To Summon Nightmares

by J. K. Pendragon

  "But you like guys, right?" asked Niall, looking concerned. "Because you seemed..."

  Cohen laughed. "I like guys, but... but I worry that guys won't like me. See, I don't... because of how my body is, I can't..." Cohen sighed with frustration at the thought. "I can't really handle being touched. It wasn't a problem with girls because I was always, you know, the active partner."

  "Ah, I see." Niall went in for another kiss, this one soft and controlled. "You can be the active partner with me, too."

  Cohen felt his heart leap into his throat with excitement at the thought. "But..." He frowned. "That defies all yaoi stereotypes."

  "You're right, I hadn't thought of that," said Niall, looking for all the world like he was wrestling with a grave issue. Cohen gave a snort of laughter, and Niall's face broke into a wide, happy grin.

  "God, Cohen, you make me laugh," he said, as if Cohen had given him the greatest gift imaginable, and he pulled Cohen tight against him in a crushing hug. Cohen hugged him back, loving the feel of him, loving the thought that he had somehow managed to at least distract Niall from his sadness. He wasn't useless after all.

  Niall tilted his head down to kiss Cohen once again, and the hug quickly morphed into something much less innocent. Niall's hands were careful to stay away from Cohen's chest or groin, but Cohen loved the feel of them on his back and waist. He began to run his hands over Niall's back, and then, when Niall didn't protest, his sides. God, Niall had muscle. Real, strong, firm muscles like Cohen had never felt before. His curiosity almost as strong as his desire, he lifted the bottom of Niall's shirt and ran a finger along his hip.

  Niall gasped into Cohen's mouth, and moaned as Cohen's hands roamed higher. Niall's muscles felt hard and smooth under his skin. Cohen wondered what it would be like to have such a strong body. He wondered if Niall didn't prefer to touch people that felt like him, all hard angles and tight muscles. What did Cohen feel like to Niall?

  Niall broke away from Cohen for a moment, and Cohen realised that he was pulling his t-shirt off over his head. He was distracted from his doubts for the moment, looking at Niall's body. He was long and lean, hardly an ounce of fat on him. His nipples were small and pert, his torso long and defined, a perfect six pack joining in jutting hips to point down to the trail of brown hair that led down below the waistline of his pants.

  Cohen suddenly felt overdressed in his hoodie. It was warm enough in here now, with the magical fire and all the burning desire. He stripped to his t-shirt and reached forward to touch Niall again, sliding his hands down to the gap between Niall's hips and the fabric of his jeans.

  "Can I...?" he asked, tugging at the button on Niall's jeans, and Niall nodded. For a moment, Cohen thought he was really going to go through with it.

  Then the dysphoria that he had been trying so very hard to suppress rose to the surface. "No, Niall, I'm so sorry, I can't." He fell back, pressing his hands to his face. Too much, it was too much.

  "Cohen?" Niall was on his knees in a minute, leaning towards Cohen concernedly. "What is it?"

  "I can't," said Cohen. The back of his throat was burning. He felt sick to his stomach. "I can't touch you, Niall, I'm sorry, I can't."

  "It's all right," Niall reassured him. "It's all right really, but... why?"

  "I've never touched a man," Cohen explained through the thickness in his throat and the creeping wrongness that was slowly seeping through his body. "It's—it's what I'm supposed to look like, to, to feel like, but I don't know how it feels, so it's okay."

  "I..." Niall looked worried. "I'm sorry, Cohen, I don't understand."

  "It's just..." Cohen took a deep breath, and tried desperately to form his feelings into words. "I'm afraid if I touch you, if I know how a man feels, then I'll know what I'm supposed to feel like. I'm afraid it will make my dysphoria worse, and I don't know if I could handle that."

  "I'm sorry." Niall had that stricken look on his face again. "Cohen, I'm sorry, I didn't know."

  "It's not your fault," sighed Cohen. "I didn't tell you. I didn't even realise it really until right now. I-I mean, I thought it would just happen and it would be fine, but..." He hated himself so much sometimes. He was such a coward, letting his dysphoria get in the way of everything, just because he couldn't handle a little sickness.

