“You first,” Asher said.
What Simon had intended to say was “I should get back to work.” Miranda was going to be waiting for him at the Coffee House, and he didn’t want to be stuck working later than he had to. But he had a chance to talk to Asher, to unravel this strange mystery that stood before him, six and a half feet of confusion and contradiction.
A chance to win the bet, if things work out well.
So instead he cocked out a hip, smiled, and asked, “What are you doing here so late?”
“Oh.” Asher’s awkwardness faded away, and the wide smile that Simon had gotten used to appeared at last. “I do most of my work at night? Well, it’s always night, because we’re at the bottom of the world and all. But after hours, I mean. It’s easier to focus when the others aren’t around, and I can pull data without fighting for bandwidth.”
“You work with the auroras, right?”
“Yep.” Asher’s enthusiasm was obvious, and his eyes seemed to be glowing. He hesitated, then added, “Would you like to see what I’m working on?”
Simon nodded, speechless. Asher wasn’t at all what he’d expected, but there was no way he could pass on the chance to spend more time with the man he’d been daydreaming about for the last two months. Miranda would just have to wait, but she’d understand.
Asher led him into an office that was set up with dual computer monitors and a desk covered in binders and paperwork. Everything was organized in clean lines and neat stacks, and an attempt to read the top pages upside down told Simon it was incomprehensible math or physics.
On the walls, though, were enormous photos of the aurora australis.
Simon’s breath caught in his throat. “Did you take these?”
“Most of them. Photography is one of my hobbies. I took these on South Georgia Island last year, and the others in southern New Zealand a couple of years before that.” Asher’s voice was full of passion.
The images were absolutely stunning. Simon wandered around the office, studying each of them one at a time. Vibrant greens and dark yellows illuminated starry skies, and hints of red, purple, and pink made the scenes look otherworldly.
“I’ve seen the aurora before,” Simon said, “but it’s never looked like this.”
Asher came up to stand beside him. “This is my first time wintering in McMurdo, but I imagine the light pollution here makes it difficult to really view them.”
Light pollution? Simon’s eyebrows furrowed. He thought of light pollution as something that big cities had, like Los Angeles or New York. McMurdo had a couple dozen buildings, but nothing else around for miles.
“You’d be surprised,” Asher said, apparently reading his expression. “The buildings here all have lights outside, and the white light can affect your vision.”
“So this is what you study?”
Asher shrugged, one big arm rubbing against his own shoulder. “In a sense. I’m studying the parts of the aurora that you can’t see, the solar winds that travel through our atmosphere.” He straightened with every word, obviously comfortable with the subject. “My research is focused on ways to better track those flares as they reach Earth’s magnetosphere, so we can hopefully predict them better and prevent damage to satellites and other electronics.”
“That sounds… really smart.” Simon laughed. “You’re basically a physics genius, huh?”
Suddenly Asher looked embarrassed and awkward again. “Uh. I mean, I know physics. But I’m not—I wouldn’t say I’m a genius or anything.”
The emotions seemed so out of place on a man who had, only seconds before, been confident and excited as he talked about his work.
“Well, it seems smart to me,” Simon said.
Asher’s entire face went bright red.
It was strangely charming. Simon smiled, but then he caught sight of the clock on the wall and cursed. “Oh man, it’s way later than I thought it was.”
“Oh.” Asher’s voice went soft again. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to keep you.”
“No, no.” Simon reached out on impulse, putting a hand on Asher’s arm. “This was really awesome. I’m glad we got to talk and you could tell me about your work.”
Asher didn’t seem convinced. “Well, it’s really nice that you let me ramble at you for a bit. I don’t, um—I don’t talk to a lot of people around the base. Just the other scientists, you know? And, uh, it was really nice. That you were interested. Or that you pretended you were interested, at least.”
“Definitely interested.” Simon looked around once more at the pictures. “I’d love to see the aurora like this. If you find out that it might be visible, will you let me know maybe? I can head down to Hut Point to see them without the light pollution you mentioned.”
