Key Lime Pie and Custard

Chapter 3

By

Tim Mead

I was awakened on Sunday morning by noisy people in the hallway outside my room. A lot of old people don’t realize how loud they’re talking because they’ve partially lost their hearing. It was some of my tour companions on their way downstairs to breakfast that put an end to my sleep. Looking at the bedside clock, I discovered I had plenty of time, so I reached for my morning woodie.

I’d long since given up thinking of Sean as I jacked off, substituting faceless naked bodies in my fantasies instead. That morning, though, I couldn’t help thinking of Graham Knight, the English kid on our tour. I didn’t really know what he looked like naked, but it wasn’t difficult to imagine his perfect bubble butt, broad shoulders, and narrow hips. I had noticed his substantial package, so I could imagine a nice dick, probably uncut, with big balls.

Soon I had splattered cum all over my abs and chest, so I ran for the bathroom. I let the cum slide slowly down my body as I shaved, then jumped into the shower. Drying myself off afterward, I pulled on a tee shirt, shorts, ankle socks, and my sneakers. I packed my luggage except for my toilet kit, hoping I’d have time to brush my teeth after breakfast before we had to get on the bus for our day’s journey to Key West.

I told myself I’d been acting like a jerk. I might as well make the most of this trip. I’d paid good money for it, and I was stuck with these people. No harm in trying to be pleasant to my tour-mates.

When I stepped into the hall, I saw Mamie and Dorothy, the two old ladies from Boston, walking toward the elevator. Graham was between them and each was holding one of his arms. How cheesy was that! He really was shameless in sucking up to the old folk. I held back, thinking I’d either take the stairs or wait for the elevator to return, but Dorothy held the door open and called for me to come and ride down with them. I couldn’t refuse without seeming to be a total lout, so I hurried up and got in the car.

On the way down I was preoccupied thinking about Graham. Maybe he’d had a deprived childhood and craved attention. That would explain why he seemed to go out of his way to curry favor with the olds in our group. Or maybe it was just some kind of ego trip, seeing how they tended to fawn all over him.

Although I tried to hang back, I wound up sitting at breakfast with the ladies and Graham. I remember Graham being unhappy with what the restaurant called tea. By the time he got something that was real tea and not Constant Comment, the water was so cold he couldn’t drink his tea after it was made. He took a sip, made a face, and pushed it away. I felt sorry for him at that moment, knowing what tea is supposed to taste like and imagining what the mess in his cup actually tasted like.

When I went to the parking lot to wait to get on the bus, the temperature was already in the low 70’s. After Cleveland, that was a real treat. And since we were literally driving the whole length of Florida, I knew it would be even warmer by the time we got to Key West. If nothing else, Pete was right when he said I could spend two weeks getting warm.

Graham looked delicious. He was dressed exactly like me, except his tee shirt was blue and mine was yellow. But the sprinkling of dark hair on his arms and calves was very sexy. He had muscular legs. I couldn’t actually see his thighs, but his shorts promised that underneath were the kind you associate with soccer players. I wondered if he played either soccer or rugby, as I think they call it.

When he got on the bus, Graham took a seat just beyond halfway back. Despite my intentions of being friendlier, I sat a couple of rows behind him. Of course, no one sat with me. At least not at first.

Our coach had a unisex toilet in the rear, smaller even than the ones on airplanes. We were told we couldn’t use it when the bus was parked, but that it was okay while we were on the highway. Because of the age of most of the group, there was almost constant traffic up and down the aisles. During the morning, first Mamie and then Dorothy took the occasion to sit beside me and chat for a while. Of course they wanted to know all about me. And I found out a little about them. Both were widows who had been friends since they attended Mount Holyoke together. One had been a teacher, the other a librarian. When they found they were both alone, they’d moved in together, and that had been ten years ago.

I think they worked as a team, because when Dorothy came to sit with me, she knew almost verbatim everything I’d told Mamie. And it was Dorothy who wormed out of me the story of my being dumped by Sean. I didn’t tell her I was more or less required to take a vacation, but she knew I was there to get over all of that hurt.

