Reposting Fic "Boyfriends"

[lobelia321]

I am having endless problems with LJ tonight. Now it seems to have zapped my earlier posting of this story. So: here's a repost!

Title: Boyfriends

Author: Lobelia; lobelia321@aol.com

Website: http://www.geocities.com/lobelia321/

Pairing: Orlando Bloom / Dominic Monaghan

Rating: PG-13

Category: Unashamed fluff.

Summary: Let's pretend to be boyfriends. Let's kiss and caress and make schöne Augen at one another.

Feedback: Yes, please, I would love feedback! Anything, even if it's only one line, one word!

Content/Warnings: RPS. German gibberish, ;-)

Spoilers: Not a single one. How could there be in a story for Jenn?

Archive Rights: Beyond the Fellowship. My niche. Jenn's birthday site. Anyone else, please just ask.

Disclaimers: This is a work of amateur fiction. I do not know these people. I am not making money. The events described in this story did not happen.

Author's Notes: This was a story written as a birthday present for jenfr. *Happy, happy birthday, dearest Jenn!*

Some nice pictures to go with the story.

-----

Berlin.

Café Kleisther. Beige balconies and curlicue pediments peer through the floor-to-ceiling windows. Tall buses roar past, or try to roar. There is a steady fume of traffic, and nothing moves very fast. Inside, twists of orange and crinkly endive leaves curl on wide white china plates. Slices of unpeeled banana cascade into fanned-out sheets of mortadella and hole-riddled cheese. There is a basket with crusty rolls, sunflower seeds on top, and a bowl with muesli and yoghurt.

"Wow," says Dom. "Weird breakfast."

"Don't you remember these from when you lived here?" asks Orli.

"Are you joking? My mum and dad didn't take us kids out for breakfast! We hardly ever went out. We had toast and cornflakes at home; we were very English."

"It's Atti," Orli says. "He initiated me into these big Berlin breakfasts. We went to one at someone's place once. It started at ten-thirty and went on until six in the evening. It was this huge buffet. Someone had brought a whole pineapple, and there were around seven different kinds of bread."

"I like his flat," says Dom, veering off-topic. "I like the high ceilings. And that funny high platform bed. And especially... " He leans over and smiles, yoghurt dripping off his spoon. "I especially like the fact that he's not here and that I'm here instead."

"Yes... well," says Orli and coughs into his freshly squeezed, organic grapefruit juice.

"It was a great idea," Dom continues, licking his spoon, "to invite me over to help you bedsit his flat. Even if it's only for five days, but a great idea. Beats mooching around in Manchester, anyway. Thank -- you -- Or -- li!" Each syllable is punctuated with a flourish of the spoon. Bits of oat flake rain onto the table.

Atti's flat.

First, Atti's flat had Atti in it. Orli barely noticed Atti's flat when Atti was in it. Atti filled the flat so completely that it simply faded into the background, like a very extended set of Atti's attributes. Then, Atti left, and the flat fish-eye-lensed into the foreground. Flat out-of-focus objects jolted forwards from the murk and turned themselves into convex items of furniture and house plants and pictures on the wall. Orli walked around the flat and interacted with these objects. He skirted the furniture, watered the plants, looked at the pictures. The flat grew larger, the ceilings higher. Orli found a cork noticeboard next to Atti's desk and studied the photos tacked to it with multi-coloured drawing pins.

In the bottom left-hand corner, obscured by a flapping map of Budapest, Orli discovered a photo of himself and Dom. Atti had clipped it out of some magazine. The caption was in German but Orli didn't need a caption. He knew exactly where and when that photo had been taken. He remembered exactly the feel and weight of Dom's arm across his own shoulders, and the sticky warmth of Dom's neck pressing into the crook of his own arm. They both looked jetlagged and slightly spaced out. Orli had his head cocked to one side, nestling into Dom, and Dom was leaning back against him. Orli remembered that drunken lurching. What he didn't remember, what he only now discovered in the photo, was how Dom's eyes had been serious and how his mouth had not grinned.

