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Montana

By: MJRoberts



PLEASE NOTE: THERE IS NO UNDERAGE SEX OR SEXUAL SITUATIONS IN THIS STORY.

The story starts with background history of some of the charters, but there is no underage sex or implications of any hints of underage impropriety of any kind.

Thanks in advance.



Dear Readers,

First off, HUGE, huge thank you to NaughtyCouture, the best beta reader helper a writer could ask for. If it wasn't for N.C., the two best scenes wouldn't have been thought up, three next hottest scenes wouldn't have been nearly as hot, and the characters wouldn't have been the ones I fell in love with! So thanks again.

Next, these characters are a work of fiction, but something specific that happened to parents of a character or characters is actually taken from my real life, maybe, I won't tell you what or which character.

Also, thanks to all the readers who have reached out and become friends. For all those who have sent compliments, this story is for you!

Enjoy!

MJ



MONTANA

Prologue

It's funny what shapes you and what doesn't.

How part of your brain can play games, and wish something was different, and paint you an entirely different history, or life in a different state, or in a different body, or on a different planet. Especially as a kid. But it can be amazing how fast you let go of that too, especially on a farm. Even a dreamer like me.

Although there was a moment when it wasn't like that. Like a song that's stuck in your head you can't get rid of, there was one day for me that replayed, over and over in the back jukebox of my mind. That's probably why flashes of that day are so vivid. 

Like a hair stuck in your glasses that you can feel but can't see, always taunting you, it's there, right in your face, but invisible. Some things you forget. Some things stay with you, shape you, like a stain on the wall that you've bleached clean, but with a flash of a CSI blue light, the blood stains stand out in sharp relief.

And sometimes, after something bad happens, a part of you is always hoping, always looking for a white knight to ride in with something good.

I was thirteen, and Clayton was seventeen, just two weeks shy of his eighteenth birthday. 

It was my parents' anniversary. They'd gone out to Route City for dinner. Even though it was late, almost ten thirty PM, my brother Clay and I were sprawled out on the couch, watching CSI Miami. Our parents weren't back yet, and we were involved in the show, watching Horatio try to figure out who ran a girl off the road, so we didn't think anything of it.

The knock at the door startled me, and I looked at the clock on the TV. 10:29 PM. My brother got up, his huge body unfolding from the couch slowly, his face staring at me with a quizzical expression even as he walked away from me to the door.

I live in northwestern Montana, in a town called Wounded Deer, population 1,100. Wounded Deer is spread out over 900 square miles, so there isn't one person I know who can see their neighbor's house from their front porch with the naked eye. The houses are too far apart for neighbors to just drop in unannounced. We might not be that close to each other in area, but we still look out for one another when we can. 

Two cops were at the door with their hats in their hands and very somber faces. 

In a town as small as Wounded Deer, you pretty much recognize everybody. The cops at the door were the police chief and Margie Greytree.

"Howdy boys. Can we come in?" the chief asked.

Clay stepped back.

The chief just looked at us.

The saturated yellow from CSI Miami flickered over them, turning everything into that light blue TV screens do when the light shines in the dark onto someone's face.

No one said anything for a minute. I couldn't figure out why they were there, what was going on.

Clay realized it first.

"How bad is it?"

"It's real bad, son." The chief looked down at the floor. "You're father's done passed on already. He was killed instantly."

WHAT?

"But your mother's over at Memorial. From what I understand, she's in real serious condition."

What, what? 

I blinked.

"Come on Clayton, Noah," Margie said gently. "Get your coats. We'll drive you over to Memorial."

It took a second, like the words weren't making any sense. My brain refused to believe it. I heard Horatio Caine, in a dry tone say, "Justice is never fair, but it sure is swift."

I burst into tears.

Clay grabbed me to him in a fierce hug. I buried my face in his chest. I thought he might crack one of my ribs, he was squeezing so hard, but I vaguely remember that I didn't care.

As if from far away, I could still hear the TV. Horatio Caine said, "Death comes to everyone, it just comes to some faster than others."

I squeezed my eyes shut, my whole face squinching up. The cable knit of Clayton's sweater was suddenly very rough and yet extremely comforting. I wanted to go back a few minutes. I certainly didn't want to go forward. I was going to stay in Clay's strong embrace forever.

"Time's of the essence boys," the chief said.

I don't remember the drive to the hospital. I don't remember walking in. I don't remember sitting down and waiting. But I remember the surgeon, his light green scrubs still splattered with blood, walking toward us as if in slow motion. I played that over and over in my head hundreds, hell, thousands of time. His voice always comes out like it's under water.

"I'm sorry. We did all we could. She didn't make it."

I don't remember anything after that. Blank spot, TV off, shock on. I think Clay might have carried me out.

And just like that all of my childhood was gone and didn't shape me at all. One day forged a mold.

But if there's one thing I've learned, it's that your life still moves forward.

Chapter 1

I existed in a zombie state for weeks after. I did my chores, and ghosted through the necessities, mechanically chewing whatever Clay put in front of me at meal times even though it tasted like cardboard.

Technically we should have gone into the foster system, because neither of us were eighteen. I still shudder when I think of that. Clayton and I would probably have been split up, and we would have lost the farm for sure. But Clay was always stronger than five men, even back then, and there was no way he was going to let that happen.

Clayton didn't have to go too far to find a way.

Old Cooter was a widower who owned the neighboring farm. Old Cooter had long brown hair which only emphasized his receding hairline. Cooter sometimes had a blade of grass he would chew on, hanging out of his mouth. He had a loud snorting laugh, and he was the best neighbor you could ask for. He was also in charge of court documents. He reissued Clay a false birth certificate saying he was born a few months earlier, so the state thought he was eighteen. That meant no one ever gave us any shit. But it also meant that all of a sudden Clayton went from being almost a high school grad to the man of the house, with a big farm to manage, and a kid to raise single-handedly.

