FIC: 2/3 "Moon Madness" OB/DM (NC-17)
Oct. 21st, 2003 11:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lobelia3211/3 / 3/3
2. Dominic
Dominic stood on the hill above Wellington and felt dismal.
It was one of those windy days, typical of Wellington. Dominic had only just got back from shooting on the South Island, but had simply dumped his bags in his room and then practically run from the hotel. He didn't want to see anyone. Well, there was one person in particular he couldn't yet cope with seeing again, and he needed to move his limbs and let the fresh air blow the cobwebs out of his mind.
It wasn't really working. Being alone just made him melancholy, and the fact that this footpath was heavy with memories didn't help. Also, the air up in these hills was almost too fresh. In fact, it was freezing cold. The wind wasn't only blowing his thoughts around uselessly in his head but also tugging at his hair and whipping drops of rain into his eyes. Beneath the path, sheets of grey were beginning to drive across the town from the ocean. Dominic tucked his head into his shoulders.
And yet it had been warm only three weeks ago ---. But he did not want to think about that now.
"Oh, what the ...," he cried out as his foot sank into a puddle of mud. This was really too stupid. He should just head straight back down, go to the hotel, have a hot shower. But then he might bump into people down there, and he did not want to bump into people.
Above all, he did not want to bump into Orlando.
Why he was so obsessed with Orlando, he didn't know. It made no sense and there was no point to it. The guy wasn't interested and never would be. He was the greatest gallivanter of the entire cast, and he never landed in the same bed more often than twice in a row. If that. Everyone knew this. It was fodder for gleeful gossip and no great secret at all. The irony was that it was Dominic himself who had the reputation for second-most promiscuous cast member. Liv called him and Orlando the 'two Casanovas', and people laughed. And Dominic had always laughed back, and Orlando had given him a wink, and that had been that.
Three weeks ago, Dominic had stopped laughing.
He sighed and blinked into the rain. He had reached the little plateau at the end of one of the paths. The rain was slowly changing from drizzle into downpour. There was the drip-drip of water from leaves. The sea was grey, and the sky was grey. No-one else was about.
So much for trying to clear his thoughts. This was the exact same place where it had all started three months ago.
They had all gone walking up the hill and ended up on this plateau. It had been their first outing beyond the city itself. The day couldn't have been more different from today. The sun was hot. The sky was so dark blue that it was almost black. Dominic had never seen such a sky, but then, he had not been to the antipodes before. The city spread out before them, houses clinging to the steep hill and crowding together in the harbour valley below. Far beyond, on the horizon, shimmered the outline of the South Island. Dominic could just make out the ferry, glistening white on the channel, and hear gulls crying on the wind.
Everyone had been there: all the main Brits, the Aussies, the Kiwis and the Americans; Billy and Elijah and Orlando, Liv, the two Seans, Viggo, David, Miranda, plus an assortment of orcs and two lads from lighting. It had been like one large high school outing. They had all been chattering excitedly. New Zealand was bright and new. They'd only just got there, and they'd exclaimed and pointed and generally laughed a lot.
"It's Middle-Earth!" called out someone. "It really is!"
"That's because you don't know what any of these places are in real life, yer great dolt!" called someone else.
"Ah, but I do know this land!" declaimed Viggo. "This is where my people walked of old, it is fairest Gondor!"
"Beware, this Man is not to be trusted!" cried little Sean and spread his arms melodramatically.
They were doing this a lot at that time, lapsing into movie-speech, because they were all still figuring each other out. They referred to one another by their characters' names, the orc-actors bared their teeth, and the guys from lighting rolled their eyes and went, "Actors!"
There was a lot of manoeuvring going on, people sidling up to this person or to that, and a lot of wondering: Who was going to get on with whom? Who was going to get off with whom? Because, yes, sex had been in the air, and Dominic was loving it. As he stood on that hilltop, the sun burning his neck, he let his eyes roam idly across the group, cruising his companions' faces.
"Legolas, can you not use your elvish eyes and tell us what that blob-thing is down there?" cried David and pointed at something on the water.
"Aye, my noble friend," cried Orlando. "That blob, as you call it, is the five o'clock ferry from Dunedin!"
"Dunedin!" guffawed the Kiwis. "You don't have the first clue where Dunedin is!" Some mockery ensued, and good-natured repartee. It was while all this was going on that Dominic noticed Orlando's wrist.
Orlando had lifted his left arm to shade his eyes for an elvish distance stare. When he did this, his wristwatch, a chunky silver Rolex type, slid up onto his arm, and for whatever reason, this gesture made Dominic's heart miss a beat. The hilarity around him faded into static. Orlando's watch flashed in the sun. When Orlando lowered his arm, the watch slipped back down and bumped against the bones of his wrist. Dominic saw the way the hand grew out of the wrist, the angular joint of thumb to palm, the ring on the forefinger, the round short nails. The whole moment lasted maybe one second, then the noise roared back into Dominic's ears.
Dominic looked up at Orlando's face. Orlando was laughing at something, dimples everywhere, and absent-mindedly rubbing the shaved side of his head. Dominic had found the haircut ridiculous but now the sight of the white skin above Orlando's ears made his own skin tingle. Orlando looked over and caught Dominic's eye, he laughed and winked at Dominic, and Dominic laughed back, feeling deliriously happy.
It was then that Dominic had fallen mildly in love with Orlando. Not enough to make him miserable, and not enough to make him give up the many pleasures of the flesh to be enjoyed on this shoot, but just enough to cast a sparkle over any event or encounter that had Orlando in it. Dominic would be somewhere, doing whatever, and Orlando would appear, and Dominic's body would come alive as if he'd just drunk a pot of coffee. Dominic would look at Orlando and smile and smile. He couldn't help smiling at Orlando, and Orlando mostly sauntered over and blew him a kiss or gave him a high-five, and traded friendly banter, and that was it, really.
Dominic never felt the remotest need to do anything about this state of affairs. He was perfectly content. That is, until that night on the beach, a full two-and-a-half months later.
What a night. What a perfect night, and what a dreadful awakening afterwards.
Looking back on it, Dominic had walked into it with both eyes open but somehow he had still failed to see anything crucial. Until it had been too late.
They'd been on the beach since the early evening, waiting for dusk to fall, and it took its time in falling. There was a little fire, and various items were roasted in it. Beer and joints were passed around. Orlando was sitting near Dominic a lot, sometimes rubbing shoulders, sometimes back-to-back.
"Look at you two," said Liv. "What a cute couple! Our two very cute Casanovas!"
"That's so old, Liv," said Orlando and threw a napkin ball in her general direction. His back moved and tensed against Dominic's T-shirt, and that felt good. All of it felt good.
In fact, Dominic felt fantastic. He was filled to the gills with weed and good will, and he had that coffee-and-champagne feeling that he always had when Orlando was around. The night sparkled, Orlando sparkled and flirted outrageously with all and sundry, Dominic's heart sparkled. And the stars sparkled above. What more could one want? Dominic certainly didn't want anything more, and he had no inkling that there was anything more to be had. But there was, oh there was.
One by one the others started to peel off.
Sean and Viggo and Billy were the first to get up. "We're off," said Billy. "You coming, Dominic?"
Dominic lifted his half-full beer can and shook his head. Orlando didn't move, either.
Sean said, "Lijah? Come on, I'd better get you home. You look a bit out of it."
"He'll be fine; I'll get him home," said Liv. "Don't worry about it, I'll take care of him. Won't I, Lijie?"
"Yeah," said Sean, dubiously, and they went. Steve the Orc, Miranda and David followed not long after. That left only Liv and Elijah. And Orlando, of course, and Dominic.
Elijah didn't look too good. He was hugging his knees, and his head was lolling.
"I feel woozy," he stammered.
"Sure you do," said Liv. "After what you've shoved into yourself tonight. Come on, time for beddie-byes."
"Where's Sean?" Elijah said. "Has Sean left?"
"Sean left ages ago," said Liv. "Come on, get up."
"I want Sean," said Elijah. "Where are my shoes?"
"Well, where did you take them off?"
Liv started crawling around the fireplace, patting the sand. The fire had by now died down, night had fallen, and it was actually rather pitch-black. The stars shone above but that only made the earth seem darker.
"Those two," whispered Orlando and chuckled.
Dominic chuckled back.
"You coming, Orli?" said Liv, still on all fours with her nose in the sand.
Dominic held his breath.
"No, not yet," said Orlando.
"Nor me," said Dominic quickly.
"Oh, good, here they are!" cried Liv, and then, "Shit, Lije, what have you done to them? They're full of beer!"
"I'm not wearing beer on my feet," said Elijah, somewhat indistinctly.