“Will, dear, wouldn’t it help to get beyond all that if you were a little more friendly with people? Especially with Graham. He’s such a nice boy, and you two do share the fact that you’re single young men surrounded by a gaggle of old geese. Why don’t you let your guard down a little? You and he could be having a good time together.”

“I’m sorry, Dorothy, I guess I’ve been rude to everyone.”

“Not rude, dear. Just a bit stand-offish.”

“But Graham has been stand-offish, too. He doesn’t seem to be interested in being friends with me. He seems to prefer being with you older folks.”

“Maybe you haven’t given him a chance?”

“Well, what if he thinks I’m coming on to him?”

“Have you done anything to make him think so?”

“Er, no.”

“Are you about to do anything like that?”

“No. He’s too young for me.”

She smiled. “Not so young you couldn’t be friends, is he?”

“I suppose not.”

She gave me an even bigger smile and patted my arm. “Well, then, you two should make an effort to get to know each other. I’m sure the rest of the tour would be happier for both of you if you did. Promise me you’ll try.”

“Yes, ma’am, I’ll think about it.”

By 11:00 or so, my morning coffee had run through me and I had to visit the convenience at the rear of the bus. When I was finished and had stepped out of the tiny compartment, someone was waiting to step in. I noticed that my shoelace was untied, so I flopped into an empty seat to tie it. As I did, Graham came sauntering down the aisle. He noticed the “Occupied” sign, so he just stood there. Then, as usual when I was around him, I said something stupid.

“Hi Graham, waiting for the bathroom?”

“Uh, yeah,” he said.

I couldn’t help looking at the curves of his ass under the khaki of his shorts. The boy had a great butt, no doubt about it. Just before he went into the john, he turned and caught me looking at him. I was busted. I could feel myself blushing. I didn’t think I liked the guy, but he was a hottie, for sure.

The trip down I-95 was pretty boring. It looked like any other interstate highway except that it was totally, absolutely flat. Along the sides of the road were stands of pine trees, with the occasional palms, mainly at interchanges.

The seat next to Graham was, I noted, seldom empty. People kept dropping in beside him to chat. He certainly seemed to fascinate the rest of the group. Well, mostly the women. I never saw one of the old geezers sitting with him. What surprised me most was how pleasant he seemed to be. Once in a while, when he turned toward the person he was chatting with I got the impression from the look on his face that the smiles were just a little forced and that he found being the constant center of attention tiring. Maybe I’d been wrong about the poor kid. Maybe he wasn’t a suck up, just the victim of circumstances. After all, he was young, great looking, and something of a novelty.

Eventually the bus pulled off the interstate and onto a very busy four-lane highway. We entered the parking lot of a restaurant called the Bay View. That was a misnomer because there was no water in sight. Jim, our tour host, told us we’d have an hour and a half to eat, use the facilities, and relax before reboarding for the rest of the trip.

It was a buffet-style place, but the food wasn’t nearly as bad as I’d expected. I was dragooned into eating with Dorothy, Mamie, and, of course, Graham. I had determined to try to be livelier, to keep up my end of the conversation, but when I sat there, I became tongue-tied, especially so far as Graham was concerned. Besides that, he seemed very fidgety, as if he were uncomfortable being there with me. I decided that he must be a homophobe, despite what he’d said at the wine and cheese party the other night. I learned I was wrong about that, at least, in a very dramatic way not long afterward.

In the lounge area of the Bay View after lunch, I heard a dumpy little guy with a perpetual scowl say to another guy, “The place [he meant Key West, obviously] will be crawling with fags.” I cringed inwardly, but decided not to say anything. I’d had to put up with that sort of thing ever since I’d come out. But then the son of a bitch turned directly to me and said, “No doubt you’ll feel right at home with all them preverts.” Yes, he actually said “preverts.” “Fucking homo-sex-u-als, you’ll all burn in hell.”

I’ve never been aggressive by nature, though I could probably have decked the old fart. I was about to turn and walk away when Graham came up to the guy, who was sitting next to his wife on a leather sofa, and told him off. Then the guy had the balls to accuse Graham of being a fag lover. I thought the Brit was going to start pummeling him. Just then, though, the old guy’s wife intervened. She told him he was full of macho bullshit and slapped him. That and Graham’s belligerent posture must have changed his mind because he subsided back into the sofa.

