"Be careful!"
That couldn't be panic he heard in Bruno's voice. He turned to see where the other man was. Maybe it wasn't too late to duck into the woods, instead.
"Get off the dock, Micha!" Bruno jogged down the lawn after him, only his tattoos covering him, a shirt he hadn't taken the time to put on dangling from one hand. He hadn't bothered to dress. There was no one to see but Micha, and it was hardly anything he hadn't seen before. He wanted to rush out there and grab the smaller man around the middle, haul him to safety, away from the rotten decking and the peril of the cold water. He was scared to move too fast, lest his bumbling freak Micha out more. The little fucker was going to drown himself if he wasn't careful.
"Just stop!" Bruno halted on the beach, not trusting the old wood to hold his heavy frame. The sound of it creaking under Micha's slight weight was enough to clog Bruno's throat with panic.
Micha did stop. One step too late. The old, tired wood gave under his back foot. He hung suspended, arms pinwheeling, body hanging in mid-air for a split second before gravity took over and freezing water closed over him. Every thought but the instinct to find which way was up fled.
Bruno cursed. He cursed Micha for running and himself for not following sooner, for being slow, and Danny for dying and the spring weather for not warming the lake, and the universe for letting everything get so fucked up. Then he cursed himself again, because he could have restrained himself. He could have held his tongue, or buttoned up his cock. Fucking always seemed so much easier than talking, only this time, he'd cocked them both up.
It took a year to reach the end of the broken dock, a decade to swim out to where Micha struggled against the undertow that dragged him further and further from shore. Bruno dug in and swam harder. It was not going to end like this. Faster and harder, he would get there. He would be in time.
He reached Micha just as his blond head disappeared under the waves one more time. He reached, caught a handful of hair, and held on.
Micha felt the tug. Somewhere deep in his gut, he knew it hurt. He wrapped his fingers tight around that wrist attached to those life-saving fingers gripping his hair and let the panic rule his strength.
Bruno hauled him up. Air struck his face, bright, whistling wind raking over his cheeks and he gasped in a lungful of it, then another. Something garbled and desperate bleated out of him, past his raw throat and he clawed his way up Bruno's arm.
The big man twisted him around, wrapped an arm across his chest.
"Hang on." Securing Micha under one arm, where he couldn't drag them both under, Bruno struck out for the nearest shore. It wasn't their beach. The deadly wicked undertow had pulled Micha almost out past the point and Bruno pumped his one free arm and both legs, headed for the rocky outcropping that dribbled its broken bits into the water. There were sharp edges and slippery surfaces, but it was land.
It took Micha a few minutes to realize he was no longer drowning and he managed to help, rather than hinder Bruno's efforts, adding his feeble kicking to the forward momentum. He kicked and struggled against the current forever before his feet finally struck ground. One ankle cracked against stone, the painful bite of it the final straw. He stopped kicking, stopped moving, and let Bruno navigate them through the labyrinth of old, broken-down mountain and finally, thankfully, out of the lake.
"Micha?"
He was too tired to open his eyes or care that he didn't feel the give of beach sand under him as Bruno laid him out on his back.
"Micha!"
"You need to stoop shouting," Micha told him. At least, that's what he said in his head. What passed his lips was more of a grunt, followed by a violent shower of lake water that mostly landed in Bruno's lap. A few more attempts to communicate ended much the same until he thought he might actually bring up a soggy lung.
"Please. Just relax." Big hands stroked through his hair and down his back. "Settle down."
Micha nodded and didn't complain when he felt himself pulled tight against Bruno's chest. He was warm against Micha's chill.
"I'm going to take your jeans off," Bruno told him after most of the vomiting seemed to have stopped.
"Already?" Micha struggled to sit up but gave up after only a feeble effort. "Still mostly dead. Can't wait till we're in bed at least?"
"Stupid," Bruno said, affection and irritation mingling to thicken his voice. He ran his fingers down the side of Micha's face. Trust the little jerk to be thinking about sex now. Always. His hand looked so big beside those small, pale features. "Denim dries slow. Makes it impossible for you to get warm." He gathered Micha a little closer. "You're shivering."