Oh yes, and Billy was in the photo, too.

So all of a sudden, there was Dom inside Atti's flat. Orli untacked the photo, he swivelled round and round on Atti's office chair, and Dom's eyes swivelled round and round along with him.

Two mornings later, the real Dom materialised at Tegel airport. He threw his arms round Orli's shoulders. He read out and translated all the ads in the U-Bahn. He opened doors in Atti's flat and said, "Is that where you cuddle up with Atti, is it? That big funny bed?" Orli followed him around, grinning and feeling Atti's flat change around him yet again. The plants retreated into the wall. The office chair shrank under Dom's weight and zoomed across the wooden floor on creaking roller feet. The photo stretched and fell asleep, tucked up under Hungarian plazas.

There was another memory, too. Dom had done the same to Orli's own flat, back in London. He'd breezed on in, he'd dropped his bags onto Orli's rug, he'd made the lamps and chairs curdle into the walls, he'd picked up Orli's telephone and Orli's books and... oops, what was that, fluttering onto the coffee table? "Ooh, look, it's us," Dom had said, "nice photo. Didn't know you cared." Another photo, another flat. "Er, bookmark," Orli had stuttered, but Dom had already moved on and was counting the spice jars in Orli's kitchen.

"Orli? Hel -- lo?"

That's not a memory. That's Dom's voice. He's here, right now, right here. In this café, now. Orli's blood flies through Orli's veins, in and out of his heart, and within seconds it's changed to champagne.

Dom's talking. What's he saying?

"Am I going to be sleeping on that bed, too? Or do I have to go on some sort of horrible folding thing? I've always wanted to sleep on one of those high-up-under-the-ceiling beds."

"Yes..." says Orli, "yes, why not? We can both sleep on the bed, yes, no problem."

No problem at all. No... no anything.

"Nice and snuggly, eh?" says Dom and punches Orli on the upper arm, very lightly, very warmly.

Orli peels his banana slices. He peels them with great care. Banana filaments get stuck under his fingernails. Smooth peel, slithery pulp. Dom's fingers, holding the muesli bowl.

"What's that ring you've got there?" Orli says.

"Oh that?" Dom brandishes his thumb. "Do you like it?"

Orli reaches over, pauses a fraction of a second too long before touching the ring. Pays a fraction too much attention to running his finger along the ring and not along the skin.

"Sorry," he says, "now I've got banana all over it."

"Oh well," says Dom, "nothing for it. You'll have to lick it off now, won't you?"

Orli almost does. He pauses for another fraction of a second too long: which is more innocuous, licking Dom's ring or not licking Dom's ring? By the time he's decided to go ahead and lick it, just because he wants to taste banana flesh against Dom-flesh, the moment has passed. Dom is licking his thumb himself. He's licking yoghurt off it.

Oh, to be that yoghurt... But Orli's losing the thread again. And there was a thread here somewhere. Wasn't there?

Yes, he's remembered now. Orli grabs Dom's hand. He says, "Oh no, you don't." He takes Dom's thumb and he licks all round Dom's ring. With his tongue. With his spit. Licking blunt, meaningless silver and banana-flecked skin. Banana yoghurt. Yoghurt banana.

"Ooh, maybe I should spill jam down my front next," says Dom and laughs uproariously.

"I'll lick you anywhere, duckie," says Orli. It comes out a tiny bit less nonchalant than Orli has meant it to sound. There is the tiniest note of breathlessness in there, the tiniest waver in the quotation marks.

But Dom doesn't notice. Dom is looking out through the glass wall and pointing with his roll. "What's that?" he says.

Orli turns. A yellow fog of monoxide swerves over the road. A black-haired man climbs over the median fence. A woman on a bicycle balances a long tube across her handlebars. Dogs pee. Youths chat. On the other side of the road, men in denim stretch their legs onto the footpath. An awning flaps above outdoor tables.

