Shine - Part Eleven
This episode is part of a larger story, Soft Touch. If you haven’t yet, you can go back and read it from the beginning right here. The episode below is NSFW and contains mature content. Please skip to the break to avoid it, if you’d like!
Late at night. The windows are open, the air clean and pure. The leaves of the branch that grows into our bedroom all whisper softly as they’re rustled by the drizzly gusts outside. The corner stove is lit, flickering flames tinting the room with their warm colors.
Aiden and I have stepped off of earth and back into our own secret, magic world.
The raw magic that Aiden let escape as he moaned into my ear is still drifting through the air, shimmering like diamond dust. Aiden could barely hold back his magic tonight, couldn’t even contain it to the lightning bolts that licked over our bare, intertwined, breathless bodies. He started glowing so soon, too. All he had done at that point was slowly slide a hand up my inner thigh, stroking my tender skin with his thumb and drawing a gasp from me.
Now that it’s over, our bodies are warm and heavy. But the sight of Aiden’s love-drunk, lax body sprawled out on the bed, his bronze skin on our rumpled sheets, those deeply expressive blue eyes the color of icy mountain streams, and the magic reflecting in them, turning them into blue nebula clouds…
The impulse was fucking impossible to resist, even so soon after.
I’m laying flat on top of Aiden, my elbows sunk into the mattress on either side of his head, kissing him slowly. I love that I can lay like this for as long as I want. I’d worry that I was crushing or smothering any other guy after a certain point, but not this one. Not Aiden Callahan.
His soft, damp hair grasped tightly in my hands. Achingly slow kisses, my tongue deep inside his mouth. I’m drunk purely on the intoxicating taste of him, on his body heat sinking upwards into me.
Aiden is just as turned on as I am - easy to tell, when I’m laying full-length over him like this. I can feel his body throbbing with desire beneath me, can taste the hunger in the way he’s kissing me back, but neither of us moves to speed up or take things further.
I think that Aiden doesn’t want this to go any further yet because he doesn’t want it to end. That’s what I’m feeling, anyways. I’d be happy if this never ended.
Besides us, all in the room is very still. The rain-soaked garden spices the air with its rich, aromatic perfume. I’m breathing in Aiden, too, that mixture of vetiver and aged paper and the salt of his sweat, and the essential, indefinable scent that I know only as Aiden. Just - him. I breathe him in like oxygen.
Aside from kissing me back and holding me in place, Aiden is perfectly still, completely absorbed. He seems dazed, like he’s completely forgotten how to move. Or like moving could break the spell.
So we keep kissing each other passionately, but slowly, so slowly. Not in the feverish, urgent, breathless way we were before. This is deeper and more deliberate, my head sunk over Aiden’s, the heat of his breath on my lips. We stay closely entangled, moving very slowly and subtly.
Every time I do something that sets Aiden’s heart beating faster, I ease up. Every time he draws a muffled little moan out of my mouth and into his, he eases up, too. Sometimes I find myself rubbing my body against his without meaning to, but when I hear his breath growing husky with surprised rapture, I force myself to stop. As soon as we get close to a place where the tension might make us snap, we fall back together.
But as we flow back and forth in our rhythm, we’re building heat and electricity with each passing second. My kisses are driving Aiden down into the bed. I feel like I’m breathing in flames of pure ecstasy, drawing it all deep down into myself, where it sets me alight. Melting me until all I can do is breathe and feel. Until all I know, all I can remember is me and him.
I’m holding so tight to Aiden’s chestnut hair that it must hurt, but he puts up no resistance.
I touch just the tip of my tongue to Aiden’s, slowly rolling my hips against him. Aiden’s breath wavers. His jaw clenches, and I feel the smooth, thick muscle of his thigh flexing. The current running between us is growing and deepening, throwing off invisible sparks, seething within both of us. My body is already melted onto Aiden’s, but I sink even more against him, tightening my grip on his hair, nibbling his lips, imbuing everything with all the warmth I keep for him in my heart.
Then I take his lip between both of mine, teasingly drag my tongue over it, and bite him hard, sinking my teeth in.
I feel Aiden twitch desperately beneath me, feel the throb in his pulse, the shudder that goes through his body. He lets out a broken, stuttering moan into my mouth, one that sounds like it came from deep down in his chest.
I raise my head to look down at Aiden. He opens his eyes and gazes up at me. They’re blurred as if by a burning heat-haze, glazed over with desire. His dilated pupils are huge, each with a sliver-thin rim of breathtaking blue, inlaid with the glimmering reflections of the magic dust floating around us. His full lips are slightly parted, his breaths coming hard and fast, almost panting. His bronze skin is dewy with a light, luminous sheen of sweat. The tension in his body has his every sculpted muscle taut.
The faint turquoise of the raised veins in his biceps. The deep crimson of the blush in his cheeks.
He looks like poetry material. But it’s the expression of boundless love in his blue eyes that makes my heart run wild.
I bend down over him and nuzzle my nose into his, overwhelmed.
“I love you, Aiden,” I murmur, feeling in some strange way like I’m saying it back to him, even though he didn’t say anything.
