Country Boys, page 13
But the farmer’s son could not escape. Not from the farm, with its daylight of endless chores and nighttime of quiet need. Not from the well, for fear that the heads would sink to the bottom and rest there like stones cast away. The land belonged to the family for generations and owned him. His loneliness kept him at the well as much as it had brought the heads to the water.
The next day, the salesman sat on the rickety porch. Yesterday’s hateful sun had been traded for a milder sibling. He fingered the jacket across his lap, the briefcase close at hand, the warm ring on his finger. He had reclaimed it from Dan only after the water had cooled and puddled on the floorboards.
The salesman had found the mattress lumpy and lonely. He had wanted to slip with Dan under the muslin sheets and fall asleep together, but Dan had given him a sad look while blotting the spilled water from the tub.
The familiar sound of his sedan came down the road. He stood up, feeling the years in his lower back and knees. He turned back to the farmhouse, but the only face in the window belonged to the girl.
On the walk between bathroom and bedroom last night, the salesman had passed an open door. By the weak light from the room’s window, he had glimpsed the farmer’s daughter sitting up in bed, one hand toying with the strings at the front of her nightgown.
The salesman had rested a hand on the doorknob. She lifted and pulled one string taut revealing more of her chest. He shut her door.
The salesman promised himself to schedule another visit soon on the same route. Perhaps before summer’s end. He glanced around at the surrounding fields and raised a hand in farewell for Dan, wherever he might be.
The farmer’s son wondered often if the rest of the world might be as magical as the well. Or had he found the only such spot on earth. Both ideas scared him.
The Home Office felt like anything but home. Too many desks filled with secretaries typing, chatting, and trying to catch everyone’s eye. Too many rooms filled by other salesmen boasting, laughing, and trying to surpass the next guy’s numbers. Water coolers gurgled.
The salesman sat by the far end of the conference room table. During his years with Link & Grant, he had moved closer to where the CEO sat, before plunging back down to the bottom to sit beside some wiry rookie who sweated over Delaware’s routes.
The salesman rubbed at his temples, wishing away the terrible headache that had begun after lunch. Along with a few of the other old-timers, he had gone to a steakhouse and shared cuts of red beef and tumblers of amber whiskey.
His hand shook when he dropped a cube of pure white sugar into his cup. He watched it bob up and down in the miniature black sea as the CEO droned on and on about the price of copper. The immersed cube remained sharp-edged, stained but intact. With a tiny spoon, the salesman stabbed at the sugar, but it refused to dissolve. When he took a sip, he crushed it between his teeth. The taste made him feel worse.
His throat began to ache and he loosened his tie.
Minutes later, he disrupted the meeting by rising and leaving the room quickly with a muttered excuse.
Every employee had a key to the bathroom, a showcase for the company. Each sink and faucet and toilet was different from the next: rows of gleaming brass and stainless steel and old bronze over porcelain bowls.
Out of habit, the salesman went to the farthest, which featured a gilded tap shaped like a swan’s neck. He turned the spigot to create a strong flow. His reflection looked pale, his eyes watery.
He splashed cold water onto his face, his neck. He drank from cupped hands. The wet ring on his finger glittered.
When he looked up at the mirror, he saw he was not alone in the bathroom. It took him a moment to recognize the farmer’s daughter standing in the shadows of the stalls.
“You’re like all the others. Come a callin’ but never pay me no mind.”
The salesman turned around. He stared at the row of empty toilets. He spun back and in the mirror she stood behind him. Her reflection clutched the back of his neck; he could feel icy hands thrust his head down into the sink’s basin.
The salesman closed his eyes to the water, so cold it numbed the pain of striking the porcelain. She shoved his face through the slender drain, the pressure of the pipes mashing his cheek-bones, his chin. Then he broke loose at the neck, felt buoyant and relieved, and the stream of water carried him off.