Mamie had by that time come to Graham and calmed him down. I was leaning against the wall trying to steady my own breathing. The thing is, I was almost unhappier with Graham than with the asshole bigot. I’ve been able to take care of myself as a gay man for all my adult life. I think I must have resented Graham charging in like a knight to rescue me. That’s pretty rich, too, since his name is Knight.

Anyway, he came over and asked if I was okay. I’m ashamed now to say I wasn’t properly grateful. I told him I wished he hadn’t interfered, that he’d probably made things worse. And that was true. We were going to have to be with the asshole for the rest of the tour, and it might have been easier just to ignore his nasty comments.

I stared at Graham to see if he understood what I was saying when I told him it really wasn’t his problem. The hurt look on his face when I said that made me feel terrible, so I did what I usually do in cases like that. I ran.

I stood outside in the parking lot until time for the bus to load. I soaked up warmth like a gecko and wondered why I had been such a son of a bitch to poor Graham, who had, after all, acted with good intentions. When he came outside, I looked at him a couple of times to try to show him with my eyes how sorry I was, but he just looked angry. I knew I should apologize, and when we had a private moment, I was determined to do that.

When I got on the bus, Graham was sitting where he had been on the morning’s leg of the trip. I thought about sliding in next to him, but he didn’t look very friendly at that moment, not that I could blame him, and I really wanted to apologize to him in private, not with all the old ones listening. So I took the seat I’d had before.

The trip over the Keys was gorgeous. The water was an incredibly intense blue-green color, and when we weren’t on keys we drove for miles over causeways that were not very much above water level.

As we approached Key West, I felt as if I were on a pilgrimage. Cleveland had its share of gay people and spots for them to hang out, but there were places in the country that were legendary as gay capitals. The Village in New York, the Castro in San Francisco. Fire Island and Provincetown. But two of them were in Florida. South Beach, which we’d see while we were in Miami, and Key West, which had been taken over several decades ago and gentrified by well-to-do gays. Now it was a gay mecca. And I was looking forward to seeing it.

Our accommodations on Key West were in the Key Breeze, what is sometimes called a “boutique hotel,” small but pretty upscale. Our group filled the whole place. A snafu occurred as we were checking in that changed the whole tenor of the tour, at least, and perhaps of my life.

I was, as usual, toward the rear of the check-in line. I was looking around the well-decorated and furnished lobby, admiring the motif that was tropical but elegant. My attention was drawn to raised voices, or more specifically, a raised voice. With an unmistakable accent. Graham was at the desk, and he was obviously unhappy about something. I couldn’t understand what he was saying, but the Brit was clearly pissed. Jim, our tour host, was in conference with Graham and the desk clerk. Then they all looked back at me. Jim came over to me.

“Mr. Thomson, there’s been a bit of a fu—er, foul-up, and we need to talk with you about it. Would you come this way, please?”

He led me to an office behind the desk. Graham and a man in a suit were already there. The desk clerk, looking harassed, had gone back to checking people in.

“Mr. Thomson, is it?” asked the suit.

“Yes. What’s happening?”

“I’m Brad Ortega, the assistant manager of the Key Breeze.” We shook hands. “Somebody has made an embarrassing error. I don’t know yet whether it’s the fault of your tour company or someone here at the hotel, but we simply don’t have a room for you.”

“What do you mean, you don’t have a room?” I asked, surprised and unhappy. Then I turned to Jim. “What’s going on?”

He gave me an uneasy smile. “I’ve called the company office and managed to find somebody available even though it’s a Sunday evening. They tell me that for some reason, they booked you a room in St. Augustine and Orlando, but here and in Miami your room didn’t get booked. She claimed it was a computer glitch or something like that.”

I asked again. “So, what am I supposed to do now?”

