Blue Always Knew
Do you think just like that
You can divide this -
You as yours
Me as mine
to before we were
Us?
If the rain has to separate from itself
does it say, "pick out your cloud?"
...Who we were isn't lost
Before we were Us
Indigo is his own
Blue always knew this
-"Your Cloud," Tori Amos
You’ll be home soon. Standing here on the porch, in the same place I stood on that night, whispering to the songbird perched on my finger – sometimes it is easy to be patient. Much easier where you are concerned. You made me no promises the last time we were together. You never do. You never tell me when you’ll be back, when you’ll visit. It’s always the unexpected with you, but I have come to appreciate that. It seems I have no choice. But I know you’ll be coming today, because you’re feeling the same thing I feel. Desire, aching, dry and needy. Desperate.
"But I can be patient," I murmur to the bird on my finger. It tilts its head inquisitively, beady little eyes gleaming like glass, as if to say, "Can you?" The grasp of its scaly talons around my finger is so tentative. It reminds me of myself, grasping onto life.
A sudden noise down the hall frightens the bird away. It takes off, lighting in a tree and singing in distress. It’s strange how birds, even when frightened or angry, can still sing and seem beautiful. The noise continues, a soft pounding growing closer and closer. Footsteps. You’re coming.
I need you. That’s all I can think about. You. Your body. Your eyes. Your voice. I need you more than I’ve ever needed anything, more than drink or smoke. More than any other body. It’s a hopeless, painful addiction, an addiction I have tried to curb. I should have listened to Hatori. I never bargained for this, for wanting you to the point where it’s all I can do to keep still; squirming in my chair during my meeting today, it took all my concentration to listen as they told me they liked my manuscript, told me they’d publish it, told me I was an amazing writer. None of that mattered then. All that mattered was you, wafting before my eyes, your come hither over-the-shoulder glances and beckoning smiles. I could see you on your knees right there, on the other side of the desk, your head between my legs. And now I can’t get to you fast enough, free but not free enough. My pants are tight, and so is my chest.
Your door is in view, steadily coming closer, until my hand is pulling it open and I’m standing framed in the wall. I’m breathless, but not nearly as breathless as I want to be. You’re across the room, standing outside with your back to me. You’re not wearing your outer robe. Just your light Yukata, your thin legs so pale in the sunlight. You turn to me slowly, and you smile. It’s not a seductive smile. It’s not beckoning. Your smile is so simple, as if you’re just happy to see me.
You start toward me. "Shigure..."
I rush into the room, barely closing the door behind me, and have you in my arms before you can utter another word. I devour your mouth, taming my kiss as much as I can. I don’t want to ravish you, I just need to be close to you, to be apart of you. You’re knotting your hands in my hair, pulling away to return my kisses with open-mouthed relief, as if you’ve missed me more than any person could ever stand. As if you need me as badly as I need you.
It’s a sweet relief to hear you open my door, to turn and see you standing there out of breath from trying to get to me. I can’t help but smile with it, my heart taking flight like the birds. Suddenly it’s not just the desire anymore, it’s the need to be with you, to be near you, and I realize that all this time spent waiting has made me less and less patient. It seems to have done the same to you since you bolt across the room and sweep me up against you like a hurricane, grabbing my face and kissing my very soul into oblivion. I want to taste you – I’m afraid I’ll forget what you taste like, so I taste you as much as I can, burning it into my memory and my taste buds. I thought I’d lost my sense of taste a long time ago, but you’re everything I’ve ever missed or dreamed – robust and rich and filling.
Your hands slide down to my waist, pulling me closer, almost off-balance, until you do knock me off-balance, lifting me up off my feet as your hands glide over my backside and down my thighs, pulling my legs around your waist as you lower yourself to the floor. I keep my hands clasped behind your neck, fingers threaded through the soft fall of hair gathered there. You’re kissing my mouth still, whispering against my lips, "Need you . . . Akito . . ."
