Shadow

-~o)O(o~-

Shadow

-~o)O(o~-

Gods.

You wouldn't think it. No fucking way, that he'd look good like this. I've been told enough times that I would, and the only reason I haven't tried it is that I'm afraid I'd look too much like a girl.

And I would. I'm aware of the shape of my jaw, my nose. I've stared long enough; hours of searching for my roots well into my mid teens, hoping maybe, on a mission, on vacation I'd be able to see myself in someone else. In a woman, to be precise. I look like a woman -- not like I am one, but it did end up ringing true that it's a woman I take after.

I might look like one, but he doesn't. It's like someone poured tar onto an idol of gold-embossed ivory and it just happened to land in all the right places. Perfect black paiselys curve up to the outer ends of his eyebrows, set with chisled cobalt so bright in the sunlight slicing through the window blinds that it’s bleeding past the rims of his irises, like they're trying to hold more pigment than they can carry.

But the rest of it doesn't bleed; he's made of both sharp angles and curves right now, but every line is precise, edged, a sharp cutoff with no accidental haze between. It only smudges on its way up to his brows -- plucked, I think, not that they ever needed it -- smoke from a fire hot enough to burn blue.

It can't last long, of course, not with him. He's already raised a hand towards his eye, barely giving me enough time to catch his wrist. "I have an itch," he whines, and there's something weird in his voice, probably nervousness. He's not used to being stared at; no wonder my eyes tickled him. "C'mon, it's fine. I'll be careful."

His mouth; Hyne, his mouth -- something's been done to it, but I still can't put my finger on what. Slightly pinker, maybe, though it could just be a natural blush, and so blessedly shiny that the sun's drawn a white needle across his bottom lip. I'm running my own lip between my teeth before I know it, and I let go; can't keep my breath from bating as a short black fingernail teases at his left cornea, and when it falls away, my lungs still barely empty themselves. I didn't expect to find this when Quistis finally let him go.

I had no fucking idea that she was an artist.

I would have killed her if she dyed his hair, and I almost expected her to; she's never been one to appreciate the value of what she already has, in every aspect, let alone the good fortune of being born a natural blonde. Let alone relating that to the others who share it with her.

And she might -- the accusation felt too cruel in my head, that's why I didn't say it -- she might have been just that spiteful. I thought she might steal what he has with some awful dark shade to draw my attention to the incomparably dull flax she carries around.

But she left it, thank whatever deities are listening, just as it's always been, as it belongs, a king's -- a god's -- golden crown arcing between his temples.

I just called him a god in my head. He would laugh if he knew it. And he would blush, and try to hide his face without letting me know it because when he’s coy, it’s never on purpose, and that just makes me want to say it out loud.

It's like he's not Zell right now; so still and serene, just standing there, watching something outside that I'm not curious enough about to bother with. I'm not used to lusting after him like this, either; usually, I just want to be around him, listen to him talk, touch him.

Right now, I want to make him scream.

And all this came about by a stream of Friday-night chat bounced between a bunch of people so drunk they shouldn't have been talking in the first place. Embarassing things come out when people are drunk. I've asked them not to tell me what I said.

So, just for the hell of it, that's the best explanation I've gotten for Zell in leather pants (riding so low that I’m positive I should be seeing pubic hair) and 'boyslut mesh,' as he likes to call it, drawn up his arms and down over his beltline to do anything but cover him up. I probably said I would like it, or something more graphic, and everyone latched on to it the second it came out of my mouth and wouldn't fucking let go.

Whichds mds me to believe that either they weren't as inebriated as I was, or whatever came out of me was just too special to forget. I really should talk more, more like he does, so people wouldn't bother listening to what I had to say most of the time. If only I’d known before that in keeping quiet for so long I was backing myself into a corner.

Fuck, he looks good. The best thing about this, and I try to keep from thinking about it, is that he’s wearing my belts.

Mine.

He threw them around his waist in an afterthought, practically showing off the fact that he’s gotten even more used to handling them than I am. They hang lopsided on him, fastened on the first notches and still a little too big. Muscular, but his hips are narrower than mine. And his ass his smaller, but I’m trying not to think about that, either.

