Black Swan
Willa Okati
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Copyright ©2011 Willa Okati
ISBN: 978-1-60521-598-3
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Editor: Crystal Esau
Cover Artist: Bryan Keller
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Black Swan
Willa Okati
Wild things are not meant to be caged. But if they choose, they can stay…
A tattoo artist who seeks beauty in all things, Paulian has had his fill of man’s
inhumanity to man, and to the world. In the wake of an Atlantic oil spill, he wishes
with all his heart that he could save one. Just one.
And then he meets Adek.
A stranger in a strange land, Adek is a black swan that has lost his wings. Before he
can fly again, he needs to find one good man who’ll finish the tattoo of his wings on
his back. Though he’s searched for the right one, he hasn’t found him yet.
And then Adek meets Paulian.
Paulian knows that Adek is the one he can save. But if he finishes tattooing the
wings of the exotic man he’s fallen in love with, Adek will fly away. All he can hope
is that Adek will return to him.
Chapter One
“… And in breaking news this evening, the most recent oil spill shows no signs
of stopping its progress despite international attempts to --”
Paulian grimaced. He‟d only turned on the TV for background noise to keep him
company in the studio, alone with no customers and no colleagues needed. With a
couple months to go before the weather warmed and the summer tourist season started
on the boardwalk, more nights than not the tattoo parlor counted itself lucky to have
one, maybe two customers.
Miami Ink they weren‟t.
Paulian liked it that way. As long as they could pay the bills he could still have
quiet hours with nothing else to do but lose himself in drawing at his drafting table.
Angled close to the window, he could glance out as the urge came to him and watch the
sea flow into and ebb away from the black sand shore. Beautiful in a way he itched to
capture with pen and ink, and ink and flesh, but he‟d never -- quite -- captured the
sense of movement.
Yet.
He would. Someday. For now, his ears pricked and he abandoned his sketch of
spiky tribal swirls and edges to angle his neck and watch the TV sideways. Ugly dark
pools, malevolent in their mindless destruction, flooded clean waters.
“… The effect on the local wildlife is --”
Paulian pushed his drafting stool back with a clatter of wheels, stalked across the
room in three paces and turned the TV off. He‟d spent the better part of his twenties in
the Peace Corps. After a point, a man could only break or be broken, stop caring, or
walk away. He‟d seen damage, disaster he couldn‟t fix, and though his mind knew it
his heart… his heart wasn‟t satisfied.
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He hadn‟t been able to stop caring.
If he could save one of the injured, he thought, whether they were hurt in mind,
body, or soul. Just one. Then, maybe…
Paulian rolled his shoulders to work out a knot of tension between them. Didn‟t
work. Restless now, he pushed his chair back and took the three steps needed to the
window, and then sideways to the door. There he propped it open regardless of the
chill wind off the ocean and braced himself with one hand on the frame, searching the
deepening twilight for the unspoiled blue of these waters.
So much beauty. How could anyone…
The shadows that fell darker and deeper were cut only by the fiery red sparks of
a bonfire down the beach. That made Paulian chuckle to himself. Even with all that the
world threw at them, nothing fully quenched every spirit. Fire, a passion for dance, for
music; these were the good things in life.
Good, too, was the gently surging need for skin against skin. Though it‟d been a
long time, too long some might say, Paulian remembered what it was like to lie down
with someone upon a blanket on the sand in the cool, yielding dark. To close his eyes
and surrender himself to sensations of sound and touch.
More, he remembered how good it had been to rest himself upon a firm yet
receptive chest both sleek and hard, to press his lips to throat, to collarbone and down.
To press himself inside warm and willing flesh.
Yes. Definitely too long since he‟d found someone he wanted to indulge with.
But not just anyone would do…
Lost in dreams, Paulian‟s sense of time swirled away as he stood in the doorway.
His vision lost its focus too as the sound of the waves filled his mind; he swayed yet
kept his balance, moving to the rhythm, idle dreams of masculine kisses and sweeping
hands saturating him with a desire, a need he couldn‟t put a proper name to, but
craved.
He wanted tonight, but differently. With a sense of anticipation. As if something,
someone, were almost within arm‟s reach. His grandmother, the woman who‟d raised
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him, had been superstitious-minded. She‟d have nodded wisely and said that was a
sign, that his senses were learning to reach for what most would call impossible.
After the life he‟d led, and the things he‟d seen, Paulian was not as inclined as
the child he‟d been to scoff off her fairy tales. There were more things in heaven and
earth than in anyone‟s philosophy.
So he‟d see.
But he didn‟t see the man approaching; Paulian only noticed him, a stranger,
when he was nearly at the door of the studio. The sound of his footsteps on the
sidewalk were oddly off, clumsy, soft and hard, decisive and slow. The pace of a man
with many things on his mind.
Paulian knew the feeling.
The man walked with his head bent and dark wings of hair fell forward hiding
his face. True black hair, so black there would be blue highlights when the sun or moon
struck him. He wore a V-necked T-shirt too light for the weather that bared his long,
slender arms, and faded denims with artful rips and holes and frayed marks. They
betrayed hints of smooth cream flesh and the lithe flex of muscles stronger than they
first seemed. There was a power to him that caught the eye and held it. Around his
neck, he wore a simple cord of twisted black hemp with a red stone as a pendant that
nestled in his hollow of his throat.
Beautiful. Paulian‟s lips parted. Like no one he‟d ever seen; next to him no man
could compare.
Though he was steps away from moving past and disappearing into the night,
the man must have sensed Paulian‟s staring at him. He raised his head to stare back at
Paulian with eyes as pale as blue-tinted quartz. It wasn‟t quite a glare; he might have
meant it that way but he belied himself with a flicker of surprise, the slowing of his
step.
More so with the hesitation in his odd gait when he came close enough for
Paulian to see his hair glittered with salt dried after a swim.
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Slower still when he glanced at the studio windows and Paulian saw him notice
the racks of flash art, the chairs, the gleaming rows of rings and gauges waiting for
willing flesh to accept them. He stopped completely when he looked at Paulian, truly
looked, and saw the full sleeves of color that decorated Paulian from shoulders to
wrists, and over the feet that peeked out under his cuffs.
The stranger, whoever he was, took a step forward as if drawn toward either
Paulian or the studio. Still clumsy -- though Paulian didn‟t think it was drink or drugs --
he missed a rough, slick pool of seawater in a board that needed replacing and
stumbled. He knew how to take a fall, palms slapping the ground first and rolling. That
was graceful enough; curiouser and curiouser, as they said.
Looked like it had hurt, too. Paulian could see red scrapes on those smooth
palms when the stranger rolled back onto his knees and rose. Dark color suffused the
man‟s cheeks, and any smile that might have been forming disappeared.
Paulian couldn‟t blame him. No man wanted to be made to look the fool, ever.
But he couldn‟t let the man leave -- didn‟t want to -- and it came to the same thing in the
end, without thinking first. He took a step forward toward the stranger, his hand
outstretched for -- he didn‟t know.
Come, stay, be with me.
Too much. The man‟s pride had been injured more than his body. He turned
sharply away and toward the beach, down the sand and into the ever-deepening
shadows. Within moments, he was gone.
But not forgotten.
Chapter Two
The stranger didn‟t return. Of course he wouldn‟t. Paulian supposed he
shouldn‟t have expected him to. A man had his pride. He couldn‟t blame the stranger
for shying away from someone he‟d humiliated himself in front of.
Yet he couldn‟t stop looking out the window, wondering.
A hour later -- maybe two -- Paulian laid down his pencil, his drawing not
finished, and stood to stretch out the knots that grew ever tighter between his shoulder
blades and down his back. He‟d been watching the fire, too, fading from bonfire flames
to crackling embers as the night grew colder and the revelers made their way inside. A
few stubborn souls remained, lingering on with their bodies warmed by bellies full of
beer, laughing and seeming as bright as birds in the bonfire‟s light.
Watching from the door, Paulian drummed his fingers against it in a light
rhythm, then made up his mind. He could flip the “back in at…” sign on the door and
lock up; it‟d manage fine without him and if any customers did come in he‟d eat his
leather sandals without salt. He couldn‟t stay here in the quiet, drawing, not after he‟d
been startled off course by the stranger who‟d captivated him.
So. He‟d walk down the beach. Even if he‟d missed the peak of the party he
could still go and soak up the afterglow.
* * *
Walking down to the fire took Paulian only minutes, but they were sharp ones
with the night wind cutting into his exposed face and through his sweater. He ignored
it, bending his body forward as had the dark stranger, and didn‟t stop until he reached
the circle of rocks in the sand. Almost everyone had gone, perhaps five left, loose and
easy, red-cheeked from drinking to keep off the cold. He knew them by sight, if not by
name, and they did the same. One tossed him a can of beer.
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Paulian caught it and put it to one side. A single can wouldn‟t impair him, but he
wanted his head completely clear. He had a sense that it needed to be.
A sense, that same sense, of waiting for something to happen.
He made himself relax in the sand, legs crossed in front of him and leaning back
on his arms to look up at the sky. Birds never all flew south for the winter. Some
remained, wheeling and soaring in dark shapes against the night sky. They looked so
free, especially when he thought back to the news report he‟d seen.
It was the birds Paulian felt the most for. They were born to soar, not to sink
under the weight of human faults. They were made to be free, not caged…
He let out his breath in a sigh. The radiant heat from the fire soaked through
almost immediately, saturating him through skin and bone, and felt as good as rays of
light breaking through a stormy sky. Warm enough that within moments he toed out of
his sandals and slipped the sweater over his head.
