1302 AD - Tunis
"I got you something," Yusuf said, when he came home from the market that evening. He liked to play chess in the marketplace after he finished in the workshop, and Nico could usually get a good few hours of lounging indolently in their bed before he came home.
"Oh?" Nico said, catching his eye and lifting his shirt up. After 200 years, he knew that look. "Will I like it?"
Yusuf smirked at him, and put his bag down at the side of the bed. He still had his boots on, like he’d wanted to hurry and not take them off at the door.
"Yes, though I don't know if you deserve it, since you are a lazy good-for-nothing and I shouldn’t spend my hard earned dinars on you," he said, but he was already shedding clothes steadily. Nico stretched his hands overhead, knowing Yusuf was watching him and enjoying it.
"Lazy?" he asked innocently. "I sold three pairs of shoes today, and Fatima asked me to fetch two new pairs for her sons tomorrow."
"Oh, a true workhorse," Yusuf said, his smile growing. "Truly you have provided for our table."
Nico smiled. They both liked to work, and kept jobs here and there wherever they went, but they had only stayed here in Tunis because Yusuf loved the leather-working workshop. Nico had no passion for shoe-selling, and he liked it more for the people he talked to from the windows of their homes, telling him they needed new shoes from the cobbler and could he please fetch them tomorrow. It didn’t bother him. Time stretched out in front of them, an endless blessing of opportunity. Soon, they would both grow restless, and maybe, years from now, Nico would find a calling that held him in one place while Yusuf idled. All that mattered was they were close to each other.
"It sounds like you have provided for mine," Nico said, working at his trousers one-handed. Yusuf sat down on the bed, his shirt off and his trousers around his knees, bending to take his boots off.
"Not quite your table," he said, cryptically. Nico wriggled out of his trousers and his underthings, enjoying himself when he saw Yusuf's gaze get warmer. All these years and he still loved the way Yusuf looked at his body, like a prize he was covetous of. Nico liked being coveted.
"You're not undressed," he said, and Yusuf kicked off his final layers, exposing his whole body to the evening air. Outside, Nico could still hear the bustle of the street, mothers calling out for their children, old men arguing, someone laughing, but in their room, in their bed, it was just the two of them, as it always had been.
Nico rolled over and reached for Yusuf's cock, nestled against the curls of his hair and already darkened. He must have been thinking about him on the way home. He liked the idea, Yusuf hurrying home, his cock thick in his trousers, thinking about Nico in their bed.
"Ah," Yusuf said, catching his hand by the wrist. "I said it was something for you."
"I thought-" Nico said, but Yusuf just smiled and bent to his bag, fumbling around for whatever present he couldn't wait to give him. The bones of his spine raised the skin of his back, as unblemished as the first time Nico had seen it, all those days and years ago. He ran a hand over it, feeling the shape of Yusuf's muscles, the contours of him that Nico knew better than he knew his own body.
"Here," Yusuf said, and lifted his prize. Nico looked at it for a second.
"It's a cock," he said, after a moment. Yusuf grinned.
"Yes," he said. "The outside is leather."
Nico reached out and took it, wrapping his fingers around it tightly. It was leather, worked to a thick softness, and something hard underneath.
"What's underneath?" he asked, turning it over in his hand.
"Wood," Yusuf said.
"The woodworker certainly knew cocks," Nico said, and Yusuf laughed.
"True," he said. "What do you think?"
"You already have a cock I like," Nico said, and shook his wrist in Yusuf's grip, trying to reach around Yusuf's hip but not quite managing.
"I know," Yusuf said smugly, releasing Nico's wrist and climbing over him, so their bodies were pressed together. "But this one I can put inside you while I suck your cock."
Nico inhaled sharply. He hadn't thought of that.
"I take it back," he said, as Yusuf kissed his neck. "I like this new cock better."
They kissed for a long time, because they had the whole evening and they knew how to make it last, thrusting against each other and gasping pleas for more, and then pulling back to light touches, Yusuf holding his wrists above his head and kissing him at the pace he set, not listening to the sounds Nico made to beg.
"I thought-" Nico said, with a gasp when Yusuf bit his nipple sharply. "I thought you had a plan."
"I did," Yusuf said, kissing his chest and looking up at him. "You distracted me."
"If I distract you any more," Nico said. "You won't get to try your new cock out until tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?" Yusuf said, with a smile, sliding down his body. "Surely you could manage in a few hours."
"Perhaps," Nico said, trying to rummage beside the bed without looking away from Yusuf's playful face. "Maybe I would take my new cock to bed with me and leave you to touch yourself and watch."
Yusuf hissed loudly.
"Is that supposed to be my punishment?" he said, his voice tight like he was trying to keep it under control. Nico smirked.
"It will be if you don't help me find the oil," he said, exasperated, knocking something over with his hand. “Where is it?”
Yusuf leaned over him to search with him, and then dropped his head onto Nico’s chest.
“It’s in the other room,” he said, with a sigh. Nico made a face, and then remembered.
“Because of-” Yusuf said, and Nico cut him off.
