Read Online The Mating of Michael by Eli Easton - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Eli Easton
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any chance Tommy could get overly attached to you?”
Michael thought about it. “We seem to be well-established as a friendship with the, uh, professional benefit. I don’t think there’s any danger of him getting hurt.”
Trudy smiled. “All right, Michael. Thanks for the update.” She turned to Jack.
“New patients…. Jack, tell us about Lem Peterson.” Trudy put up a client bio. Her laptop hooked into a projector that showed the patient bio form on the wall. It included a photo of a heavyset man in his forties, balding and with a beard. He had a shy, quiet look about him.
Jack nodded, looking grim. “This is Lem Peterson, forty-three-year-old tax accountant. I’ve had two sessions with him so far. His mother recently passed away, and he’s finally seeking treatment for long-standing emotional issues. He lived with her all his life, does his tax business out of a small office in the front of their home, and he’s never had a relationship of any kind. He has moderate social anxiety disorder, which he’s able to temper enough to meet with his accounting clients. But when he gets around a man he finds attractive, it can get severe. His mother was very religious and extremely derogatory about any form of sexuality at all. As a result, he has emotional issues around sex. He masturbates rarely, and when he does, he finds he can only do it in the closet of his bedroom, in the dark, even now that his mother is no longer in the house. The good news is, he realizes he has a problem and he’s seeking help.”
“So he identifies as homosexual, but he’s a virgin?” Trudy asked, getting to the heart of it.
“Yes. He’s known he was interested in men instead of women since he was eight years old, but his mother was very controlling. She drilled into him the idea that any sex was dirty. She lectured him frequently about girls, which worked, as it happens, but he ended up never dating anyone at all. He’s morbidly shy.” Jack paused and looked at Michael. “I’ve talked to Mr. Peterson about surrogacy. I’m meeting with him twice a week to deal with his emotional issues, but he has a lot of anxiety about the mere idea of physical contact. I think he’d benefit from some very gentle touch therapy soon, try to get him past his fear of even being in the same room with an available sexual partner.”
“I’d love to work with him.” Michael sat forward eagerly. It didn’t take a lot to tug on his heartstrings, and right then, they were playing Beethoven’s Ninth. The idea of someone reaching the age of forty-three without any human contact was so, so sad. Poor Mr. Peterson.
“Thanks,” Jack said with a smile. “You’re going to have to go extremely slowly. We can meet after this to go over a therapy plan.”
“I can go slow,” Michael said, looking at the picture of shy Lem Peterson. “Don’t worry, Jack. I’ll take good care of him.”
A FTER THE meeting, Michael and Jack got a cup of coffee in the clinic’s staff kitchen and went into Jack’s office.
Michael perched on Jack’s desk. He started to spread his thighs and caught himself. Jack was definitely taken, and he was no dummy either. He’d called Michael on flirting more than once. Jack was happy and well now, and he didn’t stir Michael the way he had when he’d been alone and hurting. Still, Michael liked Jack a lot and old habits died hard.
“How’s Tony?” Michael asked.
Jack’s serious doctor face transformed into a warm, shy blush of a smile that took ten years off the man and would not have been amiss on, say, an old Dutch painting of a milkmaid and her beau.
“Aw! True love. You’re so cute,” Michael cooed.
“Shut it. I am never ‘cute’. Tony is great. He’s been doing a lot of insurance work lately, which he finds boring, but we’ve been, um, enjoying the low workload. Went camping last weekend.”
“Yeah?”
Jack bit back a smile and tried to get his love-struck face under control. “Yeah. We
Michael thought about it. “We seem to be well-established as a friendship with the, uh, professional benefit. I don’t think there’s any danger of him getting hurt.”
Trudy smiled. “All right, Michael. Thanks for the update.” She turned to Jack.
“New patients…. Jack, tell us about Lem Peterson.” Trudy put up a client bio. Her laptop hooked into a projector that showed the patient bio form on the wall. It included a photo of a heavyset man in his forties, balding and with a beard. He had a shy, quiet look about him.
Jack nodded, looking grim. “This is Lem Peterson, forty-three-year-old tax accountant. I’ve had two sessions with him so far. His mother recently passed away, and he’s finally seeking treatment for long-standing emotional issues. He lived with her all his life, does his tax business out of a small office in the front of their home, and he’s never had a relationship of any kind. He has moderate social anxiety disorder, which he’s able to temper enough to meet with his accounting clients. But when he gets around a man he finds attractive, it can get severe. His mother was very religious and extremely derogatory about any form of sexuality at all. As a result, he has emotional issues around sex. He masturbates rarely, and when he does, he finds he can only do it in the closet of his bedroom, in the dark, even now that his mother is no longer in the house. The good news is, he realizes he has a problem and he’s seeking help.”
“So he identifies as homosexual, but he’s a virgin?” Trudy asked, getting to the heart of it.
“Yes. He’s known he was interested in men instead of women since he was eight years old, but his mother was very controlling. She drilled into him the idea that any sex was dirty. She lectured him frequently about girls, which worked, as it happens, but he ended up never dating anyone at all. He’s morbidly shy.” Jack paused and looked at Michael. “I’ve talked to Mr. Peterson about surrogacy. I’m meeting with him twice a week to deal with his emotional issues, but he has a lot of anxiety about the mere idea of physical contact. I think he’d benefit from some very gentle touch therapy soon, try to get him past his fear of even being in the same room with an available sexual partner.”
“I’d love to work with him.” Michael sat forward eagerly. It didn’t take a lot to tug on his heartstrings, and right then, they were playing Beethoven’s Ninth. The idea of someone reaching the age of forty-three without any human contact was so, so sad. Poor Mr. Peterson.
“Thanks,” Jack said with a smile. “You’re going to have to go extremely slowly. We can meet after this to go over a therapy plan.”
“I can go slow,” Michael said, looking at the picture of shy Lem Peterson. “Don’t worry, Jack. I’ll take good care of him.”
A FTER THE meeting, Michael and Jack got a cup of coffee in the clinic’s staff kitchen and went into Jack’s office.
Michael perched on Jack’s desk. He started to spread his thighs and caught himself. Jack was definitely taken, and he was no dummy either. He’d called Michael on flirting more than once. Jack was happy and well now, and he didn’t stir Michael the way he had when he’d been alone and hurting. Still, Michael liked Jack a lot and old habits died hard.
“How’s Tony?” Michael asked.
Jack’s serious doctor face transformed into a warm, shy blush of a smile that took ten years off the man and would not have been amiss on, say, an old Dutch painting of a milkmaid and her beau.
“Aw! True love. You’re so cute,” Michael cooed.
“Shut it. I am never ‘cute’. Tony is great. He’s been doing a lot of insurance work lately, which he finds boring, but we’ve been, um, enjoying the low workload. Went camping last weekend.”
“Yeah?”
Jack bit back a smile and tried to get his love-struck face under control. “Yeah. We
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