They Say

Standard disclaimer. Contains graphic depictions of homosexual acts. Continue at your own discretion.*

They say words are cheap. Sometimes, they say, things said are a little too little and a little too late. Sometimes, we don't care what they have to say.

Zach- The remainder of the week was a build up for Tag's going away party on Friday. I decided that the best thing was to be straight with him, so on Wednesday night, after all the plans had been made, I mustered up all the courage to call Tag and apologize for getting upset. We talked for about two hours before I finally told him about the get together, explaining that it was going to be a small thing, just him, me, and my roommates, hanging out and drinking and stuff.

I didn't think it was ever going to happen, but Friday night came around and an hour before Tag was supposed to show up, people started filling the apartment.

"Charles, who the hell are these people?" I asked Jesse, not recognizing any of them.

"Oh, just some people from the pool that I know. Don't worry, they're harmless, and they're all for out military, so they'll love Tag," was his reply.

Now I'm not one to avoid a good party here and there, but the whole thing seemed a little over the top. Apparently Charles had invited a ton of guys from the pool, Jesse had invited a lot of guys he knew and Brooklyn had convinced a bunch graduate students and TA's to show up too.

I was a little nervous. It wasn't just about Tag coming, but also about keeping our apartment from falling apart. It almost felt like the whole scene was from a movie, with your group of guys smoking in one corner, drinking in another, and playing some kind of strip dice game in the middle of room. Apparently my roommates knew a lot of gay guys too, because I walked into my bedroom and found three couple jacking off on top of another couple that was Denton's bed 69ing.

When it was finally time for Tag to show up, I didn't even bother rounding everyone up for the big surprise. Instead, I waited for him outside the door, the music playing to loud for me to even hear myself think.

"Hey stranger," he said, coming up beside me. He must have noticed the look of distress on my face because he quickly pecked me on the cheek and asked, "What's the matter?"

"We aren't staying here," I replied.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"We just aren't. I want you're last night here to be special and what's going on in there isn't the kind of special I was going for."

"No problem, so we have a change of plan."

Right then, I heard Brooklyn and Jesse come up the stairs, a little late, but whatever.

"Hey Zach," Jesse said approaching us. "How's it going in there?"

"Great," I replied. "If you dig bong hits and body shots."

"What the fuck are you doing out here?" Jesse asked with a look of sheer excitement on his face.

"I didn't want this night to be all big and flashy," I replied.

"Hey," Brooklyn cut in understanding where I was coming from. "My apartment is right down the street. I say the two of you order some take out and go over there. It'll be more romantic."

"Really?" I asked. "You'd let us do that."

"Sure thing," he replied. He handed over the key and gave us brief directions. He even gave us a number for a great take out Chinese place around the corner from his building.

"Isn't he great?" Jesse said squeezing Brooklyn's ass and pecking him on the cheek as we said goodbye.

"Make sure our apartment is still standing tomorrow," I warned as we walked away.

Brooklyn's apartment was way closer than Tag's loft I was going to suggest we go to. We stopped by the restaurant Brooklyn suggested, got a couple of boxes of rice and chicken, some fortune cookies and headed upstairs to Brooklyn's apartments.

"Why the boxes?" Tag asked as we set up shop on a blanket next to Brooklyn's living room coffee table.

"Jesse's moving in," I replied.

"Oh."

We ate in silence for a few minutes, not knowing what to talk about. After a few minutes, I decided I would make the first move before things got awkward. I leaned over and kissed Tag's neck just as he was opening his fortune cookie.

"What does it say?" I whispered.

"You are blessed with happiness."

"In bed."

"What?" he asked.

"In bed," I replied. "You are blessed with happiness in bed."

"That's good to know," he said. He leaned in and found my mouth with his, kissing me softly. Slowly, we moved forward, exploring each other's mouths with our tongues, taking each other in.

Before long, both of us were on our knees undressing each other as quickly as we could. I felt his cock harden close to mine as we ground our hips together, kissing passionately. Our shirts flew off and without separating our pressed bodies, I had my hand down Tag's unbuttoned pants and he fought hard to slip mine down.

It didn't take long for both of us to be completely naked, pressed hard against each other, neither one of us wanting to be the first to let our embrace go.

Slowly and deliberately, Tag moved his mouth from mine and made his way down my face, past my neck and to my chest, where he planted hundreds of small, soft kisses as he went.

He finally made his way to my nipple where he spent ample time sucking on both with his tender mouth. My head rolled back in extreme ecstasy as I did all I could not to scream out in pleasure.

