Passing Time by Ash Penn

threw his head back, muttering wordlessly.
     
    Louis increased his pace. His breath escaped in short ragged bursts. Sweat dribbled down the gully of his spine. The desperate ache of his lust thundered through his ears as he pounded into the heat of Jake’s ass again and again.
     
    “Louis…please…?” Jake cried. Sometimes he asked. Sometimes he didn’t. Tonight, he’d asked. Louis liked it.
     
    “Go on.” He wasn’t so very far away either.
     
    With permission granted, Jake shuddered. His ass pulsed around Louis’s cock. Every ripple of Jake’s orgasm centered in the raw throb of Louis’s groin. The room, the bed, even Jake fragmented in a glorious explosion of light. Louis pumped once, twice, three times into Jake’s ass. The contractions centered in his cock shivered through his body, and only after the final trickle had drained away was Louis was able to focus again.
     
    Jake’s lips tugged into a smile, though his eyes remained closed. Louis relaxed, settling on top of Jake, the sticky heat of semen sandwiched between their bodies. He buried his face in the pillow. He bathed in the comfortable silence and the slow regularity of Jake’s finger lightly caressing his spine. When the sweat began to cool and Jake’s finger stilled, Louis held on to the base of the condom and withdrew.
     
    He sat back on his heels as he knotted and disposed of it in the little bin by the bed. “You’re not going to fall asleep on me, are you?”
     
    “Hmm, no.” Jake’s eyelids drooped. He rolled onto his side and snuggled into the pillow.
     
    “Good. I’ll be back in a moment.” Louis slipped out of bed and into the bathroom. He relieved himself and washed his hands, pausing to glance at his face in the mirror above the sink. His cheeks were flushed with the remnants of his orgasm. Fucking Jake looked good on him. Pity he’d be back to his sad, middle-aged persona this time tomorrow. Now wasn’t the time to think so far ahead. Only the present mattered. And about that present…
     
    In the bedroom, Louis stopped at his side of the bed and opened the bedside table drawer. Inside, right at the back, he brought out a box wrapped in decorative silver foil. After climbing back into bed, he propped himself up on his elbow and peered into Jake’s serene face.
     
    “Jake? Tell me you’re awake.”
     
    Jake could tell him no such thing. His breathing was too deep, too even. His eyelids twitched, and a loud snore vibrated from between his lips.
     
    Well, obviously this wasn’t the right moment. He wasn’t sure if there would ever be one. They were living out their final hours together, and it seemed likely Jake would spend a good few of them asleep. Had he made the right decision with this particular gift? Should he have gone for something cheaper? No. The little memento in the box was nothing compared to what Jake had given him these past few weeks. There would be other opportunities. Louis stroked a finger across the foil and returned the box to the drawer.
     
    After grabbing some casual clothing from the closet, he dressed and headed for the door. He needed to go into town for supplies. And dinner.
     
    He strolled toward town, breathing deeply, memorizing the evening air scented with the salty tang of the river. He’d grown used to the smell these past few weeks, that and the gentle, metallic clank of rigging from the moored yachts, the questing cries of the seagulls always on the lookout for food. So much peace. So much fresh, clean air.
     
    Not too much of a hardship to imagine a life here. Perhaps with a quiet office job and a small European car. He could have Jake over for weekends and holidays as suggested the week before. It didn’t irritate him thinking of the possibilities now. He didn’t know when that had changed. The thought could only ever be a pipe dream, of course, whereas his thought of home and a world that didn’t and never would include Jake was his not quite so pleasant