The Brilliant Boy Billionaire

PART ONE — Escape from Abuse

Chapter 6: A Proper Sendoff

Come the morning, we got up early and had a light breakfast, which was all we could stomach, and got ready to go to church. I was surprised when we piled into Larry’s SUV and headed south, well outside of the city. Everything we’d gone to so far had been within walking distance, and there were several churches and even a synagogue located right downtown, so I was surprised to see us traveling so far to go to church. Then we pulled up in front of a Unitarian Church, and it made a bit more sense.

“We used to attend the Baptist church,” Larry explained, “but after Greg ran away and when he came out, there was no way we could go back there.”

“I’d run away again before I’d go back there,” Greg chimed in.

“Unfortunately, all of the churches downtown take a literal approach to interpreting the Bible,” Larry explained. “One of the Evangelical churches welcomes gay parishioners, believe it or not, but the emphasis is still on salvation. I do miss that aspect of the church, but far better to be able to pray with my son at my side than alone.”

“No offense, but salvation won’t do me much good when I don’t even believe in it,” Greg replied, “and I don’t like being told I’m a sinner for not believing, let alone because I’m gay. I can live with the Unitarian Church, but I could do without the emphasis on faith.”

“I’m with you there, Greg,” I chimed in.

Laughing, Larry chimed in with, “You’ve certainly come to the right place, Adam. You can believe whatever you want here — or not believe at all.”

We got outta Larry’s SUV and headed into the church. It was evident Larry and Greg were regulars as we were greeted by the other parishioners as we headed down the aisle and took our seats. It was evident that people were curious as to who I was, and fortunately, Larry managed to get away with saying I was an out-of-town friend of Greg’s visiting for the weekend. I was glad he didn’t make up something more elaborate, as it’s easy to get caught in a lie when things become too complicated. A simple story is easily forgotten, which was just the way I wanted it.

I’d never been to a church service before, so I didn’t have a basis for comparison. Of course, I had some ideas from the books I’d read, so I did have a basic understanding of what Christianity was all about. I guess if I had to characterize the service, I’d have called it Christian lite. There wasn’t an organ but there was a guitar and a flute and a lot of singing. It seemed like a bunch of prayers to whatever or whomever you considered god to be. It kinda reminded me of, ‘May the Force be with you.’ Seriously, they didn’t actually say that, but they might as well have.

There was a social hour afterwards that I could’ve done without, although the food was quite good. I just didn’t care for the socially awkward moments of meeting other kids. It was obvious that Greg was out, ’cause kids kept asking if I was Greg’s boyfriend. Fortunately, Greg responded that I was just a friend. Although I liked the idea of being his boyfriend, mostly I just wanted to be forgotten.

After the service, Greg and I visited Lincoln’s house and his law office, and the Old State Capitol, all of which were very interesting. We then headed back to his home, where Larry was busy making a pot roast. Since the food I had at home consisted mostly of things that could be nuked, and the food at school was, well, school food, I’d never had a pot roast before.

Larry served the roast with potatoes and carrots that were cooked with the roast as well as green beans prepared separately. The beans were from a package kept in the freezer rather than from a can, and, man, what a difference that made. The food was all delicious. Of course, Greg and I took care of the cleanup after dinner. Having a dishwasher sure made things easier.

Afterwards, Greg suggested we watch a movie or two on the big-screen TV in their living room. At first I wasn’t keen on the idea ’cause I wasn’t thrilled with the idea of watching another religious movie like Ben Hur. When he asked if I’d be interested in seeing Spider-Man Homecoming or Thor Ragnarok, I realized he meant watching a real movie, and I was certainly up for that. Greg was a major fan of the Marvel Comics movies, whereas I could take them or leave them. The problem is that they all build on each other, so they don’t make much sense unless you’ve seen all the previous ones, which I hadn’t.

Greg was a major fan of Christopher Nolan, and while I was familiar with the Dark Night trilogy, I was much more interested in science fiction. I’d seen Interstellar a few years back and had found it disappointing. It happened to be one of Greg’s all-time favorites, so we got into quite a discussion of what I thought was wrong with it.

“Look, if there’s another planet with life on it, it would be incredibly irresponsible to contaminate it with life from earth,” I began. “We probably wouldn’t be compatible with it and we’d end up destroying it as well as ourselves. Planets within the so-called Goldilocks zone that don’t harbor life probably don’t for a reason, be it the lack of radiation-shielding magnetic fields or the lack of an atmosphere or water. Mars, for example, comes to mind. Without photosynthesis, there wouldn’t be oxygen in any case.