The farmer’s son came to the well that afternoon and saw the shiny ring sitting atop the crumbling mortar. He knew before even looking that his sister had added another head. He picked up the ring and leaned over the side. The surface was dark; the heads hid whenever she came by. Tearful, he called out to them, cajoling each to rise up. The salesman’s head with its gray hair swirling in the water moved near and allowed him to pet it. The farmer’s son would have gladly traded the ring, the sun, anything to kiss a pair of lips a second time.
THE FARMER’S SON
Karl Taggart
The motorcycle broke down without warning, just crapped out like the engine had been snuffed, so I coasted to the shoulder and thought, What the hell? I’d roared out of L.A. after a shitty week at work, heading north and cutting over to Highway 99 and the central valley because I wanted away from the monotony of I-5 and the familiarity of coastal 101. So that’s how this city boy ended up stranded in farm country, far short of a motel in Visalia, the nearest burg. Fields surrounded me, rows of cabbage that had taken over when rows of onions ran out. I’d enjoyed riding along with the wind in my face, sucking in the various vegetable smells, the vastness of it all reminding me just how big California is and how easily we coastal city dwellers forget it’s an agricultural state. But then the bike quit and everything changed.
I got off and looked at the thing. I knew enough to determine the engine wasn’t getting any gas, which probably meant a clogged fuel line, so with the help of a tiny tool kit extracted from its hidey-hole under the seat, I managed to unhook the fuel lines and blow them out, none of which helped. The thing would not run. “Fuck,” I said aloud, then again, and again, finally exploding into a string of profanity until a car honked its horn as it zoomed by and I realized I’d taken on the look of a madman. So I sat on the bike, trying to decide my next move.
Part of the upset was that I had, in my hasty exit, tossed aside my cell phone as some kind of statement that I needed no connection to anyone. Now I wondered if this reckless move hadn’t created some awful karma. It was as I accepted my own contribution to the situation that I looked across the fields on the opposite side of the highway and saw a farmhouse in the distance. It was small and gray, and I wondered if it was even inhabited. But as dusk was fast upon me, I locked the bike and started walking. Soon I stepped onto a rickety porch and knocked at a door sorely in need of paint. A grizzled old man in overalls with a paper napkin tucked into the bib answered.
“Sorry to bother you,” I began, “but I’ve broken down on the highway. Can I use your phone to call a tow?”
“Murphy’s Garage,” the man said, “’cept he’ll be closed now. C’mon in, we can help you out, but supper’s on.”
The house had the cramped feel of a place built a couple centuries back, and the furniture looked that period, faded velvet sofa and chairs in an awful dark green. The family sat around an oval table in the dining room, two young men and one young woman.
“Fella broke down,” the old man announced.
The others nodded and went back to their chicken, which smelled good and made me realize how hungry I was.
“That’s Tom,” the old man said, “and his wife June and over there’s Billy, my other son who ain’t got a wife. My name’s Bob Stremple.”
“Scott Raynes,” I said. “I really appreciate this.”
There was little talk beyond Bob telling me Billy was good with motors and might be able to fix my car.
“Actually, it’s a motorcycle.”
Bob nodded and Billy’s mouth dropped open. He was big and blond, handsome in a bearish way. “What kind?” he asked.
“Triumph six-fifty. Ran fine until now.”
He nodded, taking this in, then Bob said it was too late to fix it tonight so I should stay over. When supper was finished June cleared the dishes while we men went to watch TV. Around nine, when June had settled beside Tom and he’d begun to rub her thigh, they said goodnight and went down the hall. When they’d gone Bob reminded Billy there was much to do the next day and Billy rose and left us. Then Bob turned to me.
“You’ll bunk in with Billy but I don’t want no foolin’ around, you hear? Billy gets up to things sometimes and I get after him about it so don’t you go and let him fuck you.”
The next second dissolved into a long, surreal moment in which I realized I’d stepped into a cliché, and, further, that it was going to play out. Maybe not the traditional way because that story was a farmer’s daughter, but still, it was happening pretty much as written. And I wondered in the next long moment if maybe this wasn’t even real, if maybe it was a dream and I was asleep in a motel in Visalia with my dick in my hand and the bike had never broken down at all. But I found myself nodding to Bob, unable to form words, and he stood and said, “I’ll turn in too. Billy’s room is second door down the hall, next to the bath.”
