CONTENT WARNING: CONTAINS DESCRIPTION OF CONSENSUAL SEXUAL TOUCHING AND PAST SEXUAL ABUSE

The next morning I got up and looked out the window. It was snowing. A few inches were down already. I turned on my radio and sat back down on the bed, wearing nothing but my underwear. I was just absentmindedly listening to the radio, contemplating getting dressed, when my door flew open. It was Colin, fully dressed and looking cheerful.

 "It's snowing!" he exclaimed.

"Jesus, Colin, ever hear of knocking?!?" I said, as I reached for my pillow to cover myself. 

He was unabashed. He sat down next to me. Once again he was sitting very close. I pulled away again, then stood up. I picked a pair of pants off the floor and pulled them on. I then dug around in the dresser for a shirt and pulled that on as well. Colin did not take his eyes off me the entire time. I was just about to ask him what he wanted, when the weather forecast came on the radio. The radio station always played the forecast directly from the government weather office's phone in weather service. It sounded like a cross between a robot and a 90 year old man. Absolutely monotone and deadpan with no emotion whatsoever, but old and wheezy sounding.

"Here's the forecast for Halifax county west, issued at 5:00AM on Sunday. A snowfall warning has been issued for today. Snow at times heavy. Wind Northeast 50 kilometers per hour gusting to 80, giving reduced visibility in blowing snow. High minus 5. Windchill minus 18. Snowfall amount 15 to 20 centimeters. For tonight, Snow tapering to flurries after midnight. Wind diminishing to North 20 gusting to 40. Additional snowfall 5-10 centimeters. Lows near minus 8. For tomorrow, partly sunny..."

'YES!!!" we both yelled. We both loved snow storms, even though it wasn't a school day. Snow meant shoveling driveways, and shoveling driveways meant money. Besides, this pretty much guaranteed a white Christmas. Contrary to what one might think, we don't get many white Christmases in Nova Scotia.

Spirits sufficiently lifted, we went upstairs. Mom was in the kitchen making breakfast. Pancakes. Mom made the world's best pancakes. She was in high spirits as well because she loved storms of any kind, and she was always excited about Christmas. We went out into the living room to wait until the pancakes were ready. Dad was out there reading the newspaper. He lowered it slightly and looked at us. "Boys", he said, then put the paper back up and continued reading. I turned the TV on. Sunday TV was usually pretty boring, especially as we didn't have cable and only had three channels, but this close to Christmas one could always count on Christmas specials on CBC. I settled on Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, the old Rankin-Bass stop-motion animated special from the 1960’s, and sat on the love seat next to Colin. Eventually Heather came bleary-eyed out of her room and settled on the floor in front of the TV.

"Where's Mark?" I asked.

"He's at his girlfriend's house. Probably going to be stranded there", Dad said.

Soon Mom said "Breakfast is ready", so we funneled into the kitchen and helped ourselves.

"Can we eat in the living room?" I asked.

"No, pancakes are too messy. Sit at the table."

"But Mo-om!" I whined. "Rudolph is on!"

"I don't care what's on, you'll sit at the table. You've seen Rudolph a hundred times anyway."

"I haven't", Heather protested. "I'm only 12, I've only seen it about 10 times."

We all laughed, including Mom.

"Go ahead, Claudia" my father said from the living room. "It's Christmas. Let them watch the specials."

Mom rolled her eyes and waved us into the living room and handed Dad a plate of pancakes. "If you make a mess with that syrup it's the end of the world for you", she said as she returned to the kitchen. She was about to start her Christmas baking, and we all knew there would be no distracting her now.

We ate our pancakes and watched TV. After Rudolph, Santa Claus is Coming To Town came on and we watched that too. After that we got bored and left the TV at the mercy of Heather. We went downstairs and into my room. I flicked the TV on and turned on the Atari. I then picked up a joystick, tossed the other one to Colin who had already sat on the bed, and sat next to him. Within a few minutes of playing Colin scootched closer to me so that his leg was touching mine. I did not move away this time. I didn't mind at all. I still wasn't sure what he was thinking, but I was now happy to let him think it, and to see where it went. We pulverized aliens, ate all the dots, avoided the ghosts, made it across the roads and ponds, and had a ball the whole time. The storm raged on outside, and it was getting really bad now. The snow was coming down sideways, blown around by the wind. We played the whole day away, stopping only for lunch.