“The bottom line is that no matter how badly we manage to fuck up the earth, it would still be easier to terraform the earth back to what it was than to start from scratch elsewhere.”

“Okay, I get it,” Greg countered, “but it was still a cool movie. How about Inception? Please tell me you liked that one.”

“I never saw it,” I replied. “I was like only four when it came out, and by the time I was old enough to appreciate it, there were other movies to see.”

“Oh, you have to see Inception, Greg exclaimed, so I agreed to watch it with him. He was right — it was outstanding. Next to the Star Wars movies, it was probably the best science-fiction movie I’d ever seen.

“So, what did you think about the ending?” Greg asked as the credits rolled. “Was he still dreaming or was it real?”

“Obviously, Nolan left it ambiguous for a reason,” I answered. “You’re meant to hope it’s real but have just enough doubt to make it interesting. I’d counter that it doesn’t really matter, at least not to Mr. Cobb. Regardless, he’ll watch his kids grow up and have kids of their own. Perhaps he’ll find someone and remarry. She might even be the girl of his dreams, literally.”

Hitting me on the shoulder, Greg responded, “Oh, that was bad, but very clever. You wanna watch another movie?”

“Greg, need I remind you that you have school in the morning?” Larry interrupted. “And, Adam, you’ll be helping me to open the shop.”

“Did the wheels come in?” I asked, suddenly remembering why I was there in the first place.

“I scheduled delivery for first thing in the morning,” Larry answered.

“C’mon Adam, let’s get ready for bed,” Greg suggested. “Maybe we can watch something short on the TV in my room.” He added.

Once we were behind the closed bathroom door, I asked, “Isn’t your dad gonna know we’re having sex?”

“Of course, he’ll know,” Greg answered, “but by saying we’re gonna be watching TV, it gives him plausible deniability.”

“Plausible deniability?” I said as I rolled the words off my tongue. “I like that.”

Returning to Greg’s room, undressing and slipping under the sheets, once again I took charge as I kissed Greg deeply and forcefully. There was no question in my mind that I was a bottom, yet I liked to assume a dominant role. Why was that? I’d always assumed being a bottom went hand-in-hand with being passive, but I got excited when I dominated Greg. I didn’t know if Greg preferred being a top or if he was more versatile than I was, but he clearly seemed to enjoy being dominated. It made no sense to me. Apparently, being on top versus on the bottom was completely different, from aggressiveness. Was that typical? I just didn’t know.

After a frenzied make-out session, I sniffed under his right armpit. His scent was strong and musky there, and I licked him hungrily there, moving my tongue around and over his sparse patch of hair. I repeated the action with his left armpit and then licked, sucked and nibbled on each of his nipples. Greg was whimpering and writhing, which only served to excite me further. I kneaded his balls in one hand while I teased his ring with the index finger on the other hand, and then I pushed inside.

“Quick, I’m gonna cum,” he whispered loudly, and I used the hand that was kneading his balls to grab and stroke him. I moved my head, so I was looking right into his member, when he erupted forcefully, sending jet after jet of his spunk all over me. I could feel the warmth of it as it started to slowly run down my face. “God, that is so fuckin’ sexy,” Greg exclaimed as he reached behind him, grabbed his phone and proceeded to capture several shots of me. “I’m definitely keeping this one,” he said as he turned his phone to show me. The pic he’d captured showed me with his spunk all over my face and even in my hair. There was spunk coating my eyelids, spunk running down my nose with a drop of it about to drip off the end of my nose. There was a look of lust on my face, with my lips slightly parted and a large glob of his spunk sliding into the corner of my mouth. I had to admit, the picture was sexy as hell.

“Just don’t sext that to anyone,” I admonished him.

“Much as I’d love to show it off, I wouldn’t do that,” Greg replied. “Now let me have some fun with you, too.” With that, he lifted my legs up in the air, bent my knees and spread them widely. He put a pillow under my butt and got up close and personal with my boy-bits. Next, he did something really unexpected — he spread my cheeks and started licking my hole. I’d never even thought of doing such a thing, especially considering what comes out there. I knew I wasn’t exactly clean as I’d shit earlier, and some of my farts hadn’t exactly been dry. I hated to think of Greg having to taste that, but he clearly was enjoying himself, and so was I, intensely.

