"Welcome to the Mad Tower." Jamal said to himself as he looked out the bus window. Even through the plastic windows scarred by X-acto knives with gang symbols, he could spot the building that had to be the place. A tall building surrounded by demolished piles of rubble, a small basketball court along one side, populated by basketball hustlers and what looked like a couple of drug dealers, yep, that had to be place, all right. A place where people went when they had no place else to go. A place for losers...or for someone like him, a place to start out. He wasn't staying in the Mad Tower, no, sir! A couple months, maybe, sleeping on Tybalt's floor, then he would have enough money for his own place, maybe some small decent single, just another step in itself, but better than the Mad Tower, that was for sure.
Why was Tybalt living in the Mad Tower for, hell! He'd left Shreveport over two years ago, why was he still in such a shitty place anyhow? He'd figured his cousin for better than that, he'd been surprised when he'd gotten the address from his aunt and learned its reputation from his fellow-riders on the city bus he'd taken from the Greyhound station.
His relationship with Tybalt was a little complicated. He'd grown up with Tybalt and called him his cousin. But Tybalt was actually the son of his aunt's live-in lover from a prior marriage. So they'd grown up calling each other "cousin" and now that the man had left his aunt about five years ago, what the hell were they to each other?
Well, he was a person Jamal knew in this city. And a person he could live with rent-free until he got a job and on his feet and his new life started. That was enough.
The elevator on the place was out of order, the sign on it browned and crumpled; it hadn't worked in a long time. Hell, his "cousin" was on the third floor!
The smell of urine hit him when he opened the door to the stairs. God, some wino was using the place for his own personal piss-pot! There was the hot, fetid smell of cooking, cabbage at a guess, that or a big pot of pinto beans. Both of them stunk something awful! A burst of foul language (another guess, he didn't get the language, it wasn't English or Spanish), and then he was back into the hallway. God, it smelled worse than the stairs! Didn't anyone ever clean up this fucking place! And that racket, God, he loved rap music, but did it have to be played so fucking loud!
Well, here was Tybalt's apartment. Number 308. He knocked, though he wondered if Tybalt would hear him through the racket, but the door opened and Tybalt was there. Larger than Jamal, and a heck of a lot darker (he was coffee-with-no-milk, Jamal was lots-of-cream, maybe more than half!), and strong, his arms had been muscled when Jamal had last seen him, and he was even bigger now. His hair was tightly woven into cornrows, and he looked tougher, maybe even meaner, than he had back in Shreveport. But his smile was the same old Tybalt.
"Hey, Jamal, come on in." Tybalt said. "Mama said you were coming to stay with me."
"Good." he hadn't been sure Tybalt had gotten the message, wondered a little if Tybalt would let him stay or not. He'd been pretty sure he would...but that's not definite.
He wasn't as sure when he saw the place. Looked around, then back at Tybalt.
"Make yourself at home." Tybalt said.
"With what?" Jamal asked. "Don't you have any...anything?"
The apartment was practically empty! Bare walls, bare floor except for a pallet on the floor, a few clothes on a rack that looked like it had come from a dry-cleaners, and a boombox-like radio on the floor. That was it!
"It's what I've got." Tybalt said.
"But...but you've been here for two years." Jamal said. "Haven't you gotten a job yet?"
Tybalt got angry, his face fell into those lines easy. "Hey, you think its' so fucking easy, getting a job in this town? Shit, I barely make enough to pay the rent on this place, buy some food and shit, and it's gone! What'd you think, you just come to this town and everything's going to be all right?"
Jamal's face fell, as well it should. "Is it that bad?"
"They don't give a brother a fucking chance in this town, man!" Tybalt said. "They hear you live in this fucking building, they assume you're a gangbanger or a pusher or a hustler or a crack addict. So you get a job and then what? First fucking thing goes wrong, goes missing, and they blame you and they fire you! Then you try to get another job, and they check on the first job and then they turn you down, then you end up like me, standing out by the U-Haul place hoping to get a job helping white shit move for a couple of bucks...if you're lucky!"
"I didn't know that." Jamal said.
"You'd better haul ass back to Shreveport if you know what's good for you." Tybalt said.
Jamal gulped. "I don't have enough money to get back to Shreveport."
"Me, neither." Tybalt concluded. "That's why I'm still here. And now you're here."
"Maybe I can do okay." Jamal said, to himself more than Tybalt.