"Oh, don't be stupid," said Liv. "Just put them on."
"Why are you fussing?" whined Elijah.
Liv was kneeling down and forcing the shoes onto Elijah's feet.
"I'm not fussing," she said. "Now, shut up and get up. I'll carry your radio."
"Fancy a swim?" whispered Orlando into Dominic's ear.
"Sure," whispered Dominic. There was a devilishly mischievous tone in Orlando's voice but Dominic, fool that he was, didn't make anything of it besides taking it for a sign of amused exasperation with Liv and Elijah. But everyone was always being amusedly exasperated with Liv and Elijah so that was nothing out of the extraordinary.
Dominic screwed his half-full beer can into the sand and tensed his calf muscles to stand up, but there was Orlando already, standing before him, gallantly holding out his hand and pulling him up.
"Thanks, mate," Dominic said. "Not that I'm that decrepit just yet."
Orlando laughed and kept hold of Dominic's wrist, just a fraction of a second longer than necessary. Dominic noticed, of course. Indeed, Orlando's touch burned into his arm. But he still didn't make anything of it besides taking it for a sign of his own infatuation and the general intoxication of the evening.
"We're going for a dip," Orlando called out. "See you in the morning, Liv."
"Oooh," said Liv. "The two Casanovas! Midnight dip! Well, have fun, boys! And don't forget to take the garbage with you!"
"Good luck with Lijah," said Dominic and grabbed a towel.
As they started jogging down towards the water's edge, Liv shouted after them, "And don't do anything I wouldn't do, boys!"
"Well," Orlando giggled. "That doesn't leave much. I don't think there's much that Liv wouldn't do."
"And you would know, would you?" said Dominic and laughed.
"I'm just saying that I'm glad it wasn't Elijah saying that," said Orlando. "I think we'll have more fun this way."
This was a cryptic remark, or it seemed cryptic to Dominic at the time. In retrospect, it wasn't cryptic at all, of course. But all Dominic thought then, was, 'Yes, this is fun. This is fabulous fun, and I'm fabulously lucky,' and all he said was, "We'll have fun, anyway." Which was kind of a lame response and shows that Dominic was, even at this early stage in the proceedings, not completely clear of mind.
They had reached the hard moist sand. Shallow waves lapped up at their feet. In the distance, Elijah's voice could still be heard, "My head hurts and I feel sick," and Liv's cheery reply, "Shut up and keep walking, Lijie."
Orlando, meanwhile, was stripping off and plunging naked into the ocean. Dominic, although fully supplied with bathing shorts, did likewise and splashed after him, the water slapping against his nipples and shrinking his balls.
"It's actually not that cold," puffed Orlando and splashed Dominic.
"You bastard," said Dominic and splashed Orlando. They tussled a little in the water, then they paddled out to where the breakers started and dived through a few, then they tussled some more, then Orlando ducked Dominic, and Dominic yelped and ducked Orlando. Then they waded back to shore, the blood rushing through their veins.
"Shit, there's no towel," said Orlando and hopped up and down.
"I've got one," said Dominic and felt around the sand with this foot for where their clothes had fallen. Orlando's head was silhouetted black against the constellations.
"This is a towel?" Orlando said. "This is tiny. This is barely big enough to cover my dick."
"What size dick have you got?" laughed Dominic. "Sorry I didn't bring the king size bath towel! Sorry I didn't bring the ten-foot mat!"
Talking about Orlando's dick was fun, yes, but just that little bit too close to the bone, and, ridiculous as it was, it made Dominic's ears burn.
Then Orlando said, "So. What do you want to do?" And now, Dominic listened up. The words were harmless enough but even Dominic could tell that the tone of voice was entirely and completely and comprehensively suggestive. Orlando was not only speaking softly and huskily; he was practically purring.
"What?" said Dominic, blankly.
"What Liv said," purred Orlando. "What we should and what we shouldn't do. What, then, do you want to do?"
"Um," said Dominic. Suddenly, he needed to get his shorts on very fast.
Orlando laughed. "Don't bother putting your shorts back on," he said. "I know you've got a roaring hard-on."
"Ha," said Dominic, weakly. "Have you got x-ray vision or what?"
"No," replied Orlando, and he was purring again. "It's just that I've got one, too."
"Haha," said Dominic. "Right. I didn't know hard-ons could roar." But he stepped out of his shorts.
"Maybe not," said Orlando, and he didn't even need to purr any longer for Dominic's ears to start burning. "But there are two or three other things they can do and that I could show you."
Dominic laughed. "Are you propositioning me, Bloom?" he said.
"Maybe," said Orlando with that bedroom voice of his. "Maybe. Is that what you want me to do?"
Dominic stood stock still. This was getting interesting.
"Maybe," he finally echoed Orlando's words. "Maybe."
"So," Orlando continued. "You still haven't answered my question. What, my friend, do you want to do?"
"I don't know," said Dominic. Which was a complete lie. Dominic knew exactly what he wanted to do. Five hundred things that he wanted to do with and to and on top of Orlando flashed through his mind quite unbidden. The difficulty lay in choosing only one of them.
"I don't believe you," whispered Orlando. His head was close in the dark, and his breath brushed Dominic's cheek. He smelled of salt and beer and something else, something metallic and unmistakably sexual.
"OK," Dominic said slowly, trying to keep his voice light. "I've thought of something."
"I knew you would," said Orlando.
"Have you ever...," began Dominic.
"Wow," said Orlando. He'd seen the moon.
Dominic turned around.
It must have been rising for a while but now, as they watched, the upper curve of the moon pushed over the black tangle of trees on the shore. The world was transformed. Icy silver flooded the beach. Every twig and rock and crevice became sharply outlined against its own inky shadow. The ocean rippled white and black, and the moon cast a glittering path across it. The stars were bleached in the lunar halo.
Dominic looked at Orlando. He had been a shadowy presence but now he was lit up as if by lightning. He was awash with silver, like a marble statue come to life. The shaven sides of his skull gleamed, and his face was sculpted into ivory curves and pools of onyx. Dominic's eyes dropped, and there was Orlando's erection, marvellously echoing his own desire.
"It's incredible," Dominic said. He didn't mean the moon.
Orlando tipped his head back, as if to drink in the sky. He looked bewitched.
"I'll be right back," said Dominic, and started up the beach.
"What?" said Orlando. "Where are you going?"
"Just hang on a minute," said Dominic, and ran to the barbecue place. He searched through the plastic bags with flying hands until he found it. The bottle. Full? Yes, about half. Good. He took his beer can from the sand and finished it in one gulp. Then, clutching the bottle in one hand, he ran back down the beach.
Orlando wasn't there.
Dominic looked right, Dominic looked left. There was Orlando, sprinting up the beach in the moonbeams, like some strange white sprite.
"Hey!" called out Dominic.
"Race you to that tree trunk!" Orlando's voice came, rising above the sound of the surf.
"Not fair!" yelled Dominic and laughed. "You got a head start!"
He dug around in his shorts on the sand, kicked the clothes up away from the waves and sped after Orlando. His feet thrummed on the sand. The tree trunk was a large bit of driftwood, lying sideways on the beach, sand papered smooth by the sea and with twisted branches sticking up bizarrely against the night sky. Dominic ran and ran, the air prickled on his skin, and the world seemed endless on all sides. Then he stopped.
Orlando had climbed onto the tree trunk. Nude and gorgeous, he was balancing on the log, dancing and -- could it be true? -- singing something, some old pop tune. Though teetering now and again on his narrow support, he was moving rhythmically and gracefully, with his moonlit erection bumping against his belly.
Dominic stood, transfixed. To the right, there was the sound of the ocean. Ahead, there was the sound of Orlando. The sand made tiny, rustling noises, as if traversed by small crabs or other night creatures. The moon hung above, round and liquid. Dominic felt happiness seeping into him like a drug. No, happy was not the word. It was as if all those champagne sensations had finally bubbled over and were filling him up and spilling out of him through the tips of his fingers.
Orlando saw Dominic, waved, tottered and hopped off the log. A spray of sand rose where he landed. Dominic walked up, his ears burning, his cock burning, his head dizzy with lust.
Orlando leant back against the tree. He was grinning at Dominic, sucking in his bottom lip. He looked impossibly seductive.
"What's that? What have you got there?" he said. "Is that the fucking cooking oil?"
"No," said Dominic who was now standing right in front of him. "No, that's just the fucking oil. I don't need to cook you; you look good enough to have raw."
"Perhaps you can marinate me," said Orlando.
That was such a cheesy thing to say that they both burst out laughing.
"I've thought of something to do, anyway," Dominic said.
"And what's that?" Orlando said.
