TITLE: Its Only Love
AUTHOR: Lamia
FEEDBACK: Pamela977@hotmail.com
RATING: R - m/m slash (the gentle kind)
MAIN CHARACTER/S: Ike and Buck
STATUS: Complete
DISCLAIMER: I can't claim the characters depicted in this story - wish I could. They are the property of Spielman & Co. and no infringement to their rights is intended.
Love is a strange thing and I really don't think people completely understand how many kinds there are. There's the kind that everybody knows about love between a man and a woman love of a parent for a child. Those are the kinds of love we grow up with and expect to find in our lives. But there's another kind, too. A love that's strong and pure and precious a love that binds souls together.
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My Ma and Pa didn't have much money when I was growin' up. My Pa worked a few acres of rocky ground that we called our farm a little ways outside of Springfield, Illinois. Pa would leave the house early and come home dog tired and dirty from workin' all day in the soil tryin' to convince the unbroken earth to loosen and allow the seeds to sprout and put down roots. I loved my Pa dearly. He wasn't really a big man, but to me he was huge as big as the giant in the bean stalk fairy tale and as strong as Samson in the story from the Bible. I remember runnin' along the lane that led from our house to the field at night to meet him as the sun began to set, signallin' the end of his work day. I would call to him, just to let him know I was comin'. `Course, that was before . . . before everything changed and my voice went away.
When I was very small, he would grab me under my arms and swing me around through the air while I giggled in delight. As I grew older, I would still run to meet him, but rather than scoop me up, he would wrap his arm around my shoulder as we walked the dusty lane toward the house. I remember stretching my own strides to match his longer ones as Pa described the events of his day. They were only the ordinary happenin's of a poor dirt farmer, but Pa had a way of making his day sound as excitin' as any storybook. My Pa would get wrapped up in his stories and make big gestures with his hands that made the words come alive. Ma used to say that Pa's mouth was connected to his hands and if he had to sit on them, he most likely wouldn't be able to talk.
My Ma was a beautiful lady. She weren't very big, but she was strong. I'd seen her help Pa free a calf that got mired down in the muck after some fierce storms turned the cow lot into a sticky mess. Ma was strong, but she was soft, too. Pa said Ma was "willowy". I didn't know what he meant back then, but now when I see a willow's branches swaying in the breeze, it reminds of the way Ma moved her soft cotton skirt sweeping around her quiet and gentle when she walked, barely makin' a sound. I s'pose that's what my Pa meant.
My Ma worked hard to take care of us me, my sister, Maggie and Pa. Ma had a little garden out behind our house. Every year she would save some of the money she made sellin' eggs to the man at the mercantile and buy vegetable seeds. Come spring, she would till the soil with her spade and plant all sorts of things peas, carrots, beans, squash and corn. While Pa had to coax his crops to grow, Ma's plants were anxious to please her. She was proud of it and we always had vegetables to eat. We didn't have much meat, sometimes, though. Ever' once in a while, Ma would have to butcher one of her chickens. Back then, I never understood why Ma always took the wing pieces of the fried chicken and let the rest of us eat the meatier parts. But I know now that she was lettin' her family have the best pieces. I'm sure Ma would have liked a better piece of chicken sometimes, but she thought we needed them more. I guess that's what you do when you love someone - you tend to their needs first.
`Bout the only thing the McSwain family had much of was love. My folks weren't bashful `bout showin' it neither. Every night, both my Ma and Pa would listen to me and Maggie say our prayers and kiss us goodnight. I'll never forget the way Ma's goodnight kiss felt. Her kiss was soft and warm like mornin' sunshine and her skin brushin' against my face felt like the petals of the wild rose that grew out by the lane.
Pa's skin was weathered from hours under the sun and his lips would sometimes feel dry and chapped. But even so, I loved it when Pa kissed me goodnight. I felt safe and protected with Pa sittin' there on the edge of my bed, tuckin' the covers around me. Scarlet Fever took my hair away when I was very young and sometimes I would get teased over it. The fever could have killed me easy, and I'm lucky all it took was my hair, but the teasin' still hurt. My Pa would kiss my bald head and tell me I was beautiful and special and then I could go to sleep. There weren't no insult my Pa's touch couldn't soothe away.
My Ma and Pa loved each other very much. Their eyes kinda lit up when they saw each other and they smiled a lot but it was the sort of smile you don't realize you're doin'. I grew up knowin' what love looked like `cause I saw it on my parent's faces.
