Little Things Ch. 02 of 04

"The reverse?" My tone soaring brightly, giddy, finishing the idea. He smiles shyly, nods, while I try to put on the mask of serious deliberation. Try to look like there's some real doubt before I casually answer "Sure," the nervously joyous energy tugging upwards on the corners of my mouth. Then I'm clambering up, sliding onto his lap. Perched on one beefy thigh, my legs draped down between his as I rest back against the solid expanse of his chest. A sigh that sounds almost shocked at its own satisfaction issuing softly from my throat as my head nestles at the base of his neck, as he draws up the blanket around us.

It's not a sex thing. It's...well...god, I don't know. Maybe it is, a little. But mostly I just feel warm here, with my cheek to his collar, his arm clasping close around my waist. Loved. I can listen to his breath, feel each inhalation lift me upwards a fraction of an inch, carried on his chest. I can let my hand drift on his body in aimless exploration as we watch the movie together, tracing out the princely proportions of his flesh as though mapping some new horizon. And all of it safe, without the worry of any judgment but my own, without the fear that some stray move will force me to choose between sex or being labeled a cocktease. Even our pose itself, snugly ensconced in his lap...for what handful of moments could I have this with anyone else before he would 'accidentally' grind his dick against my thigh, or fondle openly at my breasts?

Not that I'd mind so much, if David did. The thought wanders quietly about in the back of my head as we watch the main characters meet for the first time. I mean, I should mind; the idea ought to fill me with disgust, right? My brother, feeling me up. But it doesn't. I just remember the way it felt to have him look at me the other day, his gaze filled with such an adoring desire. The excitement of it, the warmth, the dangerous thrill that tickled in my heart. To go a little step beyond, for him to touch...his hands, large and strong, sliding on my skin, grasping, squeezing...

He doesn't, though. Won't, not on his own initiative. So we simply sit in close and comfortable silence, watching the tragic love that unfolds on the little screen. Forbidden, in its own way; a love across the bounds of class...though at the moment, that hardly feels a significant prohibition. Watching them grow closer, step by uncertain, fumbling step, until she's at his parents' villa, stripping off her clothes, revealing the humanity concealed beneath rags and dirt.

Whoops. A blush touches my cheek - I'd forgotten how explicit the film got. Trouble with indie movies, I guess; some of them really like to flaunt it. Right now, with the dark-haired male lead kissing at the heroine's breasts, it could almost pass for a porno, if the background music were less restrained.

And it has perhaps the effects of one. It starts out subtle, but within moments it's impossible to mistake the shape that stirs and stretches in my seat, pressing on the back of my thigh. David keeps staring ahead, eyes carefully fixed to the screen - hoping, perhaps, that I won't notice. Not much chance of that, given the size of it...I half-suppress a giddy sort of giggle. "I take it you like the movie, Davey." No louder than a whisper, in the close confines of our nest.

"Sorry." The blush breaks furiously onto his face, and he tries to pull away. Without much success, given how I'm perched on top of him. "Sorry, it's just, with you sitting there, I..."

"Shh," I murmur back, teasing and comforting all at once. A silly sparkle dancing in my head - his embarrassment, his modesty, can be so endearing. Impulsively, I turn to plant a kiss at the base of his neck, slow and lingering. Rejoicing in the sensation of his skin against my lips...though from the feel of things, this little helps to alleviate the hardness in his lap. "It's okay. It's a compliment." Pulling barely away, the words whispered into his flesh.

An uncertain flicker in his eyes. But he smiles tentatively, turns his gaze back to the screen, and we settle back again, the same as before. Almost the same. His manhood still sits thick and hard against my thigh, hot even through two pairs of jeans. Distracting. Tempting...no, dammit, not tempting, just...I don't know. It sticks in my consciousness. When I move, when I shift a bit in his lap, I can feel it respond. Feel him respond, the hand at my waist clasping barely tighter, unconscious and automatic, and I can feel by body's reaction, my skin growing warm, the little tickle of moisture down between my legs. The silent, thoughtless thrill of the animal inside.