"You'll see," said Dominic, almost dropping the bottle in his haste to unscrew the lid.
"I think," said Orlando and leant his head back, "I can guess."
Dominic poured oil all over his hands. All of a sudden, he just couldn't contain himself and bent forward to bite Orlando on the neck, hard.
"Fuck, Monaghan," said Orlando. "Has the moon turned you into a werewolf? I can't have a bloody love bite on my neck."
"Shut up," whispered Dominic and closed his fist around Orlando. He felt warm and firm and slippery in Dominic's palm. Orlando sighed.
"Is that what you had in mind?" he whispered.
"No," said Dominic. "This is just the beginning."
"Good," said Orlando and lifted his eyes, staring at the moon. He put his hands on Dominic's waist, and Dominic pushed up against him. Then they half stumbled, half fell onto the sand. Dominic ended up kneeling over Orlando, his hands on Orlando's knees, pushing them apart. His pulse raced as he emptied the remaining oil onto his hands and slithered his hands around Orlando's balls.
'It's happening,' he thought, wildly. 'This is happening.' This was no longer just friendly banter.
Orlando gasped as Dominic pushed two oily fingers against him and into him.
"Have you ever," Dominic whispered, "been fucked on a beach?"
"I...," said Orlando through his gasps. "Well, technically no."
"What do you mean, technically?" said Dominic.
"Been fucked," gasped Orlando. "Technically. I've only ever done the fucking."
"I might have guessed," said Dominic. He leaned close and whispered into Orlando's ear, "Well, tonight I'm going to fuck you on this beach till you come."
"I love it when you talk dirty," said Orlando. Then he gasped again and said, "What are you doing to me, Monaghan?"
"You feel good," said Dominic.
"Shit," said Orlando. "My shorts. They're miles away."
"What do you need your shorts for?" said Dominic.
"I need to get a...," began Orlando.
"Don't worry," said Dominic and groped in the sand for the packet. "I've got one here."
Orlando smiled. "I knew you would," he said.
Dominic ripped the packet open with this teeth but Orlando had to help him slide the condom on because Dominic's hands were dripping with oil. Both their bellies were slick with the stuff, and the smell of oil mingled with the smell of their sweat and the salt on their skin.
Orlando closed his fingers around Dominic, and Dominic thought, 'I want this to last forever.' That was the last coherent thought he had.
"Fuck me, Dominic," Orlando said.
Dominic lifted himself, one hand around Orlando, the other braced against the sand. For one long moment he rested his penis against Orlando's entrance, poised on the brink of bliss. He looked at Orlando, Orlando looked at him and then closed his eyes, and slowly, slowly Dominic pushed the head of his cock in and stayed still. Orlando moved his hips to pull him in and his eyes snapped open again. He had the most indescribable expression on his face. Dominic was drowning in that face, in those pebble-black eyes, each with a tiny moon reflected in it. He was drowning in all of Orlando. He plunged in, and Orlando was hot and sweet and tight as a fist.
Orlando's mouth opened in a wide O, and he gave a sharp gasp. His eyes were still locked onto Dominic's.
Then the rhythm started up. Dominic felt as if he were riding a wave, on and on, steadied only by Orlando's extraordinary gaze and Orlando's hands clasped around his waist. He was holding onto Orlando's cock as if for life, pushing his own belly up and down against it, moiling and toiling in the depths of Orlando.
Orlando kept on gasping. His lids fluttered. He let go off Dominic and his hands drifted up to rest loosely on the ground next to his head, palms up. He looked like the essence of helpless surrender as he lay split and opened. With each push, his head jerked back a little on the sand until it hit the log. Orlando grabbed Dominic's wrist, the one used to hold himself up, and almost knocked him off balance, but Dominic kept going and kept riding. In fact, it no longer felt like riding, it was like flying.
Orlando's head kept hitting the log but he was now gasping faster and faster, he was gasping like a fucking steam engine, and then his hot semen flowed over Dominic's hand. Orlando's muscles contracted wildly around Dominic, and that tipped Dominic over. He came and came, with a deep, throaty moan that seemed to have been ripped straight out of the depths of his being. He surprised himself with that moan, he normally never moaned but now he did, as the image of Orlando beneath him went blurry and flew apart into millions of black and white shards. Dominic shuddered, and shuddered again, and with each of these after-shudders, he found himself laughing out loud. He laughed delighted little laughs, and they, too, surprised him.
Orlando lifted his hand and laid it against Dominic's cheek, and Dominic pressed his face against it. Then he dropped his head, moisture dripping from his hair onto Orlando's chest. He grabbed the top of the condom, pulled out and rolled over onto his back. Sand stuck to his skin. His lungs were heaving, and the stars were whirling up above.
Bit by bit, thoughts returned to his head.
"Well," he said to the sky. "That was unexpected."
Then he reached over and cupped Orlando's soft cock, neat and small, in his palm, and licked Orlando's belly, all that mix of oil and sperm and sweat.
"Did I catch you off your guard?" said Orlando, between breaths. If Dominic had listened carefully, he might have caught the uncertain tone in Orlando's voice. But Dominic wasn't listening carefully. He was blithely carefree.
"You did," said Dominic and laughed. Orlando laughed, too. Dominic thought, 'I want to do this again and again.'
"I love the way you laugh," he said out loud to Orlando. "You're always laughing. And that makes me laugh."
Orlando said nothing but looking up at him, Dominic saw that he had that impenetrable look on again.
"Well," Dominic said. "The earth moved for me." Then he rolled off Orlando and fell into a sweet, sweet sleep.
He didn't know how long he'd slept, a couple of minutes at most. When he opened his eyes, there was Orlando, looking at him. Dominic did nothing, just looked back, then reached out his hand to Orlando's head. But Orlando ducked away and jumped up.
"Let's have another dip," he said. "Shit, I'm sore as a horse."
"As a horse?" laughed Dominic.
They ran into the waves again but now there was no tussling and no splashing. Orlando seemed in a strange, after-sex mood. He didn't say much but looked at Dominic sideways a lot and crinkled up his face and laughed.
"What a night," said Dominic.
"Yeah," said Orlando.
Dominic felt absurdly blissful. That bubbly sensation had gone and given way to a deep glow of contentment. Wrapped up in this glow, he thought he was noticing everything about Orlando. But, of course, he was missing all the crucial signs, and noticed nothing but Orlando's charm and the promise in Orlando's face.
Everything that night was good. Walking back to the fire place was good, and getting their gear together was good. Even clearing up the fire and their rubbish was good, and walking side by side through the dunes was companionable and good, and sitting in the back seat of the taxi was snug and good.
Last of all, saying 'good night' on the landing in the hotel was good. Orlando hooked an arm around Dominic's shoulders and said, "Thanks, Dominic. That hit the spot. I had a great time."
"Fuck it, Orlando," Dominic laughed. "You don't have to be so formal with me." He never asked himself what such formality might mean.
It was only when Dominic got to his room that he realised that he hadn't kissed Orlando once during the whole evening. But this only made him smile again at the haste and lust and perfection of it all. He fell asleep, thinking, 'There'll be another chance for kisses. There'll be a hundred other chances, and a thousand things to look forward to.'
The whole of the day after was still enveloped in a haze of happiness. They weren't working together that day but it didn't matter because in the morning, Orlando came over and ruffled Dominic's hair and winked at him, and for the evening there was already a dinner planned with a whole lot of people at some restaurant. So the evening was waiting for Dominic, like a treasure at dusk, and the day was long and bright.
But the evening, when it came, gave up no treasure. Instead, it broke Dominic's haze and Dominic's heart.
Not at first. At first, Dominic sat and ate and conversed, all in a heady fug of anticipation and hardly knowing what he was saying or hearing. Orlando was sitting a few seats away, on the other side of a long table, and seeing him from afar and knowing what they were going to do to each other in only a few hours' time, was pure, excited bliss. Orlando was mostly talking to some woman from costume but he looked over once or twice and smiled. They were smiles of invitation. Or so Dominic thought, foolishly. There was also some good-natured ragging from the others, and Billy was smiling at him a lot, raising his eyebrows.
All of a sudden, Liv cried out, "Are you going already, Orli?"
Dominic drained his glass, ready to get up.
But there was Orlando. He'd stood up, he'd placed some crumpled notes next to his plate, and he had his hand on that costume bimbo's waist. She was throwing her hair about and laughing self-consciously. Orlando directed a general wave at the table -- a general wave! --, and he was gone.
Dominic sat, stunned.
"Well, there goes Casanova Number One," said Liv, callously. "Can you pass me some of those prawn crackers, Lijie?"
"What, these things?" said Elijah.
"How's your hangover?" said Sean.
