Excessica Anthology BOX SET Winter (9 page)

I trailed off, unwilling to share the moment. I remembered kneeling between
Santa’s legs, his dick in my hands, its tender tip against my lips the second
before I took it into my mouth. Lust curled through me at the memory. And he’d
liked it, no? What did he tell me?
You’ve been a very good boy indeed.

Santa only comes
once a year. This year, it was because of me.

About J.M.
Snyder

An author of
gay erotic/romantic fiction, J.M. Snyder began in self-publishing and now works
with Amber Quill, Aspen Mountain, eXcessica publishing, and Torquere Presses. Snyder’s
short fiction has appeared online at Ruthie’s Club, Tit-Elation, Eros Monthly,
and Amazon Shorts, as well as in anthologies released by Aspen Mountain Press,
Cleis Press, eXcessica publishing and Alyson Books. For more book excerpts,
free fiction, and purchasing information, please visit
http://jmsnyder.net
.

SAN DIEGO SUNSET

By Alessia Brio
and Will Belegon

~
ONE
~

He awoke with
the same image in his mind again: the beach at sunset with the cliffs behind
him and the mysterious dark-haired woman in his arms. The same exact dream for
months now! They lay naked on a towel in the sand, khaki clothing tossed
carelessly to the sand nearby, entwined in the reverent stillness that so often
follows urgent sex. He always woke at just the wrong moment—right before
she told him her name.

The mornings
always seemed colder when he had the dream, for some reason. The aftereffects
only intensified as winter began to feel its power and the wind whistled up the
Columbia River. The Portland wind always carried a little chill, but lately it
stole more than the warmth of his coffee. It seemed as though it dimmed the
dawn—as if the sun could light his way but not warm his shoulders. The
feeling would evaporate with the dew, only to return in a few nights when the
dream recurred. It was bittersweet, because although the morning following
always felt empty, it held a comfort as well: a feeling of purpose that had
been lacking in his life since he had moved north. The days after the dream
inevitably produced a breakthrough or a conclusion, as though just the presence
of the mysterious woman in the back of his mind could free him to look at
things in fresh ways and find new solutions to old problems. She was a paradox:
a calming presence that drove his life in uncomfortable directions. The days
when she did not spring to mind were both less stressful and less complete.

He was sure he
had the beach nailed down now. It was Black's Beach in his hometown. While he
had never been down on the sand there, he had seen many pictures. An
ex-girlfriend regularly sunbathed there, and she had told him how to get down
the cliffs or walk along the beach from La Jolla Shores. What did not seem to
jibe was that in his dreams the beach was always deserted. Black's Beach was
one of the very few in the United States where nudity was tolerated, if no
longer strictly legal, and his memories of pictures and conversations about
Black’s almost always involved a steady crowd despite the difficulty of access.

That Friday
afternoon, the last weekday day before Christmas, he decided that the time had
come to figure out exactly why his subconscious created the recurring dream and
mystery woman. It wasn't a difficult decision to make, given the allure of his
destination. Work was the only thing holding him in Portland for the holidays,
and work would not be a problem. His boss had been riding him since
Thanksgiving about how—once again—the end of the year was upon them
with only half his vacation time used. The recurring sense of restlessness was
starting to gnaw at the edges of his contentment again. He wasn't unhappy in
Portland. He enjoyed his career and the people at his job. The city was friendly
and had enough of the big city feel to keep him happy, yet with just a short
drive, he could reach Skamania County on the Columbia River gorge and feel
disconnected from his Monday through Friday grind. But his life lacked
something. It was just a feeling sometimes: an empty chair in the corner that
looked wrong somehow; walking outside the office on his lunch break and being
halfway to his car before realizing he had absolutely no idea where he was
going; standing in the hallway before leaving, patting his pockets and checking
in his satchel, certain that something had been forgotten but unable to imagine
what it might be. So he sat down at his desk, circled the week between
Christmas and New Years, cleared his calendar of appointments, and started planning
his trip.

He still wasn't
sure that it made a lot of sense, but he booked the flight anyway. What
compelled him to make it at that time? Sure, his boss would like that it used
another week of this year's paid time off, but he hated to travel during the
holidays. The added stressors made people grouchy and annoyed. Lines were
longer, too, with kids headed home from college and grandparents complaining
about everything except seeing their grandchildren. He hoped he would never
again accidentally overhear a gallbladder operation story. It just seemed like
the trip
had
to be that week.