Asher’s smile was radiant. I didn’t think he could get any more attractive, damn. Sure, Asher seemed a little weird, but maybe Miranda had been right and he was nervous. Or maybe he just didn’t warm up to new people quickly. Either way, it wasn’t like Simon could judge; McMurdo was full of strange people, and Simon was proud to count himself among their number.
“For sure,” Asher said.
Simon waved, then turned and started heading down the hallway to his abandoned boots.
“Wait,” Asher called. “You didn’t tell me your name.”
Simon turned around, balancing on one foot as he tugged his shoes back on. “I’m Simon.” He grinned.
“Simon.” Asher rolled the word over this tongue, then returned the smile. “It was really nice to meet you.”
“You too,” Simon said, and he meant it.
SO MAYBE Asher wasn’t quite what Simon had imagined, but Simon easily took the new information he’d gotten from their meeting and worked it into his fantasies about the other man. Asher was a little shy, obviously; he probably took a while to warm up to new people. But Simon had seen him laughing and talking with his fellow scientists, and he’d seen the striking confidence that Asher exuded when he was comfortable with a subject.
It was that confidence that he latched on to while lying in his bed a few nights after his encounter at Crary. He’d spotted Asher a couple of times since then, but always from afar. Tonight, though, he’d watched Asher eat soft serve from a cone, licking the vanilla ice cream with quick darts of his nimble pink tongue as he’d talked with two men that Simon knew worked with NASA.
And now he couldn’t stop thinking about it.
Simon skimmed a hand over his chest, bare in deference to the heat of the room. He’d cranked the temperature up after getting in from a walk across the station, and now the dorm was comfortable enough that he could lie on top of his sheets, blanket kicked down to the end, wearing nothing but a pair of boxers.
The fantasy built up slowly but effortlessly.
Asher was still a little heartbroken probably. He’d just broken up with his boyfriend before coming to McMurdo for the winter, like Tyler had said, and now he was a bit nervous. But maybe Simon would find him at the bar one night, alone and sipping a beer.
Yeah. The mental image made Simon lick his lips. He could picture it: Asher wrapping his lips around a bottle, head tilted back to reveal his long neck as he drained it. Simon would approach him and offer to buy him another, and they’d start talking. Didn’t matter what the conversation was.
Simon closed his eyes, sinking into the fantasy as his breathing quickened and the room grew warmer. Wrapped in darkness and with only his own tentative touch across his torso, everything felt magnified, and he could practically hear his own words to Asher.
“You know, I have a few six-packs of beer back in my dorm,” he said. “Better beer than this garbage, at least. Why don’t we get out of here?”
The Asher in his imagination nodded, a small smirk playing across his lips. He clearly knew what Simon was hinting at, and that incredibly attractive confidence was teasing just beneath the surface. “Yeah, sounds good.”
They left the bar, and now Simon could see how loose Asher was, how all it had taken
was a couple of beers and the offer of something more for the other man to unwind a bit and shed his nervousness.
“Come on in,” Simon said, unlocking the door to his room. He stepped inside, tossing his coat over a chair, and turned around. He expected to see Asher still hovering inside the door, maybe a little hesitant like he’d been in Crary. But instead Asher was stripping his own jacket and advancing across the room, not stopping when he reached Simon. He pushed Simon against the wall, loomed over him with all of that coiled muscle and delicious strength, and kissed Simon fiercely.
Outside the fantasy, Simon moaned. He teased his hand down over his boxers, his cock stiffening from the light touch and the imagined feel of Asher’s mouth against his, lips a little chapped, tongue sneaking out when Simon gasped.
God, it’d be so good with him. There had been a hint of that intensity in Asher’s expression when he talked about his work, and now Simon daydreamed about Asher turning that intensity on him, channeling that passion about his work into sex.