"Oh, OK," said Elijah.
"You were completely plastered last night," said Liv. "I'm amazed you're even here. Sean, I'm amazed he's even here. It was just as well you left early. You would have been shocked, shocked at the state he was in."
Elijah giggled.
"And so we had to leave those two boys to clean up all on their own," Liv went on, obliviously. "But I'm sure they managed all right!"
"Who's that girl Orlando went off with?" said Miranda.
"Dominic," said Billy. "Are you OK? You look a bit..."
"I'll be right back," said Dominic and pushed his chair back. He found the gents' and locked himself into the cubicle, and there he stood, staring at the ceiling. The ceiling was a puce colour, with a damp patch and a decorative border with some sort of orchid motif along the wall. Dominic pushed out his tongue and licked a drop of salt from the corner of his mouth.
What had happened? How could he have got it all so spectacularly wrong? This had been a one-night stand, a beach quickie --- and that was fine. That was fine. That was perfectly fine, yes. He'd had plenty of those. He was cool with that. Even though he had imagined... But that was just Orlando. Orlando couldn't help being Orlando. Not for nothing was he Casanova Number One. He was just good at that sort of thing, that was all. It meant nothing. Dominic was good at it, too, after all. Where, then, was the problem? Answer: there was no problem.
"Dominic," said Billy outside the cubicle door. "Are you in there?"
By this time, Dominic was weeping uncontrollably.
"Are you all right, Dominic?" said Billy.
Dominic blinked and stared hard at the ceiling and forced himself to swallow his sobs silently. He nearly choked on them.
That had been three weeks ago. To be precise, twenty-three days ago. The days had, luckily, been spent away from Orlando. Dominic had left Wellington and gone on location to the South Island, and Orlando had gone somewhere else, who knew, who cared. Dominic had worked hard, he'd got up early and gone to bed early, always alone. New Zealand was still fantastic, and the job was still unbelievable, but that non-stop coffee feeling had gone.
So here he was, on this wet, high hill in the drizzle, feeling as dismal as Wellington looked. His feet were cold, his ears were freezing, and his nape was wet.
Just then, he heard a curious singing sound. It reminded him of something. He looked around and nearly had a heart attack.
Continue reading: 3/3
Notes for 'chapter' 2:
Dominic stood on the hill above Wellington and felt dismal..
I quite like this as an opening sentence for similar reasons I like the opening sentence of 'chapter' 1: it names the main character, it situates him in space (above Wellington, in a bar) and it gives them an emotion (dismal, randy). I like that way of specifying the who, where and how right at the outset.
I still quite like the setting of the rainy hillside. I was in Wellington once for a brief moment and that's what I remember: a sort of steep hill with houses and vegetation clinging to it, and some bleakish weather.
the guys from lighting rolled their eyes and went, "Actors!".
What I think is funny is the way I didn't even know of the existence of WETA yet but I was already interested in the non-actors and the orcs... :-)
As he stood on that hilltop, the sun burning his neck, he let his eyes roam idly across the group, cruising his companions' faces..
I don't think I'd write such a long and circuitous sentence these days. Too many subsidiary clauses, too many continuous presents, and I don't like the way the 'sun' clause chops up the sentence in the middle. I hadn't yet figured out how to make prose *flow*. Some of the sentences have flow but it comes in stops and starts.
Orlando's wrist.
I have a wrist fetish, and a chunky-watch fetish. But that is no excuse for introducing things that never get taken up again. Again, I violated the shotgun-on-the-wall rule.
Dominic saw the way the hand grew out of the wrist, the angular joint of thumb to palm, the ring on the forefinger, the round short nails..
I'm quite struck with the way this echoes a description of a hand that I wrote in a snippet one year later (recently posted to LJ as "Karl's hand"): He (Richard) likes to think about how they fit together, how the opposable thumb rests so perfectly on the pad of the little finger, how the distances between the first knuckle and the second and third knuckles vary from finger to finger, how the nails emerge from their beds of skin to stand like sentinels at the tip of their towers.. But I think what I did in the more recent one is that I crawled much more into Richard's head; Richard thinks of a hand and my writing is describing the hand through Richard's eyes. In the case of the early fic, Dominic is looking at a hand but the description is neutral; the words are not Dominic's words, they could be anyone's. That's one thing I learned in all my fic writing at some point: how to crawl into someone's head (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
azewewish helped; she always talked of Karl whispering to her over her shoulder but it took me a while to figure out what she meant). At the latest by "Average", I had worked out how to do it for myself.
and absent-mindedly rubbing the shaved side of his head.
Well, that's rather a touching lack of research... :-)
It was then that Dominic had fallen mildly in love with Orlando. Not enough to make him miserable, and not enough to make him give up the many pleasures of the flesh to be enjoyed on this shoot, but just enough to cast a sparkle over any event or encounter that had Orlando in it. Dominic would be somewhere, doing whatever, and Orlando would appear, and Dominic's body would come alive as if he'd just drunk a pot of coffee. Dominic would look at Orlando and smile and smile. He couldn't help smiling at Orlando, and Orlando mostly sauntered over and blew him a kiss or gave him a high-five, and traded friendly banter, and that was it, really..
This is not a good concertina-ing of time. It's lame. I think what I would do now is perhaps use one episode or instance to demonstrate, and to rely less on the coffee simile.
I think the beach scene (while the others are still there) is a bit wooden. About the only line I still like is: But there was, oh there was.. There is also a confusion about characterisation at this point. I've set up Dominic as this Casanova, but have not shown in any way how he is a gallivanter; I've just claimed it. And if he is such a sleeper-rounder, why is he so nervous when alone with Orlando? It doesn't chime.
he was practically purring..
I hate this line now. The 'purring' is so clichéd, especially with respect to Orlando.
Dominic stood stock still. This was getting interesting..
I think the timing is not quite right in this whole scene at the water's edge. It's not 'getting interesting' now: it's been 'interesting' for a while! That is just a lame sentence. Yet I wrote and re-wrote and revised that whole dialogue endlessly.
That tree trunk is from a beach I once spent a night on in NZ in 1980, and it reappears in "When the Cat's Away". :-) (There's also a bit of Astrid Lindgren in there, for those of you who know 'The Children of Bullerby' and remember Lasse naked on a moonlit rock...)
"Don't worry," said Dominic and groped in the sand for the packet. "I've got one here."
Orlando smiled. "I knew you would," he said..
This exchange I quite like, and if I were to rewrite this fic now I would make much more of their shared Casanova-ness and downplay Dominic's nervousness on the beach. I'd make them more into equals who're just in it for a good time.
Orlando's entrance.
How coy was I! Still, my very first fic was already NC-17. I could never envisage writing anything but. It took me 5 months to work myself up to a G-rating! *g* Strangely (or not so strangely), I've never had a problem with writing the graphic sex. Some of the phrases I used in the sex scene I re-used later, e.g. the 'O' of the mouth reappears as Billy's 'O' in "When the Cat's Away".
it no longer felt like riding, it was like flying.
Still though, reading it now the sex scene is just a little bit wooden. Because I hadn't yet figured out 'the flow'. Also, I was not at all adventurous with metaphors yet. In "Up Shit Creek", I didn't simply *compare* the sex to flying and riding, I *turned it into* flying and riding. Well, that was one experiment with sex scenes, anyway, but this paragraph shows how timid I was to begin with. I was very worried about my English, for one thing, and how to do things 'right'.
One thing, though: I think I was already quite good at tight POV.
If Dominic had listened carefully, he might have caught the uncertain tone in Orlando's voice. .
This is an interesting use of narrator's voice. I've stopped using that voice; I don't know why. I guess I've lost some timidities and gained others.
He fell asleep, thinking, 'There'll be another chance for kisses. There'll be a hundred other chances, and a thousand things to look forward to.'.
Rightly or wrongly, I now use direct-speech thought very, very rarely. I suppose I don't believe people's thoughts come in grammatically correct sentences. Still, the device has its uses but I'm shy of it now.
The exchange in the restaurant after Orlando has left: I quite like the use of dialogue here. It kind of evokes Dominic's state of mind by contrast: everything around him continues blithely but we *know* he's upset. I also quite like the jerkiness of the conversation. But now I would not have Dominic weep in the toilets. I'm sparer with the tears. Or if I had him weeping, I wouldn't state it so baldly -- He was weeping uncontrollably. -- but allude to it in a more roundabout way (as I later learned to do at the end of "A Perfect Day", in the phone booth).
I now remember that this was originally going to be an even longer fic and have a sub-plot of Billy being in love with Dominic. Snatches of that sub-plot remain in the shape of Billy upset in Orlando's bed and Billy following Dominic into the loo but it makes no sense the way it's been left in there.