  "We'll stop." Niall was reaching for his shirt, pulling it over his head. "I do understand, Cohen. It's okay. I'll even leave if you want."

  "I don't want you to leave," said Cohen derisively. It was selfish not to want Niall to leave, but he didn't care. "I want you to stay anyway, even though I don't have anything to give you."

  Niall put his hands on Cohen's shoulders and pulled him into another tight hug. "I'll stay as long as you'll let me," he said. "What would you like, would you like me to sleep in the spare bedroom? Is it... is it okay if I sleep here?"

  "Would you?" asked Cohen, looking up at him. It was as if the dark, cold house was closing in on him and the last thing he wanted right now was to be alone.

  "I'd love to," said Niall. "We can sleep together. Like actually sleep."

  "I have to sleep with my binder off," realised Cohen, with another icy spurt of dysphoria. It was creeping through him steadily now, taking over all his reserves of happiness and settling in like a bout of winter depression.

  "If that's fine with you, it's fine with me," said Niall.

  Cohen went to the bathroom alone to get ready for bed. He pulled off his shirt and binder and changed into his baggiest night shirt. Then he clutched his arms across himself, aware that no matter how baggy his top was, his chest was still obvious. Niall had said he didn't care. Now Cohen got to find out if that was true or not. Not that it mattered anymore if Niall was attracted to him, since they wouldn't be having sex.

  Niall had dimmed the fire, and was sitting on the bed in only his boxers and t-shirt. He was so goddamned perfect. Cohen had never had bad self-esteem. He'd always been defensive of his chubby body, and relied on the fact that his personality was attractive enough to push past any conventionally unattractive aspects of his appearance. Now, standing in his bedroom across from a man who was perfectly beautiful on the outside, but horribly scarred on the inside, he almost felt lucky.

  "I'm coming to bed," he announced, and Niall nodded, lifting up the blankets so that they could both crawl underneath. Cohen turned away from Niall, who curled up behind him and slid a tentative hand around Cohen's stomach, careful not to roam too high or too low.

  "I'm sorry," murmured Niall. "If I made it worse, somehow."

  Cohen curled up a little tighter and lowered his head, speaking so quietly he wasn't sure if Niall could hear him. "It's always bad. I have my shot tomorrow, so... I should feel better then."

  Niall was quiet for a long time. Finally, he asked, sounding half asleep. "What does it feel like?"

  "The shot?"

  "The... dysphoria."

  Cohen felt his mouth twitch. Did they ever tie you up? He wanted to ask Niall. Did they give you medication so you couldn't move, or so your body didn't feel like it belonged to you anymore? "I don't want to talk about what it feels like," he said.

  "I'm sorry," said Niall, and they were quiet, until Cohen finally fell into a restless sleep.

  Chapter Seven

  It felt like a nightmare. Like a demon on his chest, suffocating him. Cohen pushed away the blankets, desperately tearing at his shirt, trying to get free, but to no avail. He lay in bed, staring at the darkness above him, listening to the thud of his heart beat in his ears.

  He had to get it off.

  Carefully, so as not to wake Niall, he sat up and went to the door. The room seemed strange, the fire blurry and the walls dark. It wasn't his normal room, was it? Where was he?

  He felt his way down the hall, to the stairway. His hands tangled in the strings of magic on the railing, and he struggled to pull them free. Trapped, suffocating. He pressed his hands to his chest, clawing at it, but the weight remained. Get free, get free... but where could he go?
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  He stumbled down the stairs and into the kitchen, more by feel than by sight. Why was it so dark? And what was he looking for again? There, spread on the counter like dim white spheres, and next to them a clash of silver. Cohen reached for them, sifting through to find the knife.

  He reached for the neck of his t-shirt, the strangling, scratchy fabric, and pulled it over his head. He ran his fingers over the scars. Failed attempts. This time he would do it though. This time he was strong enough. His breathing was erratic, blackness was obscuring his vision. He felt the tip of the knife, pressed it to the skin on his chest. The metal was cool, and the prick was hot as the blood began to flow.

  "Cohen!"

  Cohen screamed as a blinding light flooded down from above. He dropped the knife and it clanged to the floor. As his eyes adjusted he could make out the figure of Niall standing in the doorway, and suddenly Cohen was aware that his chest was bare, and his feet were frozen on the cold kitchen floor.