It’s like a tag. A marker, a big clunky red X that shines silver dashes in the light and dwarfs him. Anyone who sees him will know right away who he belongs to.

Shit, I shouldn’t be thinking that. I don’t own him. I respect him. That chair in the corner’s looking really damned inviting right now -- if I don’t get him out of my reach, we’ll both regret it. I can feel his eyes searing into my back, asking silent questions while I walk away, but then I sit down and he’s not confused, just understanding, grinning at me.

He knows when I’m having trouble keeping my hands off him.

And that’s always when he decides to bother me.

His hips flash like strobe lights as he moves out of the light -- the way those things bring out his curves sure reminds me of why I kept them – and the smile’s just as bright, feral and innocent at the same time. Only his.

The mesh and leather are such a far throw from his usual. He’s already complained about how it binds him, how the steel in the toes of his boots locks him to the ground. He’s used to disconnecting from it every chance he gets, but no chance for that today. I can see it in his walk, too, his natural fluid grace replaced by one that’s forced, rigid. Steps clunking over hotel-regulation hardwood. Stiff, creaking as he settles across my lap and tells me what’s been done to his mouth.

I would never have guessed that peach is the tase of sin. Sweet and slippery, coated in pure concentrated glucose, and I’m still licking him from my lips afterwards.

“So,” Coal dust, blacker than night, lashes more blond than they’ve ever been against the backdrop. Sultry whether he’s trying to be or not, though he doesn’t sound it. Soft lilt and fall, excitement crackles through the end of his thought: “Guessed what I am yet?”

I can’t do anything but shake my head, and my hands are on his waist, fishnet a scratchy contrast to the cool skin just beneath.

“Wouldja say somethin’ already? Too quiet, even for you.”

I know I haven’t said a word since my nervous goodbye, my distrusting glance at Quistis before she took him. “What are you?” I’d almost forgotten what this was about: AutumnFest, or some similar name, a Galbadian holiday, one of the many unrecognized by the Garden faculty until last year.

People dress up for it. Honestly, I don’t get it, but Zell’s convincing me to recognize it too.

“I’m a demon,” and he beams at me before his eyes turn to slits. “Gonna suck out your soul, baby.” A silent laugh breaks across his face as easily as it always has, probably because of the way my eyes widened. He gets better with innuendo every day.

“You don’t look like one.” It’s the truth. He could be coated head-to-toe in shadow, and he’d still look like an innocent. Must have been hell for him, sitting still while that woman painted his face, but he’s not hurt by my considering his efforts a failure.

Once again, he succeeds in knowing what I mean. “Not even a little bit?”

Alright, maybe. If he hadn’t stuck out his lip just now, and if he had redtacttact lenses and wings or fangs or something, he might. But I still wouldn’t see it. “No.” As long as I’m careful to keep my hands away from his face, it’ll be fine to kiss him again -- but those sculpted brows move upwards a little and he leans back, leather squeaking whipcracks across my lap.

“What do you think I look like?” His arms drape over my shoulders, lighter than their weight as though preparing to move, but they’re still.

I can tell he’s honestly curious. The answer’s probably a lot less complicated than he expects. Since I can’t look at him when I say it, I go for his right ear, and disguise the fact that it feels like this is a secret with my teeth. He tenses right up; his arms gain weight and his fingers find something to do in my hair. “Slutty little goth boy,” I explain, and I must have hissed it, because he sighs and pulls a little. “And…” I drop my hands to his waist; I have to mention it. “Me.”

He thinks it’s funny. “Like ‘em?” But he leans back, makes me look at him. Gods.

“Yeah.”

“Want ‘em off?”

“Yeah. But –“ he’s already fiddling with one buckle, so eager to please. I cover his hands. “We shouldn’t.”

“Why not?”

“We’re leaving soon, and I don’t want to –“

“Don’t wanna mess me up?”

“… Right.”

He considers – he’s good at looking like he’s gotten through a million thoughts within a few seconds – and suggests, “Can I mess you up? With me bein’ a slut an’ all, y’know.” He licks his lips, and I know exactly what he’s tasting, and I have to shift under him. “That’s how it should be.”