3/3
2. Dominic
Dominic stood on the hill above Wellington and felt dismal.
It was one of those windy days, typical of Wellington. Dominic had only just got back from shooting on the South Island, but had simply dumped his bags in his room and then practically run from the hotel. He didn't want to see anyone. Well, there was one person in particular he couldn't yet cope with seeing again, and he needed to move his limbs and let the fresh air blow the cobwebs out of his mind.
It wasn't really working. Being alone just made him melancholy, and the fact that this footpath was heavy with memories didn't help. Also, the air up in these hills was almost too fresh. In fact, it was freezing cold. The wind wasn't only blowing his thoughts around uselessly in his head but also tugging at his hair and whipping drops of rain into his eyes. Beneath the path, sheets of grey were beginning to drive across the town from the ocean. Dominic tucked his head into his shoulders.
And yet it had been warm only three weeks ago ---. But he did not want to think about that now.
"Oh, what the ...," he cried out as his foot sank into a puddle of mud. This was really too stupid. He should just head straight back down, go to the hotel, have a hot shower. But then he might bump into people down there, and he did not want to bump into people.
Above all, he did not want to bump into Orlando.
Why he was so obsessed with Orlando, he didn't know. It made no sense and there was no point to it. The guy wasn't interested and never would be. He was the greatest gallivanter of the entire cast, and he never landed in the same bed more often than twice in a row. If that. Everyone knew this. It was fodder for gleeful gossip and no great secret at all. The irony was that it was Dominic himself who had the reputation for second-most promiscuous cast member. Liv called him and Orlando the 'two Casanovas', and people laughed. And Dominic had always laughed back, and Orlando had given him a wink, and that had been that.
Three weeks ago, Dominic had stopped laughing.
He sighed and blinked into the rain. He had reached the little plateau at the end of one of the paths. The rain was slowly changing from drizzle into downpour. There was the drip-drip of water from leaves. The sea was grey, and the sky was grey. No-one else was about.
So much for trying to clear his thoughts. This was the exact same place where it had all started three months ago.
They had all gone walking up the hill and ended up on this plateau. It had been their first outing beyond the city itself. The day couldn't have been more different from today. The sun was hot. The sky was so dark blue that it was almost black. Dominic had never seen such a sky, but then, he had not been to the antipodes before. The city spread out before them, houses clinging to the steep hill and crowding together in the harbour valley below. Far beyond, on the horizon, shimmered the outline of the South Island. Dominic could just make out the ferry, glistening white on the channel, and hear gulls crying on the wind.
Everyone had been there: all the main Brits, the Aussies, the Kiwis and the Americans; Billy and Elijah and Orlando, Liv, the two Seans, Viggo, David, Miranda, plus an assortment of orcs and two lads from lighting. It had been like one large high school outing. They had all been chattering excitedly. New Zealand was bright and new. They'd only just got there, and they'd exclaimed and pointed and generally laughed a lot.
"It's Middle-Earth!" called out someone. "It really is!"
"That's because you don't know what any of these places are in real life, yer great dolt!" called someone else.
"Ah, but I do know this land!" declaimed Viggo. "This is where my people walked of old, it is fairest Gondor!"
"Beware, this Man is not to be trusted!" cried little Sean and spread his arms melodramatically.
They were doing this a lot at that time, lapsing into movie-speech, because they were all still figuring each other out. They referred to one another by their characters' names, the orc-actors bared their teeth, and the guys from lighting rolled their eyes and went, "Actors!"
There was a lot of manoeuvring going on, people sidling up to this person or to that, and a lot of wondering: Who was going to get on with whom? Who was going to get off with whom? Because, yes, sex had been in the air, and Dominic was loving it. As he stood on that hilltop, the sun burning his neck, he let his eyes roam idly across the group, cruising his companions' faces.
"Legolas, can you not use your elvish eyes and tell us what that blob-thing is down there?" cried David and pointed at something on the water.
"Aye, my noble friend," cried Orlando. "That blob, as you call it, is the five o'clock ferry from Dunedin!"
"Dunedin!" guffawed the Kiwis. "You don't have the first clue where Dunedin is!" Some mockery ensued, and good-natured repartee. It was while all this was going on that Dominic noticed Orlando's wrist.
Orlando had lifted his left arm to shade his eyes for an elvish distance stare. When he did this, his wristwatch, a chunky silver Rolex type, slid up onto his arm, and for whatever reason, this gesture made Dominic's heart miss a beat. The hilarity around him faded into static. Orlando's watch flashed in the sun. When Orlando lowered his arm, the watch slipped back down and bumped against the bones of his wrist. Dominic saw the way the hand grew out of the wrist, the angular joint of thumb to palm, the ring on the forefinger, the round short nails. The whole moment lasted maybe one second, then the noise roared back into Dominic's ears.
Dominic looked up at Orlando's face. Orlando was laughing at something, dimples everywhere, and absent-mindedly rubbing the shaved side of his head. Dominic had found the haircut ridiculous but now the sight of the white skin above Orlando's ears made his own skin tingle. Orlando looked over and caught Dominic's eye, he laughed and winked at Dominic, and Dominic laughed back, feeling deliriously happy.
It was then that Dominic had fallen mildly in love with Orlando. Not enough to make him miserable, and not enough to make him give up the many pleasures of the flesh to be enjoyed on this shoot, but just enough to cast a sparkle over any event or encounter that had Orlando in it. Dominic would be somewhere, doing whatever, and Orlando would appear, and Dominic's body would come alive as if he'd just drunk a pot of coffee. Dominic would look at Orlando and smile and smile. He couldn't help smiling at Orlando, and Orlando mostly sauntered over and blew him a kiss or gave him a high-five, and traded friendly banter, and that was it, really.
Dominic never felt the remotest need to do anything about this state of affairs. He was perfectly content. That is, until that night on the beach, a full two-and-a-half months later.
What a night. What a perfect night, and what a dreadful awakening afterwards.
Looking back on it, Dominic had walked into it with both eyes open but somehow he had still failed to see anything crucial. Until it had been too late.
They'd been on the beach since the early evening, waiting for dusk to fall, and it took its time in falling. There was a little fire, and various items were roasted in it. Beer and joints were passed around. Orlando was sitting near Dominic a lot, sometimes rubbing shoulders, sometimes back-to-back.
"Look at you two," said Liv. "What a cute couple! Our two very cute Casanovas!"
"That's so old, Liv," said Orlando and threw a napkin ball in her general direction. His back moved and tensed against Dominic's T-shirt, and that felt good. All of it felt good.
In fact, Dominic felt fantastic. He was filled to the gills with weed and good will, and he had that coffee-and-champagne feeling that he always had when Orlando was around. The night sparkled, Orlando sparkled and flirted outrageously with all and sundry, Dominic's heart sparkled. And the stars sparkled above. What more could one want? Dominic certainly didn't want anything more, and he had no inkling that there was anything more to be had. But there was, oh there was.
One by one the others started to peel off.
Sean and Viggo and Billy were the first to get up. "We're off," said Billy. "You coming, Dominic?"
Dominic lifted his half-full beer can and shook his head. Orlando didn't move, either.
Sean said, "Lijah? Come on, I'd better get you home. You look a bit out of it."
"He'll be fine; I'll get him home," said Liv. "Don't worry about it, I'll take care of him. Won't I, Lijie?"
"Yeah," said Sean, dubiously, and they went. Steve the Orc, Miranda and David followed not long after. That left only Liv and Elijah. And Orlando, of course, and Dominic.
Elijah didn't look too good. He was hugging his knees, and his head was lolling.
"I feel woozy," he stammered.
"Sure you do," said Liv. "After what you've shoved into yourself tonight. Come on, time for beddie-byes."
"Where's Sean?" Elijah said. "Has Sean left?"
"Sean left ages ago," said Liv. "Come on, get up."
"I want Sean," said Elijah. "Where are my shoes?"
"Well, where did you take them off?"
Liv started crawling around the fireplace, patting the sand. The fire had by now died down, night had fallen, and it was actually rather pitch-black. The stars shone above but that only made the earth seem darker.
"Those two," whispered Orlando and chuckled.
Dominic chuckled back.
"You coming, Orli?" said Liv, still on all fours with her nose in the sand.
Dominic held his breath.
"No, not yet," said Orlando.
"Nor me," said Dominic quickly.
"Oh, good, here they are!" cried Liv, and then, "Shit, Lije, what have you done to them? They're full of beer!"
"I'm not wearing beer on my feet," said Elijah, somewhat indistinctly.
"Oh, don't be stupid," said Liv. "Just put them on."
