The Santa Mug (6 page)

“Darry, what are you doing? We have a tree to decorate.”

“I’m decorating my own tree,” Darren said. “Bare branches, remember?” He slipped the shirt over Marlon’s laughing protests and stole a quick kiss as his head emerged.

“Hey! That’s not fair,” Marlon said. “Come back here.”

“All’s fair in love and tree decorating,” Darren replied. “Now, hold still.” He unfastened Marlon’s pants and slipped his hands along the length of Marlon’s hips, pushing pants and shorts down to puddle at his feet. He stole a few more kisses as he stood, and Marlon’s body twitched at the feather-light sensations.

“Now,” Darren said. “The tree is bare, and as you said, the lights go on first.”

Marlon held his arms out, laughing. “I feel like an idiot.”

“And you look gorgeous; so be a good little Christmas tree and shut up. I’ve got work to do.” Darren began looping loose coils of the twinkling lights around Marlon’s naked body. He anchored each loop and coil with a kiss or a nip and grinned impishly as Marlon began to twitch. Darren accented the lines of Marlon’s chest with loops of white light, nipping and lashing each nipple in turn until Marlon was practically writhing. He wrapped a few more loops around Marlon’s arms, planting light kisses on the tops of his shoulders and the inside of his elbows as he worked. When he finished Darren stood back to critique his work. “You’re right. Smaller swoops do look better.” Darren started to adjust some of the coils.

“Leave them, they’re fine.” Marlon panted and his dick dripped a steady stream of clear liquid. He collected a few drops and gave them to Darren, who accepted eagerly. “Whatever else you’re going to do, you better do it fast because I can’t hang on much longer.” Marlon’s voice was low and insistent.

“Now, it’s my turn,” Darren said. His voice was equally intense. “You’re going to decorate me.”

“What with?”

“You, baby. You’re all the decoration I need,” Darren said, and he stripped.

As soon as Darren kicked his pants free, Marlon grabbed the back of his head and drew him in.

They came together in a rush, almost painfully as their lips crushed together, each overwhelmed by the need to taste, touch, and possess the other.

 As their tongues slid together, caressing and searching, Marlon wrapped his draped arms around Darren’s back and drew him closer. The warmth of the tiny light bulbs made small pockets of heat against their bare skin. An answering heat raced through Darren’s body as Marlon’s hands caressed his shoulders, his back, and the curves of his ass. The dangling lights sliding along his skin doubled and trebled the sensations and made his head spin with longing.

“Take me, baby. Please?” Darren’s whisper throbbed with desire.

Marlon nodded, his eyes wide in the glitter of the lights. He turned Darren to face away and looped several of the coils over his head until both were wrapped, head to toe, in glittering lights. Briefly, Darren wondered how that was possible. It was only a hundred-count string, after all, but Marlon’s smooth entry behind him took his breath away and drove all thought from his mind.

A trip hammer pounding suddenly sounded in Darren’s ears, startling him badly and breaking his rhythm. Bursts of noise broken by periods of silence in which the lights surrounding them grew brighter and brighter, until both were encased in a cocoon of brilliant white light. Darren felt Marlon swell inside him, felt his own release steal the strength from his legs. Darren collapsed and hit the floor, hard. The light fell away from his body, ripped to tatters by the impact and leaving him cold and naked. He called out to Marlon, reached for his comfort and safety, but Marlon was gone, and the sound in his ears grew louder still.

Darren woke with a start. The remnants of his dream spun around him, leaving faint splashes of memory around the room like gossamer cobwebs.

The sound came again, louder this time and somehow more frantic. Darren staggered to the front door and opened it.

Max stood on the stoop, his fist raised to knock again. The intense relief on his face would have been comical if it had not so closely mirrored his own. “Darren! God, you had me scared to death. I’ve been knocking for five minutes. Where were you?”

“I fell asleep,” Darren said, still haunted by remnants of his dream. “It was about Marlon.” He shook himself with an effort. “Anyway, get your butt in here. You look half frozen.”

