THE GENTLEMEN'S CLUB Travis Written by Lady Poetess egiggles at moose-mail.com /~bbp Please do not reproduce on any website without permission. This story has no resemblance to anyone dead or alive. ONE Travis Schuldt hated the night even as he realized that it was his element. He was born at the stroke of midnight on Christmas' eve, he lost his virginity at the same time on his fifteenth birthday to his football coach at the backside of the man's truck, his father died in the ungodly hours of night, and he heard news of his football coach's fatal car accident at night when he was seventeen. So many of his life's momentous occasions took place at night. He was twenty-eight years old now. Mr Haynes, the football coach, died eleven years ago, yet why was he still remembering the man this much? The man was his first and Travis remained with the man for two years, damn whether people said it was right or wrong. Mr Haynes was the perfect father and lover, and he would always remember the man that way, even if today, his cynical mind would only remind him that the man was taking advantage of a teenager starved for a male authority figure in his life. His father. Travis hated the man as much as he always tried so hard to win his father's affections. Even now, he could still the ghost of his father's disapproval hovering over him like a dead weight on his soul. "Why can't you behave? Why can't you be sensible? Why are you so rebellious?" he could still hear in his mind. His father was a gentle, even-tempered man. He had never scolded or lifted a hand on Travis, but he never hid his disappointment with his son. But his father had Eddie. James Edward Franco, his stepbrother. Hs parents divorced a year after Travis was born, and four years later his mother married some man Travis never met and Eddie became her stepson. After his parents died in a car crash, Travis' father adopted Eddie and they became a family. Eddie was a quiet scholar like Kieran Schuldt, and he even became Kieran's research assistant when Eddie graduated three years ahead of schedule from college, a true scientific prodigy in every sense of the word. Travis had watched as those two laughed and joked over their research and other matters Travis had no clue about and could never join in. Kieran was dead now, Travis thought bluntly. And Eddie, a bright star, stopped caring and retreated into his lab. Travis just had to seduce Eddie's boyfriend, and he deliberately arranged it so that Eddie would find out. If Travis had taken a knife and stabbed Eddie to death himself, he couldn't have done a better job in destroying what was left of Eddie's status quo. Maybe that was why he was standing in the shadows tonight, watching as Eddie wept silently in the darkness of his room. Eddie thought he was alone, and he was, if Travis hadn't heard him and silently pushed open the door a little. "Why?" Eddie had screamed at him earlier today after he'd found out about the sordid affair. "You could have anyone you want, but Jack - he loves me, Travis. Why do you have to take away the only person who can love me? You can have anyone, Travis, so why? Why, damn you?" Because Eddie took away Kieran from him, Travis had thought then, but he never spoke those words loud. No, he never had Kieran's affections, probably. Kieran might be a gentle and patient father, but he had no place in his life for people like Travis. Kieran lived for the lab, and in Eddie, Kieran found the son he had always longed for: an extension of Kieran himself, a young man to whom Kieran could relive the glories of his dreams and ambitions. How Travis hated Eddie for being what he couldn't be but had always tried to be! But now, all he felt was a weary sense of resignation. There was no triumph. He just listened to Eddie's broken cries, and decided to move away. Yet his hand rebelled, and it pushed the door open wider. "I'm sorry," he said. It was true, he realized with a shock. He was sorry. Eddie didn't even acknowledge him. But he flinched when Travis stood beside him in that dark room to look out the window to the word six stories down their apartment. "He doesn't love you," he said in his most gentle voice. "Jack takes me up on my offer without hesitation." "You're so beautiful, of course he can't resist you," Eddie said quietly, only his heavy breathing now betraying his emotions. "Nobody can resist you. Next to you, I am nobody." Travis turned to look at Eddie. "You think so?" he asked in amazement. "I'm not that attractive." "You are. I had a crush on you the moment we first met. Thank goodness I soon lost that crush." "How wise of you," Travis murmured. Eddie slanted him a curious look. "Are you