It had been days since he’d last gotten off, and his body was raring for it. Simon’s hand shook with the need of it as he fumbled his boxers down his legs, kicking them across the room without bothering to open his eyes. He was hard, felt like he’d been hard since he’d left Crary days before, and his cock was already weeping at the tip.
“Yeah,” he groaned. “Give it to me. Show me how intense you are. Make me really feel it.”
Back in the fantasy, Asher used teeth and tongue to ravage Simon’s mouth, until his lips were buzzing and Simon had to turn his head away to suck in a desperate breath. Asher took that as an excuse to strip off his shirt and his thermal base layers at the same time, tugging the fabric over his head until he was bare from the waist up.
Simon had glimpsed hints of Asher’s chest before through tight shirts. He knew that Asher was built like a wrestler, large shoulders and thickly muscled arms, abs that looked straight out of an ad for clothing or cologne. In the fantasy he had a smattering of hair across his chest, and a darker patch that led from his navel down, disappearing into the waistband of his pants.
Real-world Simon’s mouth watered just thinking about it, but he was too close to the edge already, too desperate to prolong the fantasy any further. He brought his hand up to his mouth, licked across his palm and between his fingers, saliva wet and sticky. Then he wrapped his hand around his cock, using the precum there to help make the slide even easier.
Fantasy Asher didn’t want to wait any longer either. He stripped them both naked, didn’t even bother with the bed—just hoisted Simon up against the wall, effortless like something out of a porno. His biceps strained with the weight, but Asher didn’t even breathe harder.
“Yeah, fuck me,” Simon said. His voice sounded foreign to his ears, raspy and heavy with desire. “Fuck, use that big dick of yours and make me feel it for days.”
Simon used his hand to strip his dick, a little rough with friction but perfect nonetheless. He groaned, clenching his eyes shut as he got himself off and the Asher in his head fucked him up against the wall hard and deep enough that everyone in the entire building could probably hear them.
And now that he’d met Asher, had seen the hint of sweetness mixed in with the nervousness, Simon could expand the fantasy. He could hear Asher’s voice in his ear, whispering compliments, telling Simon how beautiful he was, how tight he felt, how he was perfect, yeah, just like that baby, the way you take me, just like you’re made for my dick.
With a loud groan, Simon arched his back off the bed and came, spilling across his hand and his stomach. He could feel the echo of it in the fantasy as Asher pounded into him once, twice, then held Simon still and spilled inside him.
Simon fell back against the bed, worn out in the best way possible. This fantasy had been the best one yet.
Christ, Bancroft, you need to get laid.
Maybe Miranda and Oli were right… maybe Simon just needed to make his interest clear and get Asher into his bed—and out of his system.
WHEN ANOTHER week went by and Asher didn’t talk to him, or even really look at him, Simon assumed that was it. He’d tried, and Asher wasn’t interested. At least he knew Simon’s name now, assuming he hadn’t forgotten it the second Simon had left the science building.
He was tempted to tell Miranda about the encounter and let her know that he’d won the bet, but something made him want to keep the interaction private. The way Asher had looked, the genuine pleasure as he talked about his work—it felt invasive, almost, to share that with anyone else.
But he didn’t have to tell anyone, because just over a week later, Asher approached him in the middle of the dining room. Simon was at the ice cream machine—which was, miraculously, working for once—and was busy trying to decide if he wanted stale sprinkles or stale Oreo crumbs on his soft serve when a massive shadow appeared at his side.
“If you stare at the machine for too long, I bet it breaks again.”
Simon glanced over to find Asher watching him, amused.
“Probably.” He shrugged and filled his bowl with vanilla before Asher’s prediction could come true. “Was I in your way?”
“No, I….” Asher pinked up again. “I was looking for you?”
“For me?” Simon abandoned his toppings decision to face the larger man head-on. “Why?”
Asher looked mildly embarrassed. “I was wondering what you were doing tonight.”
