13-Jun-2001
Heero didn't notice that Duo was even there until he heard a softly intoned, "Hey," through the crackling noise of the ballroom. Elegant strings of diamonds were looped from chandelier to ceiling, sparkling crisply in the low lighting. Duo leaned casually against a windowsill, a champagne flute rolling between two fingers. Around them, guests dressed to the nines in watered silk and thick strands of black pearls milled around, grains of sand without purpose.
Duo had loosened his bowtie, letting the black ends dangle around the open collar of his dress shirt. His hair was loose around his face, pulled back into a more flowing version of his war-time braid.
He looks wonderful, thought Heero. He swallowed hard, pretending to be surprised in order to gain time to think of some sort of suitable response. It was times like these that he wished he had been born an aristocrat, armed with an arsenal of meaningless phrases that were mistaken for conversation. "Hey," he said, taking a calculated sip from his own glass.
"Nice party," said Duo, in such a way that Heero knew immediately that Duo despised it. "I had about six offers to turn my life into a movie from sleazy producers. The nerve," he said, his eyes flicking nervously to Heero's, and then dancing away.
"The nerve," said Heero, sitting gingerly on the edge of the sill next to Duo. He was hyperaware of every inch of exposed skin, of the proximity of Duo's hand to his knee. Not wanting Duo to think that he was afraid of him, he lifted his gaze to Duo's face. "How much longer do you think this party's going to last?" he asked, feeling stupid about the small talk. His voice trailed off at the end into indiscernable mumblings.
"Come again?" murmured Duo, leaning closer.
"Nothing," said Heero, embarrassed for having posed such a stupid question in the first place, let alone being asked to repeat it. He wondered if he was the only person in the world to ever feel like that, or if it were a universal emotion that flared in the presence of a loved one. As if able to read his thoughts, Duo smiled.
"No, seriously; I want to know what you said." He turned to face Heero, his broad shoulders cutting off Heero's view of the party. They hadn't, thought Heero, been quite so wide during the war. It made Duo look older, attractive in a masculine, earthy way instead of an innocent one.
"Okay, folks!" They both jerked as the voice of the MC blared out from a set of speakers positioned just over them. Heero winced; the mood, whatever it had been, was ruined. "This is supposed to be a party, not a funeral! It's Relena's twenty-first birthday, and I won't have any wallflowers!"
Around them, the socialites laughed at the non-joke and began pairing off for a slow dance. A disco ball descended from a ceiling trap door, casting flickers of light over the people. It was the perfect setting for a first kiss, thought some traitorous part of Heero's mind.
Heero could feel Duo looking at him. His gaze was warm on Heero's neck, making his spine tingle. Heero hoped Duo would ask someone else to dance. Heero hoped Duo would ask him to dance.
"That means everyone," said the MC, laughing into the microphone as a spotlight swung around the walls of the room, illuminating the few who had decided not to dance. A warm, slightly moist hand closed around his, yanking him onto his feet. That same hand rested hesitantly on his waist, guiding him to a relatively empty space.
"What a jerk," said Duo. Heero couldn't ascertain Duo's countenance, and remained silent. "I mean, some poor sap might not know how to dance properly, and now he's got to go find some lady willing to have her feet stomped on." Heero stifled a soft chuckle as he felt the tip of Duo's dress shoes nudge his.
"I'm sure there are people willing to dance with the poor sap," said Heero. His heart pounded faster as Duo's hand slipped an inch, his long fingers stroking the bumps of Heero's spine.
"Maybe so," conceded Duo, "but this guy, this silly 'baka', as you like to say, has his eye on someone else." Heero bit his lip, glad for the dark. His face was burning in a way only Duo had ever managed to coax from his blood cells.
Then Duo knew how Heero felt, and he was gently telling him to back off. Heero forced himself to speak before he made a bigger fool of himself. He would bow out of the running gracefully.
"I'm sure they'd love to have you," said Heero.
"I'm glad you think so," said Duo, and Heero was pulled flush against him, feeling light breath tickle his cheek.
Duo's hands burned their imprints into his body; Heero resisted the urge to focus intently on that sensation of heat soaking through his clothes to his skin. Instead, he concentrated every particle of his being on the thumb that was raising his chin, the lips that were brushing delicately over the sides of his face.
"Heero," said Duo, papery chapped lips creating a deeper ache inside Heero. Every place Duo kissed tingled, longed for that touch again. The song was about to end, and the lights were brightening, but it was still dark enough that they would be able to leave unnoticed.
Duo waited, though, until Heero wound their fingers together, bringing their clasped hands up for a closer examination. The clamshell pattern of the alternately tan and white digits seemed alien.
"Let's go," said Heero. Duo didn't argue, but raised Heero's hand for a kiss, licking one knuckle so quickly that Heero wouldn't have been sure if it had happened or not, except for the cool air gathering around the moisture.
Outside, the sky had lit all its precious candles for them, or so it seemed to Heero. Taxis were lined up curbside, waiting for the outpouring of people at the party's end. Heero climbed in after Duo. Every inch of his body screamed for more contact, anything more than a palm and five fingers.
"Where ya going?"
Duo never hesitated. "35 Park Avenue," he said, looking at Heero.
The car ride seemed too short for a transition to somewhere, someplace that was to etch its own importance into Heero's life. Duo's hand engulfed his as they sat in the backseat, watching Duo's home arrive with its smiling windows and kind shutters. Heero felt so small, like seaglass pounded on by giant cresting waves.
