Unproven Chapter Ninety Two "License to F*&% Around"

It was one in the afternoon on Tuesday and they were standing on their isolated beach. He'd stayed home from school, spending an hour in the morning discussing numbers with his father, then come straight here, having Dori drop Ary off at the head of the trail.

He'd just dropped the bomb on her, telling her that they needed to be ready to go by Saturday night at the latest.

"He's trying to take me to Munich for two weeks Ary, I would leave on Sunday."

Her tongue finally came unglued. "That sucks Grayson, it really does, but we can handle two weeks...”

"No! No. What's keeping us here anyway? Some arbitrary date?"

She shook her head, "It's not arbitrary, we need to finish school...”

"Why?" He cut her off, "Why do we? You said yourself that you had no plans to continue education even before we'd made these plans, that you're going to be a novelist... What does a diploma mean? Nothing. We won't be able to use our real names for a while anyway, maybe forever if I can arrange something.”

"It's not about that Gray...”

"Then what? More money? Because I have about seventy grand and you said fifty was a fortune.”

She put a hand on his arm, "Of course not the money."

"Then what?" He demanded.

"Nanna, that's what."

He stared at her for a second then looked away.

"It's already going to be hard enough to leave her a note without giving her any real details of where I'll be, but at least if I'm done with school it's not so bad. Plenty of people go on sabbaticals the summer after graduation. But right now? With only two months left to go? It would kill her Gray. She thinks school is super-important, she was one of the only reasons I was considering college. And she's done a lot for me. I would have been in foster care if not for her, I can't do that to her. It's only two weeks. We'll be fine."

He sunk down on the sand and put his head in his hands.

She sat next to him and rubbed his back, "Why is this bothering you so much, is it because of what happened in Europe? I trust you Grayson, things are different now. And you certainly have no reason not to trust me."

He looked at her, his features turning stony. "It's not different. Oh, it is in the sense that I have no more doubts about us, about you, about what I want for the rest of my life. But as far as the cheating goes? It's not different. It will never be different if I have to be separated from you for longer than a few days."

She cocked her head to the side, her eyes narrowing. "So what you're saying is that you can't go without sex for two weeks? To the point where you'll cheat on me?"

He laughed darkly. "The operative word there is can't. Can't Ary. As in physically impossible."

Her eyes narrowed even further, "Grayson...”

"No, you don't understand, because you don't know about me. About my curse, my goddamned family legacy."

She sat back on her heels, realizing he was serious, that this was a lot bigger than horny teenage issues. "So tell me," she said softly.

He did. Staring down at the sand he told her everything beginning with his obsessive masturbating at age thirteen and his subsequent trip to the hospital where he almost died then briefly wished he had as he'd endured the pain of draining. He explained how it worked and how it had been handled for all these years. When he was finished he continued staring at the sand, waiting for her response.

Ary took several moments to process. By the time she was done, her heart nearly broke for him. An overwhelming feeling of wonder at the lengths he was willing to go to avoid being with someone other than her left her breathless. She wrapped her arms around his stiff form. "Grayson," she whispered.

He turned toward her and she showered kisses on his face, pressing her lips hard against his until she felt the tension leave him. He pulled her into his arms and crushed her against him. "Do you see why we have to go?" He whispered, his throat clogged with emotion.

Tears squeezed out of her eyes and her throat closed, unable to respond to his plea. Because she couldn't do it. Couldn't break Nanna's heart, even if it meant he'd have to sleep with other women. She had to find a way to make it okay for him. It was just physical, she would not be jealous of women who were paid for sex. If he ever developed an emotional attachment to someone, then she would be jealous. Heartbroken. But this she could disregard. If he had a choice, if he was normal, that would be different, but in this case...

She finally pulled back. "Grayson, I love you. Imagining my life without you is like looking down a dark tunnel with no light at the end of it," she said gently.

He smiled, though it was wobbly. "Ditto."

She stroked a hand down his face. "It's not your fault. You didn't ask for it. It's no different than if you were born gay, it's just the way you were made. And to me, you were made perfect."

His eyes watered slightly and he looked away. "God, you are so amazing, how did I get so lucky?"

"It won't hurt me," She said, bringing his head back around to stare at her.

She took a deep breath. "Please Grayson. I know you want to go now, and I do too, believe me I do. But you have to understand that if we did that, if we left now, it would be the most selfish thing I've ever done in my life. I can't break Nanna's heart like that Gray. Please don't ask me to."

He continued to stare at her, his expression hardening. "But you would ask me to do something I feel sick just thinking about? To stick my dick in other women? Just so Nanna can sit in the audience at your graduation?"

She flinched at his vulgar words as well as the tone of accusation. She realized she needed a different tact, and fast. She looked down at the ground.

"If that's the way you feel," she said quietly, "if it's that important to you, then I'll do it. I'll go. But I will regret it Grayson, for a long time to come. I will picture my grandma, beside herself with worry, thinking she failed as a grandparent, a guardian, a parent. That she failed my parents. And I’ll worry that she'll die before the next time I see her, before I could ever explain and tell her how much she meant to me, that I loved her and she did everything right. But if it's that important to you, I will go Grayson, because no matter how much I love my grandmother, I love you more. You own more of my heart than I do."

There was silence for a bit, then she heard him sigh. She looked up and he was staring out at the water.

"Okay." He said finally. "It's nothing I haven't done before. And I guess if you're okay with it then I can handle it. It still makes me sick, but you've made your point. I don't want you to have regrets." He turned to her and smiled faintly. "You know most guys would jump at the chance to do what I'm about to, and if their girlfriends were on board? They'd be ecstatic."

She nodded, smiling ruefully. "Yeah, I know. It's kind of ironic."

He laughed softly, then reached out for her, pulling her onto his lap, her back to his front. He wrapped his arms around her middle and rested his chin on her head.

"This will be the last time. Once we leave here, if ever there's a reason I can't be inside you, I'll go the hospital and deal with the draining. I'd rather suffer the pain than be with anyone but you. I'd do it this time except my father would immediately know the reason. I'm constantly surprised he hasn't figured it out already, but I guess my acting skills are more impressive than I realized. Who knows, maybe that's what I'll do with my life, and you can write the scripts."

She smiled, leaning back against him. "Sounds perfect."

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