Refraction

by BA Tortuga

  “Okay….” Calvin wrapped an arm around his pretty tight for a second but quickly relaxed it and let him go. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to—okay. You got me. I’m good.”

  Calvin actually stopped babbling, started breathing, and seemed to be really trying to relax. Even the back of Calvin’s head was getting wet.

  Tucker was happy as a pig in shit. He didn’t care if this was all they did today. He was wet and cool, the sun was going down, and there was a breeze. Life was good.

  “Am I doing okay? This is pretty awesome. Feels nice after all that hot sun.” He watched as Calvin’s arms floated out to the side and water splashed and pooled on Calvin’s belly and hips, wet skin reflecting the fading light.

  “You’re rocking it. I love the way it cools me down.” There were other parts that got him off—the way the water touched him everywhere, the way it held him, the way he felt safe in the pool—but they sounded stupid as hell, so he didn’t bother to say them out loud.

  “It feels like… kind of like the water wants to hold me up. It’s kind of, I don’t know. Clingy? Is that weird?”

  “No. It’s meant to buoy, huh? We’re made of water, right?”

  “I guess, yeah.” Calvin’s fingers wiggled and splashed. “I want to go under. I want to know what that feels like.”

  “Okay. You want to hold on to me and we go together or just me lower you here?”

  “I can? I didn’t think you’d say yes! You go with me. Should I stand up?” Calvin got a little wobbly in the water.

  “You totally can.” Tucker hauled Calvin upright, encouraging his lover’s legs to wrap around his waist. “You ready?”

  Calvin’s arms went around his neck too. The quick little kiss took him by surprise, and the smile that followed lit up Calvin’s face. “Now I’m ready.”

  “I’ll bend down on three. Ready? One. Two. Three.” He ducked down, dunking them both.

  Calvin held on tight but came up laughing, shaking the water from his hair and eyes. “Again!”

  He ducked them again, both of them laughing when they came up this time.

  “So fun, tiger!” Calvin leaned in and kissed him again, lips slippery and tasting like salt.

  He turned them in a slow circle, the water sliding all around them.

  “I think I like this swimming thing. What else do I need to learn?” Calvin lifted the hair out of his eyes and combed it back with gentle fingers.

  “We can try all sorts of things.” He eased back, floating with Calvin resting on his chest.

  “Mmm. Or we can just do this for a while.” Calvin was just as relaxed as could be. “You have any swimming stories? How old were you when you learned?”

  “I don’t remember. Little. My folks are beach people, pool people, and I don’t remember not knowing how. I remember the first time I slept in the water. We were at the lake, and my dad hooked a floaty to the canoe, and I just snoozed while they fished.”

  “What an adorable memory. You were little, I guess. I’ve slept in a couple of barns but never on the water anywhere.” Calvin’s feet were paddling slowly in the water.

  “Three or four. We went out for my birthday.”

  “Back when you were painting still lifes like your mom. Do you remember painting back then? Did it feel like it does now?”

  “I think it’s different now. I was just copying other people then. Now it’s all internal.”

  Calvin nodded. “Makes sense. When did you move out here on your own?”

  “Granny deeded me the land ten years ago, give or take. She wanted me to have a place all my own.”

  “And you moved right in? Was she still here?”

  “She moved into this condo deal with cards and bingo and bus trips to the casino. I tried to do the dorms at school, but it didn’t work out so well for me.”

  “Mmm. The painting? Or something else?” He felt Calvin’s hands run slowly over his lower back underwater. Just a little caress, but the gesture meant Calvin wasn’t even holding on to him anymore.

  “Something else. I had… it was hard to learn how to be—” Normal. “—assimilated, I guess.”

  “I bet that was hard. You’re unique, tiger. You’re not like anyone else. You don’t… you shouldn’t be….” He watched Calvin’s face scrunch up like that was going to help find words. “Trying to make you fit in would crush your spirit. The best thing about you is that you don’t see things the way other people do.”

  “Thank you.” He leaned up and kissed Calvin’s temple. “It’s good to find someone that sees you like you are and loves you anyway.”