Sometimes in the evenin' after they'd put me and Maggie to bed, Ma and Pa would sit outside on the swing Pa made. We didn't have a porch so Pa attached it to a big limb of the hackberry tree out back by Ma's garden. I could hear the groan of the tree limb through my bedroom window as the swing moved back and forth. Sometimes I would get out of bed and watch Ma and Pa swing in the moonlight. They never said nothin', `least not that I could hear - just sat there leanin' against each other, holdin' hands. After a while, Pa would get up and lead Ma back into the house. My parents' bedroom was right next to me and Maggie's room. I remember layin' awake in bed some nights, wonderin' why my Ma and Pa's bed squeaked. It wasn't a loud noise just a steady squeak. One night, when I was about 11 or so, my curiosity got the better of me and I opened the door to their room. Neither Ma or Pa noticed me standin' there in the dark they were too consumed with each other. I could see them in the moonlight that streamed through the window. Pa held Ma like she was one of her special dishes that she brings down from the top cupboard only at Christmas time. Ma looked like an angel layin' there her long dark hair spread out on her pillow. I closed the door, quiet as I could, but couldn't go back to bed. Instead I sat outside their door for a while listenin' to my folks make love. I've been in a saloon or two where good times were for sale and the sounds driftin' down the stairs from the rooms above was outright embarrassin'. But Ma and Pa weren't loud or rough like that. They spoke to each other real soft like in church.
As a eleven year old, it was kinda funny' seein' and hearin' somethin' I weren't supposed to know about. After that night, whenever I heard the noises through the bedroom wall, I noticed that Ma would hum a little song while she made Pa's favorite blueberry pancakes for breakfast the next mornin'. Pa would come downstairs into the kitchen smilin', and wrap his arms around Ma's waist from behind. Ma would blush a little as Pa brushed her hair aside and kissed the back of her neck. I would hide behind the bottle of molasses and smile, knowin' my parents had enjoyed each other in the night. It must be a wonderful feelin' to make someone feel so good.
I try not to think about my family very often - it don't do no good. The love that bound my family together was strong, but it weren't bulletproof. It didn't take no more than a few seconds for a bunch of thieves to take my family and my voice away, leavin' me alone in this world with no one to love. God musta heard me cryin' though, because he sent me Buck Cross.
We've been together now for almost four years. I met Buck at a mission school where I'd been sent when no one wanted to take me in after my family got killed. The school was clear out in Nebraska Territory, quite a far piece from my home in Illinois, but no other place would take me. Seems I was considered "hard to handle" being without a way to talk and all. I s'pose I was hard to handle for a while. I didn't care about nobody and nobody cared much about me. Those outlaws didn't shoot me, but they put a hole in my heart just the same. But then Buck came along and he was just as much a misfit as I was. Maybe that's why he fit so perfectly in that jagged hole in my heart. Buck pretty much saved my life. He gave me a way to talk with my hands and gave me back my self-respect. Without Buck, I'd probably be dead or a freak act in some travelin' side show.
I love Buck. It ain't the same kinda love I felt for my sister and it ain't the same I felt for my Ma and Pa. I had a good friend named Tommy when I was young and I reckon, in a way I loved him, too. But Buck is different I love him in a way I can't rightly explain.
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Once you turn sixteen, you have to leave the mission. Seems they figure by then you can make it on your own. Buck don't know when he was born Indians don't keep track of age like white people do. I reckon we're about the same, though, so we decided Buck could have the same birthday as me. That way, we'd have to leave the mission at the same time. Me and Buck are doin' alright, I guess, but it ain't been easy.
We been travellin' around tryin' to find work, but there ain't too many jobs for a half-breed Kiowa and a bald mute. We been either kicked or laughed out of `bout half the towns we've been in since leavin' school. We just got kicked out of Julesburg, just like we did in Fort Morgan and Maple Hill and some other places I'd rather not remember. There'd been some Indian trouble in the area homesteads bein' burned and such. A couple of folks got killed. The townspeople didn't take kindly to Buck bein' there.
I feel bad for Buck. It ain't his fault that them Indians were causin' trouble no more'n it's his fault that he came to be because his Ma was attacked by a white man. He ain't had an easy life, but he don't talk much about it. Least mine was happy for a while and I have memories of a lovin' family. Kinda funny I can't talk, but would chatter all day if I could. Buck can speak, but he don't want to.
Them folks in Julesburg called him every unkind name in the English language and some I think they made up. One old coot even spit in Buck's face. I've seen Buck get into a fight for less, but this time he just turned away and started walkin' out of town with his head hangin' down defeated. I guess there's only so much a body can take.
We set up camp outside of town by a stream. I got a fire goin' and Buck went off to hunt. Buck is a good hunter. He can always find somethin' for us to eat rabbits usually. For some reason he don't eat birds, but I do, so sometimes he'll get a quail or prairie chicken for me. We don't have anything to speak of, but we ain't never hungry. I'm sure glad I've got Buck with me. I would have starved by now on my own.
I don't think his heart was in the hunt that night because he only brought back one rabbit. Buck skinned the rabbit and put it over the fire on a spit to cook. He is truly gifted with that knife of his. I've tried to prepare the meat sometimes, but I just make a mess of things. He said I could have the rabbit he wasn't hungry and went down to the stream to take a bath.
Buck's mama named him right. He moves just like a deer darting through the timber, quick and graceful, barely makin' a sound. But sometimes he gets hunted just like the deer in the timber by ignorant folks like the ones in Julesburg. Hunted for fun and it hurts.
Buck always does that after we get booted out of a town. Take a bath, I mean. He'll take some sand or pebbles and rub his skin nearly raw. I'm not sure which he's tryin' to do rub the red off and become white or rub so hard that it makes him redder.
