Chapter 26 - Dear Diary.

“January 15, 1885: ‘I have survived another of the dreaded Commerce Committee meetings with my father. Today was worse than before, however, as Uncle Andrew was there and joined father in his lecturing about my life. I am beginning to suspect that they don’t really wish me to amend my ways, elsewise they would have no one to vent their disapproval upon. So, not only was I forced to endure the tedium of more than an hour of incomprehensible facts and figures, but afterwards I was rewarded with a dose of the family’s disapprobrium.’” I continued to read aloud from Billy’s journal.

“This kid whines a hell of a lot,” Brian commented from his spot beside me in the bed where we were snuggled up as we read the journal together. “Kind of like someone else I know,” Brian teased, giving me a gentle squeeze to let me know he was only kidding.

“Hey!” I scoffed, and gave him a little kick with my foot. Damn, I fucking loved being cuddled up with him like this. “But, yeah, he really does,” I agreed, before I went back to my reading. “Oh, hey, this part gets more interesting . . . ‘The only good thing about today’s experience was that I was introduced to the newest member of the Committee, one Mr. Andrew Peebles. Peebles, it appears, is not only one of Our Fair City’s preeminent architects, but also one of the men on my Uncle’s short list to build the new Library he is contemplating for erection in Allegheny. I found Mr. Peebles to be exceedingly pleasant of manner and appearance . . .’”

“‘Pleasant of manner and appearance’?” Brian echoed the words I’d just read. “Who the fuck talks like that? Just say he was hot and you wanted him to fuck the shit out of you, Billy. We all know that’s what you were trying to say.”

I swatted Brian on the stomach with the back of my hand. “They didn’t talk like that back then, you oaf. They were more . . . circumspect . . . especially if they were gay.” Then I went back to my reading, excited that the next passage was more interesting still. “‘I have accepted the invitation of Mr. Peebles to join him for a glass of sherry this Friday at the Hotel Liberty and am greatly looking forward to engaging in more stimulating conversation about his architectural works . . .’”

“Yeah, I’m sure he’s real interested in Andy’s newest ‘Erection’,” Brian teased - making himself laugh - but then again, who among us doesn’t get amused at the occasional erection joke, right?

We read through a few more entries of the journal, making fun of the stilted writing style and vague allusions to Billy’s growing attraction to Andrew Peebles. But there wasn’t anything concrete to get excited about in those first several entries. Before we were even through the third week of January, I was bored. It didn’t help matters much that I was far too comfy and warm, lying there all cuddled up in Brian’s big bed. I was also still super tired after my week at the Diner. So it probably wasn’t surprising that I soon began yawning so hard that it was difficult to tell what I was saying as I read. Soon enough, Brian got annoyed by my antics and took over the reading for the both of us. Listening to his mellow, deep voice, droning on in the almost musical cadence of Billy’s writing, however, didn’t help keep me awake, and before long I felt my eyelids drooping.

When I woke up some time later, I discovered myself spooned up along Brian’s left side and my head pillowed by his broad chest as Brian napped beside me. My pillow was breathing deeply, letting out an adorable little wheeze on every inhalation. I just laid there and listened to the pleasant rumbling for a while, more content than I can describe. This felt right. This was where I belonged. I fit here, both physically, with the way my body and his meshed together like two puzzle pieces and the way the hollow of his shoulder seemed just the right size for my head, but also emotionally. It felt like I’d found my happy place and it turned out to be a hundred year old building in the heart of Pittsburgh occupied by a hairy hermit. Who’da thunk it, huh?

While I was marvelling over my luck, the hermit in question moaned in his sleep and half rolled over so that his lower body was facing me, his long right leg hooking around my left calf. My head was still resting on Brian’s shoulder, but now I was being held even tighter to him, my nose pressed against the slightly sweaty skin of his collar bone. I inhaled happily, taking in the spicy aroma of his cologne mixed with sweat and whatever it was that was inherently him. It was a heady scent.

I instantly got horny.

Please don’t judge me. I really couldn’t help myself. I was so relaxed and comfy and warm and, by then, rested. My body was just open to any possibilities at that point. And when he held me like that, and I was forced to breathe him in, it quickly became overwhelming. It didn’t help matters much that my dick was now tightly trapped between our bodies, and every time I so much as inhaled it got jostled, and I received a thrilling little shock of friction that only compounded the problem. So can you blame me if I indulged in a few minutes of gloriously decadent frotting?