really sorry?" "Yes, I am." It was easier to say that than Travis expected. "Do you want to hit me, if it will make you feel better?" Eddie looked shocked, and Travis thought bitterly, well, of course. Eddie was just like Kieran - almost gentle, always sensitive, and always cruel to the ones that disappointed them. People like Kieran used kindness in the most vicious ways to make Travis feel like a complete asshole. So successful was Kieran that Travis sometimes found himself wondering whether he was to blame for Kieran's death. Worse, sometimes he wondered whether Kieran would have lived if Travis tried harder to be the son Kieran wanted. He knew he shouldn't feel these things, but he still felt them at moments when he was most vulnerable, such as now. "Why did you do it?" Eddie asked again. "Because I wanted to hurt you," Travis said bluntly. "What did I... but of course." Eddie rested his forehead against the window glass pane and closed his eyes. "You are always hating me for taking our father's affections." "He's not your father." It came our harsher than Travis intended, and Eddie flinched again. "He is," Eddie said defiantly. "And you have to ask me why I hate you," Travis said. "Do you hate me?" Eddie asked. Travis stared at Eddie. "You don't hate me?" he asked, truly puzzled by this possibility. He had hated Eddie for so long, it seemed inexplicable that Eddie didn't return the favor. "I don't like you," clarified Eddie. "Sometimes," he added. "But you are always a charming man even when you are hurting me, and sometimes... well, sometimes I don't mind it that much. Nobody pay attention to me much, because I'm such a nerd." Travis just gaped at Eddie. "Sometimes I hate you, because you are hurting me and it still feels like the sweetest thing in the world. A part of me lights up expectantly when you smile at me, even if my experience tells me that you will follow up that smile with cruel barbs. When you took me out to that restaurant on my fourteenth birthday because no one wanted to come to my party, I thought you were the best stepbrother in the world." Eddie placed his palm on the glass and ran his fingers down the smooth surface. "If that's what you intended as revenge, yeah, Travis, it worked. You have hurt me as much as Kieran hurt you, and it's perfect too. You kept me wishing that there is something I can do to make you like me better, just like how you want to make Kieran love you more." "Eddie, I - " "Shut up, Travis. You've robbed me of Jack, and now I have no one else in this world. Please, give me a little bit of what's left of my dignity, and leave me alone." Eddie closed his eyes and to Travis' eyes, looked like a man utterly defeated. Why wasn't Travis happy? "Travis, can you just please get the fuck out of my life, okay?" The expletive on Eddie's tongue was comical to Travis' ears, for Eddie never swore. Eddie was always soft-spoken and earnest, never bitter or resigned. Once, Eddie spent six hours trying to solve a jigsaw puzzle when Travis gave up after ten minutes. Tenacious was Eddie's second nature, but all that changed after Kieran's death and after now. "I'm sorry," Travis just said in the end. What else could he say? "I'll see you in the morning." When he closed the door, he realized that he meant what he'd said. Well, fancy that, he thought, struck by that realization. And with that came another startling revelation: he felt strangely light- headed, as if a part of him, chained and rusted for so long, had finally snapped and broken free. Hell, he had this feeling that he could never sleep well in what was left of today. TWO "So you and the Vampire had a fight," Jared Padalecki said as he placed his tray of food beside Eddie and took his seat at the table. "Big deal. He's a jerk anyway." "Don't call him that," Eddie automatically said before nibbling on a piece of celery. "Besides, he said he was sorry." "That's a first," Jared snorted. "And he's a vampire. He sleeps during the day and wakes up only at night, and all he wears is some shade of black. And he sucks the soul out of you. He's definitely a vampire." "Easy for you to say," Eddie just said. "You're an idiot, Eddie," Jared said not unkindly. "Move out of that horrible vampire mansion of yours. Get a room like I did." "But - " But what, exactly, Eddie wondered. He was always so reluctant to change his lifestyle. He liked his life predictable and same. Changes unnerved him and he didn't like the unpredictable. There were so many potential pitfalls out there and so many permutations of disasters, that the thought of leaving the home that was his sanctuary for so many years terrified him. "I can't believe you're still infatuated