“Sunday,” he said, already smiling at the memory. Yusuf had gone drinking in the evening, and had come home with half a bottle of wine for Nico, too drunk to get hard but still solicitous and desperate. Nico had fucked him over the table in their second room, luxuriating in the sounds he made, the thick, wine-heavy smell of his body.
Nico let his head fall back on the pillow.
“You can go get it,” he said. “It’s your fault it’s in there.”
Yusuf rolled his eyes.
“Fine, you lay-about,” he said, and pinched Nico’s nipple, hard enough to make him yelp and curl away.
Yusuf picked himself off the bed, and, still naked, crossed the room and slid through the doorway to their second room. Nico watched him go, the muscles in his legs and the curve of his ass, and ran a firm hand down his side, wanting to touch himself but not daring to touch his own cock, for fear of getting himself too close.
He didn’t know how many years they would have in these long lives of theirs, but he was sure the thrill of Yusuf’s body would never leave him. Every time he saw it, in the marketplace, at war, asleep, in the bathhouse, everywhere, it warmed him, somewhere deep in his soul. He would look towards Yusuf for the rest of his life, as they walked the world together, set apart by their strange and wondrous blessing.
“You look tempting,” Yusuf said, when he came back into the room, their heavily depleted bottle of oil in one hand. Nico smiled back at him, and spread his legs. He had once felt self-conscious of his body, and his shamelessness, the depth and heat of the flames of his love, but that was a world forgotten now, a stone worn into the sea, a righteous sword reforged in the heat of God’s grace, turned to the worship of his blessings on Earth. Nico had no regrets. He left them scattered to the wind.
“You told me you had a plan,” Nico said, reaching out and reeling him into the bed as soon as he was within touching distance. Yusuf’s hands were calloused and thick from days of work, although they would heal to perfect smoothness if left for more than a few days.
“Oh, are you tired of waiting?” Yusuf said, kissing his brow, and then leaned back to oil his fingers.
“Yes,” Nico said, because he was, and they had 200 years of making love, and had many hundreds to come. He could afford to be impatient. His cup ran over, overflowing.
Yusuf cupped his cheek, gently, and, as they kissed, eased one of his legs to bend. The oil was warm on his fingers and dripped, sliding down Nico’s skin, fragrant and rich, the smell rising up to reach him, so familiar he felt himself relax around the first press of Yusuf’s fingers, pushing back into the feeling of glorious fullness.
Nico groaned, his back arching, his eyes falling shut of their own accord. The feeling was wondrous. He was a lamp lit from the inside, a flame climbing out of control. It rushed along his skin, up his spine, and turned words to noise on his tongue. Yusuf didn’t even touch his cock, just spread his fingers and stroked the inside of him, hollowing him out like the inside of a fruit, a pomegranate empty of seeds, an orange drained of its juice.
“Do you need another?” Yusuf asked, his lips soft and gentle against the fold of Nico’s hip, catching a single drop of sweat. Nico craned his neck up, to see his dark eyes looking back at him.
“Not unless that cock is a lot bigger than yours,” he said dryly, and Yusuf snorted at him, twisting his fingers as he pulled them out, Nico’s body clinging to him to the last.
There was a moment of fumbling, Yusuf’s hand still slick with oil, and then he had the cock pressed against Nico’s asshole, the leather soft and firm, a little strange feeling but not unfamiliar. He was slick, relaxed and open from Yusuf’s hands and only a little pressure pushed it inwards, and then his body did the rest, like it had been made for this kind of love.
“Nico,” Yusuf said slowly, like syrup, his thumb pressing against the edge of Nico’s body and the cock, at the place where a curve stopped it going any deeper. “Is it okay?”
Nico nodded, and then pushed his own hair off his face, staring at the tiles on their ceiling.
“It’s good,” he said, when he realised he should say something. It was good, a firmer kind of pressure than when it was Yusuf’s cock inside him. It felt almost luxuriant, a pleasant warm fullness.
Yusuf ran his hands up the inside of Nico’s thighs, moving to lie between them, one of Nico’s legs folding over his shoulder, the arch of his foot soft against the curve of Yusuf’s shoulder blade.
“You are beautiful,” Yusuf said, and Nico smiled. He wanted to reach for him, but Yusuf was too far away and when Nico moved pinpricks of fire danced up his spine and made him gasp.
“You are a flatterer,” Nico said, a little breathlessly. “You want only one thing, you are sent from the angels to torment me.”
Yusuf laughed.
“Torment?” he asked sarcastically, and then bent his head to Nico’s cock, pulling the tip into the wet heat of his mouth, and Nico forgot what he’d been saying, he forgot himself and his mind; all that remained was his body, turned and twisted as Yusuf wished. He moaned, low and long, feeling the noise more in his chest than he heard it aloud, and Yusuf tongued at his cock, sliding down enough that Nico could feel the tightness of the back of his mouth.
They had done this before with Yusuf’s fingers inside him, Yusuf on his knees with Nico at the edge of the bed, Yusuf wringing pleasure from him, but this was different. The cock Yusuf had bought was thicker and harder than his fingers, and when Nico clenched down, he felt fuller than he ever had, suspended between Yusuf’s mouth and the hard wood of the cock.
