For a Song Pt. 10

"I'm glad your home," she whispers.

"Me too," I whisper back.

---

My ceiling hasn't changed all that much. More dust and cobwebs, sure, but it is still the same ceiling I remember. It has that one whorl in a beam that looks kind of like a boob. It has that same streak of stain that looks like a number 7. It has everything the same as I remember it. And I close my eyes, but it is still there.

The other bed in the room sits empty. Kay would sleep there and occasionally mutter something before turning over. He would sit there and talk about Florence, the brewer's daughter, while I would talk about Edgar, the merchant's son. He never stuck around long, since his dad traveled so much, but we had our fun together when he was in town. And we'd try to politely tune out the noises our parents made in the dead of night by bitching about how Maman would make us run laps on the sand. Granted, we could never do as many as she could, so that level of petty competition always drove us back. We'd do it while we waited for dad to come back on land. He would be soaked and dripping and smell like fish, but those were also some amazing hugs we got. Neither of us ever got as tall as him, but we tried. Maman would cook back here and then we'd all have dinner together. I take a deep breath and turn over.

My feet hang over the edge and that is certainly a bit unnerving. There can be hands and mouths and monsters under my bed, ready to grab them and do terrible, terrible things to me. Sleep eludes me and I don't want it, really. I do want it, but I don't want its embrace. I don't know what I want. I want whatever's coming to happen already so I can get it over with and do something else.

I'm tired of the chase. I'm tired of the pursuit. I'm tired of the Weavers and the threads and the hunt for my head. I'm tired of new beds and new ceilings. I take a deep breath. Maman is making another pot of tea and the kettle starts screaming. Pure tone, nice and high. Good enough to shatter glass and break windows. It's nice. I turn again and I can't find my shape in the mattress. It should be there.

The door creaks open and I don't know if that's a thing I want or not.

"I think I like your mom," Gawain says. And I think Gawain is a thing I want. I scooch over, but it isn't enough for him. Eliza would be right out. He takes Kay's bed instead.

"She's good," I say, "She's really good."

"She's nice," he sighs, flopping onto the old mattress, "And funny. And really, really good looking. Like, I'm sorry, but it's true."

I shrug. It is true and it is my reality. Can't really deny reality. And I'm used to it. Maman and Dad and her were always all over each other. It is a little weird to sit with that fact, but it's been with me long enough to be familiar. Like a comforting rock in my shoe.

"You okay?" he asks, "You've been quiet for the past little while."

"I don't even know," I sigh, "I'm glad to be back home, but that really just kind of made me realize how much I missed home. And after this I'll have to leave and go somewhere else."

"You don't have to leave here. I don't think I would stay, but that's also a conversation for later. We are here now. No more leaving for the time being. And Eliza loves it here. So, she might stick around. It's something."

"Well, that's a bit better. But I'm not staying somewhere without both of you. You're both something I want to hang on to."

He smiles and it is beautiful. A bit smug to be adorable, but I asl tend to like a bit of smug in there. So that's fine. He lays down and stretches out and I think naughty thoughts as he moves. I know what every bar of his body is to me, and it is incredible. He knows what I'm thinking, and I know what he's thinking. The cups rattle on the other side of the wall. Eliza chuckles softly and I am a bit worried. Always a bad sign when the mom talks with the girl I brought over. SO many stories that are better off hidden and secret brought out in parade. She's building her armory to use against me, and it will be fun when she pulls them out. More blushing and fidgeting from me and he seems to like that.

"I'm honestly thinking about Eliza's castle," I say, "Can't really turn up the opportunity to live in a castle for a bit."

Gawain nods. There is wisdom in that, and he can't deny it. He gets bored of my brother's bed and slinks over to my side, sitting and crossing his legs. I watch his thighs squish and move. They're heavenly. I slowly push my hand to rest on them. He moves away like a tease. Unfortunately, there's no room to move away from me. He runs right into my shins, and I kick him back to me.

"No fair," he whines. I think it's completely fair. The bed is small and claustrophobic. I chose the battleground. He walked right into my trap. I am a tactical genius. I push him onto me and that wonderful weight pins me to the mattress. Nowhere to go for either of us, or I have no clue where we would rather be than right here. My hands are on his thighs and his hands are on my chest. I kiss his forehead. He kisses my neck. The bed protests and does not appreciate the crowded weight atop its poor frame. It needs to shut up.