with Travis," Jared exclaimed in exasperation. "You are an idiot, Eddie. How can you be so smart and still be so pathetic?" "He's all I have!" Eddie heard himself say. He tried to steady his breathing. "He's my only family now," he said quietly. "I know he's a jerk. He had all his friends made my life a living hell in school and stole my boyfriend. But when he smiles at me, dang it, I find myself willing to forgive him. I think I'm afraid to lose him and have no one else." He caught Jared's disgruntled expression and hastened to explain, "I know, I have friends, but friends are different. You're not as close as me as you are to Topher and your uncle, right?" "You're not even close to Travis," Jared pointed out impatiently. "He's not even your real brother." "Yeah. Which is good, isn't it, because if otherwise, I'll be in trouble for feeling the things I feel when I see him walking around the house shirtless." "I think I'm going to be sick." "So am I," Eddie said with a bitter smile playing on his lips. "But last night he said he was sorry, Jared, and I believe him." "You wanted to believe him," Jared corrected him. "You always wanted to believe the best in him because of some sad, twisted pathetic need of yours to have a family." "Is that so bad?" Eddie asked quietly. "All I wanted was someone close to me to be my soul mate. I want someone who understands me as much I he, and we will laugh together and share our bad times together, thick and thin. He'll share his burdens with me, and we will face the world together. Is that wrong, what I want?" "Not with Travis, and not because he has a hot smile or a great body. At the rate you are going, Topher will willingly trade places with you. Wanna be adopted by the Grace clan, Eddie?" Eddie chuckled. "You met Topher's parents?" "Worst weekend of my life," Jared said in disgust. "The father ripped me apart, saying I'll be an embarrassment to Topher, Topher lost his temper and shouts back, and the timid mother burst into tears right there in the dining hall. It was a fucking mess, and I was never more glad when the whole ordeal was over." "It's nice to see Topher so supportive of you," said Eddie. "Yeah, I'm glad too. His father's right, you know. I'm just a dumb guy who only knows about cars. One day when Topher makes it big, I don't know where I will be in his life anymore." Jared shrugged. "Oh well, I'll worry about that later when we reach that stage." "And you're still willing to involve yourself with Topher?" "Hell, yeah," said Jared. "When you gave that mawkish speech about soul mates, well, I was thinking that you're describing Topher perfectly. So why not?" Eddie shrugged. Why not, indeed? Jared was twenty, and when it came to his blind optimism, he was almost a decade younger than Eddie, who believed that soul mates were only for the weak, desperate, and hapless, such as people like James Edward Franco. Jared would never understand because he had been, as far as Eddie knew, cocooned in the warm loving shelter of his uncle Marc's affections and later Topher's. Maybe Jared had knew hurt, but his life had been blessed by loving family members and friends. Eddie envied him. He thought of Travis. Travis ignored him and when that failed, lashed out at Eddie using his greatest weapons: his golden looks and charm that always gulled Eddie into biting his bait. Such as when he lured Eddie into the school locker room (Eddie was hoping so badly that Travis would want to at least kiss him) only to have his friends strip Eddie and leave him naked, gagged, and tied up in the gym. Kieran would only cut Travis down with some weary, carefully worded stings, and Travis would only hate Eddie more intensely. At first Eddie loved this power he had over Kieran, and he had rubbed it on Travis' face as revenge. Travis wanted his father's affections so badly it was ridiculous. Once, he worked his ass off to get into a biology course only to have Kieran asking him, "Why can't you be content with the mediocrity that you are?" Travis' then fourteen-year old face was painful to watch, but Eddie, watching from a corner, sniggered. Travis only steeped up his viciousness ever since. Oh, he was a bad person, Eddie thought. Travis wasn't solely to blame, for Eddie had played his hand in the fiasco too. He had deliberately etched a wedge between father and son by subtly pointing out Travis' faults and reminding Kieran how he, Eddie, would make Kieran a better son than Travis. And Kieran was also to blame, he guessed, for letting his son slip away from him. No, Kieran pushed Travis away and never let Travis come close to him since the man learned that Travis wasn't anything like him. "Speak of