“God, Yusuf, oh god,” he said, panting, his shoulders twisting. Waves of pleasure moved through him, the pressure on his cock transmuting into the pressure inside him. He felt golden, uncontrollable, wild.
Yusuf hummed, his eyes fluttering closed. His beard scratched Nico’s thighs, the soft skin of his balls, and then Yusuf reached between his legs and, slowly at first, began to fuck him with the cock, moving the length out and then deeper, the pace building until it was hard and fast, fucking Nico deeply and completely. He shook and writhed, Yusuf moving with him, holding his body in place, fucking him and sucking his cock, riding him to his completion. He could not even hear the sounds he was making anymore, they were just noise coming from some other place; all he could think about was the building heat all over his body, racing towards the edge.
“Oh Yusuf, god take your soul away, damn you, please,” he begged, and Yusuf answered him by twisting the cock inside him, the drag so good Nico’s breath stuttered and caught. His blood was roaring in his ears, his breath coming fast, like he was running, or fighting, and he was so close, so close under Yusuf’s mouth and hands, pinned in place.
Yusuf twisted the cock again, and Nico keened, his whole body shaking and his legs kicking out sharply. His cock pulsed, and he tumbled over the edge, his pleasure pulled out of him by Yusuf's perfect, clever mouth. The final aftershocks shuddered through his body, Yusuf letting his softening cock slide from his mouth, watching Nico with intense eyes.
"Nico," he said, his voice thick, pulling gently at the cock. "Can I? Is it too much?"
Nico shook his head.
"No, no," he said, trying to spread his legs more widely, even though he felt too weak to move. "I want you inside me."
Yusuf didn't try to be gentle with him, just pulled the cock out in one smooth movement and then, before Nico could even react to the change, lifted one of his legs and pushed his cock, living and warm and still Nico's favourite, deep into him.
"Nico," Yusuf said, wondrously, and Nico flapped his hand, reaching out to touch him briefly and then collapsing back. He was spent, his cock totally soft, and when Yusuf thrust into him, he felt used, a vessel for Yusuf’s pleasure, his need, wanting nothing more than to watch him satisfy himself in Nico’s body.
Yusuf fucked him hard, chasing his own release, and Nico watched him, the lines around his eyes, his mouth, the dark circles of his nipples, where his skin had tanned in the sun. There was always something new, he found, to notice. He could learn a new thing about Yusuf every day of every century, and never be tired.
Yusuf grunted, bending at the hip as he found his release, pushing Nico’s leg to bend back. Nico clenched down around him as he came, just to hear the choked surprised noise he made.
Yusuf collapsed over him, their chests pressed together, Yusuf breathing heavily. Nico stroked his back slowly, running the pads of his fingers over the thin skin of his shoulder blades, the softness around his middle. Eventually, Yusuf rolled off him, onto the empty, cool side of the bed, and they dozed together, listening to the noise of the evening outside the window. Nico kicked the cock off the bed, making himself comfortable.
“The man you bought that from,” Nico said eventually, rubbing his hand against the grain of Yusuf’s chest hair. “What do you think he thought?”
Yusuf hummed thoughtfully, and pulled Nico a little closer against his body.
“Perhaps he thought I had a wife I could not please,” he said, smiling. “Or perhaps he thought I had a lover who I am often far from, so that she could use the cock I had bought for her and think of me.”
“Oh, really,” Nico said, pulling back to look at Yusuf’s face, to see his eyes dancing with mirth and the laughter tucked into the corners of his mouth, waiting to break free. He pulled an exaggeratedly pensive face.
“Perhaps he thought my lover was a eunuch,” Yusuf said, and Nico squawked in awkward delight when he groped his soft cock, still damp with his come. Yusuf pressed his advantage and rolled them, so he was leaning over Nico, holding himself up by one arm.
“But he doesn’t know the truth,” Nico said, and Yusuf shook his head.
“No, because my lover is the greatest man of this century and of the next, and of every century to come,” he said, his voice low and soft, barely a breath in the air between them. “And no one will ever know how much I am his, and he is mine, except for us.”
“No one would understand,” Nico said, reached up to touch his face, feeling the soft scratch of his beard against the palm. Maybe to others they would have been sad words, but he had no need for others to understand. Yusuf knew his love.
“I will love you until God takes all the nations and lifts us from the grave,” Yusuf whispered, his lips so close to Nico’s they brushed as he talked.
“I know,” Nico whispered back. He did. He had no doubts, not since his feverish dreams of Yusuf’s face had stopped. He wanted to kiss him, but Yusuf held himself just out of reach. “You know I feel the same.”
“Yes,” Yusuf said, and bent to kiss him, their arms intertwined.
They fell asleep that night the same way they had every night since they had left Jerusalem, the great city of the Lord, and turned their face to a new path, Yusuf’s nose tucked tightly against Nico’s neck, in each other's arms, a long blade in easy reach.