He never batted an eye.

Clay never made me go back to school that year. His philosophy was hard physical labor would be a lot more therapeutic than sitting on my butt in a classroom, and he was right. He got certified to homeschool me, taught me after sundown, after ten to twelve-hour days on the farm. 

I'd always had a few chores but nothing like working full time on the farm from sunup to sundown. You would think that I would be cranky, thrust into all that work, and then having to sit and study with Clay for about two hours after. But I wasn't. I was so, so glad I was near Clay, near the animals, out in the fields, alive, that even after being hot, sweaty, and exhausted, I would do anything Clay said—even math.

Clay never let me feel sorry for myself. We were barely making ends meet, but we had a big house, healthy animals, large fields, each other, glorious Montana plains, God, and country. Not that I'm the moping or feel sorry for yourself type. I'm more the brood-about-all-that-is and all-that-isn't, but maybe-could've-been type. 

If I had ever dared mope, I think that would've been the one time he'd beat my butt. And he was right; I had a lot to be grateful about, so I focused on that. 

Still, losing my parents like that... it's not something you ever get over. While it gave me a real appreciation for life, it also gave me a deep fear. I feared I might lose Clay just as suddenly. Anything could happen, a farming accident, falling off a horse, anything. I prayed a lot to keep my fears at bay. I told myself our family had enough bad luck and that lighting rarely struck the same place twice.

I developed a kind of dual nature. I was practical and analytical during the day, focusing on what had to be done on the farm and in my studies, and keeping a wary eye on Clay. In the evening as soon as dinner and my studying was done, it was like a switch flipped. I became a spacey dreamer, spending hours in one of the rocking chairs on the porch staring up at the stars, imagining life in other cities, on other planets, in other realities. Sometimes I took a sketch pad out there and just sketched abstract lines and shapes, or tried to draw, badly, pictures of the animals I imagined while I was partially spacing out. In either my day or night mode, I was pretty content in both places.

I spent a lot of time with the horses. I'd always loved animals. But after my parents died, taking care of the horses, talking to them, riding them, loving them, actually, seemed like it was the main thing that kept me together. Sometimes when I woke up in the middle of the night, or just before sunrise, I'd go out to the stable and go in with my favorite girl, a tall dark brown beauty named Eagle-eye, and just brush her down, over and over, until I felt calm and centered.

I had a few friends when I was in school, but when I dropped out, those friendships faded away. When you're a kid, your friends don't really know what to say to you when your parents die, and you don't really know what to say to them. I guess when some people face a tragedy they become a ham, always vying for attention. I became quiet, like my brother. But unlike Clay, who was always so strong, I was quiet in a small, shy way. 

Maybe part of me was worried that somehow without parents I would never quite be enough, like if you didn't have a mother to teach you, there was something vital always missing in you. Sometimes at night I wondered if there would always be a chance that fate had mixed plans for me—or worse, no plans for me—or maybe there would be something good or bad coming my way. It was as if some small part of my brain was always waiting for the other shoe to drop.

In a way, the long days were a blessing. They kept me from ruminating all day and all night, which probably would have been too much.

Instead, I spent most of my day looking to and looking up to Clay, following his lead. Clayton was six foot four, with dirty blond hair and the classically handsome, rugged cowboy look that always got him the girls' attention when he was in school. But just like my pre-accident life dropped away, so did his. He never dated those first years after my folks died, and truthfully, I never thought about the fact that socially, he never went out at all. If he had any regrets, he sure didn't show it to me. 

Old Cooter came over at least once a week. Old Cooter seemed old to me, but he was probably in his mid-to-late forties. That was just his name. Sometimes he helped out with the farm or helped Clay with the bookkeeping. Sometimes he stayed for dinner and played cards. 

Between Clay's steady, calm presence, and Old Cooter's larger than life personality, I slowly came back to myself, or perhaps I should say, continued to grow into myself—someone who took the simple pleasures like horseback riding or a perfect Montana sky seriously and wasn't going to let one tragedy define him. 

At only five foot seven I wasn't nearly as tall as Clay, although he promised me more growth spurts were on the way. I didn't have his broad body; I was thin and wiry. I had the same dirty blond hair, that in my case always fell into my eyes, but other than hair color we didn't look much alike. I didn't have anywhere near his good looks, the 'I'm a man of the plains' handsomeness. 

It was Clay who put together the connection between me not being able to see as well anymore and me not wanting to be able to see as well anymore. But he dragged my ass all the way to Route City to get glasses and made me wear them. I already looked more geek than cowboy. When you added the wire-rimmed glasses, I looked like I'd be at home in a 'Where's Waldo' poster. Not that anyone was ever around here to see me besides Clay and Old Cooter anyway.

But despite the difference in our heights, looks, temperaments, and confidence, you could tell we were brothers. We were probably closer than most brothers, because we only had each other.

Our philosophy was pretty simple, keep your head down and work hard. Then continue to plow on and work hard. Be grateful.

When I was thirteen I hated being short and skinny. But almost every holiday and birthday seemed to be accompanied by me waking up suddenly feeling like I grew a tiny bit. Clay was right about the growth spurts—although I stayed slim and wiry. 

One day in May, a few weeks after I turned sixteen, Clay sat me down at the table.

"Noah, I want to talk to you about something important."

"What?"

"I think we should change at least three quarters of the farm to flax."

"What?"

"Corn subsidies are going down. Big farmers are using GMOs on everything, trying to corner mass markets, and they are squeezing a lot of farmers out, you know this."

I nodded.

"Flax could be a good deal. More people are looking at it as a health food, so more people are eating it. Old Cooter says it's a big deal in Canada. He's got a buyer lined up, so we could sell it there. It's a risk, but I think we should do it. He's willing to go in with us as a business partner; that will lower the risk a little bit. We could stand to make triple what we're making now, assuming the weather is good, and we don't fuck up."