"Why are you fussing?" whined Elijah.
Liv was kneeling down and forcing the shoes onto Elijah's feet.
"I'm not fussing," she said. "Now, shut up and get up. I'll carry your radio."
"Fancy a swim?" whispered Orlando into Dominic's ear.
"Sure," whispered Dominic. There was a devilishly mischievous tone in Orlando's voice but Dominic, fool that he was, didn't make anything of it besides taking it for a sign of amused exasperation with Liv and Elijah. But everyone was always being amusedly exasperated with Liv and Elijah so that was nothing out of the extraordinary.
Dominic screwed his half-full beer can into the sand and tensed his calf muscles to stand up, but there was Orlando already, standing before him, gallantly holding out his hand and pulling him up.
"Thanks, mate," Dominic said. "Not that I'm that decrepit just yet."
Orlando laughed and kept hold of Dominic's wrist, just a fraction of a second longer than necessary. Dominic noticed, of course. Indeed, Orlando's touch burned into his arm. But he still didn't make anything of it besides taking it for a sign of his own infatuation and the general intoxication of the evening.
"We're going for a dip," Orlando called out. "See you in the morning, Liv."
"Oooh," said Liv. "The two Casanovas! Midnight dip! Well, have fun, boys! And don't forget to take the garbage with you!"
"Good luck with Lijah," said Dominic and grabbed a towel.
As they started jogging down towards the water's edge, Liv shouted after them, "And don't do anything I wouldn't do, boys!"
"Well," Orlando giggled. "That doesn't leave much. I don't think there's much that Liv wouldn't do."
"And you would know, would you?" said Dominic and laughed.
"I'm just saying that I'm glad it wasn't Elijah saying that," said Orlando. "I think we'll have more fun this way."
This was a cryptic remark, or it seemed cryptic to Dominic at the time. In retrospect, it wasn't cryptic at all, of course. But all Dominic thought then, was, 'Yes, this is fun. This is fabulous fun, and I'm fabulously lucky,' and all he said was, "We'll have fun, anyway." Which was kind of a lame response and shows that Dominic was, even at this early stage in the proceedings, not completely clear of mind.
They had reached the hard moist sand. Shallow waves lapped up at their feet. In the distance, Elijah's voice could still be heard, "My head hurts and I feel sick," and Liv's cheery reply, "Shut up and keep walking, Lijie."
Orlando, meanwhile, was stripping off and plunging naked into the ocean. Dominic, although fully supplied with bathing shorts, did likewise and splashed after him, the water slapping against his nipples and shrinking his balls.
"It's actually not that cold," puffed Orlando and splashed Dominic.
"You bastard," said Dominic and splashed Orlando. They tussled a little in the water, then they paddled out to where the breakers started and dived through a few, then they tussled some more, then Orlando ducked Dominic, and Dominic yelped and ducked Orlando. Then they waded back to shore, the blood rushing through their veins.
"Shit, there's no towel," said Orlando and hopped up and down.
"I've got one," said Dominic and felt around the sand with this foot for where their clothes had fallen. Orlando's head was silhouetted black against the constellations.
"This is a towel?" Orlando said. "This is tiny. This is barely big enough to cover my dick."
"What size dick have you got?" laughed Dominic. "Sorry I didn't bring the king size bath towel! Sorry I didn't bring the ten-foot mat!"
Talking about Orlando's dick was fun, yes, but just that little bit too close to the bone, and, ridiculous as it was, it made Dominic's ears burn.
Then Orlando said, "So. What do you want to do?" And now, Dominic listened up. The words were harmless enough but even Dominic could tell that the tone of voice was entirely and completely and comprehensively suggestive. Orlando was not only speaking softly and huskily; he was practically purring.
"What?" said Dominic, blankly.
"What Liv said," purred Orlando. "What we should and what we shouldn't do. What, then, do you want to do?"
"Um," said Dominic. Suddenly, he needed to get his shorts on very fast.
Orlando laughed. "Don't bother putting your shorts back on," he said. "I know you've got a roaring hard-on."
"Ha," said Dominic, weakly. "Have you got x-ray vision or what?"
"No," replied Orlando, and he was purring again. "It's just that I've got one, too."
"Haha," said Dominic. "Right. I didn't know hard-ons could roar." But he stepped out of his shorts.
"Maybe not," said Orlando, and he didn't even need to purr any longer for Dominic's ears to start burning. "But there are two or three other things they can do and that I could show you."
Dominic laughed. "Are you propositioning me, Bloom?" he said.
"Maybe," said Orlando with that bedroom voice of his. "Maybe. Is that what you want me to do?"
Dominic stood stock still. This was getting interesting.
"Maybe," he finally echoed Orlando's words. "Maybe."
"So," Orlando continued. "You still haven't answered my question. What, my friend, do you want to do?"
"I don't know," said Dominic. Which was a complete lie. Dominic knew exactly what he wanted to do. Five hundred things that he wanted to do with and to and on top of Orlando flashed through his mind quite unbidden. The difficulty lay in choosing only one of them.
"I don't believe you," whispered Orlando. His head was close in the dark, and his breath brushed Dominic's cheek. He smelled of salt and beer and something else, something metallic and unmistakably sexual.
"OK," Dominic said slowly, trying to keep his voice light. "I've thought of something."
"I knew you would," said Orlando.
"Have you ever...," began Dominic.
"Wow," said Orlando. He'd seen the moon.
Dominic turned around.
It must have been rising for a while but now, as they watched, the upper curve of the moon pushed over the black tangle of trees on the shore. The world was transformed. Icy silver flooded the beach. Every twig and rock and crevice became sharply outlined against its own inky shadow. The ocean rippled white and black, and the moon cast a glittering path across it. The stars were bleached in the lunar halo.
Dominic looked at Orlando. He had been a shadowy presence but now he was lit up as if by lightning. He was awash with silver, like a marble statue come to life. The shaven sides of his skull gleamed, and his face was sculpted into ivory curves and pools of onyx. Dominic's eyes dropped, and there was Orlando's erection, marvellously echoing his own desire.
"It's incredible," Dominic said. He didn't mean the moon.
Orlando tipped his head back, as if to drink in the sky. He looked bewitched.
"I'll be right back," said Dominic, and started up the beach.
"What?" said Orlando. "Where are you going?"
"Just hang on a minute," said Dominic, and ran to the barbecue place. He searched through the plastic bags with flying hands until he found it. The bottle. Full? Yes, about half. Good. He took his beer can from the sand and finished it in one gulp. Then, clutching the bottle in one hand, he ran back down the beach.
Orlando wasn't there.
Dominic looked right, Dominic looked left. There was Orlando, sprinting up the beach in the moonbeams, like some strange white sprite.
"Hey!" called out Dominic.
"Race you to that tree trunk!" Orlando's voice came, rising above the sound of the surf.
"Not fair!" yelled Dominic and laughed. "You got a head start!"
He dug around in his shorts on the sand, kicked the clothes up away from the waves and sped after Orlando. His feet thrummed on the sand. The tree trunk was a large bit of driftwood, lying sideways on the beach, sand papered smooth by the sea and with twisted branches sticking up bizarrely against the night sky. Dominic ran and ran, the air prickled on his skin, and the world seemed endless on all sides. Then he stopped.
Orlando had climbed onto the tree trunk. Nude and gorgeous, he was balancing on the log, dancing and -- could it be true? -- singing something, some old pop tune. Though teetering now and again on his narrow support, he was moving rhythmically and gracefully, with his moonlit erection bumping against his belly.
Dominic stood, transfixed. To the right, there was the sound of the ocean. Ahead, there was the sound of Orlando. The sand made tiny, rustling noises, as if traversed by small crabs or other night creatures. The moon hung above, round and liquid. Dominic felt happiness seeping into him like a drug. No, happy was not the word. It was as if all those champagne sensations had finally bubbled over and were filling him up and spilling out of him through the tips of his fingers.
Orlando saw Dominic, waved, tottered and hopped off the log. A spray of sand rose where he landed. Dominic walked up, his ears burning, his cock burning, his head dizzy with lust.
Orlando leant back against the tree. He was grinning at Dominic, sucking in his bottom lip. He looked impossibly seductive.
"What's that? What have you got there?" he said. "Is that the fucking cooking oil?"
"No," said Dominic who was now standing right in front of him. "No, that's just the fucking oil. I don't need to cook you; you look good enough to have raw."
"Perhaps you can marinate me," said Orlando.
That was such a cheesy thing to say that they both burst out laughing.
"I've thought of something to do, anyway," Dominic said.
"And what's that?" Orlando said.
"You'll see," said Dominic, almost dropping the bottle in his haste to unscrew the lid.
