Your Day in the Barrel

Shmuel had always been a dreamer. He had a mind that was purely his own, the type of person that his mother called "boldly inventive", and his father, "fuckin' weird".

The Triton blared its horn, and Shmuel woke up with a start in the windowless brown study. His heart was beating rapidly, the tic going in his dark-circled eye while the jitters washed over him again. He was smallish and skinny, with spectacles and sandy-brown, carefully combed hair.

He still sat in the same chair where he'd collapsed from exhaustion. On the table was an immense nautical chart. The ship's route ahead was traced out in pink ink, sweeping down the Atlantic seaboard, then bending east through the Mediterranean to Monaco, before curling back and running off the map's left side, headed for New York City, his home.

Shmuel had spent his youth being sent around to one alternative school after another because he could never focus enough to pass tests, and from there he went straight through the pipeline into manual labor jobs. Now approaching thirty, he stocked the light gear on the Triton, the gear that went in the pantry and cabins and bathrooms.

This ship gave him a path forward at last. It needed an extra navigator soon. But he'd already taken Alan's navigation test last year, and failed. He just knew this was his last chance. And the test was this afternoon, giving him the entire day to let his mind spiral - and reel.

He frenetically scanned the map. What was the order of the ports again? Nantes, then La Rochelle, then Bordeaux. Or was there one more? Bordeaux was on the Gulf of Lion, right? No, no, that was Marseille. Bordeaux was Bay of Biscay. Why was the Gulf of Lion called that anyway? It wasn't even on the side with the lions. That was the African side. Africa was probably really nice this time of year. He'd always wanted to see giraffes. And zebras. Were zebras black with white stripes? Or were they -

A sudden motion wavered right beside him, and he shrieked like a banshee. The first mate was standing in the room. He had come to get the test materials, and he'd walked in without a sound.

"Hello," said Alan. "Studying hard, I see?"

He mostly squeaked in response, plus one grunt.

"Ye need to calm down a little bit, Shmuel!" the mate warned. "You'll catch a heart attack if you're not careful."

"My future hangs in the balance," Shmuel panted, talking fast. "Today decides everything. Everything. My future, my money, my career, my life, my - my -"

A yawn cut him off there. Alan's comforting hand came to his shoulder.

"Listen," he said. "One test is not going to make or break your future. I'd let you try again next year, if needed. I would say a nap is what'd be best for you, son - you've got time."

"I can't nap! I have to study now," whined the lad, shifting away from the table. Alan sympathetically looked him over, his eyes studying his hair, his face, his small but defined physique, and then that unmistakable hard lump in his pants.

"I think I know exactly what you need," said Alan.

He smirked, and the little guy smirked back, and without hesitation he unfastened his britches. He might have been scared to do it, but honestly, he was scared almost every waking minute anyway.

Licking his lips, Alan bent under the table and kissed Shmuel's penis. He sniffed and licked around its groove, and along the two diagonal ridges on the underside of his glans. The lad's dusty white skin flared up into pink and red while the mate's mouth got it wet, and all the while, that shaft and glans kept expanding, until they were barely smaller than Alan's own. The mate slid his shoulders beneath the table, bearing down on his young candidate, and soon he was giving him masterly head, pausing at times to lick his balls, or lightly slap at them.

Shmuel's stress was melted away - vaporized. His mouth was shaped into a toothy rectangle, hissing and spitting and swearing in his timid voice. "Wow," Alan heard him sigh at one point, breathless and contented, and it warmed his heart.

Filled with adrenaline, Shmuel came fast. In short order Alan heard his shrieks again, and felt the tell-tale squeezing inside his ballsack. Pulling his jaws away, he laid the little guy's cock against his arm just as a high-pressure stream of cum blasted out of his piss slit, and at the same time two little spurts came from the flares underneath. His seed was watery and quite hot, and smelled like bleach, but with a faint flowery perfume behind. Alan gently rubbed it on the back of his hand, softening his skin.

Clarity and calmness swept over Shmuel's mind. He yawned again. He'd go take a nap, and then he'd write the test, and then either way, there was a road ahead, a sea ahead, that he'd get to travel.

He stood up from the table. Alan smiled at him while he bustled out of the room.

"You're not getting extra marks, by the way."