Holy shit. It’s going to happen. Miranda is never going to let me hear the end of how right she was.
Somehow, he managed to keep his calm. Simon raised an eyebrow flirtatiously and said, “I’m not doing anything at all.”
Asher’s bright smile returned. “Cool. Would you, maybe, want to—”
Yes please.
“—come watch the auroras with me? NOAA is forecasting a high level of activity.”
Simon blinked. That… was not what he’d been expecting.
He must have waited too long to respond, because Asher’s face fell. “Or if you’re not interested that’s fine too. I just thought I’d ask, because you seemed interested last week when we met, and—”
“No!” Simon struggled to reboot his brain. “I mean, yes. I’m totally interested. I’d love to go check out the auroras with you. Should we go now? I really don’t need this ice cream.”
The smile was back, only a tiny bit dimmer than before. “Yeah,” Asher said. “We could go now.”
Outside it was calm and clear. Simon sunk into his jacket, tugging the hood up over his head as he walked beside Asher.
“It’s a nice night.”
Asher glanced over. His face was pale, washed out by the bright lights that lit up the paths through McMurdo, but he was smiling. “Perfect weather for aurora watching. You look cold.”
Simon laughed, breath coming out in a puff of white air. “It’s negative thirty out here!”
But Simon had to admit that it wasn’t as cold as he’d thought, and he warmed up as they started the trek out of town.
“Where are we going?”
“I figured we could walk over toward Scott Base, if you don’t mind the hike,” Asher said. “Once we get up into the pass, it should be dark enough that we’ll have a good view, and there’s a warming hut up there that we can duck into if needed.”
Scott Base, the station owned by New Zealand, was only about a mile and a half away, on the other side of a pretty big hill. But a mile in Antarctic terms was an eternity.
“I’m game,” Simon said, “but you may have to distract me from the cold.”
Now it was Asher’s turn to laugh. “All right. So you’ve wintered over before?”
“Twice. This is my third year.” Simon swung his arms as he walked, glancing around. He’d been all over the station, but he rarely came up this way. They passed warehouses and a few other buildings, as the ground started to curve upward toward the hill. “How are you enjoying your first season?”
“I love it here.” A glance up showed
Simon that Asher was smiling. “It’s beautiful, and I like the solitude. I know some of the other scientists miss civilization, but I don’t mind it.”
They paused to move off the road and allow a truck to drive past. “You’re not a big people person, are you?” Simon had spent the last week really watching Asher, after their brief conversation in Crary. What he’d thought was an outgoing, popular man had been revealed to be shy, friendly but introverted. Asher spent his time with his fellow scientists or alone, and rarely interacted otherwise.
Asher was silent for a moment, and Simon worried that he might have offended. Then Asher responded, “I guess you could say that. I just…. People can be confusing. Most of them are so busy, always moving so fast and never stopping to think or enjoy life.”
The words hit Simon unexpectedly hard. They walked in silence for a few moments, both of them beginning to pant a little as the incline got steeper.
“I think I know what you mean,” Simon said eventually. “It’s why I keep coming back down here. Things on the Ice move at a different pace. It’s easier here to find pleasure in the little things in life.”
Like walking up a hill to watch the aurora.
“Exactly.” Asher sounded pleased, almost triumphant. “I hoped you’d understand.”
This time when Simon glanced up, Asher was looking back at him. Their eyes met in the dim light, and Simon felt the breath catch in his throat.
Asher looked away first. “We should keep walking.”
As they continued to make their way out of town, they talked about whatever came to mind. Simon confessed that he was taking a few online courses, hoping eventually to get a degree. Asher explained more about his project, and talked a little about his family back home.
“They all live in Minnesota,” he explained. “They think I’m crazy for coming here. St. Paul gets cold enough, but I read that McMurdo can hit negative fifty.”
“Last year during Winfly, it got down to about negative eighty with windchill,” Simon declared.
Asher stopped in his tracks. “You’re joking.”
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