Hot Like Me

Part XV: "Always Have..."

Trey flopped down on the bed, throwing his arm over his eyes to shield them from the overhead light that Jake had turned on when they'd entered the bedroom.

Harley wasn't in the room. Jake, having 'been there, done that' more times than he wanted to remember, knew exactly where he'd find the poor kid.

Jake leaned against the doorjamb of the adjoining bathroom, his arms folded casually across his chest and a grin on his handsome face. "Problems, Princess?"

Harley turned his head and looked up, scowling from his crouched position in front of the toilet. "This is so not good," he managed to say before leaning his face into the commode.

Jake winced as Harley retched. "Patrón's not nearly so pleasant on the return trip, is it, Love?"

The boy gagged and sputtered. He pulled some toilet tissue off of the roller and wiped his mouth with it, then tossed the wadded ball of paper into the john to join the contents of his stomach. With a truly forlorn look on his face, tears began to leak from his pretty blue eyes.

"Jake..." the boy bleated through pouting, trembling lips. "Help me... I think I'm gonna die. I'm so-" He got caught short in mid-sentence and had to lean back over the toilet bowl, his body breaking out into a cold sweat as his stomach forcefully ejected more of the alcohol.

The Englishman shook his head softly. He walked over and knelt beside Harley, running his hand up the boy's soft back to gather up the long, beautiful honey-gold curls in his fingers.

A promise was, after all, a promise.

"You'll be okay, Harley," Jake cooed soothingly. "Don't worry, I'm right here."

Harley laid his arm across the edge of the toilet seat and rested his head on the back of his hand. "I'm so sorry," he wailed. "I'm such a fuckin' drunk. Why do I do this to myself?" His stomach lurched and he spewed again.

"Because you're young and stupid with no sense of your own limitations or mortality."

Jake tangled damp curls through his fingers and gently stroked the back of the boy's clammy neck. "You'll get over it."

"What am I gonna do?" Harley pleaded, full out crying now, drunk and sick.

Jake smiled. "Well, for now you're going to continue worshipping the Porcelain God for another half hour or so, and then I'm going to give you a nice, warm bath and tuck you into bed. You'll feel better tomorrow." He gave the boy's neck an easy, fond squeeze. "Maybe the day after, on second thought."

Harley had entered that mushy, maudlin, philosophical stage of a serious puke-inducing bender. "You're such a good friend," he weeped and sniffled. "Why do you even bother with me?"

"Because I love you, Princess," Jake replied without hesitation. He slapped his hand over his mouth as if that would prevent Harley from hearing the words he'd just spoken. This was positively not the time to go there.

The drunken young actor heaved into the toilet again, his skin pasty white and coated with a sheen of perspiration from the effort. He grabbed some more tissue and wiped his mouth. balling the paper up in his hand and tossing it into the bowl. Reaching up from his perch on the cold, tile floor, he managed to find the handle to flush. When the noise of the swirling water dissipated, Harley turned to face Jake, feeling like perhaps that was finally the last wave of nausea. Jake's hand was still resting lightly on his neck.

"I know you do," the boy said quietly. "I'm sorry."

Rip-roaring drunk to stone-cold sober in less than five seconds. Funny, how an emotion can do that to a person.

Jake removed his hand from Harley's neck, suddenly wishing he was the one who was drunk. At least that would be a valid excuse.

"I shouldn't have said that, Harley," Jake offered, "and you have nothing to apologize for."

Harley nodded his head. "Yes, I do. I'm sorry about what happened, Jake. You know... how things ended for us. But I wasn't so stupidly arrogant to believe that you'd ever leave Evelyn and the kids for me. I wouldn't have wanted you to do that. And then, this thing with Trey started, and I know you don't approve, but..."

"Sshhh." Jake pressed his index finger to Harley's lips, shushing the boy. "You don't have to explain. I may not approve, but I do understand." The man took a deep, sighing breath. "You just don't know how to love halfway, Harley. That's not a bad thing."