Without the sweater he left himself naked from the waist up save for the fitted
sleeveless shirt he wore beneath, but he still wasn‟t cold. No wonder there were still
some lingering partiers, even if they were cozied together.
His wisewoman of a grandmother would have said there was something not
canny about this fire, too, that it was as close to a fairy ring as America could get. It
didn‟t feel dangerous, though. More welcoming, drawing him into an embrace that
would last while he waited for -- whatever was coming his way. The warmth caressed
lover-like across his skin and the ribbed black cotton that fitted him like a second,
sensual skin, rough and soft at the same time. The full sleeves of his tattoos were only
shadowed enough by the ember-light to deepen from vibrant to deep jewel tones,
dragons and Koi flowing down his limbs.
Paulian turned his face to the stars. Warm, the ocean a soothing white noise, and
the wind -- gentler here -- almost like wings at his back. Flexing now brought peace,
and a sense that he could, if he wanted, take flight.
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He didn‟t hear the footsteps at all this time, silent on the sand, until a shadow fell
over him and blocked the warmth of the fire, a blacker darkness piercing his closed
eyelids. “You‟re a quiet man,” a stranger to him said.
Paulian opened his eyes, and was somehow not surprised to find that the man
from the boardwalk had found him. Less surprised -- but well pleased -- that his senses
told him yes, this; this is what you waited for.
He liked that.
He liked still more that this was a man who couldn‟t be caught, only coaxed to
the hand. “I speak when spoken to,” he said. He gestured to the empty stretch of sand.
“There‟s enough to share, if you‟re interested.”
“I might be,” the man said even as he sat. When he spoke, Paulian noticed
something exotic about his speech. An accent Paulian couldn‟t place. Was he then a
stranger from a strange land, a long way and many years from home, lonely and alone?
There was a sort of wistfulness in the way he moved subtly closer that made Paulian
think that if nothing else this man was alone in the world.
Paulian… well, he knew the feeling.
He waited for the man to sit, watching him and knowing the man didn‟t miss
that. Whoever he was he seemed discomfited by the gaze but not offended. He folded
his legs beneath him and took a place on the sand in a loose lotus position, his feet at
angles instead of resting on his thighs. More graceful than before, but not entirely; he
moved as if his limbs were as unfamiliar to him as a teenager hitting his growth spurt.
Fair being fair, he studied Paulian as if Paulian were something rare and
fascinating and not the other way around. Paulian let him. “I‟m Adek,” the man said
abruptly. He picked up a handful of sand and let it sift through his fingers. “I was rude
before. I think.”
“Paulian,” Paulian murmured, as quiet as the night and feeling a sense of
lassitude and peace that matched the ebb and pull of the waves. “Adek. It suits you.”
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Adek made a face. He rubbed the back of his neck, endearing in his uncertainty
with taking a compliment. It charmed and fascinated and made him seem less fey, more
human.
“You‟re not much of a talker yourself,” Paulian observed. “No, don‟t.”
Sheepishness had shifted to a warning flash of almost-anger. “I wasn‟t criticizing. It‟s all
right.”
Adek shifted his weight. He frowned at his feet and their lack of cooperation. It
almost made Paulian smile, but he held it in. This man was prickly with pride and he‟d
grow as many thorns as a tribal design if anyone needled at that pride. He waited
instead, lazy with a sense that he could take his time, not sure where it‟d come from…
but not questioning.
He raised one shoulder in a movement both fluid and jerky, aborted before it
came to a natural finish. “I was rude before. I never did have much skill with manners.”
“It‟s forgiven,” Paulian said, not because he‟d held a grudge but because Adek
seemed to need to hear it. It was easy to speak to Adek as if they were not strangers, but
had known each other for a long time, in this seemingly enchanted circle. “Did you
grow up with a rough crowd?”
“You could say that.” Adek had an unusual sort of smile, one that tilted the right
side of his lips up and left the rest in guarded stillness. He drew his gaze slowly over
Paulian‟s body, a study of him so intense as to be nearly tangible, one that made
Paulian shiver, and return it in turn.
Paulian didn‟t know Adek, not yet, but he understood him. A hungry man. A
lonely man, with the shadows of night and the ember-light lending him the fire to
move, to act, to take.
And yet… more than that. The way he hunched and moved his shoulders,
drawing them close to him… that reminded Paulianof something. He couldn‟t put his
finger on what -- yet. But he could lay hands on something else. He could sense from
Adek the need to touch and be touched, the hunger for human contact that if too long
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denied would drive a man mad. Adek looked exhausted, pale and desperate, but
unsure, not knowing how to ask for what he wanted.
But Paulian did.
He lifted the pendant that hung around Adek‟s neck. So deep a red. Not ruby.
Not as dark as garnet. Something altogether different. “This is beautiful.” He wound
the pendant‟s cord around his hand, then his wrist, not stopping until the pads of two
fingers rested against the hollow of Adek‟s throat.
Adek laughed as uncertainly as he walked, as little used to the one as he was the
other. “I wasn‟t sure if you liked men. I‟m not used to --” He made a face and raised his
hands in a gesture of surrender. He dropped his head and looked up at Paulian with a
steady, hooded gaze. “But I hoped.”
“What did you hope for?” Paulian caressed the smoothness of Adek‟s throat. He
recognized now one of the things that gave Adek a different look from other men: a
long, slim neck, almost elegant. An aristocrat‟s turn of shoulder and a fine-boned face.
“Many things.” Adek‟s hand hovered over Paulian‟s skin a hairsbreadth away
from contact, tracing the tattoo designs in the air. “These are… I want a closer look.”
His crooked smile quirked up. “Is that rude too? I told you I had no manners to speak
of.”
“I never said I minded.” Paulian guided Adek‟s touch, pressing the man‟s warm
hand to his skin. His hands were rougher than Paulian would have suspected, and lean
and hard too. They tingled where they brushed against him and left wide-awake sparks
behind them. Electric.
It was only to brace himself -- at first -- when he laid a hand on Adek‟s chest,
over his breastbone, and found it hot to the touch. Almost too hot for a man, even one
who sat by a fire. Paulian frowned --
Thoughts, idle and otherwise, ceased, then coalesced into simplicity at the touch
of Adek‟s curious fingers tracing the tattoos at his neck. The first brush of fingertips
against flesh were so very close to the same as a lover‟s kiss.
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Lonely men found one another in the dark, sometimes. Paulian wouldn‟t
question it.
Adek would. “I have your permission? You don‟t know me,” he said, almost
making Paulian want to laugh quietly if he didn‟t think Adek would take it wrongly.
Paulian brushed the back of one knuckle against the fine bones in Adek‟s wrist.
“Go on. As much as you want. Unless you hear me say „stop‟, then don‟t.” He encircled
that same wrist and drew it down to press Adek‟s hand against his chest. “But I don‟t
think I‟ll say that.”
“What will you say?” Adek asked. Someone not feeling his touch would have
said he bantered and teased; someone who did, someone who was Paulian, knew there
was more than an idle question in those four words.
“I‟ll say something I don‟t need words for.” Paulian brushed his knuckles gently
beneath Adek‟s jaw, cradled his face -- it was so oddly easy to be gentle with this
strange man, and so natural it needed no thought -- and feathered a touch of his lips
across Adek‟s.
Adek shuddered and sighed. Paulian could feel the surprise in his flinch despite
his telegraphed want. He almost stopped -- almost -- but then Adek dropped a sort of
shield he held about himself and went pliant to the touch, leaning into Paulian‟s kiss
and returning it with one of his own.
He tasted -- different. Wild, somehow, and free. Paulian stroked Adek‟s lips
apart with the tip of his tongue and sought inside for more of that flavor. He could
grow addicted, very quickly. Even more so to the surge forward and Adek‟s too-warm
hands pressed wide-fingered to his back, holding onto Paulian to keep him steady. He
moaned deep in his throat and drew closer, bringing them nearly chest to chest. Paulian
could feel the hammering of Adek‟s heartbeat -- as fast as he was warm, more so than
any other man Paulian had known -- as fast as hummingbird wings.
Adek wasn‟t the only one who needed to cling to another, who needed more skin
against skin. His shirt had come untucked at the waist, making it easy for Paulian to
tease beneath the loose fabric and to skate his palm upward.
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“You have tattoos of your own,” Paulian broke the kiss to murmur, pleased and
surprised. They were new, mostly healed but not very old, still a slightly traceable
pattern of raised lines on his flesh.
“Mmm.” Adek rolled his head on his neck and pressed closer, seeking Paulian‟s
lips for a better use than speaking. He kissed the way he moved, a little awkward, but
with the strength and grace of a master lying just below the surface if only he could
access it. A quick learner, he stole Paulian‟s words away and gave him in their place a
rising fire of need, of want, coaxing the flames higher with the strokes of his hands and
the rising surge of his cock.
Paulian wanted to touch… but he couldn‟t tear himself away from his new
fascination with Adek‟s tattoos. What pictures did he carry on his body? But who said
he couldn‟t have both? “Here,” he said, and he did laugh softly this time when Adek
protested the loss of his lips.
Adek changed his mind and returned the quiet chuckle, pleased, when Paulian
lifted Adek to straddle his lap. Both hissed when they molded into full contact, the
ridges of their cocks snug together and straining eagerly, denim damp with proof of
want.
“There,” Paulian encouraged, just as pleased. He rocked his hips, guiding Adek
into a rise-and-fall that ground them languidly together even as their breathing
quickened and Adek‟s kisses grew harder, melting one into the other, as if he would
devour Paulian with the force of his desires now they‟d been unleashed. Desperate,
almost; hungry, certainly, the short bluntness of his nails digging into Paulian‟s back.
