by Thole <poondu@bigfoot.com>

Eric eventually wrote back to tell how he and some school chums had tried swimming in their skysuits in his family's backyard pool one afternoon much to the consternation of his "What if the neighbors should see you?" father. Eric explained it was the neighbor kids he was swimming with and their parents' didn't seem to mind.

The evening went on with the old man doing his Show&Tell routine; a bag of trinkets and artifacts from exotic places was spread upon the living room rug in front of the fireplace and a pile of postcards passed hand to hand. Eric's two boy friends came round and sat on the floor with him whilst his folks tried to dissimulate their annoyance over the presence of these two whom they suspected were corrupting their son.

Before the old man had left his station on the ice he told Eric he would be traveling through the boy's community and in a hasty exchange of several letters it was agreed he would stop off for at least dinner and maybe sleep over. Now, as the other boys were leaving, Eric was reminded by his mother to get ready for bed and bring some bedding for the couch in the den cum computer room.

Eric, now wearing just a singlet and under shorts and ever trying to be the perfect host, was bent nearly double over the couch, arranging sheet and blanket when the old man walked in quietly after finishing coffee with the grown-ups. The boy's summer tan had long since faded but one could still see the demarcation where his summer togs hung against his thighs. The curve of the boy's bum and the cleft between its cheeks were inviting. The old man drew a finger along the tan line and up over the curve as the boy stood in surprise.

—I can see you did not get much time to work on your all-over tan last summer. Perhaps another time I can take you hiking for a few weeks and show you how it is done.

—That would be great if my folks would let me go off with you. Now that they've met you maybe they would. That would be cool! Well, have a good night. I hope that couch is not too lumpy for you.

Eric went off to bed and the old man stripped off what little he was wearing, carefully arranging his shorts and singlet for easy access in the dark. He could see the boy across a hall, through the space of their almost closed doors, lying in his bed, shirtless now, reading in a circle of yellow light, and he wondered...

Perhaps it was an hour later that he felt the blanket lift slightly away from his back. He was laying on his right, facing the back of the lumpy old couch. Above, piled along the back of the couch, were several stacks of computer zines, boxes of disks, a few spare boards, ready to avalanche at the slightest sneeze. Cold fingers touched his lower back, explored his nates and the crack between them as if looking for a tan-line in the dark. He turned toward them and the hand that followed the fingers rested on his belly. The boy whispered—

—Are you awake?

He covered the boy's hand with his own and moved it to his tumescence.

—Is this what you are looking for? he whispered in reply.

The boy was wearing a short silk robe, its belt hanging loose at the sides; when he turned the old man could see, by moonlight falling as if from a klieg spotlighting a star on stage, the young boy's erection standing firm against the siege of prepubertal down.

The boy's hand closed over the man's hardness and tugged on it.

—You have travelled the Way that is before me, take me now and show me. My bed is a better place than here.

But the man sat up and slipped the robe off the boy's shoulders. His hands explored in the darkness what was not illuminated by the moon and his mouth found the fountain of youth and sucked it dry. On the floor they explored each other's bodies: the old man with experience, never ceasing to praise how wonderfully boys were put together; the young boy with naiveté spilling over into wonderment of all that awaited him. They ate and drank of each other in every virtual and physical sense and then slept entwined under a blanket.