But Tybalt answered, "Shit! Well, come on and make yourself at home. I got some Rice-A-Roni we can fix for supper. You better hang onto as much of your money as you can, we can shop for groceries tomorrow, whatever you're willing to spend of what you have. But save out fifty bucks for a monthly bus pass, you have to have one if you're going to get a job in this town. Nothing close by you can do for jack shit."
Jamal had exactly seventy-five dollars on him. Jesus, what had he gotten himself into? Shit! He had nothing, absolutely nothing!
With nothing better to do, nothing at all, he sank down onto the pallet. He sat there a while, and then something cold kissed his cheek. Cold and damp. He looked over at it, up Tybalt's arm. He was being offered a can of Schlitz Malt Liquor. "Here." Tybalt said. "You need it more'n me."
Jamal took it gratefully, took a big slug off of it, and then handed it up to Tybalt. "We'll split it."
"Thanks." Tybalt sat down beside him. Not like there was any place else to sit in this place, except maybe on the window-sill.
They passed the can back and forth once more, and then Jamal said, "How you keep this cold?"
"Got a small ice chest." Tybalt pointed. "Good one, ice keeps in there nearly 24 hours, and ice for a cooler comes free at the store if you buy something from them to put into it, they'll scoop it out of their ice-maker for you. I could use a refrigerator though. One for sale at the second-hand shop down the street, forty dollars. Can't decide if I should get a fridge or a stove."
"How about a hot plate?"
"Got one. It sucks." Tybalt said. "It's how I'm making the Rice-A-Roni right now."
"Still need to get a fridge first." Jamal said. "My first check, I'll pay half for the fridge."
"Hey, thanks." Tybalt said. "We need one." He handed the can back to Jamal. "You can finish it. I'll go stir the Rice-A-Roni."
"Great." Jamal said and turned the sweet malt up to his lips. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad after all.
They ate and listened to the radio. The loud racket down the hall kept on going until nine o'clock, then it stopped suddenly. After that, it was better.
But at ten, Tybalt turned off the radio. "I got to get some sleep." he said. "I have to be at the U-Haul place by five a.m. if I'm going to get any work. By ten, it's not worth sticking around."
"Okay." Jamal said. "I'll buy a paper and make some calls for a job and we'll go shopping when you get back."
"Sure." Tybalt said. "Let's get to sleep."
"Okay." Jamal said. "But where?"
"You can share with me." Tybalt said. "Hell, we did it plenty of times growing up."
"Yeah." Jamal said. He snickered, remembering those times as kids. Hell, his first sexual exploration had been with Tybalt and some other kids about his own age. They'd been crazy in bed, the kids making up a crazy-quilt of intertangled limbs so they'd all fit into the bed, and their hands reached for whoever's willy was nearest, and they got busy. They'd tried a bit of sucking, too, but about the time it all got really interesting, a revival had made everyone uncomfortable with the idea of playing with their own willies, not to mention others. They'd started wearing their briefs in bed (they'd all slept naked before), their sex play had stopped, and never started up again. Something sad about that, Jamal always felt, not that he'd had the courage to say such a thing. Religion had been a big deal in his life, and even his scorn for such things these days were an echo of the way it had been so overwhelming to him when younger.
Jamal got down to his boxers, looked over at Tybalt, who was down to a pair of blue briefs with white stripes marking the fly. Tybalt looked up at him and Jamal smirked. "So, how far you wanna go?" He said to Tybalt.
Tybalt smiled back. "All the way."
"Fair enough." Jamal said and skinned off his boxers. "I hate wearing my underwear to bed." He'd returned to sleeping nude about six months before, though in a solitary bed and bedroom.
"Yeah." Tybalt agreed. "Might as well be comfortable." He took off the briefs and threw them at Jamal, by design or bad luck, they got Jamal right in the face.
"Man, you need to wash those things." Jamal said, wrinkling his face. "They're skanky!"
"Been washing them out in the sink." Tybalt said. "Saving money for laundry."
"Well, wash them better next time." Jamal lay down on the bed and pulled the covers over himself.
Tybalt slid in next to him. The pallet wasn't very big, the base of it was an old sleeping bag, and it was about four feet across. Big for one guy...crowded for two.
There was a sort of musky smell from Tybalt's body next to him. Jamal had never smelled such a thing before. The few who had slept next to him since he had hit puberty hadn't smelled like this. The women had smelled of perfume, or body creams, the sole man (his brother) had smelled of soap from a bath taken just before bed. This smell was of a man who hadn't showered before getting in bed...maybe not for a few days, even.