"Because I'm cold. Practically ice water, still."
"I know." Bruno ran a hand down Micha's chest to sluice away as much of the remaining water as he could. "I know. Sit up." He kept his commands gentle. Micha was small and pliant. Not submissive, but Bruno needed him to pay attention and just do what he was told. Hypothermia was still an issue, even if drowning wasn't. In a few minutes, the sun would rise the rest of the way over the tall pines and bathe their little rocky outcropping with warmth. Once Micha was dry and feeling stronger, they could follow the shoreline back. For now, Bruno just wanted to get him warm and keep him safe. He made short work of the button fly on Micha's jeans and together, they managed to peel the wet material from his legs. Micha curled, automatically seeking Bruno's greater bulk and warmth.
Bruno gathered him and kept him close.
Micha let Bruno take care of him. It was comforting, and the fear of the dark and cold under the water was still too near. He would have been ashamed of the clinging, except Bruno seemed to understand and even reciprocate. He couldn't remember the other man's touch ever being quite so gentle, except when he'd watched him care for Danny, those few times he'd been permitted to see such intimate moments.
"I'm sorry," he mumbled after a while. "What I said about you buying me for Danny. About you not giving him—"
"No. You were right. At least about me not being able to give him that. We only 'bought you' once. The first time. After that it was..."
"Different."
Bruno nodded, his chin brushing against Micha's wet hair where it tucked up close against his chest. "Different."
It hadn't ever been money on a bedside table after that first time. It had been rent paid, a load of groceries arriving at his doorstep at unexpected times, or his phone bill paid when he thought he'd get cut off. New clothes, warm boots, leather gloves, and protection in the form of a new roommate who happened to be Danny's cousin and didn’t happen to want to fuck him. The guy moved in, wouldn't let angry Johns or drunk pimps in the door, and respected Micha's space.
And all he had to do for the help and the protection was answer the summons when they came, wear what was handed to him at the door, and perform what was asked. It was never unpleasant. It was never just business. It wasn't a relationship.
For five years, it had been enough. He'd had a glimpse of what it was like outside the desperately poor world in which he'd grown up.
Then Danny died. And yes, Micha did count the days, always thinking Bruno would come for him. Two years and too many tricks later, he finally had. Unannounced, pulling his car up to the curb on which Micha had been standing and motioning for him to get in, their reunion had been unspectacular. Relief at seeing Bruno alive and well and anger at the long silence had split Micha in two. But he got in the car and didn't ask where they were going or why. He didn't refuse the fat envelope of bills or the silent ride to the docks, or the drunken sex. He'd waited to ask the question, but now it was time.
"What took you so long?" He'd needed to know since Bruno had appeared on his corner.
"I can only swim so fast," Bruno replied.
"No." Micha sat up, putting some distance between them. "After Danny? Why wait until I'd figured you'd forgotten all about me?"
Bruno stared at him. Forgotten him? Forgotten the man who brought Danny to life, who saved what was left of their relationship? "I—
" How could he possibly explain what he didn't understand himself?
"I waited." Micha's face clouded and it was like the sun went out.
"I couldn't...replace him. I didn't know...how." The admission caught in Bruno's throat, but it was the truth.
Five years of watching a life fade away, watching the future get shorter and shorter until it disappeared completely. He didn't know how to see past that. Micha had been their only bright spot. He'd pulled them back together when Danny's wandering eye and Bruno's insatiable need had almost destroyed them. They'd even talked about inviting him to stay just before Danny had been diagnosed. Then everything changed.
"It isn't hard." Micha rolled onto his knees and crawled closer again, cupping Bruno's face and lifting it. "It's just words."
Bruno shrugged. Words. Fucking he understood. Touching and lying together afterwards...or not. Hard sex in an alley or a bathroom, just to get the ugly out, or burying himself deep inside Micha and holding him there, where he couldn't disappear; those things, he understood.