He expected to
encounter significant barriers to such last-minute holiday travel. Thus, the
mystery intensified when he was able to effortlessly reserve the last available
room at his first choice of hotel and book the only remaining seat on the
flight he wanted. He considered himself pretty skeptical, shunning the notion
that something as ethereal as fate could influence his life path. Preordination
got in the way and made his sense of adventure meaningless. After all, you
weren’t cheating death if you were meant to die twenty years later, right?
Fate, destiny, and all that metaphysical crap were just ways for people to
manipulate themselves away from the harder choices. Why work at something,
after all, if you could just accept that it wasn't meant to happen?

~
TWO
~

"No,"
she groaned as sleep escaped into the dawn. "Don't go!" Remnants of
the dream teased her consciousness. She shivered as she pushed aside the
sheets, damp from her perspiration, and rose on shaky legs. The dream was
always more vivid toward the end of each month, as if the date carried some
mysterious power. And, as the end of the year approached, it intensified to the
point of distraction.

Although it was
a seemingly innocuous—albeit erotic—dream, it carried with it a
promise of many passion-filled tomorrows. The mildest versions simply contained
an image of the sun setting into the sea, obviously the west coast. As the
month progressed, however, it would grow in duration and intensity until she'd
wake with his name on her lips, the pulses of her orgasm fading. The name she
could never recapture, but the touch and the scent and the sound of him were as
memorable as the sight. His words, spoken into her ear with an urgency
bordering on desperation, echoed in her mind:
Come to me.
His skin
smelled of the sea, as if he'd been in the water and dried by the sun, and he
tasted of her sex.

Grabbing the
notepad and pen from her nightstand, she rapidly jotted down a couple new clues
as to the location: a hang glider coasting lazily overhead; a winding path,
with occasional rough stairs, along a steep hillside; and dark sands on the
beach at its base. She shook her head in frustration as the images dissipated
leaving behind only a pervasive longing. There was no doubt in her mind that
the place was real. She would find it eventually, and when she did, she'd go
there. It was crazy but, no matter the time or the trouble or the cost, she'd
go. The incredible pull left her no alternative. He'd be waiting there for her,
on that beach at sunset. Ready and waiting. The thought warmed the embers of
her climax.

Outside, the sun
shone with a clarity that seemed to be magnified by below-freezing
temperatures. Detouring only long enough to start a pot of coffee, she carried
her laptop onto the deck wiped off a chair while the machine whirred to life.
Her neighbors undoubtedly thought her a bit eccentric, but she started every
day with coffee on her deck—regardless of the weather. It calmed her, and
after one of the recurrent dreams, she was in great need of calming. The
invigorating air penetrated her full-length fleece robe and fuzzy slippers. It
was better than caffeine.

The Internet
thus far had not been much help, but armed with new information she pecked a
string of key words into the search box and sent it into the ether with a
muttered prayer. The results were encouraging: down from 8,160 hits to just
under five hundred. On a whim, she added the word "California" to the
query, since it occupied such a large expanse of the Pacific coast, and
resubmitted. There! On the very first page, the words jumped out at her: Torrey
Pines Gliderport. So THAT was what the sign said; the sign which would never
come into focus in her dreams.

When her head
began to swim, she realized she'd been holding her breath. Fear mingled with
anticipation, causing a tingly pressure in her sternum which radiated outward.
She felt on the verge of a life-changing discovery, and with trembling hands
she placed the laptop on the glass patio table as if it'd suddenly become too
hot to touch. After all these months of searching, piecing the puzzle together,
she somehow knew that once she clicked that link, nothing would ever be the
same.

She rose and
backed away, eyes never leaving the screen. Only when her backside bumped into
the door frame did she turn and enter the apartment. The coffee was ready, and
she poured a couple ounces onto the counter before realizing that she'd not
gotten a mug from the cupboard. Cursing herself, she threw a few paper towels
over the mess, fetched a mug, and tried again. By the time she returned to the
deck, the screen saver had activated. She watched for a while as the pictures
scrolled: snapshots of a life which now felt foreign, as if it'd been lived by
a doppelganger–a shadow of her true self.

