Accepting Thanksgiving

As he watched the two men work, just like one imagined a father and son doing but in a way Marty and his father never had, the two men now at the hog pen, slopping the hogs, an onerous, but necessary twice daily chore, Marty tried to imagine whether Frank had kept his beautiful, muscular body fit. Surely he had if he was working the farm; it was hard not to keep fit in working the farm. That was something that Marty had had reason to be proud of when he went into the Marines. He'd already been whipped into shape. He and his father hadn't worked in a comfortable synchronization that his father and Frank were doing, but Marty had always done his share of the work on the farm. His father never had complained otherwise.

It was mid-November. Thanksgiving was approaching. Snow covered the ground, although not nearly to the depth that there'd be in December. Frank and Walt were well bundled up. Marty could only imagine what physical shape Frank was in now, although he fancied he'd been assured of that the previous night, as he sat in the frame of his bedroom window and watched Frank do the same across the farmyard in the old homestead house. Seeing Frank's silhouetted body in the window frame and knowing Frank's preferences had aroused Marty to taking hold of himself and masturbating. As far as he could discern, Frank had done the same, watching him.

Marty hadn't gotten nearly the sleep the previous night that his mother thought he had. The questioning of himself after that incident at the gate guardhouse and the military review board's clear intention of painting Buzz as a hero kept coming up in Marty's mind when he finally went to bed.

"Yes, when the firing started—and it and the attack lasted for only a couple of minutes; it was really typical of the Taliban harassment of the camp—Captain Thompson pushed me to the ground and came down on top of me. He sacrificed himself for me. He took several bullets, any of which would have killed him, and I came out with only one in my thigh and a messed-up face."

"You were shot in the face?"

"No, I bloodied my face when I went to the ground." That was just one of several lies, of course. It had been the blows to his face—an angry captain punching him because he'd found that Marty was giving it to other Marines, not just to him. It had been Thompson's anger and his wish to punish Marty that had had them there at the gate, standing outside the guard shack, to begin with. And the captain hadn't heroically pushed Marty to the ground and covered him out of any sort of heroic act. He'd beaten Marty to the ground to begin with and then just collapsed when the raiders' bullets hit him.

That, of course, was not the way Marty played it, though. Captain Buzz Thompson became a hero based on the way Marty told the story—and the reason they were out there at the gate and the captain's role in Marty's military life was hidden for all time, behind the citation for bravery that had been appended to the captain's military record and sent home to his wife and kids upon Marty's say so. To this day Marty didn't know if he spun this version of the story to honor the captain and the relationship the two of them had had at Camp Leatherneck or if it had been to cover Marty's own tracks there. The "relationship" had been mostly of Thompson's beating Marty into sexual submission. And not knowing which it was that was eating him up.

He looked out the window and saw now that Frank had stopped work, come out into the center of the farmyard, and was standing there, looking at Marty through the window. Embarrassed at the naked stare he interpreted as what Frank was giving him—with Muriel sitting right there, her back to the window, though—Marty mumbled something about needing to find something useful to do and stood and withdrew into the opposite side of the house.

He realized that Frank had clearly seen him in the window frame the previous night and what he had done—what they'd both done, together, even at a distance. And the look Frank now gave Marty told him that Frank was claiming him—that Frank would be coming for him.

He kept track of Frank's movements from the various windows in the brick house, though. When he saw Frank drive out in the farm truck, he bundled up and went out into the cold to give his father any assistance in the continuous farm chores that he could.

Over the next few days leading up to Thanksgiving, the two men, Frank and Marty, played a dance of hide and seek like this, keeping visual track on each other, but never coming together, avoiding contact—not yet even acknowledging the existence of each other or any shared work on the farm.

That didn't mean that Marty didn't think of Frank, though. At night now, his perpetual dream, whether or not it got to the bad part, started off with Captain Thompson's office and the supply room. When it moved Marty into the supply room and on his knees, though, the other man in the dream now had become Frank—a handsome, muscular, well-endowed Frank—not Captain Buzz Thompson.

