This is my very first attempt at writing. I've always wanted to write and after years of starts and stops I decided something short like this might be a good way to get my feet wet, so to speak. This story isn't terribly graphic. There is some sex, but it comes at the end of the tale. My goal here was to try and tell a coherent story of friendship, love, and a little sex thrown in for good measure.
I welcome constructive comments. If this is not your cup of tea, that's okay. If you enjoy it, let me know. If you have any advice, I'll be glad to hear it. If you make it all the way to the end, thanks for your time.
All characters in this story who engage in sexual situations are completely fictional and are 18 years old or older.
Special thanks to RandyD1369 for his amazing editing of not only grammar and punctuation, but also story plot, flow, and cohesion. Thanks for calling me out on parts of the story that didn't completely make sense or come full circle. You're willingness to not only "red pen" grammatical issues, but to invest in the story to the point where you're able to draw references between different parts of the timeline shows your commitment to your craft and your writers.
*****
Jake awoke from what was apparently a very good dream since he could feel his erection straining against his boxers. Laying on his side, facing the wall, he was still in that transition between sleep and wakefulness. Taking a deep breath and stretching he noticed a distinct and familiar smell. It was floral and fresh with a hint of strawberry. He started to roll over but something was pressed against his back. Craning his head around the first thing he saw were bare feet with red painted toe nails, ankles crossed with one foot lightly bouncing. Turning his head further, he saw bare legs, smooth, shapely, tan, and athletic. He next saw blue-jean shorts over narrow hips, a tucked in white tee shirt concealing firm, proud breasts, one of which was covered by a cascade of blue-black hair which came almost to the waist, a long slender neck, clean jawline, supple lips, narrow nose, and deep emerald green eyes. The eyes, and the lips, held a smile as Jake looked at his unexpected visitor.
"Morning sleepy head," Dani said pertly.
"Hey Dani," Jake said sleepily, in his deep soft voice. "What's up?"
"Uh, not you," she joked. "I was beginning to wonder if you were going to wake up today. I started to wake you once, but you sounded like you were having a really good dream so I just got comfortable and waited for you to wake up."
"What time is it? How long have you been here?" Jake asked, still keeping his back to her because his erection was still raging.
Dani looked down at her phone. "It's 9:30 in the morning and I've been here about an hour or so."
"So what are you doing here so early on a Saturday morning?"
"Will you go with me to the mall today?" Dani asked.
"Uh, yeah, sure. I just need to take a shower," Jake said.
"Okay," she said looking at him with her trademark half-smile. She waited a full five seconds to see if he would move. He didn't.
"I'm going to get some orange juice," she said getting up off the bed. "You want some?"
"Uh, sure," he said, still looking back over his shoulder.
Dani left her sandals on the floor next to his bed and padded barefoot out the door, headed to the kitchen.
Jake jumped out of bed with tented boxers. He grabbed some clean underwear, a pair of khaki shorts and a tee shirt and headed down the hall to the bathroom, but only after looking both ways at the door to make sure no one would see him.
Turning on the shower as soon as he got inside the bathroom, he stripped his boxers off and threw them in the hamper.
Feeling the water before stepping into the shower, he put both hands on the wall and let the water flow over his head and down his back. At 6'3" he had to bend slightly at the waist to get his head below the shower head. His broad back was pale compared to his face, neck and arms that were nicely tanned. Jake had the classic farmer's tan, meaning he was rarely out in the sun without a shirt on. The reason for that was evident in the raised red scars crisscrossing his back.
*****
Jake had grown up in the foster care system. His mother had abandoned him on the steps of a church in Cleveland, Ohio when he was a day old. He was handed over to social services and placed with a family that made a living out of gaming the foster care system. Child care was not on their list of priorities. He was barely fed, never loved, and when the man of the house had a little too much to drink, the boy became the target of his evil inclinations.
When he was 6 years old, and after a particularly harsh beating, he had waited until his foster parents had finally passed out from drink, took the only thing he owned, a small metal car with one wheel missing, and he left. It was raining and cold. He didn't know where he was going, but he knew he wasn't staying here anymore.
He walked down the dimly lit sidewalk, passed street corners where hookers and drug dealers plied their trades, past darkened alleyways where junkies snorted and injected drugs, some of them for the last time. He felt invisible, as he had so often in his home. Unseen and unheard until fate or just plain bad luck seemed to shine a spotlight upon him, making him the most visible thing in the room. A target. On this night though, thankfully, he remained invisible. Cold and wet, but invisible to those around him.