And Paulian? Paulian stroked eager swathes up and further up Adek‟s back,
tracing the shapes of the tattoos to fill out the picture. He felt a pattern of lines but no
solid blocks within them. Most likely blackwork with no color. Angled oblongs with
quill-like edges on their sides, sweeping down in long arcs on both sides.
Now he recognized the shapes. They were wings. He‟d seen tattooed wings
before, but none like what his fingers told him he felt now. These were -- what were
they?
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Adek flinched away when he realized what Paulian was doing. “Shh, shh,”
Paulian soothed. He broke long enough to flick open the top buttons of their jeans and
to mold his hand over Adek‟s straining cock, giving him something to rock into.
Yet the tattoos drew Paulian back. Kneading Adek‟s cock with one hand, he
carefully searched higher on Adek‟s back. What was…? His sensitive fingertips had
found something odd. He traced beneath and above the deeper line that slashed from
the tip of one shoulder blade to the end of the jut of bone. A scar? A deep one, if it was.
Paulian didn‟t think this was wise, but it would eat at him if he didn‟t know for
sure; he knew himself. Carefully, carefully, he eased Adek tighter to his lap and guided
Adek‟s arms around his waist. He urged Adek in his pace, as fast as he wanted. God.
Felt so good. He could forget, almost, his need to --
But he could not forget entirely. Driven by an urge Paulian could not explain, as
foreign from a dull night in a dead studio as anything could be, he cradled both of
Adek‟s shoulder blades in the palms of his hands.
There, he found the match to Adek‟s scar on his opposite shoulder. Paulian
winced, not in disgust but in sympathy. He‟d taken a knife wound or two in his day,
even in the Peace Corps -- not everyone wanted peace -- and he could tell these had gone
deep to leave such heavily indented, ragged-edged scars. He pressed his lips to the
bend of Adek‟s throat and feathered his fingertips over what he could only call war
wounds. “What happened?” he asked.
He might have expected many things, but not what he got. Adek‟s passionate
touch turned to a hard shove, throwing himself off Paulian‟s lap to skittering backward
on the sand. An wild, animal-like anger glowed dark and savage in his pale, pale eyes.
He bared his teeth, and Paulian almost thought he would bite.
Paulian held up his hands in surrender, held his body back too, struggling to
recover from the shock and not sure at all what Adek meant to do. “I‟m sorry,” he said,
as neutrally as he could. Had he seen this kind of reaction in men with PTSD? Yes. He
recalled that now. Stupid, he told himself.
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He reached for Adek, palm up, not demanding but asking. “It‟s all right. I won‟t
hurt you.”
Adek‟s face twisted in disgust. “I‟m not a child,” he said. “I don‟t need your pity.
Leave me alone.”
“Adek --”
Too late. The wild man had risen to his feet as if he were the bird his tattooed
wings suggested, but still slightly unsure of the length of his limbs. With a snarl -- at
himself, or at Paulian? No telling -- he turned his back and ran, up the beach and down
the boardwalk.
Left alone with an aching hard-on, abruptly cold now that Adek had bolted,
Paulian gingerly stood and brushed a heavy coating of sand off his hips and knees. He
could go after him…
Or…
Just before he disappeared from sight, Adek stopped. He looked back, over his
shoulder, at Paulian. He didn‟t stop moving or come back, but… he would. Whatever
this was between them, it didn‟t need an enchanted fire. It needed ink and skin and the
beat of a heart and the touch of a master‟s hand.
Adek would come back to him. And for that, Paulian could wait.
Chapter Three
The studio seemed emptier than it had before. Silence pressed in too closely on
Paulian‟s ears, yet he grimaced and turned away from the TV remote. Music didn‟t
seem right either, though on a busy day you could hardly hear yourself speak over the
cacophony of death metal, fusion jazz and classic rock blaring from one booth or
another, and he liked it that way. Sometimes.
Tonight he wanted the quiet -- and he didn‟t, too. The sense of waiting mantled
heavily on his shoulders, making him restless.
He‟d have bet that no customers would come in that night, and he‟d have been
wrong. Technically. A small cluster of probable teens with beer on their breath and too
many giggles for the number of girls among them, there to page enthusiastically
through the racks of flash art before hemming and hawing about ID. One tried to sweet-
talk him, all batting eyelashes and pouting lips.
That wouldn‟t have worked on a normal night. Now less than ever, with falling
wings of black hair over pale-blue eyes in the back and forefront of Paulian‟s mind;
those and a memory of a man as fragile-seeming and sinew-tough as a bird briefly
touched down to earth.
The thought stayed with Paulian when he shooed the girls out, and when he sat
down at his drafting table to draw it was wings that flowed out beneath his pen. He still
couldn‟t quite capture that sense of movement that eluded him, and it would be harder
still to capture on living flesh, but…
A second customer wanted to get an estimated price for a full sleeve design. She
didn‟t want the price Paulian gave her. She wanted least of all the number of hours he
warned her a piece that large would take.
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He couldn‟t really bring himself to mind too much when she huffed her way out.
Honestly, if he weren‟t waiting -- hoping -- then he‟d turn out the lights and lock the
doors.
Instead he sat at his table drawing wings and idly listened to the clock tick by its
minutes. Without trying to, or thinking about it, he found himself copying the pattern
he‟d only felt on Adek‟s back. It‟d been a mix of artists, he thought, each doing part of
the design. Some better than others, but none unskilled. The wings almost felt alive…
Paulian shook his head and rubbed hard at his eyes. Sparks danced behind his
eyelids as he yawned, almost -- almost -- missing the sound of the door opening once
more. He glanced up, annoyed now and ready to show anyone else who didn‟t belong
here the way out that door.
The pen dropped unheeded from his fingers and rolled across his desk, down to
the floor where it disappeared beneath the desk. “Adek,” he said, surprised that he was
surprised. Hadn‟t he been waiting for this? Hoping for it?
Yes, he decided. But waiting and hoping were nowhere near the same thing as
getting.
Adek stood awkwardly in the doorway. He carried a plastic sack in each hand
filled with plastic take out boxes that smelled of nothing except a sharp breath of
wasabi. “I was rude before,” he said. “Again.” He lifted his shoulder in a movement
that wasn‟t exactly a shrug. More like a bird trying to settle its wings, but without any
tangible feathers to smooth. “I‟m still not used to -- I forget.”
Paulian took care to take his time responding, turning the paper he‟d filled with
sketches over, hiding them. “It‟s all right,” he said once Adek fell silent. “Is that a peace
offering?”
Adek brightened slightly. “If you like sushi. Do you?”
“I do tonight,” Paulian said. “The spicier the better.”
“I figured,” Adek said. “Take anything that smells strong. I‟ll have the plain.”
Paulian kicked away from his desk and rolled a few feet closer to Adek on the
wheeled stool. “How‟d you know I‟d be hungry?”
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“Your stomach growled earlier.”
Had it? “I forget to eat sometimes,” Paulian admitted. He made bring-it-here
gestures. “Stay and eat with me? To do this right we have to break bread together. At
least I think that‟s how it goes.”
“Does it still work if we break nori and rice?”
“Close enough.” Paulian held his breath and beckoned again; he let that breath
out slowly, and let a small pleased smile touch his lips when Adek braced his shoulders
and approached. “There‟s a second chair behind you. Come and eat with me.”
Adek settled more or less gracefully on the low perch but dropped the bags on
the table clumsily enough for them to spill out. He grimaced, shrugged, and looked his
rueful apology to Paulian as he opened a container of unspiced yellow tuna and used
his fingers to pop a slice in his mouth. “I forget,” he said as he chewed and swallowed.
He licked his lips, clearing away the taste. “There‟s so much that‟s not safe to eat raw.
Except this.”
“Depends on what your culture dictates,” Paulian said. He savored his portion of
spicy sashimi with wasabi and soy sauce. It burned, but so enjoyably. He didn‟t even
mind when Adek laughed at him for snatching up a bottle of water beneath his desk
and taking a deep drink. He grinned sheepishly. “I don‟t mind a little pain. The
reward‟s worth the risk.”
He broke apart a pair of the chopsticks they‟d ignored and lifted a segment of
red snapper to Adek‟s mouth. “The risk is worth the reward, too,” he said.
Adek parted his lips and let Paulian slide the bite between them. He closed his
eyes in pleasure and sighed. The sight made Paulian ache inside, desirous of more,
but… time, they had time, and he‟d do it right this go-round.
He‟d begun to have ideas, and those ideas had begun to coalesce. It seemed
impossible, but… well. He‟d seen enough of the impossible in his time to know that
word no longer meant what most thought it meant.
He‟d wait and see, but somehow Paulian didn‟t think his instincts were wrong.
They‟d see.
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* * *
Adek ate silently, in between tapping his chopsticks against the rim of the plastic
container. Paulian knew deep thought when he saw it, just as now he saw -- when he
was looking for it -- the haunted darkness behind the pale blue of Adek‟s eyes. He held
his tongue, tingling from the spices, and waited.
“Why are you nice?” Adek blurted. “To me. Sex is sex. I know you want to fuck
me, but you act like you care about the rest, too. How can you?”
Paulian took his time chewing and swallowing a bite. Because you make me want to
take care of you wouldn‟t go over well; troubled or not a man still had his pride. Adek
more than most. Because he‟d lost more than most? Hard to say. “Is there a reason I
shouldn‟t?” he asked at last.
Adek lifted one shoulder in that unique way of his, then made an impatient
noise. “Because most people won‟t or don‟t? When they see someone different.” The
faintest hint of his smile, unexpected though it might be, and a little bitter, was still
surprisingly beautiful. “People really don‟t like it when someone gets them worked up
and bolts before he follows through.”