"You gonna be okay?" Duo's voice never failed to send shivers through him, warming in his shoulderblades. He was sure that if someone had taken a body heat image map of him at that moment, they would see reds and blacks swirling around in a confused jumble, coagulating in his hips and his face.
Heero nodded his head, not trusting his own voice. How many nights had he dreamed of this, of Duo holding him and kissing his hand, over and over, until his heart simply _exploded_ in a scattering of four- pointed stars? Too many, he thought.
"Good," said Duo, leading him inside and upstairs.
The lights were on all over the house; their bodies, thought Heero disjointedly as Duo laid him onto the bed, must have given off gray silhouettes on the shades that anyone, the neighbors, the cab driver, could have seen. Then Duo kissed him on the mouth, and he didn't bother with the cabbie or the woman that could have sat with binoculars on her front porch and seen everything.
Duo pulled away after a moment, simply staring down into Heero's eyes, willing him to understand.
"You too," said Heero, exhaling softly as Duo smiled for the second time that night.
"I'm. I hoped." Duo swallowed. "I'm not good at this."
"Me neither," said Heero. He wanted to kiss Duo again. He wanted to curl up and die in Duo's arms, because nothing else in the world could have been more perfect than that moment of admission. There was no point in living if he'd already encountered the peak of his experiences.
Heero looked at Duo, and saw the same struggle moving galaxies and shooting stars in his eyes.
Physical desire won out over transcendental bliss. They struggled past secret buttons and seams that were really zippers, shoes with impossibly knotted laces, laughed over mismatched socks and the patterns of boxers, until they were both naked and trembling.
Heero pulled Duo down for a kiss, gasping as the smooth silk of Duo's belly was replaced with the prickly thatch that preceded his hard length. What he hadn't known he'd wanted rushed at him in a blaze of heat and rained kisses. He tried to find a place to rest his hands, rubbing Duo's shoulders, locking them around his neck, and finally slid them beneath the pillow. The position stretched his belly taut, bringing the lines of his ribs to the surface.
Duo licked his lips, moving his hips a bit. The warmth of Duo's erection was almost comforting, as it was ultimate proof of his desire. "Want you," he rasped, holding Heero's waist, rubbing just below his navel with the rough pad of his thumb, and that felt quite nice to Heero, who was conscious of the blood rushing to his face. He was suddenly dizzy as he curved his back into a near u-shape, opening a hollowness in the pit of his stomach that demanded to be filled.
Heero, judging from the movies and books he'd skimmed, didn't think that a touch like that was supposed to bring such intense pleasure. Then he thought that anyone who could describe lovemaking in lurid, precise detail had probably never been with someone as Heero was with Duo.
A slight caress on his hip bone, stroking the place where a rainshadow would hover if his hips were mountains, melted into a kiss just above his collarbone. The two were inextricably connected. There was no proscribed method; no 'first this', 'then that'. Even as Duo ran the backs of his hands over Heero's inner thighs, his knuckles brushing so lightly that Heero broke out in goosebumps, he could feel the kiss and caress as if they were still happening.
And so it continued, until Heero was floating, feeling Duo on every part of him, with him everywhere. "Duo," he whispered, wondering if he was supposed to cry his lover's name, or if he was to stay silent despite the bucking of his hips, the weeping desire that trickled down his own arousal. People in movies never seemed to do much moaning; they cursed and called for God to damn it, gritted their teeth and took it like men.
Duo wrapped his hand around Heero's erection loosely, forming a tunnel with his roughened skin. That part of his body was something that hadn't received a great deal of attention in the past, but now Heero lifted his head from the pillow, trying to watch the feathery pumps that made his thighs turn inward and his cock swell, raising into the air.
"Stop thinking," said Duo, kissing him until Heero laid back down. Duo's cross hung down near Heero's face, the plain gold glinting in the spare light. He was uncut, and the velvety foreskin rubbed between Heero's cheeks, stimulating pleasure centers he hadn't known he possessed.
He urged Heero to lie on his side as he wrapped an arm around his waist. Moist fingers slipped inside him with silent ease; the discomfort was quickly spiraling out of control, past the boundaries of pain. Heero searched for Duo's other hand again, holding them against his chest like some kind of protective barrier against his own urge to bolt and never let anyone touch him there again.
He pressed a sloppy kiss to Heero's shoulderblade, smiling as the wing-like edge of it flexed beneath his lips. Somehow, unbelievably, it took the edge off the sickly sweet pressure between his legs, making it bearable enough for Duo to enter. Duo lifted Heero's upper leg, sliding his own pale limb between them, and began to move, first in tiny loops, then in harder, swinging thrusts that made Heero think of the arc of a door slamming shut, again and again.
Heero closed his eyes, letting the soft murmurs of encouragement echoing in his ears and love guide him into a place where only Duo, and the pleasure he woke inside Heero, existed. His fingers trembled and his mouth dropped open as his lover's thrusting pushed him over the edge into a white fire that gushed through his veins and pooled in a trembling mess at the cave where his thighs met.
"Duo..." He sank bonelessly back against Duo, letting the other man support his weight. He could feel acutely every breath that passed through him. The air seemed so cold after the warmth that had consumed him only seconds before. Heero blinked slowly; every time he closed his eyes, it took a little longer to open them than before, until he was fast asleep, still clutching Duo's hand.
Duo unwound their limbs and drew up the sheets to their waists. In the darkness, he let his hands play over Heero's skin, a map of the beautiful world that he now knew by heart.
The End
{title is from that cheesy Backstreet Boys song, off their "millenium" album}
Bianca
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