1952 AD - Buenos Aires
It was a hot January that year, in Buenos Aires, and an ever hotter February. Nicolás was on holiday from the university, but was still doing research, and writing lesson plans. Joseph was not working, except for tasks suggested by Andy’s regular letters, her permanently untidy handwriting arriving every two weeks, and whatever else took his fancy. They both spent that summer in long periods of nakedness in their bed, lying under the open window, praying for a breeze, reading from a pile of books next to the bed that only seemed to grow. It was too hot to do anything else.
At the end of February, the heat finally broke in a day of rain and one of Andy's letters arrived, post-marked Australia. They read it together, half-dressed, listening to the rain outside.
"They're moving again," Joseph said, handing the cheap paper over to Nicolás when he was done reading.
"Where to?" he asked, unfolding the pages.
"Malaya," Joseph said, around the first bites of his breakfast. "She says the fighting there is getting worse."
"I thought she wanted to keep Booker away from wars for a while," he said, scanning the first lines of the letter, Andy's hand-writing that looped and swerved, like she was dueling with the words themselves. My dearest brothers, I hope this letter finds you well it began. Sébastien and I are waiting for our ship to Malaya...
Joseph shrugged.
"She changed her mind. Maybe it will do him good," he said.
Nicolás was not sure her theory was sound. Booker did not need fighting or peace, Andy's careful kindness or her aggressive encouragement. It had not yet been 150 years for him, and he was still grieving a life that had slipped through his fingers. Andy dragging him around the world, hoping something would stick, would not cut the grief out of him.
They gossiped about Andy and Booker for the rest of breakfast, and then their friends and acquaintances in Buenos Aires, Nicolás' colleagues and students, his new plans for a paper on some of the recent refutations of logical positivism, Joseph's friends in the Communist Party and in the newsrooms.
Joseph went out, when the rain thinned, to have coffee with a friend, and Nicolás stayed to read the new Camus and write a few desulatory sentences in his draft paper. It was dark when Joseph came home, the brim of his hat dripping from the rain, and new bullet holes in his shirt.
"What are these?" Nicolás asked, helping him take the shirt off, sticking his fingers through the holes. "What happened?"
Joseph shook his head.
"Someone tried to kill Juana and her husband," he said. "They were lucky I was there."
"Who? The government?" Nicolás asked, fetching a washcloth. Joseph's shoulder was covered in blood. He shrugged.
"Maybe. Maybe the communists, or they made someone angry. They make a lot of enemies," he said, and took the cloth from Nicolás’ hand, pausing to kiss his fingers.
"Did they see you die?" Nicolás asked. He would be sorry to leave his students at the university, but he could read philosophy books anywhere. If Joseph had been caught, they would need to move on, and quickly.
Joseph shook his head.
"It was just a shoulder wound. They think it grazed me. I'll wear a bandage," he said. Nicolás went to fetch their rarely-used first aid kit from the kitchen, in the cabinet over the sink.
"Nicolás," Joseph called after him, while he was in the other room. "I only came home to change clothes and tell you I was going."
"I know," Nicolás said, coming back into the room with the first aid kit under one arm, and Joseph's scimitar in the other. They kept it in the tall cabinet, with their only set of nice dishes and Nicolás' longsword. "Juana and Martín, they will need to leave the country."
Joseph took the sword, and turned his shoulder towards Nicolás, to let him tie the fake bandage.
"They say there are a few others from the newspaper who have been thinking of leaving. This will convince them. I know the way," Joseph said.
"How long?" Nicolás asked, tying off the bandage tightly. It would not fool close inspection, but enough to allay suspicion.
"A week, at the most," Joseph said. "We cannot cross the Plata or the Uraguay, all the safe ways across are watched and we will have children with us. We will have to go to Paraguay, and I will need to make sure they are safe in Asunción."
"A week," Nicolás said, and bent his head to kiss Joseph's neck, the edge of the bandage. "If you are not back in a week, I will come find you."
"I'll send a telegram from Asunción, if I can," Joseph said, reaching up to cover Nicolás' hand with his own. "I'll hurry back."
"See that you do," Nicolás said, and gripped Joseph’s fingers tightly before releasing. "I'll pack some food. The bullets are in the box under the bed."
They packed efficiently, Joseph's bag filling with everything he would need for a week of moving quickly and quietly. Nicolás tucked a packet of candy in the front pocket. They would have children with them.
Joseph kissed him in the doorway, his bag slug over one shoulder, his sword strapped against his back.
"Be careful," Nicolás said. "Give Juana and Martín my love."
"I will be," Joseph said, and leaned his forehead against his, their faces so close Nicolás could only see him in blurred impressions. "A week only, I promise. I love you."
"I love you," Nicolás said back, and then Joseph was out the door into the rainy evening, and Nicolás was alone.
They had been apart before, and he was sure they would be apart again. Nicolás had travelled with Andy and Quynh for a time, not long after Lykon had passed, and Joseph had stayed in Constantinople. When they had lived where Aden was now, Joseph had gone to Great Zimbabwe, with Lykon, and not come home for nearly a year. But modernity had spoiled him. He was used to everyone he loved being in easy reach, a letter, a telegram, Joseph only an arm away from him in their bed. A week seemed impossibly long.