  “Say that differently. Not ‘loves you anyway.’ That sounds so negative, right? Like there’s some right or wrong to being who you are. Say ‘loves you for it.’ That’s better. God, I got so tired of people that didn’t want to see past the whole model thing. That didn’t get that I wasn’t acting all the time. Can we just stay in this pool forever? It’s so mean out there.”

  “Loves you for it. I approve. And yes. Forever. We can float until you’re bored.” God, he loved this man.

  “Good. Glad the sun’s not frying my back. All these lights around the pool just come on as soon as the sun goes down? It’s so pretty.”

  “Yeah. They do. I love the way they make everything shine.” Please. Please let this last. Please let this be real.

  “It’s kind of romantic, you know? It’s… oh. Speaking of romance, tiger, I just thought I’d tell you… I mean, it’s totally up to you and everything, but you haven’t been with anyone else, and I get tested every six months, you know? So I’m clean if you ever wanted to…. Anyway, it’s totally your call. I just wanted you to know.”

  “Yeah? Me too. I want everything.” Mostly forever.

  “Good. Because I’m going to be your first, last, and only.” Calvin kissed his chest and ran a hot tongue over his cool nipple.

  “Fair enough. I accept.” His abs tightened, and he moaned, so caught it wasn’t funny.

  “Like you have a choice.” Calvin leaned over and winked at him, then wobbled and slipped off his side, splashing into the water and going right under.

  He grabbed Calvin, not too worried because all Calvin had to do was stand. They were fine.

  “Whoops! Good catch.” Calvin got his feet under him and stood, grinning and not looking the least bit worried. “I forgot to hold on.”

  He swooped in and scooped Calvin up, swung him around in the water, making his lover howl with laughter.

  “Hey! Put me down!” Calvin ordered in a very unconvincing tone. “Stop! Tucker! You’re just showing off now, you stud.” Calvin laughed again and was trying to get hold of him anywhere, fingers slipping on his wet skin.

  He was laughing so hard that he couldn’t breathe, but he didn’t let go.

  “Put me down, you brute, or so help me….” Calvin was laughing still. “Tuck-er-Will-iams!” Strong legs wrapped around his waist, muscled thighs squeezing his middle.

  “Grr! Argh! Rawr!” He was going to fall down. Calvin leaned hard to one side and threw his weight over to the other, and that was it for his balance. The two of them went down together.

  He rolled them, then moved to the edge of the pool, Calvin in his lap. “Lord have mercy, honey. You tickle me.”

  “I do love this pool.” Calvin poked him in the nose. “You should swim if you want to. It’s almost dark enough to go set something on fire.”

  “You okay sitting here, honey?” He lifted his chin and nibbled Calvin’s finger.

  “I’m okay. I’m gonna haul myself out and sit up on the edge and watch you swim.”

  “Good deal. I’m just going to burn off a little steam.”

  “Go. Have fun.” Calvin climbed out of the pool.

  He stole a kiss on Calvin’s wet leg, then pushed off, zooming across the pool.

  After a couple of laps he wasn’t focused on Calvin watching him anymore; it was just him, the water, and the familiar stretch and burn in his muscles. All he needed was to go and go an
d fly.

  When he’d finished ten laps, he let himself slow, ease back and just glide.

  As he headed for the wall, he spotted a bottle of water Calvin was dangling in the pool right in his line of vision. He snatched it and popped up to drink deep. Good. Just what he needed.

  “Tiger, you look so strong when you swim. You have got to teach me.”

  “I totally will. It’s amazing exercise, and it feels so good.” He lifted himself out of the pool and stole a kiss.

  “I could just sit here and watch you swim. It’s a pastime all on its own.” Calvin pulled him back for another kiss. “It’s turned into a beautiful night, huh?”

  “It has. The breeze makes the difference, I think.” He loved the way the wind cooled the world down.

  “I haven’t seen this many stars since I lived in Vermont. Actually I don’t think I saw this many at home either.”

  “It’s a thing. The stars at night, you know?” He winked over.

  Calvin bumped shoulders with him. “Yeah, not so much in New York it’s not, smartass. Except on super clear nights. I mean, we see some, but not a lot. Too much light pollution. I’m sure you remember. Or is your memory going in your old age?”

