Page 21 of Topping Off the Alien

His eyes drop to my mouth, then come back up to meet mine. The pause stretches before he says quietly, “Not what. Who.”

I open my mouth to ask the next question, but the answer lands before I can get a word out. Because I already know it. I know it the way I knew the current between our palms wasn’t my imagination, the way I knew that night was never just a weird Halloween adventure.

Two people, he said. A conduit, and someone on the other side. If the connection runs deep, it holds the anchor open.

My eyes widen. “Are we holding it open?”

“It appears so.”

“So that means our bond...” I start, but I can’t even finish the sentence.

“Is holding the anchor open, yes,” he confirms. “It’s strong enough to keep a door in the fabric of space from closing.”

I want to say a hundred things, but none of them would come close to what I’m feeling. So I move instead, closing the distance between us and pushing up onto my tiptoes.

Sol leans down to meet me, and my arms go around his neck and his go around my waist. He’s warm all the way through, and the current ignites everywhere we touch, that low hum roaring back to life as if it never went quiet at all.

“I missed you,” I say into his shoulder. My voice cracks, but I don’t care.

“And I missed you, Wes.” His arms tighten. He presses his face into my hair. “More than I have the language for. In any of the languages I know.”

I lean back until I can see his face, and then I kiss him.

His mouth opens against mine, and our tongues slide together, my fingers fisting in his hair. His hands spread wide across my back and haul me closer until there isn’t an inch of space left between us.

We kiss until my back hits the shelving unit and a row of glasses rattles, and neither of us stops. We kiss until all I know is his mouth and the scent of him under the wool of his sweater.

When we finally break apart, we’re both panting. Sol rests his forehead against mine, eyes closed, and for a few moments I just take in how gorgeous he is.

“So,” I manage, once I’ve got the breath for it. “Does this mean you’ll visit me regularly now?”

“Yes.” He opens his eyes, and they’re bright. “If you want it. The anchor holds, so I can cross it whenever I choose.”

“If I want it,” I repeat. “Sol. Of course I want it. I want it so much.”

“You can visit Prasinus, too.”

My heart kicks. “Really?”

“Really.” He smiles again. “You would be the first human to walk on my world. And you would be my guest. In my home. For as long as you wished to stay.”

I try to picture it and fail. An entire planet, a whole sky of wrong stars, and Sol in it, showing me his home.

“I’d like that,” I say, my voice rough. “I’d like that a lot.”

“Then it will happen.”

We stand there a moment longer, forehead to forehead.

“Listen,” I finally say, forcing myself to lean back. “I need to finish my shift. There’s like an hour left, and I can’t leave my coworker out there alone. But after...” I take his hand, and the current jumps between our palms. “We could go to my place. And... talk more.”

Sol’s mouth curves into a smirk. “Talk. That sounds good.”

My face burns so hot I’m sure he can see it, even in this light. “You know what I meant.”

“I know exactly what you meant.”

“Oh, you’re funny now?”

“You were a bad influence,” he says gravely. “I expect it to get worse.”

I give him a playful shove in the chest, which accomplishes nothing except making him smile again. So I rise onto my tiptoes and kiss him once more, quick and hard, a promise instead of a goodbye.

Then I take his hand, and he threads his fingers through mine without being asked. We leave the storage room together, out into the noise and the light, and hold hands all the way down the hall.