I move my hips against yours, unknotting your tie and unbuttoning your dress shirt, sliding my hands over your skin with relish. I need this. I need your closeness and your warmth, as much as you’ll give to me. Your strength and your admissions of weakness.
I’m taking your little waist in my hands, losing myself in your delirious kisses. My mind is lost to me when we’re like this. The whole world fades into the dream of being with you, of this lust and love, so that we’re being engulfed in white, entangled in clouds. I pick you up, wrap your legs around me as I sink to the floor, only needing you, only wanting you. My body is here for you to do what you want with. My body is here for you to use.
You’re unbuttoning my shirt for me – oh, thank you, thank you! – and your hands are cool inside my shirt, my clothes an oven and my body like a roast. You rake your nails over my skin, across both my nipples simultaneously, making me whimper into our kiss and pull away. You latch onto my throat, suckling skin, and all I can do is pant into your ear how much I need you as I’m pulling your robe off. Every time I get you naked I’m a little taken aback by your body. Your ribs and their bitter glare through your skin, your grace even in such decline. I admire this about you. The way you move against me even now, so graceful, thrusting your hips gently as you untuck my shirt, unbutton my pants. Reaching inside to touch me . . . touch me . . .
"Touch me . . . touch me . . .," you whisper even as I’m doing so. You’ve been hard for a long time it seems. You’re already wet. Have you been wanting me this badly? Been waiting for me this long? Your hands sliding over my ass, up and down, gripping and kneading as I caress you. Your hands are making me twitch in response, making me wish you had four arms so you could keep kneading my ass and touch me where I want it most. I could never get this desperately aroused before, not with anyone else, not thinking of anyone else, only with you. And I love the feel of you in my hand, your thick length, me knowing I’m doing what you want me to do, making you understand that I love to touch you.
My kimono is hanging on only by the bend of my elbow. There’s something so very arousing about making love with your clothes on. I don’t push your shirt off, you don’t try to get out of your pants all the way. We’re exposed as much as we need to be. It’s the closeness that matters. Not the skin or the touch or kiss. My eyes open to look upon the crease between your brows, taking in the whole experience.
I start to move away, going to bend and take you in my mouth, but you hold on to me, muttering gruffly, "No."
Oh no you don’t, I’m thinking as you start to pull away, bending and gripping me in that familiar, preparatory way. I don’t need that, I just need you and I will make you understand this. Holding you up, you look up into my eyes with a question, almost hurt in a way – those big seductive eyes of glazed tanzanite bringing such a longing to hold and protect and comfort to my heart that I feel fit to burst. I wrap my arms tight around you and pull you as close as I can, kissing your mouth, taking it hostage with my tongue so that you will have no more doubts. You moan into my mouth, arching against me and touching me with relish, your narrow chest pressed flush against mine. You’re hot and your small and your soft and sweet, so delicious and perfect. I run my hands up and down your thin thighs, smooth as a girl’s and trembling against my touch, thrusting forward into your hands as you add a second grip. I press my mouth to your throat, murmuring and groaning against your skin while simultaneously gnawing the creamy flesh. You’re panting in my ear, your lips warm and wet against my skin and your breath full of need and desperation as you chant my name in a helpless prayer – begging and riding and writhing.
I fumble with one hand in my pants pocket, pulling it inside out as I remove the lubricant I stuck there earlier. It’s gotten to where I don’t leave home without it, and if I weren’t so preoccupied I would laugh at this. But laughing is something I can’t do – it’s simply not on my mind as I flip the cap open and liberally anoint two fingers, doing it blindly as I continue to lick and gnaw on your throat and collarbone. You can sense it coming. I know not only from your, "Hurry . . . hurry, Shigure . . . please . . . God . . .," but also from the way and push your hips back, as if searching for my fingers, aching to be penetrated more than anything. I am still surprised by how wanton you are. It’s everything I’ve ever wanted – a partner as hungry as I am, if not more so . . .