Shit, I really hope I didn’t make that whimper out loud. Shame on me. He literally does have me wrapped around a few of his fingers, twirling the hair behind my ear. I raise an eyebrow, tying to look sarcastic, and reach into my pocket for the hundred-gil bill I put there in preparation for the dreaded night out Selphie planned.

It’s not as easy as I thought it would be to slip it halfway into his waistband, and it’s a testament to how long it’s been when he takes it the right way and laughs. “That a ‘yes?’”

My pants are black too, but denim; normal and comfortable and loose enough undo with more deftness than he uses. He knows beyond a shadow of a doubt how badly I want him, and I wish he didn’t, because it’s giving him the confidence to keep from moving as fast as he should.

Yes, I’m selfish. When Zell looks like this, I’m allowed.

“So, whatcha want me to do?” he asks, Mister Conversational, as cool fingers reach inwards, draw me out. His palms are rough and scratchy with the netting that covers them up to his knuckles, fingers poking out individually through the holes cut for them – rough and textured and so horribly good that my teeth have already clamped onto my lip without getting my permission first.

Seems he sees this as the right time to elaborate. “Suck you? Fuck you?” He says it lightly, but his eyes are drilling into me and I can barely stand it. “Fast or slow? Whatever you want, baby.” Gods, he really does know how to play this role, pretending he doesn’t care. It’s almost scary. Almost.

I don’t want to talk, taking the initiative to push up between his palms, just short of painful. “Been hard since you came in… hn… that. Fast.”

“Like this?” He squeezes a little as he moves and it makes me wince – that was painful. It must have been some sort of test (that, or he wanted to hurt me a little, an incling the look in his eyes doesn’t disprove) -- his hands raise to his mouth and when they come back, it doesn’t sting like it did. They hum over me; slide and scratch, the brush of a fingernail, pulling softly. Everything he can do to keep away from pure rhythm, keep me interested, on my toes.

He’s so fucking beautiful, watching me without having to look at what he’s doing, some of the façade already falling. I have to kiss him, inhale him, touch him, worship him with my hands, not that I’m worthy. The net peels easily from his stomach’s hard plane, and I move on past a twich that tells me it tickles, breaking from his mouth only a second at a time to get the air I need.

Most of his weight shifts to his knees when I reach around his back, and it’s hard to keep track of precicely what part I’m touching anymore, and as long as it’s him, I don’t care.

It’s just part of the natural flow to follow down the soft ridges of his spine, to a waistline I forgot was so tight. He stirrs, shifts, but his hands don’t lose their metre. “Waitaminnute.” He’s maneuvering to help me. “You paid me, ‘member?”

That’s remedied easily enough. I take that bill and flick it away – the air catches it and it doesn’t go far, just a few feet before it flutters down, barely in sight. “Better?”

“Mm,” he acknowledges, tilting his head, eyeing my throat. Dangerous or promising, I’m not sure which, but the top of the seatback’s against the back of my neck and he’s getting pulled with me, minus the ‘eep’ he should have made.

So, I shove, right past the leather edge and that’s exactly the sound I wanted. His skin’s nearly sweltering; he must be dying, like I’m dying because his grip tightened at the same time. “Gods… Zell—“

“Do it,” a growled invitation against my neck, the tone for show, for me, but not fake, not forced. “Do something.”

This won’t work – his pants are too tight, but his words gave me a great opening – it isn’t fair, anyway; he shouldn’t be doing this to me while I – “Uhn” – sit back and get lost. I shove the belts downward, out of the way with a jangle, and the button’s pulling in the direction I don’t want. My damned fingers are shaking, and I can’t see what I’m doing because I’m trying to reach under his forearms and he won’t fucking stop moving.

Finally it pops from the hole, traces of bodyheat rushing over my fingers before I take him, pull just hard enough to guide him closer. He’s confused, I think, faltering before he figures out what I want: him against me, fingers tangling until we don’t know whose are whose.

He’s slick already, only a small part sweat, a little gasp and a flick of his hips when he feels what his mesh palms have been doing to me. “Woah that’s…” his eyes drift shut, “… good.”

Zell doesn’t learn much by deduction or logic; it’s experience that brings him his answers. It’s his reason for always being so open to the new – if he doesn’t feel it, doesn’t see it played out in front of him he doesn’t understand it, and he can never, ever predict it.