Just the touch, the contact...my hand drops to his, at my knee, my fingers interlacing barely into the spaces between his. Just this sets such a tingle in my skin, like it's gone raw, tender. We can't do anything real, I know, but we can have this, right? I want it, need it. His touch. We share no words, but there's a subtle language of rapport spoken through slight and flickering movements, until his hand and mine slide slowly upward on my leg. His grasp moving with my faint suggestion, drifting across my clothes to set fire to the flesh beneath. He - we, I - moves aimlessly, drawn by the moment's impulse...slipping up my leg, his long fingers curled in an arc that seems to reach half around. Flitting past its fellow on my waist, fingertips pressing gently inward. Rising up to my abdomen, just beneath my chest, and my breath is shallow. The figures on the television are talking, but I can't hear them. Ascending the curve of my breast, moving inward so he can hold it, so he can squeeze it...my heart beating so damned fast...

"Um." A spell is broken, his voice abashed as he pulls his hand quickly away. I feel the heat on my cheeks, and I'm not sure if it's embarrassment or arousal. Fuck, I'm stupid. I shouldn't push him. Shouldn't push this. What am I even trying to do?

"Sorry," I murmur as I pull a little away. Feeling the irony, taking up his favored line. But what else can I say?

"What?" Softly surprised. "No, it's fine. I mean, I just...I thought you didn't want us to do that." And his honest blue eyes fall into mine, deep and searching.

A silence draws out, slow and lingering. I don't know. It isn't anything too bad, is it? Nothing too big, nothing against the rules...we both have all our clothes on, for fuck's sake. It's just...we're just...I don't have a word for it, nothing that makes it sound as small as it is, as small as it has to be. But I need it; my skin aches to be touched, seems almost to pulse with my heartbeat.

So once more I take David's hand into mine, stroke softly at his palm with my thumb. "I do." My head resting at his shoulder, almost nuzzling there at the top of his chest. My voice quiet, uncertain. "Um. You know, as long we're still dressed and everything, it's just..." My tongue still obstinately refusing me the words I need to minimize this, to play it off. "I want you to."

Another few moments' hesitation, and I begin to wonder if it's too much, if I've...after everything, after all of this, I've gone too far. But then his hand lifts away from mine with a deliberate slowness, rises to clasp with delicate insistence at my chest. Fingers outstretched in a grasp of cautious exploration, tiny twitches of motion feeling as electric sparks through the thin fabric of my shirt. I'm not breathing. After a moment, I realize that he isn't, either.

In the back of my mind, I'm reassuring myself that this doesn't mean anything, that no lines are being crossed...but ecstatic tension still rushes through my heart as David's thumb slides in a small caress across the upper curve of my breast, as his long fingers tighten in a soft and loving squeeze upon this sensitive skin, nerves sizzling with satisfaction at the tiny touch of strength. My lips against his neck, a fleeting kiss. A note of approval, a command to continue.

The touches begin in earnest now, a sigh escaping my throat as his hand moves in slow circles on my chest - kneading, squeezing, grasping, and my body aching with gentle pleasure at his manipulations. His arm drawn tight at my waist, pressing us together, with my hand resting upon his wrist. His cock, stiff and bulging under his jeans; I can feel it slide against me when I shift my hips, hear his breath catch and hiss in satisfaction, inhaled through clenched teeth.

God damn, just the smell of him...he smells of masculinity, the sweat of honest toil, a scent of sweat and earth. I bury my face in his chest, breathing deep, and I can feel the wave of liquid desire that flows through the corridors of my mind, heavy and thick, sweet as syrup. I don't know how he can have this effect on me; it doesn't make sense. It's not reasonable. But it just feels...I don't know. His fingers tickle gently along my skin, and I can't help a little sigh, a nuzzling deeper into his neck. It's hard to think right now. I don't even want to, not really. Just want to sit here in his arms, let him lavish his attentions on me. Want to be treasured, desired, cherished.

More. My hand guides his other down from my waist, descending those few essential inches to the juncture of my legs. His fingers touching, first with a tentative pressure I can scarcely feel through the rough denim, but soon strongly, hungrily. Insistently rubbing here at my most private place, my spine arching as subtle waves of pleasure sweep up from my center and crash into my mind.

The film's a faraway thing now, a quiet beetling I scarcely notice. All I see, all I feel, all I know is contained inside the forest-green blanket draped around the two of us, a world made of clothed caresses and pleasured sighs. Just these two inhabitants, clasped in this fierce embrace. Restrained by the fabric which separates us, his touch can't quite reach the intensity to drive me to the edge of ecstasy; it's a slower satisfaction which ripples through me as his hands draw and clutch upon my flesh. I drift in his arms, softly writhing in a puddling of tepid rapture. Feeling as though floating in a warm bath, as though I'm a flower carefully tended...nurtured, watered, made to come into bloom...