“I‟ve had worse cases of blue balls in my time,” Paulian said, nibbling at a
fragment of nori.
“See? There you go again. Nice.” Adek shook his head and made a face.
There was a deep conflict inside him. Paulian could see it; he could almost feel it.
A struggle between what he wanted to say and what he felt comfortable saying.
“There‟s no harm in being nice, and trust me, I‟m not usually. You should have
seen me kick a group of underagers out.”
Again the hint of a smile. “I did see.” Adek laid the chopsticks down. He‟d eaten
more than Paulian had noticed, almost all the unspiced sushi vanished quickly if not
neatly. “I don‟t understand you.”
“Nor do I you,” Paulian said. He laughed at the sharp rise of Adek‟s eyebrows.
“See? That wasn‟t nice.”
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As fine as his smile had been, Adek‟s laugh was better still. He resettled his
shoulders more easily this time. “I didn‟t say I minded not understanding. Though I do.
Sort of. It‟s hard to --” He let out a frustrated breath. The curl of warm hair hit the edge
of the paper Paulian had filled with sketches and lifted its corner. Far enough, it
seemed, for Adek to see beneath.
“Don‟t mind those,” Paulian said.
Adek ignored him. “Those are wings,” he said, stroking the paper. He hesitated,
glancing up at Paulian, though Paulian could tell he‟d do what he meant to do whether
or not Paulian gave him permission. “I want to see.”
Maybe not a good idea… or maybe so. Paulian cleared away the boxes, tossing
them catch-as-catch-can into the trash bin, and kicked his stool back in silent surrender.
Adek handled the paper roughly. If it weren‟t sturdy, he‟d have caused rips and
poked holes through as he drank in the designs. “These are my wings,” he said,
pointing to the central design, the strongest set of wings that almost -- not quite --
seemed to fly. He wiped his hands on his thighs. “You figured that out by touch?”
No sense in denying it. Paulian nodded. “I‟m good at seeing what isn‟t there to
see. Visual memory. Touch sensitivity. Making guesses based on what I feel and have
felt.”
“In older times, they‟d have called you a witch.”
Paulian laughed. “I wouldn‟t be surprised.”
“You wouldn‟t have found it funny then.” Adek bent his head to study the
drawing more closely.
With his neck at so sharp an angle, Paulian could see beneath the fall of his
smoother, darker locks to the shorter, softer hair at his nape. Soft as down, and almost
as if it would feel that fluffy and light to the touch. He watched the faint pressure of the
circulating air in the studio riffle its fingers through that soft down, and remained quiet,
lost in thought.
“This is…” Adek stopped. He pressed his lips together. “You‟re good,” he said.
“You see them more clearly than I do.”
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Paulian wanted to ask, and did. “Let me see how close I came?”
Adek‟s head came up sharply. Paulian sat still, waiting. “It was too fast the first
time,” he said. His mind had fallen slowly but surely into the peace of the quiet, and the
calm whiteness that came when decisions mattered. “Not just the ink. All of it. I‟m okay
with slow. Show me if you want, but only if you want.”
Adek shook his head, but in fast, furious thought, not denial. Paulian let Adek
take him in, all of him from head to toe, lingering on the tattoos that showed on his
arms and legs, neck and hands. He lingered there, hungry in a way Paulian thought
he‟d never be able to understand, but coming to a decision.
He stood and lifted his shirt, pulling it over his head in one move almost as swift
as a wingbeat, if that wing had crooked feathers. In the same motion Adek turned,
baring his back to Paulian.
If Adek had stolen Paulian‟s breath before, that had only been a pale shadow of
what came now.
“These are --” Paulian hesitated, feet flat on the floor; he would have surged up
and laid hands on Adek, but knowing what he suspected he now knew… not a good
idea. He dug his toes into his shoes and calmed himself before he took the chance.
Waiting wasn‟t the hardship it might have been. Not when he could and did
gaze at Adek‟s back in awed silence. Feathers, wings, yes, all of that, but not as he‟d
imagined after all. His sense and his drawings had been of neat, orderly feathers.
These? Far from it, but perfection here would have been… dull.
Adek was anything but dull. Did he know that? He looked back over his
shoulder, coal-black strands of hair that fell over his face nearly hiding it from view
save for one clear, crystal-blue eye that glinted in the studio light. Hair of black, eyes of
blue, skin of cream…
And waiting as if he expected Paulian to curl his lip or back away, warding him
off.
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Paulian swallowed down a knot in his throat and rubbed his hands along his
thighs to still the sparking muscle tremors. He stood -- slowly -- and telegraphed his
reach for Adek. “May I?”
Adek shivered. He dropped his head, hiding the blue of his eyes, and nodded.
Paulian made himself go slowly. They had gone too fast before, in the rush of
need for skin on skin and the surcease of loneliness, strangers who‟d collided in the
night rather than coming to rest together as they should have.
So hard to stay patient, though, with the living canvas of Adek‟s tattoos bared for
him.
Paulian spread his hands wide and together -- as if he were making shadow
wings -- and laid them at the small of Adek‟s back. The inky feathers began there, their
tips brushing the tops of his thumbs. He had and hadn‟t been wrong about some things.
As he glided his touch both soft and rough across the tattooed pinions and overlapping
blackwork lines, he saw he had guessed right that some artists who‟d worked on this
were better than others. A couple of the feathers were as crude as prison ink, and
prominent.
He laid his lips to the top of the biggest and most roughly etched of the feathers,
then held his breath until Adek shivered and bent forward in silent, almost pleading
permission. Paulian laid his hand on the curve between Adek‟s ribs and hip and kept it
there to steady him, stroking his thumb lightly over the soft skin.
Better, he thought, to see the feathers this close. Or better simply to be close to
Adek. He kept only distance enough to drink in the details of each as he made his way
up Adek‟s back.
He liked that they weren‟t exactly as he‟d imagined. That there were things to be
discovered, and hidden beauty in the tatterdemalion feathers that overlapped one
another in a mismatching patchwork set. They would have looked false and superficial
if they‟d been perfect, a cartoon of wings. Fine for some, for those who desired
symbolism.
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Rough, ragged, ready, tumbling: Adek‟s wings were inked into his skin, but they
were almost -- almost -- alive. Paulian hid his smile in a kiss at the center of Adek‟s
back. Now he knew what Adek‟s odd shrug reminded him of. The pattern of the
feathers seemed to make them rise and fall with his breathing, and this close their
pattern-that-was-no-pattern made them seem to shift as if Adek were settling them as a
bird would.
They should have joined to or covered over the tops of his shoulder blades, and
indeed some few tentative lines had been etched that far, but there they stopped. The
twin scars, long and ragged and white even against Adek‟s pale skin, ran the length of
each blade. Paulian bit back a wince that would have seemed like pity, but he could not
stop himself from thinking that, whatever had made the marks, how much it must have
hurt. They might have gone as deep as the bone; in fact they probably had.
Paulian had tattooed over plenty of scars in his time, even with less than five
years as a full artist to his credit. Sunbursts to disguise gunshot wounds and kanji to
cover scars on wrists. He‟d known it for the honor it was to help tattoo vines and
symbols on a woman who chose to celebrate her body after conquering breast cancer.
She‟d been a survivor. All of them had.
Adek, too, was a survivor. Not the same kind as those Paulian had done work for
in the past. But he‟d made it through something awful and lived to face another day.
In a way, the scars made him more beautiful still.
He kissed the knobs of Adek‟s backbone, tracing a path upward. His kisses were
light and soft as the brushes of feathers, but his hands were firm as they followed
against Adek‟s side.
This close to him, Paulian could sense the shift in Adek‟s mood -- and more -- as
he moved. Flattening his palm against Adek‟s stomach, he felt the tight flex of muscle.
Against his chest he felt the rapid beat of Adek‟s heart and he could hear the
shallowness of his breathing. He knew Adek could feel him, too, nestled together as
they were with his groin pressed to Adek‟s ass. If he let himself stroke downward he‟d
find Adek hard, but… not yet, not yet.
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Soon.
Paulian stopped when his lips were at Adek‟s nape and his thumbs -- just --
below the bottom edges of Adek‟s angled scars. The soft, short down of new hair
brushed against Paulian‟s forehead. He could feel Adek holding his breath. “Why
weren‟t these ever finished?” he asked, stroking ever so lightly. “They‟re too beautiful
to leave undone.”
Adek stiffened, and not in the way Paulian might have wanted.
“Shh. It‟s all right. You don‟t have to tell me.”
“It‟s not --” Adek said, Paulian picturing exactly what sort of face Adek was
making now. That frustrated grimace when words deserted him. He let out a ragged
breath and drew in a sharp one when Paulian stroked the backs of his knuckles down
Adek‟s stomach. “I didn‟t want them to be finished. By just anyone,” he said, pauses
between words growing longer and more uncertain. “When they‟re done, it needs to be
by someone… I don‟t know the word. Someone who wants to, who I want, too. It
matters. And even then…” He made an impatient growling noise. “I can‟t explain in a
way that you‟d understand.”
“Can‟t?” Paulian hooked his finger through one of Adek‟s empty belt loops. He
bit lightly at the nape of Adek‟s neck. “Can‟t or won‟t? I only want to know.”
