The Aftermath

The Aftermath

“Hey, he looks blissed.”

Milton smiled and carded his fingers through Sheldon’s hair. Sheldon was curled up on the sofa, his head in Milton’s lap, his eyes unfocused on the television in front of him. He shifted slightly at Ryan’s voice, but it was as if it were too much effort to move.

“Sheldon, sweetheart, can I shift you so I can talk to Ryan?”

Sheldon nodded languidly and scooted forward so Milton could slip out from under him. Milton propped a pillow under Sheldon’s head and smoothed the red hair down before dropping a kiss on his head.

“I’m good,” Sheldon said, focusing his big green eyes on Milton. “Stop fussing. I’m just going to doze.”

“I’ll be right outside,” Milton said, his hand still resting on Sheldon’s head, both possessive and tender. 

“I’m good; I promise I’ll call you if I have a sudden attack of the frights. Go do your top debrief thing. I know it’s what you want.” Sheldon paused and caught Milton’s hand with his, entwining their fingers together. “You took care of me; now go take care of yourself.”

“Sure?”

“Very.” Sheldon pulled the checked blanket snug around his shoulders. “I’ll be here when you come back.”

Milton kissed Sheldon’s forehead and stood up. Ryan followed him across the hall into the study where Milton collapsed in the big chair behind his desk, seeming to shrink as he was surrounded by his books and dwarfed by the heavy walnut desk. He ran his hand through his hair, the tiredness evident on his face.

“You’ve both had a rough few days,” Ryan stood behind Milton and rubbed his shoulders. “Relax,” Ryan chided. “It looks like smooth sailing for the near future.”

Milton ran his hand over his face again. “I hated making him hurt like that.”

“He needed it. Sheldon’s a full time submissive; he needs all of you.”

“I made it harder for him. I’ve put this off for years.” Milton’s voice was weary and full of anguish. “It’s my job to protect and guide my boy.”

“And love him too. Sometimes it’s hard to hurt them when we love them so much.”

“Even when I knew it was right,” Milton said bitterly.

“Milton.” Ryan spun the chair around so they were face to face. “If you want someone to beat up on you about how you handled Sheldon, you can go to Gordon. I’m not doing it. Sheldon is not easy. I flail around with his brother; I should know. I am nothing but envious of your skill and the sheer beauty of your relationship. You are his master, and he adores you for all of you, not just your dominance.”

Milton gave Ryan a faint smile. “Thanks for the pep talk, but you saved my bacon here.”

“It was my pleasure; sometimes someone less familiar can make the final push that you as his partner and lover cannot. Plus, it will hopefully cut down on the dry cleaning bills.”

“I don’t know,” Milton said with a more genuine smile. “Sheldon likes you; he has a special hell for people he likes.”

“I’ll look forward to it,” Ryan said with a laugh.

“Ryan.” Milton reached out toward Ryan and caught his arm. “Thank you. I mean it.”

“I know.” Ryan caught the older top’s wrist in his big hand and squeezed. “It truly was my pleasure. You’re family.”

Milton shut his eyes and swallowed. “Family takes care of their own.”

“Yes,” Ryan said softly.

Milton opened his eyes and visibly seemed to pull himself together. “Tilden and Trent love Sheldon.”

“But they weren’t the type of tops to help push both of you where you needed to go,” Ryan said, finishing Milton’s thoughts. “You have to push Tilden, and Trent’s private.”

Milton nodded.

 Ryan needed to choose his words carefully here. Tilden and Trent were wonderful men, but they couldn’t be the backup Milton needed. Tilden still fought his own demons over the appropriateness of his dominance, and Trent was steeped in privacy and reserve.

“You have wonderful friends and housemates, but you didn’t have a fellow dominant that could have stood shoulder to shoulder with you while forced your boy to jump over the chasm he’d created in his own mind. I’m a different sort of top than Trent or Tilden. You needed more firepower to draw Sheldon beyond bratting”

“Sheldon became focused on only one side of the relationship. My fault.”