There’s a silence, Aiden looking up at me hazily, breathing hard. There was an imploring, taunted, tantalized look in his eyes before, but now that’s changed into something else completely.
“Holy shit,” he finally says, in a strangled, rasping voice. He sits up, surprising me, easing me off of him. “Just gotta - lemme get my breath for a sec.”
I’m not sure what’s going on, but I sit back and loop my arms around my knees, staring at Aiden curiously. He stares with unseeing eyes at the wall, breathless and silent.
He slowly turns his head to look at me.
“Goddamnit, Keane. You trying to kill me, man? I oughta kick your ass.”
I jerk my head back and let out an indignant laugh, caught entirely off-guard. “What-?”
“I told you to stop with - I can’t handle - in one week - and now this? That was just from - we were just kissing. That’s all. And somehow it was that. And then you go and - and-” Aiden is speaking in fits and starts, stumbling over his words. “I’m gonna die. You’re gonna kill me. I mean it.”
“But I-” I’m starting to grow concerned. “I’m sorry, I - did I do something wr-?”
“No, but you - you-” Aiden stops for a second, all out of breath, wincing as he struggles for the right words. “How am I supposed to believe-? You don’t know what - for me, this is, like - and you planted the malachite tree. You planted it.”
I blush deeply, confused and alarmed.
“Should I not have done that? You seemed happy about it, earlier… I thought it would be nice outside the kids’ room, so they can see it from their windows.”
“And then you looked real fuckin’ cute when we were at Raj, Mel, and Noah’s house, and then we get back here and you take me upstairs and - wait, what? What’d you say?”
“Um…” I hesitate, looking at Aiden timidly, twisting the ring around my finger. Shit. Did I say something wrong? Either way, no point in trying to lie. “I - I said I thought the malachite tree would be nice outside the kids’ room? Since we had that talk about kids?”
Aiden stares at me blankly for a long moment, then lets out an agonized, punched-out sound, pressing his palms over his eyes. I sit up more in alarm, then stop as Aiden tips forward and grabs the nearest part of me he can reach - my feet - and starts pressing kisses onto them.
“What-?” I let out a startled laugh, tickled by the rich stubble on his jaw. “Aiden!”
I go to push him away. He catches my fingers and kisses them, then lifts his head and leans in to start kissing my face.
My surprised laughter is caught in his mouth when it suddenly finds mine in a fierce, hard kiss. I let out a sharp gasp as Aiden throws me down onto my back, pushes my legs apart, and sinks down between them. I turn my face into my arm and pant desperately as he buries his face in my neck, licking me and biting me over and over again before his mouth comes back to mine.
He kisses me so deeply that the heat and passion we’d been slowly building up sweeps back over me in one immense, electric, white-hot wave. I moan beneath him, and he reaches down to lift my hips.
And now it’s his turn to put me through perfect, breathtaking torture. He brings us together so slowly that by the time our bodies are fully interlocked, I’m clutching at him hard enough to leave bruises, shivering in mind-numbing throes of ecstasy, a scarlet blush searing across my nose and cheeks.
Aiden exhales a heavy rush of breath, his muscled chest heaving. Even now, his fingers reach down to stroke me, tease me.
“Aiden,” I gasp, fighting to stop myself from writhing beneath him, my pleading voice trembling with ecstasy. “Please…”
Aiden lets out a deep moan in my ear, then hisses when he feels the answering spasm of pleasure from my body. He rocks us in a slow, tantalizing movement, tearing a breathless, begging little whimper from my throat. I turn my head to the side and close my eyes, gulping and gasping for breath, lights exploding across my vision.
Aiden leans down and presses a kiss against my exposed neck.
“Sometimes I’m afraid to even close my eyes, you know that?” he whispers, his deep, husky voice spilling right out into my ear.
I open my mouth to answer him, but my words are lost in a hoarse, shivering, half-gasped cry of pleasure. My fingers fly up to seize two fistfuls of his chestnut hair, and hold on tight.
But if I had gotten to answer, I would have said - yeah, Sugar Maple. I know exactly what you mean.
~~~~
Aiden falls asleep with his head in my lap, but I’m awake long after his breathing steadies into its slow, peaceful rhythm.
His unintentional magic hasn’t gone away yet, not completely. The air was rich with motes of glittering diamond dust before, and now it’s slowly starting to disappear, seeping out of the windows, tangling in the ivy and tree branches that overhang them before it vanishes. But there’s still some left, enough for me to see Aiden by.
I slowly work my fingers through his messy hair, my soul glowing so bright that I’m almost surprised the light of it doesn’t become visible, like how Aiden glows sometimes. It’s like I ate something phosphorescent.
The time Aiden and I spent together after the night grew late was a dream. But everything that happened earlier tonight felt really good, too. Ralph was quiet at Noah, Mel, and Raj’s house, but he seemed - happy. As much as Ralph ever does, or as much as he lets show, anyways.
He left the house with bright eyes, and asked with the tiniest hint of hope in his voice if maybe we could all do this again sometime soon.
“Fuck yeah, man, you’ve gotta meet Nikita,” Noah answered instantly.