Before long my activities came to the notice of my previously-slumbering bed mate; it was probably that last, rather vocal, moan that I couldn’t completely stifle. Brian awoke with a groan of his own and then, with my next thrust against his hip, he used the heel hooked behind my calf to pull me around, rolling us together until I was perched on top of him, our full bodies touching with only the thin material of our sweatpants separating us. And so we frotted and squirmed together and eventually our lips made contact allowing us to add kissing into the mix and fuck me if I wasn’t just about going insane with lust by that point. It was fucking glorious!

Thank fuck for that tiny little voice of caution in the back of my mind, though. It kept telling me, over and over, that I couldn’t take this any further, no matter what my dick was telling me. For once I even listened to that voice of reason - which I think shows tremendous personal growth, don’t you? - pulling back right before things got to the ‘point of no return’ stage.

“I think . . . I think we . . . we better . . . slow down a bit,” I panted, working hard to get my brain back online sufficiently to get actual words out. “Won’t be able . . . able to stop . . . if . . .”

“Who said I want you to stop,” Brian pointed out, towing my face back down so he could reach my lips again, and canting his hips upwards so that his erection ground against my own in the most delicious manner.

Good point. Why was I trying to stop these wonderful feelings again? What was that we’d been saying earlier about interesting erections? “Mmmmm . . . Okay . . . Kissing good . . .”

But even then that nagging piece of my conscience wouldn’t let up completely. It kept bugging me, telling me that Brian might WANT to continue, but he wasn’t READY for the results. With what little was left of my rational processes, I scrambled to come up with some alternative that would work. Something that would allow us to keep on keeping on but without triggering my boyfriend’s OCD. There had to be some way to make us both happy.

Then, out of the corner of my eye, I spied the huge organizer tray full of condoms Brian had sitting on the nightstand next to his bed. Leave it to Egbert to have organized even his condom supply, right? He couldn’t just have random half-full boxes of them stashed in some drawer like every other man in America; no, Eggy had a special, stainless steel, three-troughed, wire-mesh tray, with all his condoms perfectly lined up, every one of them facing the same way, the lines exactly even except for the first one in each row, which was slightly elevated above the rest as if waiting to be plucked free. So, of course my mind went right to, ‘why not?’.

Without breaking our kiss, I freed my left hand and pulled out the first one of the bunch. Of course, then I had to free my other hand in order to tear open the package, but I still managed to maintain a solid lip lock on Eggy’s mouth while I accomplished this step. In fact, it wasn’t until I began to reach between our bodies, squirming and wiggling around so that I could make enough room to reach my crotch, that Brian seemed to wig to what I was doing.

“Justin . . . I don’t know if I can . . .” Brian mumbled, the vibrations of his words felt against my own lips as he spoke.

“I know,” I replied, adding a kiss of reassurance at the end. “Do you trust me?”

“Yes,” he replied without any hesitation at all, and fuck me, if that didn’t make me hornier than I already was.

I gave him one more kiss, biting at his bottom lip with a tug as I pulled away, and then sat up so that I was straddling him. With Eggy watching, I unearthed my cock from the baggy sweatpants. I then very deliberately rolled the condom I’d already opened down its length. Brian was watching my every move with a hungry smile. Next, I grabbed another condom and, just as deliberately, reached out towards the waist of his matching sweats. For a split second I thought he was going to stop me, his hand darting out as if he was going to pull my hand away, but instead, he just gripped my wrist tightly as I reached inside and pulled out his beautiful dick. I wanted more than anything to take him into my mouth and suck him dry, but instead I did what I’d originally planned to do, and rolled a second condom down his length.

I had seen his dick before, held it in my hand even, but I had been so busy giving the hand job of my life that I’d never noticed just how . . . big . . . he actually was. I’m not talking length here - yes he was a solid nine or so inches, I remembered that much - but the girth on that thing was pretty phenomenal. Just thinking of what he could do to my ass with that instrument had me groaning out loud and rubbing my my ass furiously against his legs like some deprived animal.

Brian grinned up at me as he settled himself against a pillow and shuffled down the bed a bit until he was where he wanted us. His hands gripped my waist and I felt him bring his knees up so that I had something to lean against.

I looked down at our cocks, which were resting rather heavily together and I signed happily.

“So, what? You just going to sit there all day contemplating how amazing our dicks look together? Or are you going to show me what you’re made of, Sunshine?” Brian asked smugly.

