Chapter Text
The Present
I bit his lip; Though I knew that I shouldn’t have done so.
I touched his skin, gripping on its smoothness as though it were my carnal desire; And it was.
I looked into his eyes, and I got lost.
I had met him a few times before the affair began. We had a few passing conversations over the years. He was a rising young artist in the early years of the Chicago seventies, and I had somehow found myself on a date, inside of this little up-and-coming dive bar on the Northside of the city, that spent most of their weekends spotlighting unsigned talent.
It was amateur night; And he was there.
That was the first time we met, officially anyway. Because I think I always knew him, somehow.
I always did…
And it was nothing like what they talk about in the movies. My heart didn’t stop in the immediate moment. I didn’t know right away, who he was; Or who he’d become, to me. I could breathe fine. It was normal, meeting him. I felt completely, at ease; Oddly peaceful about it, like I had done it sometime else, maybe more than once.
Perhaps, I did.
Because I have never been one to be, peaceful; My emotions are on a constant downhill, and I’ve lived my life, forever at the mercy of my own anxious, somber fuse. And yet, there he was, and I felt, peace, in his presence.
So, no, it was nothing like how the movies describe it; Meeting your first love.
It was better.
Stuck there forever, enthralled by the Emerald specs in his glowing ocean eyes; I was, in love.
Caught up in the rapture of it.
But I shouldn’t have done that. None of it.
Because he was my kryptonite, and I knew that he would destroy me.
For one touch from him, brought me to my knees and ruined my life.
My date was beautiful, one of the most beautiful girls that I had ever seen up close. And I was taken with her when she did a presentation on sex erotica for a sexual liberation class that I was taking. She used her own body as a canvas, and my heart stopped.
Sure, I was taken with her because she was stunning and her confidence was something that I had hoped would rub off on me. But more so than that, she had a way about her, an air. And I thought that if I stood next to someone like that for long enough, it would suddenly become who I was.
It was 73’ and I was just beginning to come into myself. My lean form had been lanky in childhood. I was always a scrawny boy with soft features that I felt, muted my already awkward frame. I was tall without strength for most of my childhood. I was pale, with no warmth to aid my dull skin. I was gentle in my young age, until high-school, where I started to, pretend like I wasn’t. But in college, I transformed. And then suddenly, one day, I woke up in my dorm room and I wasn’t what I once was, anymore. My body had changed overnight, morphing into that of a man; And yet, still, no matter how I presented myself to the world, I wasn’t confident, internally. But that didn’t matter. Not with him. It never did.
Just with the promise of one kiss, I was his.
I was his.
But we should’ve stopped ourselves long ago. Because the things that we did, and the way that we went about it? It was wretched; Wrong. He had a family. He had a life; We both did. But somewhere along the way, the thought of losing the lives that we had both built, didn’t measure up to to the loss of one another. And it sounds diabolical to say, and it is. We were selfish. So very, selfish.
I caress over the skin of my lips, reminiscing.
We certainly were, good together; Something that fit, perfectly.
But how could I do it? How could he do it to his family? His wife, his kids?
How could we, do it, to them?
Because it was a choice, in the end; One that we both made, together.
But how could I give myself to this man? He was sinful destruction.
He was everything that could break me.
And he did.
I left him many times over the years. Or rather, he left me.
We left one another, broken; Shells of who we once were. And we beat each other down so mercilessly, we had made it so that the only person who could ever make us who we once were again, the only person who could ever make us feel, whole, was one another.
He was living a lie. I was living a life of pretend; And together, we were miserable, finding solace in the arm cracks of one another. And those moments were beautiful, perfect. Of course, until the curtains were drawn, and I had to see his ring on the nightstand, and my lover sneaking out of our crap hotel room together as if I was some dirty secret to him; And as if he were one, to me.
And we were; We were dirty, and we were secrets; Oh how we kept so many of those...
We could never be together. Never; Not really. Not anymore.
He had changed, and so had I. We weren’t lovesick fools in our twenties anymore. He was a family man now. And he owed it to that family to be faithful. To be a good husband and father.
We both owed it to his family, not to be those people anymore; These people.