Harley bit his lower lip, and a huge tear ran down his cheek. "I do love you, Jake, I hope you know that," he said. "I always have, and I always will. I just knew that I couldn't have you, not completely anyway. I'm really glad that we can still be friends, despite everything."

Jake sighed and stood up, walking to the other end of the large bathroom to kneel and turn on the spigots in the garden tub. He stuck his hand under the jets, and when he was satisfied with the temperature he engaged the stopper, then poured nearly an entire bottle of bubble bath into the water. Swishing the warm water around to get the bubbles going, he adjusted the hot water spigot slightly and stood up again.

"Get your butt in the tub," he smiled. "I'm going to check on Trey. I'll be right back."

---

Trey was fine, either asleep or passed out on the bed. Jake pulled the covers up over him, tucking him in. He sat on the edge of the bed and lit up a Camel, smoking the whole thing as Harley's brother snored loudly beside him.

Jake craned his neck and looked down at the man sleeping soundly beside him in the bed. He flicked a long ash into the over-full tray on the night stand.

"I know why you love him so much," he whispered softly as he gazed at Trey's sleeping form. "I know..."

Standing up carefully so as not to wake Harley's snoozing brother, Jake opened an armoire drawer and grabbed a large t-shirt and a pair of plaid boxers to dress the boy in after his bath.

He snuffed out the cigarette - his last remaining vice - and returned to the bathroom.

---

Harley had always adored candles, and the decor of the master bathroom reflected that love. With lighter in hand Jake lit over a dozen of them; some tapers, some fragrant jarred Yankees, and the two, large three-wicked pillars sitting on the vanity and the edge of the tub, respectively. He flicked the switch on the wall and turned off the overhead lights, plunging the bathroom into a golden, candlelit glow.

The boy was sitting in the tub, leaning forward with his arms clutched around his propped up knees, his lithe form swaddled in steaming water and thick bubbles.

Jake ran his hand over his chin purely out of habit, the now phantom beard having long since been shorn. He took a deep, steadying breath and knelt down beside the tub.

"Feeling any better?" he asked the boy in the bath.

Harley nodded without looking up. "Yeah... the water feels good. And I don't feel like I'm gonna throw up anymore."

Jake grabbed a large, soft sponge from the rack on the side of the garden tub. He submerged it in the hot water and scooped up a fair amount of bubbles along with it. With a gentle touch he ran the warm, soapy sponge down the length of Harley's back, from the nape of his neck to the base of his spine. The boy arched his back subtly and purred like a kitten.

Jake closed his eyes. Why do I do this to myself? He stared, transfixed, at the bubbles that now clung recklessly to honey-gold ringlets, now grown nearly down to Harley's shoulder blades.

It should be fucking illegal, Jake thought fiercely, for anyone to be that goddamn pretty.

"Feels so good," Harley sighed, "feels really good."

And so Jake gently bathed the boy with the golden curls, swathed in candlelight.

As he patted Harley down with a soft, thirsty towel, drying him from head to toe as the boy stood on the plush carpeting, Jake gained a solid appreciation and a newfound respect for his own decision. For his own sense of resolve and self-restraint.

Jake pulled the huge, 2X-sized "Fall Out Boy" concert t-shirt over Harley's head and helped him to find the armholes. He held the boxers open wide as Harley gingerly stepped into them, then shimmied the garment up the boy's legs and over his rear end.

Sober, clean, dry, and dressed, Harley put his arms gently around Jake's neck and hugged the man tightly to him. "I do love you," he said simply.

Jake returned the embrace, sliding his hands around the boy's warm, slight form, but he didn't dare say the words. Not out loud, at any rate.

I love you too, Princess. I always have, and I always will.

~~~~

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© Copyright 2006 Justin Tyler. All rights reserved. Publication or distribution of any kind is prohibited without the written consent of Justin Tyler.
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