I totally wasn’t prepared for that much assertiveness so I sat there, on his lap, with my mouth wide open, until the hands on my waist gripped me tighter and he began moving me against him.

“Imagine you’re riding me, Justin,” he ordered in this sex-heavy voice that went straight to my groin.

His words caused my dick to become painfully hard but I knew I wanted, more than anything, to make this good for Brian, so I had to restrain myself. I shuffled a little closer up his body and then leaned forward so I could rest my hands on either side of the pillow he was laying against. I began gyrating my hips, rocking back and forth - his cock rubbing along the crack of my ass and mine trapped between our stomachs - never breaking eye contact with him. Before I knew what was going on, Brian had manhandled me to where he wanted me and was controlling our movements with strong, self-assured, and forceful movements. He knew exactly what he was doing and, more importantly, what he wanted.

All I can say is, if I had died right then, I would have died one very happy and satisfied man.

Brian’s body began jerking wildly underneath me as he got closer and closer. The almost silent puffs of air he let out would be forever ingrained in my brain, like a favorite song. I closed my eyes so I could focus more intently on the delicious noises he was making. Damn, he was providing me with so much jerk off material, that I might never leave my bed again . . . well, only to do this again right here in his bed.

“Look at me, Justin.”

I obliged, opening my eyes again and shivering as I stared into his lust-darkened eyes.

“I want you looking at me when you cum. I want to watch it in your eyes. I want to see the exact moment you lose yourself to me.”

Those fucking words and the pressure of his hard cock grating against my ass as I rocked back and forth was what finally pushed me over the edge. I felt myself exploding from somewhere deep inside, a wash of fire flowing through every nerve ending, and my body shaking violently as my orgasm took over. I literally couldn’t see straight. I knew I was still looking into Brian’s eyes, but I saw nothing but a bright white light. At the same time, I felt the body under mine bucking and heard a groan that matched my own, only in a deeper tone, before Brian too finally came to a panting stop.

When my vision finally cleared, I found myself collapsed on top of Brian’s chest, huffing like I’d run a fucking marathon. Out of the corner of my eye I could see my Apple Watch flashing brightly, alerting me to my unusually high heart rate. Shit, 201 bpm? Good thing I was young and not genetically prone to heart attacks, or else shit like that would kill me, I thought with a quiet chuckle.

Maybe in response to my jollity, or maybe just because he wanted to, Brian took that opportunity to wrap his arms around me, holding me so tightly I felt enveloped. Not that I was gonna object; I’d never felt so cared for ever in my life. I could hear Eggy’s heart beating loudly against my ear - almost as loudly as my own - and I turned my head and dropped a kiss on his sweaty chest. He tasted salty and delicious and I wished I could bottle that taste and save it forever.

“Fuck, Brian. That was . . .” I didn’t have the right words to finish that sentence so I gave up halfway through.

“You have . . .” Brian waited a second so he could catch his breath before continuing, “. . . no idea . . . how much I wanted that . . . Justin.”

I rubbed myself teasingly against his already re-hardening cock, “I have a slight idea,” I grinned.

After about a half a minute more of just panting in tandem, I reached over to the nightstand and grabbed a handful of tissues,  lifted myself up, and reached into my sweats so I could pull off my condom. Brian did the same. I grabbed them both, holding them up to judge the volume of the contents, and gave my Egbert an approving look.

“Fucking hell, Brian! You shoot more than a . . . I don’t know . . . more than a blue whale probably.”

He shook his head at my juvenile remarks and then made this disgusted face, probably grossed out by my playing around with the icky, used condoms. Not wanting to trigger him and ruin the moment, I hurried to wrap them both in tissues, making sure not to spill anything. He looked on, approvingly, as I tossed the wad I’d made towards the trash can, smiling proudly at me as I made a perfect basket. And then I moved around so I could once more assume my comfy spot, curled up like a contented cat next to him in bed.

“Mmmm. I like it here,” I confessed, letting my hand drift upwards so I could play with the long hairs of his beard, creating a series of perfect little curly pyramid structures. “This feels . . . safe . . . you know?”

My Eggy made this happy mumbling sound in agreement.  The noise reverberated through his chest and caused me to smile. I buried my face deeper into the crook of his neck so I could breathe in his musky, sweaty goodness.