I nearly lost it when I felt the tip of his tongue teasing at my ring, and then he pushed forward, and his tongue slipped inside. Oh. My. God. As he started to fuck me with his tongue, he used one hand to rub my chest and the other to stroke me. I was insanely aroused and could only hold back from such a broad assault for a short time. When my climax was imminent, I warned Greg as he’d done with me, and he put his face right in the path of my erupting spasm. Of course, having no outward evidence of having entered puberty, my eruption was limited, but there was enough to leave a streak of my cum in his hair, down the side of his nose, across his mouth and down to his chin.

As I came down from my high, Greg again grabbed his phone and, putting his face next to mine, took a selfie of the two of us together with semen covering both our faces. It was an amazingly sexy shot — one Greg could share with no one else.

I initiated an intense make-out session in which we smeared each other with our cum and licked most of it off. Finally, I grabbed the condom I saw on top of Greg’s nightstand, opened the package and unrolled it onto him. I grabbed the tube of lube I saw there as well and smeared it generously over him. He’d never gotten fully soft, nor had I, but now we were hard as steel, so I pushed his shoulders back and sat down forcefully on him. At first there was some sharp pain, but then it felt wonderful as I started to rock back and forth on top of him. It didn’t take long until we both came again.

By now, Larry had gone to bed, so I snuck into the bathroom and took a shower while Greg changed the bed clothes. We then switched places and, once he returned, snuggled up together under the sheets and went to sleep. The alarm on Greg’s phone went off way too early.

We both washed up in the bathroom together, then grabbed a breakfast of cereal, yogurt and toast. I’d never had yogurt with cereal before and wasn’t sure how I’d like it instead of milk, but it was actually much better tasting than with milk. The toast was made with whole-wheat bread instead of white bread, and to me there was no comparison. The whole wheat had much more substance and flavor.

The three of us headed out of the house together and came to the bike shop first. Larry and I peeled off at that point, while Greg continued on toward the high school. A FedEx truck pulled up just as we unlocked the door, and we ended up helping the driver to offload not only my wheels but a bunch of merchandise for sale in the store. No sooner had the FedEx truck departed minutes later, a brown UPS truck pulled up, and we unloaded even more merchandise. By the time we carried everything inside, it was time to open the store, and there were already customers waiting outside.

“Why don’t you unpack the new wheels for your bike and check them to make sure they’re okay,” Larry suggested. “Make sure there are no nicks or dents in the rims, and that they’re true. When you’ve done that, I’ll show you what to do next.”

As I got to work, I noticed that one of the customers was simply picking up a bike that had been repaired, and another was picking up a custom-order bike seat that had arrived with the morning’s delivery, and Larry installed it while the guy waited. The third customer had a malfunctioning derailleur that was causing the chain to slip off the sprocket while attempting to change gears. Larry decided he was gonna hafta replace it and promised to have it ready by the end of the day.

In the meantime, I opened the boxes containing my new wheels and was shocked to see that they were only rims, without hubs or spokes. I couldn’t believe I was paying so much money, just for the rims. I guess we were gonna have to reuse the ones already on my bike, but I’d no idea how to remove and install bicycle spokes. No wonder replacing the wheels was a four-hour job!

I looked over each wheel to make sure there were no nicks, dents or scratches, but how could I check for alignment? I hit on the idea of laying the wheel on a flat table and checking for gaps, and then rolling each wheel to see if it settled in any one place on the wheel. Once I was convinced the wheels were both true, I got ready to remove the front wheel, but then Larry, noticing what I was doing, told me to wait because aligning the disk brake was tricky. I’d changed the front wheel multiple times already and was surprised to learn that I might have been doing it wrong.

After Larry finished up with the customers, he showed me how to remove the pannier case, which was far trickier than I would’ve thought. He recommended I do that first, before doing anything else, which turned out to be very sound advice. While I did that, Larry opened boxes from the morning’s shipment and placed the contents either into inventory or on display. That left about a dozen bikes in boxes that needed to be assembled and put on display. First, however, he got to work replacing the derailleur on the bike that had been dropped off that morning. The precision and speed he exhibited in disassembling and reassembling the parts, and then aligning them was extraordinary, but then he’d been doing this for a living for years.