Again, Tag began the slow decent, lower this time, until he reached the trail that lead downward from my navel, licking along the sparse hairy line until his mouth was breathing heavily on my rock hard dick.

In one quick motion, he engulfed half the length of my shaft. I could feel the back of his throat on the head of my dick. Tenderly, I palmed the back of his head, edging him further and further down my rod. I desperately wanted him to take me all in. And he did. He continued to bob up and down on my dick, slicking it up with his hot tongue.

I looked down and briefly met Tag's eyes looking back up at me.

For that brief moment I was in heaven. And then Tag sucked in hard, sending me reeling over the edge. I came suddenly and without warning all down Tag's throat. After a few spurts, he let my dick slide out of his mouth but kept the head on his tongue so that he could taste the last few drops of my cum. My flaccid dick hung there on his hot, moist mouth while I knelt there breathing hard.

Tag got up on his knees and with traces of cum still in his mouth, kissed me hard and deep.

Everything we did was slow, deliberate. There was no need to rush; we had all night. When I finally came to my senses after Tag's hot kisses, we were sitting on Brooklyn's floor with our backs leaning on the couch, smiling at each other.

"Why'd you leave the other day?" Tag asked me quietly, breaking the silence. His hand was on my thigh, slowly caressing me up and down.

"What?"

"When I said I was being deployed? Why'd you leave?"

"I was scared," I answered truthfully.

"Of what?" he asked sincerely.

"I don't know." Again an honest answer.

There was a brief silence before he asked, "Who hurt you?"

I hesitated. I didn't want to mention Chris and everything, but I guess to Tag it was obvious that, yes, someone had hurt me. He took my silence as my answer.

"You don't have to answer that. I've only known you a couple of weeks. I'm sorry for intruding."

"It's ok," I replied. "It's just you came at the perfect time, and you erased some pretty hard memories from me for a while."

"Is that why you don't want to get to close?"

"Is it that obvious?" I asked. He leaned in close to me and whispered, "Whoever hurt you doesn't know what they're missing out on."

Then he kissed me. It was a kiss that said everything he wanted to say. It said that he cared, and that he knew I did to. It said that he was just as afraid of how he felt as I was, and that this whole thing had taken him aback. The kiss said he was glad that fate had lead the two of us together, even if it was for these brief weeks. The thing that scared me the most was that it said that he loved me. And kissing him back, I realized that my kiss was saying the same thing.

Denton- It finally happened. I knew that it was a matter of time, but when it finally happened, somehow I wasn't prepared.

I had been avoiding Glass all week, sneaking past him at every chance. I slept as little as possible to stay out of the room. I ate and studied with other guys from the floor. Above all, I snuck past him to get to Mitchell.

Every chance we got Mitchell and I would sneak into a dark room, or a secluded bathroom, just for a quickee as all we could afford. And every time, I always felt like Glass new exactly what we were doing.

Then it finally happened. Glass caught us. I'd called Mitchell up from studying when Glass told me he was going out for a five-mile jog. Five miles, I figured, would give Mitchell and I at least half an hour of quality time, so he came up and we started messing around.

As usual, Mitchell and I were hot at it for a few minutes, savoring every moment together. This particular time, he happened to savoring my dick as well. I was laying there on the bed, watching Mitchell's head bob slowly up and down my hard dick.

"What the fuck is going on?" I heard Glass say suddenly. I looked up and there he stood, dripping from the chest with sweat, a stern, angry look on his face.

"Glass, listen, I can explain," Mitchell said, recovering faster than I could.

"Shut the fuck up," Glass yelled at him. Mitchell coiled backward in apparent fear. Glass stared at me. I had stood up and with Glass' eyes boring through mine, I was beginning to think that it was a bad decision.

"What did I tell you?"

I thought his question was directed towards me, so I opened my mouth to answer right as Mitchell shot out "To stop messing with him."

"And what are you doing?" he asked, still staring me down but apparently talking to his brother. I kept my mouth shut.

"Listen, Glass," he said. "It isn't what it looks like."

Glass' eyes suddenly shot toward Mitchell. I swear his glass eye twitched in a fit of rage. "How can it not be what it looks like?" he didn't give Mitchell a chance to answer. Instead, he backhand slapped him across the face. Mitchell fell backward, hard into the bed, grabbing his face. I looked at Glass in terror.

