“Wait.” Alexei blinked at Ben’s grin, a sudden thought making the blood drain from his head. “Are you going to—”
Ben interrupted him with an even louder laugh. “Nah, Lex. I’m going to keep my drawers on, but I amdefinitelygoing in. You down?”
Alexei nodded and followed, only slightly unsteady on his feet as Ben stepped around scantily clad people and abandoned packs. They soon found a small pool that wasn’t yet overcrowded.
“This look good to you?” Ben glanced over his shoulder as he toed off his shoes.
In fact, it looked perfect. The water was still and clear, the bend in the creek where the hot springs lay surrounded by a majestic outcropping of scarred, golden rock and chaparral covered hills. It was quintessential Southern California wilderness, and it was gorgeous.
And none of it was as distracting as Ben ripping off his shirt.
Alexei averted his eyes, studiously focused on unbuttoning his own shirt, the solidness of the rock where they stood. Until he heard Ben splash into the water, followed by a long, indecent groan.
“Holy shit. This feelsincredible.”
Alexei glanced up to see Ben, wearing nothing but hisdrawers, sink under the water to his shoulders. His hair was down. He lifted his chin to the sky, closing his eyes as he spread his arms wide across the surface of the pool.
Like an angel. A hot, gay angel.
Huffing a breath, Alexei shed his own shirt and shorts and joined Ben in the pool before he could think too hard about it. Which—oh. Thisdidfeel incredible.
Alexei navigated around Ben’s floating form, eventually resting against a smooth, sun-warmed stone. He let his body slowly become light, attuned to the gentle current of the pool.
A small puff of a cloud drifted at the edge of his vision before Alexei’s eyes flitted closed. The din of other hikers, onshore and in surrounding pools—their laughter and chattering, tabs cracking open cans of beer—faded to a distant murmur as Alexei’s body surrendered to the dark, to the feeling of being liquid.
He wanted Alexei 2.0 to be more honest.
Letting Deep Creek Hot Springs soothe all of his jangled joints—letting them wash away the stress and the adrenaline of the last few days, at least temporarily—felt like one of the most honest things Alexei had ever done.
He wasn’t sure how much time passed before he felt the brush of Ben’s knee as he leaned in, his breath like a kiss on Alexei’s earlobe, intimate and soft.
“I thought I should warn you,” he said, “that at this very moment, two very old, very naked men are about to get into this hot spring with us.”
And then Ben leaned away to exchange greetings with their new companions.
Alexei tried to hold on to the sensation of sunshine on his face, the healing water surrounding him.
Eventually, he lifted his head and blinked open his eyes.
The men were, indeed, very old.
The one Ben was talking to—about angina, currently, and rather enthusiastically—had brown skin and a decent head of nearly white hair. The one directly across from Alexei was paler, almost bald, his skin looser. Alexei very consciously tried not to look into the depths of the water near either of them.
Bald Guy gave Alexei a nod. He moved his arms underneath the surface of the water, engaging in the simple joy of floating. A thin gold chain circled his neck, a small cross resting on the hair of his chest.
Ben and White-Haired Guy moved on to arthritis. The old man reached out his hand for Ben to examine and Ben took it, pressing gently on the man’s wrist, his fingers, his lumpy knuckles.
Alexei watched the care and focus on Ben’s face, and his insides went soft.
He glanced back at the man across from him, who had lifted his arms to rest on the rocks that enclosed the pool. His left arm draped behind the back of his friend.
Were these men lovers? The thought seeped into Alexei’s skull the longer he stared at the bald man’s arm. Had they seen Ben whisper in Alexei’s ear before they walked in? They must have. Did they assume Ben and Alexei were lovers, too? What compelled them to walk for miles on a hot, dusty trail to slip into hot springs in the nude at their age? Because they wanted to? Because they could?
They seemed so comfortable with themselves, all of their wrinkles and imperfections. They carried an air of two people who knew each other. Who had seen things together. Who would continue to see things together, for as long as they could.
The longer Ben talked with them, the longer they shared this pool, the more Alexei couldn’t stop thinking about it.
How much he hoped he could be like them one day. Share their ease. Their indulgence in a life well lived.