“Stop it,” Ryan snapped out. “You’re neither clairvoyant nor have a crystal ball. You have always tried to do the best for your boy, and you’ve done a damn fine job, a spectacular job. I have some idea what Sheldon was like as a young man.”

Milton grimaced and then smiled. “It was pretty wild at first. I enlisted my grandfather’s help and Gordon’s. He bratted, but had no idea why he bratted nor any idea what was safe bratting.” Milton smiled fondly as if remembering some past incident. “He tended to forget not to involve everybody and the neighbors.”

“Ah, yes, I’ve had some of those moments with Blade.” Some was probably the understatement of the year, and that was only with Ryan. Blade enjoyed regaling Ryan and anyone who would listen with his adventures with Milton. Of course, Milton had fewer means to control Blade; he wasn’t his lover. He had to manage a submissive while trying to remain sexually neutral. Ryan could only imagine what that was like--a beautiful boy who looked like a younger image of your lover. Ryan had played with plenty of people who were never going to be his partner for a night or a week, but that was different than Milton’s mentoring of Blade. He’d stabilized a submissive on a dangerous path without any sexual incentives for either of them.

“At least you missed the garden store; that was creative even for a Zath.”

“I’ve heard about it, several times.” Ryan smiled. “Better you than me.”

“You give him other outlets for that energy.”

“I’m his lover. It gives me more leverage than you ever had, and at least until today, I thought I enjoyed this more on the edge than you.”

“The toys,” Milton said softly with a sad smile. “I enjoyed it, but I love Sheldon, and he wasn’t ready for it. I would have broken him.”

“You won’t now.” Ryan let his gaze rest on Milton. This was the man who easily and effortlessly guided others’ relationships, and he had lost his own footing. “He’s not the boy you brought home from that party; he’s not the boy you trained to manage people, keep his job, and move up the ladder. He’s not even the boy that brought a devastated Blade to you and begged you to save him. He’s a strong submissive who is more than capable of standing up to you. Make him give you more. Collar him.”

Milton’s fingers brushed along the desk, straightening papers that were never astray. “Sheldon is adamantly opposed to collaring.”

“You’ve stopped asking him. I saw him with the collar.” Ryan shifted a hip against the desk and stared down at Milton. “You must ask those questions every year, and you must insist Sheldon answer truthfully. Sheldon’s way too glib and slick for his own good. He hides from himself; he hides from you. Don’t let him.”

“I won’t force him to go where he cannot because of my desires.”

“Milton,” Ryan growled. “You have never forced anyone beyond his will. You don’t have it in you.”

“I could.”

“We all could,” Ryan said, letting his exasperation show in his voice. “You don’t.”

“I’ve wanted to.” Milton’s voice was a pained whisper.

“And you didn’t,” Ryan said, enunciating each syllable clearly. “You’re the safest dominant I’ve ever met. You won’t take Sheldon too far.”

“I’m capable of manipulating a submissive to my will.”

“Sheldon wants you to. Do I have to brain you?” 

“Don’t shout at me.”

“I’m not all Green Mountain Boy like you, not all wrapped up in the hierarchy. I can shout if you’re being an idiot, and you’re being intentionally obtuse. You’re not a saint. You’re a human being with wants and needs, and your partner wants to give in to those wants and needs. Take it. You’re head of the Green Mountain Boys, not up for canonization. Gordon isn’t a saint, and we all know it.”

“He did a lot of good for this community.”

“Yes, he did, but he could be downright evil to those who crossed him. You’re kinder and more tolerant than Gordon on his best days. Gordon’s a good dominant, but it’s Landon who makes him a tolerable person.”

“How did we get off on this subject?” Milton asked after a pause.

“We were talking about collaring your boy.” Ryan smiled. “And you are good, changing the subject before we were in a real argument.”

“We would never have been in that argument if I’d been doing my job.”