"I've been there with Atti," says Orli. "Bt's a gay bar. Gay coffee shop sort of thing."

"Ooh, let's go there next." Dom cranes his neck. "We can pretend to be gay. Hey, Orli, we can pretend to be boyfriends."

Orli chokes on a sunflower seed, and Dom has to bash his back.

"Yes," croaks Orli and swills down the seed with the last dregs of juice. "Yes, why not?"

"Fun," says Dom. "Remember when we did that in Wellington? What a hoot. And I smooched..."

"Yes, yes," says Orli. Of course, he remembers when they did that in Wellington. Except that was before. That was months, years, centuries ago. That was way before this madness kicked in, this madness in Orli's blood. When Dom had just been Dom, and being smooched by Dom had been just like being smooched by a favourite cousin.

Oh, what a waste of a smooch!

"I need to change some money," Dom says. "I need to get my hands on some of those euros."

Orli screws up his eyes and tries to pronounce the lettering on the awning. "Café Endurez Uffer."

"Anderes Ufer," says Dom. That's just what Orli has hoped he'd do: say something in German again. "It means," continues Dom, "other... hang on, what's Ufer again? Yeah, shore. Other shore."

"Atti explained what it means," says Orli, "but I've forgotten. There's some sort of double meaning there. Look, I need to pee. What's 'I need to pee' in German?"

"Ich muss mal. If you want to be polite. Or you can just say, Ich muss mal pinkeln." Dom laughs.

"Yes, anyway, that's what I just need to do, mooss mull pinkln. Here, you can pay with my euros in the meantime. I'll leave my wallet with you."

Orli looks around for the sign with the 'H' on it. 'H' for 'Herren', he knows that much. The tiles in the loo are shiny and white, shiny and bright. Orli looks down at the dick in his hand. Only two days ago, he pissed in this very same loo, side by side with Atti, both of them pointing their streams at the porcelain bowls.

It's only when he's washing his hands that Orli remembers why it may not have been such a bright idea to have left his wallet with Dom.

And sure enough, when Orli comes out, there's Dom, his legs curled around the legs of his bar stool, his hands up on the table, holding something, studying something -- and it's not the breakfast bill.

It takes Orli five hundred years to cross the floor. When he reaches the table, he doesn't sit down.

"Hey, Orli," says Dom. "What's this lock of hair in your wallet?"

A stray ray of sun slants through the window. Spots sparkle on the knives and spoons.

Orli clears his throat. "Oh," he says, "that."

Dom holds the hair up. He's got it twisted round his index finger. He's pinching it between forefinger and thumb. He moves it close to his eyes, then away again, as if trying to get the measure of this thing, as if trying to measure it up and figure it out.

The hair is of a finger's length. It's straight and slightly frayed from having been squashed in Orli's wallet. It's dark at one end and light at the other. It's wheaten. It's flaxen. It's less of a lock, more of a wisp. If Dom rubbed his finger together, the individual hairs strands would come apart and drift away on the wind, like dandelion down.

"So," says Dom. "Who's the lucky lady? Anyone I know?"

Metal legs scrape. Orli sits down on the edge of his stool. He's trying to gauge the situation. He's trying to get a fix on what's happening here, on what level of banter is called for, on the precise balance of confidence and reticence required. The room spins with possibilities.

Orli looks out of the window. A bus belches puffs of gas. Someone at an adjacent table squeals. "Yes," Orli says, "actually, yes, you do."

He looks back at Dom. He looks at the sheaf of hair between Dom's thumb and forefinger. The hair is pointy at one end and blunt at the other. It's blunt where Orli cut it off with his kitchen scissors. Orli cut it off one sleepless night, with his heart thumping so hard and his hand shaking so violently he thought he might cut into the scalp and draw blood. And after he cut it off, he looked down at the tousled head beneath his fingers, at the mouth slightly open in sleep, at the cheeks softly curved under the dreaming eyes, and Orli's thoughts flew right out of his brain and whizzed round and round the ceiling, like stirred-up butterflies.