That means that this – our hands locked together, pumping in time and feeling the exact same things; that the friction he’s added with that mesh doesn’t only intensify it for me – it surprises him. His hips have joined in, moving against me to make it better, breath trickling liquid fire in the shape of my name across my throat.

“Hn… Squall, co-ould … mm… more… I need… ah -- please please…” I knew it before he asked; I’ve already detangled a hand from the mess we’re making. He leans back to take my middle finger into his mouth, just to show me, stare at me while he vibrates more sound through my hand and curls his tounge.

I can’t fucking take this, and he knows it. He knows everything.

His breath comes out in a sweet explosion that brushes my hair from around my face when I push inside him; I’m afraid I might have been to rough, too fast, my own urgency showing through. Either I’m wrong, or he’s forgiving: he throws his head back as he tries to draw me in to the next knuckle, quietly hissing a “Yesss…” that isn’t even touched with discomfort.

I’ve found what I’ve been probing for – a harsh angelic cry and he collapses into me and there’s pain, bolts of it shooting down my spine for a split second. It makes me echo him, finally, I’m at the point that lets me make sound, his name over and over again because I never know what to say, just that I have to say it.

Gods, it’s too late; it’s my heart swollen enough to explode and it’s his drawn out “Unnngh…” drowning out my own, it’s him tight and sweltering and hungry with every plunge and his hands moving erratically just like mine.

“Z… ell, I… n –“

“Come, baby, right now. I gotta … c’mon, gotta hear it.”

Fuck that, no, not yet, even though permission makes everything easier. I add another digit – dry but he likes it, added sensation that gives me what I want: his back tensed up, a keening moan right into my ear, hips bucking into me, against me, telling me it’s more than he can handle.

“Hnn – Squall – fuck me – fuck me – “ A warm rush against my belly, timed with contractions and I swear he’s fucking my hand, twisting against my arm, his voice dragging me with him and I can’t see anymore.

His name.

Over.

And over.

Too soon, I’m at that point that sharpens the nerves I’ve forgotten about. Keenly aware of his netted shouder against my teeth and wet from my tongue, the breeze from the window that means some passerby probably heard us.

He’s dead weight on me, relaxed, exerted, made of rubber, stomach hot and stuck to mine with his hands on my forearms. It’ll be a few minutes before he proves he’s not asleep – I could probably count it down to the exact second if I tried. “Zell?” I’m rough and still breathy. He doesn’t answer, but an instinctual twitch of his muscles reminds me to reclaim my fingers. “Zell, you’ve probably left a mark the size of an apple on me.”

I can feel his eyes, closed, on the side of my neck, pretending to blink in little spasms. Ruined, no doubt. That’s fine. “It’s the only time’a year you can tell people it’s part of a costume. Go with it.” He snaps back into shape, gleaming and alive as though nothing ever happened. If it weren’t for the sweaty grey smears mingling with his tattoo, he’d be able to fool me. “Do I look that bad?”

What am I doing, smirking? His grin leaves with mine, disappointed that I’ve let it go. “Yeah.”

“Hn.” He slides backwards, feet clunking to the floor, and doesn’t even waver as he thoughtfully reajusts his waistline and practically corsets himself inside that leather. “Guess I’ll hafta fix it, then. How bad d’you think Selph’ll kill me for being late?” He doesn’t pull down his top; it stays scrunched across his chest, out of the way of the wet sheen on his stomach.

“I think we’re already late.” I don’t want to move, let alone go out anywhere. Let alone even do my pants back up. “You know how to fix it?”

He rolls his eyes and brings a wrist to his lips. “’Course I know how to fix it,” he says before his teeth start tugging. One, two, and the netting tears, leaving him with the sticky palm of a glove to peel from his hand. If anyone knows how to edit a wardrobe in an emergency, it’s him. “Did it once, I can do it again.”

My brows move so close together it hurts, and he looks at me just before getting to work on his other arm. “What, you thought I’d let Quis attack my face with a pencil?” He laughs, rips again, and shakes his head at me. “Psh.”

Then Zell turns and heads for the bathroom. I’m on his heels. I have to watch him do this.

-~o)O(o~-