Both men turned and looked at Graham. “There’s a simple solution if we could only persuade you and Mr. Knight to agree. He won a trip for two, and he was booked with a double for the whole tour. We thought that perhaps you two could, uh –“

“That’s not acceptable,” I said. “There must be something else you can do.” Graham was shaking his head in agreement. “Mr. Knight and I have no wish to share a room.”

Holding his hands palms up, Jim said, “I’m sorry, but that’s the best we can do.” Ortega looked sad as he nodded his head to confirm what Jim had said.

“Well, you can just refund my money and I’ll go someplace else. I’ll see Florida on my own.” I thought about calling cousin Stacie in Naples and asking if I could use her guest room as a base of operations for a few days.

“I’m sorry, but no refund is possible. It says so in the contract you signed.”

Before I could sputter a reply, Ortega said, “You need to consider this, too, Mr. Thomson. This is the height of the tourist season. I don’t think you’d be able to find a suitable place to stay anywhere on the island tonight. There are no flights out until tomorrow, or any buses either. Without a car, you have no way to get back to the mainland. You could, of course, rent a car and drive the 100 miles back.”

No way was I going to drive across those bridges and causeways, especially at night, hoping I might find a place to stay when I got there. But what was I going to do?

Graham had been strangely quiet through all of this. I knew he didn’t want me as a roommate, and I couldn’t blame him.

Then he spoke.

“Mr. Ortega, what’s the bed setup in my room?”

“Two singles.”

Graham smiled and turned toward me. “Look, Will, I reckon we haven’t gotten off to a very good start, but I can’t see you turned out into the night with no place to stay. Like I said to you the other day, me mum didn’t bring me up like that. What say we give it a try?”

I felt about two inches tall.

“After what I said to you this afternoon, you’d be willing to share your room with me?”

“Yeah. Just one condition.”

“What’s that?”

“You stay in your own bloody bed.” He grinned to show he was joking. Ortega gasped and Jim sort of giggled.

“Count on it!” I said, offering him my hand.

We shook on it.

“Excellent,” Ortega said. “Now, we’ll get you two signed in. You’ll have time to freshen up before our wine and hors d’oeuvres reception at 5:30. Your group will be guests of Key Breeze for that and the dinner following.”

“What’s appropriate dress for this evening, Mr. Ortega?” I asked.

He smiled. “This is Key West. What you and Mr. Knight are wearing will be fine almost anywhere.”

As soon as we got to the room and we’d taken turns using the bathroom, I said to him, “Graham, I don’t know what to say. I was a real shit to you this afternoon. I’m used to fighting my own battles with the homophobes, but that’s no excuse for what I said to you. I admit I’ve been so wrapped up in my own problems I’ve been a real wet blanket to everybody. Now you’ve agreed to put up with me. I guess I just want to apologize and say thank you at the same time. I promise to stay out of your hair if you don’t want to have anything to do with me. Just let me bunk here at night, okay?”

It’s trite to say that my heart skipped a beat when he smiled at me then, but something like that actually happened.

“Apology accepted, Yank. This is your room now just as much as it’s mine, so you should come and go as you want.” He paused a minute. “Besides, worse things could’ve happened?”

“Yeah,” I said, grinning at him, “like what?”

“Well, we could have had to sleep on the beach.”

“Lots of homeless people do, I hear. A lot of gay kids who’ve run away from home come to Key West hoping to find a job or a hookup. So if we’d had to sleep on the beach, I’d have had to protect your virtue.”

“I can bloody well protect me own virtue, thank you very much!”

I wanted to say that he looked as if he sure could, but I didn’t want him to think I was coming on to him, so I just smiled and nodded.

“Do you want to go to the wine thingie?” I asked.

“I’m fuckin tired of coke, but I’m hungry, so let’s go see what the snacks are.”

I wondered what Mr. Ortega would say if he heard Graham call their hors d’oeuvres snacks.

“Lead on, MacDuff,” I said.

“You probably think I’m some dumb git, but I’ve read Macbeth you know. In fact I saw it on stage in Stratford Upon Avon on a school trip. The whole place was crawling with Yank tourists, though.”

When we got to the room where the goodies were being served, I looked for a wait staff person. When I found one, I pulled him aside and said, “My friend doesn’t like wine. Could you possibly dig up some beer for him?”