He cleaned up the blood Joseph had left at the table, and put away the first aid kit. From their good stash, he poured two thick fingers of whisky and took himself to bed, to drink and read until he fell asleep, his body curving towards the empty space in their bed.
He tried to stay busy, over the next few days. He had his paper to finish, and his friends in the city, colleagues and their families, a small collection of other men and women with lovers of the same sex.
He went to dinner at a colleague’s apartment, and got his opinion on the progress he’d made on his paper. There was a new translation of Popper’s book, and a new paper of Quine’s to read and tear apart. He went to the shops, and wandered through Gath & Chaves, looking at all the new appliances.
He had been doubtful of electricity, when they had first figured out how to harness it. Yes, of course, if you rubbed amber over fur, it would spark your fingers, and some fish could do that of their own accord, but that was just a curiosity to entertain children. He hadn’t seen what anyone could use that for.
But he had followed Joseph to all those demonstrations, in 1801 and afterward, everyone excited about the possibilities, and now, trailing uselessly around the department store, missing his lover, he could see every type of possible use for it. Coffee makers and toasters and electric kettles, when the one he heated on the stove top worked just as well as it had 100 years ago. You could buy electric machines for washing dishes, cooking your food, mixing your meals. Nicolás still remembered lighting candles, the shadows cast on Joseph’s face by a fire in the hearth, the smell of melting tallow. How far the world had come.
One appliance caught his eye, the packaging showing beautiful people with perfect skin and smiles, the folding case it came in sleek and discreet. Nicolás smiled. Camila’s lover was French, and had brought one of these with her when she had come to Argentina. Camila raved about it. He’d been meaning to try one.
He took it over to the counter and paid the pretty shop girl with a smile, and put it in his satchel while he did the rest of his shopping, vegetables for dinners for the next few nights, bread, another two books by French philosophers from the foreign bookshop, which Joseph would tease him for. He went home with a light step. Joseph would be home soon.
He was in bed nights later, taking notes on The Second Sex for his lesson plans. They had published a Spanish-language translation two years ago, but it did not really do justice to the French. And a part of him missed reading in French, for all he had been speaking nothing but Castilian since 1950.
He was trying not to think about how it was the sixth night since Joseph had left, and that he had promised a week, and not a day more. Joseph had taken his favorite pistol, but Nicolás had an illegal scoped Mosin-Nagant strapped to the underside of the mattress, and enough ammunition to mow through anyone trying to keep them apart. He was hoping he wouldn’t have to.
At the sound of footsteps in the building stairwell, he sat up. Their building was quiet, mostly couples and families, and it was rare for someone to be on the stairs this late. A moment later, there was the sound of a key turning in the lock, and Nicolás slowly put down his book. There was a pistol and a trench knife in the bedside table, but he didn't want to go for them unless he was sure it wasn't Joseph.
"Nicolás?" He heard Joseph's quiet voice in the hall. "Are you awake?"
"In here," he said. Why did a week feel like a year? He had not kissed Joseph in six nights, had not held him in his arms, and all the ways his life had been colder without felt starkly clear now. They were halves of each other, lesser alone.
Joseph appeared in the doorway. He was a little bedraggled, his trouser legs dirty, the brim of his hat curled, and his shirt looked like it had been worn for a day too long, but there was no visible blood and he was whole and smiling.
"My love," he said, and Nicolás opened his arms, his smile so wide he felt like his face would split. Joseph crossed the room in two long paces, and bent to kiss him, deeply, one of his knees up on the bed.
"You're early," Nicolás said, when they paused. Joseph pulled back to pull his shirt off over his head, and then peeled off his undershirt. The bandage on his shoulder was yellow and falling off, and he ripped it off quickly, letting it fall onto his pile of clothes.
"Maybe I wanted to hurry home to my lover, wasting away while he pined for me, thinking only of me," Joseph said playfully, undoing his belt, and Nicolás laughed and looked around like he was searching for something.
"Oh, where is he, then? Did you go there earlier and he couldn't satisfy you so you came to me?" he said. Joseph laughed loudly, and dived for him as soon as his trousers were off, crawling over him in the bed.
"900 years of insolence, is that what I get?" he asked, in between kissing Nicolás' neck. Each press of his mouth was luxurious, a reward for Nicolás' lonely nights, awakening his body to Joseph's, his blood coming up.
"It has been 853 and not a year more," Nicolás said, but then Joseph kissed him in earnest, passionate and deep, licking into his mouth firmly, his body holding him in place. Joseph's skin was heated warm against him, and, still kissing, they wrestled the sheets of the bed away until they could be skin to skin.
"God, Nicolás, I missed you," Joseph said, and Nicolás rolled them so he was on top. He would show Joseph just how much he missed him. He thought of the case he had bought, under the bed, tucked next to the case of ammunition.
"I got you something," he said, looking down into Joseph's dark eyes. Joseph raised an eyebrow.
"Oh?" he said. Nicolás grinned.
“Give me a moment,” he said, and ducked to the side of the bed to pull out the case. It had a cord to plug into the wall, and he had to wrangle the lamp’s plug out of the way for a moment.