"Is there ever a time where you don't want this," he murmurs in my ear.

"Why would I ever not want you?" I whisper back. I nibble his ear lobe and he shivers. It is somewhat of a silly question. There is another person in my vicinity, and I will always, always be in tune with it. His breathing, his heartbeat, it is the music of the world. I will always play against that and with it. I feel him shiver and grow excited as I work him. It's finally adorable. All that confidence and ego melts under my touch. I break him down and reforge him back to full. He is clay. I am the wheel. He is blushing and dizzy and lost. He is hard and pushing against my stomach. He loses the composure and starts thrusting. Poor little thing that he is.

I move us around and he helps as best he can. He finds moments to take off his shirt. He finds another to do the same to me. I do more with our trousers. It's easy for him and a bit harder for me. I have more work to do and my own excitement makes it difficult. He helps. He helps and it is appreciated. His soft hands glance my length, and he shivers once he realizes what he is doing. He realizes the difference and that is another sharp shake from his body.

He responds to every so well. He is in tune with the world and all of its surroundings. I am all he can see. I am all that he can feel. He is on top of me, and I feel him pull everything he could ever want from me. He works my trousers down further and further and we are all open and free. My length smacks into my stomach and my heartbeat makes it dance. He moves his stomach along the rhythm, and it is soft. There are hard lines of muscles under it all and that provides just enough texture. There is enough of everything in him, compact and concise and whole. He nibbles and bits like an affectionate kitten unsure of how to properly express it.

He slowly pulls away from me and I am cold. I forgot about the draft in the corner. Every so often, it bursts in and sends my skin into gooseflesh. It is wonderful. I feel my breath cloud and fade, just like his. He is warm. I am warm. We can be warmer, and we are slowly working towards that.

Gawain comes up to his knees and starts getting into the position. He brushes his hair away and burns his eyes into me. Red and smoldering and smoky. He is incredible. He is amazing. He is beautiful. He moves his hips in a lazy circle. Enticing. He is enticing as well. His hands creep down and make me stand up. He is hard as well, everything tight and bouncing and twitching. Eager, an eager little bead pools from his tip and falls down to my stomach. I huff and he giggles. Every noise he makes is a wonderful little instrument trull in the symphony that I live.

He lines us up and begins to drop. Slowly. I am a lot to take, and he does not have a lot in him. So, it is slow, my ever-present waltz through his body. I spread him and open him, and he takes it in stride. He knows what he has to do. I know what must be done. And it is slow, so incredibly, wonderfully slow.

We may not have forever right now, but over the future, we do. The forever is chopped and spread, thicker in some places, thinner in others. Hours and days every so often. Moments and minutes snatched between other obligations. But each moment has a sequel. There is no final roll where it ends that I can feel. He takes me in deeper and I start to see my shape poke through his stomach. I smirk.

"I love that," he says trying to keep his voice even, "I love the way you smile like that."

"Like what," I sigh.

"Like you're the hottest thing I'll ever get my hands on. Like you're the best lay I'll ever have. The best part is, you're not exactly wrong."

It is my turn to sit back in my smugness. I think it's earned. With the trouble he's having getting me even halfway, with the way the words stutter and stop, with the way he tries to stuff down the quivers and moans, with the way I effortlessly make him feel so incredibly sublime, I do think I am the best partner he's ever had. I can only imagine what he must feel when Eliza decides to join us as well. Such an overwhelmed little thing he can be. My hands go to his hips and try to get him deeper. He does. It takes a bit more out of him, but I can get a bit more to him. He takes it. His stomach morphs around me, and I like it. I like the way he grips and hugs and squeezes me. He takes a deep breath and then one more. We stay like this for a good long moment.

I buck and he squeaks. I have grown bored with this state of affairs and now I want movement. He takes it because he has no other choice. He tenses and another little bead comes from him and joins its place on my stomach. It is warm. It is burning. It is everything I have ever wanted. I buck and get another. I have found the perfect little sport to keep pressing and pushing against. And I do. I remind him that every single good thing he can get of life. I am here, right here and everything is right and beautiful.