the devil," Jared said. "That's the Vampire coming over here." Eddie turned at once to the direction of the doorway of the restaurant, and sure enough, it was Travis. Since Travis graduated with honors (business administration - and hence Travis' honors went unappreciated by Kieran) and became a decently successful businessman that operated from their vampire mansion, sorry, house, he rarely ventured out at daylight. He once joked to a friend, Eddie overheard, that most of his customers lived in Asia and with the time differences between them Travis decided to live according to his customer's time. Travis looked like hell. His hair was swiftly and maybe carelessly combed just enough to keep it down, and he looked exhausted. Eddie felt his own expectations rise, like the instincts of a Pavlov dog, and when Travis focused those beautiful - if red-rimmed and exhausted at this moment - eyes at him, it was if the world never existed; it was always just he and Travis, it seemed. "I'm outta here," Jared muttered, casting Travis a look of intense dislike. It wasn't natural for Jared to dislike someone so deeply, but he probably hadn't forgiven Travis for calling his uncle Marc a 'fucking milquetoast'. "See you, well, sometime soon." Eddie was sorry to see Jared go, as Jared was one of the few guys who didn't mind his company. At the same time, he was also unnerved by Travis' presence. "What are you doing here?" he asked nervously. "To spend some time with you." Eddie was floored but suspicion soon reared its ugly head. "What is it now, Travis? It isn't enough that you screwed my ex- boyfriend?" "Do you want Jack that badly?" Travis asked finally. He didn't meet Eddie's eyes, as if he was very uncomfortable with this conversation. Eddie was intrigued despite himself. "Do I love Jack?" He used the dirty L word deliberately because he knew Travis hated hearing the word. Lately though, he began to wonder if he knew what that word meant himself. Travis looked paler, if that was possible. "Yeah. Love." "Probably. But I think I don't want him back. He slept with you. That was bad taste, and I don't want my men with bad tastes." He paused when Travis made an odd gurgling sound. "What?" "Nothing. Go on," Travis just said. That man was laughing at him, Eddie realized. "No, I don't want him back," he said firmly. "Well, he called me. He said you weren't answering his calls, and he was close to tears. He wants you back." "It's not my fault he let you screw him now, is it?" Eddie just said before sipping his coffee. "No, it's my fault," Travis said meekly. "I hope that new car I bought him will make him happier." "Oh, so now I'm worth as much as a car." Travis just smiled instead of biting the bait. "Smartass. Look, last night I've been thinking." "Oh, spare me." "I've had this epiphany, Eddie, and I think maybe you and I should try to at least be friends?" Travis suggested. "I'm tired of being a jerk, it's more exhausting than you can imagine, and I want to have someone to talk to over dinner. Please?" Eddie was floored, and he tried to keep his surprise from his face. He tried to figure out this man, but as always, he could see too clearly what could go wrong and what could go right. His idiot heart always hoped that maybe this time, unlike the last, Travis would be kind. It was always rewarded harshly for its gullibility. Why couldn't he learn by now? "Maybe Jared's right," he just murmured. "I should just get my own place." "You don't have to." "I wanted a family, Travis. I wanted my old family, but they were dead, and I wanted a family with you and your father. But even that was all fucked up, right?" Eddie said bitterly. "You hated me for being what you couldn't be and for being your father's favorite, and I hated you for making me feel - well, I was jealous of you because you were someone I always wanted to be. You were Kieran's son no matter what, and you were handsome, popular, and charming." "You hate me," Travis just echoed. He sighed. "Yeah, and I hate you. But I am too tired to keep hating, Eddie. I just want to lie down and sleep and never get up again, sometimes." He reached out and touched Eddie's hand before he realized what he had done and quickly pulled his hand back. "I miss him sometimes." Eddie didn't misunderstood. "I wish you knew him the way I know him," he said with genuine regret. "Yeah, I know you do," Travis just said. "I understand you took two weeks from your research at the lab," he asked, deliberately changing the subject. "They said I was working too hard," Eddie just said carefully. Travis didn't have to know that he was close to a nervous breakdown and how he was ordered to take a fortnight's