  “Light pollution… that’s a cool thought. Also, not that old. I meant the song—‘Deep in the Heart of Texas’?” He sang a little, clapping happily with the song that every little kid in the history of the state learned in kindergarten.

  Light pollution.

  “Oh. Sorry. Never heard it.” Calvin laughed.

  He chuckled, but his brain was spinning over the idea of light pollution. That could be a whole series….

  “Whoops. There you go.” Calvin stood up and tapped his shoulder. “Come on, tiger. We’ve got stuff to set on fire. Stay with me another hour or two. You can paint all night after if you want.”

  “I’m with you. Bonfire ho! Let me put some pants on. Flame and dangly bits could be a problem. You want the bug spray?” Tucker asked.

  Calvin trailed after him as he headed inside. “Definitely. Bugs like me. And I should put on something dry.”

  “Totally. I find the salt water gets a little crusty, even though it’s not supposed to.” He could have a little shower and shampoo, even, although he’d have to do it again after the bug spray.

  “I’ll shower off all the goo later. You can join me.” The pinch Calvin gave him stung like hell.

  “Ow! My poor heinie!” He made a show of dancing around, holding his ass.

  “Ha! Your heinie is so muscley I could hardly grab anything.” He watched Calvin dig through a drawer in the little dresser he’d emptied for his lover and pull out a tiny pair of bright pink briefs and blue jeans. “Are we doing shirts?”

  “I’m gonna grab one, just to give the skeeters less to nosh on.” He pulled on a pair of shorts and an ancient button-down.

  “That was my thinking with the jeans. Less skin I have to spray too.” Calvin grabbed one of those long-sleeved skintight deals that he remembered Calvin wearing all the time in New York. “Ready. My flip-flops are by the back door. Oh, look at you.” Nimble fingers unbuttoned and rebuttoned his shirt. “You had it buttoned all wonky.”

  “You’re good at that.” He grabbed Calvin up and took himself a good, hard kiss.

  “Mmm.” Calvin let him for a second but then pushed away, somehow grinning and looking horrified at the same time. “Sir. My virtue!”

  He grinned, leaning down to nuzzle into the curve of Calvin’s jaw. “I love you and your virtue, honey.”

  Calvin laughed at him. “You should, what little virtue I have left is yours anyway. Let’s go set a righteous fire.”

  “Let’s go burn shit up.” Before he headed out, he scribbled Light Pollution on the wall, along with a cracked lightbulb.

  He’d have to explore that for a bit.

  He and Calvin decided to walk the distance to the tower of paintings. They held hands, watched the stars, and didn’t say much on the trip, Calvin seemed perfectly happy to just enjoy being with him.

  It was a gorgeous evening, not too warm, a breeze, and there’d been enough rain that he wasn’t worried about a grass fire.

  “Would we get eaten by something if we slept out here one night? Under all these stars? Wouldn’t that be amazing?” Calvin sat a few feet from the tower and started twisting newspaper into a torch.

  “We can totally sleep out here. The bugs are the worst part. Possibly a stray cow.” He would open up the skylights in the barn. Calvin would love that.

  “Cool! We could get a bunch of those citronella candles, maybe.” Calvin stood, a foot-long stick of tightly twisted newspaper in one hand. “Light me?”

  “You got it.” He pulled his lighter from one pocket and got the flame going.

  “Nice. Okay, use your long arms and tuck this in somewhere low and with some airflow around it. You want it to burn from the inside out, you know?” Calvin plopped back down and started making another torch. Pretty soon they had four of the newspaper torches tucked into the stack of paintings, and the light nighttime breeze was feeding them nicely.

  He watched the paintings begin to melt and morph, the demons going black and twisted. He wasn’t sure how he felt about it. He wasn’t sure if he felt anything at all.

  “This is good, right? Just to let that time go? Let all those mistakes we made go?” Calvin moved in close and looked up at him. “I shouldn’t have let so much time pass by. I should have replied to those pictures you were sending me even if I didn’t understand them. I don’t want to harp on things, but I do want to tell you I’m sorry. I don’t expect anything with us to be simple all the time—I’m a nutjob and a stress case, I know that—but… I’m totally all in.”