And it became a ritual for Marty to go to the window at night, finding Frank at the window of the old homestead. Both of them would be naked. Both of them would masturbate to an ejaculation, watching each other.

Marty was afraid, though. This was too close to home. How long would it be before one or both of his parents discovered this wasn't the perfect solution to the farm's needs that they thought it was?

* * * *

Darius was big and black, which was unusual for the central farm area of Iowa, which had made him a standout at Alexander's Tavern off Highway 1 running south of Fairfield beyond the east-west Highway 34. This had been about the only place gay guys could go, other than the area parks, for hookups before Marty had left to join the Marines. It still was nearly the only place, the parks being covered with snow this time of year. Darius had been attracted to Marty as soon as the young man had come into the tavern. Marty was something new, having been gone long enough to no longer be suspected as a submissive here. And he'd come home Marine fit. Even his slight limp was intriguing. He'd only been in the tavern a couple of times before. He was here on his third night back in the area, because he was driven here by frustration.

As soon as he'd bellied up to the bar, there was the big black bull, Darius, at his elbow, offering him a drink. Marty had barely had time to see, in shock, that Frank Munoz was leaning into the bar as well. They still hadn't come together on the farm. The frustration of wanting to but avoiding the risk of starting up with another man right under his parents' noses had been what had sent Marty to this tavern.

Frank saw him and, after a bit of hesitancy, indicated he was going to move down the bar to him, but Darius, an electrician at the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant to the east, near Burlington, on the Mississippi River, was there first and obviously interested in establishing possession of this new, handsome, and very fit blond.

"Buy you a drink?" he asked. Saying yes in the tavern to a drink from a guy, was saying yes to more than that. Accepting a second drink and you were leaving with the guy.

Marty said "Yes." He said yes to the second drink too, at which time Darius had felt him up and had him under control. It wasn't really that hard for a dominating top to get Marty under control. Frank was talking to another young guy at the other end of the bar, young guys being a premium at the tavern that night. But he was spending as much time watching Darius hovering over Marty and getting ever closer as he did talking to his guy. The four of them were the most attracting men there that night, Darius an exotic black giant; Frank a dark and sultry hunk; the cute, somewhat effeminate young man Frank was talking to; and Marty, the young former Marine, with handsome blond features and the intriguing slight limp. There were only a half dozen other men other than the quite obvious punk bartender, and all of them looked like farmers at least in their middle age.

After the second drink, Darius was guiding Marty to a beaded curtain-covered doorway at the back of the room, and Marty was willingly following Darius's lead, although when they passed the other end of the bar, Marty and Frank shared a questioning look.

In the dimly lit corridor beyond the beaded curtain, still within hearing of the music from the juke box in the barroom, Darius pushed Marty down on his knees in front of him—somewhat forcefully, just as Captain Buzz had done at Camp Leatherneck—and Marty, knowing what the dominating man wanted of him and being of a submissive slave mentality, unbuckled the black giant's belt, unzipped and flared his fly, and pulled his shaft out. He was hung, as Marty knew he'd be—and he was in magnificent erection. Darius might be unusual here in rural Iowa, but there had been Marines of color like him at Camp Leatherneck. Marty called upon his military experience and managed to deep throat the shaft.

After a few minutes of oral servicing, Darius took a condom packet out of his pocket and handed it down to Marty. The inference was clear. He wanted more than a blow job. Marty complied, slitting the packet open, extracting the disk, letting the foil envelope fall to the floor to mingle with other foil packets and spent rubbers there, and rolling the condom on the jet-black shaft.

Darius pulled Marty up and pushed him toward a doorway farther down the hallway. The door led to a small, windowless room, which contained a single bed and a straight chair. There was not much in the way of seduction or preparation. Marty's frustration since leaving Afghanistan eleven days previously had built him up to having just the need for release and the decision that he wasn't going to radically change his lifestyle. He was tired of being at a crossroads of his life—what he was going to do with his life, where he was going to go, whether he was going to continue to go under men.