“And it’s your job to keep doms from telling each other off?”

“It’s my job to keep harmony between the members and to settle disputes.”

“Are we disputing?” Ryan gave Milton his best smile. Blade wasn’t the only one who could use a bright smile and good looks to his advantage.

“No, I think you were telling me off.” Milton smiled back. “Deserved also.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself.” Ryan fought the urge to ruffle Milton’s hair or kiss his cheek, not a gesture Milton would tolerate from a younger dom. Instead he reached forward and squeezed Milton’s shoulder. It was Milton who expanded the gesture, pulling Ryan forward and kissing his cheek.

“We’re not shy with each other.” Milton wrapped an arm around Ryan’s neck and tousled his hair. 

“You’re older,” Ryan said, fingering his hair back into place.

“And not always wiser.” Milton gave Ryan an awkward half smile, making his usual austere face younger and sprinkled with uncertainty. “You’re allowed to touch me.”

Ryan wrapped his arm around Milton’s shoulders and kissed his cheek. “You’re a good man, and Gavin would throttle me if I took these liberties.”

“Tell him to get over himself. You seem good at that.”

Ryan grinned and felt a slight flush on his face. “I think the less polite term is bossy and unable to mind my own business.”

“Resilient and determined would be nicer adjectives.”

“You’re always the encouraging professor.”

“My students think I’m an ogre. You should have seen the reviews last semester. Brutal in the language of my students.”

“I teach. I know how students respond to exacting standards. They tell you they hate it, but underneath they’re proud.”

“Are you talking about students or submissives?”

“I guess it would fit submissives also. It surely fits your boy.”

“Sheldon,” Milton said in an almost dreamy voice. Milton ran his hand down his beard and traced the neckline of his sweater as if he were imagining a collar around his own throat. 

“Offer it to him. With Blade collared, Sheldon’s opinion has changed.”

“I don’t want him to take it out of some misguided sibling rivalry.”

“They’re brothers; they compare themselves to each other. We can’t stop it unless one of us wants to move to the remotest corner of Alaska without electricity or telephones. It won’t kill Sheldon to be pushed by his brother.”

“Sheldon understands the ramifications?”

“You know he does,” Ryan said, projecting as much confidence as he could muster. It was impossible to ever know for sure if a submissive understood the changes to the relationship brought about by the commitment of the collar until it was around his neck and he’d awakened to the collar’s brush against his throat in the baking sun of summer and for the postcard snows of winter. Ryan had collared Blade early; the boy had seemed so desperate for the stability that Ryan had thrown caution to the wind. Sheldon had more experience and a greater taste for independence. Sheldon was submissive, easily as submissive as Blade, but with a different quality to his submission. Blade wanted to hand it all to Ryan, sometimes without proper forethought. Sheldon had needed the illusion of the games he played with Milton. He enjoyed being spanked; he craved the submission, but Sheldon had always needed to cloak it under his bratty exterior: throwing rolls and gravy, pissing off his brother, or whatever other excuse Sheldon’s agile mind could instantly invent.

The collar would mean something more, accepting the submission without hiding it behind the bratting. Ryan had watched Sheldon enough to realize he already did this in his quiet, private moments with Milton. Only Sheldon didn’t recognize it, or maybe he knew but refused to publicly acknowledge it.

“He’s such a sweet boy,” Milton said mostly to himself.

“He’s gentler than his brother. Sheldon’s a wonderful man, and he’s far more than those scared and lost kids you seem to have a penchant for dealing with as a Green Mountain Boy. He’s yours, and you both damn well know it. Think about it. He needs the collar, even if you only use it part time, a silent signal that Sheldon needs you to be the dominant I see you suppress when you handle him. It won’t kill him to kneel at your feet occasionally or to submit without the ridiculous dance he puts you both through.”

