The Competition

Chapter Three

The bed was unmade, the sheets beneath him were rumpled, and the room was just dark enough with the curtains closed to be gloomy despite the daylight outside. Neal was satisfied. It was perfect. He relaxed back onto the bed, arranging the pillows behind him so that he was half sat up. Outside his room the dog whimpered to be let in, and he tuned it out deliberately, barely noticing the absence when the noise stopped.

Letting the fingers of one hand tease his nipples, he dropped the other to gently cradle the heaviness beneath his still soft flesh. Everything was right. He brought an image to mind – a favourite one – while he watched the dancing of his fingertips as they skimmed over his chest. Trailing the back of his right hand down over the side of his ribs, he sighed. It took Neal less than a minute to get into the right mood. He knew his own body better than any lover, and he teased the right responses from it instinctively, until he was able to take himself in hand and begin the true purpose of it all.

He watched his own hand for a while, moving slowly up and down over his erection, just beginning to feel the build-up, and the relentless momentum that would carry him onwards. Neal let his head fall back at last, and breathed in the clean scent of his own freshly shampooed hair. As before, when he had tuned out the noise, he barely noticed it.

Now all that was important was the feeling. The grip had to be just so, and he moaned on an exhalation in appreciation when it was exactly right. He felt his own quickening pulse, his heated skin, was aware of his breathing as though it was suddenly too loud. The world became eerily still, except for him. Only then did Neal pay closer attention to the vision he had conjured up, when there was nothing else worthy to distract him.

The details of the fantasy were hazy and meaningless; the how, the why and the out-and-out weirdness of the situation. None of that mattered. He was back in the shared house he rented with three other final year students. Neal was drunk and stoned, as were they all, and they had decided to play a kind of game. A sexual game. The cushions of the settee were soft beneath him, and he glanced slowly down his own naked body to meet the darkened liquid gaze of Simon, resting on his knees before Neal.

Neither of them said anything. But Neal continued to watch as Simon slowly took Neal’s hardened flesh into his mouth without breaking the eye contact. He felt what he saw, the incredible welcoming warmth and almost obscene wetness as the head of his cock slipped past Simon’s lips, the sudden shocking sensation when he saw the other man’s tongue flick out to caress the underside of his shaft. Another inch. Now the details were important. Simon’s lips stretched around him as he moved forward, enclosing Neal in the velvety, moist embrace of his mouth.

He moaned and tried to move forwards, desperate to feel it all – but something held him back. The others were holding him to the back of the couch, their hands on his upper arms and hips. The slow forward momentum continued until he could feel the tip of Simon’s nose on his crotch, the eye contact lost as soon as he had closed his eyes to the pleasure. He whispered a heartfelt ‘please’ to those around him, wanting to be free of the hands that held him back. Simon’s tongue wasn’t still, instead moving back and forth restlessly over his length, rubbing at him sensuously.

Despite his closed eyes, Neal could see the way Simon’s cheeks hollowed out, casting perfectly angled shadows onto his face as he sucked rhythmically. And then he cried out when Simon began to pull back, those same reddened lips tight over his skin, dragging softly over his hot and needy length until they were back at the beginning. He wanted desperately to speak, but words were beyond him, and so it wasn’t his own whispered voice he heard. It was one of those beside him. Perhaps Andy.

“When you come, he’s going to fuck you.” It wasn’t a threat but a promise, and the statement was delivered with such heated desire that Neal groaned aloud as Simon’s lips began to cover him again.

“Oh, fuck! Yeah…” Neal was lost to his fantasy, and he writhed a little on the bed beneath his own hand. “Just like that,” he demanded as if there was another with him. He bit his lip harshly, just to feel the pain, his hand beginning to move faster, keeping pace with his ragged breathing.

It would be difficult to say exactly what changed, to know what broke the spell. Perhaps something just didn’t feel right. But Neal became aware of his room again, and his hand doing the work of Simon’s lips. He tried immediately to lose himself once more, closing his eyes desperately to block out reality. So close! But it was much more demanding to recreate the fantasy that it was to invent it.

While a part of him was obsessed with being in the house with Simon, almost demented, another part was cold and analytical. Now it spoke to him. Simon was not Neal’s boyfriend. The guy was just someone he shared a house with. The man wasn’t even strictly fantasy material. The guys he shared digs with were not gay themselves. How did it make any kind of sense? Despite how turned-on he was, Neal began to feel faintly ridiculous.

“Shut up,” he hissed, speaking directly to the voice. It wasn’t Simon’s physical appearance that made him hot, and it wasn’t even really the thought of getting up to these kind of games at their house. If the truth be told, if this ever turned out to be on the cards, Neal would be out of there before you could say ‘Strip Poker.’ But there was something wonderfully freeing and real about a fantasy that involved people Neal saw every day. Something illicit and very private. He loved it, and he wasn’t about to let it go. Ignoring the voice, Neal replayed Andy’s words in his mind over and over, experiencing the sweet torment of wanting to give in, but trying to stay in control.

He became embroiled in his inner world all over again, back at the precise point where he couldn’t hold back any longer, and it wasn’t going to stop. Simon quickened the pace as if to encourage him, and Neal came with a cry, jerking forward into his own hand as strings of white come shot from his cock and landed on his chest, feeling warm and satisfying. He had tensed up, but then he relaxed suddenly as the honeyed warmth of orgasm spread throughout his body. He felt it in his fingertips and his toes. At that point, Neal became still at last, moaning once more completely involuntarily as the feeling faded.

When a couple of minutes had passed, and the world widened again, Neal dropped a hand down beside the bed, and retrieved the towel he had discarded earlier. He cleaned himself up with it, and then sat for a couple of minutes more while his heart regained a more normal rhythm. Then he smiled. He always loved fantasies like that.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Demon smirked. “He didn’t listen to you, Angel,” he said proudly. He looked towards his lover just as Neal rose from the bed and opened the door before Nip could scratch a hole in it. Angel seemed so lost and hurt, his brown eyes troubled, and Demon thought he looked absolutely delightful.

“No, he didn’t,” Angel admitted honestly with a disappointed sigh. Demon embraced his lover from behind while they both watched the youth dress. The dog walked around him in circles until Neal swore at it in a fit of unreasonable temper. Angel frowned. This was going to be different – Demon had been right. But he let his head fall back against Demon’s shoulder in trust, letting his love show through his actions. His lover’s hands roamed over him possessively, and Angel smiled despite his loss. There would be more appropriate times, times when he would hold sway. “It doesn’t matter,” he said thoughtfully, happy again. Demon chuckled softly into his hair, making him shiver.

“You think not? I endured Heaven for you, Angel, and now there is but one word on my mind. Do you know what it is?” Demon taunted. Angel laughed in genuine amusement at Demon’s games. They never really worked with him. But there was a word – a word Demon had taught him – and it was only fair. Angel was all about fairness.

“Revenge,” he whispered in answer, and he felt Demon’s arms tighten around him in preparation. They were going to Hell.


To be continued...