I nodded again.

"The farm is yours as well as mine," Clay said. "We have to both agree on it."

"Let's go for it," I said.

"We'll need a farmhand."

"Where are we gonna get a farmhand? Everyone here is workin'."

"I thought I'd put the word out to some fancy agricultural colleges, see if we can get someone who knows what they're doing about this stuff."

I shook my head. "Someone like that's gonna be too expensive. And they're not going to want to come all the way out here."

He was silent for a minute. "Yeah, you might be right. I'll put the word out. See if anybody knows anybody or has any ideas. But we'll need someone soon, before it's too late to plant for this season."

"Ask Jenny Mae down at the feed store," I said. "She's related to half of Montana and probably a quarter of the rest of the world."

"Good idea. She always has her nose to the ground," Clayton said. "And while I'm at it, maybe I'll see if Sherry's busy. Jenny Mae might be 400 pounds now, but her daughters are still pretty as a picture."

*

Turns out Jenny Mae did know somebody. One of her distant cousins just graduated some fancy agricultural high school on the border of New York and Canada and was looking for a place to get real world experience. Jenny Mae said they had to take all kinds of new-fangled courses in rare grains, cutting edge technologies, new farm business management.

It was the perfect solution. He had education we didn't have; we had experience he didn't have. We could pay him a decent salary without having to pay him an arm and a leg. 

After three years of just my brother and me working the farm, we'd have someone new around. I liked the idea, a start of a new adventure.

Chapter 2

The new guy would have to stay with us. Our house is pretty large, but it only has three bedrooms, and we'd been using one bedroom as an office. We moved all the office stuff into the dining room, moved the dining room table into the living room, and we were ready for the new guy. He could start in a week.

Clay and I debated on whether we should both go and meet him at the airport. I felt we should. Clay felt there was no reason for us to lose a half-day labor for both of us on the farm. In the end, I conceded that one, and after breakfast he left for the airport to pick up Kevin, and I started my daily chores.

I had my earphones in and was tossing bales of hay when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I jumped and then turned around. It was Clay. I took off my headphones.

"Noah, this is Kevin."

He gestured to someone behind him. The guy was in silhouetted in the open barn doors, so all I could see was his large dark shape, with sunlight streaming out from behind him. He stepped toward me. At first sight of him the world titled. I felt a jolt of electricity, lighting bolt strong, go through me from my toes to my head and back again. My breath caught, and my heart seized up.

I gulped. I blinked. My temperature spiked about a hundred degrees.

I dropped the pitchfork.

Kevin walked the last few feet toward me and stuck out his hand.

I wiped my hands on my jeans and shook his hand. A zing of awesome lust zoomed up my arm with a prickling sensation.

I blinked again.

"Aaaaahhh..." I said.

He had a firm handshake, and after two quick pumps, he let go of my hand. I wiped my hand on my jeans again, as if that would wipe off some of the lust and electricity that seemed to pool there.

He was tall, maybe six-three, with dark hair, bright green eyes, big dimples. And I immediately wanted to say witty things to make him like me. I wanted him to tackle me to the ground. I wanted him to whisk me up into his arms and whirl me around.

Something about him was both sophisticated and ruggedly gorgeous, and I wanted to lick him all over. I hadn't felt anything like this before, nothing even close.

Sex had been on my mind a lot the past year, with a vague feeling like I constantly wished I could get my rocks off, but I had schooled my mind from dreaming anything too specific. Except now in front of me was something clearly, very, very, specific, and my entire being was screaming with wanting it.

I was staring. Really staring.

"Welcome to the farm," I said. My voice cracked. Oh gosh. Did I sound like an idiot? 

"I'm going to show Kevin his room, then go introduce him to Old Cooter," Clay said.

I nodded.

I tried to get my heartbeat under control. We needed Kevin to stay. I couldn't risk doing something that would put him off before he even started. Even though I was pulling the weight of an adult, he probably would see me as a kid, at least somewhat. I bowed my head, blown over by the intensity of feelings I felt. I had to keep my lust under wraps. The farm had to come first.

Chapter 3

I was a little worried about the transition from just Clay and me, to having someone else in the house, but Kevin put us at ease right away. He grew up with five brothers, and the idea of sharing a bathroom and a TV remote didn't bother him. Better than the ease with which he fit in was the casual way he was always saying something to crack us up. I hadn't realized how glum and serious we'd become until Kevin's lighthearted personality joked us into a better way.

We were probably one of the youngest working trios in the area. I was sixteen, Kevin was eighteen, my brother was twenty-one. But I have to say, we kicked ass. Kevin showed us things we never would have thought of, like when you are sowing the flax, put a little flour in with it, and that helps the seeds sprinkle out evenly and germinate faster. 

I grew another two inches the first few months Kevin was here, topping out at a little over six-one, and I felt weird—new and gangly—like a colt in a strange, new place. The way I felt about my body was probably parallel to how we all felt on the farm, not knowing if the flax was going to pay off.


Montana



A reporter from our local paper found out that each flax flower only blooms for a day. She wrote an article about it, and then a big shot reporter from Billings wrote an article about the flower seasons and uses of flax, and even before the fall harvest, we had extra orders we hadn't expected. 

We worked so hard, we didn't really have time for anything else. I still woke up every morning at 5:45 to milk the cows and check on the horses, but everything else was flax, flax, flax, from the time the sky lightened until it was too dark to work. The days went by as the weather changed, and changed again. As much as vague urgings tried to wander into my mind at night, my day was singularly focused on the farm and the new work created by the flax. Planting, watering, checking, harvesting, bundling, drying, threshing, packaging, shipping, planning, planting again.

Clay was still teaching me after sundown, although Kevin took over more and more of the teaching when I started studying for my GED. Kevin apparently whizzed through school, and his light-hearted manner worked more for teaching me than Clay's concentrating frown.