I followed him into the hall and as his door closed behind him the bathroom door opened and out stepped darling Billy, stark naked. A jolt ran through me, radiating from my dick, while Billy just stood smiling as if nakedness in the family hallway was perfectly natural. He was over six feet tall, thick, solid, and furred with more of the blond that curled so beautifully on his head. Without a word he opened his bedroom door and as I entered I noticed his hand on his dick almost absently, as if that was also perfectly natural.
He was in proportion down there, big dick for a big man, and as he hardened I noted the blond thicket where the cock grew. Bob’s words echoed in my head, “Don’t you go and let him fuck you,” and I almost laughed at how futile the request was. I began to undress.
As Billy pulled back the covers, I thought of him dutifully making his bed each morning, which gave him a certain innocent appeal—farm boy schooled in the basics but little more. His life centered on crops and animals and family; he was earthiness incarnate, and when I stood bare before him, he grinned almost shyly. His cock pointed at me now and he pulled on it slowly, gently, as he eyed me up and down.
“I can fix your bike,” he said, which surprised me.
“You have experience with motorcycles?”
“No but it’s an engine and I’m good with ’em, keep everything on the farm running.”
“It’s not getting gas,” I said as he approached.
“Carburetor, maybe, or a fuel line,” he replied.
“No, I checked it all.” He put a hand on my cock, thumbed the tip.
“I’ll figure it out,” he said as he knelt and then I was in his mouth and nothing on wheels mattered.
In seconds I was frantic, thrusting at him while he sucked me. I ran my fingers into his wet curls and when I started to come I held the yell to a muffled grunt, mindful of Bob’s admonishment.
It was an exquisite long climax, possibly because this gorgeous bear of a man was expertly pulling it out of me and also because I hadn’t been sucked or fucked in weeks, which was part of the reason I’d fled L.A. in the first place. Billy sucked until I ran dry and even then kept at me, playing with my soft morsel. Finally he let go, looked up and smiled. I thought about Bob as I climbed into bed.
Billy stood holding himself and eyeing me like he was deciding which piece to eat first. He even licked his lips. Then he crawled onto the bed and began to explore the whole of me with his big rough hands, finally turning me over and parting my buttcheeks, which caused him to suck in a long breath before getting down between my legs. As he held me open, I felt hot breath in my crack, then a tongue. Bob had every reason to worry.
I had never before been devoured so completely and as I shuddered with delight I wondered if country living had encouraged this big bear to simply do what came naturally, to feed his desires, literally, never mind the limits of society—or his father.
His tongue was a marvel, pushing in deeply then poking around like some snake in search of prey. Mouth plastered to me, Billy crawled around in my chute until he had me squirming and then, as if he hadn’t done enough, he began a tongue-fuck unlike anything I’d ever known. As he went at me, a corner of my mind—the tiny part still able to form coherent thoughts—wondered where he’d learned all this, because it was too good to simply be something he’d fallen into. He was expert, beyond a doubt. What on earth went on out here in the middle of nowhere? But then he withdrew and sat back and I rolled over to look at him licking his lips with that tongue and then he was on me, pinning me in a full body press as he shoved his tongue into my mouth.
I passed a moment in which I considered that it had just been up my butt but this quickly faded as his tongue set up a dance with mine. He began to grind his big hard wet dick against my belly while he kissed me hard and he kept on for several minutes, then pulled off, grinned, and said with a sort of childish glee, “Let’s fuck.”
Turned out he was well prepared, and I discarded his innocence as mere illusion. He got off the bed, opened a dresser drawer and took out several condoms, a tube of lube, a dildo and a handful of other stuff that looked to be tangled with a long string of anal beads. He suited up, greased himself, and told me to get on my back. His commands had the ring of Bob Stremple; I did as told.