worth of leave to get his act together. "Well, it's the usual slow season for me as well. The prices of plastic products are down, and my usual customers are waiting to see how low they will go before they place their usual orders. Want to take a break with me? Just one week, and we'll see how it goes." "Where are we going?" "I don't know," Travis said honestly. "Just somewhere close to the ground, I guess." Oh yeah, Travis was terrified of heights. For a purportedly strong man, Travis was afraid of a lot of things: heights, closed spaces, spiders, snakes, and crocodiles. Eddie remembered how Kieran brought them once to a river to fish and swim, but Travis refused to even step into the waters, because he'd seen in a documentary how crocodiles lurked silently under still waters of rivers. They were just boys then, and Kieran was unforgiving of Travis' fears. "I always wanted to bungee-jump," Eddie said deliberately. "Let's go," Travis just said, surprising Eddie into chuckles. Not laughter, maybe not yet. THREE "You're taking the cowboy shit very well," Eddie said laughing three days later when Travis came out with that stupid hat on his head. "Yeah? I have one for you too, partner," Travis said in mock offense as he smacked an equally silly white cowboy hat over Eddie's head. Eddie tried to duck, only to laugh louder when Travis stopped him and forced the hat on his head. He was laughing more freely with Travis these days, he realized. He didn't know what to make of it, but while he was self-absorbed enough to psychoanalyze everything he felt, he wouldn't question this new freedom in his soul. It was as if the ghost of Kieran Schuldt had temporarily been banished between them, and they made it this far along the Nashville track without killing each other. Travis always harbored a dream of becoming a country singer, which Eddie only learned a day ago. It was strange to realize that Travis, the omnipotent cruel demigod in Eddie's life, harbored silly dreams just like everyone else. Even more disconcerting was the laugh lines around the edges of Travis' beautiful lips, which Eddie only noticed now because only now was Travis more free with his smile. Away from their vampire manor, they were finally beginning to live. And Travis was irresistible. Even now in simple faded denims and shirt that, while loose, were snug enough to emphasize his lean and well-muscled physique, he was a sight to behold. And Travis' smile only made Eddie's heart leap harder and skip a beat. When Travis looked and smiled at him, he made it seemed as if Eddie was the only person that mattered in Travis' world. If Travis made everyone else feel this way, Eddie didn't care. Let him pretend this week that Travis felt some affection for him. Travis playfully pushed back a stray curl from Eddie's hair, and Eddie heard his audible intake of breath. He wanted, he hoped that Travis would... and Travis' eyes darkened into an unfathomable shade of green as if he too wanted to lean down and take Eddie's willing lips with his. In the end, he only leaned back, his breathing slightly more labored as if he was shaken inside, and he awkwardly arranged the hat on Eddie's head. "Let's go somewhere else," he just said. It was a long drop, Travis knew with a sickening lurch of his stomach as he tried not to stare down the gorge. The strapped wires and cords around him felt like a death trap. He wanted to say no and back out of this nonsense. He didn't want to bungee jump! Who invented this shit? If Travis could get his hands on that fucker, he would make sure that fucker would never be able to walk for a week at least and - "Ready?" Eddie asked beside him, looking down with an expression of rapture. "Never," Travis muttered, but he was more intent on studying Eddie's face. He had never noticed until now how beautiful Eddie was. Those lips, those eyes, those sad, sad but beautiful eyes, all drew him like a moth to a bonfire. "Ready?" someone asked. "Don't hold up the queue, man." Okay. "I think I'll just - " Travis began to say, but he was silenced when Eddie's hand closed over his and held it in a warm, assuring squeeze. "We'll jump together," Eddie said. Travis nodded nervously, looking down a little before quickly averting his eyes. "One, two, three - jump!" Travis screamed like a girl on his way down. He was humiliated and he almost wet his pants. But the fall was broken by an almost painful tug and bounce, and Travis couldn't take it any more. He wanted to break the cords holding him, even if it meant certain death. He was being suffocated, and he was falling and he was never this terrified in his life and he wanted - his mounting hysteria slowly calmed as he