Every day after my 'school work', Kevin and I made dinner. Kevin was an amazing cook, which was something, because we'd been living on Clay's plain burgers for way too long. Kevin told me what to do, usually chopping vegetables and things like that, and I did it. We cooked pasta carbonara, and tons of other Italian dishes, sixteen different types of Asian inspired stir fry, Greek foods I'd never heard of—and could barely pronounce—but loved to taste.

There was something special about all the prep time we spent in the kitchen. Kevin with his dark hair, which had grown longer, would fall down around his face when he looked down at something he was cooking. Our kitchen was big, but somehow I always managed to be close at his side, barely brushing my hip against his, or reaching for the same thing at the same time. He definitely gave the instructions, and I just blindly followed them, but I enjoyed it, all of it, not just because it was new and different, but because it gave me some extra time with him.

After our late dinner, all three of us usually settled in to watch TV every night. After the first year, Clay went out occasionally to the bars by himself on a weekend night if something special was going on. He was the only one over twenty-one. Kevin and I were still too young to go.

Harvesting flax was a lot different from corn or anything I'd ever done. But we didn't just get used to it, we thrived on it.

After that first season of success, Old Cooter decided he wanted to move to a warmer climate and he let us buy his land. He had two farmhands over there who already know what they were doing. It was a win-win situation.

Clay spent a lot of time over on Cooter's land, which left Kevin alone with me more. We got a new horse, a small bay who Kevin named Arabelle, and I called Ari. She was sweet and well-behaved. Kevin taught her how to stamp out her front foot, three times in answer to simple math questions where the answer was three. Clay thought that was pretty stupid, but it still amused me every time Kevin asked Ari what was one plus two, or seven minus four, and Ari would stamp her answer.

Clay got a new contract, and we started working even longer hours, seven days a week.

It was mid-winter, on a brittle, clear, windy, bitterly-cold day about an hour before sun down. Kevin and I had cleared a small path from the chicken coop to the outbuildings. We were way out between the machine shed and the remains of the old, dilapidated, original barn, shoveling a path in the snow. He had his back to me. I stopped to admire his form. His strong back and perfect ass, flexing and bending as he lifted the heavy shovels of snow. He was so incredibly beautiful, big and strong, in his red parka, dark blue gloves, grey scarf, and snug jeans. I planted my shovel in the snow and just leaned on it a second, enjoying the sight of him. I took a small step back, slipped over a rock or patch of ice, and went down hard on my ass with a loud bang.

"Ooof. Fuck!"

Kevin turned around. He was over me in an instant. "You all right?"

I knew I twisted my ankle pretty badly, but I was tough. "I don't know. I'm more embarrassed than anything." 

"Happens to the best of us." 

I felt a tiny throb in my left ankle, but I figured it was nothing. Kevin put a hand out and helped me up. A shooting pain zinged up my ankle. I went down. "Holy shit," I said.

"What is it?" he asked.

"It's my ankle," I said.

He got his shoulder under my armpit and helped me up. "Ya think it's broken?"

"I don't know. I don't think so. It's probably just a minor sprain." We hobbled together about three feet.

We both stopped and stared at the house. We could just barely see the top of the roof in the distance. It was almost a mile away. The household only had one truck and as usual, Clay had it.

"Listen," Kevin said. "That's too far for us to walk back in the snow. The best way to get you home is by horse."

We both looked to the barn. Not far, but it might as well have been in Siberia for how I was feeling. Kevin looked behind him and half-carried me until I was leaning against the side of the machine shed.

"All right, buddy. I'm going to the barn, and I'll be right back." He turned around and jogged to the barn. I watched him go. I wanted to hang my head. This was my fault. I was seventeen, I should know better than to be mooning over my best friend while I was out on the farm. That's how accidents happen, obviously.

I waited a few minutes, looking down and blowing on my hands. When I heard hooves I looked up, and there was Kevin, riding Eagle-eye.

I expected him to bring two horses, riding one and leading another, but that's not what he did. He swung down off Eagle-eye and came over to me. He helped me hobble over to her. I patted a friendly hand on her flank and realized it was going to be a bitch getting up. Apparently Kevin realized it at the same time too. 

"Okay," he said. 

He stood close behind me, put his hands on my hips and took all my weight as I put my good foot in the stirrup. I swung my leg over, and I was up. He stared for a minute. I scooted way forward, and he easily got on behind me. Eagle-eye grunted at the extra weight. Kevin snuggled up his hips next to me, reached around for the reins, and made the tsk-tsk sound he always did when working with her.

I held myself rigid, my cheeks on fire in the whipping cold, embarrassed from my fall and from my enjoyment of the feel of his thighs against mine. But my ankle was killing me, and after a few seconds the tension of holding myself like a board was too much. I melted into him, my back loose against his front, my neck and head a boneless puddle against his shoulder. I reveled in the feel of his forearms against my sides and the warmth of his gloves near the front of my waist.

The ride back was short.

He got down first and helped me a little as I slid down onto one leg. We hobbled up the front steps.

The warmth of the house and the hard seat of the kitchen chair never felt so good.

I couldn't get my boot off.

Fuck.

"Ah, Kev, I need help."

He looked at me.

"Fuck."

"Yeah, my sentiments exactly."

He knelt in front of me.

Now my ankle wasn't the only thing that was swollen. I was glad I was wearing a long jacket. 

He grabbed my boot, and I clenched my hands into fists.

"Ready?"

"Yeah."

He yanked my boot off in one swift motion and fell back on his ass.

"Yaaaaaaggggh." I had tried not to scream. No such luck.

Kevin got back up, knelt again and tenderly touched my ankle.

Ouch, ouch, ouch.

Oh God. He's finally touching me, and please God, touch me all over, but not there. I sweated inside my coat.

He kept touching me, the electricity driving me mad.

"Stop touching me, Kevin," I whispered.

He must have misinterpreted the cause of my grimace, because he tried to cheer me up.