And now Dom's holding that very hair, and how to square that with this, and oh, life is getting complicated.

"So I know her," says Dom. "But you're not going to tell me who it is?"

His eyes are glinting. But then, his eyes are always glinting. Aren't they?

"No," says Orli.

"Okay. Is she good-looking?"

Orli laughs. He glances out of the window, then back at Dom. "Yes," he says. "Well, of course. What do you think? I don't keep just anybody's hair in my wallet."

Dom pulls his mouth sideways. He's cross-eyed with staring at the hair. "Hm," he says. "Does she have hair this short? Or is this just the tip of a long tress?"

"Oh, give me that back. Tip of long tress, of course. Rapunzel." Orli snatches the hair. Stuffs it back into its zippered pouch, in between the coins and the cards of his wallet. "Actually, no, it is short hair." A heartbeat passes. "About as short as yours, in fact."

"Right. So. Is she English, then?"

"Yes, English. From the north, actually."

"Like me?"

"Like you."

Another heartbeat passes. Dom shakes himself, as if shaking off some absurd idea. He laughs. "What's she like in the sack then, Orli, eh?" he says and gives Orli's arm another punch.

Relief rains past Orli's ears. Dom's going to let him get away with it. Dom's going to defuse everything into banter. "Shut up!" Orli laughs back. "What sort of a question is that to ask about a lady?"

"You're right," says Dom. "Not a nice question at all to ask. About a lady."

Is that a pointed look? Is Dom not defusing anything after all? Before Orli can decide, Dom's jumped off his stool.

"So," Dom says. "Let's go and be boyfriends over the road, shall we? Go on, put your hand on my arse. That'll get them going."

-----

Anderes Ufer.

Summer men jostle their way into the room. Men in ironed T-shirts, men in fishnet tank tops, men in little vests, showing off their midriffs. Men with gold earrings, men with gold navel rings, men with tattoos on their biceps. Men with cropped hair, men with floppy hair. Men with make-up, men in bovver boots, men in very short, very tight gold lamé shorts. Men in pink, men in ruffles, men waving brawny arms and calling out, "Yoohoo, Schatzie!" and other incomprehensible syllables.

Incomprehensible to Orli, anyway.

"What did he just say?" he whispers to Dom.

"Which one, honeybunch?"

"That one over there. The one with the lips."

"That one, eh? You like him, do you, Orli? Ooh, should I be jealous?"

Dom's eyes are glinting. Dom has a red patch on his skin, just above the hem of his T-shirt. Dom's head swivels from right to left, Dom's voice is full of giggles, Dom's pressing up against Orli on the sofa they share, Dom's hand is on Orli's knee. Dom's calling Orli 'honeybunch', and Orli's pretending that he's only pretending to be boyfriends with Dom.

"Kaffee, die Herren? Wer bekommt den mit Schagsahne?"

"Der ist für mich," says Dom.

Orli looks at Dom, then at the waiter, then back at Dom. "Duh ist foo mick," he repeats under his breath.

The waiter turns to Orli and comes out with more mysterious syllables. Orli pulls up his eyebrows, crinkles his forehead and indents his dimples. He tries to look earnestly interested. He opens his mouth to say, politely, "Sorry, I don't speak any German." But he's cut off half-way through "Sorry".

Clap. A bronzed hand lands on his shoulder. More incomprehensibility follows. A cup of coffee lands before him, clink. The waiter winks at Orli, then turns on his heels, swivels his denim-clad arse and swivels on back to the bar to pursue whatever waiterly duties gay Berlin waiters live to pursue.

Dom looks at Orli's face which is still frozen in mid-sorry, and bursts out laughing.

"What was that all about?" asks Orli.

"Well..." Dom's eyes dance. "First he said to you, 'This coffee must be for you; it's hot and strong, just like you.' Heiss..." Dom lowers his voice by an octave and speaks with a rumble at the back of his throat. "Heiss und stark."