"I think," said Orlando and leant his head back, "I can guess."
Dominic poured oil all over his hands. All of a sudden, he just couldn't contain himself and bent forward to bite Orlando on the neck, hard.
"Fuck, Monaghan," said Orlando. "Has the moon turned you into a werewolf? I can't have a bloody love bite on my neck."
"Shut up," whispered Dominic and closed his fist around Orlando. He felt warm and firm and slippery in Dominic's palm. Orlando sighed.
"Is that what you had in mind?" he whispered.
"No," said Dominic. "This is just the beginning."
"Good," said Orlando and lifted his eyes, staring at the moon. He put his hands on Dominic's waist, and Dominic pushed up against him. Then they half stumbled, half fell onto the sand. Dominic ended up kneeling over Orlando, his hands on Orlando's knees, pushing them apart. His pulse raced as he emptied the remaining oil onto his hands and slithered his hands around Orlando's balls.
'It's happening,' he thought, wildly. 'This is happening.' This was no longer just friendly banter.
Orlando gasped as Dominic pushed two oily fingers against him and into him.
"Have you ever," Dominic whispered, "been fucked on a beach?"
"I...," said Orlando through his gasps. "Well, technically no."
"What do you mean, technically?" said Dominic.
"Been fucked," gasped Orlando. "Technically. I've only ever done the fucking."
"I might have guessed," said Dominic. He leaned close and whispered into Orlando's ear, "Well, tonight I'm going to fuck you on this beach till you come."
"I love it when you talk dirty," said Orlando. Then he gasped again and said, "What are you doing to me, Monaghan?"
"You feel good," said Dominic.
"Shit," said Orlando. "My shorts. They're miles away."
"What do you need your shorts for?" said Dominic.
"I need to get a...," began Orlando.
"Don't worry," said Dominic and groped in the sand for the packet. "I've got one here."
Orlando smiled. "I knew you would," he said.
Dominic ripped the packet open with this teeth but Orlando had to help him slide the condom on because Dominic's hands were dripping with oil. Both their bellies were slick with the stuff, and the smell of oil mingled with the smell of their sweat and the salt on their skin.
Orlando closed his fingers around Dominic, and Dominic thought, 'I want this to last forever.' That was the last coherent thought he had.
"Fuck me, Dominic," Orlando said.
Dominic lifted himself, one hand around Orlando, the other braced against the sand. For one long moment he rested his penis against Orlando's entrance, poised on the brink of bliss. He looked at Orlando, Orlando looked at him and then closed his eyes, and slowly, slowly Dominic pushed the head of his cock in and stayed still. Orlando moved his hips to pull him in and his eyes snapped open again. He had the most indescribable expression on his face. Dominic was drowning in that face, in those pebble-black eyes, each with a tiny moon reflected in it. He was drowning in all of Orlando. He plunged in, and Orlando was hot and sweet and tight as a fist.
Orlando's mouth opened in a wide O, and he gave a sharp gasp. His eyes were still locked onto Dominic's.
Then the rhythm started up. Dominic felt as if he were riding a wave, on and on, steadied only by Orlando's extraordinary gaze and Orlando's hands clasped around his waist. He was holding onto Orlando's cock as if for life, pushing his own belly up and down against it, moiling and toiling in the depths of Orlando.
Orlando kept on gasping. His lids fluttered. He let go off Dominic and his hands drifted up to rest loosely on the ground next to his head, palms up. He looked like the essence of helpless surrender as he lay split and opened. With each push, his head jerked back a little on the sand until it hit the log. Orlando grabbed Dominic's wrist, the one used to hold himself up, and almost knocked him off balance, but Dominic kept going and kept riding. In fact, it no longer felt like riding, it was like flying.
Orlando's head kept hitting the log but he was now gasping faster and faster, he was gasping like a fucking steam engine, and then his hot semen flowed over Dominic's hand. Orlando's muscles contracted wildly around Dominic, and that tipped Dominic over. He came and came, with a deep, throaty moan that seemed to have been ripped straight out of the depths of his being. He surprised himself with that moan, he normally never moaned but now he did, as the image of Orlando beneath him went blurry and flew apart into millions of black and white shards. Dominic shuddered, and shuddered again, and with each of these after-shudders, he found himself laughing out loud. He laughed delighted little laughs, and they, too, surprised him.
Orlando lifted his hand and laid it against Dominic's cheek, and Dominic pressed his face against it. Then he dropped his head, moisture dripping from his hair onto Orlando's chest. He grabbed the top of the condom, pulled out and rolled over onto his back. Sand stuck to his skin. His lungs were heaving, and the stars were whirling up above.
Bit by bit, thoughts returned to his head.
"Well," he said to the sky. "That was unexpected."
Then he reached over and cupped Orlando's soft cock, neat and small, in his palm, and licked Orlando's belly, all that mix of oil and sperm and sweat.
"Did I catch you off your guard?" said Orlando, between breaths. If Dominic had listened carefully, he might have caught the uncertain tone in Orlando's voice. But Dominic wasn't listening carefully. He was blithely carefree.
"You did," said Dominic and laughed. Orlando laughed, too. Dominic thought, 'I want to do this again and again.'
"I love the way you laugh," he said out loud to Orlando. "You're always laughing. And that makes me laugh."
Orlando said nothing but looking up at him, Dominic saw that he had that impenetrable look on again.
"Well," Dominic said. "The earth moved for me." Then he rolled off Orlando and fell into a sweet, sweet sleep.
He didn't know how long he'd slept, a couple of minutes at most. When he opened his eyes, there was Orlando, looking at him. Dominic did nothing, just looked back, then reached out his hand to Orlando's head. But Orlando ducked away and jumped up.
"Let's have another dip," he said. "Shit, I'm sore as a horse."
"As a horse?" laughed Dominic.
They ran into the waves again but now there was no tussling and no splashing. Orlando seemed in a strange, after-sex mood. He didn't say much but looked at Dominic sideways a lot and crinkled up his face and laughed.
"What a night," said Dominic.
"Yeah," said Orlando.
Dominic felt absurdly blissful. That bubbly sensation had gone and given way to a deep glow of contentment. Wrapped up in this glow, he thought he was noticing everything about Orlando. But, of course, he was missing all the crucial signs, and noticed nothing but Orlando's charm and the promise in Orlando's face.
Everything that night was good. Walking back to the fire place was good, and getting their gear together was good. Even clearing up the fire and their rubbish was good, and walking side by side through the dunes was companionable and good, and sitting in the back seat of the taxi was snug and good.
Last of all, saying 'good night' on the landing in the hotel was good. Orlando hooked an arm around Dominic's shoulders and said, "Thanks, Dominic. That hit the spot. I had a great time."
"Fuck it, Orlando," Dominic laughed. "You don't have to be so formal with me." He never asked himself what such formality might mean.
It was only when Dominic got to his room that he realised that he hadn't kissed Orlando once during the whole evening. But this only made him smile again at the haste and lust and perfection of it all. He fell asleep, thinking, 'There'll be another chance for kisses. There'll be a hundred other chances, and a thousand things to look forward to.'
The whole of the day after was still enveloped in a haze of happiness. They weren't working together that day but it didn't matter because in the morning, Orlando came over and ruffled Dominic's hair and winked at him, and for the evening there was already a dinner planned with a whole lot of people at some restaurant. So the evening was waiting for Dominic, like a treasure at dusk, and the day was long and bright.
But the evening, when it came, gave up no treasure. Instead, it broke Dominic's haze and Dominic's heart.
Not at first. At first, Dominic sat and ate and conversed, all in a heady fug of anticipation and hardly knowing what he was saying or hearing. Orlando was sitting a few seats away, on the other side of a long table, and seeing him from afar and knowing what they were going to do to each other in only a few hours' time, was pure, excited bliss. Orlando was mostly talking to some woman from costume but he looked over once or twice and smiled. They were smiles of invitation. Or so Dominic thought, foolishly. There was also some good-natured ragging from the others, and Billy was smiling at him a lot, raising his eyebrows.
All of a sudden, Liv cried out, "Are you going already, Orli?"
Dominic drained his glass, ready to get up.
But there was Orlando. He'd stood up, he'd placed some crumpled notes next to his plate, and he had his hand on that costume bimbo's waist. She was throwing her hair about and laughing self-consciously. Orlando directed a general wave at the table -- a general wave! --, and he was gone.
Dominic sat, stunned.
"Well, there goes Casanova Number One," said Liv, callously. "Can you pass me some of those prawn crackers, Lijie?"
"What, these things?" said Elijah.
"How's your hangover?" said Sean.
"Oh, OK," said Elijah.