"Hey, now your ankle is almost as swollen as your head."

"Very funny."

He got up. He opened the cabinet under the sink and took out a bucket.

Oh no.

He started filling it with ice.

Oh, God no.

I closed my eyes. I opened them. He added water to the bucket. He brought it in front of me. Rolled up my jeans.

"Sorry, dude," he said.

Then he took my leg and plunged it in the bucket.

"Aauuuuggghhh!"

I tried to pull my foot out, but he put pressure on my knee to keep my leg in there.

"God damn it, Kev," I said, my eyes watering. "That hurts worse than twisting it."

"I know, I know. Twenty minutes in, and then you can take it out."

Clayton came in, stamping his feet. "What's Eagle-eye doing out in the snow? Oh, fuck."

"Hey, boss."

"Wha'd you do?" Clay said to me.

"I twisted my ankle," I said, ducking my head. "No big deal."

"How'd you do that?"

Well you see, I'm gay. And a year ago, we hired this hot guy. And I haven't done anything about it. And today I was staring at his ass so hard I fell over.

"Well?"

"I don't know. I was shoveling, and I slipped on a patch of ice. It's no big deal."

"Kiddo, you gotta be careful on a farm," Clay said.

No shit.

"I'll go put Eagle-eye away," Clay said and walked out.

The only good thing about this was Kevin still had his hands on my knee, and his chest pressed as close to my upper leg as the bucket would allow.

"Has it been twenty minutes yet?" I asked with as much humor in my voice as I could muster.

Kevin laughed. He let go of me and got up.

Damn.

"I'm gonna go back to shoveling"

Double damn.

He left.

My ankle hurt like a son of a bitch. I closed my eyes and tried to distract myself. I knew that being on a horse with Kevin and having him plunge my leg in a bucket was probably the most physical contact a guy as shy as I was would ever get with him. I hung my head and sighed. I talked to my ankle.

"You know, ankle. It was almost worth it."

It was the next day when my ankle stopped throbbing enough that I thought to thank Kevin.

"Dude, don't mention it, I'd do anything for you, you know that."

Oh, God. I've got it bad. Because that touch meant so much to me, and I knew it would have to last me awhile... maybe forever.

Chapter 4

It was like Kevin was a good luck charm, we had so much success on the farm. Our garden tomatoes on the porch grew bigger, the attitude of the whole house was lighter, and the constant buzz I got from being a seventeen-year-old with a secret crush, well, I ruthlessly forced down, and it gave me energy to spare.

I had just put Ari back in her stall when the grumbling sound of the motor in the background slammed into my conscious full force like having a ten story brick building dropped on my head. I ran to the open barn door and looked out.

Kevin!

He was riding the tractor.

"Kevin!" I yelled. But of course he was too far away to hear me.

I spun around and got Eagle-eye out, jumped on her bareback, and pushed her into a hard gallop.

"Hee-yah!" I yelled as I leaned forward near her neck, squeezing my thighs hard against her, urging her on with all I could. 

I saw the potential accident in my mind, as vivid as a 3D movie and then some. The wind whipped my face. Panic surged through me, and Eagle-eye put out another burst of speed. But it was like when you see a cup drop off a table, and everything seems to go slow motion for a second as you realize you're not fast enough to get across the room to catch it before it hits the floor. You know it's going to shatter, but there's nothing you can do about it.

"KEVIN!!" I yelled again.

But of course, over the noise of that old tractor motor, there was no way he could hear me. He was headed toward the ditch at the northeastern part of our property, but the problem was the heavy rains from last week would have made that ditch into a gully. The tumbleweeds and leaf debris from the wind storm we had yesterday would cover it, and it was around a blind corner Kevin couldn't see from where he was.

All it would take is just a little bit of the tire to be more on ditch than on solid ground and it would cause a rollover.

The number one cause of deaths on farms.

Oh God.

And that old tractor didn't have a rollover bar.

I spurred Eagle-eye with my heels. "Come on," I whispered. "Faster. Faster! Come on, girl, he's almost at the bend."

We cut across the fields, and then suddenly nothing was in slow motion, it was in super speed. I was almost there! Yes! I made it.

Kevin craned his neck around and saw me barreling toward him.

I vaulted off the horse just as I heard a sickening pafff-swaaaft of a tire slipping. Five tons of John Deere tractor hovered miraculously on its side for a second, as if it couldn't decide whether to come back down on its wheels or flip over. I ran the last few feet there just as it flipped over into the ditch.

Oh, God.

"Kevin!" I yelled. 

I laid down flat on my stomach. 

"I'm okay!" he said. 

The tractor was suspended upside down in the ditch. Thank God Kevin was wearing his seatbelt.

I started digging in the soft mud like a mad dog, scraping and flinging mud out of the way with a super strength I didn't know I had until there was enough room for me to get to him. I unhooked his seatbelt, grabbed him hard around the armpits before he even had his bearings, and dragged him out fast; his body left a huge mark in the mud. I rammed my shoulder into his midsection, picked him up into a fireman's carry, and ran for all I was worth.

I made sure Eagle-eye was running away with me.

Kevin was three inches taller, and about forty pounds heavier than me, but I made fast time away from that tractor until he started hitting me on the back.

"Dude! I'm okay, what are you doing?"

I kept running. 

"Yo. Dude."

I dropped to my knees, put Kevin down, and threw my body on top of his.

"Noah, what the hell are you doing?"

"Did you smell gas?"

"No," Kevin said.

I lifted my head up and stared at him. My breath came out in huge, heaving, gasps.

"Dude. Ya gonna get off me?"

The tractor exploded.

I used my body to shield Kevin's.

A blast of heat wafted over us.

"Holy shit," Kevin said in my ear.

I braced my hands on the ground and raised up on my forearms, doing a sort of half push-up on him as I twisted my body around to look at the wreckage. One giant fireball.