  “You’re mine, and I love you.” He didn’t understand Calvin a lot of the time, but that was okay. He didn’t understand himself 90 percent of the time.

  “Yeah. Same here, tiger. I love you.” Calvin leaned on him, and he tucked an arm around his lover’s shoulders to watch the fire. “I blew Michael off the other day. I think I’m going to have to turn my phone back on tomorrow and check in.”

  “You do what you need to. I got your back.” Whatever Calvin needed to do. He wasn’t all the way sure of what that was, but he was pretty flexible.

  “I know, baby. You’ll be busy painting I bet anyway. I can’t wait to see what’s in your head.”

  “I need to finish the current group, and then I want to play with the light.”

  “Sounds good to me.” The fire popped, and the paintings shifted and settled again, making Calvin jump. The last few reluctant frames went up in flames. Everything around the fire was bright, and beyond that looked pitch-black. “Ooh! Cool.”

  “Yeah.” He held Calvin and watched. “I’m glad I didn’t paint over them.”

  “There was no painting over these. They’d have bled through everything.”

  “Exactly.” Tucker didn’t know how to explain, and he was so glad he didn’t have to, that blessedly, Calvin heard him.

  Calvin nodded and slipped an arm around his waist. The stack of paintings shifted and collapsed again, but Calvin didn’t jump this time. A warm hand slid over his shoulder, up the side of his neck, and cupped the back of his head, pulling him down into a kiss. It was gentle, but burned slower and hotter than the fire in front of him.

  Oh. He moaned softly, his knees going weak as Calvin stole his breath away.

  His hand pressed against Calvin’s chest. Calvin placed it there, he knew, so he could feel the strong, fast heartbeat. It was a gesture that had become Calvin’s way of making sure he knew he was wanted. Needed.

  The flames danced in Calvin’s eyes, and it felt so normal, so right. So perfectly genuine. This wasn’t about demons. This was about everything but.

  What had been a tower collapsed for probably the last time into not much more than a mound. One of the few remaining paintings that was still somewhat intact but blackened and smoking, flipped off the pile and landed inches from Calvin
’s feet. Calvin didn’t hesitate and kicked it, despite essentially bare toes, right back onto the pile.

  “Impressive,” he moaned, then took Calvin’s lips again.

  Calvin’s fingers traveled down the front of his shirt, opening the buttons and then slipping under the fabric against his ribs.

  Oh, that made him ache, made his nipples tighten and his balls draw up. He could fucking worship at the altar of Calvin for the rest of his goddamn life.

  His fly was next, and Calvin opened up his shorts and freed his cock, letting it lie heavily in a hot palm.

  “Please. God, your hand….”

  “Is that what you want, baby?” Calvin’s fingers tightened around his shaft and stroked slow. Painfully slow. Too goddamn slow.

  “I want everything.” He spread his thighs, bracing himself. “You make me feel….” So much.

  “Loved, I hope.” Calvin waved a little bottle in front of his eyes briefly and then pressed it into his hand. “So you can have everything.”

  “Oh damn. You’re fixin’ to kill me.”

  Calvin laughed and kissed him, fist sliding faster along his erection.

  He leaned in, nuzzling Calvin’s throat, humping up like a desperate man.

  “Want you.” Calvin’s words were muffled in his beard but clear enough all the same. Even if he hadn’t understood, the way Calvin pushed his hand under the waistband of those low-riding jeans made the point. “Take me back to the loft, have me here, I don’t care, but I want you.”

  “Loft. I ain’t got a blanket for you.” And he wouldn’t hurt Calvin for the world. Although…. He tore off his shirt and pushed off his shorts, sat his bare ass on the fabric. “C’mere and ride me, huh? We got this.”

  Right out here in the fire and the wind.

  “Fuck, tiger. That’s the hottest thing ever.” Calvin stripped off, tossing everything down next to him and moving slowly into his lap, straddling his thighs. “We totally got this.”

  “Uh-huh.” He slicked his cock first, then his fingers, his mouth dry as dust as he focused on the way Calvin was backlit, the flames like wings. When he pushed his hand behind Calvin’s heavy balls to wet the tight hole, he was already lost in the magic they were making.