******

Milton stroked his hand over the wood of the trunk. It had been years since he played with the items kept inside. Landon had been his last hardcore playmate, and Landon had been as much the teacher as the submissive. Sheldon was his--his love, his everything--and Sheldon had shown no inclination of stepping beyond his comfortable niche. Milton had asked the first years they were together; every year in the negotiations he’d bring it up; every time their relationship stumbled he’d hint that maybe Sheldon would like a little more from Milton. Sheldon had always been adamant that it wasn’t his thing, as he liked to put it. 

The key scraped against the lock and the lock clicked over, quieter than usual; the trunk had been opened today. Milton lifted out the small box and slowly opened the lid. The collar was as perfect as always, the leather soft and oiled. Milton lifted the collar and ran it through his hand, not an edge to chafe Sheldon’s neck. 

Could he ask this of his boy? Milton wanted Sheldon to wear his symbol, to allow the entire world to know Sheldon was his cherished boy, to loudly proclaim to the world that to threaten or to damage Sheldon meant going through Milton. But the collar also meant that the public displays of pretend defiance would have to end. They were usually pretend, but a collared boy didn’t bait the way Sheldon did, or at least that was what Milton had always been taught. Milton was head of the Green Mountain Boys. If he had a collared boy who wanted to brat, why not? He made the rules now.

No, Milton wrestled with himself. It was the very rules and expectations, which he carefully upheld, that kept all the boys safe. Without understood standards, it would be chaos, and chaos and slack rules fermented abuse. He caressed the collar with his thumb. It wouldn’t have to be full time. Milton could give his boy both. Away from the bustle and heightened expectations of the Green Mountain Boys, Sheldon could careen around as if he were a toddler on his first tricycle. Sheldon had the good sense to keep his bratting harmless except for the occasional spats with housemates and his brother. Sheldon meshed well with Mace and Luke and tolerated Mike after several threats, but friction always bubbled to the surface if Steve was over, less now that Miles, Simon and Steve had survived the early tumult of their marriage. Miles spoke his mind and charged full speed ahead, traditions be damned. Josh had managed to curb the worst of it with an unhesitating willingness to toss Miles over his knee despite Miles obvious affinity for the top side. Miles was undoubtedly a top with Steve, and it was Miles’s overwhelming need to stand between Steve and all comers that had curbed Miles’s instinctive dislike of older authority. Landon corralling him into a play session had also helped. Old people were suddenly not as easy to stereotype; Landon could be wild, and for a switch there was no better teacher.

Sheldon needed more than only the brat side; Milton needed more. He loved Sheldon, but it was increasingly difficult to handle Sheldon’s outrageous behavior with the gentle spanking that was expected. A thrown stick of butter or hunk of cheese in the kitchen or even the egg tossed all over Milton’s favorite tie was an obvious request for a quiet moment over Milton’s knee. Hot gravy onto Ryan’s lap was stepping outside the bounds of acceptable behavior, and Sheldon careening around the grocery store, using the shopping cart as a modified scooter and nearly mowing down the grandmother with the toddler was unacceptable. Milton had been both irritated and shocked at that little misadventure. It hadn’t been safe bratting, or maybe it was safe. No one except the unsuspecting grandmother had been in any danger, but it had been public and dramatic. Sheldon wasn’t Blade; Sheldon had been less than pleased with the results. Doing the family’s grocery shopping for the next month had not been what he’d been angling for. He’d wanted spanked, and for that very reason Milton had refused to go there. Milton might have laughed privately and spanked Blade, but for Sheldon it wasn’t acceptable.

The collar could be a signal. Milton could set the rules tighter if Sheldon were wearing a collar. A minor tease that might result in a mere scolding could land Sheldon over Milton’s knee for a full fledged spanking, and it could ratchet up from there. He could ask Sheldon for the public display of submission that Sheldon so assiduously avoided. For all of Sheldon’s ease around people as a brat and for all his willingness to brat in full view of his housemates and any random visitor in Vermont, Sheldon’s exhibitionism vanished at showing other facets of submission to anyone but Milton. Sheldon didn’t kneel unless issued an unequivocal order, but he’d sit against Milton’s legs, half hidden by the desk, and collapse into a near trance as Milton idly fingered his hair.

