A Summer at the Farm - Chapter 24 (Patreon)

A SUMMER AT THE FARM

Chapter 24: Rising from the ashes

“Liv! Liv, wake up!”

I shook her up, but the girl was fully out.

I knew she was taking sleeping pills sometimes and she must have swallowed one to adjust to the time zone difference because she was not opening her eyes.

Fucking bad timing!

I could barely see anything in the room, the black smoke was everywhere.

For the first time in my life, I really thought I was about to die there. I was twenty-two, only learning about who I was, and it was way too soon for that!

“Liv!”

I grabbed her in my arms and tried to lift her up.

I needed to get her out, the both of us actually, from the burning building.

But then… I thought of Joe…

If he was not howling yet, it meant that he was still sleeping. The fire had not reached his bedroom yet.

What to do?

The father or the daughter? Who was I supposed to save first?

Another huge boom came from the outside. The barn was collapsing on itself and the window in the bedroom exploded. I sheltered Liv from the pieces of glass flying, she was finally – but barely - waking up. She looked lost.

Maybe her state was more serious than I originally thought. Maybe she was unconscious because of the fumes?

I had read something somewhere about the worst complications from fires were often coming from inhaling the smoke.

Shit, shit, shit…

“Blake?” She muttered.

I lifted Olivia up and carried her in my arms once and for all.

The orange flames were already eating up the door of the bathroom but they had not reached the other door leading to the corridor yet.

It was the quicker way out anyway but that worried me for Joe. I had no idea where he was but I knew he tended to sleep very deeply.

One problem at a time, though.

I struggled moving as I was feeling the heated wood flooring under my feet, ready to collapse at any time, but I did reach the corridor, the stair cases, and brought Liv downstairs where the situation was more manageable.

Because she was still out of it, I had to held on her and to bring her outside.

I lied her on the ground about sixty feet away from the farm.

From there, I was finally able to have a larger view of the situation. The barn situated on the left of the farm was already turning into ashes, while flames were dancing on one side of the roof of the house, right above what used to be my bedroom.

It was strangely beautiful as it was terrifying.

Animals were only adding to the terror by running around the farm and trying to escape.

FUCKING GOATS.

I had always hated them.

“Joe?” I shouted.

He was nowhere to be seen.

I cannot say if this was bravery or plain stupidity but I ran back inside the house.

“Blake, no!” Liv screamed behind me, finally coming back to her senses.

She was full-on crying.

“Joe?!”

I went back to the stairs to try to reach his bedroom but the flames had already blocked the access to the corridor. The situation was getting worse by the second, deep black smoke had now invaded the first floor as well.

“Blake…”

I heard a muffled and terrified voice calling me.

Despite the heat, - it felt like a volcano in there -, I had chills as I heard Joe’s weak complaint. It was like a totally different person.

He was trapped.

“I’ll get you out of here!”

“Run, Blake… Go away, everything’s…” He coughed. “My farm… My farm is burning down! It’s over.”

“Joe!”

I ran to the kitchen to fill a basin of water. I emptied it, or rather threw it, on the flames in the stair cases but it did not help much.

“Go, Blake! Go! My life’s already over… My farm…” He was howling like a hurt wof.

I finally saw the massive figure of Joe, stark naked, standing behind the flames, swallowed by the smoke.

What a sight!

I did not have the luxury of breaking down, I had to stay strong for the both of us. I could not let him give up.

“You just have to go through, or you’ll be stuck. It’s getting worse.”

“I’ve lost everything.”

It was gut wrenching to see him and especially hear him like that.

“Joe! FUCKING HELL! There’s a way here, you can come down! It’s now or never!”

“My farm… My life…”

“I’m begging you, Joe. Please. Don’t let me see you die in here. Don’t do that to me! You need to come down.”

“Go, Blake… Go…”

If he would not go down himself, I would have to get him. I started to find a way up. I was not even scared anymore.

“Joe, I’m here. See, come on.”

“What the fuck are you doing? You’re gonna kill yourself.”

“I won’t leave without you!”

Finally, Joe seemed to understand that we were either surviving or going down together. He tried to find himself a way down the stairs.

“Fucking hell…”

“Here. Jump here!”

He did, but he was too heavy.

We both were.

He managed to go over the flames with an impressive jump but the entire stair case collapsed and everything went black.

Maybe I had died after all.

*

From pitch black, I was suddenly blinding by white lights.