"How the fuck," Glass yelled, pulling Mitchell up to his feet by his jaw. "Is he supposed to learn anything from me when he has his dick stuck so far up your ass?" Another slap. I cringed.

"Leave him alone," I said, my words to weak to be heard over Glass' yelling. "Leave him alone." I felt helpless and week, standing there watching Glass yell the hell out of Mitchell. Mitchell's nose bled and his eye was already turning a dark color. Glass was standing over him fuming. I could almost see the smoke coming out of his ears.

The room became dead quiet. I looked at Glass helplessly. Glass looked at Mitchell angrily. Mitchell was turned, facing nothing, avoiding Glass' gaze.

Slowly Glass turned to me and in a voice that was nothing like that he'd used on Mitchell he said, "Pack your things."

"What?" I asked, wondering what he was talking about.

"Pack your FUCKING things," he yelled. He walked to the closet and began chunking my clothes out. "I want you the hell out of my fucking face tonight. I warned you to stay away from my brother, and you didn't listen so you leave me no fucking choice." The whole time, Glass was ripping my things from around the room, moving at a hundred miles an hour. I stood there petrified. "Get the fuck out," he kept yelling over and over. Between his orders and Mitchell's sobs coming from the bed, I had no idea what to do. I wanted to roll over and cry.

Suddenly Glass stopped yelling and came close to me. "You have no idea what the fuck you've done, do you?" I didn't answer. "Do you?" he yelled.

"No," I stammered. His face was inches away from mine.

"If anyone else in this fraternity found out that the two of you were fucking around, do you have any idea what could happen?" he knew I didn't know. "No, you don't. Because you are so fucking stupid." He turned and started walking out of the room.

"So tell me," I said boldly, probably not the best decision. He stopped just short of the door. I could still hear Mitchell whimpering on the bed.

"You want to know?" he asked, only it wasn't a question. Without turning, he explained in a low gravely voice. "You are being bred. In a few months, you were supposed to be told by the president and legacy leaders of this fine organization that as of May, you would be inheriting my position in this fraternity. Part of that position is knowing that you can never become attached to anyone." He turned and looked at me, slowly making his way closer to be where I stood. "When I joined this frat three years ago, I had no idea what my job would entail. I made friends; I let myself care about people. But since then, I have been forced to hurt those very people I cared about."

"You kill people," I whispered under my breath. I looked at him in terror.

"I don't kill people," he said. "I make their lives a living hell. People who cross the tribe in any way find their lives destroyed, Denton. Not immediately, but soon enough." I stared at him blankly, so he continued to explain. "Imagine doing something in college and facing no consequence. You continue your life, get a good job, and start a family. Then you come home one day and there is a note saying that all of your mistakes have come full circle. There are pictures of you and your mistress having sex. There are receipts of things you've bought that you never told your wife about. And at the bottom of the note, there is stamp that looks identical to this fraternity's emblem. And you realize, that twenty, maybe twenty-five years ago, you pissed someone off at the Tribe and now you're paying for it. I make people pay, Denton."

"What does that have to do with Mitchell and me?"

"Two reasons," he began. "The first: who knows who'll have to deal with in the future Denton? For the next three years, the Tribe will order you to take care of people, and often, those people will be people you know and like. When we went camping with those two guys a couple weeks ago? That was a job. I have enough pictures of Adam giving head to ensure that the Tribe will always get its way concerning him. The photos probably won't be used for the next 20 years, until he has a wife and kids, but if they're needed, the Tribe has them. And I took them. He was my roommate when we were first years, and I just took pictures of him that could ruin his life somewhere down the line. And you know I live with myself? You know who its easy for me to sleep at night?" he paused. His voice had been growing increasingly louder and stronger. "Because I didn't FUCK the shit out of him when my Big Brother warned me not to." This last part he yelled in my face. "Learn something, Denton." He said softly, turning and walking towards the door. "If you do nothing else, just learn something."

Jesse- The remainder of the week breezed by in anticipation of Zach and Tag's little party. It was weird living with Brooklyn, but not in a bad way, just in a strange way. It was awkward seeing his flaws, like walking around the apartment in his socks or drinking from the carton, but it was all stuff I could live with.

What I couldn't live with was knowing that he had fucked around with Charles, and not knowing whether it was that one time thing or something they did on the regular.

Charles words wrung in my ears all week as I thought about them messing around in the apartment I now lived in.

