by Alexis Hall
“I’m sorry,” he said helplessly. “My house is a mess as well.”
Alfie took the saucer and the LP, put the LP back on the nearest pile, and dumped the saucer in the already-overflowing kitchen bin. “It’s okay.”
“I hadn’t really noticed how bad it had got. And I’m not really a smoker. I just . . . I don’t know.” Fen’s voice had that sharp, brittle quality it got when he was upset, and trying to pretend—or convince himself—he wasn’t. “It’s weird, suddenly seeing through someone else’s eyes what your life has become.”
“I get it. You should see my place.”
“Is it a mess too?”
“Uh, no, sorry. But it kind of looks like a science lab. I have this haute couture sofa that’s too uncomfortable to sit on. And a stunning view of a city I don’t really like.”
Fen smiled one of his odd, thin little smiles. “Oh, this is a fun game. At least you have a place. I’m in storage above a flower shop because the only alternative would be to move in with my dad. A thirty-year-old man living with his father. It’s sexy stuff, Alfie Bell.”
“It’s not a competition.”
“I guess not.” Fen hooked his thumbs into the pockets of his jeans, looking up at Alfie from under his lashes. He’d only ever seen girls do that before. But this wasn’t girlish. Not even a little bit. “Take me to bed?”
“This way, right?”
Fen nodded and followed him down the dank little corridor and into the bedroom. It was just like it had been when Alfie had accidentally blundered into it before: crumpled sheets, stacks of books, and piles of clothing. The curtains were closed but thin enough to admit a wash of pale yellow-grey daylight.
“Well,” said Alfie, “here we are.”
Fen’s eyes danced over him. “Are you intending to stay fully clothed?”
“Not if you aren’t.”
A slightly clumsy shrug and Alfie’s jacket slid off Fen’s shoulders, flumping onto the floor. It wasn’t a striptease by any stretch of the imagination, but the sudden revelation of Fen’s bare, gilded arms was the most erotic thing Alfie thought he’d ever seen. He wanted to stretch him out and lick him. All the way down, from wrists to ankles, and back again.
But Fen was scowling. “You don’t look very naked to me.”
Five seconds later, that problem was solved.
“Oh,” whispered Fen, staring at him. “Oh.”
It felt as real as a touch, as any other sort of claiming, warmth sweeping across Alfie’s skin in answer. And then Fen did touch him, following the thick black swirls of Alfie’s tattoo with unsteady fingers. “You are fucking unreal, you know that? By rights, you should be sprawled on a rock in nothing but a pair of—” Fen’s eyelashes flickered “—straining CK boxer briefs.”
“Sounds like you’ve put a lot of thought into this.”
Fen glanced down, then hastily not-down, then off to the side, blushing a little. “Maybe.”
Alfie was sort of into the way Fen looked at him. But it made him weirdly shy at the same time, like it stripped him a bit more, a bit deeper. “It’s just, y’know, bones and muscles and stuff.”
“And a hot-fudge sundae is just ice cream and chocolate sauce and stuff.”
Alfie gripped the inch or so of flesh at the top of his hips. “Yeah, but look at this.”
“So?” Fen’s hand slid over Alfie’s, then over his skin, his thumbs brushing the ridges of his abdominal muscles.
“I want one of those . . .” Alfie shaped a V with his hands.
“You’ve kind of got one.” Fen’s fingers were almost but not quite ticklish, and a little bit cold, as they traced down the groove of Alfie’s obliques.
“It’s meant to be more defined. But I think I’d have to stop eating food. And I like eating food,” he added plaintively.
“Please don’t stop eating food.” Fen looked up, smiling a little, but gently. “I heard somewhere you need it.”
Suddenly Alfie noticed something important. “Hey, why am I the only one with my clothes off?”
“Because you distracted me with your hotness.”
He coughed to conceal his stupid, giddy pleasure.
“And if you have a problem with it, there’s a very simple solution.”
One of Fen’s wicked glances was invitation enough, and Alfie was on him like some kind of wild animal, pulling him out of his clothes. And Fen let him, smiling and shivering a little, sometimes trying to help, so that their hands got all tangled together between buttons and fabric and skin.