We both spoke at once.

"Noah, you saved my life."

"Clay is going to be so pissed."

Kevin pulled my torso back down to him and grabbed my back in a huge hug. I started laughing hysterically.

"You're safe," I said between giggles. I couldn't stop laughing for a few seconds. Then I had the shakes. Adrenaline burn off.

"Yeah," he said.

I collapsed, my forehead knocking smartly into his. I heard thunder, and the whistling sound the leaves made when rain was very close, and then the heavens opened up and we were soaking wet. I turned around to look at the twisted, burnt, wreck of modern art sculpture that up to a few minutes ago had been our tractor. The fire was fizzling out in the rain.

Thank God.

"Dude, ya gotta get off me, you're crushing my junk."

I laughed. He was okay. I don't think I have ever been so grateful for anything in my whole life. I pushed my glasses back up my nose. The frame was hot. I looked over at Kevin. He was okay. We were okay.

"Kev, you gotta stop eating your own cooking." I gave his flat stomach one light slap. "You weigh a fuckin' ton."

"Yeah, and I still do, thanks to you, hero."

*

Clay wasn't as pissed as I thought he'd be about the loss of the tractor. "I've been saving up for a new one. That thing was older than I am. We should have one that has all the new safety features."

Kevin made a huge deal of me rescuing him, telling the story to Clay over and over again until I finally had to give him a light punch on the shoulder to tell him to shut up.

"Seriously, Clay, it was like he was psychic. If he hadn't started to come for me before the accident happened, you'd have Kevin toast ashes on your mantle for sure. You should have seen him barreling down on me with Eagle-eye. It was like something out of a movie, totally fierce."

"I'm just glad you're okay," Clay said for about the hundredth time.

Kevin looked straight at me. "Yeah. I am now."

*

As always happens, winter turned to spring, and before we knew it, Kevin had been with us almost two years.

We had just finished another flax planting, and the spring day, which had been warm, turned into a scorcher. Kevin picked up the hose on the side of the barn that we use to water down the horses. He took off his cowboy hat, and his shirt, and laid them over the fence. Then he turned the water hose on, spraying it up in the air above his head, so it rained down on him like a shower. The sun was just beginning to set, the first streaks of pink high in the sky. Kevin was glistening, sweat and water. His eyes were closed, and his head was thrown back. He looked like he was starring in the most obscenely delicious porno I had ever seen.

I watched as he rubbed the water into his hair and over his chest. His jeans plastered to him as soon as they got soaked. When I realized I was getting hard, I turned my back to him. I had been staring, for sure. What if he had opened his eyes and caught the way I was looking at him?

Then a huge blast of cold water hit me square in the back.

"What the hell?" I sputtered and turned around.

Kevin had a playful expression on his face, and his thumb over the spray, fanning it out to hit my face and torso.

"Yikes, ahh, that's cold," I said as I tried to jump away from the spray. But his aim just followed me.

"That's the point," Kevin said. "Too hot? I'll hose you down."

I threw my hat to the side. "Fuck that," I said. I rushed him, trying to get the hose away from him. He was still taller and bigger than me, so even though I ended up tackling him in the midsection, he didn't go down. Kevin just pushed the water near me, and it ended up in my face. I sputtered.

"I'll get you," I said. I ducked to avoid the most intense part of the spray. I ended up grabbing Kevin's leg, my hands slipping down the wet denim. The ground had become muddy beneath us. I gave a yank, and Kevin fell backwards, landing hard on his butt, and I jumped on top of him trying to rip the hose away. He rolled on top of me and wrangled me and the hose until he was able to shove the tip of the hose down my pants.

"Oh, fuck!" I said as cold water cascaded down into my underwear, shriveling up any evidence I had of excitement. "Damn," I said as I pushed him off me and rushed to pull the hose out. 

"Mud fight," Kevin said. He tackled me, and I dropped the hose, which continued to make the ground beneath us further and further into a pond of mud. I bucked hard underneath him and managed to get out from under, but while I was slipping on my hands and knees, trying to get up, he tackled me from behind, lying on top of me with his arms wrapped around my head and neck in a wrestling half nelson pose.

"Uncle," Kevin said. "Scream uncle."

"No," I said. I bucked up underneath him again, and this time, without meaning to I ground my ass up into him.

He just pushed me into the mud further, and I had to sputter as I got some in my nose.

"What the hell is going on?" Clay bellowed.

We both froze. I spit some more mud out of my mouth.

"Ahhh, mud wrestling?" Kevin said.

"What are you two, six? Come on, get up and hose yourselves down. I'll put out Noah's studies for the day."

"Spoilsport," Kevin mumbled when Clay walked away. He was still on top of me. I was starting to get aroused again, and I was hoping the mud on my face would hide the fact that my cheeks were on fire.

Kevin rolled off me and laid in the mud for a second before helping me up. My mud-soaked glasses were hanging off my face, just barely hanging on by one bent temple bravely clinging on to my left ear. Kevin gingerly placed them back on my face and wiped some of the mud off the lenses. 




Montana



"I won," I said, and sent him a cheeky smile.

He gave me a friendly pat on the back. "Yeah. Keep telling yourself that."

That night, as my hands slowly wandered down my body, I let myself, for the first time, imagine they were Kevin's hands. I stroked myself, wondering what would have happened if Clay hadn't shown up. I pretended Kevin started the whole mud fight just to seduce me. I could feel him, literally feel him, his hip bones grinding into my ass when we were both face down in the mud. In the way of fantasies his clothes suddenly disappeared, and he ground his hard erection into my jeans, nestling himself forcefully into the crack between my muscled cheeks, wanting in. I could smell that delicious Kevin sweat, and feel his hands, so hot on me they scorched through my shirt. I arched back up into him and tilted my head to the side, baring my throat. In my dream he put his mouth near my ear and growled, "Why don't we get you out of those muddy clothes, dirty boy?"

