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A nightmare, he told himself. It was only a nightmare.

There had been so much blood that it had been gushing down the walls, and his mother had been screaming in his ears. The rain had been pouring outside, thunder crashing and lightning crackling around the house. The Man in the White Coat had been right there, leering over him, laughing and laughing, but he still had no face.

He didn’t have a face, only a black hole that threatened to swallow Jimmy completely. He had been sucked right into it, falling and falling, waking when his stomach dropped and everything went dark.

Panting hard, Jimmy tried to shake off the remaining panic from the bad dream.

It wasn’t real.

None of it was real.

The dull pain in his arm was unexpectedly welcome because it confirmed his current surroundings were tangible and safe. The nightmare was only that and nothing more.

He sat up, rubbing his hands over his face.

He was in bed alone and fumbled for his phone to see that it was a little after five in the morning. He could hear the shower running, but he didn’t dare disturb Cold.

The bathroom door would be locked anyway.

Jimmy reached down around the foot of the bed, feeling for something to wear. The first thing he grabbed was Cold’s dress shirt from last night. He smiled, pulling it on over his head and breathing in the warm and familiar scent of his lover.

He was far too awake to even attempt going back to sleep, padding out of the bedroom and into the den. He had been dying to get a peek at Cold’s vinyl collection, and it was the perfect distraction to settle his restless mind. He turned on a lamp so he could see. He could still hear the shower going and figured he had time to browse.

Carefully thumbing through the records, Jimmy was delighted by the names he found. Sam Cooke, the Pixies, Wild Cherry, the Coasters, Queen, Cheap Trick, the Temptations. He paused when he found one album all the way in the back that didn’t have any cover art. He picked it up, curious, and read its small label.

Suzanne.

Cold’s mother.

Jimmy couldn’t resist. He cautiously took the record out of the sleeve to set it on the player. He bit his lip, anxiously adjusting the needle into place.

It was jazz, warm and slow, and Suzanne’s voice rose up over the music with a strength and beauty that made Jimmy’s skin prickle with goose bumps. He tried to think of a singer to compare her to. Maybe Ella Fitzgerald? Billie Holiday? But no, neither had that faint rough edge that Suzanne did. Neither sang of love with such an intensity that it made Jimmy’s heart ache.

Jimmy stood there mesmerized, and he was pleasantly surprised when he recognized the next song. It was a jazzy cover of a Patsy Cline tune and he sang along, softly at first, but louder as the melody took over. Suzanne’s voice was beautiful, and he swayed his hips as he sang with her, feeling tears in his eyes as the music moved him.

So caught up in the song, he hadn’t realized someone had turned off the lamp. Strong hands rested on his hips, and Jimmy jumped, yelping in terror. He tried to whirl around to see who had grabbed him, but Cold’s voice was urgent.

“Don’t turn around.”

Jimmy froze, the words of the song suddenly lost to him.

“Please,” Cold urged. “Keep singing.”

Pressing as close as he could, Jimmy reached back to hold Cold’s waist and gasped as he felt bare flesh under his hands. Cold wasn’t wearing a shirt. It didn’t feel like Cold was wearing much of anything.

Cold smelled fresh and clean from his shower, and Jimmy’s chest swelled with the thrill of knowing his lover was naked right behind him. He closed his eyes and picked up the next chorus as he leaned against Cold’s warm body.

Cold’s hands moved over him, fingers lightly dancing over the curve of Jimmy’s hip bone, reaching up his shirt and tracing his sides and stomach, and gently rocking him in time to the music. Jimmy melted everywhere Cold touched, his voice stuttering sporadically as he tried not to moan.

Cold had never allowed him to be this close. His chin was on Jimmy’s shoulder and his arms felt strong, comforting, sliding easily around Jimmy’s waist with a familiarity that made his stomach flutter. Jimmy’s hands naturally fell to rest on his forearms. He was still singing, but he was also trying to take in every detail of the exposed flesh.

In the dim glow of the light from the record player’s display, he could see a wicked tangle of scars. Some of them wrapped around Cold’s arms like snakes, a few were broad lakes of keloided tissue, and others were thin cuts like a spiderweb etched across his flesh.

Jimmy dared to touch and trace every one he could see. There was tension in Cold’s arms at first, but it began to ease as the music played on. He let Jimmy explore all he wanted, his breathing soft at his ear.

Turning toward the sensation of warm breath, the last words of the song on his lips, Jimmy felt Cold’s mouth ghost over his skin, every muscle in his body winding up tight in anticipation. He wanted to kiss Cold so terribly, and he reached back to rake his fingers through Cold’s short hair to claim his lips.

Cold flinched out of the way and easily caught Jimmy’s wrist, tangling their fingers together as he groaned. Jimmy could sense his indecision and tried to press closer to tip the scales in his favor.