At last, Fen was naked except for a single sock that had somehow been overlooked in the chaos. He glanced down at himself and back up at Alfie, shrugged, and . . . twirled? It was the most ridiculous thing Alfie had ever seen. Also maybe the most beautiful. A one-socked man pirouetting and laughing in a spill of dirty golden light. Fen finished with a flourish, head thrown back, arms extended, gleaming everywhere, from the tips of his fingers, all the way down.
Alfie gazed at him, entranced, bewildered. Was this something else he’d missed in his years of not-gayness? “What are you doing?”
“Well . . . you know. Naked in socks is just about the least sexy thing in the universe. I was trying to distract you so you wouldn’t notice.”
Like Alfie would have cared about a sock when there was so much else to be looking at. He’d seen Fen before, at the hotel, but back then he’d just been a hot angry guy Alfie had sort of accidentally pulled. He hadn’t been Fen. And now he was so much Fen it was almost too much. Leaving Alfie dazzled, and worshipful, and dizzy with lust. Trying not to make too big a deal out of it, in case Fen thought he was weird.
But, fuck, he looked so good. Effortless in his nakedness. Carelessly gorgeous. Lean and strong and glinting gold. All the mysteries of him laid bare to Alfie’s gaze. The long muscles of the legs that had enwrapped him. The tough sinew of the forearms that had strained beneath his touch. The knots of his knees and ankles, the bouquet of small bones that met at his wrists. The edges of his clavicles, his pelvis, the tender places—throat and flanks and inner thighs—where his skin seemed impossibly tender.
Alfie wanted to touch, to taste, to be with him and inside him. To know him completely.
Their secrets spilled together, shared, in a moment of skin.
“You daft bugger.” He put a hand on Fen’s chest and shoved him down onto the futon. “I’d find you sexy if you were covered in socks.”
“What if I was wearing one massive sock?”
“Like a onesie?”
“Yes. A socksie.”
He reached out and tugged the sock from Fen’s upraised foot. Brandished it for a moment—ta-da—then tossed it over his shoulder. “You’ll have to work a lot harder than that to turn me off.”
Fen smiled, a little shyly, and held out his arms, and Alfie fell into them, like he’d been waiting for it all his life. It was such a simple thing, the closeness of two bodies, but right then, it was everything, everything he’d ever wanted. And having it—even if it was just a taste, a memory in the making of a thing that was probably far too complicated—made him feel awkward. Like he would break if it wasn’t for Fen wrapped around him like a scarf in winter, his legs pressed hard to Alfie’s hips, holding him tight.
“You’re sure this is okay?” Fen asked.
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“I can’t really see what you’re getting out of it.”
“I’m getting to be with you.”
“While I’m unconscious.”
“Well—” Alfie smirked into Fen’s neck “—you’re a lot nicer that way.” Teeth nipped sharply at his earlobe. “Not helping your case here.”
Fen wriggled an arm free and pulled off his glasses, tucking them by the side of the mattress. Then he unbunched the duvet and dragged it over them. In small, instinctive movements, they untangled and retangled, finding ways to fit together. There was a bossiness, somehow, to Fen’s cuddling. He burrowed right in. Got a knee between Alfie’s legs. Curled his ha
nd possessively over a hip. And Alfie simply let himself be arranged. Lost himself to heat and skin and the intimacy of a heart beating next to his own.
“God, you give good hug, Alfie Bell.”
He cupped a hand round the back of Fen’s neck and slowly slid down his spine, feeling the muscles yield beneath the pressure of his palm. “Shhh.”
The first warm flush of sleep crept over Fen like sunrise. His body grew lax, then restless, and then quiet again beneath the slow, steady sweep of Alfie’s hands. His face, without glasses or grief or some other animation, looked almost unlike him. Too empty, too open. Profoundly naked and fairy-tale pretty, the tips of his eyelashes glinting against his cheeks, and his mouth a waiting kiss. And Alfie was staring. Like some kind of creepy bastard. He snugged himself into the covers and closed his eyes. Listened to the rhythm of Fen breathing. Breathed in the scent of his skin . . .