I had an oxygen mask over my mouth and people were bustling around me.

I felt a bump in the road, that made me realize I was in a moving vehicle.

I tried to move but…

“Aaaaaaaaaaah.”

My right arm and leg were hurting like crazy. In fact, everything was hurting.

“Calm down, Sir.” A woman told me. “You’re in an ambulance, we’re bringing to an hospital.”

“It… Hmm… Hurts.”

So much that I could barely express it. I had never felt a pain like that in my life.

“I know that this is very difficult, but we’re gonna take care of you. It’s a good sign if it hurts, Sir. It means you’re certainly not paralyzed, we’ll get you to a doctor.”

Memories started to come back like flashes.

“Joe?” I blurted out.

I had survived but if Joe was dead or seriously injured, I was not sure I wanted to live.

“Is that your name? Joe?”

“No… I’m… I’m Blake… Joe is…”

“The farmer?” The woman smiled at me. “He’s fine.”

I had never felt more relieved.

“Where is he?”

“He’s the one who got you out of the farm. Quite the character! He’s been insulting us for about twenty minutes, we weren’t doing enough to help you. He’s in another ambulance right now.”

They put the oxygen back on me and I cannot remember what happened next. I supposed I fell unconscious until I was waking-up in my hospital bed.

A few hours had passed, it was late in the morning.

Olivia was holding my hand, she seemed very distraught.

“Oh, thank God, you’re here…” She spoke as I slowly opened my eyes.

I felt sore everywhere but the pain killers were helping. They were also making me high.

“Thirsty…” I muttered.

“I’ll get you a nurse.”

I grabbed her arm.

“Liv… You look good… Like an angel…” I told her.

“Shhh… Don’t use your energy, babe…”

“Where’s Joe?”

She bit her lips, she seemed worried. One would be for less; both her father and boyfriend had almost died the same night.

“They’re still assessing if he’ll need surgery, but he… He’s mostly fine.”

“I love him.”

I heard myself saying it and only then, realized the bomb I had just thrown on Olivia.

She looked a bit surprised. She had been crying a lot and she wiped her tears.

“I know, I love him too. And I love you… You… You saved him, and you saved me.”

Phew, she did not seem to think a lot of what I had just said but I knew I had to shut up or other things might slip up.

The situation was hard enough as it was, no need to confess that I was fucking with her dad.

The doctors and nurses came to visit us shortly after, and by some miracle, we would all be pretty okay despite the violence of what had happened.

My right ankle was twisted and my right wrist was broken but there was no surgery to be done at this stage, I just had to wait and have my forearm casted.

This part was merely inconvenient though; the real pain was sitting with my ribs. I had a couple which were broken and this was a living hell.

It was literally hurting at every single breath I was taking. Yeap, staying alive was definitely painful.

The doctors told me that I would have to wait for a minimum of three weeks to see any improvement, but overall, it could have been much worse for Joe and I, meaning that I had to be grateful.

Somehow, Joe had managed not only to survive his fall, but to stand back up and carry me outside of the burning farm on his greasy shoulders.

That man was a beast and Olivia had gotten to see us walk out of the fire, naked, hurt, but alive.

Joe was only dealing with a few bruises although his back had been partly burnt and he had to wear bandages 24/7.

The first day at the hospital was hectic between the medical exams and the police showing up to investigate the incident.

I was not there but apparently, Joe had lost his shit in front of the investigator, blaming everything on Dave.

He was positive that it was a criminal act from his old buddy’s part.

In reality, we had no idea if it had been an arson or an accident. The heatwave was still hitting the area strongly, - global warming is no joke -, and a single spark could have had dreadful consequences.

The policemen were suspicious of the barn which had been recently renovated. Maybe we had done something wrong with the material used. The only thing which was certain was that the fire had started there.

As for me, I frankly had no idea, nor that I cared that much about the reasons why.

I had too much to deal in the present to worry about the past.

Once we were still in the hospital, Olivia organized our return home to Sacramento but she was concerned about her father.

The farm had not totally collapsed but would not be liveable for at least a few months and with the theories of Joe against his old friends, that was a not a good place for him to stay anyway. If people wanted to murder him, maybe he should move indefinitely.

I think I was the one suggesting the idea first…. A part of me already knew this could end very badly but as often, I could not help myself.

“Maybe he could come back with us? I know the apartment is small but the couch could be used as a bed.”