The smell was...intoxicating. Powerful. It seemed to touch some primal thing inside of Jamal, he felt his cock spring into attention immediately! God, he hadn't felt this horny in...how long? Ever since his hormones had settled down at age fifteen!
"How long has it been since we shared a bed?" Tybalt asked him.
"We was just kids." Jamal affirmed.
"Had some good times then." Tybalt said.
"Yeah." Jamal said. Was Tybalt asking him...?
"I haven't thought of those days in I don't know how long." Tybalt said. "Man, I'm glad you come to stay. Man misses his family, more'n he thinks he does."
"Family. Such as we are." Jamal said. Kind of a long connection...does having a father who fucks your aunt make a man a relative? "You and me are friends, anyhow."
"Yeah. Friends." Tybalt said in a husky whisper. "I've missed friends. Especially like we used to be."
And a firm, black hand closed upon Jamal's cock. Jamal's only response was a soft groan. So long! God, it had been so long!
"You remember this?" Tybalt said.
"Yeah." Jamal breathed. "When we was kids...."
"Yeah." Tybalt said. "Only we aren't kids no more."
"Yeah." Jamal said. And then, realizing that Tybalt was asking him a question, and to make clear his answer, he grasped towards Tybalt's crotch. He misjudged it, fumbled, touching a part of Tybalt's leg or abdomen, he couldn't quite tell which in this position, and Tybalt's other hand reached and caught and guided his hand over and down to its intended landing site.
"Whoa!" Jamal said when he felt that huge pud that Tybalt was packing between his legs. Damn, Tybalt was hung! No wonder his God-fearing aunt had lived in sin with Tybalt's father for so long, and it had been the man who had left her, not the other way around, if this had been the same kind of tool he'd used on her! Over ten inches of hard black dong pounded under his hand, he could feel the blood boiling inside of it.
Tybalt's hand began to pump Jamal's cock, and Jamal returned the favor. Hell, maybe this would be all they'd do, not such a big thing. Sometimes, a brother needed a hand like this and you could give it to him without getting into the down low about it. Just a favor of sorts, as long as you didn't do something like...kiss?
Suddenly his lips propelled themselves at Tybalt's mouth, he groaned as their mouth-flesh collided. Groaned again as he felt that wide, pink touch of Tybalt's fish into his mouth, questing for his own, and he reached out to taste it, suckle that tender tentacle of Tybalt's that searched over and across his mouth, a slim sheath of slimy fluid over it that tasted of Rice-A-Roni and malt liquor...and man!
Tybalt's hand left Jamal's shaft and went around him, Jamal did the same and their erections collided as they embraced, pushed their groins towards each other, they were grinding now against each other, a rhythmic rubbing that roiled their tubes of man-steak across each other, slipping the succulent skin over the globe of their gorged glans and washed them with waves of welling pleasure that pulsed and pounded in their veins, vigorous, vibrant, voluptuous, voluble...screaming delight!
"Oh, God, oh, God!" Jamal gasped as he hunched at Tybalt. "Aw, man, aw, man, we're going to make it, we're going to make it, man, you and me, we'll make it tonight."
"Sure, sure." Tybalt crooned to him gently, "You and me will make it. We're going to be together here, you and me. Got no money for nothing else, a brother's got to take what he can get, right?"
"Yeah." Jamal agreed. "Nothing but each other."
"It's a start." Tybalt said. "Let's see where it goes."
"Sure, sure." Jamal gasped. "Where do you want to take it?"
"Can I put it in you?" Tybalt wheedled, unsureness in his voice now. "I'll be easy on you, I'll do you good, man, you won't hurt none if I can help it...."
"Okay, okay." Jamal cut him off. He didn't want Tybalt begging him, it didn't feel right, not big, strong, older Tybalt, the man who was supposed to take care of him in this new, big city. He didn't want Tybalt to ask him. "Come on, take me, just...you got any lube?"
"I got some." Tybalt said. "Got some Vaseline, I mean, I use it on my lips if they get chapped.
"That'll do, that'll do."
"It's in the bathroom." Tybalt said. "I'll get it and be right back."
The separation was a sort of agony, so far, it had been a mad adventure in the bed, not quite real, not mundane, pedestrian life, but something approaching a fantasy, he could have kept it up and not felt it quite real in the morning. But if Tybalt got up...they'd have to treat this as more than a fantasy.
The decision came with more ease than he'd expected. "Okay. But hurry. Man, I got to do this now, before I change my mind or something." He was telling himself that as much as telling Tybalt. If he stopped to think about this, his mother's Sunday afternoon preachings might start in on him, the way she'd come back from church all fired up and lay into him. Hell, that was what had sent him after Tybalt more than anything, he was tired of justifying himself to her.