“I have to warn you, if you take too long I will fall asleep,” Joseph said, to the ceiling, but then Nicolás got it plugged in and pulled himself back to the middle of the bed, holding the device in one hand.
“What is it?” Joseph said, after looking at it for a moment.
“Remember Camila raving about that thing Marie brought with her? It’s a vibrator,” he said. Joseph’s eyebrows climbed even higher. Nicolás knew he wasn’t convinced. He ducked his head, and looked up at him through his lashes. “Let me use it on you. You’re tired. Let me make you feel good,” he said, and then before Joseph could say anything else, bent to lick along the line of his half-soft cock, tonguing softly at the head, his mouth lax. Above him, Joseph made a breathy noise, and thrust his hips, groaning when Nicolás pulled his mouth away.
“Let me?” he asked, looking up and Joseph rolled his head, throwing an arm over his eyes.
“Fine,” he said. “But I will fall asleep if we don’t do something soon, just to spite you.”
Nicolás grinned.
“You won’t fall asleep,” he said, and sat back. The vibrator had a dial in the handle and a nubbed plastic head that rumbled comfortably against his hand when he turned the dial to the first setting. He licked Joseph’s cock again, holding himself up one-handed, sucking on the head and luxuriating in the feeling of its increasing weight.
Carefully, because the damn thing was still plugged into the wall, and he was coordinating two hands and a mouth, he pressed the vibrator against the inside of Joseph’s thigh, only inches from his balls. Joseph sighed loudly, and spread his legs, giving Nicolás the space to lie down, pressing his own cock against the cool sheets and holding Joseph’s hips down with his free arm.
He knew the taste and feel of Joseph inside his mouth as well as he knew any part of Joseph, who he had loved and fucked in every way under the sun. It still made him hard and wanton, to know his mouth brought Joseph to the edge so precisely. He loved the slick side of the pink head of his cock over his lips, and the sheer physicalness of his throat rolling and choking around the whole length of him, the smell and texture of his pubic hair. All of it was a part of the way their bodies fit together, the same way their souls reached for each other.
Joseph moved underneath him, and Nicolás moved with him, leaning his weight on his hips to hold him in place, moving the vibrator higher, up Joseph’s leg to tuck against the soft skin behind his balls.
“Oh,” Joseph breathed, pushing back against it, his hips twisting. Nicolás sucked in one final pull, and then leaned back.
“More?” he asked, and, behind his hand, Joseph nodded.
“Yes, Nicolás, oh,” he said, and then groaned in pleasure when Nicolás turned the dial up, the buzzing kicking up a notch. It was such a view, Joseph with his legs spread widely, his cock thick and leaking against his stomach, his arm thrown over his face, the muscles in his arms twisting and bunching. He was everything Nicolás had ever wanted, and he was in his bed and had been there for more than 800 years. He would never stop being blindsided by his good fortune.
He pressed the vibrator firmly against Joseph’s body, holding his balls tightly against his body, and Joseph twitched and cried out, his cock jerking on its own. He was beautiful.
“Fuck, Joseph, you’re gorgeous,” Nicolás said, and turned the dial up again, watching his reactions, the jump in his stomach, the way his leg kicked out against nothing.
“Oh god, Nicolás, touch me,” he whined, tearing his arm off his face, his cheeks dark and flushed, and how could Nicolás resist that? He was only a man.
He licked the palm of his hand in a wide stripe, enough to be a smooth glide, and jerked Joseph’s cock tightly, letting his hand rub over the tip, watching Joseph react. He could feel the vibrations spreading from the toy, and everytime he rolled his wet palm across Joseph’s cock, he would push back hard against the feeling, chasing the pressure. Nicolás didn’t even care about his own cock, or how hard he was, he could watch Joseph’s body roll through pleasure like this forever. He was about to move the dial up again, just to see what would happen, could he make Joseph beg him, when the stretched string of Joseph’s body finally went completely taught and he grabbed Nicolás’ hand, holding him in place as he came, spurting come over both their hands and his chest, shaking with the force of it.
“Ah, ah, too much, Nicolás,” he said urgently, curling upwards, as soon as he started to come down, and Nicolás jerked the vibrator away, quickly turning the dial to zero. He hadn’t realised he was still holding it in place, too entranced. Joseph flopped back onto the bed, one of the pillows bouncing. “God,” he said faintly, to the ceiling. Nicolás crawled up the bed to flop down next to him, already fisting his own cock. He couldn’t wait, after watching that.
“You - ah - didn’t fall asleep,” he said, grunting as he tightened his fingers. Joseph laughed, one entertained gasp, and rolled over onto his side, pulling him in with one gentle hand to kiss him open-mouthed, sucking filthily on his tongue.
“Come here,” Joseph said, when they pulled apart to breathe, and they slid in against each other, Joseph sliding his hand between them to hold his cock and let Nicolás fuck his hand in tight jerks of his hips, breathing wetly against his collarbone. It didn’t take more than a minute, coming messily over Joseph’s hand and adding to the mess on his stomach.