I know what you are doing and I am impatient for the result. Your mouth against me and your chest against mine – your stomach and your hips and the line of your groin pressed to mine – it makes me wonder how I had ever lived without this. Without knowing you or needing you. It makes me wonder how I would ever live without it if you were to take it away. It makes me afraid, and fear is something I don’t show to anyone. I couldn’t dare. But I think I could show it to you, because I think you would understand. And that scares me most of all.
Your left hand has a hold of one ass cheek, pulling and spreading me opening, and I hold my breath as I wait for penetration. Your slick fingertips massage my entrance for only a moment before pressing inside, fast and eager, barely giving me time to grunt and register anything that could be considered pain. No . . . I don’t feel pain. I never feel pain when I’m with you. You take it away. You make it something else. You transform me. Your touch – in and out, probing up, sending shocks of pleasure ringing through me and out my throat in heady moans demanding more; your kiss – lips burning against my chest and littering my skin with bruises that you will apologize for later, but that I will look at when I am alone and smile to myself as I touch them. I cherish the evidence of our time together. I like the thought of being yours. I like the thought of you as mine, even though there is something painfully deceiving about it . . .
I throw my head back, riding your fingers as you pump them in and out of me. I pump your sex in both hands, until you suddenly withdraw from me and are taking my hands away from you. The fingers of your right hand are hot from being inside me. It gives me a sweet thrill to feel them against my skin as you put the lube in my hand and ask in a husky voice to put it on you. I feel delirious, leaning my forehead against your chest as I do as you ask, slicking you up and down, purposely putting pressure over your slit and watching your muscles tense and feeling your hiss of breath in my hair.
"Akito . . . please . . ."
Oh yes, say please . . .
"Akito . . . please . . ."
Your wet touch is enough to drive me insane. I dig my fingers into your backside and pull you up, and together we guide me into you. I slide into your heat easy, sheathed in you so that there’s no space in between where we connect. And now I couldn’t tell you which is you and which is me – it feels as though everything we feel, we feel the same. The way your eyes fall closed, the way you tilt your head back, the way you grip onto my upper arms and whisper a small oath – I know exactly how it feels. I see you differently – the backdrop of midday sun and your glowing skin combine to make a pale golden aura around you. I think I can feel it inside you as it emanates out, pulsing to the tune of your blood. There is no beat to your body. It is a freeform melody that whispers and sings. Ashen and delicate and ethereal, heavenly and pure, how the angels sound in chorus.
Your hands slide down to my chest as you lift yourself and then press down again, groaning from deep in your throat. I feel it reverberate through me. I hold onto your thighs again, using them as my grip and my guide. I keep my eyes on your face, taking in every little nuance, every breath and flutter of your eyelashes, waiting for you to say my name and reach down to touch yourself.
"Shigure . . ."
It’s barely even breathed, wafting to my ears quiet as a feather falling, and your hand slips down my chest, my stomach, wrapping slowly around yourself and moving gently. I pull you against me and move into you, the world now blending into shades of gold and white that swirl and opalesce like the unreal and unimaginable. Soft, faint as clouds, so fragile. The pleasure in you and the pleasure in me, what is shared that’s not even shared anymore – just experienced, just is. The light is glittering, slick against your white skin and what shimmers in your selfish hand, arcane patterns dancing like sunlit dust falling through the air. Framed as you are in the light and glitter and your loose kimono, riding me and stroking you – your hair in your eyes, your eyes barely opening to look at me, your lips wet as you frame my name in a soundless plea. Moving into you is as simple as breathing – it’s as if it was always meant to be this way between us.
When I look at you I can’t describe what I see. All I know is that it’s you, and that’s all I care about right now. Just you. The arch if your length sliding into me, the obvious need in your eyes as you stare at me. You never look away. You don’t even blink. How could I ever stand up to this intensity? When did you become so bright to the eye, glaring like the light refracted through glass? Is it me that’s made you glare like this? Is it because of me that you’re so brilliant and hard to look at?