And must have dozed off in that pool of shared heat and bodily closeness because when he opened his eyes again, the light had thickened like honey and Fen was a boneless sprawl, half on top of him. But Alfie’s waking seemed to rouse Fen somehow, and he jerked up, cracking Alfie soundly under the chin with the top of his head.
“Oh God, oh fuck, I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
“Are you sure?” Fen pulled back, blinking, and batting not too soothingly at Alfie’s jaw.
“Yeah but—” Alfie caught his hand “—I might change my mind if you punch me in the face.”
“Sorry.” Fen shook a tangle of hair out of his eyes. He looked mussed and sleepy and confused and, frankly, adorable. Then suddenly he was staring at Alfie’s hand, still wrapped around his wrist, and something hot and shuddery ran through his whole body, so strong that Alfie felt it too, like their skin was water, and where they touched made ripples. Fen’s lips parted, but all he said was, “Oh.” A little bit shocked, a little bit . . . not.
Alfie let go as soon as Fen tugged. Let him wriggle away and flump into the space beside him.
For a moment, neither of them said anything, Alfie staring at the cracks on the ceiling, Fen idly running this own thumb over the place where Alfie’s hand had been.
“Fen?” he asked.
“Mmm?”
“Why do you like it when I . . . you know . . . when I hold you?”
“Because you’re like a big, muscular, partially erect teddy bear.”
Alfie laughed. “No, I meant pinning your hands and stuff.”
“Oh. That. Um.”
“I mean,” Alfie added hastily, “it’s totally okay that you’re into that.”
There was another long silence.
“Just with you, Alfie.”
Was that a good thing? He wasn’t sure.
“I mean,” Fen went on slowly, “that first time, I didn’t think I’d ever see you again, so it didn’t matter what I did. But I think I sort of knew even then that you wouldn’t hurt me, so it felt . . . safe. Yes, that’s it—it felt safe to be a little bit powerless with you.”
It was maybe the bravest thing Alfie had ever heard. And he felt entirely unworthy of it. Too aware of all the ways he was cowardly.
Next thing he knew, Fen had tucked himself in tightly against Alfie’s side, face pressed against his shoulder. A few strands of hair were stuck to Alfie’s neck. A little bit irritating. But he didn’t mind. They made it real. The closeness of Fen. “I’m so sorry I was a dick to you after.”
“I deserved it. I sort of wish you hadn’t run off, but—”
“Not that after. Before.” Little more than a whisper, the words half-hidden in Alfie’s skin. “You know, making you beg and all that nonsense.”
As it happened, Alfie had almost forgotten. He had a vague memory of something like that, maybe, but mainly what he remembered was the hot, rough clasp of Fen’s hand around his cock. How amazingly good it had felt. “I guess I was too turned on to care.”
“Honestly, at that point, I just wanted to make you feel good. But I was supposed to be using you.” Fen gave a mortified little squirm. “So I think I tried to embarrass you. I don’t know. It was awful.”
“Don’t worry about it.” He slid his palm soothingly down Fen’s flank. It was too sleek and angular to be much of a curve, but it was a shape, a shape he could follow and learn, a shape that felt good under his hand. The skin there was eggshell smooth, pulled taut over an intricate web of bone and muscle, human and real and perfect.
Fen pressed into his touch, like a cat in a sunbeam, making a noise that sounded about as close to a purr as a human could manage. But then he rolled away, turning Alfie fully onto his back and settling over him. He wasn’t heavy, but it was still a surprise somehow: all that supple strength pressing him down. The heat of it. “I still want to make you feel good though.”
Alfie drew in a sharp breath. This was weird. Not bad weird exactly. But he was startled. And he didn’t know what to do with hands. “Um, okay.”
Wow, that sounded unenthusiastic. He would have tried again except Fen sort of leaned over him, into him almost, and did something with his hips that was even weirder for Alfie than it had been before. He was hot and cold, and a little bit fearful, and a little bit wanting. But while he was worrying about it, his thighs slid open under Fen’s, like his body was okay with stuff his mind really wasn’t ready for.
“You know,” murmured Fen, moving sleekly between Alfie’s legs, “you ask a lot of questions.”
“In general?”
“About sex.”
“Yeah, Dan Savage says gay men talk about sex.”
