A Broken Kind of Life (8 page)

It was an excuse he’d used over and over again, but one that seemed to work. Well, except with @BottomBoi, who offered to ship him a brand new computer headset so they could talk. God, if the guy only knew what he was asking, he’d shut the hell up. One day soon, he’d just give up and unfollow Spencer, who couldn’t wait for that day.

Mark John-Thomas
‏@
Mark4873

@Spence9876 No prob man. Wanna chat?

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Mark, whoever he was, understood that Spencer didn’t Skype. He’d asked once, and when Spencer refused, he hadn’t asked again. Instead, they’d gone onto chat and talked there privately. It was faster and more reliable than the private messaging system in Twitter.

Spencer Thomas
‏@
Spence9876

@Mark4873 Yeah, logging on now.

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He brought up the chat window and minimized Twitter, no longer in the mood to deal with BottomBoi and his neediness. Besides, Mark was always fun inspiration for a late-night stroke. Just to be safe, he got up and locked his bedroom door as Mark’s first message popped up on his screen.

MARK:
been hard 4 u for days loved those pics you sent

Spencer leaned back in his desk chair and popped the button on his jeans. He might not be able to talk a guy to orgasm, but he could certainly share some hot pictures. A few videos might reside on his phone too, but he felt reasonably sure his password would save him from curious eyes. He hadn’t been brave enough to send one of those out. A still shot, he could argue he’d gotten from the Internet and shared. A video taken on his phone was another story.

SPENCER:
You like my dick?

MARK:
Yeah, it’s a work of art. Are you hard?

SPENCER:
I’m typing one-handed if that’s what you’re asking.

MARK:
Me too

Spencer pulled his jeans and briefs down to his calves. The cool leather office chair chilled the backs of his thighs as he sat stroking himself for the faceless guy on the other side of the chat window. He wondered what Mark thought about as he jerked himself off, probably someone who could hear him moan.

With that thought, his hard-on started to falter. He sighed, stood up, and moved over to the bed where he could get comfortable. Spencer was rapidly getting out of the mood to play, but jerked his jeans all the way off anyway. Pulling his shirt over his head, he grabbed one of the pillows and propped it against the headboard. The screen moved up as another message came through. He ignored it for the moment and settled the laptop onto the bed next to him. God, he just wanted to jack off and go to sleep.
Was that really too much to ask?
When he glanced at the screen, he saw the message Mark had sent, and he got hard all over again. The image of an older guy, naked and jerking off filled his laptop screen. The guy was naked from the waist down, his nondescript blue T-shirt hiked above his nipples, which were pebbled out on his chest.

It was beautiful.

He took a picture of himself from an angle somewhere between his knees up his chest, being careful not to include his face. After attaching it to an e-mail on his phone, he sent Mark a message to check his e-mail. With the slow response time, he figured Mark was only doing the barest essentials of typing anyway because his hands were otherwise occupied.

After a while, Spencer just wanted it over. Speeding the motion of his hand, he focused on the spots where he was most sensitive. Years of practice told him exactly how to get himself off with minimum fuss. It would be empty and hollow, just as it always was, but at least he’d be able to sleep. Another night, a sex chat with Mark would have been hot, but right then, the lack of connection grated on his nerves, and he snapped the laptop lid closed. Let the guy think he’d lost his Internet connection. He’d be back. They were all desperate, lonely guys looking to get off. They’d all be back, just as he would.

His orgasm, empty and unfulfilling, finally landed on his stomach in warm, sticky blotches. The pressure behind his eyes and the burning in his throat took him by surprise. An emotional release came right along with the physical, and he turned his head into the pillow trying to stop the lonely ache in his chest.

A
S
HE
expected, Aaron’s mother offered to go with him into the bookstore just to keep him company. Of course, he knew she was afraid for him. With the groups of people on campus, would this be the day he had a panic attack in the bookstore or became unresponsive in the bathroom? The college had been briefed about his various neuroses by his mother and the current stop in his revolving door of shrinks, but at the end of the day, it was his mother who had to pick up the pieces if he fell apart. It took a long time to convince her to wait in the car outside the quad. If he was going to sit in a room full of other people for class, he had to start doing things for himself.

As luck would have it, the bookstore was relatively quiet when he arrived. Most of the students probably already had their books.

“May I help you?” the young woman from behind the desk asked as Aaron approached. The smile faded quickly from her pointed little face as Aaron looked up, his scars illuminated harshly in the fluorescent lighting. He could tell she was trying not to stare as she twirled her blonde hair around one finger, obviously nervous and uncomfortable. Aaron handed her his receipt without a word, and she looked it over before going to the shelves a few feet behind her to get his bag of books. Looking around at the different products on display as he waited, he was glad his mother had already taken care of getting everything else he needed. Aaron thought maybe his mother took a special kind of comfort in doing something as mundane as picking out his school supplies, because he was still around to buy them for. Picking up notebooks and pens was his mother’s way of celebrating the fact that he needed them.

The hairs on the back of his neck stood up as he felt someone standing in line behind him. He didn’t want to be here any longer than was absolutely necessary. God, he didn’t know if he could sit in a classroom surrounded by people if he couldn’t even stand in line to get books. The girl stepped back to the counter and double-checked the bag’s contents to make sure they matched his receipt. It seemed to Aaron that she was almost deliberately taking her time checking his stuff. It made him uncomfortable. She pushed the bag to him but didn’t let go of the bottom when he grabbed the handles at the top.

“I don’t know if you remember, but… uhm… we went to high school together,” she said finally. Warning bells started to sound in his head, and his heart raced. His breathing became shallow, and he tried to pull the bag away from her and leave, but she held on. “I’m so sorry about….” That was as far as she got before Aaron ripped the bag from her grasp and bolted for the door. He had no idea if she was going to express her sorrow about what happened to him or Juliette, but whatever it was, he didn’t want to hear it. He hated the word
sorry
. They couldn’t possibly understand what the word meant. The girl, well, all of them who tried and failed to console him, they couldn’t possibly be as
sorry
as he was. He didn’t want their hollow apologies, no matter how sincere they seemed. Aaron didn’t know the girl behind the counter, didn’t remember her. She certainly didn’t know him, at least the boy he had become. There was absolutely nothing she could say that he wanted to hear.