For the Glory of the Earth

"I gotta answer the call," Ervin told Monte in a loud voice. "You need to catch a ride back to the farm with someone else. Lamont can take you." Ervin didn't wait for an answer. He pushed off from the bar and headed out to his truck.

Ervin had said that loud enough for the whole room to have heard him, it would seem, so he had every reason to assume that Lamont had. But the siren had just gone off on the roof, so there was competition for his voice.

Whether or not Lamont heard Ervin, about ten minutes after Ervin left, so did Lamont—without taking Monte. Monte had been looking over at the table where Jack Carson sat—looking back at Monte—and he didn't even notice Lamont leaving. He looked around and, not seeing Lamont anywhere, he looked back at Jack Carson's table. Jack Carson was smiling and waving for Monte to join him. Monte took a deep swig of his beer, breathed deeply, almost hiccupping from the nervous catch in his breath, and pushed off from the bar.

Half way back to Ervin's farm from the Roadhouse, Jack Carson pulled his EnergyFuture Land Rover off onto a lane leading to the banks of White Oak Creek. He cut off the engine and turned in the seat, facing Monte.

"You know I've had my eye on you since the meeting down in Danville," he said in a low, hoarse voice. "You're a right fine strapping young man."

"I 'spose," Monte said shyly, his legs spread and his arms hanging down between them. He was looking down at the floor mat between his legs.

"You haven't asked why I pulled off the road."

Monte didn't answer or look up.

"You're not the least bit curious why?"

"I reckon I know why."

"And it doesn't bother you?"

"I reckon not."

"You know what kind of bar that was that we were just in, don't you, Diamonte?" It didn't escape Monte that Carson had taken the time to learn his name. Monte hadn't given him a name.

"They call me Monte. Yes, I know."

"That man I always see you with, the scratch farmer, Ervin Walker. Is he your man? Do you lie under him?"

"Yeah, he's my man."

"I heard tell you got fucked out in the parking lot Saturday night by a trucker. That true?"

"Yeah. It was OK. He paid me."

"And this Walker guy. Did he know about it? Was it OK with him?"

"Seems like. He lets me make my own decisions, do what I want."

"Lift your head and look at me, Monte."

Monte did so, but he didn't only look into Carson's eyes. Carson's thick cock was rising up outside of his fly and standing straight up.

"You see how I'm interested in you, how badly I want you, Monte? Do you like the looks of me as well as that trucker? Or Walker? You going to make me work hard at this?"

There was a pause, and then, letting his held breath out in a long sigh, Monte said, "No, sir."

"No what?"

"No, I ain't gonna make you work hard for it. I knew this was what you wanted when you pulled off the road. I knew it when you offered me the ride home."

"I'll pay you fifty dollars for it."

"That would be right nice, thank you."

Carson leaned over and, putting his hands on either side of Monte, brought his face in for a kiss. The kiss didn't last too long, though. Carson obviously was anxious to get right to business. Without releasing Monte's face, coming out of the kiss, Carson just continued pulling Monte's face down to his lap onto his already released, engorging cock.

They fucked in the backseat of the Land Rover, with Monte giving Carson his money's worth by straddling the thighs of the sitting older man, facing him, and riding Carson's thick cock.

Carson encircled Monte's body with his arms and nuzzled his face into Monte's shoulder as they cooled off from the fuck in which they had ejaculated nearly simultaneously, Carson filling up the bulb of a Magnum and Monte shooting off up Carson's flat belly. His pent up lust taken care of, Carson wanted to take more time playing. His lips went to Monte's nipples and Monte arched his back to accommodate Carson's play. They kissed now in long, breathtaking moments with plenty of tonguing.

"That was extra nice," Carson said as they came out of a kiss.

"You're extra big," Monte murmured.

"You cramping? You want to come off it?"

"No, not yet. I like you deep inside me. We can do it again, if you want. You don't have to pay more. I liked it. Your cock is as good as a black man's."

"God, you seem so natural and casual with it. Are you this way with any man who wants to fuck you?"

"Not just anyone. But the ones I want to fuck, yes."

"It's a turn-on that you take it natural like this."

"Why not? Animals fuck. We're animals, ain't we? It's the way of nature. If you want me and I want you, why not?"

"Why not indeed. And tomorrow you can let Ervin Walker fuck you too and you feel no guilt that I fucked you tonight?"