Hearing him say those words opened up a Pandora's Box of questions for me. If Brooklyn and Charles were fucking around, why did Brooklyn ask me to move in? Was he cheating on me with Charles or on Charles with me? Do they have feelings for each other or are they just buddies that get together and do it?

I realized that Charles at least had to have feelings for Brooklyn because that explained why he was always defending him to me. But what it didn't explain was why Charles never told me or rubbed it in or gloated that he'd managed to 'steal' my guy.

So the whole week, I thought. I thought that the only way to put the entire thing behind me was to prove to Charles that Brooklyn was mine now, and that whatever happened between them in the past was over and that Brooklyn 100 percent belonged to me.

"Babe, are you ready," I heard Brooklyn ask around nine o'clock as I stood primping in front of the mirror. I was deliberately taking a long time, wanting to make a bit of an entrance.

"Almost," I called out. I heard Brooklyn step into the bedroom, fully dressed and ready to go.

"Come on," he urged patiently. "This thing started two hours ago."

"If I remember correctly, you're the one that wanted to 'suck me senseless' before we left." I turned from the mirror and smiled to him.

"Ok," he replied. "You win. Now lets go."

I walked up close to him and gave him a hug. "Sure," I whispered in his ear. "Unless you wanna suck me senseless again."

He smirked, pulled back and said, "I've lost my appetite. Let's go."

Something in the back of my mind made me wonder why he was so anxious to get to the party. The first thing I thought about was that he wanted to see Charles, but I pushed it out of my head. Brooklyn was mine.

We arrived at my old dorm. No fond memories filled my mind as we ascended the stairs; nothing made me want to move back in. I was loving life with Brooklyn.

As we approached the door, we noticed Zach and Tag hanging outside the party and we spent a few minutes finding out why. Apparently, the party didn't turn out to be what Zach wanted, partly due to me calling everyone I knew on campus and telling them to call everyone they knew. Brooklyn finally decided to let them use our place for the night, gave them the key and the two of us headed inside to see the damage.

The first thing I noticed was the all-male population. Almost everyone in the room was hot and built. I guess I hung in sexy circles because all the sweaty gyrating bodies looked like eye-candy to me.

I hung on to Brooklyn as we made the rounds, saying hi to the people we knew, getting to know the people we didn't.

After a few minutes at the party, I spotted Charles talking to the guy that was going to move in tomorrow. He caught my gaze and I gave him a grin and a wave; I nudged Brooklyn to do the same. I could see the look of disdain briefly cross Charles' face.

"Let's go say hi," I nonchalantly suggested to Brooklyn.

"I don't know," he replied hesitantly. "He's having a pretty in depth conversation."

"Who cares?" I conjectured. "He's my old roommate. How rude would that be if I didn't go over and say hi?"

Brooklyn reluctantly followed me to Charles side. I caught him from behind, off guard, but I had to commend him for his quick recovery after seeing Brooklyn and I standing there merely feet away from him.

"Hi Brooklyn, Jesse," he said.

"Charles," Brooklyn nodded.

"Hi Charles," I said. "Good to see you again Shane."

"A pleasure," he replied politely. "But if you'll excuse Me." he turned to Charles and whispered, "See you later," before he turned and disappeared into the crowd.

"He's squeamish," I commented.

"Who is he?" Brooklyn asked.

"My new roommate," Charles replied quickly. They exchanged a look that didn't escape me. I saw a pained look briefly cross Brooklyn's face as he replied, "Oh."

I could sense the two of them uncomfortably standing there, unable to exit the triangle, and desperately trying to stand it.

"Brooklyn, babe, why don't you get us all a round of drinks? I need to discuss something with Charles," I said. Brooklyn willingly obliged wordlessly. "So what have you been you up to?" I asked lightly.

"Cut the shit Jesse," Charles replied. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm here for the party," I replied. "And I ain't leave till they throw me out," I sang.

"Get out," he said. He remained cool and calm, but obviously agitated.

"Why?" I replied. "You wouldn't ask an invited guest to leave?"

"One, you no longer live here, and two, this is my apartment, I would ask you to leave."

"I'd have to take Brooklyn with me," I replied strongly, raising my voice.

"Go ahead," he said. "Just leave."

"Are you sure?" I asked, raising my voice. "You don't want to fuck him again?" people around us were stopping what they were doing and paying attention to Charles and I. Again, I raised my voice. "You think I didn't know, Charles? That you were sitting here fucking my boyfriend and lying to my face?"

"That is enough, Jesse," I heard Brooklyn say from behind me.

