Unavoidable Truths

Part 3 of Unavoidable Truths

Don would later say that the events conspired that Sunday morning were brought about by the perverse bitch and twisted sister of fate. Whether by the fickleness of nature and time or just as a bizarre series of events that coincided, Don was not prepared for the sight of Charlie as he crossed the hallway from the bathroom to his bedroom, still wet and wrapped minimally with a thin, threadbare towel about his waist.

When Don had called out a tentative hello as he had entered the house, Charlie had just opened the bathroom door to allow some of the steam to escape and had called out, "I'm upstairs, Don."

And at the vision of bare, smooth skin intermixed with patches of curly chest hair that had little rivulets of water sliding down it, all of Don's carefully constructed house of lies about the nature of his feelings for his brother crumbled and fell apart. His body reacted almost immediately to the visual and olfactory stimuli, and lust raced rampant through his body, almost slamming into him as if being hit by a solid two by four board.

"Hey, Don. Glad you could make it. I wasn't sure if you'd come after that um... thing, yesterday."

Don blinked rapidly, as he tried to control his body's automatic response and to keep up with what Charlie was saying.

"Um, yeah. I, uh... spent most of the night thinking about what was bothering me."

Charlie looked closely at Don in the partially lit hallway, and noticed the bruised eyes. "So, does that mean whatever has been troubling you has been resolved?"

Don took a half step backwards and turned towards the steps he'd just come up. He had to get the sight of Charlie out of his head. "Yeah, you could say that my worries have an answer. I'll just head back down and start the coffee, while you get dressed."

"Okay. Be down in a bit," Charlie muttered to Don's departing back. Charlie got the sense that Don might have gotten some answers, but that his brother's worries were far from over.

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Don reached the kitchen first, before giving into his thoughts and emotions. He gripped the edge of the counter and squeezed as hard as he could to still the lust coursing through his body. With a pained gasp, the image of Charlie flashed this mind once more. He moaned and leaned over the counter to rest his forehead against it. Part of him wanted to throw-up from the nauseous feeling rolling in the pit of his stomach, while the other wanted to give into the other physical urgings and enjoy the pleasure by jerking off.

"Damn it. Why is this happening to me?" Don tried to calm his racing heart and quell the panic now overriding everything. He breathed in and out slowly, and willed himself to stand upright and to release his death grip on the countertop.

He forced himself to perform normal, mundane tasks of preparing the coffee and getting out the juice from the refrigerator. Once he was done, Don stopped and looked around the kitchen. It dawned on him that it was there that he had realized the true extent of his feelings for Charlie and that it hadn't even been twenty-four hours since the realization had occurred.

"What in the hell am I going to do now?" he said to himself. He wasn't sure he could sit at the same table now with Charlie, consciously aware of how he felt towards his brother, and yet he couldn't very well leave without risking Charlie asking more questions -- questions he definitely could not answer.

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Charlie hurried through getting dressed and roughly brushed his damp curls. He felt that he couldn't leave Don along for long or his brother might once again disappear without some answers being given.

He quietly descended the stairs and went through the dining room, but before he could enter the kitchen, he heard Don speak, 'What in the hell am I going to do now?'

Charlie halted mid-step at those words. When no answers appeared to be forthcoming, Charlie assumed the question was self-directed. Charlie stopped from entering the kitchen and back-tracked towards the living room. He sat down quietly on the couch and gave deep thought to the events from yesterday and to this morning, paying closer attention to what Don was focused on.

Charlie leaned back against the couch and closed his eyes to replay everything. Don had been fine during the round of basketball, but it was in the kitchen that Don had started acting strange. He had wondered if Don was upset about being asked for relationship advice, just after he had left yesterday afternoon, but had dismissed it. Their dad had put Don on the spot repeatedly about Don not having a steady girlfriend or relationship, so it couldn't be that. Charlie had assumed that as Don looked at him, he hadn't been seeing him, but had been lost in thought. But with Don's change in behavior this morning, almost with a blink of his eyes, perhaps it did have to do with him. It was when Don had actually taken a good look at Charlie, that Don appeared to falter. But that made no sense to him, because Don had seen Charlie partially naked lots of times when they were growing up.

'But not since you both went off to other schools and then into different life paths,' a thought whispered in the back of his mind. 'You've grown up since then. Maybe now it's hitting him that you're no longer his little brother, but a grown man and his image of you in his head has changed. Maybe he doesn't want that to happen.'

Charlie opened his eyes and nodded his head. That could be the only explanation Charlie could think of for his brother's recent behavior. However, he stopped and his brow furrowed, that still didn't really explain his brother's outburst in the kitchen just moments ago. That self-directed question didn't cover the idea of a difference in image about Charlie. But before Charlie could give it anymore thought, he heard his dad enter the house and greet Don in the kitchen.

Charlie figured he had best join them.