He ran a gob of lube into me and I sucked in a breath as he poked his big cock at my rim. His eyes were on mine, sparkling now, I swear, his face flushed, his mouth open, tongue out like it wanted to fuck again. And then he pushed in, not easily, not with care but with the thrust of the animal he was and he set off on a slamming stroke that set the bed creaking and I thought of Bob across the hall and hoped he was a heavy sleeper.
I wanted to work my dick while Billy did me but couldn’t manage anything more than holding on because he had me in his thrall and I was loving it. His face registered every bit of his pleasure and I watched it go from wonder and passion to bearing down and biting his lip at one point, then that tongue getting loose, caught between lips locked into a grimace I knew all too well. Grunting then, going at it full out, bed screeching under the onslaught, then sudden silence from him, eyes closing as he let go his load, pumping it into me for what seemed forever. I pictured not the spurts of most men but great gushes and a condom stretched beyond capacity.
When he’d emptied and stopped, he didn’t have the look of a man who’s finished but of a man just getting started. He grinned as he pulled out, stripped the rubber and held it up like some prize. The thing was heavy with spunk. “Be right back,” he said as he stood up and tossed the thing. “Gotta wash.” And he was gone naked down the hall while I still lay with legs up, happily and thoroughly fucked.
When he came back minutes later his big dick was at rest, hanging heavily over a pair of fat balls. I noted, as he entered the room and closed the door, a change of demeanor, the ass-eating, butt-fucking bear now hesitant, almost shy, looking at me, then away, blushing. I saw he wanted something else.
“What is it, Billy?” I asked as I sat up. My cock was hard from the fuck and I had a hand on it, hoping he’d suck me off again—but he avoided me now because I’d seen something in him, something he maybe thought wrong, so I pressed further. “That was some fuck,” I told him. “You’re really good, Billy. You can do whatever you want to me.”
He kept his head down, looking at me from under his brows, then worked himself up to spilling it. “I want you to do it to me,” he said, then looked away.
“What? Fuck you?”
He nodded. “From behind,” he said to the floor. “Like a bull does.”
Holy shit, I thought, squeezing my drooling dick. “You ever been fucked?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Just the rubber one but I like it up there.”
“Oh, Billy,” was all I could say.
He was so different then, getting me a condom and lube, making sure all was in order before he climbed onto the bed and stuck his butt up. He was furred back there and his crack, where I’d soon have my dick, was a riot of blond. I got in behind him, applied the rubber and lube, then hesitated with a finger full for him. Billy, surprisingly perceptive, reached back and pulled open his buttcheeks to such an extent that his hole quivered before me. “Give me some grease,” he said. “Lots.”
I ran several gobs up him, mindful I rarely topped anyone though far from adverse to it. Caught up in the thrill of being taken, I’d almost forgotten the rewards of reciprocity so I found myself in an oddly grateful state of mind. This big bear of a man was giving me his all.
When he was awash in lube I eased my dick into him, listening to his little moans that accompanied my progress. When I was all the way in he squeezed me and held fast which impressed me but then he was muscular all over so why not there?
When I began to ride him he chuckled and when I had a good stroke going I slapped his ass, which got an “Oh yeah” out of him and I saw we were now cowboy and bronc, me in the saddle, him cutting loose below.
As I rode and slapped and held off yelling yee-hah, I tried to recall the last guy I’d done but found only an unsatisfying blur, which was to Billy’s credit, darling Billy who was likely in the process of erasing much of my sexual memory.
When my juice began to rise, I couldn’t help letting go verbally as well and I asked Billy if he liked taking dick up the ass, liked getting fucked, and he responded to each demand like some raging Baptist calling out amen to his pastor’s holy exhortations. “Praise the dick,” I said, in keeping with this thought and Billy responded, “Fuck me, lordy yes, fuck me,” and there I was unloading into this big furry ass, this big furry man, and I saw the world anew, healed, righted, brilliant before me, untroubled and oh god, how good it is when you’re coming.