He didn't have to justify himself to anyone any more. Only to Tybalt, who wanted to fuck him. That made it easier. His demons he laid to rest, for now, at least. They might wake up later, but for now, they rested easy.
Tybalt got into the bathroom, there was a metallic sort of fumbling, and then a harsh flare of yellow light, Tybalt had had to turn on the light to see where the Vaseline was. Then it was off again, only a second or so of reality, and now the darkness wrapped them up again, the glares of the saints and martyrs faded away again. They couldn't see him in the dark!
"Let me do it from behind." Tybalt said. "Both of us on our sides, and I'll ease it in gentle. You won't hurt none, honest you won't."
"Just do it." Jamal hissed. "It's okay. Just do it."
He'd never expected such a huge tool to try to penetrate him. A black man experienced jail, it was hard to keep out of it when your skin was the wrong color, and he knew that one time he could end up in a cell with someone who decided to use him like that, for domination and pain and anger. This wasn't like that. Tybalt took it as easy as he could...but damn! That was a big fucking piece of meat he was trying to jam up in there!
Tybalt stuffing it at his butt was knocking him around on the pallet, for God's sake! They fetched up against a wall, hell, he was scooting the entire bed around with them on it!
"Ah, hell!" Tybalt said after a time. "I got to do it harder than that on you. You ready for it?"
"Yeah, man, yeah, do it, come on, stuff it in me." Jamal urged him. "I can take it, I know I can!"
He wasn't so sure when Tybalt caught hold of his upper leg and used that to hold him firm while he stuffed that bulb of his glans into Jamal's ass. Shit, it felt like he was cramming an apple up there! How the fuck big was Tybalt! That apple-glans was followed with a thick, oversized cucumber of shaft right behind it, God damn but it hurt! He must have been crazy agreeing to this! He couldn't take it, he couldn't!
"Come on, come on!" he groaned, less in desire for sex than a desire to get it over with! He'd heard that once it got inside you, it stopped hurting. All the women had acted that way, and he figured it would be the same for him.
It was better, somewhat, once that huge shaft began plunging into him, once the sphincter had been ravaged apart and it was only a case of his insides having to unwrinkle to give it all room. God, this was like taking a really constipated dump...in reverse! All the exertion, all the discomfort, and it was getting more, not less!
After some interminable time, Tybalt gasped, said with a heavy tone, "Okay, man, that's got it in you."
"Oh, thank God!" Jamal meant thank God it was over, but Tybalt chuckled.
"You're liking it, are you?"
Not really, but he didn't hate it, neither. "It's okay." he settled for saying. "Got to get used to it, I guess."
"Get used to this." Tybalt answered and began to move back and forth...and Jamal gasped!
What the fuck was happening to him? He had a flare of ecstasy boiling up from inside him...and it wasn't coming from his cock! It was below that, deeper...more satisfying!
"Oh, man!" Jamal groaned. "Man, that's doing it for me!"
"I figured it would." Tybalt agreed. "Everyone loves this tool when it gets inside them."
"Yeah, ah, wow, yeah!" Jamal breathed. "Ah, man, that feels good, so good!" He didn't understand it, but he liked it, shit, did that make him a queer, or just normal? How was he supposed to know! It felt right...he'd settle for that.
"Ah, yeah, fuck me harder now, harder!" Jamal encouraged Tybalt. When Tybalt did it faster, that made the pleasure bubble up even more, this was less like the strident delight his dick gave him, it welled up more gently, less like he was being showered with joy than that it was seeping up around him, submerging him little by little. Was this what women felt? No wonder they all claimed they needed so long to come, a feeling like this, you wanted it to go on and on forever! Give him a dick up his ass all night long, moving, and he'd call it Heaven without looking around for the Angel Gabriel! "Ah, yeah, yeah, man, uh, yeah, uhhh, uhh, uhhh!"
"Nice ass, man, really nice ass." Tybalt murmured to him from behind, a moist sound that bubbled around his ear before going inside. "Going to love having this in my bed, that's for sure."
"Give us something to do when we get home at night." Jamal agreed. "We got nothing now, that's for sure."
"We got each other." Tybalt said. "That's something."
"Yeah." Jamal agreed. "Fuck me harder. Let me feel that thing slap in and out of me. Damn, man, you going to fuck me, come on and fuck me!"