Milton folded the collar into his fist, shut the trunk, and headed back to his rooms. Sheldon was still asleep, his red hair splayed across the pillow, the blanket pulled to his chin. He looked impossibly innocent and sweet. He was sweet, or at least Milton considered him sweet; Sheldon might publicly blanch at the adjective and complain that men weren’t sweet, but secretly Milton knew the descriptor pleased Sheldon. Innocent was hardly fitting. Yes, Milton protected Sheldon; he was hardwired that way. He couldn’t help himself, but Sheldon worked in a business that was notoriously tough with people losing favor and being axed in an instant. Sheldon effortlessly charmed Gordon and Landon’s business acquaintances while making ribald jokes as soon as their backs were turned. And Sheldon was no innocent as far as their lifestyle; he knew what was out there from the tamest to practices that made Milton want to question the sanity of the participants. Sheldon might know what was out there, but he also closed his mind to it. Perhaps he was innocent to the pleasures they could enjoy together.

Milton loved Sheldon over his lap, the easiness in which they fit together. Sheldon gentled after a robust spanking was beauty beyond the paintings of the great masters or the architectural treasures of the old world. It was only after a spanking that Sheldon lost his hyper vigilance and hyper kinesis. Most likely in today’s world Sheldon would be diagnosed with some attention disorder and drugged into somnolence. Milton saw it in enough of his students, all the more shame to dull the edges that made a Sheldon so wonderful. Sheldon wasn’t broken; he was just highly unsuited for group sedentary activities.

Milton smiled; he hadn’t smiled at the time. In fact he’d been furious at the disruption, but in hindsight it was more than funny and vividly portrayed Sheldon’s charm as well as his follies. Milton had been a speaker at one of those long and dry conferences in which Banner had demanded his participation. Even a historian could grow tired of listening to people debate the minutiae of Napoleon’s army and the number of equines deployed in the battle of Moscow. Sheldon had grown tired long before the dinnertime speaker started diagramming equations to determine the number of horses, using a complicated formula involving number of cannons and foot soldiers. Milton had swiped Sheldon’s dessert fork, coffee spoon, and butter knife when he started building miniature fortifications with them. Milton hadn’t thought to take Sheldon’s drink, and before Milton could wrap his dulled brain around the turn of events, Sheldon had shot Barq’s red creme soda through his straw at several of their table mates. Sheldon had later confessed that he’d decided a spanking was far the lesser evil than listening to that man one more minute, and as he’d so blithely explained he’d given the fellow sufferers sitting at their table a well deserved reprieve.

No, not innocent at all. Deliberately naughty and ever so right if society would only condone shooting reddish pink soda at innocent bystanders as a way to end an awful lecture and an awful meal. Milton remembered the prepackaged crackers as the most edible part of the dinner. Mystery chicken in an equally mystery sauce had not been appetizing.

Milton perched on the edge of the sofa and carded his fingers through Sheldon’s hair. His beautiful boy. His beautiful man. Sheldon was far more than the boys Milton had dated long ago. They played exquisitely with whips and plugs and tightly bound ropes, but they weren’t his wonderful partner. Sheldon owned his heart, and they did far more than play. Sheldon balanced Milton’s stern and dour side. Raised on a Vermont farm, Milton couldn’t help himself. No one ever accused New Englanders of excessive outward warmth. Sheldon more than made up for Milton’s reticence and had trained Milton well to project a softer side of himself. Sheldon curbed the intensity of Milton’s life. Landon had complained once that Milton played like he worked, all concentration and perfection. Chasing after someone who’d shot vibrantly colored soda over his colleagues changed Milton’s perceptions in a hurry. Serious and concentrated and Sheldon didn’t fit together. 

Sheldon stirred and blinked, his green eyes hazy with sleep. “You finish your powwow with Ryan?”