  "Cohen, are you all right?" Niall lunged towards him, and Cohen backed away, pressing his arms over his chest. His heart was beating fast and desperate, his skin prickling painfully.

  "God, Niall, don't look at me, please." Cohen turned away, bending over the counter behind him, wishing he could curl into nothing. He felt bile at the back of his throat again, and his mouth was full of thick copper. "Just go away." He could feel Niall's footsteps coming closer, and he jerked away desperately. "Niall, please don't look at me!"

  Niall's footsteps stopped. "I'm sorry, Cohen, I just need to know that you're all right."

  "I'm fine now, I'm awake."

  "You were sleepwalking?"

  "I do that." Cohen made his way to the sink and spat, trying desperately to clear his mouth. He reached for one of the glasses on the counter and poured himself a glass of metallic-tasting water.

  "You're bleeding," said Niall, and Cohen looked down at his bare chest. The cut was just above his left nipple, and a thick trail of dark blood rolled down over the breast tissue and onto his stomach. He wiped at it before it could stain the waistband of his trousers. Niall was looking at his chest, but Cohen couldn't summon up the energy to care any more.

  "I'm fine," Cohen sighed. "It's all right, this used to happen all the time, see?"

  He moved his hands to cover his nipples and lifted the breast tissue to show Niall. He didn't want to look at Niall's face. He knew what he was seeing. Small white scars, some thin and barely noticeable, others thick and raised. "I used to try to cut them off." Cohen dropped his hands, and turned away again, leaning over the sink. "It's fine, it's... normal. I'm going to get the surgery as soon as I can."

  Niall took a few steps forward, then dipped down to pick up Cohen's nightshirt and hand it to him. "How long have you been doing this for?"

  Cohen took the shirt gratefully and pulled it over his head, crossing his arms over his chest again. The cut was bleeding through the fabric. He'd have to bandage it properly. "I thought I'd stopped. Guess I'm under a lot of stress."

  "I'm so sorry, Cohen." Niall's eyes were wide and open, his sincerity heartbreaking.

  "Don't worry about it," said Cohen. "It's fine, okay? It's just something I have to live with." He stooped down to pick up the knife from where it had fallen to the floor. He turned the tap on again and rinsed the bit of blood from the tip of it. "My mam used to hide all the knives at night, because I did it so often. I guess I'll have to start doing that again."

  "I'll stop you next time," said Niall. "I'm sorry, I should have stopped you right away."

  "You didn't know what I was doing," sighed Cohen, drying off the knife with a dish-towel. His heartbeat was still erratic, and he felt a bit sick to his stomach. He pressed a hand to his face to find that the skin was cold and clammy. "I should have a shower," he said. "Um... this is selfish, but do you think you'd mind staying up with me a bit? I just, I don't think I can sleep just yet."

  He couldn't find any bandages in the bathroom cupboard, so he settled for holding a cloth over the cut until it stopped bleeding. It was a fairly shallow one; Niall had interrupted him before he'd had a chance to do much damage. Some of the larger cuts had ended him up in hospital. He'd been lucky this time.

  He felt angry and ashamed. It had been years since he'd cut. He'd worked through all this in therapy, he was better. He didn't want to hate his body. He wanted to embrace it as his own and be patient and let medicine make it into something that felt right. Why was that so hard?

  He showered, making sure to wash off all the sweat, and by the end he felt much better, especially when he put his binder back on under a fresh t-shirt. He stared at himself in the mirror for several minutes, drinking in the sight of his flat chest. The relief was almost euphoric. He hoped Niall would be willing to stay up with him for a bit. He didn't want to have to take the binder off and go back to sleep. Not for a while still.

  Niall built the fire up again and they slipped into bed together. Cohen sat nestled in Niall's arms, staring at the flickering purple flames and the sparks of gold magic that jumped off of them.

  "Niall," he said finally. "Do you think that you could use magic to make me... you know, cis?"

  "No," said Niall. "I wouldn't dare. I don't know my magic nearly well enough, I could hurt you really badly."

  Cohen shifted, his stomach squirming. He had to know. "But I mean, with all the magic out there, there must be someone who could do it."