Which is when I realized I truly liked the people we were when we were together - and I know that sounds moronically stupid to say, but it’s the truth - we were good for each other in ways I’d never even thought about before meeting Brian. I wondered about that for a bit, and how lucky it was that I seemed to have found my person, after all the false starts and superficial relationships I’d tried in the past. I wondered if that was the way it was for everyone. Were all those romance novels right? Did you just KNOW when it was meant to be?

While I was waxing philosophical in my crowded and busy head, I spied Billy’s discarded journal which was lying halfway buried under Brian’s pillow. He must have dropped it when we fell asleep earlier and it got shoved aside by our happy-time antics. But thinking about Billy and Andrew, in the afterglow of our lovemaking, got me wondering again. Was Andrew the one true love of young William Carnegie? Was it like that for them? What would that journal tell me?

I reached over and grabbed the book without moving from my spot lying with my head on Brian’s chest, and flipped to the page where we’d left off. I briefly scanned through a couple of more mundane entries. Then I found something juicy and decided to read it aloud to my bed mate.

“Listen to this,” I told Brian as I recited the interesting journal entry I’d discovered. “‘January 21, 1885: ‘Last night I joined Mr. Andrew Peebles for that libation that he had earlier invited me to share and, may I say, the experience was enlightening. I met Mr. Peebles (or, as he implored me to call him by his given name, Andrew) at the Club, after which he escorted me to the Hotel Liberty, a well known establishment just a block or so away, whereupon he introduced me to his circle of friends. As several of the gentlemen were already known to me, I was quickly put at ease in their company. The owner of the hotel, Mr. BF Jones (also known as ‘Beefy’ to his more intimate acquaintances) soon invited a select few of us to accompany him to his private rooms in the basement of the building. Andrew and I followed the rest and were made right at home. We proceeded to play cards and drink far more brandy than was probably good for us, causing me to become downright giddy before very long. That is likely the reason I did not take notice of the other activities going on around me until things had gotten rather scandalous. I daren’t detail all the happenings that occured, not even in the sacrosanct confines of my personal journal, for fear of discovery, but suffice it to say that I was soon exposed to things I had never thought to imagine. I fear that, should I continue my association with Andrew and his provocative friends, I shall never succeed in turning over that ‘new leaf’ my father wished for me this year.’”

“Sounds like young Billy had a busy night,” Brian surmised with a sexy smirk.

“If he was introduced to all the toys ‘Beefy’ kept in his basement, you can count on it,” I agreed. “You know . . . when I was doing my project on your building, I looked up Peebles’ history and, by the time he was building this place, he was pretty old. Like fifty or something. Which means that there was a huge age gap between him and Billy. Which is . . . kinda creepy, you know, especially if he was taking a kid like that to wild orgies and all . . .”

“You have a problem with older men, Kid?”

I laughed. “Of course not, but it’s not like you’re THAT old. Or, maybe you are, and the beard just hides it? I don’t know . . .”

“Bite your tongue, youngling,” Egbert ordered with a playful squeeze of my shoulders from that arm wrapped around me. “Besides, from the sounds of it, your Billy was already well on his way to debauchery before he even met Peebles. Why else would his father have been lecturing him about ‘turning over a new leaf’ and all? I don’t suppose Peebles showed the boy anything he didn’t already want to know.”

“Maybe. But I don’t think their relationship could have been all that strong, what with the huge disparity in their ages,” I concluded, answering my own prior musings. “I mean, if you went by what Peebles wrote in that love letter we found behind the picture, you’d think they were lovers for a lot longer than what this journal says. They’d only met in January and by May he was dedicating the building to him? It was either a whirlwind romance or just a crazy infatuation on Peebles’ part.”

Brian’s only answer was tapping on the edge of the journal I was still holding, indicating that I would likely find my answers, if they existed, in the book.

I went back to reading. There were the usual boring daily entries - Billy had been quite the diligent journaler - but it was mostly about unimportant family issues and meetings his father made him attend as Thomas tried to groom his son to eventually take over the family business. None of it made much of an impression on me. However, a couple of weeks after the entry where Billy had first gone to the Hotel Liberty, there was another entry specific to Peebles.

“February 3, 1885: ‘Andrew is taking me to see the progress on his building today. He is rightfully proud to be the architect and owner of such an imposing edifice. He tells me it will be done later this year, of which he is glad, as he is eager to take up his next challenge. I have promised to report favorably on the work’s progress to my Uncle in the hopes that will propel Andrew higher in Uncle’s consideration for his Library project. A job such as that would be quite the feather in my Andrew’s professional cap and I shall do whatever I can to win him the honor.’”