I don't know how long it's been. Don't much care. This could go on forever, David petting with languidly powerful desire at my breasts, between my legs. With every stroke of his hand, my hips push inward, meeting his pressure, wringing every drop of satisfaction from the contact, so that I sway in a gentle rhythm upon his lap...sliding back and forth, back and forth. It's a terribly hypnotic feeling, with my eyes closed, my face buried at the base of his neck, breathing in his scent - the hazy, euphoric timelessness of dreaming. Warm and sleepy and sexy, all at once; no thoughts in my head, just a fuzzy pink delight of sensual pleasure, tight and Tantric.

So there's a note almost of disappointment as my consciousness is slowly roused by a change in his breathing, a new depth and force. The faint shaping of words on his expelled breath. "Oh, god." Barely audible, even with my ear so close beside his lips. Another stroke, three fingers rubbing rough down the fly of my jeans. A sigh, a murmur in my throat as my hips roll hopefully against him, sliding on the heated hardness that lies concealed in his lap. Forward - His fingers tighten, his body stiffens, his breath catches and holds in heavy anticipation. And back - A slow, deep groan sounding beside me, his arms clutching me tight. An unwelcome end to the gentle attentions of his strong fingers, now sitting quiescent, let to loosely clasp where they lay.

It's some moments before I emerge enough from my daze of pleasure to realize what just happened. "David..." A whisper, to catch his attention. As if I don't already have it. "Did you just, um..." I have to suppress a light, nervous giggle; even if I think it's sort of cute, I know guys are sensitive about this kind of thing. "Did you just cum in your pants?"

Misery painted on his face, his gaze kept fixed to the wall, away from me. A little shake of the head. Not a denial, I can tell; anger at himself, a seething of shame. "I..." He tries to answer, and gets no farther. The words choking off as his lips twist with humiliation, self-disgust.

I feel immediately the bloom of sympathy, of pity in my heart. God, he takes things so hard. "Hey." My arms slip up, around his neck, and I swing around to face him more directly. "It's okay, you know?" A comforting smile curved on my lips as I look up sincerely into his eyes, trying to catch his gaze.

He still resists, turning his head aside. Trying not to let me see the glint of bitter tears that flashes from the corners of his eyes. "It's pathetic." The words forced out roughly, torn like an arrow from a wound. His hands hanging down at his sides, not touching me. Like he thinks he doesn't deserve to.

"No, it's not." I cram every spare ounce of earnesty I can find into that answer, into my expression as I stare back up at him. My fingers gliding softly at the back of his scalp. And just to press the point, I lean inward an inch to plant a kiss on his chin. Another on the side of his jawline, at the top of his neck...a whisper against the skin, fraught with meaning. "I was pretty much about to do the same thing." A bit of an exaggeration, maybe. But there's something else, something I don't have to exaggerate. "I did do the same thing, yesterday. When we were together on my bed."

His eyes flicker over to mine, wide and startled. Quickly narrowing with doubt. "No, you didn't."

"Did too." Lightly admonishing. A little smile, biting at my lower lip, thrilled and self-conscious at this confession. My hand at rest on the back of his neck. "You were too much, more than I could handle. You didn't even have to touch me." I raise an eyebrow, to accentuate the point. "So if you're pathetic, then I'm just as pathetic, myself. More."

He doesn't answer. Not exactly. A half-hearted shake of the head. But I can feel the quiet relief flowing gradually into his spirit, and as moments pass, his hands again touch lightly at my waist. Currents of warm delight circulating under my skin at the contact. I lean into him for another kiss, tender and wanting, biting ever so slightly at his lower lip before retreating again with a wry smile quirked on my face. Sliding off his lap. "I guess you'd probably better get yourself cleaned up."

The responding smile flickers on his face only briefly, weak and uncertain. But he nods, meekly. "Yeah...I guess I should." Lumbers to his feet. Embarrassment softly glowing on his cheeks as he picks out a new pair of underwear, and then with a final backwards glance, steps out into the hall towards the bathroom.

Alone, now. The film ended a while ago, flipped back to the DVD menu, an endless loop of somber piano music. I switch it off, and the silence that fills the room is almost deafening. A chance to think. I'm not sure if I want it. I mean...jesus. It's not that big a deal, is it? What we just did. It doesn't mean anything, it's not any kind of huge step. It was just a little thing. Nothing. Nothing to worry about, just a little harmless playing. That's all.