I could feel how hard Kevin was as he kept grinding his pelvis into my ass. My clothes disappeared, and he reached around to stroke my cock. My brain told me it was his hand, not mine, stroking harder, faster. My body bowed off the bed with the overwhelming hot pleasure. 

I scrunched my face up tight. I was torn as my fist stroked faster. In the back of my mind I was fighting guilt, hoping I wasn't too much of a sleaze, lusting so completely over my best friend. On the other hand, it felt so good, so right... so real. I could smell the wet mud, hear the splashing sound of the running water and the squinching sound of the mud below us, everything magnified under the smell of Kevin's sexy, hot sweat.

I wanted to prolong it, draw it out further, but I pictured him plunging into me, and biting my ear, and I lost control.

The release was the best I ever had, and I bit my bottom lip to avoid shouting. I knew I should feel guilty, but I didn't. I felt wonderful.

Chapter 5

Pretty soon it was my eighteenth birthday, and Clay actually let us take a whole day off. We had too much food and beer. Then Clay turned to me and said, "I think for a while we should stop doing flax."

"What?"

"We made a shit load of money. It's not good to work the land like that year after year. Even with us doing some rotation and keeping a small part fallow, we're overworking it."

I was silent for a few moments. "What would we do?"

"What would you want to do?"

"I'd like to have a ranch where we can teach kids to ride horses."

"Then that's what we'll do."

"Really?"

"Yeah."

Then I had the stomach plummeting notion that maybe we wouldn't need Kevin as much if we did that. Or that Kevin wouldn't want to be part of something that wasn't giving him agriculture experience. But I'd already said it. Shit. What if Kevin didn't want to do that? Clay looked over at Kevin, and he nodded.

"That'll take up some of our property, a good portion of it if we make it really big, but we can still farm Cooter's land," Clay said.

"We could do oats," Kevin said. "Or cherries."

We looked at him.

"They'd both grow really well here. You've got a lot of land, if you consider what you bought from Old Cooter. Having oats and cherries would replenish and ground the soil, making richer ground if you ever want to do flax again in a few years. And it would give the horses something to eat. And us."

"Huh," Clay said. He looked at me.

"Sounds good to me," I said.

"All right then," Clay said. "Let the celebration continue." He brought out a huge cake, which was ridiculous, because it was only the three of us. It had big candles on it—a one and an eight.

"Make a wish," Clay said.

I looked over at Kevin, his dark hair and sparkling, knowing eyes, big dimples, and perfect shoulder muscles. I knew what my wish was. I realized I was staring at him.

"That's a great idea," I said softly to cover the fact I stared at him a little too intensely, a little too long. I closed my eyes. Until I first saw Kevin, I never knew I was gay. But the moment I saw him, I knew what I wanted. I just felt he would never want me. I was just a kid. But I was an adult now. I wished, fervently, for something I didn't feel I'd had any of since my parents died. Courage.

I took a minute with my eyes closed and the candles burning in front of me. In my mind I could see Kevin's torso, the way it glistened with sweat when he was working hard. God help me. I needed more than courage. I needed courage and the willingness to do something about it.

I opened my eyes, blew out the candles. Both Kevin and Clay gave me hearty smacks on the back.

"All right," Clay said. "Let's pick a movie for tonight." 

About a million years after other people, we had just managed to get a subscription to a movie streaming service. Because it was my birthday, it would probably be my pick. I wanted to pick something with handsome tortured gay guys coming out but couldn't. First of all, I couldn't think of any, and second of all, there's no way I'd be able to watch something like that with Clay and Kevin.

Instead, I picked a classic that I had heard about, called Bound. I thought maybe the homosexual theme would sort of... I don't know, give me some heads up regarding the world's temperature, but both Clay and Kevin seemed fixated on Gina Gershon's general sexiness, so that was really no help. I did like the movie, though.

I spent a few hours awake in my bed that night, my arms cradled behind my head, staring up at the ceiling. If I wanted Kevin, I was going to have to do something. He never would. It would have to be either here in the house or outside, in the barn or in the fields somewhere. I tried to weigh the benefits of each. If we were inside, it was possible, but unlikely, we could be caught by Clay. He was a heavy sleeper. If we were outside, the chances of being caught by Clay were still not very great, because he was spending a lot of time on Old Cooter's section, and we usually knew when he was coming and going. But not always, as evidenced by our mud-ious interruptus. So the chance of getting caught was greater.

I continued to weigh the pros and cons of each but finally decided on the house. The truth was, too many accidents can happen on a farm if a man's distracted. Even if I could catch Kevin on a moment's break, I couldn't be sure that whatever I did would be well received. If he fell under a tractor or into a thresher a moment later, I'd never forgive myself.

That left the house. I tried to figure out when would be right—what would be right. 

I could wait until Clay went out one night, but that could be months. With all our farm work, he wasn't going out much lately. I could wait until Kevin's birthday maybe, although that was also months away. The more I thought about it, the more I came to the conclusion the best time to approach Kevin would be now, tonight. Maybe he'd be more likely to hear me out, less likely to hurt me on a day we were still celebrating my birthday.

As if my legs and feet had a mind of their own, they swung me out of bed and out my door. I tiptoed silently down the hall and suddenly found myself in front of Kevin's closed door. I stared at the door for a few minutes, a cold sweat breaking out on my forehead and my breathing coming out in harsh, uneven rasps. I had an attack of shyness worse than I ever had. What the hell was I doing here? What the hell would I say to him? I looked down and prayed for courage and guidance. I gathered my nerve. Whatever the result, I had to do this. It was now or never. My fist raised before I was even one hundred percent decided. It was shaking. I very, very quietly knocked on his door. "Kevin?" I whispered.

An extremely sleepy voice replied, "Come in."

I opened his door and shut it behind me. Kevin sat up in bed, the sheets pooled down around his waist and hips, exposing his glorious torso. Oh my God, did he sleep naked?