"Right," says Orli. "Hice oont shtahk."

There is an old-fashioned ceiling fan above their heads. It churns the sluggish air. Pink crêpe streamers flutter from its banana-coloured blades. Pink breezes flutter through Orli's veins. He looks at Dom, he hears Dom saying "Heiss und stark", he can't help smiling. Dom's hand is still on his knee. All the while, all throughout the flirtatious waiter interlude, Dom's hand has been on Orli's knee. As if to keep a hold of him. As if to take possession. As if to say to all the waiters of this world, 'Paws off, he's mine.'

Not really, of course. It's only pretend. Still, though. Still.

Dom's making eyes at him. He purses his lips and says, "Heiss und stark, honeybunch. That's you all right."

"Shucks, duckie," says Orli. Because it's still pretend, and Orli's good at pretend. Orli's so good he can make goo-goo eyes right back at Dom and he can put his hand at the back of Dom's neck and rub Dom's nape without even batting an eyelid.

For a minute. He can do that for one minute exactly. Then he has to clear his throat and shift position. He has to take his hand away. He has to take his eyes away. He has to force his thoughts away.

Not much time seems to have passed in the real world. Dom is still on the same topic. In fact, Dom seems to be finishing the same sentence.

"And then he said," Dom continues, and it takes Orli a moment to realise that it's the waiter he's talking about, "then he said to you, 'If you keep on making eyes at me like that, I'll have to come and kidnap you away from your lovely boyfriend here.'"

"Come on. You're making this up! He didn't say that!"

"He did! I swear! 'Schöne Augen machen'. I swear he said that. And anyway, so you were."

"Was not."

"Were, too."

"Was not. I was not shorna owgen whatever. I was just looking at him. You know. Just like I'm looking at you now."

Which is gobbledygook. Because Orli's not even looking at Dom. He's looking at his coffee which, yes, is hot -- steam curls off the meniscus -- and yes, is strong -- blacker than black, black without a trace of brown.

"You're not looking at me at all," says Dom, inanely stating the obvious.

Orli cranes his pupils upward.

"Well," says Dom.

Beat, heart, beat.

"Well," says Dom, "point proven."

"How, what?"

"You were making schöne Augen at the waiter. You're certainly making schöne Augen at me right now."

"Yes... well," says Orli. "You are my boyfriend, duckie." Orli founders and flounders but only for a second. He almost slipped just now, he almost fell, and there's no safety net below.

"True, hon," says Dom and makes a pout-face at Orli.

Then they devote themselves to their coffees.

Orli shakes a sugar sachet, one of those tubular ones. He cracks it open and watches the crystals abseil down an invisible rope into his hot and strong and black and long coffee. The coffee is in a white cup, the cup sits on a white saucer, and on the saucer, resting against the wall of the cup, there is a metal spoon and a thin brown biscuit.

Dom's coffee is in a bigger cup. Dom's letting the sugar plop into it in one blob. Dom's coffee can't be seen because it's got cream on top. A big, white, wobbly mound of whipped cream.

"What's that you've got there?" says Orli. "What did you order? Is that whipped cream?"

"Yup," says Dom. "Schlagsahne."

"Shlugzahnuh," says Orli.

"Want some?" says Dom.

"Yes, why didn't I get any?"

"Don't whinge. You didn't order any. Here, have some of mine."

Orli lifts up his cup in expectation of cream. In expectation of Dom dipping his spoon into his cream and dropping the cream into Orli's cup.

That's not what's happening, however. Dom's not dipping his spoon. He's not dropping his cream. He's not even touching his spoon. He leans down -- down, down. Orli can see the hairs bending across Dom's smooth nape he's so far down. Why is he leaning down like that? Why isn't he dipping and dropping?

Dom's not dipping and dropping because Dom's licking. Dom's leaning over his cup. He pokes his tongue out. Now he dips, but not his spoon. It's his tongue he dips. The tip of his tongue disappears right into that white mound. Dom straightens up.