Adek shivered. “Both. It matters, who finishes these. They‟ll be…” He spread his
hands wide. “I‟m not trapping anyone,” he said, soft and low. “No one belongs in a
cage. Never mind. I didn‟t say that. I --”
“Listen to me.” Paulian cradled Adek‟s neck carefully in one hand and used the
other to guide him around until Adek faced him. Deliberately, so deliberately, he put
his arms around Adek and his hands high on Adek‟s back. He drew the rough pads of
his forefingers up the length of the jagged, ragged scars. “Not everything is a cage, and
all cages have keys.” He drew his lips across Adek‟s in a hint of a kiss.
“I want to finish these,” Paulian said. “I could be the one, if you‟d let me.”
Open the door, if you trust me, and let me in.
Chapter Four
Paulian could feel Adek‟s abrupt tensing, the rush of a bird gathering itself in
preparation for a burst of flight. He caught Adek and hung on tight.
Adek struggled, and though Paulian had mostly expected it, the man was
stronger than his light weight and slim bones would have led anyone else to believe.
Even prepared, Paulian could only hold him for a moment before he broke free and
whirled. He was clumsy still, but swift, wheeling about and almost at the door of the
studio before Paulian recovered his balance.
“Wait!”
Adek stopped. He looked back over his shoulder, but not with hesitant shyness
this time. Now he had a fierce gleam, a challenge and a warning.
Paulian had had to catch his balance on the table, but now he stood upright and
braced, not going anywhere. “I know,” he said. “I know what you are.”
Adek went still as ice, as stone. Though the circulating air blew over him,
nothing about him moved save for the tips of his hair. “You can‟t know.”
“I couldn‟t prove it.” Images of the news report he‟d seen flashed through
Paulian‟s mind‟s eye. Of the birds caught in disaster, struggling to free their wings and
fly away. Of Adek and his strange ways, the things he‟d said, and the simple instinct
that Paulian chose to follow. He looked Adek in the eye and refused to let him break the
contact. “That doesn‟t mean I don‟t know.”
Adek‟s shiver racked him from head to toe. Chillbumps rose on his bare skin.
“Your body temperature. The lightness of your bones. How fast your heart beats.
And now this, the wings?” Paulian gestured to them. “I have no proof. But I think I‟m
still sure.” Moving closer, he stroked Adek‟s side. “Let me finish the wings.”
Adek recoiled, as savage and fast as a hawk‟s strike. “No.”
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“Then tell me why not. If it matters who finishes them, why won‟t I do?”
Adek shut his mouth tightly and looked as if he wanted to glare, but wrenched
his gaze away instead and stared laser-sharp holes at the floor.
“Do you think I‟ll be trapped the way you were?” Paulian had almost reached
him now. He could have stretched out his arm and touched, if he‟d wanted, but if Adek
was -- what Paulian thought he was -- then it mattered, coaxing him to the hand instead
of grabbing. “I‟m just a man.”
“And not a bird trapped in a man‟s body?” Adek said, bitter as ash. “I‟m not like
you. Don‟t expect me to have the same reasons.”
“One thing I‟ve noticed over the years.” Paulian stopped between one step and
the other to make sure Adek heard clearly and understood. “Animals and men are more
alike than they seem. They care, they breathe, they fight, they fly -- one way or another.
When a man trusts no other, he might trust an animal.”
“And I‟m just a --”
“I think you‟re something only you could be,” Paulian said. “Something new.” If
I could save one, just one, he‟d thought earlier. Let it be this one, he thought now. “Come
back.” He turned to one side to make a path for Adek, back to the table and the chairs
and the booths he could take his pick from. “I‟m not asking for your story. How you
lost your wings, or why, or what happens when they‟re finished. Though I don‟t think
you know for sure.”
“I know that when they‟re done, then the man who finishes them --” Adek‟s
hands flexed. “The men who inked my first feathers, they would have kept me with
them. I didn‟t want to stay. Shackled, with a ring around my leg. Maybe I‟d never fly
again.”
“Did you know that before you started?”
Adek bent his head as he shook it, but the tightness with which he crossed his
arms over his chest and held himself close told a different story -- different, but the
same. Loneliness. It sought a home even for those who looked up and ached to fly free.
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Even those that flew needed a nest to come home to. “Let me try,” Paulian
coaxed, hand held out for Adek, if Adek would take it. “You can let me go, if -- if that‟s
what needs to be done. After. I won‟t hold you here. Then.”
Adek squeezed his eyes tightly shut. He shook his head again, sharply, strands
of black hair whipping at his pale cheeks. “No. I --” He lifted his head, glossy in all his
hues, so cleanly cut and finely carved that Paulian wondered how for a second anyone
ever mistook him for human. “I know you mean well,” Adek started, slowly. “I don‟t
worry about you letting me go. I wonder if I could --” He stopped.
Paulian kept his hand out for Adek. “If you did keep me, I wouldn‟t say no.”
“Nice,” Adek said, with a bark of a laugh. “Always nice.”
“It‟s not niceness. It‟s not even unselfishness. It‟s wanting.” Paulian opened his
hand and spread his fingers wide to draw Adek closer. “Let me. Please.”
Adek warded him off. Paulian could see the confusion, the want and the
wariness chasing themselves roundabout one another in Adek‟s head, etching quick
paths across his face and flashing through his eyes, and it made Paulian‟s heart ache for
him.
Adek licked his lips at the last and shuddered. He took the doorknob in hand
and twisted it, letting in the cold night air and the wild scent of sea air and salt water.
The wildness of the night. “I have to think about this,” he said. “I can‟t -- not right
away.”
“You came to me after what happened before,” Paulian said. “I think you
already know what you want.” He took a step back. “But I won‟t hold you. Come down
to the beach with me, and I‟ll show you. I don‟t like cages either. Go. If you choose, if
you want me, then I‟ll be on the beach again. Waiting.”
The tension he saw in Adek hurt. Paulian did want to take care of him, and if
that meant… letting Adek go, he‟d let Adek go.
Even if it left him lonely for the rest of his life.
Chapter Five
Paulian led Adek down to the fire they‟d found to nest at before, settling him in
the still-warm sand around it. He lay casually on his stomach and said nothing for a
long time, waiting for Adek‟s ruffled feathers to smooth down.
Adek sat next to Paulian. He tugged at his necklace, rolling the pendant between
his fingers. “You‟re a strange man,” he said.
Paulian folded his arms behind his head to rest it in the cradle of his hands. “So
I‟ve been told.”
Adek rolled to one side, the spiraling movement bringing him close enough to
touch. He stroked the rococo designs visible above Paulian‟s collar, tracing them in
intense fascination.
“Here.” Paulian lifted the shirt off over his head. “Now. Touch all you want.”
Adek frowned even as he did as he‟d been told. Did what he wanted to do.
“Finders-keepers, they say. Whenever anyone has guessed, they‟ve wanted to cage me.”
Paulian shrugged. “I‟m not everyone.”
Adek scoffed.
Paulian laughed. “I know. I‟m not right in the head.”
The ghost of a smile touched Adek‟s lips. “I guess that makes two of us, then.”
“All I know is…” Paulian searched for the words. He took Adek‟s pendant in his
palm and let the red glass warm in his hand. “It matters, what I do with you. And I‟m
not going to keep you if you don‟t want to stay.”
“You say that now --”
“I mean it.” Paulian rose on one elbow. “I think you know that.”
“Nice,” Adek said. “Always nice. It‟s irritating.” He wrinkled his nose when
Paulian laughed again. Paulian didn‟t mind. It‟d been almost as long since he‟d had
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occasion to laugh as he‟d had occasion to love. Adek shifted his shoulders irritably and
sighed. “Here.” He slipped the necklace thong over his head and let it fall over
Paulian‟s wrist, the pendant still in Paulian‟s loose clasp. “Keep that.”
Paulian opened his hand to look at the dark glass. It looked like a drop of heart‟s
blood in the shadow, and a fireberry from the sun in the light. He‟d forgotten that old
story, of the bird that flew to the sun to bring back the rarest and sweetest fruit for his
lover.
He smiled and slipped the length of cord around his neck.
Adek nodded, satisfied. “Now you „shh‟.” He pressed his lips to the elegant lines
that spiraled up Paulian‟s neck and to the point where they faded away into the edges
of his cheekbones.
Paulian turned his head to one side and brushed his lips across Adek‟s palm.
Testing the waters, coaxing him on. “Do you like what you see?”
“Delicate work,” Adek said, and not just meaning the tattoos. He lifted Paulian‟s
chin with two fingers and breathed across his lips. “I like…”
Being with Adek in a gentle mood was like swimming through honey and
burning at the same time. He bit at the webbing between Adek‟s thumb and forefinger.
A nibble, nothing more.
Not enough. Paulian needed more. He extended his arm the length of Adek‟s
body and stroked him, feathering a light touch. His teasing grew stronger and more
certain as he traveled the length of Adek‟s right thigh and stopped just short of his
groin. He could feel the heat of Adek‟s stiff cock before he stopped just shy of it and
waited to see how he‟d react.
Adek bowed inward. Surprising, yet beautiful to see him slowly -- and quickly --
crumbling beneath the gossamer touch of temptation. He breathed more rapidly when
he rose. Kneeling with his knees apart, an intoxicating vee of spread thighs and hard
muscle presented itself to Paulian.
“I know what being close to me does to you,” Paulian said. He drew his tongue
across his lips. It was one thing to suspect; another thing to know. His mouth watered at
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the sight, the shape and hard shadow trapped in black jeans, and he wanted more than
anything just then to draw Adek‟s cock out and press his lips to the length. He was
temptation incarnate, and it seemed as if in this moment, here and now, it didn‟t matter.