I can’t breathe when I think about him losing his children because of me. But, I don’t want to breathe when I think about losing him.
I am so very despicable. Disgusting, I know. What kind of a man am I? Certainly, not a faithful one.
But, he was a drug; My drug.
He’s my drug of choice, the one that I dabbled in once out of sheer curiosity, and got addicted to instantaneously.
He’s ruining me, all these years later. He’s corrupting my heart, my spirit, and the very essence of the man that I wanted to be. He is no good for me, and yet, even if I was the author of everything that we are, even I wouldn’t have the power to change it; Not any of it.
I am but a weakness against the love that he provides to me. Or against the despair that he ravages me with.
I am a shell of the man that I was before I met him, when I enter into the world.
He holds my heart in the palms of his hands, and he waves it into the air, controlling me with his own will.
And he strums his scorching fingertips against my heart, like he plays his instrument; And he has me; Every bit of who I am.
And I hate him, for doing this to me.
I hate him for looking at me the way that he did, and for showing up so many times.
I hate him for brushing up against me and making me question everything that I knew.
I hate him for breathing so close to me, and for luring me into a trap that I would never escape.
I hate him for giving to me, a love that I would die by, and kill for. Or spend an eternity, holding onto, even when it killed me day by day, to do so.
I hate him so much that my envy for him bleeds into everything that I do.
I’m angry at times when I shouldn’t be. I’m bitter and stuck. I’m still living a life of longing for the past, for a life that could’ve been, so different.
I’m still waiting for the life that he promised me in our twenties, when I was clueless and stupid.
I still, wait for him, to save me.
But that was never going to happen. He was never going to rescue me from this life.
He was my kryptonite, and no matter what he did, I knew better.
This is on me...
I bring my fingertips up to my lips, placing them over my skin; The soft skin that was once covered in his own.
I can almost taste him on my tongue. I can smell him still, even after all of this time.
He was the author of all of the pain in my life, and too, he was the creator of everything good.
He was never mine. But I was always, his.
I look in the mirror. I’m staring at a ghost; I barely even recognize myself.
I’ve aged, well, but still, only I can see the true effects of the loss.
I can see beneath the sunken eyes. I can see the ways of which he’s ruined me, drowning me into his sea of lust, love, and lies. I can see the ways that he tarnished everything that I was, and everything that I could’ve been, resulting in this crumb of a man before me now.
Yes; I can see it, our history written across my skin; Across the flesh of lover’s past, I can see it. I can see his name carved into the crevices of me, like the ink of a tattoo.
I can see, the man that I used to be, on the sides of my cheeks, in the worn skin that used to be his playground for kisses.
I can see his leftover mess of shitty affection. And I feel the hatred boiling within me because it wasn’t that shitty, after-all; Not at all, actually. Only the feeling that I was left with was, when I had to let him go.
Because he was the destroyer of me, the author of my despair, the owner of the cracks in my heart. But, be that as it may, though he was the author of this pain of mine, he was also, the only owner of the true happiness in my life; The happiness of which I only ever shared, in his presence.
And eventually, it was him that I wanted to stand by, hoping desperately that everything that he was, would be who I became.
And tragically, or maybe, magnificently, I got my wish. We became one, together; Wicked, cheaters.
And yet still, even after everything, I’d do it all again. I’d let him, ruin me.
Because, how could I not?
How could I do anything other than, be his?
Yes.
William Hargrove destroyed me; He left me, in ruin.
But, I’d gladly, do it all again.
Chicago 1973
“Their setlist's pretty sick, huh?”
It was an inviting voice, but that of a strong young man.
Steve looks up, eyes fiddling over to the man beside him, his girlfriend’s hand still wrapped up in his own.
To Steve’s right, there he stood; An auburn blonde boy, around his own age.
The man’s eyes were on the band before them, passion churning from within. And Steve’s mouth parted to speak but nothing came out, like the anxiety was slipping away, and everything was stilling around him. But he couldn’t, utter a word. And the silence between them, was loud.
Steve could see the muscles in the man’s jaw contracting; Probably taking Steve’s silence as an insult; Rude behavior at best.