We stopped playing long enough to go upstairs for supper. This time we sat at the table. The whole house was smelling of Mom's baking, but supper was just a normal meal: Smothered pork chops. We finished eating and I went out into the living room to look out the window. It was getting dark now, but you could see that there was a lot of snow down. Way more than the 20cm they had called for. Probably closer to 40. And the drifts were huge. It was still coming down and blowing hard – you could barely see the street lights on the next street over. We went back downstairs and resumed our gaming marathon, with Colin once again sitting so closely that our legs were touching. We played like this for about an hour when suddenly everything went dark. Power outage.

"Shit!", I said. "I was kicking your ass!"

"In your dreams you were", Colin said.

"Oh, Come on! You know you were at my mercy!"

"Bull Shi...Crap! Bull Crap!" Colin said, as my mother opened my bedroom door and interrupted his cursing.

She was carrying a flashlight and a lit Christmas candle. It smelled like cinnamon. She put the candle on top of my TV and said "The power is probably going to be out for a while. Keep an eye on this. Don't move it, and don't let it fall over. Make sure you put it out before you go to sleep."

With that she let herself out of the room and closed the door. I heard her going up the stairs and walk across the floor directly above us.

"Well, this sucks. What are we going to do now"? I asked.

Colin took out his cigarette pack and pulled one out. He handed me one, then put the pack on the bed. I was grateful – it was my first cigarette since before we went into that drug store yesterday. He got up and lit his from the candle, then returned to the bed. When he sat back down he did the same thing he did after that wrestling match: He draped his left leg over my right one. It was almost like deja-vu, right down to Colin's next words: "So you gonna light that thing, or what?"

"Oh! Yeah..." I reached over, plucked his cigarette out of his mouth, and used it to light mine. I handed his back to him, and he laid back on the bed with his leg still draped over mine. My heart was pounding. Was this it? Was this finally going to happen tonight? I decided, no matter what the outcome, that it was. I couldn't stand the anticipation anymore.

I placed my hand on his leg, out toward his knee, kind of draped over so that most of it was on his inside thigh. He did not react, so I gently started scratching at the seam on his jeans with my fingers. Still no movement, so I slowly started rubbing his leg, moving my hand further up with each slow stroke. He stirred a little to reposition himself, but otherwise did not react. After a few minutes rubbing, getting further and further up his thigh, I finally ran out of room. My hand brushed against his crotch. When that happened, I stopped rubbing and left my hand there, all the way up his thigh and against his crotch. I stayed still for a little bit, then slowly started moving my pinky finger, rubbing lightly on the bulge.

Colin only moved to take a puff off his cigarette. I took this as permission, so I slid my hand the rest of the way home. It was now fully off his leg and I was cupping his bulge in my hand. I gently wrapped my fingers around it and started rubbing. His hardness was obvious. Colin squirmed a bit but still made no indications to stop me, so I kept going. While rubbing, I laid down on my back beside him, leaving his leg draped over mine. We laid there for a bit, not saying anything and each puffing on our cigarettes occasionally while I massaged his junk. Finally, I had to say something.

"Colin?"

"What"

"Are you OK with this?"

He replied by shifting his leg off of mine, then rolled onto his side to face me. He went straight for home, placing his hand on my stomach, then sliding it down under my jeans and grabbed my crotch. He was inside the jeans but outside the underwear, and he started rubbing. I was already hard, and this was heaven.

"Oh yes," he replied. "I'm OK with this."

We laid there side by side feeling each other up for several minutes, then he withdrew his hand from my pants and rolled on top of me, pressing his crotch against mine. When he did, I reached up with both hands and grabbed his ass. I pulled him tighter into me, and we just laid there looking into each other's eyes in the candle light.

"I've been wanting to do this for a long time", he said.

My mouth was so dry that I could barely talk. "Me too", I squeaked. He started slowly grinding against me, and I guided his movements by holding onto his ass and steering him.

"Have you done anything like this before?" he asked.

"Sort of. I had a friend before that we fooled around a little bit one night. But it only happened once."

"Why only once?"

I briefly explained about Aiden, how that he was the brother of the kid who had died in the lake last year, and that he had moved away the next day. He didn't need to hear details.

"Wow. That's sad. But still, I suppose it worked out for me so I can't shed many tears for him."