He takes his hand to my chest and starts to ride with me.

"You really are the best," he moans, "Don't think I ever even thought it could be this good."

He is such a little kiss ass and I hate myself for falling into such a blatant praise trap. It warms my heart. It tickles my fancies to hear these words. I am the best. I am the peak of whatever the world has to offer. He rides me and receives it all. The beads come faster and faster until they turn into a slow stream. It forms a pool in my stomach and starts to flow and fill. It is warm and wonderful and amazing. It thrills my spine and I pull him down more.

He tastes like embers and smoke and shadows. He tastes like the deepest part of the night. He slides over me like a moonless sky. I am hidden and safe and calm. Some unreached pocket of the world where nothing has the idea of presence. I kiss him and roll my tongue against his. I slow a bit. The bed is getting loud again, and I have a modicum of dignity to preserve. This is my mother's house and while I am sure she knows what is going on, I still want to preserve the illusion of sanctity. Gawain moans into me and the noise softens into a deep mewl. He always responds with the best noises I think I've ever heard. I don't tell him that fact. It would inflate that rather terrible ego he can have. My ego, however, needs all the love and attention that it can gather.

The way he stifles a moan once he hits the hilt is all the attention, I think I can handle right now. It is beautiful the way it changes him, the way he purses his lips and scrunches his eyes. It gets even better once he starts to move.

Not the roughest or the fastest or the hardest, but it is a good middle ground between that and the gentle care we have to take. Mutti is busying herself with a household chore that I should probably be doing. Sweeping or wiping the windows or cutting some of the herbs. Maybe even prepping the seeds we've harvested. I don't know. It's been so long since I've had a house to keep. I think I will wash the dishes at some point, unprompted. Gawain's cheek on my sternum drives me back into the moment. He is trying his best to hold on for me. He is trying to remain in control. He is trying to assert the fact that I am deep within him, deeper than anyone else could possibly be and that alone is something miraculous. I kiss the crown of his head and start moving in earnest. He is doing the best he can, but it really only gets good when we both do what we need to.

It's a simple motion and I do it well. It's a simple act and it is never dull. In and out, moving around the spots he likes, the ones that make him squirm and writhe just as salaciously as he could ever hope to. I stroke his back with a bit of nail, just to give a bit of red to his pale skin. I'm tempted to write my name, but I think that is better spent with makeup and paint. This fades all too easily. On Eliza though, I think it would be more fitting. And I'd just keep doing it whenever it faded. It's a beautiful plan and one that I hope I can act out. All she has to do is stop being a responsible and helpful guest and help her host's son have sex. I think that is much more important than whatever menial chore I am slacking on. I reach over and give his ass a slap and I hope no one else heard that. That is for me and me alone.

Gawain moves up a bit to my collar bone and bites. He is trying to stifle it all and it is working. I swallow the noises he makes and go a bit faster. He gets louder, so I go a bit faster. My stomach is covered in his emissions, and I don't think he will ever stop, so long as we are doing this.

I feel the urge in me, and I see no reason to stop it. Clean up is going to be a bit awkward, but we'll manage. He's already so close to the edge and that is something I don't ever want to prolong. He's nibling and chomping and biting like an overstimulated pet. I stroke his back and torment him some more. Because I want to and no other reason. I play him and he is fun to play. That is all there is to this. It's all I could ever want from this.

He gives one last little yelp before everything in him starts twitching and writhing. His stomach clenches. His back tenses. He shivers and shakes, and I feel his warmth spread over my stomach in pulsing waves. Even after last night, he wants more from us. So, I give him more. My own core is tensing and cracking. My resolved falters and I give into temptation. I hilt in him one last time and let the tension free.

Like a bow and arrow, it is sent into motion, and I cannot stop it. I do not want to stop it. My mind is blank and warm like a blanket of snow aflame. It cracks and sparks, spearing the word around it. It is quiet, a soft whistle parting the wind. The bed creaks one last time and finally falls silent. We have our moment of stillness. We have our moment where the world falls away. Everything stops, frozen in crystalized amber. It is a masterpiece, the way he bites, and I scratch. Something so simple and primal rendered into being in a moment for us. It hangs in the air like a frozen raindrop. I fill him and he paints my stomach. Warm, I am warm and tingling on a bed of starlight that keeps creaking like an old painful joint.