Darius made one of those decisions for him. He put Marty on all fours on the bed, mounted him from on top and behind, penetrated him, and fucked the stuffing out of him. Marty held steady, strangely relieved that this decision had been made for him. He pressed his cheek to the bed as Darius stretched and pumped him with his thick, black cock. Marty realized that the door to the corridor was open and someone was there, leaning against the door frame, watching them fuck. It was Frank Munoz. He remained there for a few minutes, watching, before withdrawing.

When Marty came out from the back of the bar, he walked directly to the exit from the building and entered the parking lot. He looked neither left nor right in leaving the bar, afraid of seeing Frank there and not knowing what to do. He had come here to avoid anything happening with Frank on the farm, in the presence of Muriel and Walt, but from the moment he'd seen Frank in the doorway, like in the dream, it was Frank on top of him, fucking him, not Darius.

He'd driven his mother's car to the tavern. As he approached it, he saw their farm truck. He was surprised he hadn't noticed it when he'd arrived at the tavern. Frank was sitting in the front seat of the truck, with the motor running. Marty tried to act like he didn't see Frank there. He got in his mother's car, started it, and pulled out onto Highway 1. He had to drive back into the southern outskirts of Fairfield to get on the Libertyville Road. Frank followed him all the way back to the farm. They parked next to each other in the farmyard. The lights in the main house were out.

Frank was out of the truck before Marty turned the ignition off in the car, and he opened the door and held a hand out to the young man.

"You best come into the cottage before going into the main house," he said. "We can't do it in your parents' house."

The tone of his voice was low and a bit hoarse. Marty looked into the older man's eyes and knew what Frank wanted. He wanted it too, but he looked plaintively over at the darkened main house. His folks didn't know about him. They must know about Frank, because there'd been all of that scandal and yet they still offered him a job. But they didn't know about him, their son. It would break their hearts to know, Marty was sure. He couldn't do this here. He couldn't do it at all if he didn't want to ruin everything on the farm.

"Should we go back to the tavern?" he asked in a weak voice. He wasn't saying no. He was too weak to say no to Frank. But not here. They couldn't do it here.

Frank was holding his hand in a strong grip, though, and pulled him up from the driver's seat and out of the car. "We'll go into the cottage," he said, as he pulled Marty in that direction.

Frank fucked him in the larger of the two bedrooms in the old homestead—the room Frank was using. The older man took his time, getting them both naked, making Marty service his cock as he no doubt watched Marty service Darius's cock. Then he put Marty in the same position on the bed that Darius had done—on knees and elbows, Marty's chest and cheek to the mattress, and Marty moaned as Frank pressed his face between the younger man's butt cheeks and ate him out until Marty was begging for it. Then Frank mounted Marty from above and behind as Darius had done, worked a cock inside him that rivaled Darius's in length and thickness, and fucked him hard and long.

Marty held there, mewing, under Frank, who, gripping the younger man's waist as he worked his cock inside, stretching Marty's walls, making the young man his until he was fully saddled, and, when he was, moving his hands to cover Marty's pecs, thumbing the nubs and nuzzling his face into the hollow of Marty's throat, as he thrust and thrust and thrust, fulfilling a dream of congress with each other that both men had carried for years.

"Yes, fuck yes. Give it to me. Breed me!" Marty cried out as Frank went deep, held, throbbing, tensing, jerking slightly, and then gave up his seed. No condom here; just raw, primeval sex. Marty had been vocal in the coupling. He had dreamed for years of the sultry mixed breed's shaft being deep inside him, its seed flowing like this. He was mighty glad, though, that they were doing it in the old cottage rather than nearer to the brick house where his parents could hear them.

He knew now too that he'd let Frank do it again—whenever the stud wanted to and they could manage it. He knew he'd be here on the farm, with Frank, as long as Frank was here and wanted him.

Later in the night, when Marty entered the main house as silently as he was able, he fancied he heard a bedroom door shut in the back hallway before he entered it to reach his room.