I squeezed both ass cheeks. "That's awful."

"Sorry", he said.

I thought for a few minutes. "How about you?"

"Huh?" he replied.

"Have you done this before?"

He hesitated for a second, then said "Lots of times."

I was shocked, and also a little jealous. "What? How? When? Who with?"

"Well, I've bounced around from foster home to foster home. At one of those homes one of their natural sons started fooling around with me. He was much older, probably 20."

"He MOLESTED you?"

"Well, yeah, I guess you could call it that. When I was really young I hated it. When I got a little older though I didn't mind. I actually started to like it. It felt good. I didn't tell him that though. I learned to use it to my advantage. I got him to buy me stuff in return."

I was shocked. I pushed him back off me. Our crotches were still against each other but his face was away from mine now. I looked him in the eyes.

"That's awful. He was taking advantage of you!"

"And I was taking advantage of him. I was having the best of both worlds. It felt good and I was getting stuff."

"But you were a kid!"

He winked at me. "I know. That's what made it better for me. I had him wrapped around my finger. He had to do what I wanted. He gave me everything I asked for. If I told anyone, he'd go to jail."

I suddenly felt sick. I didn't know which bothered me more: Colin being molested, or his using that to blackmail his foster brother to get stuff. It almost seemed like prostitution.

He must have noticed this because he said "Hey, don't feel bad for me. I knew what I was doing. And don't feel bad for him. He would have molested me whether I wanted it or not. I know that because when he first started I did not. Just be happy he wasn't doing it to a kid that wouldn't enjoy it. Well, maybe not 'enjoy' – I always did feel gross during and after, but at least I wasn't scarred by the experience".

I thought, 'Weren't you, though?' but I did not say that out loud.

Instead, I said "Any other times?"

He suddenly looked uncomfortable, as if wrestling with something internally. Finally he said "I told you that you could trust me, so I'm going to be honest. I did it a whole bunch of times at Waterville."

"So those things they say about jail are true", I said stupidly. He laughed.

"Not quite. Well, sort of. Let's just say that I soon learned to use it to my advantage there as well. You'd be surprised what favours a hand job or blow job will get you in a place full of horny teenage boys."

"Favours?"

"You know, things like protection from the bigger kids, an illegal pack of smokes here and there, etc."

I laid there on my back, looking up at him. I was sad and intrigued. Finally, I asked.

"Are you gay?"

"What? No. I'm not attracted to dudes."

"Then what are we doing here?"

"I just do what feels good. I don't look at dudes and think "He's hot", but if I can have sex with him I will. Same thing with girls. Sex is sex."

"Have you had sex with many girls?

"No. Not yet, I mean. Most girls won't come near me because of my reputation. But if I can, I will."

I thought about that. "So you're bi then?"

"No. I don't even really think about gender. If it feels good I do it."

"That's weird."

He laughed. Then he said "What about you?"

"Gay. Definitely gay. I like boys and only boys."

"Fruit", he said, then started laughing again.

I rolled over and forced him onto his back, then crawled up on top of him and started grinding my crotch against his. I felt his hands come up and grab my ass.

"Takes one to know one", I said.

We both started giggling. The giggling died out and we just laid there, looking at each other. A surge of affection came over me, so I lowered my head to kiss him. His eyes grew wide with panic. Before I could make contact he pushed me back. "No kissing!" he hissed.

"What? Why?"

"Because kissing is weird. It might be OK for you, but I can't do it."

"Really? You'll suck a dick but you won't kiss?"

"That's right."

I rolled off of him onto my back.

"Well, you'd better get sucking then."

I was half joking, but he didn't take it that way. He rolled onto his side facing toward me and slid his hands into my pants again, this time inside the underwear too. He took me into his hand and said, "I thought you'd never ask."

He took his hand out and started undoing my fly. Once undone he folded the two sides to the fly aside, got up onto his elbows and re positioned himself. He took one hand and lifted my member so that it was sticking straight up, then started lowering his head toward it. I was shaking with anticipation.

BLINK.

Suddenly we were bathed in bright light. The TV was loudly making that static noise they make when they don't have a signal. The power had come back on. It scared the hell out of both of us, and I went soft like a balloon being popped. Colin jumped off of me and onto his back. As we realized what had happened we started laughing. Colin was just about to re-assume the position when we heard the noise of my mother waking across the room upstairs.