Max stamped his feet and came in, pausing only long enough to shuck his coat before wrapping Darren in a bear hug.

“Hey, wow. What’s this for?” Darren laughed and hugged Max in return. “Not that I mind or anything.”

“I just… I… Never mind. I was just being stupid.” Max let go and stepped back. “How’s that Irish coffee coming along?”

“Burned, by the smell of it. Help me start a fresh pot.” Darren took Max’s hand and dragged him into the kitchen. Maybe it was his dream or just a longing for human company on a day like today, but Darren found himself strangely reluctant to let the man out of his sight, even for a moment.

9

The two men sat huddled together on a sprung sofa, drinking Irish coffee that was perhaps a bit too strong as the snow fell outside the bare picture window. The flickering flames of a gas fireplace cast dancing light and shadows across their faces, giving each the aspects of angels and demons in turns. The storm, which had heralded the day and faded, had returned with a vengeance and set a chill in the air that had nothing to do with temperature.

“Darren,” Max said. “I have something I need to tell you.” The words ruffled Darren’s hair and tickled his ear where Max was lightly rubbing his cheek against Darren’s temple.

“A good something or a bad something?” Darren said, teasing. He tilted his head and nuzzled the underside of Max’s jaw.

Max flinched and pulled away, laughing. “That tickles.”

“I know,” Darren said. “Now, hold still so I can get the other side.”

Max held out until his laughter nearly spilled his coffee. He leaned over to set the cup down on the end table. When he straightened, his face was serious.

“Uh, oh. It must be a bad something.” Darren’s smile faltered when Max’s face remained stoic. “Max?”

“That’s just the thing, Darren. I don’t know if it’s good or bad.” Max laid a hand on Darren’s leg. “Wait a minute. I’ll be right back.”

Darren nodded and sipped his coffee as Max got up. The sudden butterflies in his stomach threatened to send his coffee back where it came from.

Max returned a moment later holding a small square box gaily wrapped in red foil. The flickering firelight made it gleam like a jewel.

“Hey, I thought you weren’t going to make me do Christmas this year?” Darren said as Max handed him the package. He took Darren’s cup and set it on the table beside his own.

“It’s not from me, baby. Read the card.”

Darren folded back the slip of paper and read the tiny card taped to the top.

To: Darry

From: Marlon

Love,
always

Darren stared at the slip of paper for a long, long time. Max sat down beside him and tried to pull him close, but Darren’s body was rigid. “I don’t understand,” he finally said. “Max, where did this come from?”

Max sighed and sat back. He angled his body to face Darren. “Marlon gave it to me the night he died.”

“But it has my name on it.”

“I know, baby.”

“And that was four years ago.”

“I know, Darren—”

“So why are you only just now giving it to me?”

“Darren, please….”

Darren stopped, caught by the entreaty in Max’s voice. Still, it was a piece of Marlon he held in his hands. A piece of Marlon that had been kept from him for four years.

“I’m listening,” Darren said, and his tone was glacial. “Why only now?”

“I’m afraid it might not be good news,” Max said simply.

“That doesn’t make any sense. Why would he give me anything that day that wasn’t….” Darren broke off, considering. “Unless—”

“Yeah. That,” Max agreed, but the look on his face said he was anything but happy about it.

Darren stared at the package in his hand, suddenly colder than he had ever been in his life. A deep, bone-shattering cold that permeated his entire body like hoarfrost. “We had a fight that day, Max. Did I ever tell you that?”

“No,” Max said as he scooted closer. He had a sudden flashback to that night out on the porch swing at his parents’ house and shivered. “You never told me, but Marlon did.”

Darren’s head shot up, and his eyes locked on Max. “When? How could he?”

“He said he left early because of that fight. He came to my house,” Max said. “He was awfully upset about it; the fight, I mean. Marlon said he wasn’t sure if this one was fixable.”