His finishes before mine and I still am nowhere near close to done. This I was soft, but that doesn't mean it is small. A wide river carries many skiffs, and this is no different. I have no reason to be different. He is full of my seed, and I have every intention of never stopping.

My body does have limits and that's terrible. I feel it end in a sluggish surrender to anything and everything based in reality. The shots and pulses wane to a trickle then nothing at all. Shame. I wanted more. But I cannot have more. There are terrible limits to my body and then I need rest.

Everything is sore and aching and fatigue. No more strength in my limbs. Everything is slack. I collapse into the bed and hold Gawain close. HE slowly comes back to his senses and finds them suffused with night black skin and a meandering hum. I'm tired. All of my momentum is gone. I am at rest, and I will remain at rest until the world musters its strength to move me.

A knock gives us a start and apparently, I am much easier to move than I thought I would be. I scramble to put on my pants. Gawain has no such panic. He hides under the covers. Nothing bad ever happens under the covers.

"If you boys are done rough housing," says Mutti, "Eliza and I need some help strategizing for the siege."

"Ok," says Gawain, "Just give us a sec."

"Take all the time you need honey. Jackalope, you have until I count to ten."

She counts slow, but that is a hard line. The panic sets in and I can't find my shirt. Gawain pokes a helpful hand out and gives it to me. My hair is still a mess, and my neck has marks. Nothing I can do about that and nothing I should. We all know what's going on. We have no reason to hide anything. The elephant in the room deserves to be talked about.

I feel presentable and the snaking thumbs up from Gawain confirms it. I'm the best I'll ever be.

---

The table is transformed. There's a towel spread over the far end and that's the shore. There's the kettle and that's our house. A neat line of forks and that's the general flow of the streets. A lone sprig of thyme serves as the tree on the hill. I get to be old Mr. Hopper, a stuffed bunny that would make me cry in its absence. I fight back the urge to pick it up and squeeze it. Later. I will sleep with it later. Gawain rummages through Mutti's drawers until he finds a pair of knives. Those get to be him and Eliza. Mutti is her finger pointing right by the tree.

"So, I stay there and wait for the signal," she says, "Then I start playing."

"What are you going to play," Gawain asks as he sets the knives down. Eliza adjusts them to a more strategic position.

"No clue. I have a handful of ideas, but they depend on the mood. That's half of performance right there. Can't play sad songs to a happy audience. Can't play happy songs to a sad audience. Or I could just wing it entirely. I have a few improvised pieces that I've been mulling over."

Eliza huffs. Not a clear answer, but I don't think there are any clear answers here. A ship is coming up from the south and that's all we have to go on. That's all the thread we have to weave. That's more than enough really. I've worked with less.

"Are any of the townspeople trained at all?" Eliza asks.

"Hell no. Owen can brawl, but that's about it."

"Any weapons or forges or anything?"

"Gutting knives and spears and said Owen can hammer some things into blades. But that's about it."

I rub my temples. Eliza's foot runs up and down my shin. This isn't working. This isn't a siege. This isn't a battlefield. It's a small fishing hamlet that doesn't have a mean bone in its body. Hardened bones, dour bones, broken bones, but nothing mean. This is not an army. I connect with Mutti, eyes locked. Not the right mindset for this engagement.

"We could just talk to them," she says.

"We could just talk to them," I say.

"We can't just talk to them," Eliza says. Gawain is busy moving the pieces on the board to his liking.

"Why not," Mutti says, "None of us are in a position to do anything military like. I'm an old woman. My son's a tramp in every sense of the world. You're an ex-general who fights with a farm implement. Gawain's Gawain. All of us can throw a punch, but none of us can go against anything like a formation."

"If they start pillaging this place?"

"Then I will burn them to the ground with dragon song and melodies from hell," I say. Mutti points to me and nods.

"But that's scorched earth policy," she says, "So fuck it. Invite them over for tea. Schmooze and sweet talk and charm what we can. Threaten and lie what we can't. The option of violence is our last option."