“You wouldn’t mind my father invading our personal space?”

“He’s lost everything, we cannot leave him like that… And I mean, I’m gonna need help on the daily with my casts and everything. I don’t want to be a burden for you. The semester starts in a week.”

Olivia thought about it.

“Ok, I think you’re right. I’ll talk to him about moving in with us for a few weeks. We’re his only family after all.”

My stomach hurt when she included me in their family and this had nothing to do with my injuries.

“Joe welcomed me in his home for three months, it feels right to return the favour…” I mindlessly replied.

For the first couple of days, since Joe and I were confided in our respective room in a different aisle of the hospital, we did not see each other.

It was quite annoying as Olivia had to do the messenger and do the work of convincing him to come back with us.

Of course, there were many more things that I wanted to tell Joe that I could not mention to his daughter to pass through.

In the end, maybe it was better this way.

Did I want to declare my love for Joe, to tell him that it was all over, or just to fuck him? It seemed like I was changing my mind every other hour.

Bob passed by the hospital at the end of our second day there and he promised to take care of the goats and the chicken. He did not believe that Dave could have anything to do with the fire.

“Joe’s losing his shit. Make sure he goes through an MRI or a cerebral scan because the man is going crazy.”

I agreed, I did not think Dave would have set fire to the barn… Cody would have stopped him, right?

He was impulsive and certainly an asshole, but the fight had happened a few weeks back, Dave would not have waited for this long to take his revenge.

Besides, another person might have been after Joe…

I was thinking about Aiden a lot, making theories in my head, he seemed very hurt to have lost Joe. He knew we had built the barn together. Maybe he had gone rogue? I had no proof though, only a hunch.

Of course, I could not talk about him to Liv. I was already concerned enough that she might ask why Joe was in a tumultuous relationship with Dave in the first place.

Dave, Cody, Aiden, or even Bob, they were all in capacity to reveal our big secret and I hated that.

I was sort of eager to leave Utah as I felt like we were no longer safe there.

Joe was reluctant to go to Sacramento at first. Living in a big city was his nightmare and sharing a one-bedroom apartment was only making it worse.

He came to check on me in my room when he was authorized to leave the hospital on the third day.

I am not sure whether it was on purpose but he waited for Olivia to go back to an hotel nearby before coming in.

“Blakey, the three of us living together in a tiny apartment, you know that’s ridiculous, for so many reasons.”

“Where else would you go?”

“Erf… I don’t need your charity… I can stay at Bob’s.”

“His wife will be pleased.” I spoke ironically.

“Shut up, I can take care of myself.”

I rolled my eyes and he looked at me a bit more tenderly.

“How are you feeling? Physically?”

“Better. It’s my ribs… They’re killin’ me.”

“Sorry about that.”

He felt guilty about the whole situation. I had walked back into the fire for him after all. I was not mad at him at all.

“You saved my life. In the end, you got us both out.” I told him. “It could have been much worse.”

“Bullshit. You didn’t leave me a choice, getting back there like a maniac, trying to stop a fire with a freaking bucket of water.”

I laughed, which was a terrible mistake because of my ribs.

“Ouch.”

He hurried closer to me and held my left hand, the one which was not in a cast.

“Should I call someone?”

“Nah… Just don’t make me laugh, Joe.”

“I’ll try. You know I’m a funny lad.”

“Look, Joe, we’re not offering you charity, we need you there at the apartment.” I insisted. “It’s not for you, I need help, I can barely move. Here, I’ve got a nurse washing me up every day.”

He looked down on me. I knew exactly he was picturing us in a shower.

“You’ll be fine…” He whispered.

“Yes, I will, cause you’re gonna help me.”

He sighed.

It was very hard to understand what I was feeling towards this man, but now that I was seeing and touching him again, I could not deny that I was still very much attracted to him.

“Are you sure, Blakey? Like… With the whole thing… The things that we did. Sometimes I feel like the farm burning down is my karma for doing that.”

I got teary eyes but I tried to hide it.

“That’s nothing to do with that, I just… You need a place to stay, I’ll need help. We have to stick together. Besides, Liv’s gonna need you to work on the insurance paperwork with her. It’ll be just easier to have you with you.”

“Just for a few weeks?”

I nodded yes.

“No funny business?” He added.

This time, I did not nod or say anything. I could not make that promise.