"I need you not to let me go." Micha swung himself around, straddled Bruno and settled himself in the big man's lap. He draped both arms over broad shoulders and looked down. Fuck it. He was here, he had this chance to take what he wanted. The sex hadn't been enough for Bruno to understand what they had. Plain English would have to do. "Hold on and don't let go," He demanded.
It sounded so simple. Bruno wrapped both arms around the slim waist, noting the chill of Micha's skin, his glowing paleness in the sunshine finally falling on them.
"You see?" Micha asked, settling into the hesitant embrace.
"Danny—"
"Is dead." Micha kissed Bruno's forehead, pressed his lips there and closed his eyes, remembering. "I miss him, too. He saved me from so much shit. Took care of me, sent his cousin to look after me. The fucking was..." he drew a deep breath, let it out in a long, shaking sigh. "Beside the point. That was for you. To know your gift was appreciated. Not that we didn't both enjoy it immensely, but it was for you, and at the end, when he couldn't anymore," Micha looked down, "I was for you, then too. To give you what he couldn't." He shrugged and smiled. "Fucking couple bastards couldn't just say you loved each other. That would be too simple. Had to bring me into it, and you can't just..."
"Let you go now.""No."
"No. I should get you back to the house, though, and into bed."
Micha raised on eyebrow.
"To rest. The sun is going to crisp you up and you just fell into a freezing lake and nearly drowned. You have no body fat. You're shivering. Danny would dress your ankle, tuck you into bed and coddle you."
"You aren't Danny."
Bruno grinned. "No. I'm not. That's why you need your rest."
"I'm sorry we fought. Sorry you had to dive in the lake and save my ass."
Bruno craned up, caught Micha's lips in a kiss as tender as he knew how to make it. He reached up and pushed the last strands of golden hair off Micha's forehead, studied him a long moment. "I'm sorry you were so...sorry you thought you had to run from me."
Micha just shook his head as he ran his hand over Bruno's bald pate. "I was running from just—everything."
"Don't do it again."
"Believe me, I'm not jumping in any more lakes any time soon."
"You are, because you're going to learn how to swim."
Micha melted a little bit into the protection of Bruno's arms. "Don't need to swim in the city. Not in that dinky apartment."
"You're not in the city now, and you aren't going back to that apartment."
"When did you become a dictator?"
Bruno would have pulled Micha closer if it was possible, melded them into one. "When I realized I was done mourning what I couldn't have and about to lose what I need. Just about the same time you took off out the door. Don't do that again."
Micha shook his head.
Piggybacking along the rocky shore and through the blueberry brambles and junipers left them both hot, scratched and tired and Micha insisted on hopping the final stretch through the dandelions to the back door. He went up the stairs on his ass, one step at a time, his ankle too sore to put weight on. Bruno removed the strip of denim he'd torn from Micha's jeans to wrap around the cut and cleaned the dried blood away. Now they sat on the bed, freshly showered and cleaned up, Micha once again wrapped in Danny's plush green robe.
"Does it need stitches?"
"No." Bruno frowned at the jagged tears in the skin. "Might scar, though."
Micha leaned back into the pillows with a sigh. He could just reach to run his fingers down the tail of the dragon on Bruno's back. "Maybe that will be my first tattoo. A mini lizard to match your brute here."
Bruno swung round, placing a fist on either side of Micha's hips and leaning over him. "You're perfect just the way you are." He let his gaze rove over the expanses of pale, milky skin, marred at the moment by fading bruises left by uncaring hands. Bruno traced delicate fingers over the ugly marks. "Why would you want to cover all this up?"
"Why did you?"
"I lived with a tattoo artist. He wanted to practice."
"I think he did a beautiful job."
Bruno nodded. "I won't get any more. No one can take Danny's place or match his work."
Micha swallowed hard, trapped under Bruno's body, under his gaze. "I don't want to replace him. I want to be me. With you."
Bruno bestowed another kiss on him. Only the second in their lives. It wasn't something Micha had ever seen him do, even with Danny, and he sank deeper into the bed under the assault, wiggling until he had his legs straightened and his body was spread under Bruno.