"No. Why? Mr. Walker, he don't own me. And he says he sees it that way too. Otherwise I'd probably not be with him. And it's only for the summer."

"Only for the summer? So you aren't tied to Walker?"

"No, I'm goin' to community college in the fall."

"I see. I'd like to see you again. You think Walker would let you be out for a night?"

"Uh, I'm not sure . . ."

"I'd pay you a hundred dollars for a night."

"Well, then . . ."

"I've got use of a cabin over on the Dan River below Boyd's mountain. Maybe in a week or two . . ."

"Why not right now?"

"Now's not a good time. I've got these land deals to work. Another couple of weeks and . . . oh shit . . . what the fuck!"

Monte had swiveled around on the cock, facing the front of the Land Rover. He had planted the heels of his feet in the floor of the vehicle and gripped the tops of the front seats with his hands and was pushing back and forth with his channel on Carson's cock, fucking himself hard and deep on the shaft. Immediately lost to the moment, Carson grabbed Monte's waist in his hands and helped with the push and pull as he threw his head back and howled to the ceiling of the vehicle.

"Cabin now. Cabin now," Monte was chanting in a mantra.

They were barely in the front door of the cabin, when Carson pushed Monte down on all fours on an oval braided rug, mounted him like a dog, and rode him for a half hour.

On the second day, when Carson's interest seemed to be flagging a bit, Monte begged to be fucked in the shower and then to have his wrists bound to the headboard and for Carson to punish him roughly. Any time there was a gleam in Carson's eyes in response to something that could be done in sex, Monte wanted to do it. There was nothing that Carson could conceivably think of asking Monte to do that Monte wouldn't do.

Monte kept Carson in the Dan River cabin for three days, riding the cock and being ridden by the cock in every conceivable location and position and time of day or night.

On the afternoon of the third day, Carson asked Monte to go back with him to Richmond. There he could enroll in a community college that Carson would pay for, and Carson would set him up in a small apartment. Carson's wife need know nothing of the arrangement, Carson said. He had gotten away with such an arrangement before.

* * * *

The afternoon of the fourth day, Ervin had the hood up on his Ford pickup and was seeing what he could do about keeping the truck going through another winter, when he sensed he wasn't alone. He looked up and saw Monte opening the gate of the fence surrounding the farm yard. The young man looked hot and tired—as if he'd been walking for miles. And, as it turned out, he had been. Jack Carson had let him off out on Route 41, and Monte had walked the dusty dirt back road into the farm.

As Monte approached, Ervin came out from underneath the hood and turned toward the young man. Monte was only wearing jeans and was barefoot. Ervin was the same.

"You've come back."

"Yes."

"To pick up your things or to stay?"

"To stay through the summer. Like we agreed."

"You been with that EnergyFuture huckster, Jack Carson, all this time?"

"Yes, sir."

"Thought so. Haven't seen him around."

"Was it long enough?"

"Yes."

"Good."

"He treat you right?"

"Nothing to complain about."

"OK, then. Best you get under the spigot and wash down."

Ervin watched Monte as the young man went over to the spigot next to the horse trough. He unbuttoned his fly and stripped off his jeans. Then he bent over to get his head under the spigot.

A low growl came up from deep inside Ervin's chest and, trembling, he walked to Monte, stripping off his own jeans as he moved. His eyes were on the curve of Monte's naked back. That image was what aroused Ervin the most. And it had been four days of foregoing his needs, living the sacrifice.

Monte felt the strong hands on his waist, and he moved to the side, as they guided him, coming down on his belly on the rim of the nearly empty horse trough, letting his head drop down into the trough and grabbing the far rim of the trough with his fists, while Ervin kissed and stroked his back with gliding hands. There was no resistance in the young man whatsoever. It was like he hadn't been gone the three days and more. There'd be no apologizing—indeed Ervin couldn't imagine that there would be—and Monte was as ready to be spiked by Ervin as he ever was.

Ervin's hands glided down Monte's back from his shoulder blades to the small of his back, where they fanned outward to the young man's hips. Monte raised his hips as Ervin's meaty cockhead moved into the crack and dragged across the puckering hole, again and again, while Monte gasped and sighed.

"Yes," Monte murmured in a husky voice, "Put it in me. Fuck me, daddy. Be good to me."

There was no hesitancy, no resistance.

Ervin's hands tightened over Monte's bulbous buttocks and spread them as his cock head pressed against the hole and pressed into the cavity.