"You were completely plastered last night," said Liv. "I'm amazed you're even here. Sean, I'm amazed he's even here. It was just as well you left early. You would have been shocked, shocked at the state he was in."
Elijah giggled.
"And so we had to leave those two boys to clean up all on their own," Liv went on, obliviously. "But I'm sure they managed all right!"
"Who's that girl Orlando went off with?" said Miranda.
"Dominic," said Billy. "Are you OK? You look a bit..."
"I'll be right back," said Dominic and pushed his chair back. He found the gents' and locked himself into the cubicle, and there he stood, staring at the ceiling. The ceiling was a puce colour, with a damp patch and a decorative border with some sort of orchid motif along the wall. Dominic pushed out his tongue and licked a drop of salt from the corner of his mouth.
What had happened? How could he have got it all so spectacularly wrong? This had been a one-night stand, a beach quickie --- and that was fine. That was fine. That was perfectly fine, yes. He'd had plenty of those. He was cool with that. Even though he had imagined... But that was just Orlando. Orlando couldn't help being Orlando. Not for nothing was he Casanova Number One. He was just good at that sort of thing, that was all. It meant nothing. Dominic was good at it, too, after all. Where, then, was the problem? Answer: there was no problem.
"Dominic," said Billy outside the cubicle door. "Are you in there?"
By this time, Dominic was weeping uncontrollably.
"Are you all right, Dominic?" said Billy.
Dominic blinked and stared hard at the ceiling and forced himself to swallow his sobs silently. He nearly choked on them.
That had been three weeks ago. To be precise, twenty-three days ago. The days had, luckily, been spent away from Orlando. Dominic had left Wellington and gone on location to the South Island, and Orlando had gone somewhere else, who knew, who cared. Dominic had worked hard, he'd got up early and gone to bed early, always alone. New Zealand was still fantastic, and the job was still unbelievable, but that non-stop coffee feeling had gone.
So here he was, on this wet, high hill in the drizzle, feeling as dismal as Wellington looked. His feet were cold, his ears were freezing, and his nape was wet.
Just then, he heard a curious singing sound. It reminded him of something. He looked around and nearly had a heart attack.
Continue reading: 3/3
Notes for 'chapter' 2:
Dominic stood on the hill above Wellington and felt dismal..
I quite like this as an opening sentence for similar reasons I like the opening sentence of 'chapter' 1: it names the main character, it situates him in space (above Wellington, in a bar) and it gives them an emotion (dismal, randy). I like that way of specifying the who, where and how right at the outset.
I still quite like the setting of the rainy hillside. I was in Wellington once for a brief moment and that's what I remember: a sort of steep hill with houses and vegetation clinging to it, and some bleakish weather.
the guys from lighting rolled their eyes and went, "Actors!".
What I think is funny is the way I didn't even know of the existence of WETA yet but I was already interested in the non-actors and the orcs... :-)
As he stood on that hilltop, the sun burning his neck, he let his eyes roam idly across the group, cruising his companions' faces..
I don't think I'd write such a long and circuitous sentence these days. Too many subsidiary clauses, too many continuous presents, and I don't like the way the 'sun' clause chops up the sentence in the middle. I hadn't yet figured out how to make prose *flow*. Some of the sentences have flow but it comes in stops and starts.
Orlando's wrist.
I have a wrist fetish, and a chunky-watch fetish. But that is no excuse for introducing things that never get taken up again. Again, I violated the shotgun-on-the-wall rule.
Dominic saw the way the hand grew out of the wrist, the angular joint of thumb to palm, the ring on the forefinger, the round short nails..
I'm quite struck with the way this echoes a description of a hand that I wrote in a snippet one year later (recently posted to LJ as "Karl's hand"): He (Richard) likes to think about how they fit together, how the opposable thumb rests so perfectly on the pad of the little finger, how the distances between the first knuckle and the second and third knuckles vary from finger to finger, how the nails emerge from their beds of skin to stand like sentinels at the tip of their towers.. But I think what I did in the more recent one is that I crawled much more into Richard's head; Richard thinks of a hand and my writing is describing the hand through Richard's eyes. In the case of the early fic, Dominic is looking at a hand but the description is neutral; the words are not Dominic's words, they could be anyone's. That's one thing I learned in all my fic writing at some point: how to crawl into someone's head (
azewewish helped; she always talked of Karl whispering to her over her shoulder but it took me a while to figure out what she meant). At the latest by "Average", I had worked out how to do it for myself.and absent-mindedly rubbing the shaved side of his head.
Well, that's rather a touching lack of research... :-)
It was then that Dominic had fallen mildly in love with Orlando. Not enough to make him miserable, and not enough to make him give up the many pleasures of the flesh to be enjoyed on this shoot, but just enough to cast a sparkle over any event or encounter that had Orlando in it. Dominic would be somewhere, doing whatever, and Orlando would appear, and Dominic's body would come alive as if he'd just drunk a pot of coffee. Dominic would look at Orlando and smile and smile. He couldn't help smiling at Orlando, and Orlando mostly sauntered over and blew him a kiss or gave him a high-five, and traded friendly banter, and that was it, really..
This is not a good concertina-ing of time. It's lame. I think what I would do now is perhaps use one episode or instance to demonstrate, and to rely less on the coffee simile.
I think the beach scene (while the others are still there) is a bit wooden. About the only line I still like is: But there was, oh there was.. There is also a confusion about characterisation at this point. I've set up Dominic as this Casanova, but have not shown in any way how he is a gallivanter; I've just claimed it. And if he is such a sleeper-rounder, why is he so nervous when alone with Orlando? It doesn't chime.
he was practically purring..
I hate this line now. The 'purring' is so clichéd, especially with respect to Orlando.
Dominic stood stock still. This was getting interesting..
I think the timing is not quite right in this whole scene at the water's edge. It's not 'getting interesting' now: it's been 'interesting' for a while! That is just a lame sentence. Yet I wrote and re-wrote and revised that whole dialogue endlessly.
That tree trunk is from a beach I once spent a night on in NZ in 1980, and it reappears in "When the Cat's Away". :-) (There's also a bit of Astrid Lindgren in there, for those of you who know 'The Children of Bullerby' and remember Lasse naked on a moonlit rock...)
"Don't worry," said Dominic and groped in the sand for the packet. "I've got one here."
Orlando smiled. "I knew you would," he said..
This exchange I quite like, and if I were to rewrite this fic now I would make much more of their shared Casanova-ness and downplay Dominic's nervousness on the beach. I'd make them more into equals who're just in it for a good time.
Orlando's entrance.
How coy was I! Still, my very first fic was already NC-17. I could never envisage writing anything but. It took me 5 months to work myself up to a G-rating! *g* Strangely (or not so strangely), I've never had a problem with writing the graphic sex. Some of the phrases I used in the sex scene I re-used later, e.g. the 'O' of the mouth reappears as Billy's 'O' in "When the Cat's Away".
it no longer felt like riding, it was like flying.
Still though, reading it now the sex scene is just a little bit wooden. Because I hadn't yet figured out 'the flow'. Also, I was not at all adventurous with metaphors yet. In "Up Shit Creek", I didn't simply *compare* the sex to flying and riding, I *turned it into* flying and riding. Well, that was one experiment with sex scenes, anyway, but this paragraph shows how timid I was to begin with. I was very worried about my English, for one thing, and how to do things 'right'.
One thing, though: I think I was already quite good at tight POV.
If Dominic had listened carefully, he might have caught the uncertain tone in Orlando's voice. .
This is an interesting use of narrator's voice. I've stopped using that voice; I don't know why. I guess I've lost some timidities and gained others.
He fell asleep, thinking, 'There'll be another chance for kisses. There'll be a hundred other chances, and a thousand things to look forward to.'.
Rightly or wrongly, I now use direct-speech thought very, very rarely. I suppose I don't believe people's thoughts come in grammatically correct sentences. Still, the device has its uses but I'm shy of it now.
The exchange in the restaurant after Orlando has left: I quite like the use of dialogue here. It kind of evokes Dominic's state of mind by contrast: everything around him continues blithely but we *know* he's upset. I also quite like the jerkiness of the conversation. But now I would not have Dominic weep in the toilets. I'm sparer with the tears. Or if I had him weeping, I wouldn't state it so baldly -- He was weeping uncontrollably. -- but allude to it in a more roundabout way (as I later learned to do at the end of "A Perfect Day", in the phone booth).
I now remember that this was originally going to be an even longer fic and have a sub-plot of Billy being in love with Dominic. Snatches of that sub-plot remain in the shape of Billy upset in Orlando's bed and Billy following Dominic into the loo but it makes no sense the way it's been left in there.
3/3