Suddenly he smelled something that smelled like heaven. Someone was cooking and his stomach was growling. Driven by hunger, he followed his nose down an alley until he found a door propped open and the smells coming out where too much to resist. He went inside and found a pan of fresh bread rolls. He grabbed one and started eating. He didn't hear the large man that walked up behind him.
"Would you like a glass of milk with that?" a voice behind him asked.
He spun around like a cornered animal, looking for an escape.
The man could see the fear in the boy's eyes. He backed up so that he wasn't too imposing and knelt down on one knee. "It's okay son, I'm not going to hurt you," he said holding his empty hands, palms out, toward him. "Would you like some eggs and bacon?" he asked.
"What's bacon?" the boy asked quietly.
"What's bacon?" the man asked stunned. "Well son, it's only the best dang breakfast food on the planet. It's practically it's own food group."
"I've never had any bacon," he said, unable to meet the man's eyes.
"What's your name son?"
The boy stood, not answering, looking down at the floor.
"It's okay son, you're not in trouble. My name's Mike." He held out his large hand.
The boy automatically flinched back, away from his hand.
"Hey, hey, hey; it's okay. No one's going to hurt you, I promise," Mike said soothingly. "You do have a name don't you?"
The boy shook his head slowly, side to side.
"Well, how about we call you, uh, Jake?"
"Jake," the boy whispered. It was the first time in memory that he had an actual name, other than kid, brat, bastard, or any of a hundred names of the type. He nodded his head and said again, "Jake."
"Okay Jake, how about those eggs and bacon?"
"Okay," Jake said, his head slowly nodded.
Scrambled eggs and bacon soon became Jake's favorite food in the world. It was so good. He had eaten two scrambled eggs and was on his 6th piece of bacon when he heard someone knocking on the back door of the diner.
"Jake, this is John." Mike said, introducing the man who came in. "John is a policeman and he helps people."
"Hey Jake," John said. Mike had already warned him about trying to touch the boy. "Like Mike said, I'm a police detective. My job is to help people. Do you need help, Jake?"
Jake sat, looking at Mike and John for a few moments before very slowly nodding his head.
"Okay, finish your breakfast, and we'll get Mike to make you a sack lunch to take with us, and we'll go for a ride in my car, okay?"
"Okay," Jake whispered.
"Hey Mike, would you have any of MJ's clothes here? He's about Jake's size isn't he?" John asked. MJ was Mike Jr., Mike's 5 year old son.
"You know, I think I do. I keep a change of clothes for him here because whenever he comes by to visit he invariably gets something on his shirt or his pants so I keep a couple sets of clothes here."
Mike left the room and soon came back with a shirt, pair of pants, and even a pair of sneakers.
"Hey Jake, would you like to change into some dry clothes?"
"Okay," Jake said.
"All right, come on back here where you can have some privacy."
Mike took Jake to his office and gave him the clothes, "Here you go bud, put these on."
Mike closed the door, but walked around the side of the office where there was a window. He just wanted to make sure Jake could get changed okay. When he looked through the window, the blood drained from his face. "John," he hissed.
John came over and looked through the window. He saw Jake gingerly removing his old, wet tee shirt. The red lashes across his back were angry, swollen, and fresh. "My God," Mike said in an emotional whisper. John simply shook his head. In his line of work, he had seen this type of thing far too often, and he never got used to it.
When he was changed, Jake was taken to the police department where he was able to give the names of his foster parents. They were arrested, charged, and would be in prison for many years to come.
John called his sister, Diane, in Texas, because he knew that she and her husband had recently found out that they would never be able to have children and had been talking about adopting. He arranged with the social services representative to meet with Diane and Bob Hardin. Within the month, Jake was getting on his first airplane, bound for Dallas, Texas.
Bob and Diane understood the uphill battle they faced with Jake. They knew that years of abuse would be hard to overcome, but they were kind, patient, supportive and now Jake was 18, having just graduated in the top five percent of his class, with academic scholarships for pretty much anywhere he wanted to go. He still had his physical scars, and his emotional scars. He still did not like to be touched. He would willingly accept physical contact from only three people. His adopted parents and Dani Flint.
Jake moved in with Bob and Diane, to a quiet suburb in The Colony, Texas. Soon after, he was outside, playing in their spacious back hard. Though his adoptive parents had bought him many new toys, he still played with his familiar old three wheeled car. On this day, as he played, he heard a voice call to him with a simple, "Hi."
Jake turned to see a girl about his age standing at the fence between his yard and the yard next door. She was tan with long hair that was shiny black like a crow's wing. She had green eyes that seemed to look into his soul.
"Hi," Jake said.
"What's your name?"
"Jake."
"Hi Jake, I'm Dani."
"Isn't that a boy's name?"