  "There probably is," agreed Niall. "But it'd be a really dangerous procedure, and probably very expensive as well, and whoever did it would probably belong to the Guild, so you'd be in their debt. But... He sighed, and Cohen felt like he waited forever to say, "Yes, it's probably possible."

  Cohen's heart leapt into his throat. It was possible. He could make his dysphoria go away. He could be normal, like everyone else, never have to worry about how he looked to other people, or how wrong his body felt. And he could have sex. But the squirming in his stomach was still there. There was something wrong with that idea; something indescribably horrible about it. "I don't know if I want that though," he said. "I don't know why, but... it feels like this is part of who I am."

  "You're braver than me," said Niall sadly. "If I could go back in time and make it so I'd never gotten these powers, I would. If I was brave enough, I'd summon that demon right now and ask him to take them away. But you," he turned to look at Cohen, "you do so much with what you have. You tell your story, and you inspire people..."

  "But you could do so much too," said Cohen. Niall's face fell, and Cohen almost wished he hadn't said it. Almost.

  Niall turned away. "I couldn't. I'm a coward."

  "You're not." Cohen shook his head vehemently. "The stakes are huge for you." It was true. Niall could die, he could be captured and tortured. And Cohen? What was stopping him from doing what he wanted? "Niall," he said, "this might be a bit out of the blue, but I kind of want to try having sex again."

  Niall looked like he welcomed the distraction. "What, right now?"

  Cohen nodded.

  "Are... will you be okay? I don't want to make you uncomfortable again."

  "Uncomfortable is just going to be part of it," said Cohen. "But I want to do it anyway. This is my body and I'm stuck with it this way. I don't want to miss out on anything just because it might make me uncomfortable. I have..." He could feel his cheeks colouring slightly. "Well, I brought my strap-on because I was afraid my family might find it in my room while I was away."

  Niall laughed at that. He looked at Cohen for a moment, bit his lip. "Yeah," he said finally. "Yeah, I'd love to, just... just let me get cleaned up a bit."

  "Okay." Cohen watched Niall go into the bathroom, excited, and then realised he needed to get ready too. He was buzzing with anticipation, terrified of the dysphoria this was probably going to cause, and determined to ride it out.

  He pulled his pyjama pants off, and quickly changed into a set of briefs while Niall was still in the bathroom. Then he dug through his luggage a bit longer and pull
ed out a black plastic bag. Inside was his strap on and an old bottle of lube. They were the only sex paraphernalia he owned, bought for him by his first girlfriend, who had been several years older than him. He got embarrassed just thinking of what his parents would think if they found out Cohen had this sort of thing.

  The strap on was black as well, long and quite realistic looking. Cohen had missed wearing it. He secured the thick polyester straps into place and slid his hand around the shaft to position it. He slid his fist up and down the soft silicone a few times, and his imagination did the rest. It wasn't as good as a real one would have been, of course, but it was something.

  He was tightening it a little more, making sure the base was pressing up against his real (although notably smaller) cock perfectly, when Niall came back into the room. He was naked, and Cohen could feel the blush rising all the way to the top of his head.

  "What do you think?" he asked, laughing through the mortification, and gave the dildo a little push, so that it bounced from side to side. "You can still change your mind." He said it as a joke, but part of him was still sceptical that Niall was actually going to go through with this.

  Niall just smiled. He walked quickly towards Cohen, the firelight rippling on his skin, and pulled Cohen into a deep kiss. That desperate desire of Niall's was back, and Cohen happily gave in, opening his mouth to allow their tongues to slide together, and moaning as he felt Niall's body pressing into his.

  Niall's hands were around Cohen's waist already, and Cohen easily slipped his onto Niall's, loving the feel of his hard, angular body. He ran his hands over the angles of his hips and his thighs, into the soft down of the hair between his legs. He broke away shortly, breathless, and whispered, "I'm going to touch you now."

  Niall's reply was another encouraging kiss, so Cohen slowly slid his hand up Niall's thigh, and connected with the soft length there. It was hardening already, and Cohen began to move his hand over it, exploring its shape, the soft head and little folds of skin. It felt easy, somehow, as if he had been touching one all along.