Daybreak in Sandbridge

Chapter 2-2

Andy sat in Scooter’s chair in the office for a long, long time, looking at the letter on the desk. He wasn’t sure he wanted to touch it, much less open it. There was no return address, but he knew that handwriting. It had gotten shakier over the years, but he’d know that swooping loop on the end of his name anywhere.

Scooter rapped on the doorframe, his normal, brilliant grin in place. “Hey, space cadet,” he said. “Earth to Andy.”

Andy glanced up and smiled. “Hey, honey.” He looked back at the letter, rubbing his hands on his jeans. “Why? After all this time?”

“What, why?” Scooter stepped into the tiny office, put a hand on Andy’s shoulder. “Something wrong?”

“I don’t know,” Andy said, leaning into Scooter’s touch. He nodded at the letter. “That’s from my mom.”

Scooter blinked. “I didn’t realize. Well, of course you have a mom, but. You never talk about her, not at all.” He plucked up the envelope and turned it over in his hand. “Do…you want me to throw it out for you? Or read it?”

Andy closed his eyes, breathing slowly. “No, I…I’ll read it myself. But. Stay with me?”

“Always.” Scooter ran a hand through Andy’s hair, pulling on the short scruff lightly. He put the letter back down on the desk in front of Andy before leaning on the desk to face away, giving Andy as much privacy as the confines of his office allowed. “I’m right here.”

Andy picked up the envelope and carefully slid his finger under the edge, tearing it open. There was only one sheet of paper inside, the heavy, creamy stock she kept in her desk. He unfolded it, and his hand sought Scooter’s as he read.

Dearest Andrew,

I know that you left us for good reason, and I couldn’t blame you for not wanting to come back. When we found out you’d moved again, I hoped you might send us your new address, at least, but you didn’t. I’ve tried to respect your wishes and stay away.

I’m sorry for intruding now, truly I am, and at your place of employment, no less. I hope this hasn’t gotten you in trouble with your employer. But I hope you’ll agree it was necessary.

Your father is gravely ill, and has been admitted to hospice care. He has a few weeks, maybe a month.

Please, come home to New York to say goodbye. If not for his sake, then for mine, and if not for mine, then for your inheritance.

My number is below, if you need money for tickets or anything else. However you decide, know that I will always love you.

Mama

“Oh, God,” he breathed. His heart was pounding like it was trying to climb out of his chest. “Oh, God, I don’t…” He looked at it again, but the letters were blurring from the trembling in his hand. “What the hell.”

“You want to tell me?” Scooter’s voice was cautious, full of an emotion Andy wasn’t sure how to interpret. Restrained, in a way he rarely was. His hand continued to move over Andy’s hair, stroking and soothing. “Bad news?”

Andy laughed joylessly. “I wish I could say.” He held out the letter for Scooter to take. “Maybe you can tell me.”

Scooter scanned the letter, eyes flickering from the graceful scrawl and then to check the emotional weather on Andy’s face. The paper was shaking, just slightly, when he put it back down on the desk. “She knew. About how your father treated you?”

Andy shrugged and then nodded. “He didn’t treat her much better.”

Scooter nodded. “Know a little about that,” he said. “Ask Jason sometime.” He scrubbed at his chin, the scruff there making soft sounds against his palm. “You love her?”

Andy had to think about that. For a long time, he had hated her for not stopping his father, for not leaving. But he’d missed her desperately when he’d left on his own. And he’d come to understand, slowly, that it wasn’t as black-and-white for her as it had been for him. “Yeah,” he said finally. “I don’t always like her, but…she’s my mom.”

Scooter took a long, deep breath. “Then you should go,” he said. “Not for your dad; he can go straight to hell after he dies and I’ll help push. But for her sake. And yours. The last thing you want in this is to regret it.”

Andy nodded. Scooter was probably right. At least if he went, he could say he’d tried. He leaned into Scooter, closing his eyes and burying his face in Scooter’s shirt, breathing in the warm scent that had come to mean home. “I’ll…ask around, see if I can string together some subs for me for a few days.”

Scooter picked up his phone, tapped into the screen. He frowned, tapped again. “Do…would you want me to come with you?”

Andy looked up, eyes stretching wide. He hadn’t even dared to hope. Dockside was Scooter’s life; usually it was like pulling teeth just to get Scooter to take a whole day off. “Could you? I know you…it’s not like you have vacation you can cash in.”

Scooter’s phone buzzed. He glanced at the screen. “I can,” he said, and turned the phone to show Andy.

Scooter: gt ur ass bak hre. Nd u 4 a fw dys.

New text from Jeff: not far. Charleston. be home tomorrow.

Jeff hadn’t even asked why. f**k, Andy was going to start crying or something. “Okay, then. Yeah. Let’s…” He took a couple of quick breaths. “I’ll look up air fares tonight.” He wrapped his arms around Scooter’s waist and squeezed. “Thank you.”

“Never been on a plane before,” Scooter mused. He put his arms around Andy, gently. “It’ll be okay, babe. I promise, I won’t let anything happen.” He kissed Andy’s hair. “Let’s finish getting closed up, yeah?”

“Yeah. Yeah, that’s…Yeah.” A sudden laugh bubbled up out of Andy’s throat. “Oh, God, you’ve never flown and I’m going to take us to La Guardia.” But he felt better, knowing Scooter would be with him. He let go, then took the hand Scooter offered to stand. “Maybe I’ll drag you sightseeing while we’re there. So you’ll finally know what it’s like to be the tourist.”

“Yeah, okay,” Scooter said, a little hesitant. “We can do some of that, if you want. Maybe it’ll give me patience with some of th’ idjits we get around here sometimes.”