Nicolás caught his breath with his face buried in Joseph’s chest, Joseph’s nose in his hair, until he knew they were going to stick together if he didn’t move and rolled away.
“No, come to sleep,” Joseph said, when Nicolás climbed out of bed on shaky legs. Nicolás laughed.
“I’m getting a washcloth, you animal,” he said, bending at the side of the bed to unplug the vibrator and throw it in the case. It was definitely getting used again.
He brought a washcloth from the bathroom, and wiped them both down quickly, smiling at the noise of protest Joseph made, and lay down beside him, Joseph’s arm hooked lazily over his hip.
"Juana and Martín are safe?" he asked. Joseph nodded, his eyes still closed, stroking his fingers down Nicolás’ side idly.
"Everything went okay. Martín has a cousin in Asunción, where they will stay for a while," he said, and then smiled. "Juana says they’ll name the next child José."
“Or Josefina,” Nicolás said with a smile, and Joseph opened his eyes to look at him.
“Or Josefina,” he agreed. “They are thinking of Mexico. Juana’s sister is there, and her husband is a journalist too.”
“Will they come back to Argentina?” Nicolás asked. Joseph shrugged.
“Maybe. They are too brave,” he said. Neither of them spoke for a long moment, just lying silently together.
“We could go elsewhere, you know,” Nicolás said eventually. “I know you think we could do more good elsewhere.”
Joseph sat up a little, and looked down at him.
“Nicolás, you have a passion here,” he said gently. “Besides, we can do good anywhere. We do good here. Juana and Martín would be dead, and their children orphans, if I had not been here. How many students have you inspired, with all your preaching about French philosophers?”
Nicolás blushed.
“It’s just-” he said. He knew they had stayed here a long time. They had come for rest, in the wake of the war that had sickened them of Europe, and the long years of dying to rise again, a weapon in hand, but they had lingered, settling into Buenos Aires life. Joseph reached out and touched his face gently, smoothing the skin next to his eye.
“I am where I am meant to be, my love, if I am with you,” he said, and how did he always know the right words? Nicolás was blessed to love a poet and an artist, a gentle man in the body of a warrior.
“You have a golden tongue,” Nicolás said, softly, and Joseph laughed under his breath.
“Your golden-tongued lover is very tired. He drove all night to be with you,” he said, lying down next to him and pulling him into his arms. Nicolás tucked himself into the curve of his body. They fit together the same as they ever had. “Sleep,” Joseph said, into his ear, and they did.
1991 AD - Berlin
They came through Berlin regularly now, passing from the West to the East and back again. Of all the cities in Europe, Nicky thought he probably knew it the best. They hadn't stayed in one place since ‘85. The world was changing. They were needed everywhere.
It was April when they came back from Belgrade, satisfied with work well done, counted in lives saved, people helped. Joe had died in his arms but he had come back, as whole and perfect as ever. Nicky had killed the man who had done it. Death was a waste, every time, but he no longer felt bad about killing people who tried to take Joe from him. They had sown the wind, and he was happy to be the whirlwind.
Andy knew a squat with a spare room for the four of them, and they left their bags, nodding to the men and women in the communal kitchen, executing the assembly line cooking of communes the world over. There was a bar in the abandoned building next door, and they sat outside, on a picnic bench covered in graffiti, Andy and Booker smoking and dumping their ashes in an old can, a peeling label advertising tomatoes on the outside. Joe went to the bar and brought back two bottles of Gorbatschow, one for Andy and one for the rest of them. They clinked shot glasses and threw back the drinks quickly, Nicky wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. It was still just the afternoon, but Andy poured herself another, and knocked back three more without stopping. They didn’t try to keep up; the woman had been drinking for 6,000 years.
“Where next, boss?” Booker asked, leaning back to start a second cigarette. Andy leaned her elbows on the table.
“I was thinking Ireland,” she said. “We could do some good. Booker?”
He nodded.
“I’ll look into it. It’ll be tough, boss,” he said, tapping the ash of his cigarette into the half-full can. Andy shrugged.
“That’s the work. Take some time, we can stay here a while without problems,” she said, running a hand over her short shaved hair. She’d shaved it off in ‘87, in the sink of the apartment they’d shared that summer, Joe holding the clippers and all of them laughing at the mess they were making, clumps of Andy’s hair getting everywhere. It made her look ageless, and, Nicky thought, a little terrifying. It suited her.
They drank and talked for a while, slowly draining the bottles, and coming down from a long week of fighting and dying. The squat’s communal kitchen spat out bread and senfeier, in a big bowl they ate out of together, until Nicky was a little drunk and happily full and the sun had started to go down.
Booker went to call a contact from a phone one of the women in the squat said was available down the street, and Andy strapped her labrys to her back, under a thick covering cloth, to go find the man who made replica weapons who kept her spares. That left Nicky and Joe alone in the room in the squat, finishing the last bottle by passing it back and forth, and sharing the only sofa, which looked like it had seen better days.
The vodka had gotten Nicky’s blood pumping again, his adrenaline up. They had cheated death, for the thousandth time, and he didn’t want to sleep, he didn’t want to wake up to just another morning. He wanted to celebrate; they were alive, they were lucky, they were together.