"Fuck you," I said turning. Everything I had been holding inside me for weeks was building up and I couldn't stop it. "Fuck you, Charles, you disgusting piece of shit. I hope you fucking burn in hell. What kind of friend does that?"

Surprisingly to me, Charles stood there and took my yelling. I expected him to yell back, lash out, and get angry. I wanted him to.

"Nothing to say now, Charles?"

"That's enough, Jesse," Brooklyn tried again.

"Shut up. This doesn't concern you," I replied over my shoulder. Back to Charles, I lowered my voice and said, "You tried to get what was mine, Charles, but you failed. I hope you find something to keep you warm at night when you're sleeping here all alone."

"Let's go," Brooklyn said, grabbing my shoulder.

I stared Charles in the eyes; still surprised he hadn't said one thing to me. The look in eyes was intense. I could see anger and frustration. I saw guilt. But at that final moment, as Brooklyn pulled me away towards the door, I could see something I hadn't expected to see at all. What I saw staring back at me in Charles' eyes, was pity; not for himself, but for me.

Charles- The people started pouring in at about 7:30, and immediately I forgot about everything I'd been stressing about all week.

I'd talked to Brooklyn almost every day, because even though Jesse thought he was on a tight leash, he couldn't keep eyes on Brooklyn between classes and during office hours.

What surprised me was seeing Jesse show up with Brooklyn at the gym a couple of times; I wasn't really quite expecting that one. I shrugged it off and disappeared into my workout.

Shane was excited about moving in and didn't fail to remind me just how excited he was every afternoon I saw him at the pool. But even though Shane was sexy and cute, had an amazing personality and even more amazing body, I couldn't forget how much I cared about Brooklyn. I knew after I told Jesse about Brooklyn and I that I was a step closer to getting what I wanted, but when Brooklyn told me that Jesse hadn't said anything to him, I realized that maybe I wasn't.

Why hadn't Jesse confronted Brooklyn about everything? Now that I'd laid it all out and Jesse could pretty much guess the entire truth, why was he still quiet about the whole thing? I expected him to blow up and say something to Brooklyn, run crying back to Matt or something, but silence was the last thing I expected.

So when I was in the middle of my conversation with Shane and I saw Jesse and Brooklyn walk up to me, I knew that everything that Jesse had been bottling in for the last few days was about to come out.

And it did. He royally embarrassed himself, going on like a drunken lunatic. I stood there motionless, able to yell back, but not wanting to. Jesse was doing enough to damage to himself as it was.

They left and I felt sorry for them both. I felt sorry for Brooklyn because he didn't deserve what he was putting himself through. He was better than this, and no matter how many times I tried to show him that, he just didn't get the picture. 'The heart wants what it wants,' he'd say, convincing himself if no one else.

I felt sorry for Jesse because I knew that even though he deserved what he was going through, everything he was feeling was my fault.

But sorry wasn't enough. I wanted Brooklyn, and I didn't care what I had to do to get him.

The party winded down after the incident with Jesse and me and people started strutting out, hooked up for the night and heading back to their rooms for their private after-parties. I didn't even know where Tag and Zach had gone off to, but I assumed they were taking advantage of the time alone.

The place emptied and I felt a little lonely. I'd told Shane I wasn't in the mood for him to stay over tonight, and I noticed him walking out with a very handsome dark guy, giggling, both of them ready to get some for the night. I wasn't the least bit jealous.

I looked around, thinking that maybe I should get a start on the cleanup when I decided I'd do just as well to wait until tomorrow. Plus, no matter how hard I tried to fight it, I was feeling down. I was in a mild depression, you might say.

So I headed into my bedroom to crash, kicking plastic cups along the way.

Then there was a knock on the door. I almost felt like not answering it, but then I decided "What the fuck? I may as well."

"Hi," he said looking back at me with puppy dog eyes. "I'm sorry about tonight."

"What are you doing here?" I asked in a low tone.

"I don't know," was his reply. I let him in.

"I wasn't expecting to see you again tonight," I said sitting next to him on the couch.

"I just had to come back and tell you something," he said. But he didn't say it. He just looked at me blankly, but he didn't say it. I waited for him to say it...

"..."

Sometimes, the words they say aren't the words we want to hear. Sometimes, they say, things are a dime short and a day late. Sometimes, we don't give a fuck what they have to say.

**I would like to extend a sincere thank you and apology to everyone that's been keeping up with the series. I hope this installment was worth the wait. Comments are always welcome at heavensforlife@aol.com.