saw Eddie's blood-suffused ruddy cheeks and the man's exhilaration. Eddie's eyes were bright with pleasure, and the man's expression was animated and alive as he savored the rush of the fall. Travis, who was holding on to Eddie, forgot the world, forgot that they were hanging in thin air, right there, hundreds of feet up in the air. He had never seen a more beautiful sight than Eddie now, alive, and he knew he just had to kiss Eddie there and then. So he did. Travis heard a strange, hungry sound, and realized that it was he. He didn't want to, he shouldn't, but oh, he needed this. He unclenched his fists and tried to fight the tremors of urgency in his taut body. Every muscle of his was tensed as if to flee or fight, and all his nerves were burning. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't see or hear anything but the roaring red and thunder of desire in his ears, eyes, and heart. A low growl from him finally marked his breaking point. He didn't care anymore. Fuck his father, fuck everyone, and definitely fuck Eddie - he reached out to Eddie and pushed the man down on the bed. He only had time to unzip his pants before his wildly aroused cock sprang free, and then he felt his cock crown against a wet, pulsing orifice between Eddie's eagerly spread thighs. Instinctively, he thrust home, and Eddie's mews of pain/pleasure only drove him wilder. He didn't care that he was hurting Eddie. He was only aware of Eddie's shapely thighs clasping his waist so hard that he almost spewed his load, and he was unable to believe the tight and moist sensation of the unbelievably pleasurable anus. Tight membranous muscles clasped his cock as he filled Eddie to the widest possible stretch, and the sensation was fucking unbelievable. His hips began thrusting in a short, stabbing rhythm, and Eddie did something that wrung a cry of pleasure from Travis and then another. Travis couldn't describe it, but Eddie did something - everything he did, from the rhythm of his anal muscles clenching and easing on Travis' cock to his meeting the man's cock thrusts, slowly guiding Travis until he was pumping in a steadier, deeper motion - everything Eddie did was perfect, so fucking perfect. "Slowly, like this," Eddie would gasp, and Travis would obey. Soon he innately realized what Eddie liked, and tried to vary his fuck thrusts - slowly when Eddie was close, and when Eddie's peak ebbed, he began pumping wild, deep, and hard. It couldn't last long for it was all Travis could do to hold back his load the moment he plunged home up Eddie's anus. But he had no idea that his huge cock was enough, and every time his wide ridged cock crown bruised Eddie's anal pucker with each thrust and withdrawal, and every time Travis thrust so deep up Eddie the man could feel fires of his orgasm wracking his very being. He had no idea that Eddie came violently at least three times in that half hour of fucking. He only shouted his pleasure as his ejaculation spurted forth in powerful geysers, scorching them both into white-hot climax. "I'm sorry," Travis began to say when he could steady his breath. "I am too fast, I - hey!" Eddie only laughed breathlessly as he easily turned them over so that he was straddling Travis now, Travis' cock still half-hard and embedded deep in him. "That is the wildest fuck I've ever had," Eddie exclaimed, his face flushed with his pleasure. "Damn, wow, fucking damn!" As he spoke, his hips were already making slow, circular grindings on Travis' crotch. "I'm having you again, fucker, so get hard, damn you. Get that big, fucking cock hard, yes, harder, harder!" Travis stared at the man fucking him now, unable to believe that anyone could get this wild from fucking. He groaned and yelped when Eddie bore down hard on him, but his own instincts had him meeting Eddie's motions. His cock hardened to dimensions he had never achieved before, and his fingers dug into Eddie's buttocks and he kissed and licked the sweat off Eddie's sweat-sheen body. When he came, he came so hard that his upward thrust lifted his buttocks off the bed. They fell onto the floor as they came in violent spasms, but the pain was nothing. This time Travis kissed Eddie, and Eddie kissed him back, and soon their tongues were mating in a fiery duel, mimicking the urgent rhythm of Travis' still hard cock still fucking Eddie's asshole. Travis loved this, he fucking love this! He loved the wet slapping sounds their coming together made, and he loved the juices from their previous coupling spilling out of Eddie's anus as his cock thrust in and withdrew brutally, and he loved the way his lust-swollen balls banged against Eddie's buttocks. When Eddie came, that hot brand