I can hear water, thrumming through the house's old plumbing. David, washing up. For a moment, I almost have an impulse to go after him, see the mess he's made. See his body again, slip into the shower after him, help him wash up...a little daydream of running a hand down his powerful thigh, collecting his spilled cream, and a flush breaks across my face, hot and foolish. Stupid notion. Not even something I want, not really. Just a silly idea, from the arousal that still whispers in my mind, awakened but unsatisfied by my time on David's lap.

I need to focus on something else. Like getting ready for bed; it's late enough. I slip out of my jeans, pull from my bag a large t-shirt emblazoned with a cartoon sunflower; by the time David appears again at the doorway - shirtless, his chest glowing with a faint sheen of moisture - I'm just about ready to slip into bed. Still perched on the edge of the lower bunk, just before the pillows.

"Feeling better?" My gaze climbs his body, lingering briefly on prominent muscle. Taking refuge in eyes of mild blue.

"Yeah." He nods, smiles a bit bashfully. Steps inside the room, closing the door with slow and quiet care. Not wanting to wake up mom and dad, I guess. A step closer; his eyes flicker down, taking in my half-undress. "Time to hit the hay?"

"Nah." Lighthearted sarcasm. "Just thought I'd take my pants off for the hell of it."

Silence. His gaze lies steady and careful, slightly uncertain, and I can feel my cheeks redden. Not funny. With what we've been doing...not even obvious that it's a joke. "Yeah, um. I figure you've got to get up early, right?"

A solemn nod. Another step closer; he rests a hand on the ladder to the upper bunk, his gaze now sitting just to the side of me. His breathing deep and deliberate. I realize there's something big on his mind, only a moment or two before he begins. "I was thinking, ah..." His voice faltering, burdened with a tremor of the same shame that had possessed him before his shower.

"Yeah?" My tone light, encouraging. Interested.

"What if we, um." His eyes close, and he takes a breath, steadying himself. Three seconds before they open again. "Do you think maybe we could sleep together?"

Astonishment. My own eyes shooting wide, shocked that he'd ask this, that he'd say it so openly - even with this stuttering hesitation, it's very...direct, demanding, for him. And how outrageous a demand; he can't possibly think... "David," I begin, cautiously chiding. "You know we can't do that, that's...I mean, it's way beyond anything we've been doing, it's against the rules, it's-"

"It is?" Faint puzzlement on his face quickly dissolves into abashed understanding. "Oh, no. No, jeez, I didn't mean...not sex. I meant just, if we could maybe, um, share the bottom bunk. Or the top one, whichever you..." His mouth moving briefly without words, the blush radiant on his cheeks. "If I could hold you while we sleep..."

Relieved laughter tickles at my throat, accompanied by a note of intrigue. "What, so you want to just...cuddle all night?"

His smile flashes small and hopeful. "Yeah, I guess. If you think it's okay..." His fingers curling firm around the ladder's metal rung.

A slight shake of the head, touched and amused. "God, you're crazy." Worries flitting through my mind. I can't completely dismiss them, though I'm almost inclined in that direction. "What if mom or dad came in? How could we explain sharing a bunk?"

"Well..." He hesitates. "I don't think they would. I mean, they haven't really checked in on me like that for a long while, it's always just been calling from downstairs." A pause, considering. "I guess we could lock the door."

"Would that even help?" I feel a bit of a killjoy, asking. But the sense of how this would look to anyone outside is a quiet terror crawling on my spine. "How could we explain the door being locked, then?"

David's gaze drops quietly to the floor, his body seeming to sag slightly forward. "Yeah." A disappointed murmur. "I guess you're right, it's a dumb idea. Forget about it." And he stands there awkwardly, waiting for me to rise from his bunk. Giving in so easily, with hardly a struggle.

Funny thing, that. I mean, you get used to guys being ravenous, demanding. You get used to saying no, even when maybe you don't feel it, because you're the only one who will. Because otherwise it's just a quick descent to debauchery, no one there to say 'when.' Hard to adjust to someone who's different. To someone who doesn't push, to the only question being "What do I want?"

"Wait." I speak it softly, glancing up into his sad eyes. "You know, if it comes to that...we can figure something out." A flicker of a smile. "Go ahead, lock the door."