He took Adek by the wrist and drew his hand lower, pressing it atop his groin,
molding the fingers around the outline of his shaft. He‟d been half-hard since they
started this, and fully hard now, aching for touch. He moaned when Adek‟s muscles
spasmed and when Adek kneaded him with a master‟s skill, drawing the arousal higher
and harder.
Adek shuddered, harder. He knelt forward and stroked a hard path down
Paulian‟s chest, tracing almost sharply the dragons that twined roundabout one another
atop and among their I Ching treasures; he ran the faintest scrape of fascinated scrapes
down the Koi tattoos that swam around and down Paulian‟s arms. “You‟d trust me
with this? Are you mad?”
Paulian‟s breathing slowed, though his heart beat faster and the answering pulse
echoed in his cock stretched painfully tight over his jeans. “No,” he said, closing the
distance between them. “But I want something beautiful, too.”
He could see Adek‟s need grow; saw it in the parting of his lips and the hooding
of his eyes; saw it in Adek‟s aborted surge forward.
Paulian hissed at the pleasure of feeling Adek‟s hard-on eager in his hand. It
throbbed under his touch, straining toward him. “You want me. This doesn‟t lie.” He
stroked the length of Adek‟s shaft and rippled in pleasure at feeling it stiffen still more.
“Why fight?”
“I have my reasons,” Adek said. But he didn‟t let go.
Paulian could have rebutted that. He might have said, you need this, I can tell. Or I
need this, and you can tell.
There was no need. Their bodies spoke for them.
Only small words remained. “I said I‟m yours,” Paulian murmured, so close now
to Adek‟s lips to taste his breath. He had a wild flavor, something of the sand and sea,
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not unpleasant, only strange. Something that, when breathed in, felt like breaking
chains within his chest.
This wasn‟t his way, but it was his desire.
“I mean what I said,” he spoke on. “Even if it‟s only tonight.”
Adek kneaded with abrupt firmness. Paulian could see the last of the barriers
begin to crumble, and they were beautiful when they fell. “Even without knowing those
reasons?”
“Even without.”
Paulian could tell Adek believed him there, too; he had an advantage, he
thought. He understood Adek. Not the other way around.
He‟d keep trying until he found his way through the cracks. They had time, here
in this circle of ember light.
“Don‟t say that if you don‟t mean it.” Adek bowed his head and put his mouth to
Paulian‟s neck, the curve where neck met shoulder, the dip between collarbones. His
arm came around Paulian‟s waist to hold him there, to steady them both as they moved
toward one another, torsos rocking in a mimicry of fucking even if their groins were
nowhere near enough to one another.
That Paulian could and would fix. He shifted forward, moving as fluidly as Adek
had moved, settling into place astride Adek‟s spread thighs and pressing their bodies
together. His moan mingled with Adek‟s. “I do mean it,” he said, reckless and languid,
needing and needing to give. Both hissed when skin pressed against skin.
“Why?”
“Because I want to mean it.” Paulian arched his back and pressed his groin
against Adek‟s, rocking slowly, tempting him. This would wipe away the darkness that
had smudged his heart not so very long ago. An hour, two hours. It seemed like longer.
That wasn‟t the only reason, needing something beautiful. He couldn‟t put a
name to the other reason. Only that Adek called to him, ever stronger within each
passing moment, until he drowned out the rest of the world, even to the sound of the
waves washing to shore.
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He would question this another time. Not now.
Chapter Six
Paulian searched for the hem of Adek‟s shirt and lifted it, stretching the dark
cotton over his head and casting it aside. Better. Thin, but so finely shaped. As fluid as
the finest lines of a master‟s tattoo, done in cream white.
“Be sure,” Adek whispered against Paulian‟s skin, his lips moving in hungry
patterns. “Be very, very sure…” He traced Paulian‟s tattoos with the tip of his tongue.
“You are so beautiful,” he said, breath and voice ragged, moving faster and harder,
body rigid and devouring the distance at the same time. “These designs on your skin,
like but not like feathers beneath… color and light. I saw them on you at the door of the
shop.”
Paulian ruffled up the softer hairs at the back of Adek‟s neck; strangely soft, they
were, and almost as fine as the down beneath -- feathers.
“Say you‟re sure.” Adek put his thumbs beneath Paulian‟s cheekbones to lift his
head, to make their eyes meet. “Promise me you‟ll be true.”
“I do.” Paulian yielded to temptation and began to pluck open the buttons of
Adek‟s tight jeans, one by one, slowly, ever so slowly setting his cock free. “I will.”
Adek stopped him, one hand hard on his forearm. “It‟s been… a long time,” he
said, his confession broken in the middle by the need for a deep and ragged breath.
It cost him pride. Not easy for a man like Adek. Though -- was there any other
man like Adek? Paulian thought, perhaps not.
“Then tell me what you want. It‟s yours. I am yours.” Paulian eased out of
Adek‟s hold and pressed forward, drawing Adek‟s rigid cock out. He didn‟t look yet.
Only felt. The sensation made him want to close his eyes and sway to the rhythm of the
faint sound of the sea surging back toward shore. Smooth. Hard. Hot. Silky. Wet at the
tip. Uncut.
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He dragged his palm up the underside and toyed with the slit, coaxing out more
proof of need. Adek sank his teeth into his lip and butted his head against Paulian‟s
shoulder. When he let go, his teeth scraped over Paulian‟s skin. He held himself rigid
again, too rigid, and that wouldn‟t do.
Paulian opened his eyes, for he had closed them after all, and pressed his lips to
the top of Adek‟s head. That was soft, and sweet, but it had to be done for himself. And
for both of them, he took steady hold of Adek‟s cock and worked him with a firm hand.
“Even if it‟s been a while,” he said, whispered into Adek‟s hair, “A man‟s body
remembers. Let me show you.” He pressed on, faster with his strokes, slower with the
rocking of his hips. “You‟ll see.”
He knew it when Adek let go and gave way. Adek‟s nails dug into the bare skin
of his back -- over a twisting dragon, if only he knew, a creature with a long and
sinuous neck and a mouth opened in a roar of pride or possession or passion. A dragon
with its wings spread in flight.
Paulian knew what he wanted, and what Adek needed. He pressed his palms flat
against Adek‟s chest to ease him backward onto the sand. “Like this,” he said, following
Adek as Adek fell to rest in the sand. “It‟s been a while for me too, you know. But I
haven‟t forgotten.”
“Haven‟t you?” Adek set his hands at Paulian‟s belt. “Then show me.”
Paulian answered him with a kiss before he drew up to his knees, then to his feet.
He couldn‟t help but tease Adek with a soft rippling laugh when Adek frowned and
reached after him. “I‟m not going anywhere. But I need these off.” He made fast work
of his jeans and shed them, nothing worn beneath the denim.
Adek approved. He stroked the cut of muscle at the corners of Paulian‟s stomach
and made a noise that was less groan, more growl. Craving him.
“And these,” Paulian said. He caught the belt loops of Adek‟s jeans and eased
them down long legs, off his feet, and cast them aside to join his wherever they might
have fallen.
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Telegraphing his every move for show and for pleasure -- both of theirs -- he
knelt astride Adek again and stroked their cocks lightly one against another. “Take
what I‟m giving you,” said. “Give me what I ask of you.”
Adek‟s pupils were dilated wide now, nothing but the thinnest ring of pale blue
left glittering beneath his heavy lids. He caught Paulian by the wrists. Paulian could feel
him shudder with the need to fuck up, in, deep.
“Say you want me,” Paulian coaxed, holding back just a little, just for now.
Adek‟s throat jerked when he swallowed, before he closed his eyes, before he
opened them again to pin Paulian into stillness. “Want you.”
“Good.” Paulian took Adek‟s cock, needier still, and worked him with fast
strokes and no mercy. “Then take me.”
Adek moved faster than Paulian figured he would, all-in the way Paulian would.
Breath knocked out of him, almost, Paulian rippled with a full-body shudder of
enjoyment that snugged them as close together as they could be. Adek‟s arms wrapped
around him, fingers digging in without intent to hurt but sure to leave marks of where
he‟d been.
And yet he was careful. Mindful enough not to want to abuse, no matter how
urgent the broken thrusts of his hips were.
“So tight,” Adek murmured. He thrust two fingers inside and stretched them
wide.
“Ahh.” The noise escaped Paulian in an explosive gasp. He wanted Adek, but he
hadn‟t lied about how long it‟d been. It‟d been months, almost a year, and his touch
was not the same as another man‟s. The push stung, burned, but after the first shock it
was worth it. Like inking himself, the pain and the pleasure mingled and married until
there was no telling where one left of and the other began.
“Beautiful,” Adek said. He braced Paulian with one hand hard on his hip,
though his fingers were shaking with the need to fuck in and fuck deep. “I could watch
this for hours.”
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Paulian bent to nip his ear. “Watch, or take?” he queried, soothing with his
tongue where he‟d bitten.
Adek‟s eyes, so pale, still flashed dark. “Take.”
Adek slid his fingers free, the loss abrupt and leaving Paulian open, empty, so
ready to be filled.
Paulian eased himself down and pressed his hands flat, spread wide over Adek‟s
chest to keep him still, bent to kiss him with a clash of teeth and tongue before he sat
up. In the smooth motion that still came like second nature to him, he sank down on
Adek‟s straining dick. He didn‟t stop, not until his ass nestled against wiry, crinkling
hair and tight balls.