Orli's cup goes clink, back onto its saucer.

Here's Dom, eyes glinting, lips parted, tongue out. And oh, what a big, pink tongue Dom has. It's so broad, it fills his mouth entirely, from corner to corner. At the tip there wobbles a fluffy, floaty dollop of cream.

"Oh," says Orli. "Right."

Men laugh. Men gesticulate. Men wave to other men across the crowded floor. Men lunge toward each other. Men kiss and caress. The pink streamers float and wave. They create slipstreams of air, slipstreams of lust. They create a cocoon of two-ness around their table. They stream down invisible walls. The laughing and gesticulating men recede. They are background static. They are outside of the cocoon. Inside, there are only Orli and Dom. Orli and Dom and Dom's big wet tongue. The inside of Dom's mouth turned inside out.

Orli leans forward. He leans forward in slow motion, in freeze-frame motion. He's got his mouth open. He moves his open mouth towards Dom's inside-out mouth. He reaches it. He closes his lips around Dom's dollop of whipped cream.

Heartbeats pass. Nobody moves. Dom's tongue trembles. The cream dissolves into Orli's mouth and slips down into the cavities of his cheeks.

Orli takes his mouth away. Dom's tongue is pink and clean. Orli has sucked the cream right off.

Orli swallows. Cool cream slithers down his throat.

"Do you," says Dom, "want some more?"

"I...," says Orli.

Dom's already got his tongue out, fully dolloped.

Orli lifts his cup. The steam has got thinner but the liquid still burns his tongue. Or was his tongue burning already? Is it burning from cream and Dom? And what else in his body is burning? Because something is, something is burning the thoughts right out of Orli's brain. Some thoughts. Some thoughts are burnt right out, and other thoughts are burned right in. Bright thoughts. Blinding thoughts.

The cup shakes against Orli's lips. He keeps the next swallow of coffee in his mouth. He keeps it in the pouches of his cheeks. He moves toward Dom like a hamster with caffeine addiction. He closes his lips around Dom's tongue. He moves his lips up and down the shaft of Dom's tongue. He coats Dom's tongue with his hamster coffee and with his burning spit. The cream slides into Orli's mouth. It is cool. It is fluffy. It douses the fire in Orli's mouth.

"Hm," says Orli and swallows.

"Hm," echoes Dom.

They look at one another.

"Duckie," says Orli and attempts a rakish grin.

"Honeybunch," says Dom, and if that's a mirror image of Orli's expression, it's the most pathetic rakish grin ever attempted. "Good coffee," adds Dom. "Yours, I mean. Good."

"Yes," says Orli. "Yes. You. Do you want some more?"

Dom has his tongue out at once.

"Dom," says Orli. "Cream."

"Oh yes, cream." This time Dom uses the spoon. He dips the spoon into the diminished mound. He scoops a dollop onto the spoon. He scoops it onto his tongue but not onto the tip of his tongue. Oh no, this time Dom opens his mouth wide, he sticks the spoon in, deep deep, and he deposits the cream on the back of his tongue. Quite a way back. Right inside his mouth. Almost down his throat.

Dom sticks out his tongue. The cream can't be seen.

Orli takes the tip of Dom's tongue between his lips. Already, it's an almost familiar movement. He takes Dom's tongue between his lips but as he closes his lips around it, Dom reels his tongue in. It slithers back, like a fish on a line. Orli hangs onto it, he doesn't let go, he is reeled right back with it. His lips land against Dom's lips. Dom's tongue is inside Orli's mouth.. Orli doesn't know where the cream is. Somewhere. Orli moves his tongue across the root of Dom's tongue, and yes, there's cream somewhere on his tongue. Their tongues. There's also coffee and spit and the grit of sugar. There's hot and cold mixed up together. There's burning and there's cooling.

This is actually very close to a real kiss. Very close.

