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Three days later.

Mark sat, his head back on a cushion of a chair with his eyes closed. Johnny sat far away on the edge of the trough with his feet in the water reading the pages from the manuscript he showed professor Lee. He looked towards Mark. "Are you sleeping?" He asked loudly. Johnny then waved his sheet of his manuscript paper at him. "I was." Mark mumbled to himself.

Johnny gestured for Mark to come closer, Mark walked slowly towards the older man and he noticed that Johnny was wearing his red bathing suit. "Just listen to this; 'For the early Greeks, Heidegger contends, this underlying hidden-ness is constitutive of the way beings are, not only in relation to themselves but also to other entities generally. In other words, they do not construe hidden-ness merely or primarily in terms of entitles' relation to human beings.'" Johnny looked at Mark.

"Does this make sense to you? It doesn't to me or your dad." Mark was pleased that Johnny asked for his opinion on the manuscript, he fought back a smile, barely managing to remain nonchalant. "Maybe it did when you wrote it." Johnny weighed Mark's words carefully. "That's the kindest thing anyone has said to me in months." Johnny spoke so earnestly in a low tone, it was as if he was hit by a sudden revelation. This made Mark feel weird and ill at ease, he looked away.

"Kind?"

"Yes, kind." Silence returned and Mark looked at Johnny in his red bathing suit as he lied on the edge of the trough. Johnny let himself fall into the water, catching Mark by surprise.

[~▪-▪~]

Still lives.

Still lives of Johnny's swim trunks which were different colours, hung, drying on the bedroom windowsill. Johnny had three personalities depending on which bathing suit he wore. Red was for bold, set in his ways, gruff, ill-tempered, snappy.. and dangerous. Yellow was for good humoured, funny, spontaneous but he didn't give in too easily. He didn't wear his green bathing suit that often. It meant that Johnny was eager to learn, eager to speak, just eager.

[~▪-▪~]

Mark observed Johnny swimming in the narrow and long stone trough. Mrs. Lee was close but she kept moving further and further away as she picked fresh fruit and put it into a basket. Johnny came out of the water with his green swim trunks. "Mark! What are you doing?"

"Reading my music." Johnny leaned on the edge of the trough, staring at Mark. He was trying to figure out Mark but his body language gave off no clues.

"No, you're not."

"Thinking, then."

"About?"

"Private." Mark answered with a quietly triumphant smile on his face. "So you wont tell me?" Mrs. Lee listened to the conversation feeling a bit amused. "So I won't tell you." Johnny looked over at Mark's mom, an unbelieving smile on his face, "So he won't tell me! In that case, I'm going with your mom."

Putting on his espadrilles, Johnny took Mrs. Lee's basket and followed her to the orchard. He went up to a ladder and climbed, stretching into the branches for the ripe fruit as Mark watched. He noticed how the curve of Johnny's ass resembled the sensual arc of the fruit. Mark went over to the both of them and offered to hold the basket which was filling with apricots.

Johnny continued to toss down fruit to both Mark and his mom down below while Mark continued observing his ass.

[~▪-▪~]

The next day.

Johnny arrived on his bike from town, he wore a never been worn before blue bathing suit and the blue billowy shirt he wore when he first arrived. The house was quiet and deserted on a Saturday afternoon. Meanwhile, Mark was on his bed, only wearing a bathing suit with his right hand down inside his swimsuit. He was tense, expectant and alert to every sound.

There were footsteps just outside his door and Johnny entered his room shirtless from the bathroom. Mark quickly pulled his bathing suit higher with a jerking movement as if he was caught in an embarrassing position (which he was). "Why aren't you with the others at the river?" Johnny asked, ignoring what he had just witnessed. "I'm... I'm... I have... an allergy..." Mark was speechless and out of breath. "Me too. We might have the same one." Mark shrugged, a second of silence. He didn't catch onto Johnny's slight way of asking to stay so Johnny spoke again.

"Want to go for a swim? Just the two of us?"

"Later, maybe." Mark answered, still out of breath. "Let's go now." Johnny extended his arm. Mark grabbed his hand and turned to the side facing the wall away from Johnny to prevent him from seeing his confusion but in the movement was a slight tugging which almost pulled Johnny down onto the bed.

"Must we?" 'Stay here?' Was what Mark really wanted to ask. Johnny straightened up and paused to look down, still grasping Mark's hand and he eventually succeeded in pulling him upright. "I'm going to change. What about you?" He left Mark's room with a teasing smile. Mark put the hand that Johnny had been holding inside his bathing suit. He panicked when he found it damp. He pulled out his hand before hitting his forehead with his fist.

"Stupid! Stupid!"

He stripped off the trunks and now naked and defiant, he went into the bathroom while grabbing a new pair of trunks.  As Mark wore his swimsuit, he caught a glimpse of Johnny naked in his room, his ass extra plump. "See you downstairs!" Johnny called out as he got into his bathing suit.