“He looks pretty young. Are you sure it’s okay?”

“Put it in a wine glass and people won’t notice. He’s a visitor to the US and not very happy with some of our laws, if you know what I mean.” I handed him a twenty dollar bill.

He smiled, pocketed the bill, and ducked out. When he came back, he had a glass that looked very much like it contained a straw-colored wine, if you didn’t notice the bubbles. I thanked him and took the glass to Graham, who’d just moved from a group of oldies and headed toward me.

“Here’s something for you.”

“Looks like champers but in the wrong kind of glass.”

“Smell it.”

He did and then beamed. He took a cautious sip. “Lager! How the fuck did you manage that, mate?”

“Never mind. Just accept it as a peace offering.”

“Cheers!”

Our dessert was more key lime pie. This time, however, it was fantastic, totally unlike the bland stuff we’d had in St. Augustine. Our server told us that, of course, this was made from a traditional recipe with real key limes. Graham didn’t even complain that he needed custard with it.

The ever-smiling Jim tapped on a glass with his knife.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we’ll all be taking a tour on the Island Trolley tomorrow morning. This evening you’re free to rest, swim in the pool – yes, this is Florida and you can do that in January – or visit downtown Key West. Even though this is Sunday, Key West is a pretty wide open town. Most of the shops and other establishments on Duval Street are open and within walking distance. I have maps if you need them.”

“Uh, Graham, what say we take a walk? Or do you just want to get away from me for a while?”

“No, I think I fancy a walk.”

I’d done a little studying up about Key West before the trip, so I asked Jim to direct us to Duval Street. He told us it was about a twenty-minute walk from our hotel and explained how to get there. It was pretty simple, actually a straight shoot from where we were.

It had gotten dark by the time we reached our destination, but everything was well lighted and there were people strolling around everywhere, straight couples of all ages and gay couples of both sexes. Graham’s eyes nearly popped out of his head.

“Christ, I’d never a believed it! All these people are so, uh, open about it.”

“Welcome to Key West, Englishman!” I said, grinning. I confess I’d never seen anything like it before, either, but I felt very much at home, as contrasted with my companion for the evening, who acted as if he were in Oz, and I don’t mean Australia.

We found a bar that was open to the street. It didn’t seem to have any front wall. There was music inside and tables there, but it also had tables on the sidewalk.

“Sit at one of these tables, and don’t let anyone pick you up while I’m gone.”

He looked puzzled, but he grinned and said, “Right.”

I went to the bar and got two frosted mugs of draft beer. When I got back to the table and propped one of them in front of him, you’d have thought it was Christmas.

“Graham, you’re a good guy. I’ve been a shit. Let’s start over and be friends, okay?”

Holding up his hand in the universal “wait a minute” gesture, he took a big swallow of his beer.

“Yeah, mate. Friends. That’s twice you’ve gotten me a beer today. I’m can’t help thinking you really do want to be friends.”

Then he stopped and smirked at me. “You aren’t just tryin to get me legless, are you? So you can have your wicked way with me?”

“You wish!” I said, lifting my mug in salute. “You know, they had Guinness in bottles, but I thought on a warm evening you’d like the cold beer instead.”

“Yeah, that’s nice. But maybe if we’re back here again, I’ll have the Guinness, okay?”

“You got it, bud.”

“Bud.” I’d called him “bud.” This was the guy I’d wanted nothing to do with twenty-four hours ago. Just goes to show how appearances can be deceiving.

We indulged in people watching, which on Duval Street was like nothing I’d ever seen before, as we finished our beers. He offered to go back for seconds, but I was afraid they wouldn’t serve him, so I went back.

When I set his mug in front of him, he said, “Will, can I ask you something personal? No need to answer if you don’t want.”

“Under those conditions, fire away.”

“Now that we’re finally getting to know each other better, you don’t seem like such a bad bloke at all. But you keep avoiding people. I gotta think something bad has happened to you and you’re worrying over it. Is that right?”

I took a big swallow of beer. “Yeah, but you don’t want to hear about it.”

