“Did fucking something, alright.” Bo swallowed hard, tasting river water and the abandoned spaces he so often found comfort in. Hefeltit, that oil sludge of shame creeping between them. It wasn’t his, the crushing weight of it. Shame and guilt, all of it trying to disappear into cold and arms-length distance.
It tasted of ice.
Bo didn’t wander into people’s homes randomly. He wasn’t the sort to step inside and gawk at baubles on tables. So why had he? There wasn’t a fucking precedent for this. Broken floorboards, he knew how to handle. The time with the drug den, well, he’d gotten away. Left with some big fucking scars, stumbling through woods blind, but at least it’d made fuckingsense.
Shifting to the edge of the couch and reaching for the guy didn’t make sense. Yet there Bo was, pushing hair back from the stranger’s face. Bare, pale fingertips on rich, warm skin. Sharp angles and generous lips. Freckles and more freckles.
Real.
Alive and leaning into Bo’s touch with a shaking breath. Bo’s hand lingered, his palm on the guy’s cheek, fingers webbed in black. The other curved loose by his jaw, thumb tipped to feel the flutter of his pulse. He could feel it, the man’s own hunger for closeness, mirroring his own. That itch to not let the stranger get further away, not– It sounded weird, that way. It wasn’tthat way, no matter the guy’s face. (No matter how Bo touched him, gentle along a freckled jaw.)
The fuckwasthis?
“Fuck just happened?” His mind felt full of moss and the sound of water on rocks, but he could manage asking that much. Could work out where that guilt came from, unpleasantly sticky on his skin if he tried.
“I allowed you to touch me,” the stranger answered, all level calm. “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry,” he said while Bo’s senses sang with quiet places and calm waters. Bo could almost understand that, dimly through the gentle haze of crisp grass and safe shadows. The nameless guy let Bo touch him. Maybe if Bo were that guy, he’d be sorry about it, too.
The man reached up and caught Bo’s wrist, gently pulling his hand away. Bo shuddered, as contact turned to nothing at all. It fucking hurt, pins and needles. Not as bad as when he sat back entirely, but bad enough.
But the guy didn’t let go of Bo or tell him to pull his other hand away. Something fucking weird was going on, and never mind that low, soothing voice that shook far less than it had. Not just the possible weird-ass psychic things or fucked up house. Somethingelse.
That guilt, the shame and other shit that wrapped tight around‘grave disservice,’and it felt fuckingwrong. The only thing that didn’t was a thin cord of something not unlike relief threaded through it. And fuck him, Bo couldn’t look away.
(He could all but hear his aunt, with her,“I swear, Bo, you’re like a damned cat watching a bird. Don’t just stare and twitch your tail, waiting to pounce. Go knock something off the counter already before I spray you with water.”)
“What–” Bo started before shutting his mouth with a click. There were too many questions, and still the itch in his palms to touch. He might have jittered out of his skin if not for the soft flutter of the man’s pulse against his thumb.
“Don’t worry. That bit passes.” He still held Bo’s wrist, glove muffling the heat of his fingers. “I’m going to sit down. Then I’ll answer any questions you have.”
“Good, ’cause I have a lot of fucking questions.” Bo’s attention trailed to the fingers wrapped around his wrist, then to his own thumb still resting against the man’s pulse. “I go by Bo. What about you?”
The stranger hesitated, unmoving. Bo didn’t budge either because moving meant movingaway. And fuck him if the placid look in the dude’s eyes didn’t throw Bo through a fucking loop, contrasting with the torrent of shame and guilt that wasn’t fucking Bo’s.
Talk about a goddamn mindfuck.
“I’m called Everil,” the man said, soft as snow. Almost as cool.
And maybe someone who didn’t have a ‘Goodfellow’ or ‘Cedardusk’ in their family might have had something to say about a first name like ‘Everil.’ Bo was not that person.
“Hi, Everil,” Bo said, just as quietly, a half-smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. He ought to let the guy, letEverilstand up. Bo ran his thumb up from Everil’s pulse to the square cut of his jaw. “Let go and move back a little for me?”
Everil’s grip tightened on Bo’s wrist. A feeling ofbristlingthinned out the oil-slick guilt and concern, emotional hackles raised at the mention of releasing him. Nothing aggressive. Desperate.
There and stifled, Everil leaning into Bo’s touch with a reluctant, “As you wish.”
He shifted back, letting go of Bo with a single, pained inhale, then locking his fingers around his own wrist, like he was trying to keep from shifting back in or taking Bo’s again.
As he wished, and Bo’d been right, the distance was fucking terrible. No more crisp winter mornings. Only a need to reach out. To touch.
Bo took a moment to tug off his gloves and let them drop to the sofa. His fingers didn’t quite shake. Bo blamed the sudden heaviness of exhaustion. Or hunger, maybe. He’d only eaten a couple breakfast bars. It couldn’t be because he’d stopped touching Everil.
He still slid off the cushions and onto the floor, using his now free hands to make sure he didn’t fall straight on his ass. Breaking a tailbone sounded almost as bad as Everil’s fingers uncurling had been.
It’d gone from cool water and crisp air to skin tight with sunburn. Bo fucking hated being sunburnt.
And there they were.