An idea which everyone agreed to, except Ripley, who shrugged like he didn’t care either way. But he also gave Ralph’s hand a slap when they said goodbye, which is more than he did when they met.
“Thanks for this, A,” I heard Ralph quietly tell Aiden before we left.
Aiden was so happy. I couldn’t drag my gaze away from his smile as he drove us home. The way it crinkled up the corners of his eyes. And then there’s what happened when we got back.
It’s been a good night.
I let out a contented sigh, drawing Aiden closer to me, then blink as what’s left of his magic light abruptly flickers and goes out.
Aiden takes in a sharp, uneasy breath in his sleep. His fingers suddenly curl around a fistful of the bedding.
I look down at Aiden in the moonlight, startled. He’s stiffening up in my arms, and I can feel his pulse picking up. He lets out another unhappy exhale, his breathing growing shallow and strained. His eyebrows knit as a despairing, tortured look comes over his face.
“I’m sorry,” he murmurs breathlessly, his deep voice shattered with guilt. “I’m sorry…”
The anxiety that had been swelling in my chest stops, replaced with a surge of sympathetic pain. I had been afraid that someone was in need of rescuing, but now I’m sure that Aiden is having a nightmare about a rescue that’s already happened. A rescue where no one was actually rescued.
I’ve come to find that it doesn’t always matter how happy Aiden is when he falls asleep. Sometimes the nightmares come for him from nowhere. But at least now I know how to help.
I gather him up as close to me as I can. He turns his head and burrows his face into my chest, breathing hard. I can open the connection from that alone, but I wrap my arms around Aiden and place my palms gently on his back.
I take a second to steady myself out first. I know I’m gonna need it.
The thing is, I’ve gotten better at doing this, and now I know what to expect, but that doesn’t make it easier. It hurts so bad, every time. That’s why I haven’t told Aiden that I do this for him.
“I’m sorry…” Aiden stammers, his words slurred with sleep, his voice wracked with guilt. “S’my fault… should’ve been - faster…”
I take a deep breath, then ease the connection open.
The horror and heartbreak of whatever Aiden is reliving in his nightmares crash into me with the force of a hurricane. I gasp as the cold blade of it stabs deep into my chest, blinding me with sudden tears of grief-stricken, gut-wrenching guilt. My breath is wrenched from my lungs, and I feel unforgivable, crushed by the weight of the guilt on my shoulders, my heart ripped in half. I could sink to the ground, I could sink into the ground, I just want to disappear forever -
The scent of vetiver reaches me in the gasping, sobbing breaths I’m taking, and I remember that I have Aiden in my arms.
The endlessly deep ocean of love I have for him sends forth a soft wave, rolling out through me. It’s so much softer and gentler and quieter than the screaming gale-force storm of Aiden’s emotions, but it wraps around them like a soothing hand stroking my hair - my hand is stroking through Aiden’s hair, I realize, but not by any movements that I’m making. It’s happening through the connection.
I hope it’s reaching him in his dreams.
Aiden’s emotions push back with ruthless brutality, so painful that I almost can’t bear it - but Aiden does, he does it every day, I can, too…
I center my thoughts on Aiden, everything I love about him. I try to breathe into him the same sweet warmth that he gives me. The soft wave of warmth and love and calm slowly grows and swells, enwrapping the sharp, slashing claws of what Aiden is feeling. Slowly melting it all, even as we twitch and shudder in pain together.
Very slowly, it all sinks into the ocean, and the surface grows tranquil, calm. Safe enough to float on.
We sail gently together on the quiet waters, our heartbeats matched to the gentle tide. Oxygen slowly floods back into my chest, lets me take a deep breath. Aiden takes it in tandem with me.
I smile to myself, smear the tears off of my face with the back of my wrist, then press a relieved kiss onto the top of Aiden’s head. Defeated the nightmare. Now my Guardian can rest easy, dream safely.
I’ll see you when you wake up, I murmur, through the connection.
I take a few more slow, deep breaths. Then I open my eyes, look down at Aiden - and find him looking up at me.
Jamie? he mumbles softly, sounding sleepy even through the connection. What are you doing?
I freeze, and then, realizing that he can feel what I feel, I close the connection without even meaning to.
All the calm that I had been sending into Aiden through it cuts off, releasing him from the spell. He blinks hard, his drowsy eyes opening more. Focusing on my face.
Aiden looks over his shoulder at my hand, which is still spread on his back, where I placed it to open the connection. Then he looks at me, sees the way I was holding him in his sleep. He sees the drying tears on my cheeks.
He stares at me, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. I stare back at him, at a loss for words. I have no idea what to say. He’s never woken up when I’ve done this before, he’s never caught me - oh, my god.
I told him that I’d see him when he woke up. Somehow he heard me in his dreams, and woke up right away.
I bite my lip, knowing full well what an oh-shit-busted expression I have on my face, but helpless to do anything about it.
Very slowly, Aiden sits up, suddenly very awake.
“Jamie,” he says again, all traces of drowsiness gone from his voice. All traces of calm, too. “What were you doing?”
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