“For now.” Milton pushed the hair off Sheldon’s forehead and studied his face: the long lashes the color of corn silk, the sprinkle of freckles over the nose, the eyes starting to brighten as Sheldon’s mind stirred from the coma of sleep. “Good nap?”

Sheldon stretched and yawned. “I haven’t been sleeping well.”

“I know,” Milton said with a gentle smile. “I sleep next to you, remember?”

“You’ve been swatting me more than sleeping the last few days,” Sheldon said, his voiced laced with guilt. “I made this hard.”

“Stop with the guilt,” Milton scolded, sliding Sheldon down on the sofa so he could sit and pull Sheldon against his chest. Milton tightened his arms around Sheldon and let his chin rest on the crop of red hair. “Did you like today?”

Sheldon flushed and nodded. “I didn’t know it could be like that.”

“It can. You’re ready for it now, but I won’t stop taking you over my knee. I like it too well.”

Sheldon relaxed against Milton’s chest. “I like it too.”

“Sheldon,” Milton said in a quiet voice that he knew would focus Sheldon’s attention. He opened his hand and placed the collar in Sheldon’s view.

Sheldon reached out and stroked the smooth leather. “Maybe.” His fingers worried over the buckle. “Not all the time. Ryan suggested sometimes when I want to do this. I don’t want to give up the other.”

“I’m not asking you to give up the other.”

“You don’t want me to throw gravy at Ryan.”

Milton laughed and kissed Sheldon’s cheek. “The gravy was too much, and you know how I feel about you always clashing with Ryan.”

Sheldon was silent for a moment, his fingers still playing with the collar. “I like Ryan. He loves my brother.”

“He does.” And Sheldon will still do battle with him, Milton added silently. It was too much in his nature.

“He could be fun.”

“Tease him at dinner at your own peril. I might let Ryan deal with you next time.”

“He does things to Blade.”

“And Blade wants it, doesn’t he?”

“Yes,” Sheldon answered softly.

“And how much do you want?” 

“Not like Blade. Not all the time.”

“He does this easily. His easiness is hard for you?”

“He’s my little brother.”

And big brother is supposed to know best. Big brother is supposed to be the leader. “You aren’t Blade. I don’t want Blade. I want you.”

Sheldon closed his fist around the collar. “Sometimes. Sometimes can I..?”

“You can wear it sometimes.” Milton traced his finger around Sheldon’s neck. “Do you want now to be one of those sometimes?”

Sheldon squirmed around and looked at Milton, his eyes bright with longing but also a trace a fear. “What will you do to me?”

“What would you like me to do? I have some limits I won’t touch. No blood, no marks, no whips or belts.”

“Ryan marks Blade, and you have a whip upstairs.”

“Sheldon.” Milton squeezed the back of Sheldon’s neck. “The whip is only fun with a partner who enjoys it. You hate it. I’m not interested in punishing you when you wear the collar. It’s about finding your headspace without bratting yourself into real trouble. It’s about letting go and me taking greater charge. Blade lets go by submitting to the lash. I think you’d rather walk across a field of broken glass barefoot.”

Sheldon nodded and worried his lip with his teeth as if he had more to say.

Milton ruffled Sheldon’s hair. “You’re afraid; I understand that. Change is difficult. A terrible cliche, I heard it at least twice at the last faculty meeting, but true. It was terrifying the first few times you bratted with me. I remember you shaking over my knee. That worked out OK, didn’t it?”

“Yes,” Sheldon mumbled. He looked into Milton’s eyes. “I was naive and clueless the first time. You could’ve hurt me. You didn’t; I trust you. I don’t always trust myself, but I trust you.” Sheldon placed the collar in Milton’s hand. “Collar me.”

Milton stroked the leather and traced his finger around Sheldon’s throat. Slowly and deliberately he wrapped the collar against Sheldon’s neck and tightened the buckle. “OK?”

“Yes, sir.”