Once I had the pannier case off my bike, Larry had me remove the chain and then remove both the front and rear wheels at the same time. He showed me how easy it was to knock the brake pads out of alignment and how to open them properly to facilitate removal of the wheels. Then he said, “The work involved in reusing these spokes isn’t worth the effort. Take these bolt cutters and cut all the spokes close to the wheel. When you’re done, discard the wheel and then remove the other halves of the spokes from the hub.”

Following his instructions, I removed both wheels and set them aside. I then unhooked all of the spokes from the hubs and set them aside as well. In the meantime, Larry finished installing the new derailleur on the bike with the faulty one, and then he began unboxing new bikes and assembling them. It was fascinating to watch him, but I needed to focus on working on my bike.

Once I had the hubs separated from the spokes, I asked Larry what to do next. He said, “Ordinarily, we’d use a spoke alignment tool to make it easier to replace a full set of spokes at once. Unfortunately, your bike uses a non-standard number of spokes and spoke spacing, which is why we couldn’t replace your wheels with a standard model. We’d have had to replace the hub as well, but they don’t make a standard hub that would fit this frame. You can custom-order one, but for what that would cost, you could buy a really nice new bike.”

Larry got out a box of spokes that were pre-sized to fit the size wheels on my bike, and then he showed me how to start with inserting three of them to fix the hub squarely in the center of the wheel. He then demonstrated how to add the rest of the spokes and snug them up, and once that was finished, to adjust the tension in opposite pairs using a torque wrench. Finally, he showed me how to check the wheel for wobble and circularity and to tweak the spokes until the wheel alignment was perfect. After doing the first wheel with his help, I did the second one completely on my own, and then he inspected my work, which he deemed to be satisfactory, as he put it.

With the new spokes all in place, Larry told me to install the inner tubes and tires on both wheels. That was something I knew how to do! When it got to reinstalling the wheels on the bike frame, Larry showed me how to adjust it properly so that the wheel remained true without even the slightest wobble, and he showed me how to re-calibrate the disk brakes, so the bike didn’t veer to the side when stopping. Finally, Larry told me to go ahead and reinstall the pannier case, figuring I could figure it out on my own, and I did.

Throughout the day, customers came in to look at bikes and accessories, and to bring in their bikes for repair. As the business picked up in the afternoon, a young guy joined us and took over the lion’s share of the sales while Larry got down to the business of assembling the shipment of new bikes. Each bike had to be aligned, calibrated and tested by riding outside. It was very apparent why the shop had all five-star reviews. Larry provided exceptional service and had earned a reputation that kept customers coming back.

When I finally finished the work on my bike, I rode it around the immediate area to make sure the wheels were properly installed and true. I couldn’t get over how much more smoothly it rode than it had before. When I mentioned that to Larry, he explained that the tires had a much less aggressive tread than my old tires, which were designed for riding on dirt. These were far better suited to a road bike and had a much lower rolling resistance. Since the vast majority of my riding was on pavement, road-bike tires made far more sense. However, the 4-season tread design, particularly in the side walls, gave them exceptional traction on snow and ice and made them suitable for occasional use on dirt and mud.

The Kevlar belts and sidewalls made them resistant to puncture, and I could ride them right over broken glass and keep riding them for several miles, even flat, without worrying about damaging the rims. A little money spent on better tires could’ve saved me a lot of time and money, but then I’d have never met Larry and Greg. I lost four days and spent hundreds of dollars, but it was time and money well spent.

Before I knew it, having finished the day in high school, Greg showed up at the bicycle shop. I asked Larry about paying up, but he said we’d take care of it later at home since he had to cash in my Applazon gift cards. Larry and I headed home, but my plans for wild sex with reckless abandon had to be put on hold, ’cause Greg had a shitload of homework. Greg said that it went much faster with my help, and he understood it much better, too.

Unfortunately, by the time we finished, it was time to start dinner. Since we still had some leftover pot roast from last night’s dinner, Greg suggested making a beef stew from it. They served something like that at school, but it was nothing like what Greg and I were gonna make. Adding water to the pot, Greg brought it to a low boil and let it simmer until the meat literally fell apart, making it easy to remove the few bones from the roast. He added some carrots, celery, broccoli, cauliflower, a can of candied sweet potatoes and then something I never would have thought to include: a can of pineapple. He added a dash of cumin, a pinch of chili powder and a sprinkle of black pepper. After allowing the mixture to cook thoroughly, until all the vegetables were overcooked, as he put it, he added flour to thicken the water and turn it into a brown gravy.