He barely heard Adek‟s stifled groan, and then his shout. He‟d shut his eyes
tight, lids pressed together with explosions of fireworks behind them in the darkness,
and squeezed around the heft and width of Adek‟s cock. He rose, but that wasn‟t good
enough; he‟d had enough of loss; he sank down and stayed there, grinding in figure-
eights that took Adek deep, so deep. He lost his grip on Adek‟s hands, his arms, his
chest, and he might not have stayed upright if Adek --
If Adek hadn‟t caught him and held him up. If Adek hadn‟t lifted up, one foot
planted flat on the beach. Balancing him. He might have fallen. “Fuck, Paulian, fuck,”
he panted.
“Give it to me,” Paulian demanded, though almost out of air to speak through
his tingling lips with, Adek‟s hard kiss still there in sense and spirit. “Hard. Fast. Now.”
Adek took Paulian by the hips, and the wildness in the animal baring of his teeth
shone white in the darkness of the beach. “Your wish,” he said.
“Your wish.” Paulian let Adek hold him. He shifted his hips. He hadn‟t laid a
hand on his cock and it throbbed, his balls so tight, so ready to spill. “Now. Now,
before, before, it‟s too late, Adek, now --”
“Oh -- God --” Adek said, the cry to heaven dragged from him. “I have to. I have
to, I -- fuck, Paulian --”
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“Take,” Paulian goaded, needing it as much as Adek, maybe more, maybe just
the same, but the word that fell from his lips was what Adek needed to shed the last of
his restraints.
Adek‟s drive up betrayed every ounce of the strength he‟d never lost, every bit of
the power in his legs, a shove so deep and hard Paulian‟s teeth clacked rough and
painful together. He was barely gone half a stroke before he came back, and back again,
and again, the sweat slippery as the precum dripping down Paulian‟s cock onto his
stomach, drops sliding together in a puddle. He hit Paulian the way he‟d learned long
ago, and he hadn‟t forgotten each, just how rough he should go, deeper than he should
be able to, driving Paulian hard and fast toward the highest he could go, and never a
hand on his dick still.
Paulian shook his head, sending drops of sweat flying, sweat that burned his
eyes when he forced them open. His lips were strung wide apart and he couldn‟t speak,
but he shouted it at Adek with his moves and his stare, and Adek knew. Adek took
Paulian in hand, though that was too gentle a word; he seized Paulian and showed him
he knew, remembered just how, to twist it out of him.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Paulian heard someone gasping, and knew it was him. His
nails left deep scratches on Adek‟s chest. “Oh God, gonna come. Gonna come.”
And Adek answered him, raw, ragged, tight, thrusting deeper and harder, jolting
Paulian, going after his orgasm and giving Paulian what he wanted. He never let go.
“Want to see,” he said, his soft dark hair tickling Paulian‟s skin. His strokes roughened.
“Let me see how you‟re beautiful now, let me see you --”
Paulian couldn‟t hold back the scream, the shout, and he didn‟t want to,
wouldn‟t even if he‟d had a choice. The rush, the release, the jolting of his hips as he
shot over Adek‟s stomach, splashes of white landing as far up as between his nipples.
That was his heaven.
Almost. Adek‟s chest heaved, the shuddering in him almost strong enough to
knock Paulian free of him as he panted through the last of his coming, ass squeezing in
merciless spasms around that magnificent cock.
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“Harder,” he goaded, flexing even if his arms wouldn‟t work right to hold Adek
down. “Give it to me good, all the way, harder, deeper --”
He didn‟t expect the sharp jolt when Adek sat upright, dragging Paulian on his
lap while still buried inside him, or the desperation in Adek‟s bruising kiss that went on
and on and on, lips curling back only -- only -- when he strained up, stilled, and buried
his face in Paulian‟s shoulder as he came, spurting deep inside, hot cum where it
belonged burning Paulian up from within.
Paulian thought it, but didn‟t say it, clutching Adek as best as he could with
sweat-slick fingers and clumsy nails, riding him through it though it went on forever.
And didn‟t go on as long as he wanted, but there was never enough Adek like this, not
ever, and he would never forget this moment.
It was worth any cost.
Chapter Seven
Aftershocks were always the worst -- or the best -- and, with men like Adek, each
striking as hard as the climax itself. He jerked in Paulian‟s arms that held him tight and
waited for him to settle. For his wings to fold and rest against his back. Paulian stroked
the smooth skin with its light pattern of raised lines, laid his palms over the vicious old
scars, and whispered nonsense words into his ears.
When Adek‟s shakes had subsided, the tide had turned and begun washing into
shore. Sunrise wouldn‟t be too far off now, perhaps an hour or three.
Time enough to finish the wings.
Paulian was certain Adek knew what he would ask, and that was why Adek
spoke first though his voice was still rough-edged with sex. “I know what you want
now,” he said, lips and breath warm on Paulian‟s bare skin. He grasped Paulian‟s arms,
kneading them and the tattoos both, as if he could sink into the bright colors and soak
up their warmth. “I should say no.”
“Will you?”
Adek remained still for a moment so long that Paulian wondered if it‟d ever end,
or if he‟d have the patience to wait it out until Adek made his decision. He forced
himself into equal stillness. This mattered too much to rush.
He still shut his eyes tight and breathed out long and shallow when he felt Adek
nod, before Adek raised his head to meet Paulian‟s gaze. His crystal-blue eyes were
darker, and not just from the sex; he didn‟t smile, but the wing‟s beat of a shift in his
mood, a choice made, brushed from his lips over Paulian‟s.
“All right,” Adek said. He was the one to stand, and to offer Paulian a hand to
his feet. He was shaking, faint tremors beneath his skin, but his shoulders were square
and his vision focused. He looked up at the sky and took one more breath.
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The yearning that Paulian saw in him -- was it hope, or was it uncertainty, or was
it goodbye? Now, when he needed to most, Paulian couldn‟t tell.
“Finish the wings and -- come what may.”
As it had to be, then let it be done. “Get dressed -- except for the shirt -- and
follow me,” Paulian said. He took Adek‟s hand. “I‟ll give you your wings.”
Adek smiled. It was the first smile Paulian had seen out of him that mattered,
truly mattered. “Yes.”
* * *
“Lie down.” Sand clung to Paulian‟s skin beneath his shirt, damp with the
humidity of the salty sea air. He‟d found it almost at the water‟s edge, ready to float out
on the tide, and it‟d be ruined after tonight. No matter. He had others, and he enjoyed
the slight rasping. It kept him in the moment. Focused.
Adek stood by the edge of the tattooing chair, extended to its full length of black
vinyl. Narrow to lie on, but so was Adek. Slim of hip but powerful of shoulder. More so
now than before? Paulian couldn‟t tell. He thought, when he laid his hand to rest on the
left one, that the muscles flexed and strained.
Eager for flight.
Yet Adek lingered. His fists opened and closed, loose and tight, and his jaw
worked with words he couldn‟t or wouldn‟t say.
Paulian knew how Adek felt. He was as strong a man as Adek, and pushed him
gently. “Lie down, I said.”
Adek flashed him a glare, colder than most from his ice-blue eyes. Paulian still
saw the fear behind the mask of stone and anger.
Paulian kneaded Adek‟s shoulder. “Come what may,” he said. “It‟ll be all right.”
Adek lay down.
Though he‟d come to the art later in life than some, Paulian knew his station
well. It was second nature to catch the rolling stool behind him with one foot, without
looking, and slide it into place beneath himself. He‟d laid out all that he‟d need,
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machinery and ink, but no stencil. Even if he‟d taken the time to try to draw Adek‟s
wings, they could only be done right on Adek‟s body. They belonged to no paper.
Their design was in Paulian‟s mind‟s eye, and he kept it there, just behind his
forehead, as he bent to work.
Adek hissed and flinched when the needle touched down. “Cold,” he said,
crossing his arms to rest his forehead on them.
“I‟m sure.” Grains of sand still clung to the fine down at Adek‟s nape. Paulian
cleaned the skin, chuckling when Adek grumbled. “Lie still. This has to be right.” He
stroked the top of Adek‟s shoulders. “I won‟t let you down.”
Adek glanced back at him, ice and crystal through fallen and falling locks of
ebony. His lips were paler. In softer light -- the moon, perhaps -- he might have looked
as if he were a being carved from ice and shadow. How Paulian had ever thought him
human, he‟d always wonder. “I know,” Adek said. He turned away and pressed his
forehead to his joined wrists, took a deep breath, and settled as a bird would sink into
repose. “Finish them. Please.”
Paulian stroked the blank spaces above and below the scars on Adek‟s back, took
his own deep breath, and settled to work. “An hour,” he said. “Maybe more. Maybe
less.”
Adek said nothing.
Speed mattered in a busy studio, but nowhere near as much as quality. Both
flowed through Paulian this night. A freehanded design flowed onto Adek‟s back,
gliding up and up in the shapes of pinions and pinfeathers. He wanted to go back and
mend as best as he could some of the shoddier work Adek had had done in the past; he
restrained himself, but only just. The past was a rough road, no matter where one
traveled to. Let it rest in the past.
As Paulian worked, soothing Adek‟s occasional flinch, he could not help but
stroke down the middle of those tatterdemalion wings. Partly to soothe himself, and
partly -- as he went on, and the feathers he tattooed seemed fuller and more real than
art -- to see if his mind were playing tricks on him.
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He thought not. Every so often, from the corner of his eye, Paulian saw a flicker
of dark movement. Each time, Adek arched as if aroused, and settled more uneasily.
Paulian shushed him, gentle and steady on his flesh, working on, and --
And finally came to the last of the feathers, the two that would join to the base of
Adek‟s scars. There, he stopped, teeth sunk into his lip and the machine slightly
unsteady in his hand.
No. He‟d said he‟d finish it, and finish it he would. Paulian wiped his forehead
with the back of his arm, murmured soothing nonsensical sounds to himself, to Adek,
and laid needle to skin.