Monte gasped and pushed back on the cock, taking it inside him. "Ride me, daddy. Fuck me deep."

So natural; so giving, Ervin thought. No hesitancy in the young man. Freely giving and taking pleasure. So . . . earthy. It would be a sacrifice to give him up.

Then Ervin was inside Monte, stroking him vigorously and hard and singing his hallelujahs to the noonday sun above, not caring who or what saw them. Though this be sin, his mind screamed, he would make the most of it.

Thrusting again and again. Monte pushing his rump back onto the cock, crying for more of it, deeper and harder. The two of them coming in a gush, almost simultaneously, Ervin flooding Monte's channel deep, as the urgency had provided no opportunity for niceties. Monte arching back to him after the ejaculation, the two men kissing deeply, Monte whispering that Ervin could do it again, if he wanted. Monte not begging for it now, but not avoiding it either. Always ready, always open for it.

After lunch, they both climbed up the White Oak mountain ridge, sat near to each other on a rock, and stared down into the valley. It was Friday, Ervin's day to open himself to the word for Sunday's preaching. He was too full of the moment, though, to meditate. He wanted Monte up here for a time—to see and understand what he had sacrificed for. Afterward, Ervin would send him back down to the farm and would mediate for a word. He would cheat today, though. He sometimes did, but he always pretended that the word only came to him after meditating up here. He already knew, however, that the word that would come to him today would be "thanksgiving."

"See how beautiful it is down there?" Ervin asked.

"Yes."

"Pristine farm land. Never developed as anything else but fields and meadows—for more than three hundred years—and maybe longer, by the Indians, before that."

They were both silent for a few minutes, their hands entwined.

"And, thanks to you, it will stay that way."

They were silent again, gazing out over the valley.

"Did you have any trouble getting that Carson guy to drive you away after I left on the false fire alarm I set up and Lamont left as planned too?"

"No, none at all. You managed with the land sales OK?" Monte asked.

"Yes, Sadie Harrison hauled out her checkbook. The three days that EnergyFuture shyster could have been making land deals but was holed up with you somewhere, Sadie was buying up from whoever wanted to sell. Lamont Jackson's already sold out and gone from the valley. There's no way that EnergyFuture bastard's going to get that land from Sadie. She's already arranging to put it in the nature conservancy, so not even death is going to help them."

"So, we got what we wanted?"

"Yep. EnergyFuture can't get enough parcels of land together now to put in the uranium mine here. Sadie rattled the government in Richmond and came up with information not contained in any of those pamphlets they gave us. Only an open-pit strip mine would work here, it seems. All that radiation exposed and going up in the air morning, noon, and night, and probably coming back down as far away as Danville and Chatham. Now if they want to do their mining here in Virginia, they'll have to go back across the county to that Coles Farm tract. And that can be an underground mine. Still dangerous, but not like they wanted to do here."

"I'm glad you got what you wanted and the valley will stay as it is," Monte said.

"I hope it wasn't too much of a sacrifice, son," Ervin said. "I didn't know of any other way to get those three days out ahead of the Carson snake. I knew it had to be by sacrifice. I hope that brute wasn't too rough on you. I hated asking you to do that for us—keeping him occupied to give Sadie time to buy the land out from underneath him. But what we did here, we did for the glory of the earth. Can't do no better than honor the earth, my momma always said."

"Naw, it was OK," Monte said. He turned away from Ervin, so that the older man couldn't see him smile. "One thing I thought of while I was gone, though," Monte said.

"What's that?"

"I think rather than going into Danville for community college in the fall, I'll go up to Richmond. I think prospects there might be better than down here."

"Whatever suits you, son."

"You would be OK with that?"

"It will be a sad day when you move on, of course. But you have been a sin that I must work on. Not your doing, of course, other than being here. My weakness. You've made such a sacrifice for this valley. It will be my turn to make a sacrifice too. Not today or tomorrow, of course. But, yes, going to Richmond will be a good idea; you should find friends of your own age there. And I've ever said I have no hold over you, that you can do what you like."

"I think I'd like that . . . going to Richmond. I got a friend there who says he'll put me up while I'm going to college."

Monte had to stay turned so that Ervin couldn't see how hard he was smiling about just how much he thought he was going to like that. As sacrifices go, it had been a pretty easy one—a lot more enjoyable than he'd thought it would be. That Jack had a cock as good as a black man's.