He turns to look at Steve, one quick look before vanishing, really; Size up the asshole to his left. But then something happens; The man beside him takes his breath away.
Steve is beautiful to him. And not in the way that anyone else has ever been.
He's pretty, in that kind of way that Billy didn’t think, any person could really be, anymore.
He's breathtaking, in the same way that music pierces his soul.
Or how paintings make him feel.
Beautiful like records; The kind that should be hung up in the hall of fame.
Steve is, the kind of beautiful something that Billy would spend his life looking at, if he could; Something that he would admire for an eternity, if it were on display; Spotlighted on stage.
He's art; A song made just for him.
And suddenly, Billy couldn’t walk away. He just, couldn’t.
The rude silence didn’t matter; Because in one moment, everything changed.
He had to know him, and he had to be close to this man; In ways that he hasn’t felt an urge to be close, to anyone; In so long.
Maybe his body knew then.
It knew that it had to love, him...
The truth was, Steve didn’t know much about music, or art. So he was at a loss for words.
He didn’t have anything to contribute to any conversation with anyone who knew anything at all about true craft; And he figured that he could only ever, open up his mouth and reveal his own incompetence. So he remained silent when others spoke to him about it.
He remained, dormant; Waiting to be awakened, by the other.
Maybe Billy was drawn to him, for this reason; Without knowing it.
Intrigued by the man’s, dissociative nature, because everyone else in this bar, had been singing Billy’s praises that night, and showing him too much attention, having been one of the debut performers himself.
And yet, here was this couple, tucked away in the corner; Watching the band that followed after him, with an air about them.
An air that seemed, lost.
And maybe Billy had hoped to find something; Without knowing it.
But it never really mattered if he knew what he was searching for or not, because it was written in the stars, something kismet. Steve and him? It was something that was bound to happen, in any life.
“The dude on the drums right there, he’s nice. Thinkin' of poachin’ him for myself,” Billy says, suddenly moved to just, keep talking; His body leaned in closer to the other young man at his side, some heavy tension existing between the open space.
Steve looks over at him again, shooting the other a small smile.
And it was nothing special really, his smile; Nothing that songs are written about.
But it was an opening; An invitation, to Billy.
An invitation for him to love this man with everything that he was; And he would, in his own way.
In his own, broken way.
Billy noted the woman to Steve’s side; The gorgeous girl that Steve had wrapped up in his hand, securely and openly.
And he knew that it was, no use.
Not here.
Not now.
And not, with him.
They could never really have, anything.
They would never really be, anything; Not in this lifetime.
But, that smile?; Billy would write a thousand songs about, even if no-one else would.
Because it scarred him, leaving a selfish imprint on him for an eternity.
And he’d sketch it against paper with lyrics when he got home as to never forget it.
He'd paint it with words.
He'd do everything messily and urgently, to keep the memory of him, alive.
And he knew that it would happen; He’d eventually, have to walk away; Like he always does, with boys that catch his eyes.
But he felt it pressing against his spirit, in this moment, locking eyes with him, the need to stay.
He didn’t want to walk away from this man; He didn’t feel like he could.
Because Steve was alluring, and breathtaking to him.
And Billy? He just, had to know him.
No matter if it would set them both down a path of soul crushing misery and longing.
No matter the outcome, he just, had to know him…
Steve was clueless for a while; He didn’t see it happening at first; His entire world changing. So, it hit him like a mac truck, when Billy took over his life…
The Present
Steve’s fingers trail to his lips again.
There really is no point in hating any of this. Because in the end, he’d do it all again.
No matter the consequences, and no matter the pain.
'I’d do it, forever.'
Perhaps, that’s why he’s here; Doing it again.
Because he was bound to do this, with him, forevermore…
He exhales deeply, running a hand through his hair, bracing himself to come to face-to-face, with the only man that has ever had, all of him.
Knock, knock. Knock; He pushes his knuckles up against the door.
It was a special one...
And he already has an erection just thinking about melting into the man’s arms, behind this door. Because Billy's there, just within his reach; And suddenly, nothing else matters.
It had been too long, and he needed his drug of choice...