I've seen Buck naked lots of times and he's seen me, too. Livin' together like we do it's hard not to. We ain't never given it much thought. But lately, Buck's been acting different like he's ashamed of himself - maybe ashamed of some of the things he's feelin'. I think it's only natural to be curious about your body and . . . I admit some mornin's I wake up smilin' with my hands places they might not oughta be. But, I reckon that's part of bein' human. I've seen Buck wake up with the same smile only to become embarrassed once he's awake enough to know what he's doin'.
I think maybe Buck's scared that if he finds pleasure in that part of his body he'll be the same kind of man his father was capable of inflictin' pain and shame on someone. That's all he knows about two people bein' together I guess. He never heard his parent's soft words of affection through their bedroom door.
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Buck dreams a lot, and lately, they ain't been good ones. Indians take their dreamin' real serious and Buck's scare him. He won't talk about them, but I know him well enough to know there's a white monster with no name or face in his dreams.
I was still awake, sittin' against a tree trunk, lettin' my mind wander back to happier times when he woke up scared, the monster creepin' into his sleep again. Buck sat up with a start and jumped again as I touched his shoulder lettin' him know I was close by. Once he realized it was me, I pulled Buck back against me and wrapped my arms around his chest, protectin' him from the nightmares. I've watched Buck stand up to the nuns at the mission not flinchin' one bit as they struck his hand with the edge of a ruler `til it bled, punishin' him for usin' his left hand `stead of his right. But he'd pull away from a gentle touch like it burned him. It took a while for him to learn to accept a friend's touch like bein' schooled in somethin' new.
Buck needed the touch of a friend- but he needed to be loved, too. I'm not exactly sure when I started lookin' at Buck in a different way, but I had been for a while. Sometimes at night when he's asleep I have to fight real hard to keep myself from touchin' his dark hair and runnin' my hands over his brown skin. I was afraid he'd think I was a freak of some sort and leave me. I didn't want to be alone again, but I couldn't hold back what I felt for him much longer either.
I felt Buck's breath catch in his throat as my hands moved over his bare chest, lovin' the skin color others hated. I'd never felt anything so right or so meant to be as touchin' Buck and it was too late to stop. I pulled him closer to me and reached between his legs for the bundle underneath his buckskin trousers and started rubbin' the deer skin against him. He shuddered a bit afraid of my touch afraid of what his body was doin' because of it. I took Buck's hand in mine and held it against him, lettin' him feel himself come to life under our hands. He calmed a bit and I think he understood that I'd never hurt him.
I snaked my hand underneath the buckskin and felt Buck slowly melt back against my chest trustin' me, allowin' me to roam under the animal skin that covered him. He covered my hand with his, the deer hide between us, lettin' me please him, his soft rockin' movements and his back pressed up against me creatin' desires of my own.
I crawled out from behind Buck and let him lay back in the grass. His dark eyes watched me as I slipped out of my clothes and reached for his. Buck laid real quiet and still in the grass, unsure `bout what I was wantin' to do, but then he raised himself up a bit and let me strip him bare willin' to learn somethin' new.
Our bodies couldn't have fit together more perfectly as I pressed my white skin against his brown flesh and memorized his face with my lips fearin' it would be my only chance to feel him that way. I felt Buck's breath warm my skin as his lips searched for mine in a needful way like somethin' was hungry inside him. My heart nearly exploded against my chest tryin' to reach out to his as his hardness rubbed against mine doin' a dance no one has to learn and Buck whispered that he loved me.
Never since I lost my voice had I wanted it back so bad as I did right then, lying there, brushing away Buck's tears. . . tears I don't think he even knew he was cryin'. I pulled away from Buck and straddled his legs watching the firelight dance across his face across the golden features that, no matter how hard he scrubbed, would never become white.
There was so much I wanted to say to him and I tried to sign but my hands weren't good enough. I wanted to tell him he was beautiful just the way he was. I wanted to tell him how special he was and that I loved him. I wanted to convince him that he would never be the monster his father was and that there was no shame in what he felt. I opened my mouth and tried again and again to force the words up from my throat but they wouldn't come. Instead, I took him, full and warm into my mouth, deep into my throat and repeated my unspoken words against him, over and over again until his back arched hard and he believed me.
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In the daylight the prairie is a big, lonely place. When I first came to this country it scared me some. Durin' the day you can pretty much see forever, but when night comes somethin' magic happens and the edges of the prairie curl up around you like the land holds you safe in the palm of its hand.
Off in the distance I heard the mournful howl of a coyote callin' for its mate bounce off the upturned edge of the prairie. I felt bad for him, bad for anyone alone without someone to love and care for. I laid there for a long time in the grass holdin' Buck's dark body in my arms. I could tell by the steady rhythm of his breath against my chest that he slept the hurt gone for a while. I pushed his dark crop of hair aside and kissed my lover's neck.
My Ma and Pa would surely disapprove and the sisters at the mission would condemn me to eternal fire for what I did with Buck that night. But in a world where nobody cares if we live or die, I don't much care what others think. Who's to say what's right or wrong? After all, it's only love.
The End
FEEDBACK: Pamela977@hotmail.com