Archive of Our Own ^beta

I don't own them.

Oh, it's wild tonight. The wind catches the strands of my hair and blows them across my face. In the distance I feel the rain coming in, the clouds rolling over the sky. The dust kicks up, swirling, glittering, in the dimness of the streetlights.

I throw my head back and watch the clouds eat up the sky, covering the stars as though hiding the earth from the beauty of the heavens.

The sprinklers on the lawn (sprinklers, and it's going to rain tonight, there's your government spending your tax dollars) spray gently over me, blown from their trajectory by the wind.

There's not a soul in sight, and so I can laugh at the wind and rain all I want. My students would think I was nuts if they saw me walking across campus at almost nine in the evening, muttering poetry to myself about the stars and the wind and the rain.

I know it will be raining before I make it to my car, and I don't really care. I'll be laughing when it starts, not caring if I get wet.

The first drops are falling when I come in sight of the fountain in front of the school. I stop for a second to watch the waters meet, the water from the sky and the water from the earth.

The city's orange glow against the night sky lights up the fountain, and suddenly it looks sinister. Terrifying even. I deliberately turn and walk on, not looking any more at it.

I reach the parking lot, see my car, one of the last in the lot -- but no, wait.

There's a familiar truck there.

Oh, Jim. You shouldn't have, really. I can make it home by myself, done it a thousand times before.

I don't say that. Instead I just run up to him, to the window.

"Hey."

"Get in," Jim says in his almost-command-but-not-quite voice.

"Do we have something going on?" I ask, puzzled. Why would he pick me up? It's out of his way.

"No," Jim feels quiet, calm, gentle, tonight. "Just wanted to pick you up."

"Thank you," I return. "Hope that means you'll also want to bring me back in the morning."

Jim nods.

The rain starts falling in earnest as we pull out of the lot.

"You hungry?" Jim asks, glancing at me while we're at a red light.

"Um, yeah, kind of," I say. Honestly, I'm ravenous, haven't eaten anything since that morning early.

We drive through Wendy's. I get a salad; he gets a burger. I give him most of my fries, nasty greasy things. He pays. We stop and eat in the truck, 'cause rain and food plus driving are simply too much for even Sentinel senses.

Our picnic's quiet, broken only by the offers of another packet of ketchup, Jim's snatching the salt packets out of the bag, to my horror (goodness James, those things are already salted and you want to put more on?), and the soft patter of the rain on the windows. It's the silence of friendship, the kind of silence where you don't feel obligated to talk, but wouldn't feel out of place if you decided you had something to say.

We're comfortable. It begins to feel like this truck is a small, enclosed universe where only the two of us matter.

There's this current that is beginning to run through me, this sappy mushy feeling I get at certain times that's unaccountably directed at Jim. It's pleasant. And I haven't stopped to analyze it. Just enjoy feeling it, whatever it might be.

Tonight, it's stronger. That little bit of buzzing and humming energy that's thrumming its way through my belly seems to be reflected in Jim's face.

He looks at me, and the butterflies in my stomach go wild.

"Chief," he breathes, and his voice is unutterably tender.

I know what he's trying to say. I hope.

It seems like the confirmation of my destiny to scoot over a bit closer to him, reach up, put my arms around his neck and whisper, "Yeah?"

His arms come around me. "Love you," he says.

"Oh, I'll just bet you do," I grin. And I kiss him.

We stay like that for just a minute, slowly discovering the wild wonder of each other. His breath catches when I pull away; he stares at me like he's never seen me before.

I look into his eyes, truth-teller serious. "I love you, Jim," I say. "I really do."

He shakes his head, smiling. "This is serious," he says. "I mean, it's really happening, right, I didn't just dream it?"

"If it's a dream," I say, "it's a damn good one, and I don't want to ever wake up."

When we get home, we're still feeling a bit awkward with each other. Just confess your love to your best friend, and see how weird you feel. We don't know what to do -- do we go to bed together, do we wait a few days, do we sit down on the couch and start necking?

"I'm taking a shower," Jim announces, then seems to remember and turns to me. "Unless you want...?"

I wave him on. "Go ahead, man. Just don't use all the hot water."

He laughs. "You're the one with that problem," he kids me.

I flop down on the couch, but he's out in a few minutes, and I stand up to watch him saunter, yeah, there's no other word for it, up the stairs, in only a towel.

By the time I'm out of the shower, he's down the stairs again, in a bathrobe, looking slightly damp and definitely delicious. He looks at me, and is it my imagination, or does he blush?

"Blair," he whispers. I can't resist. My hair is still wet, along with most of the rest of me, but I can't stay away from my Sentinel.

I step forward. He takes the towel from around my waist, pulling it out as calmly as you please, and begins to dry me off with it.

"Can't have you...getting the couch all wet," he says, voice gone slow and deep, as he dries off my shoulders and hair.

"No, can't," I whisper, hardly knowing what I am saying, I'm so fascinated by the chest hair that peeks out from his bathrobe. I want to rip the robe off of him and explore that big body. I want to touch him everywhere.

I move forward, still mostly wet, pushing against him, shoving parts of robe aside. The towel stills, then Jim drapes it carefully over my hair, bunches and twists it to get as much water as possible out.

Towel and robe fall together to the floor as we kiss, naked together as lovers for the first time. We're not even thinking about what to do, where we'll take it from here. Just kissing. His lips are smooth over mine, and when his tongue finds its way into my mouth, it's all I can do to keep from crying out.