“Makes you wonder what they got up to while Peebles was giving him the tour of the building, huh? What’s that old saw, ‘wanna come up to my place and see my etchings?’” I joked, enjoying laughing together with my Eggy.

“If these walls could talk . . .”

We continued to read through the journal as the afternoon settled into evening and the weak winter sun set outside the warm confines of Eggy’s Tower. I didn’t care. I would gladly never move again if I didn’t have to. It didn’t hurt to have something interesting to occupy my thoughts as I was lolling around in Brian’s arms, though, and this journal was definitely proving to be that.

“Damn! Looks like Billy’s father got wise to what he was up to at the Hotel Liberty,” I read in a subsequent entry. “Listen to this . . . ‘March 8, 1885: I have had a horrible row with Father this morning and am terribly distraught. That old busybody, Reverend Clarke, and his Presbyters, have again been raising a stink over what they view as the rampant lawlessness and sin of Our Fair City. These annoying do-gooders went so far as to send a delegation to confront the City Council, wherein the Reverend called out several of what he calls ‘Dens of Iniquity’. Unfortunately, both Father and Uncle happened to be in attendance at that meeting, and were appalled to discover that the Hotel Liberty, a place I have been frequenting often over the past month or so, is included on the good Reverend’s list of places he wants eradicated. I was henceforth subjected to the familiar lecture about how I am seen as a representative of ‘The Family’ and I must mind my reputation for fear of sullying theirs . . . etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. In the end, I was threatened with financial ruin if I was ever again seen entering the doors of the dreaded establishment. But if I am forbidden that refuge, wherever shall Andrew and I find another safe haven?’”

“Looks like Billy got caught being naughty,” Brian summed up the entry in his usual curt way.

“Yeah. Poor guy. I feel for him. I remember living with a homophobic father and having to sneak out of the house all the time back when I was in high school. It wasn’t fun. But a gay boy has to do what a gay boy has to do, right?”

Brian shrugged. “At least until he gets caught and his father threatens to cut him off from his older lover.”

“We know that’s not the whole story, though,” I replied. “If it had been, we never would have found that May love letter. They must have found some way to be together, despite Billy’s dad.”

Luckily, I didn’t have to read much further to discover just how it was that our lovers had managed their ongoing tryst. And in the process, I also came across the answer to one of the more puzzling parts of our building’s mystery: why the hidden tunnels?

“March 15, 1885: My dear Andrew is such a clever fellow; I shall never doubt him again. He has solved all our problems with his architectural genius. When I came to him, in despair over the fallout from my discussions with Father and Uncle, he went right to work devising a solution, and came up with the perfect expedient. Andrew posited that the real solution was NOT that I must now begin frequenting less disreputable venues than the Hotel Liberty and any other such ‘Reprobate Establishments’, but that I should henceforth avoid being SEEN to go to these places. According to his brilliant, unconventional mind, all that was needed was a mechanism by which I could continue to join him in our usual haunts, while accessing those places via some alternative entrance. And, in mere days, he has designed me just such a contrivance! It seems that the City of Pittsburgh has already been working to facilitate our plans; they have been installing improved plumbing, sewer and gas lines throughout the downtown area by way of excavation of several utility tunnels beneath our very sidewalks, and Andrew has assured me that we can take advantage of this fact. Accordingly, he is already constructing a special tunnel, making use of the City’s existing utility excavations, to connect his new building to the Hotel Liberty. This proposed underground entrance should allow us to access all the amusements offered by Dear Beefy, without fear of detection. As I said, the man is a genius!’”

“Aha!” I exclaimed when I’d finished reading that particular passage. “That’s the reason for the tunnels! They were put in so Billy and his lover could continue to hang out at their favorite gay club! See? Life back then really wasn’t that different than it is today; gay boys have always had to hide from their fathers.”

“Only, back then, instead of secretly texting their older gay lovers, they had to build entire secret tunnels,” Eggy pointed out.

“Well, yeah. They did kinda go all out there, huh?

“Ya think?” Brian laughed, whether at me or at the image of Peebles building Billy secret tunnels, wasn’t really important.

“Good thing that all I had to do to be with MY older gay lover was break into his building,” I concluded.

“That is a good thing,” Eggy agreed with me.

Then he knocked the journal I’d been reading out of my hands so he could roll over on top of me and distract me from any further reading by taking possession of my lips with his own.