It’s getting hard for me to look at you. I’m slipping closer and closer to the edge – the brighter your face, the darker your eyes, the more intense the throb and clumsier my hand gets. You press a kiss to my lips with your eyes still open – it’s all I can do to stare back at you, the blacks of your eyes immense and eclipsing completely any sort of color they may hold. They’re hazy and strange, animalistic even, as if seeing something in me you would not normally see. Something no one else would ever see. Is that where I really am, captured in those filmy eyes? I stare into them as hard as I can, trying to see myself, but – oh God – your hands are bearing me down against you, grinding and lunging and I can’t keep my eyes open, but I try – with all my might, even though I have to pull away to make a sound, even though I have to let my body tense and shudder and cry out loud, coming on your stomach and your hand as you grab me at the last minute – despite this loss of control, I still manage to look into your eyes. And for a moment I think I see . . .
Until you grunt and moan and release inside me, thrusting repeatedly until I can feel you seeping out. I embrace you, delirious and sad that it’s over. You dig your fingers into me, curving your body so that we’re perfectly molded together, making sure every last tremor of yours is passed through me. I cling to you and think that now it’s over you’ll leave. I can’t bear the thought at all.
"Stay."
I barely hear you at first, still not over the rush of blood or the beating of my heart, the fading tune of your blood and the gentle cadence of your release running down my stomach, pooling for a moment in my navel then sliding on until it has gone full circle by returning to you. I lift my arms, put a hand on the back of your damp head, trying to not let the reality of our world sift in too fast. I want to stay here in these milky golden currents for as long as I can. I want to keep this carefree feeling, this feeling of importance and secrecy. Your jasmine smell – the smell I can scent on everything that is mine – is soiled now by sex and sweat, and somehow it saddens me, to have marred you like that. I get this way sometimes, when I wish it hadn’t come to this, when I wish it hadn’t taken fucking you to realize your true beauty. To know it only taints it. I hate compromises. I hate wanting everything. I hate needing something to the point of lunacy even more.
You whisper against my skin, so soft and forlorn, "Stay." I tilt my face toward you, not sure of what you’re saying. I’ve never heard your voice like this before – thin and weak and lacking confidence. It feels as though I’m hearing your true voice for the first time. So this is what Akito really sounds like? Are you really afraid of being alone?
You tighten your embrace, our clothes now feeling like a burden, irritating my sensitive skin. "Stay. Please." Trying not to cry. Oh, Akito . . . why did you choose me? I have no idea how to help you. I’m the worst person to ask such things of.
I stroke your back, pulling your kimono down to reveal more of your skin so that I can write out, "Whatever you want" in your sweat. You pull away to look up at me, hopeful and childlike. I know I should feel grateful and honored to see this face – this true face of yours, nothing more than a boy who is needier than even he suspects. But somehow it just makes me sad to be smiled at like this. I trace your lips with my sweat-tinged fingertips, then kiss you. Still . . . as amazing and unreal as it is, I wish it could be different. That we were different people in a different time, and being together wasn’t taboo or difficult or just for the sake of being together.
"Stay the night?" you ask, and I nod, somehow showing you my slippery smile. I rise and pull you up with me, and we finish undressing each other before going to your bed, where you curl up in my arms like a tiny child, smiling to yourself and telling me you’re glad. I wonder as I watch you sleep . . . is this love? Or is it something completely different? What do I feel when I look at you? Awestruck, lustful, warm, hopeless, protective, weak. Is this what love is about? Or is it undefinable . . . just like you?
If there is a Horizontal Line
that runs from the map
off your body straight through
the land shooting up
right through my heart...
Will this Horizontal Line
when asked know how to find
where you end, where I begin?
-"Your Cloud," Tori Amos