There was a pause. Alfie got the feeling Fen was trying not to laugh. “Alfie Bell, are you trying to learn how to be gay from Dan Savage?”
“Well. Yeah. At least he’s saying things about it.”
“God, you’re so fucking adorable, I can’t even. But you know he’s not the Gay Pope, right?”
“The what?”
“He doesn’t get to decide what gay men are like. You can do that for yourself.”
Alfie hadn’t actually considered that. He’d always assumed he was behind the gayness curve. Held back a year in gay school. “I guess. But honestly it was kind of a major fucking revelation to me that you could just have a straightforward conversation about sex and everybody goes home happy.”
“That’s not a gay thing, Alfie, that’s a human-being thing. Men can be just as confused and cagey as women.”
“Yeah, but I hadn’t realised you could just ask. I was too busy trying to figure out what I should be doing to pay attention to, y’know, the actual person I was doing it with.”
Fen went down onto an elbow, his free hand stroking lightly over Alfie’s cheek. “God, you’re sweet.”
“I am not,” protested Alfie, appalled.
Which made Fen kiss him, his mouth full of laughter. “Well,” he said, pulling back, breathless, “you took good care of me, even when I was being awful to you. So now I get to return the favour and blow your mind.”
Fen pressed his mouth to a strangely sensitive spot beneath Alfie’s jaw, and did that thing with his hips again, his cock sliding against Alfie’s, then sort of beneath it, to all manner of tender places. And Alfie must have responded, or not responded in some sort of odd way, because Fen paused, looking down at him. That alone was unsettling. Usually it was the other way round—Alfie looking down—and it seemed very different right now. And he couldn’t tell if that was because it was different or because he had the sort of issues an enlightened twenty-first-century homosexual shouldn’t have.
“You don’t?” Fen sounded almost embarrassingly gentle right then.
“It’s not that I don’t,” Alfie muttered. “It’s just I don’t in practice.”
“You haven’t?”
“No, I have.”
“Did you like it?”
It was complicated. “It was all right.”
“It’s okay to have preferences.” Fen ran kisses like a string of beads down Alfie’s chest, and he shuddered u
nder those soft touches. Almost thought he felt them shining. “I don’t mind if you’d rather top.”
That was the way he’d always imagined it going: Fen wrapped around him, all around him, hot and wild and heedless. But if Fen wanted otherwise? Was he really going to say no? Uncertainty and resistance and longing and shame twisted up inside him. And stronger than any of it, wanting to be with Fen, to please him, and not hold anything back.
Fingers swept lightly across his eyelids. He hadn’t even realised he’d closed his eyes. So he made himself open them again. Made himself look at Fen. Look up at him. His face was all shadows and angles and focus. A hint of roughness beneath his jaw. The gold-framed glitter of his eyes.
It was sexy as hell. But also intimidating. That was a man there. A man he was letting press him down. A man he was trusting with his body.
“No, it’s . . . it’s okay.” He swallowed. “This is okay.”
Fen stretched himself out over Alfie. All of him, his full weight. And Alfie felt everything. From the stipple of hair across Fen’s chest and stomach, to the sharp places of his pelvis, from the long, long muscles of his thighs, to his slightly ragged toenails. It was lavish, somehow, all that closeness, all that skin. It made his heart beat like it was flying. Or like he was running too fast.
“It’s going to be more than okay, Alfie Bell.”
“Uh. Okay.”
“You’ve no idea how long I’ve wanted this.” Fen’s voice, soft as the evening light, had become its own caress. “And now I get to have my wicked way with every glorious inch of you.”
Alfie’s stomach was flipping like a goldfish out of its bowl. He couldn’t tell if it was terror or something else entirely. And it turned out Fen hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d indicated an intention to get as familiar with Alfie as possible. He wasn’t methodical exactly, but, God, he was thorough. Alfie didn’t think he had ever been quite so . . . so touched. It was far too intense for what it was, the brush of Fen’s lips, the quest of his fingers against places—the crook of his elbow and the groove of his hips—that shouldn’t have been even remotely sexy. But somehow lit him up inside and out. Made him kind of . . . sparkly, his body tight and bright beneath Fen’s touches, like a spider’s web strung with dew.