Darren’s eyes fell away. He put the package down on the couch between them. It sat there, gleaming and dangerous, like a snake. “Did he tell you what the fight was about?” When Max shook his head, Darren continued. “It was my fault. I wanted him to quit his job so he wouldn’t have to be away on Christmas Eve. He wouldn’t do it.”

“That doesn’t sound too bad,” Max said cautiously.

“It’s not,” Darren agreed, his face set as if it had been carved in ice. “The worst of it, the part that forced him away, was when I told him to choose; either his job, or me.”

Max’s breath caught for a moment, confused. “But he didn’t even like his job. That doesn’t make sense.”

“You don’t understand, Max. His job wasn’t really the question. It was his obligation that was on the line. I was asking him—” Darren broke off. “I was
demanding
he choose between me and his own integrity.”

The ice in Darren’s eyes began to melt, sending tiny drops of water coursing down his cheeks. Max reached for him, but he pulled away, grabbing a throw pillow instead. Darren sat hunched around it, rocking slightly.

“How could I do that to him, Max? How could I make him choose like that?”

“I don’t know, Darren, but it explains a few things.”

Darren looked up at that. “What did he say?”

“Not much, really. He only stayed about a half hour and then left. Next thing I know he’s back again, with that in his hand. He wouldn’t come inside. He just stood on the porch and told me to give that to you; that it would take care of everything, once and for all.”

The finality of those words bored their way into Darren’s gut and shattered the ice there into razor shards. “What does that mean? Was he breaking up with me?”

“I don’t know, Darren. That’s why I was afraid to give it to you. I forgot about it until after the funeral. When I remembered, I was afraid it was bad news, and you were already so devastated.” Max’s face hardened and froze, etched in lines of self-loathing. “Maybe if I wasn’t such a coward….” Max let the words fall away. “It feels like I am betraying him somehow. He trusted me to do something for him, and yet, if I did it, things would have been so much worse for you.”

Darren stared at Max’s face for a long time, but instead of seeing the obdurate stone of his remorse, he saw Max on a dozen different occasions. Max standing in the background while a group of strangers who had once been Darren’s friends shouted and cheered on his birthday. Max at a football game, his eyes shining as he turned to clutch at Darren as they cheered a touchdown. Max, watching him, over and over again as the years passed and Darren withdrew further and further.
Comfortable Max. Reliable Max.
Max, with love and regret in equal measure shining in his eyes as Darren pushed him away, held him at arm’s length and refused to see what was there all along, simply because he was wrapped too tightly in his own guilt and pain.

It hit Darren like an avalanche and he gasped with the weight of it. In an instant, Darren finally saw, with the clarity of hindsight, what he had done to himself, to his friends, and to Max these past four years, all in the name of his own belief that no one could hurt as much as he. Like the last few pieces in a nearly complete puzzle, things fell into place and Darren saw the result of his greed. How his friends had stopped calling and coming over so often, why he hadn’t had much in the way of promotions at work, and how Max—comfortable, dependable Max—was always there, his patient, beautiful face tinctured by regret.

Darren tossed his pillow aside and moved the package to the end of the couch. He leaned, took hold of Max, and drew him closer, tucking the man’s head beneath his chin and drawing Max’s body tight against his own. For once, maybe for the first time since he and Marlon had met, it was Darren’s turn to give comfort where he had always simply taken it before, and in doing so, Darren understood Marlon’s gift didn’t really matter. Not after all this time. What truly mattered was the man who had brought it to him.

“Max, Max. I’ve been so selfish all these years. I’m so sorry.” Darren rocked him back and forth, cradling him like a hurt child. Instead of being calmed, however, Max seemed to grow more agitated. “Max, what is it? What’s wrong?”

Max looked up into Darren’s face for a moment and then turned away. “I should have thrown it away. I should have forgotten about it and let you keep your memories of Marlon untainted.”

Darren hushed him. “It’s okay, Max. All my memories of Marlon are good, when I bother to let them out.”