The search
screen returned as soon as she touched the keyboard. "No time like the
present," she gulped, clicking the link. The view from her dream filled
the screen, and she gasped as tears of relief burned her eyes. The beach at the
base of those cliffs was precisely where she needed to be, and she had to be
there the next time the dreams peaked in intensity—only a few days away.
There was no information about the beach itself on that web site, but she was
not dissuaded. She dashed off an e-mail to the address displayed and decided
that if there was no response by noon—nine o'clock on the west
coast—she'd follow up with a phone call.

Over her second
cup of coffee, she booked a flight into San Diego, made reservations at an
upscale hotel, and left a message for the building manager that she'd be away
for a while. There were several cheaper lodging options, but they just didn't
feel right.
La Valencia
had a welcoming vibe, and as she entered her
credit card number into the online form, a different type of anticipation
replaced the nervous anxiety. A restless impatience settled over her and came
to rest between her legs, where it coalesced into a dense ball of desire.

She was
scheduled to begin a new job on the day after Christmas, but they'd just have
to wait. If it was meant to be, the position would still be hers when she
returned. If not, well that was just one less tie to sever should she wish to
relocate. Baltimore was her home, and it had been comfortable, like a favorite
pair of jeans, until the dreams started. That was when the familiarity of
routine became grating, and she began to seriously consider a change. Life was
too short to be lived in a rut, especially when there was such unbridled passion
on the horizon.

~
THREE
~

Gorgeous weather
greeted his arrival. The sun was hotter when he journeyed further south, and
there was no chill wind with the taste of snows to come. The air smelled like
home and, at this time of year, the difference was far more tangible.
Portland's air might be a little cleaner due to all the vegetation and the
Columbia River, but San Diego would always hold a special place in his heart.
It had hurt to leave, but he had to follow the work and, once his parents had
passed on, there had not really been anything tying him to this city. But even
with those ties gone, he still felt he belonged in Southern California moreso
than in the Pacific Northwest.

He stood at the
window and looked out over the ocean below. The steam from his coffee was
curling up and lightly misting the glass near the table. Behind him the
Living
Room Coffeehouse
was busy and loud; here, looking west at the horizon, he
felt isolated from the woman's voice ordering the double raspberry mocha and
the college kids talking about last night's adventures in Tijuana.

So what to do
with his day? He had not packed a swimsuit since the beach in question wouldn't
require it, and—even for San Diego—it was unseasonably warm. A
winter Santa Ana had gifted late December with a touch of spring. While he
still had plenty of friends in town, he didn't want to tell anyone where he
was. He grinned as he imagined trying to explain the purpose for his visit to
his old friends. Their incredulity might actually make it worth the effort, but
he preferred not to get caught up in hellos and goodbyes. For some reason, he
felt today was without pressure: the calm before the storm. No need to stress
about anything. He decided to spend the day alone—revisiting old
haunts—then return to La Jolla for dinner and drinks at
The Spot
across the street, and let things just happen for a change.

The morning had
a sense of entitlement about it, as though the universe itself was feeling smug
and proud of its accomplishments. Maybe it should. He certainly was still
surprised at himself for just up and leaving like he did. He could not remember
ever traveling someplace on a feeling before—on a whim. Something was in
the air, something more potent than just the smell of chocolate coffee and
raspberry syrup. Chocolate and raspberry? Why did that stand out? He turned to
look but all he caught was the closing of the door and the last whiff of vapor
rising from the oversize cup and saucer at the table nearest the street.

Setting his
now-empty cup on the nearest table, he walked toward the exit. Something
elusive compelled him: a thought he could not quite grasp and a need to solve
the mystery of two scents on the air that overrode the pervasive bitterness of
the espresso machine. He stopped at the street-side plate glass window, looking
up at the passers-by in the La Jolla morning. Most were merchants hurrying by
with their heads down, seeing only pavement instead of the morning's beauty. They
rushed to open the little shops that lined Prospect and Girard Streets. There,
they sold the t-shirts and souvenirs for tourists to give grandchildren and
neighbors upon return to St. Louis or East Lansing. But, no one looked
remarkable. Preparing to join them, he glanced back to reassure himself that
he'd left nothing behind.