"Do me," he panted, the moment Bruno released his lips.
"Not now. You should rest."
"Now!" Micha slid his hands up under Bruno's shirt, finding his nipples with his fingertips and playing over the quickly puckering nubs. "I want you to."
Bruno shook his head even as his big body shuddered under the impact of Micha's intense gaze and questing finger. The little imp could always get to him. "You're insatiable."
"I can keep up to you." He removed one hand and ran it down into Bruno's boxers, cupping his rapidly filling cock, stroking it with merciless intent. "I want you."
"We're out of lube."
"The condoms are lubed."
"Your ankle—"
"Isn't required for fucking. Now shut up and do it."
"Now who's dictating?"
Micha smiled. "Get used to it. I like sex. I like your cock." Micha wrapped his fingers around the shaft in his hand and pumped smoothly, gratified by the way Bruno's lips parted in a silent moan. "And I'm all talked out."
Sinking into tight, willing flesh, with Micha's legs wrapped securely around his waist, Bruno found he didn't need words. All the things he thought he didn't know how to do, he found he'd just forgotten. Or perhaps chosen to forget. Death had left him numb, all kinds of things left unsaid, impossible to say over a grave. Impossible to hold onto and not end up hollowed out from trying to keep his grip on the impossible.
"Let go," Micha encouraged, the words breathless pants.
"Of what?"
"Of everything." Micha reached up and touched Bruno's face, trailing his fingers through the sweat. "You can't hurt me."
"I already did."
"Love hurts, baby."
"Ungh!" Micha's words caught Bruno off guard. Micha's blinding smile trapped him.
"Come, Bruno. Finish."
"Oh." Bruno dropped his chin, trying to hide from the light of Micha's incredible trust. "Fuck!" all the tension of the lonely years coiled, the stress and fear of seeing death once again reach out for what was his, it all twisted into a great knot, spiralling inside Bruno's guts and he moaned.
"Harder," Micha encouraged, fumbling to find purchase on slick skin with shaking fingers. "You can fall. I'm right here."
"Too—"
"Not too anything. Just do it."
Bruno shivered under all that certainty. He already k
new how easily everything could fall apart. He met Micha's gaze and everything stopped. For a split second, the world stood still.
Then Micha smiled. The sun came out. Bruno's orgasm ripped through him and all he could think was he didn't deserve any of it.
After a few minutes, he felt Micha's arms slip around his shoulders. He let the slighter man roll them onto their sides and he just lay there, listening to Micha breathe, feeling their bodies slide into sleepy stillness.
Afternoon sun brushed across the blankets. Bruno watched it through half-lidded eyes as it crawled slowly towards the window beside the bed. The light was different, clearer than the morning misty glow that had awakened him, coming at the room from the opposite direction, a completely different angle. He glanced at Micha to see the other man sound asleep at last. He slid down and curled securely around him as the last rays of sun covered them both in a blanket of light and warmth.
THE END
Author bio: Jaime Samms has been writing for various publishers since the fall of 2008, although she's been writing for herself far longer. Often asked why men, what’s so fascinating about writing stories about men falling in love, she's never come up with an easy answer.
These days, you can find her work on her website. If you flip through the pages of her site, you’ll find plenty of free reading and a bit of art, as well (Gotta use that Fine Arts Diploma for something!). she also writes for Freya’s Bower, Loveyoudivine Alterotica, Pink Petal Books, Dreamspinner Press and Total E-Bound Publishing.
Social networking:
Website: http://www.jaime-samms.net
Livejournal: http://dontkickmycane.livejournal.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/prof...
Twitter: JaimeSamms
Justin South – REFLECTIONS (First Love/Hurt-Comfort)
Selected by Justin South
Dear Author,
I was looking through the 'cuddling' pictures of the NFSW picture thread and I kind of fell in love with this one.
To the untrained eye it seems like there isn't much going on, but to me I feel like there's something reflecting in this man's eyes, some unnamed emotion.
Don't Read in the Closet volume one Page 51