of male meat trapped between their taut stomachs spurted creamy juices that splattered both their torsos with delicious precision. Travis licked the tangy semen off Eddie's chest, nipples, and chin, and when one particularly powerful ejaculation from Eddie hit him right in the face, they both laughed before Travis licked the man's face clean. Somehow he ended up kissing Eddie, and they were both sharing Eddie's juices between them as they kept fucking. Travis came again, and again, but he didn't stop. He refused to stop. He kept pumping until his cock hardened again, until Eddie threw his head back and screamed for mercy. That wild scream only made Travis grin and increased his thrusts even faster. It was a long time coming to the grand finish. FOUR Sobriety hit them hard the next morning. Travis groaned and staggered into the washroom, all strength seemed to have sapped out of his legs, while Eddie avoided his eyes while he brushed his teeth and gargled his mouth. "Regrets, Eddie?" Travis finally asked as he sank onto the bathtub in the motel bathroom. "Yeah," Eddie answered. "I always wanted this, but it was some stupid fantasy I couldn't outgrow, but now that it has happened... wow. But it feels...," Eddie looked into his reflection in the mirror, stunned, as he finished, "... right." Travis nodded. "You're not so bad," he finally conceded. "You're a wild fuck, and that's something. Jack was a fool to give you up." "Oh?" Eddie turned to look at his stepbrother in surprise. "I probably won't look at anyone else if you're mine." Travis smiled in self-effacing bitterness. "If you can ever be mine." "So now you're thinking of keeping me by your side always? Because I'm a good fuck?" Eddie was getting angry now, but he didn't know why he was angry. No, wait, he knew why. Travis never wanted him, rejected him when he wanted to play nice, and now that he finally had had Eddie at his own convenience, he was whining that the world was against Travis? "Yeah," Travis said, watching Eddie warily. "Wrong answer, you prick!" Eddie cried, and threw the toothbrush in his hand at Travis. "I hate you!" "Tell me something new." "Do you how humiliating that is, knowing that I am unable to fight this crush on a guy who treats me like a jerk? I'm supposed to be a smart guy, so why the hell am I so pathetic? And now you've fucked me, you dare whine that I am making it hard for you?" Eddie yelled. "Fuck off! I've had it!" "You like me?" Travis didn't duck the sponge coming his way. "Well, you like me?" "Yeah, throw my shame on my face, damn you," Eddie muttered, making his way out of the bathroom. "Hey, come here," Travis asked in his low seductive purr. Eddie turned to look questioningly at Travis. Travis just gestured at Eddie to come closer. "Join me in the tub and tell me again how much you like me," Travis invited him. "Please?" "No," Eddie answered sullenly. "Come on, don't be so hard on me," Travis exclaimed. "What about me? Don't you ever consider that even if I like you a little, I'm scared that you'll reject me just like father did?" "I'm not Kieran." "I'm starting to believe that. I doubt Kieran would be as wild as you in bed." "So what do we do now?" Eddie asked. "I don't know. But it will be nice if you will join me in the tub." "I don't think it'll fit us two." "You can sit on me." Eddie hesitated, but then decided that it wasn't such a bad idea after all. Travis stared down at the gorge. Well, it wasn't that bad, he thought. He was sleeping with the guy he had hated all his life. What could be worse? But sleeping with Eddie wasn't so bad, he admitted. In fact, it wasn't bad at all. He thought of the last few days. They were different people here, and they touched, interacted, and fucked each other as if they were never Kieran's bitter winter harvest of anger and envy. Eddie had stolen his father from him, and he had taken everything he could from Eddie. Or did they? Maybe Kieran was never his in the first place. And for the first time in his life, he pondered the possibility that Kieran wasn't worthy of his affections. "Travis?" Eddie yelled, running up the path. "You're not jumping alone, are you?" "I damn well am!" Travis told him. "You know what, Eddie? If I survive this, we'll be okay. I forgive you and I hope you'll forgive me. And we'll start this new. We'll be okay, I swear." "Well, yeah, we'll start new. Just get off that thing," Eddie told him. "You're afraid of heights. Wait until I get myself ready and I'll join you." Travis shook his head. He thought of Eddie, Kieran, and all the wasted emotions he held on in vain. Maybe it was time he let go of the past. "Travis, don't - damn!" Laughing, Travis jumped.