"Yeah, yeah!" Tybalt began to really hump Jamal's butt now. He even rolled them over and got on top, so he could drive that dong down into Jamal's bowels, and that made it even better. God, he was being fucked by a big, strong, black man and he was loving it, shit, he must be queer if he liked it this much! Though how anyone couldn't like it once they had it. Maybe it was just something that men had always liked doing until God came along and told them to cut it out for whatever reason. Well, he wasn't listening to that crap anymore, he wanted a dick up his ass, he was going to get one up his ass. "Maybe do yours, too." he muttered up to Tybalt. "You like that, cousin?"
Tybalt was lost in his own desires, he didn't answer. Or maybe that was an answer. "Ah, ah, man, shit, God this feels good, ah, man, going to fuck you every night, man, God, man, God, uh, uh, ahh!"
"Come on, man, shoot that in me, shoot it hard." Jamal guttered out. He was drowning in the pleasure now, the rock of his spirit was now deep within the well that had sprung up out of him from the joy of Tybalt's prick in his butt, he was ready to see where and how this was going to make him shoot his nuts off. But for that, he needed it harder, more. "Come on, plug me, man, give it to me, come on, harder, uh, huh, harder, uhh, uhh, guhh!"
"Ahh, gahh, hahhh, uhh, guhhh!" Tybalt smoldered above him, the heat of those sounds pouring down like flames. Oh, God, Jamal felt, he was going to come, he was going to come! Come on, body, you going to squirt from this, you'd better do it now!
By sheer effort of will, he forced his body to take this joy into its realm of his cock, he channeled it there by raw force and packed it in tight. His cock throbbed on the pallet, he began to squirm to let the foreskin add its bit to the mixture, he had a hot, sweaty, black man pounding his ass, he was going to shoot his wad from it, damn it, he didn't want to wank off after, come on, he told his body, come on, shoot it, shoot it, shoot it!
And his body staggered up the hill to ecstasy, he nurtured the blossoming flower of the climax as it opened, and as the orgasm struck him at last, he could only think to himself, thank God, thank God I made it, I don't have to do it with my hand or nothing, thank God! That was uppermost, like icing on the cake of his ejaculation, he soaked the bedding beneath him with his salty squibs of jism, and fell into a lassitude marred only by the rutting beast that had been Tybalt who was still ramming him hard.
"AAHHH, AHH, GAHH, UHHH, GAH, UH, UH, UHH, UHH, GUHH-HUHHH-HHUUHHH, KUH-GNNNNHHHKKKKHHH!" Tybalt finally finished, and that final grunt was accompanied by a blast of jism into Jamal's ass, he felt it suddenly burst in around Tybalt's dong like a hundred openings had poured it from Tybalt's cock like a sieve into his butt, and Tybalt's rock-hard dong was pumping in and out of that sticky cavern, and the come squelched as Tybalt foamed it up inside of Jamal's ass, and then Tybalt was done, and he pulled out, leaving a mess with the consistency of the foam-head on a mug of beer, Jamal squeezed his ass and it bubbled around inside him, and Jamal relaxed and felt the bubbles popping as bubbles do, one here, one there, but rapidly all over at once, until the entire mass of the load was substantially less than it had been and his ass felt like something closer to normal if a bit sticky.
"Ah, shit, man!" Tybalt said to Jamal as he crawled off. "That was so fucking hot. I never had an ass like yours, man, ever."
"It was good." Jamal agreed. "You and me got something to do besides listen to the radio now, I guess."
"Yeah." Tybalt chuckled. "I just hope you don't end up on a night job or something."
"I wouldn't take one." Jamal assured him.
Tybalt frowned. "Don't say that. You might end up with a decent job. Man, you get something, you take it and you hang on tight. That's how I screwed up, not sticking with it. A boss would chew me out, I'd get mad and quit. You do that twice, you get shit for work."
"Okay, okay." Jamal said. "We'll hang in there, you and me, and work together and get out of this. I find a good job, and they need someone, I'll tell them about you. Together, we'll get out of this place."
"We'll do good." Tybalt said.
Jamal looked at the bare apartment. "Be hard to do worse, that's for sure."
"I got nothing, and so do you." Tybalt said. "But we got each other now."
"Yeah." Jamal agreed. "Now let's get some sleep, if you got to be up at five o'clock."
As Tybalt settled in, Jamal looked across the empty floor at the wall beyond. They had nothing. A hell of a place to start out, nothing.
But look at it this way...when you start with nothing, you can only get better from there.