Babber into my Heart

People liked to speculate that it was bad, traumatic even. In their minds why else would a boy from Eastman Park with an Ivy League education spend his free time with a kid from the burned out side of the railroad tracks, whose only brush with higher education was the dos and don’ts of the streets. Truth was, their bond had come from a moment of triumph, stuck in an elevator during a blackout with a pregnant woman whose water had decided to break. They’d worked with her to bring Bastian Chauncy Medlow into the world beside Blake Mathias Medlow, each of the twins wrapped in their shirts when the firemen arrived.

What a contrast that had been. A twenty-dollar rock band t-shirt next to hundred-dollar Armani, and yet Chauncy had taken his off with the same disregard for what might become of it as Bastian had and they’d been fast friends ever since. In the elevator, they’d shared childhood stories in the hopes of entertaining the first time mom, who was nervous, worried, and desperate to breathe and laugh through the pain. By the time they’d been freed and guided out into a Washington State evening, they were tired, hungry, and more than ready for ice coffee and pizza: supreme, no black olives with extra soft mozzarella cheese melting in puddles all over that pie.

That had made them laugh too, especially when their coffee order had proved to be another similarity. Bastian hadn’t laughed so much since Shep, his best friend since elementary school, had gone off to pursue work in California. After that, they’d bumped into each other everywhere, until they started making a point to get together, which had somehow led to joining the same kink club along with the same gym. They’d started doubling up at the club while they learned what they loved and what they had little interest in, which was how they’d ended up here. There was a month long series of training sessions culminating in a pet play event and somehow, probably between shots of tequila, Bastian had let himself be talked into signing up.

Bastian still didn’t know how he felt about these upcoming sessions, but he knew shy Chauncy wasn’t going to come to the event until he’d agreed to come too.

So now here he was, sky streaked with the brilliant colors of dawn. There was enough light to see by, at least for what he wanted to do. He closed the cover on his e-reader and slipped it in his backpack beside a spare t-shirt, zipped it up, and left it with the front desk receptionist before heading out. The moment he reached the path, he broke into a jog. Walking it yesterday had shown him where the obstacles were: benches, low hanging limbs, short retaining walls, planters, and waist high shrubs. Those he could practice doing summersaults over.

There was a freedom and exhilaration in flipping and bouncing off things, in twisting and making his body spiral. He loved gymnastics, but this was different; this was parkour, free running, also known as the art of displacement, and he was damned good at it. Breathing rhythmically, he exhaled as he leapt on the back of a bench, paused for a heartbeat, then spun, hurling himself through the air until his feet hit the grass and he was off running again. It wasn’t about speed, it wasn’t about keeping time, it was about the effortlessness of it all.

As he neared the end of the trail, he debated making a second run, but the sun was fully up over the horizon and people were starting to move about. Already he’d had to retime a jump to avoid crashing into a fellow jogger, and the looks he was getting? Well, he wasn’t in the mood to explain what it was he was doing. Hell, he wasn’t quite ready for any human interaction at all, especially not with a stranger.

Chauncy was supposed to be the shy one, not him. They were so screwed.