In the meantime, Greg put me to work peeling potatoes. Once that was done, he put them in a large pot of boiling water and cooked them thoroughly. He then had me mash them in their mixer while he sautéed butter and garlic powder in a small saucepan. He folded the butter and garlic into the potatoes, added grated Parmesan cheese and a dash of paprika, and mixed them thoroughly into the potatoes. They smelled wonderful.

We finished it all as Larry arrived home, and I set the table while Greg warmed and sliced up a loaf of challah. Following Greg’s example, I spooned the stew onto a slice of the challah, added a dollop of mashed potatoes on the side and spooned some of the gravy over the potatoes. For a meal made with leftovers, it was amazingly good. Since it was our last night together, Greg and I took our time snuggling up in bed, just making out for the longest time and then slowly and gently making love. It was a memorable night.

In the morning, Larry fixed a frittata for breakfast. Made with eggs, potatoes, sausage, peppers and onions, it was an incredible sendoff for me. As we were eating, however, he asked me where I was headed, and I told him my next destination was Hannibal, Missouri.

“You might not be aware of it, but the bridge at Florence washed out with the flooding we had a few weeks back,” Larry informed me.

“Not a problem,” I replied smugly. “I’ll be crossing at Meredosia.”

“I hate to be the bearer of bad news,” Larry interjected, “but that bridge washed out over a year ago and it won’t be fixed until later this summer.”

“Fuck, how am I supposed to get across the Illinois River?” I asked. “I can’t take the Interstate.”

“I’d be happy to drive you to Hannibal, but it’s a four-hour round trip,” Larry responded, ignoring my language. “I couldn’t take you until Saturday and something tells me you’d like to be well on your way before then. Your best bet is probably to take the bridge at Beardstown. It’s a bit out of the way, but it shouldn’t add much more than an hour to your trip.”

“Then Beardstown it is,” I replied, but then I remembered, “Oh, I still need to pay you for the repairs to my bike!”

Shaking his head, Larry said, “You did all the labor yourself, so I certainly can’t charge you for labor.”

“But you showed me how,” I replied, “and that took a lot of your time.”

“Even so, you did almost all the work yourself,” Larry countered, “and you helped me assemble all those bikes, which saved me a crapload of time. Let’s just call it even.”

“But there was Saturday night’s dinner,” I noted.

“Greg and I don’t get out to eat a nice meal often enough,” Larry countered.

Wiping the tears from my eyes, I exclaimed, “You guys treated me so nicely, even after I told you what happened with my dad.”

“Son, you’re a really good kid,” Larry countered, “and good kids don’t kill their father without good reason. There was as much said as unsaid, and I know you probably told Greg more than you told me, but you didn’t need to say anything for me to realize you’d been physically, mentally and sexually abused by your father. Horribly abused.”

“Shit, how’d you know?” Greg asked in surprise.

“Let’s just say I learned a lot after you ran away, Greg,” Larry answered. “If we were rich, I’d hire the best criminal defense attorney and the best family lawyer in Indiana, and we’d fight this thing to the ends of the earth. But even if I sold the business and the house, it wouldn’t be enough, and then how would I send Greg to college?”

“Adam’s more important than college, Dad,” Greg responded with tears in his eyes.

“I understand how you feel, Greg. If it were only me, I’d live homeless on the street to save Adam, but even then, it wouldn’t be enough. I called my personal attorney and asked how much something like this could cost, and it’s into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Even if we sold everything but the clothes on our backs, it wouldn’t be enough. Like it or not, Adam’s best bet may well be what he’s already doing: to make a new identity for himself and to run.”

Then turning back to me, he said, “Son, take care of yourself, and if you can, keep in touch.” Handing me a card from the bicycle shop, he added, “My phone number and e-mail address are both on here, and I’ve written Greg’s number and address on the back. If you ever need help, no matter how bad things may be, contact us. If you’re only allowed one phone call, make it us.”

I couldn’t help myself as tears flowed freely from my eyes. I ran to Larry and hugged him tightly. I’d never loved my father, but I loved Larry as if he were my real dad. Letting go of Larry, I hugged Greg tightly, and then I kissed him long and hard on the lips. As I pulled away from the kiss, I saw that Larry was smiling. He was actually grinning. He was truly happy that Greg and I had connected as lovers, even if only briefly. I loved this boy and this man so much it hurt, and I didn’t want to leave them in the worst way. But Greg had to get to school, Larry had a shop to open, and I had a long ride ahead of me, and so I mounted my bike and rode away.