“And why would you say that? You don’t know me.”

“I know you’re straight. And this is about me and my lover.”

He frowned briefly and then said, “You have a lover?”

“Had.”

Looking me straight in the eye, he said, “I know what that’s like.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I was supposed to have me girlfriend, Amy, with me on this trip.”

“What happened?”

“We broke up at the last minute.”

“Graham, I’m sorry. I’ve been so wrapped up in my own troubles, I was totally insensitive to anyone else’s.”

“No worries, mate. But the trip I won was for two. If Amy had come along, the bed you’re sleeping in tonight wouldn’t have got much use.” He gave me a rueful grin.

“Man, I am sorry.”

“Like I said, ‘s okay. Now, tell me about what’s made you so glum.”

“First let me go back to the bar and get us another.”

“If I can’t go to the bar, at least let me pay for this round.”

“Not necessary, since I’m sleeping in your room.”

“You can’t keep doin this, mate. I wanna pay me share.”

“We’ll settle up eventually. Right now, don’t argue. I’ll be back in a minute.”

As we worked on our third beer, we told each other the story of our lives, though all I told him about Sean was that we’d been together but now we weren’t. He was intimidated at first that I had an MBA and a CPA, but then I got him to talking about his rugby achievements and convinced him that I was in awe of his sporting prowess.

I wasn’t much of a beer drinker, and by 11:00 or so I was really feeling the effects of all the beer we’d consumed.

We were both feeling no pain as we staggered back to the Key Breeze.

As we walked across the lobby, the desk clerk smirked and wished us a good night. When we got to our room, we found a bowl of fruit and a bottle of wine waiting for us.

Somehow that struck us both as funny, since neither of us wanted fruit – and certainly not wine. We giggled as we got undressed.

With a surprising lack of embarrassment, Graham stripped to his boxers and I to my briefs. His thighs were as magnificent as I had suspected, and the rest of him was equally sexy. We did the bathroom thing and got in bed. I hopped in quickly to hide the boner I had sprung after seeing him nearly naked. I took off my glasses and put them on the table between us.

As he reached for the light, he said, “You know, mate, you’re all right.”

“Thanks for letting me share your room.”

He left the light on. “Look, Will, you paid for this trip. For me it was a freebie. I’m the one who shouldn’t be here. Goo’nite.”

I lay there thinking of what had happened that day. I’d behaved badly. Very badly. Graham had turned out to be a remarkably good-natured and generous guy. Not to mention he was hot. It was all I could do to keep my hands away from my stiffie, but the last thing I wanted was for him to hear me beating off. We had the beginnings of a friendship started that evening, and I didn’t want my being gay to come between us.

What with wine before dinner and too many beers down on Duval Street, I slept like a log. No dreams.

I woke up the next morning with the usual piss hard. I reached for my specs. Graham was lying there still asleep. He’d thrown the covers back, and his morning wood stuck up through the fly of his boxers. God! The boy was amply endowed. No wonder there had been such a bulge in his pants. I hadn’t seen a hard dick except my own since Sean dumped me. Graham’s big tool sticking up looked so good it was all I could do to keep from going over there and sucking on it.

We had plenty of time before we needed to go downstairs for breakfast. I got out of bed quietly and padded to the bathroom. After closing the door, I dropped my briefs. There was a free sample of hand lotion on the counter, which I opened. I used the lotion to smear all over my throbbing cock. In my mind was a picture of the hot young hunk in the bed just on the other side of the door. Now that I’d discovered he was a decent guy, I was really turned on as I fisted my dick.

I came almost before I wanted to, catching my spunk in my hand. As I rinsed it off, I could see that I needed to shave but didn’t want to use my electric razor while Graham was still sleeping. So I turned on the shower.

I don’t know how long I stood there in the hot water, slowly waking up and enjoying the warmth, when I heard the toilet flush. It was obviously a good hotel because the flushing didn’t turn my shower water cold.

“Mornin’, dude,” I said.

“Mornin’, mate,” Graham replied, his voice still full of sleep.

‘You know, Thomson,’ I said to myself, ‘this might not be such a bad tour after all.’