is hard work.’ Mickey left off washing to take a deep swig of the hot sweet tea. ‘Still,’ he said, spooning more sugar into his mug, ‘I’m dead lucky to get on it so soon. There’s fellas waiting years to work on the Council.’ Mickey stood beside Rob, the heat of his body giving off the odour of carbolic soap and a brave attempt to wash away his labour. ‘And it gives me time to do me school in the evenings.’
Rob had started to ask what he was studying when Mickey leaned across him to pick out clean underwear and a shirt.
‘All of it really, me I’m thick. Well, I never really went to school proper. So English and doing sums are worst.’ Mickey seemed to think of the reasons why, then shrugged. ‘Still Missus Harbinger says I’m not as daft as I make myself seem.’

Rob watched closely as Mickey eased into his clean shorts, catching an eyeful of the large dark package they were about to cover. ‘If you need a helping hand with them,’ Rob blushed at his own secret innuendo.
‘No kiddin?’ Mickey smiled a shy little-boy-lost smile as he dropped his towel.

A child’s whiney cry came running at them, and Padric’s voice barked after it. Seeing Rob talking to Mickey the child stopped dead in his tracks. ‘Po-po,’ the little lad, naked and wet from head to toe, cried reaching up to Mickey, who bent and whisked him up in his strong arms with a whoop.
Padric came into the scullery too, and winked at Rob as he dripped water from his towel wrapped body. ‘He just keeps calling me, I don’t know why.’ Padric sulked.
‘No!’ Mickey tutted at him. ‘Our wee Seamus needs his pot. Don’t ya, son?’
The child whimpered in desperation, ‘Po-po!’ And he started crying.

To be continued - Crying (2)...