Page 13 of The Scent of the Ideal

“Sorry, but you left?” Katoh demanded. Rafi imagined her hands on her hips while she loomed over him on the bed, but he didn’t twitch the blanket down to check if he was correct. Cambray had just had to run to Katoh to inform her that Rafi had returned earlier than expected and was now lying exhausted on his small bed with a blanket over his face. “Was it that bad?”

“Perfect. You’re perfect,” Viau panted against the back of Rafi’s neck before shoving his head down to thrust into him hard, with Rafi begging him to.

“No,” was all Rafi said in answer, his throat rasping and raw in a way that no amount of water could soothe, though he had guzzled the water a blushing Cambray had fetched for him and then downed the water Katoh had also given him.

He felt not unlike the morning after a night’s drinking, though without any nausea. A consequence of coming so many times and of all the lubrication he’d spent all over Viau’s bed.

And in his mouth and on his fingers.

Rafi swallowed. “No,” he said again.

The reluctant admission must have done something to appease Katoh, because she laughed shortly and backed off. Cambray’s bed creaked as she sat on it. “Told you that you’d have a good time. I bet he’s good at everything.”

Rafi didn’t have much basis for comparison, but judging from the heaviness in his bones, the pull of nearly every muscle, and low throb all through his blood when he thought about what he remembered, he would have to agree.

Exactly what he also would have expected, if he’d allowed himself to think about it beforehand and also had intimate knowledge of how Viau treated his lovers.

Yet he didn’t want to emerge from his blanket, or move from his bed, and the weight in his bones had spread to his chest.

He pushed out a long, tired breath.

“That’s why you’re supposed to stay,” Katoh chided him. “Well, one of the reasons. Your partner or partners are supposed to take care of you so this doesn’t happen. You know miné love the chance to pet and spoil afterward. Most of them, anyway. There are probably some true assholes out there, like with anything. But you are supposed to laze around and let them bring you water and food and get too excited about helping you clean up. Laure once….” She stopped abruptly. Rafi wondered if she’d actually gotten embarrassed for the first time in her life. She cleared her throat. “Like, one, you’re tired, too tired to care for yourself properly and they are slightly less tired. But equally important, you asked them for a lot when you weren’t in your right mind. They want to make sure you’re all right, and you give them that, and then you both feel better.”

“I wasn’t going to inconvenience him further.” Rafi had explained that to Cambray too. Cambray hadn’t snorted and laughed at him.

“What did he say about that?” Katoh demanded. “Oh shit,” she went on with Rafi didn’t answer. “You snuck out?”

“He was sleeping,” Rafi defended himself, scratchy-voiced and burning hot beneath the blanket.

Flat on his back on the side of his bed that got some afternoon sun from one of his room’s three big windows, Viau hadn’t seemed real. Even the shadow along his jaw, the dark beneath his eyes, and the fall of his curls, tangled from Rafi’s hands, had only made him more beautiful. He hadn’t had a stitch on except for a strip of a sheet covering him. But ogling while in aedis was not at all the same thing as ogling while in his right mind, so Rafi had turned away.

Viau’s room wasn’t huge but it was larger than any students’ shared rooms. The second floor of an older building now housed instructors and those like Viau, who were granted privacy that students weren’t. Signs of Viau’s comparative wealth showed in the size of his bed, the curtains for it, the amount of bedding he had shoved carelessly to the floor. That made Rafi cringe too, thinking of Viau waking up and having to deal with practicalities like laundry.

The curtains were likely needed in a room with three large windows. Even with wooden shutters closed, the room would be cold in the winter… if Viau ever closed the shutters. Each window ledge had held a variety of potted plants to soak up the sun.

The greenery was a splash of color against the white walls, the stone floor, the undyed linen bedding. The only other color had been the dark wood of a desk and chair, a chest, and a wardrobe. But Rafi had stared at all the green, his weary mind caught on the idea of Viau gently tending to plants.

It was hardly a kitchen garden. Rafi couldn’t imagine why Viau had them except for personal pleasure, and then had felt like a prying interloper and hurried to find his clothing.

Which had been folded on Viau’s desk. Rafi didn’t know if Viau had managed to sneak away to request someone launder Rafi’s clothes but assumed so, perhaps during one of the times Rafi had slipped into sleep.

More that Rafi had to thank him for. And he fully intended to once he was rested and had bathed. That would surely be enough.

“Sleeping?” Katoh was disbelieving. “Yeah, and then he’d have woken up to you gone. Raf….”

Rafi finally lowered the blanket to look at her and was grateful that the curtains were closed so the light was dim and that Cambray wasn’t there. Katoh had probably told him to get out. Miné certainly loved to do what Katoh said. It must be her sure manner.

“Laure cares for you. Loves you.” He fought the rasp to ensure his words were clear. “Vi… Viau will not be so invested in my wellbeing. And will certainly recover faster without having to bother with me, and then he can resume his duties elsewhere.”

Katoh studied him, probably noting the stubble burn over his mouth and jaw and neck even in the dim light. Rafi didn’t remember being kissed though he obviously had been. But even lovers of only a few hours did that.

“And you’re embarrassed,” she summed up. “Over aedis in general, or because it was him?”

Rafi considered pulling the blanket back over his head. “I asked for too much,” he whispered. “I exhausted him. He didn’t even wake when I tripped over my own boots and fell.”

Katoh snorted another laugh, then slapped her hand over her mouth. She tried to be serious. “Well, I hardly think he’ll mind that. He’ll probably jump at the chance to do it again… if you bolting without a word doesn’t change his mind.”

“I’ll write him a note,” Rafi insisted, but could no longer look her in the eye as he thought of all the things he must have asked for. He cringed back against his pillow.