He rubbed his eyes over his face and tried to focus. "Noah," he said. "Oh, my God. Is it one of the animals?"

Kevin jumped out of bed in one quick move, showing me that he did indeed sleep naked. He grabbed a pair of jeans off the floor—bending over and displaying a marvelous view of his perfect, well-muscled, naked ass—and yanked them on. He zipped and snapped his jeans as he talked.

"Is it one of the horses?" He was looking around. He spotted his cowboy boots behind me and went to grab them.

I stopped him with a hand on his bare chest.

"It's not the horses," I whispered.

"Huh?"

"Everything on the farm is fine. It's not the horses."

I saw his eyes dart to the digital clock. 2:30 am. He looked confused.

"It's me," I said. "I couldn't sleep." It came out the way a five-year-old would say, 'Mommy, I had nightmares and I couldn't sleep'.

He just smiled and stepped back. He sat on the edge of his bed, and I sat down next to him. 

"The pressure of finally being legally an adult getting you?" he asked in a teasing voice. 

I smiled back at him. 

"Well being an adult will surely have its downfalls, but it also has its privileges. And I've been feeling a pressure all right."

A sliver of moonlight coming in from between the slats of Kevin's blinds landed on his cheek. Almost involuntarily, my hand raised up to stroke that silvery beam of light, but what Kevin said next stopped me.

"You know, my parents died when I was young, too."

I dropped my hand. "I didn't know," I said. How could I have lived with this guy for two years and not know an important piece of information like that?

He shrugged and focused at some point on the wall over my shoulder. "When you're right in the thick of it, you just put your head down and barrel on," he said. "But then, on my eighteenth birthday, right before I came here, I had a little bit of a breakdown. What if that happens to me? What if adulthood mows me over like it did them? What the hell was I going to do?"

"What did you do?" I asked.

"I came here," Kevin said. He looked at me. "Jenny Mae told my older brother, and he told me, and I jumped at the chance to leave everything bad behind and start totally new, in a whole different environment."

"I... had no idea."

"So, it seemed like I was doing you a favor, coming for the job way out here, but in a way, you two were doing me a favor, giving me a new place to be, to forget for a while."

I nodded. I didn't want to ask but I felt I had to. "How did your parents die?"

"My mother died of breast cancer, and then my father shot himself."

I slammed one hand onto my chest and one hand over my mouth. The matter-of-fact tone he used was at complete odds with the pain that hit me like an exploding bullet, square in the heart.

"Oh, my God." I grabbed Kevin and yanked him into my arms for a huge hug. I held him and rocked.

"I would do anything," I said. "Anything for you not to have to feel hurt."

He laughed, a sorrowful sound.

Every single conversation we'd had in the time he's been here was replaying through my head on super speed. Was his jocular way just a defense? Humor as a cover up for something deeper?

I rubbed his back, but he didn't seem to need comforting. I did.

"So I get it, No," Kevin said, shortening my name the way he often did. "Turning eighteen just brings on a whole onslaught of 'life can be so short what do I need to do differently?'"

"Life is precious," I said.

"That's right, but it can also be fun. So snap out of it."

"I need you to do something for me," I said.

"Anything," he said. He didn't hesitate. He pulled out of my embrace to look at me.

"Actually, it's something I need to do for you," I said. Then, as if in slow motion, I reached out with my hand and put it in the center of his chest. He just stared down at it, confused. Then slowly, I slid my hand down, over his waistband, onto the bulge in his jeans and squeezed.

He scooted back from me, eyes wide. But I followed him, not removing my hand. "Shh, shh," I murmured.

Kevin's gaze darted around like a startled horse. "What the hell, No?" he rasped, his voice coming out in a harsh whisper.

I ground the heel of my hand into the base of his cock, and his hips made a small, involuntary thrust up into my hand. I treated him like the startled animal he was, talking to him a quiet, calming, reassuring voice. "It's not a big deal, just two guys helping each other out because there aren't any girls around. Let me help you. That's it. Shuusssh. Let me help you."

I kept rubbing him through his jeans. His eyes closed, and I could see him fighting himself.

"Aw fuck, Noah," Kevin whispered.

I opened the snap on his jeans. Then I very, verrrrry slowly lowered the zipper down. "Let me do this Kev," I whispered near his ear. "Let me do this one thing."

"Oh God," Kevin said.

I reached in, and I was touching the bare skin of his cock. It was warm and smooth. I might have stopped there if he wasn't hard.

I tried to wrap my hand around him, but I could barely do that with us both sitting up so close together; the angle was all wrong. I put one hand on his chest and pushed him toward his pillows.

"Fuck, No, what are you doing?"

"This," I said, and I reached in and gave one firm tug. His hips bucked way up with me, and he pulled the flaps of his fly apart a little. I gave another stroke.

"Oh fuck," Kevin said.

"Please. This is the something," I whispered. "Tell me to stop, and I'll stop. But it's not a big deal. It's just..." I stopped talking as he let out a soft quiet moan and bit his lip. His eyelids fluttered shut.

I stopped, suddenly shot through with insecurity. His eyes flung open and stared at me, harsh in the moonlight. We stared at each other. Raw. Moment of truth. I started to withdraw my hand. And slowly, very slowly as if in slow motion, he put his hand over mine.

We didn't move, just stayed there for a moment with my hand around his warm cock. My heart was like a thousand horses ready to beat out of my chest and bolt. His hand was sweaty and clammy over mine.

I thought maybe he would push me off him, and I would run from the room in shame. I had said it was nothing, just two guys helping each other out, but for me that wasn't true. I took a deep breath and calmed the pounding of my heart and focused instead on love and then on lust. I gave him one firm squeeze. It would be up to him now.

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. Copyright belongs to MJ Roberts 2014. Please do not reproduce without permission from the author. 



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