The first of the feathers flowed raggedly, the workmanship almost as poor as the
oldest tattoos in the shakiness of the line. Paulian swore at himself and clenched his
jaws. When he began again the lines were smooth, darker, and flowed seamlessly into
flesh. He watched, almost not believing his eyes, but when the first wing was completed
and he ran his thumb over the fresh lines, he could feel no scar at all.
He‟d known, but to see, that was another matter.
“Swans,” Adek said. He peeked at Paulian through his hair. “What do you know
about swans?”
“Is that what you are?” Paulian pretended to refresh the caps of black ink,
though he didn‟t need to. He‟d poured out just enough. Giving that up, he brushed a
fallen tangle of dark hair away from Adek‟s eyes. The tangle fell back across them
immediately, making him smile. “A black swan?”
“Warrior birds,” Adek said. He hid his face, but held his shoulders tense.
“Among other things.” He squeezed his fists. “Do you want to finish me now?”
“I want to see these as they should be. Is that enough?”
Adek caught his wrist. “But you won‟t keep me?”
“Not if you don‟t want to be kept. Don‟t ask me that again.” Paulian washed the
last scar clean with alcohol and rolled his chair around for a better angle. From there, he
caught a flashing glimpse of Adek watching him. There was an almost fierce clarity to
his stare now. Something not human at all, but proud and animal. Wild and free. It
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would have made him back away, once. Not now. He let what he‟d said stand and
dipped his needle in ink. “Are you ready?”
He didn‟t expect Adek to resettle himself abruptly and rest one hand on his
thigh, kneading the muscle. It put his shoulder to an awkward strain until Paulian
moved forward to give him room. He kissed the side of Adek‟s mouth, ran a thumbnail
lightly down his back, and began. If he didn‟t do it now, brave words or no, he never
would.
The last feather took shape faster and smoother than any design Paulian had
worked before. It wanted to be made; Adek and the magic that made him what he was
called through an age for completion. Paulian almost thought he might not have needed
to keep an eye on the needle, that it would have drawn the lines without his attention,
but that would leave him with nothing but an ice-blue stare he couldn‟t break.
He finished the last line and palmed it to feel the scar fade to nothingness. Adek
shuddered, ripples of motion flowing down his back. Paulian rolled a foot away and
stood to look down at the work he‟d done. Even the poor tattoos, the ragged and
awkward ones, had smoothed themselves. They all looked like his work, finally joined
together.
When Adek flexed his shoulder, the motion almost seemed to make the feathers
raise themselves. They were symbols, too small for a man of Adek‟s size to fly with…
but perhaps the symbol was all that was needed.
A bird could not be caged, much less a swan. Paulian nudged the stool away and
offered Adek a hand up. He did not let go, guiding Adek two steps to the left with the
man‟s -- the swan‟s -- back to a mirror. “There,” he said, hushed as if they were in a
monastery. “Look.”
Adek craned his neck to look over his shoulder. He shuddered, and the noise he
made was nothing like human. When he flexed his arms, the wings moved. Very little
time remained.
But time enough for Adek, not at all the man he‟d been when he and Paulian first
crossed paths tonight, to take Paulian by the shoulder and the chin, and to kiss him
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with the flavor of the sea air on his tongue. “Thank you,” he whispered into Paulian‟s
mouth, and if that were to be all, it would have to be enough.
Paulian broke the kiss first and moved abruptly, roughly, guiding Adek toward
the door. “Outside,” he said. “And I‟m coming with you.”
Chapter Eight
Paulian left his shoes off for the walk down the beach. The sand was cold
between his toes, but he wanted to feel everything. Next to him, Adek‟s body heat
would have warmed anything and his presence saturated Paulian now. He imagined
blue flames dancing down his skin, and did not dare look in case he was right.
In case he was wrong.
They stopped at the water‟s edge, bare inches away from the salt and foam from
washing over their toes. Adek tipped his head back to look up at the sky, the yearning
that Paulian had seen in him from the start clearer now. Hungrier.
He took Paulian‟s hand and held it tight, flexing in small, capillary motions so
very like the wingbeats of a bird. Without looking at him, Adek said, “You never
answered my question.”
Paulian could no more look at Adek now than he had been able to look at
himself before. He could feel a slow-moving waft of air behind him, and he could
almost hear the rustling sound of wind through wings. “Which one?”
Adek chuffed. “What do you know about swans?”
“Almost nothing,” Paulian said. He too gazed up at the sky, seeking the blue
inside the black. Dawn wouldn‟t be far away now. They‟d spent longer in the studio
than he‟d thought, time ceasing to have any meaning while he gave Adek back his
wings. A long night, a short night, a night he would not soon forget.
“What is „almost nothing‟?” Adek pressed.
“Only that they‟re beautiful.” If this was goodbye, then Paulian refused to let
himself shy away from facing it. He held Adek by the elbow -- for this last moment --
and turned the tall, slim man to face him. “That‟s enough for now.”
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Adek‟s face was human; the spirit behind his eyes was not. His voice sounded
different in ways Paulian couldn‟t begin to describe. He was the one to brush the back
of his knuckles across Paulian‟s cheek. “If I could take you with me, I would.”
Paulian swallowed. He made himself take a step back, the sea air swirling cold
between them. “I know.” Best to do it now, before he changed his mind -- or Adek did.
Not that Adek could. He was what he‟d been made to be, and the shadows behind his
back, the sound of wings, both were darker and louder. “Let me watch you go.”
Adek shivered. He tipped his head back further still, displaying his long, pale
length of neck, and parted his lips. Forward he stepped, the lightest touch of sea foam
brushing his bare toes, and raised his arms above his head.
He looked back once, just once, and caught Paulian with his eyes. “I‟m glad it
was you,” he said, less human still. “I --” He shook his head. “Watch, then.”
“Watch,” Paulian echoed. He crossed his arms over his chest to warm himself
now that Adek‟s body heat had withdrawn. “I‟m ready. Go.”
“No. One more thing.” Adek dropped his arms and moved; he was quick, and
his body molded itself against Paulian‟s to warm him, heat him, almost burn him. The
wide-fingered press of his hands against Paulian‟s back seemed as if it would leave
scars, burn marks that he would always feel with every move he made.
Adek‟s lips on Paulian‟s were hotter still. Paulian had once read a story about a
prince who swallowed a berry from a tree that grew only on the sun, brought to him by
a bird burned black by the heat. He could taste the sweet juice of that berry on his
tongue. Fire and light ran down his throat, making him gasp.
The heat of Adek‟s kiss burned on after Adek had gone. Paulian only realized it
in time to stagger back a step and open his eyes to see --
There were no words. Blue on black, light and shadow, shape and form and then
-- not. Vast black wings spread in flight as a swan caught the rising wind from the sea
and stroked toward the heavens with power beyond any man‟s.
And Paulian stood alone, cold, still tasting Adek‟s kiss, watching Adek until he
had disappeared completely from sight in the rising dawn.
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He had spent much of his life set apart from others, because it had to be that
way. Sometimes, because he liked it, had grown accustomed to it, sitting at the edge of
the circles of fire on the beach and content with the crackle, not the flame.
He had been alone for a very long time, but until now he had never been lonely.
If I could save only one, Paulian thought, Then I am glad it was him. So be it. He
turned toward the studio and a new day, carrying himself from wet sand to dry; he
closed his eyes against the first streaks of gold in the sky and breathed deeply.
And -- he was not looking, nor expecting it, when the sound of wings filled his
ears once more.
Though in the back of his mind, he had hoped. There was one thing he‟d known
about swans, but hadn‟t spoken of in case he was wrong. It made sense to him, though,
to look ahead of himself and see black on blue, shape and light, a bird and then -- not.
“If you hadn‟t let me go, I wouldn‟t have come back,” Adek said before he
surrounded Paulian with heat and the softness of feathers over the hard cut of muscle
and the strength of sinew.
Paulian let himself be consumed. He welcomed it. “I know.”
“I thought you might,” Adek said. “I wondered if I was wrong. I‟m glad I wasn‟t.
Open your mouth for me.” When he touched his lips to Paulian‟s, slanting their mouths
together in a kiss, he slipped a small drop of golden light between Paulian‟s lips and
onto his tongue. He stroked Paulian‟s throat until he swallowed.
Paulian slipped his arms around Adek and stroked his back, over the
smoothness of inked feathers settled into skin for now, until they were needed again.
“What was that?”
“I think you know,” Adek said. He lapped the juice away from the seam of
Paulian‟s lips. “I think you knew one other thing about swans you didn‟t tell me, too.”
Paulian thought, though they were smooth, he could sift his fingers through the
softness of Adek‟s wings all the same. He couldn‟t hold back his laugh, and didn‟t want
to. “What‟s that?”
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Adek cupped Paulian‟s face in both hands and eyed him narrowly, having
trouble holding back his own enjoyment and far less practiced at it. He was less than
wild now, but still more than human. He‟d fool no one, but he didn‟t have to. Paulian
would take care of that.
“That swans mate for life,” Adek said. He kissed Paulian again, and again, his
mouth moving against Paulian‟s time and again until time itself dissipated into
nothingness and the sea flowed into the shore.
Willa Okati
Willa Okati is made of many things: imagination, passion for manlove, creativity
and a lifelong love of storytelling.
You can reach Willa at willaokati@gmail.com, visit her at her website
www.willaokati.com Join Willa on Twitter at www.Twitter.com/willaokati, blog with
her at www.FictionWithFriction.com or join her Google Group for updates at
http://groups.google.com/group/lovers_and_dreamers.
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