* * * *

He got up late the next morning, dithering in his room, afraid to go out and face his parents, sure that they now knew and that the world would come crashing down on him even before he'd had a chance to figure out what he wanted to do with his life now. But this morning was no different from the three previous ones since he'd come home. Muriel had made him a substantial breakfast and she sat, drinking coffee, and pushing food at him at the table by the bay window, as Marty watched his father and Frank doing their morning chores out in the farmyard. This morning she chose to ask him about his trip home from Afghanistan, and, with a great relief at not discerning a change in her demeanor with him, Marty spun a story for her—one that didn't include his encounter with the cowboy on the train between Chicago and Fairfield.

Despite his consternation of the complication of whatever Frank and he did on the farm now, he felt strangely relieved that he'd been covered both by Darius and Frank and that the decision of whether he would continue to lay down for men as he had done for Captain Buzz and other Marines at Camp Leatherneck had now been settled.

But now there were his parents to worry about. He knew they never could accept what he was.

* * * *

On Thanksgiving afternoon, Marty drifted by the dining room table on his way to the kitchen to see what he could pilfer from the fruits of Muriel's full day of preparations. He paused briefly at seeing the already-set dining room table, all of the best china, crystal, and silverware out and a centerpiece of fresh holly taken off one of the farm's trees, with yellow and red candles set in it.

At the kitchen door, he asked, "There are four places set at the table. Are we having company for Thanksgiving dinner?"

"Not company," Muriel answered. "One of us. Frank will be sitting with us tonight. I probably should have asked him to come in to eat with the family before now—to take his place with the family."

"Take his place with the family?" Marty asked, confused. "I don't take your meaning." Were his parents adopting Frank because they thought Marty would never pull his weight on the farm? That would actually be fine with Marty. He didn't want to inherit this place and try to keep it going on his own.

"I think you do know what I mean, son," she said, turning and looking at him pointedly. "I don't think we need pretend that what is doesn't exist anymore."

Marty was stunned. She knew. Did his father know too? He and Frank had made an effort to be circumspect. They'd fucked like bunnies the last three days, whenever they got the chance, and Marty had been going over to the old homestead cottage at night when he figured his parents had gone to sleep and had slipped back into his room before he thought they had awakened, but he'd clearly been wrong about that. But was it only his mother who had cottoned on to them? Was his father still in the dark about it? What would happen with Frank if they, indeed, knew? Or would it be Marty who was thrown off the farm—just when he was beginning to want to be there? Frank was more useful at the farm than Marty ever would be. Frank lived for farming; Marty couldn't manage that level of interest in it. And his parents had known about Frank's bent all along.

Did his father, at least, not know?

The voice called from the living room. "Come in here and let's talk, son," Walt had called out. His voice sounded tired, but he'd worked a full day already on the farm, less work to do in the winter snow than during the other three seasons, but more than enough work for one man. When Marty entered the living room, his father was sitting in his favorite recliner, the daily newspaper open on his lap, a serious expression on his face. "Sit here beside me, son," he said, gesturing to the smaller recliner beside him, both chairs pointed at the TV set. It was the chair that Marty's mother usually sat in. They hadn't established one in front of the TV for Marty yet.

"Did you think we didn't know Frank was gay when we offered him the job here?" Walt asked.

"I don't know. I wasn't here then," Marty said, trying to distract from what he knew the topic was, as he sat in his mother's chair. He was just dissembling, though, and they both knew it. He'd been here when the scandal about Frank had blossomed in the community. He could see now that his parents probably thought Marty was tied up in the Frank scandal, although he wasn't. He would have been if Frank had come for him then; he idolized Frank and it was Frank who helped propel Marty to accepting his feelings. But the backlash had scared Marty. It was a primary reason he joined and left. Now he knew that his parents probably understood all of that.

His dad just looked at him until Marty broke the painful silence. "Yes, I guess you did know," he admitted. "It was all over the community. I thought it was because you had always given the Munoz's a good shake. You didn't hold them being a mixed-race couple and poor against them like others around here did until Frank became the local sports hero in high school, bringing all those trophies back to Fairfield and Libertyville. And then when the community turned on them when Frank was outed as gay and wants giving them winning teams anymore, I just thought you and Mom were being the good people that you are."