“Unlikely,” Andy said. “But it’ll give us an excuse not to hang around the house all the time, at least.” Andy tugged Scooter close and kissed him, soft and chaste. “Love you. So much.” He sighed, tucked the letter in his pocket, and shoved his hand through his hair. “You think Kat and Jason will believe we’ve been skiving off cleanup and close so I could blow you in here?”

“Pretty sure Kat’ll believe just about anything from you,” Scooter said, groaning into Andy’s neck. “The question is, will Jason believe I’d let you. Or you think Kat’ll open the door to prove it to him?”

“And then she’d probably kill us both,” Andy sighed. “Feed our bodies to the jellyfish.”

Scooter appeared to consider it. “Jellyfish get hungry, too,” he said, raising one eyebrow hopefully.

And, well, Andy had said it as something between a joke and an excuse not to have to talk to the others about the letter and its news yet, but if Scooter was actually going to let Andy blow him in his office, with Kat and Jason still in the restaurant, just on the other side of the door…

Well, that was an opportunity too good to pass up. Andy pushed Scooter back against the desk and slid to his knees, unfastening Scooter’s pants. “You going to be able to keep quiet for me?” he teased, looking up at Scooter through his eyelashes.

Scooter sucked in air and bit his lip. “Gonna try,” he promised. Quiet was not a thing either of them did very well.

Andy worked Scooter’s pants and underwear down, just enough to let him pull out Scooter’s c**k, already half-hard. Andy had seen it hundreds of times now, but it never failed to make his mouth water. He licked up its length, a broad, slow stripe, then tipped his head to watch Scooter’s face as he took the head into his mouth to suckle gently, tracing each tiny fold of skin with his tongue.

Scooter’s fingers threaded into Andy’s hair. “God, baby, love the things you do,” he whispered. He chuckled, low and wicked. “Gotta marry you soon, before I get sued for sexually harassing my employees.”

“You keep saying that, and here we are, still not married,” Andy pointed out. “Mr. Stahl, are you just stringing me along so you can have your wicked way with me?” He punctuated that with another slow lick up Scooter’s now mostly-hard prick.

Scooter pretended to consider that, which would have been more impressive had he not also been clutching, white knuckled, at the desk behind him. “Depends. Do I get more, or less s*x once I marry you?” He wobbled a bit, then let out a low moan.

“Shhhh,” Andy warned. He wrapped one hand around the base of Scooter’s c**k and braced the other on Scooter’s hip, and sucked Scooter in, slow and steady, teasing at his own gag reflex and humming happily.

Scooter shivered. He shifted his balance, hooking one leg around Andy’s lower back, the muscle in his calf flexing. Breathless, wordless, he watched, staring down at Andy with wide, ocean-gray eyes as Andy took him in. Andy tongued at him, and Scooter twitched, breathing slow, so slow, then jerked his hips as Andy found a particularly wicked combination. “God.”

Andy chuckled a little at that, and sucked harder. Not for the first time he wished he could talk while doing this. He wanted to tell Scooter how good this was, how much he loved this, Scooter’s taste and scent overwhelming everything else. He wanted to tease Scooter with the reminder that the others were still nearby, could walk in on them at any moment. He settled for humming vibrations into Scooter’s skin, keeping his eyes on Scooter’s face so Scooter couldn’t look away.

Scooter wasn’t above cheating; he licked his lips, then sucked the lower one into his mouth, denting the skin with his teeth. Using the back of Andy’s leg, he flicked one ancient sneaker off and rubbed his foot against Andy’s thigh, teasing until he got an angle on Andy’s stiffening prick, pressing lightly. “Hey there,” he said, soft.

Ohhhh, that felt nice. Andy let his eyelids flutter shut for a moment, rocking into Scooter’s touch. He redoubled his efforts; there were times he wanted to draw this out as long as he could, see just how desperate he could get Scooter, but not this time. The possibility of getting caught was a fun added adrenaline rush, but actually getting caught was slightly embarrassing and also rude as hell to the people who hadn’t wanted to be involved in their s*x life. And the longer they were in here, the more likely it was that someone would come looking.

Andy pulled off, just long enough to gasp, “Come on, baby, come for me, and then you can take me upstairs and make me scream, hm?” and swallowed him back down, even deeper, hand sliding between Scooter’s thighs to cup his balls and press gently just behind them.

Andy f****d Scooter with his mouth and Scooter returned the favor, cupping one hand behind Andy’s head and sliding in and out with deep relish. “Jesus,” he whispered, then lost the ability to speak at all, his mouth working but no sound coming out. He thrust twice, hard, almost gagging Andy, then stiffened. He raised one hand to his mouth, bit down hard on the meaty part of his palm, just under the thumb. His c**k jumped, twitched inside Andy’s mouth. Scooter convulsed once, violent, and came, thick streams of it, spurting into Andy’s willing throat.

Andy swallowed and swallowed again, and kept licking and sucking, softer, until the last weak pulses were spent and a tiny whine of overstimulation slipped from Scooter’s throat. Andy pulled back and very carefully tucked Scooter back into his underwear and pants. “That was awesome,” he said, just to hear the rasp in his voice. He nuzzled at Scooter’s fly a little, then climbed to his feet. “We are so doing that again.”

“Holy s**t, Andy,” Scooter said, low and reverent. He tried to stand up and fell back weakly against his desk, knocking over the jar of pens and pencils. He rubbed his thumb over Andy’s lip, then along the side of his jaw. “God, you look well and thoroughly molested.”

Andy grinned. “Good.” He leaned in to kiss Scooter, feeling a hundred times better than he had before. “Come on, let’s go finish cleanup so Kat and Jason will go away.”