Breathless. Chest going up, chest going down. Looking now, just looking. Orli looking at Dom. Dom looking right back. Orli remembering... doesn't know what. Everything seems unconnected. His hand is disconnected from his arm, and his brain from his body, and his cream from his coffee.

They come up for air.

"So," says Dom. Shaky voice. Shaky eyes. "Boyfriends, right? That's what boyfriends do?"

"Yes. Yes, that's..." Voice disconnected from words.

"We don't need the," Dom says, "we don't need the cream then."

Orli opens his mouth. He opens his mouth and he closes his eyes. Paper streamers. Tattoos on forearms. Kissing and caressing. Cups clinking, spoons sinking. Orli sinking, too. Orli disappearing, Orli vanishing right into Dom's mouth. Orli trying to catch Dom with his tongue. Dom holding Orli's tongue down, Orli fighting back up, Dom sliding past sideways, Orli almost choking in his eagerness to capture all of Dom.

Dom has his hand on Orli's shoulder. Dom's hand squeezes Orli's shoulder. Dom's thumb ring brushes Orli's neck. The metal touch makes Orli's skin shudder. Orli's got his hand on Dom's waist. Sugar sachets fall, one by one, into Orli's lap. Orli's cup goes clink, his hip bumps the table. His brain flies round and round, along with the streamers above his head. His thoughts are still bright but they can't blind him because his eyes are closed. Orli's lashes twitch against his own cheek. His lashes can't keep still because his eyes are flying around behind their lids. His eyes are flying around along with his thoughts, round and round, on a wild merry-go-round through space.

The kiss is over. Breath in, breath out. Orli tries to adjust to the state of just-having-kissed-Dom. That was a real kiss, all right. That wasn't pretend. That wasn't like that smooch all those years ago. Dom's hand on his shoulder doesn't seem to be pretend, either. Nor does the glint in Dom's eyes. Orli now knows that Dom's eyes never glint like that usually. He has never seen such a glint. He doesn't know what his own eyes are doing, whether they've come back from their cruise around the ceiling fan yet. His hand is still on Dom's waist. He's crunching up the fabric of Dom's T-shirt; one of his fingers is touching skin, the skin between Dom's T-shirt and Dom's jeans.

Let's kiss and caress and make schöne Augen at one another.

"Orli," says Dom. "Why do you keep a lock of my hair in your wallet?"

"Oh," says Orli. "That."

"Yes," says Dom. "That."

The table spins around once, twice. Men holler, men hoot. Smoke twists upward from somebody's cigarette and gets trapped in the ceiling blades. Orli puts his other hand in his lap and holds on to the sugar sachets.

"Well," he says. He tries to look away from Dom but his eyes are disobedient. They won't move. They are still dizzy from their orbital ride.

Dom leans forward a fraction. His hand is still on Orli's shoulder. His other hand moves to Orli's knee. Sugar in paper plops to the floor, plop plop. Orli's knee is shaking. Only slightly, only very very slightly. No more than the cream on the top of Dom's coffee. What's left of the cream. What's left of the fiery, floaty cream.

"I think," says Dom, "that you cut off my hair and kept it because you're secretly in love with me. That's the only reason I can think of, actually. Offhand."

"Well," says Orli. "There you go then."

Abruptly, the fan stops whirring. The air vibrates in aftershocks, then it gels into a still space. Orli is still. Dom's eyes are still, too. Quite still.

Orli smiles.

He pulls Dom close. He grabs the skin at Dom's waist and tugs Dom forward. He leans into Dom, chest, shoulder, arm, hip, thighs awkwardly squeezed. He rests his chin on Dom's shoulder. He feels Dom's breath against his earlobe. Breath in, breath out.

"Why don't we go back to Atti's flat?" says Dom into Orli's ear. "And pretend to be boyfriends some more?"

-----

The End.

Comments

[giglet.livejournal.com]

Whoo! You've eroticized my coffee! If I didn't love you before, I would love you for this. Thanks!