I push into him, my arms wrapping themselves around his neck, our bodies touching everywhere. Our groins meet, and we both let out a half-sob, pulling away from each other just a little. He tucks a strand of damp hair behind my ear and I smile at him, awfully shy in spite of the fact that we're both standing here with hard-ons for each other.

"Blair, a little slower, okay?" he whispers, and I don't misunderstand, not when I'm looking in his eyes like that, seeing the love shine there.

"Upstairs?" I say, wanting it to be his bed.

He nods and moves away from me, picking up the dropped towel and robe, then extending his hand. I take it, and we climb the stairs together.

I can still hear the rain beating against the windows, clattering against the skylight, and it makes me feel as though we're enclosed in a tower, a nest of our own. No one can disturb or harm us here.

At the top of the stairs, we pause briefly, and he lifts my hand up to his lips and kisses it. That gesture, more than anything else that has happened so far this evening, tells me this is more than just sex between two buddies, that this is real and hopefully forever. I turn into his arms as we reach the bed.

He feels like he wants to take charge, and part of me is interested, but not tonight. Tonight is for us, not a power trip.

I resist, very slightly, when he tries to lay me down on the bed, but pull him with me, pull him against me.

"You and me, together, making love," I say. "Not you making love to me, or me making love to you."

In the dimness I see him digest the concept. Men are always the ones to take charge of sex, he's been taught, but there are two of us in this bed. No control, no holding back, just equal loving between us. That's what I want.

Finally he nods, and we move toward each other for a kiss. That kiss seals all the promises we've been whispering to each other through hearts, words, and actions since the day we met. And that is only the beginning.

Time goes slow as our mouths meet and speeds up again only when he lets me go. Our hands, seemingly of their own will, slide over each other's skin. I caress his thigh, then his side, and he twitches. I've found a spot.

Oh, but he's finding the spots on me, too -- the hollow of my back that makes me jolt into him when he licks at it, the tender skin just at the very top of my ass, and ah! my throat just below the ear.

I gasp against him and my hand on him goes still. We breathe in long shuddering pants together. Equilibrium at last restored, I resume my caresses, hand traveling down to wander over his chest.

He jerks against me when I rub at his nipple. I mark the reaction for future further inspection. "Like that, don't you?" I say, smiling.

He growls into my ear and pulls me to him, hard. Suddenly the mood changes, and though we're still both in control, it's me on top of him now, rolled over before I had a say in the matter. I reach up and kiss him, deep and strong, as his hands explore the curve of my ass and his cock thunders against mine.

We're breathing hard again, and I know this isn't going to last too much longer. We're both so caught up, so on fire.

"Jim," I whisper, again pulling back a little. "How do you want to do this? Me in you, you in me, or just continue as we are?"

His eyes are practically black with arousal as they stare into mine. "I want to be inside you," he says, low and thick and dirty. The words flash straight to my cock.

"Do you have any...?" my voice trails off, and I hope he knows what I'm referring to, because I damn well don't want to go downstairs to get my own tube of Astroglide.

He nods, and sits up, dumping me off of him, and reaches into the bedside table drawer. Oh, he's just like me, bi as they come, and how could we have ignored each other for so long?

The tube isn't new, and doesn't look like it's been opened in a while. He pries the cap off, and turns to look at me.

"You want to, or me?" he growls. I snuggle up to him, opening my thighs.

"You do it," I say.

His fingers burn for half a second when they go into me, and I twist on them, loving the ache. It's been too long, my God, far too long, but no more on long-lost lovers -- this is Jim I'm with.

We're still sitting upright, Jim leaning against the wall with a pillow behind him and me on his lap, feeling his fingers stretch me wide open. His cock nudges against my opening before we're quite ready, and the feel of his wet flesh against the sensitive nerve endings of my ass makes me whimper.

Two fingers in, and then three, and my body has forgotten the initial pain. I want him, I want him inside me, now!

"Please," I moan against his lips, and he withdraws his fingers. Hand visibly shaking, he pours lube over his cock, and presses against me.

I yield to him, slowly, the head of his cock sliding into my body with infinite measured care, millimeter by millimeter. I can feel every ridge on him, every contour. The further he gets in, the more whole I feel.

At last, his cock is inside me, all the way to the root, and I exhale one long slow sigh. For a few moments that could translate to years in eternity, we stay still, not moving, hardly breathing, staring into each other's eyes.

Then his hand sneaks down to hold my cock, and the spell is broken. I move on him. I feel his cock sliding in and out of my body, shapes changing against sensitive skin.

Deep inside on the fifth thrust, he sparks against something in me that sets the world whirling in front of my eyes. His hand just rests on my cock, gently petting it, but that is enough.

"Jim!" I gasp wildly, and break apart, falling free from my body and soaring, savoring the scent and taste of my love sharp in my mouth, the universe exploding before my eyes. I feel him come inside me just then too, the hot splash of him leaving me clenching around him, gasping, panting, shuddering.

His arms come tight around me, holding me to him. My face is buried in his neck. I am totally surrounded by him, and he is surrounded by me. We are one being in that moment.

Even the most perfect of moments cannot last forever though, and slowly we come down from our wild ecstasy to find that I'm getting a cramp in my thigh and we're both wet with sweat and semen.

We pull back from each other.

"I love you," I say suddenly.

His eyes are blue, a warm soft after-love blue. "And I love you," he answers.

That is enough, all we need to know. Whatever tomorrow brings, we'll face it together.

Jim grabs the towel from the floor and cleans us both off. Then we move into each other's arms to sleep away is left of the night.

I listen to the rain pattering on the roof and think, "Oh, yes. It's wild tonight. And I hope it stays this wild forever."

End Wild Tonight by Amy Fortuna: [email protected]

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