A nurse came in anyway, and we had to stop talking.

If I had been honest with myself, I would have admitted that I could not see myself living without Joe, but eh, there, I had found the perfect excuse to prolong the summer.

Almost burning to death should come up with some perks, right?

*

Five days after the fire, I was finally cleared out of the hospital with precise guidelines on how to heal my injuries.

We passed by the farm, - now a ruin -, and Joe pulled back his tears.

Olivia tried to hug him but he refused her embrace.

“I’m not cryin’…” He repeated.

I suppose some things never change.

“Stop trying to consol him, Liv, you just have to let him be.”

“I know…”

Then, we got in the cars to head for Sacramento.

I could not drive so Olivia took my car, and I rid with Joe as his car was more suited to let me lie my bruised leg on the passenger seat.

I swear, we did not get in the same car on purpose, but for the first time in a week, we were alone and we could speak freely.

Of course, Liv was driving right in front of us so we could not be too explicit. I was not going to blow Joe’s fat cock while he was behind the wheel, although, I have to admit that the idea crossed my mind.

I tried to discuss things but, as usual, Joe pushed back.

“I really think we should talk… Set up some ground rules before getting to our place.”

“Don’t start with the bullshit.” He grunted, being his grumpy-self.

“You’re really good at sex but you’re really bad at talking.” I spoke, actually repeating what an ex-girlfriend had told me once.

He smiled.

I knew that I still had him.

“I’m tired, Blakey. It’s complicated enough as it is.”

“I might help you feeling better.”

He glanced at me.

None of us had sex since he had raw-fucked me on the kitchen’s counter, a couple hours before the fire.

It was a personal record of abstinence for me, probably since my teenage years.

Needless to say, despite the pain, I was horny as fuck.

“What are you playing at, son?”

“Nothing…”

I casually put my left hand on his crotch.

He was wearing some grey shorts, commando. He let me grab his dick over the fabric, I took his absence of reaction as an invitation to go further.

The anaconda was waking up under my skilful touch.

He did not say anything but he put some music on, probably to have some sort of distraction.

You will never believe what track came on first… “Dirty Little Secret” by All American Rejects. Fitting.

I slid my hand under the shorts. It was warm and musky in there.

*I'll keep you my dirty little secret (dirty little secret)*

I checked the car in front of us, Olivia could not see what was going on. I felt Joe’s bare dick, his prominent veins, his abundant foreskin, and his fat hairy balls.

They were full, I could tell.

*Don't tell anyone or you'll be just another regret*

I started rubbing his XXL cock and Joe moaned softly. My cock was throbbing in my own shorts.

*(Just another regret, hope that you can keep it)*

I felt instantly better as I was stroking the familiar and heavy slab of meat.

His precum was already dripping on my fingers.

*My dirty little secret, who has to know?*

Joe did not seem to catch the irony of the song playing; he fetched my own cock as he was still driving.

Soon enough, we were jerking each other off and panting in the car. This was an intense stroking session.

Kudos to Joe for keeping his focus on the road!

We nutted in our respective hands, – a huge bucket of cum -, just as we entered the outskirts of Sacramento. Not sure of what that was saying about our future there…

Our hands were full of jizz and I could not move easily with my casts in the passenger seat.

“Shit, don’t you have anything to clean us up with?!” I started panicking after my strong orgasm, we were getting very close to our destination.

“As if you need a towel!”

Joe made sure to let a couple of cars pass us by so Olivia would not be right in front of us in the line, and he brought his drenched-with-sperm hand to my mouth.

I licked his fingers avidly.

Then, I licked my own hand to taste his sperm. Sweet and delicious.

“I’m gonna miss the farm…” Joe mentioned as we were dealing with our first traffic jam in the city.

“Don’t sweat it, the insurance will help and we’ve already built a damn barn in a month. We can do it again.”

“No… I meant, our time at the farm.”

He took his eyes off the road to actually look at me for the first time.

I swallowed my saliva.

“Oh God… We’ll never be done with this…” I muttered.

“With what?”

“With whatever’s going on between us. One of us always cracks.”

“Yeap. Guilty.”

It started raining, first sign of the change of the season.

I held Joe’s hand until we were parked in front of our building.

I had no idea of what was coming next, but I knew for sure that I did not want to let go of that farmer’s hand.

[THE END]

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Please note that the e-book version of "A Summer at the Farm" will be available next Tuesday.