“Come dancing with me,” he said, wheedling, pulling Joe in close to him with his arms around his waist. “Let’s go to Tresor.”
Joe looked at him. Nicky knew he liked going out to the clubs as much as Nicky did, and he was just resisting for show.
“C’mon,” he said, tightening his hold on him for a second. “You know you want to.”
Joe snorted.
“Yes, okay,” he said. “Let’s go.”
Nicky kissed him in celebration, and then wriggled out of his embrace to pick through the bags and find something acceptable to wear. Joe wore his leather jacket with no shirt, which made Nicky puff up with pride. Everyone was going to think he was the luckiest guy out that night, and they’d be right.
Everything that was open during the day had closed, and the streets had gone eerily quiet, except for the other clusters of people looking for a party. It was a chilly night, and there were other couples in the line at Tresor, arms around each other against the cold. In front of them, two boys were kissing, both of them in dark military boots and tank tops, arms wrapped around each other, totally lost to the world.
“Ah, youth,” Joe said fondly, his chin tucked over his Nicky’s shoulder, his breath tickling his ear.
“Were we like that?” Nicky asked. Joe laughed, his chest rumbling against Nicky’s back.
“Worse, I think,” Joe said. “Remember Baghdad?”
Nicky shivered all over just from the memory. They had been worse, so surprised by their good fortune, their invincibility, the things they could do together without end. It had been glorious.
“Maybe I am forgetting in my old age,” Nicky said back, over his shoulder, leaning back as Joe slid his hands around his waist, sliding his palms under his shirt and against his bare skin. “You should remind me sometime.”
“If it’s your old age, surely it’s mine too,” Joe said, his voice full of humour. “Maybe you should be reminding me.”
The line inched forward, and Nicky tugged Joe with him.
“Maybe I am,” he said. “You like dancing with me.”
Joe hummed his agreement, and bent his head to kiss Nicky’s neck, the leather of his jacket rough against the bare skin of Nicky’s arms.
The doorman barely glanced over them when they reached the door, the heavy industrial door disguising the club inside.
“No pictures,” he said in a gruff voice. “And no drama.”
Nicky nodded, and then they were into the dark, concrete hallways of the club, tripping over each other and the other people on the stairs down into the vault. It was dark and smoky, cigarette and dope and smoke machines mixing to make each room a shuttered mystery until you were fully in it, the strobe and whatever had been rigged in corners the only lighting. The music was so loud you could feel it through the walls, reverberating inside Nicky’s body, turning everything into a throbbing beat. He and Joe didn’t try to talk, just pulled each other deeper into the vault, past the rooms near the door where the kids lingered and to one of the bars, half-hidden behind rusting spars of metal rebar.
Tresor wasn’t really a club for drinking at, and they knocked back their drinks quickly, just something to wet their throats, and then Nicky pulled Joe out to one of the dance floors by his hand. It was crowded, and they were buffeted by the flow of people, pushed together, their bodies slipping together, Joe’s hands on his hips, holding him tightly.
Nicky loved this new kind of dancing, and he had a lot to compare it to. It felt so animal, sweaty and uncontrolled, to a wordless music you could lose yourself in. Hours could pass easily, there were no windows to see the sun coming up, and he could dance intertwined with Joe without interrupting or wanting anything else.
They weaved and swayed and ground into each other, held up by the crowd and the songs that never stopped, that only built to peaks that kept on going. They drank more, and dove back into the crowd, dancing just the two of them or sometimes joined by others, their bodies pressed together and anonymous. He had lived a hundred thousand lifetimes, and yet it was still this that made him feel immortal, like a single night could truly never end. They would remain here forever, on the banks of the Spree, the world outside erased, time itself made meaningless.
They went to the bar again, and Nicky left Joe to grope his way to the toilets, always made strange by the lack of mirrors, every one of them banned from the whole building. He pissed, and tried to walk steadily back. His balance always went when he was drunk enough, and he had to focus without Joe there to hold him.
A blonde skinny guy was doing a roaring trade in the hallway outside the bathrooms, condoms, pills, cocaine, even bottled water, which made him a clever entrepreneur. Nicky could respect that.
“Something to keep you going?” the man said, through the thumping reverb, his Ossi accent audible even over the noise. Nicky smiled. He loved Berlin.
“You have ecstasy?” Nicky said, and took two. More for him if Joe didn’t want to.
At the bar, Joe had saved him a shot, and Nicky showed him the pill on his tongue, a question in his eyes.
“Did you at least save me one?” Joe said, Nicky reading the words off his lips more than he heard them. He grinned, holding out the other pill to place on Joe’s tongue, and swayed forward into Joe’s chest. The music was shaking up his bones, and it felt like his whole body was vibrating.
They had both been hedonists before in their lives, off and on. They’d drunk wine in Grenada, smoked hashish in Rajasthan, fed each other cocaine in Paris in 1901, even mushrooms in the desert in America in the 60s. They couldn’t do anything permanent to their bodies; even tattoos slowly healed away to nothing. Nicky had found he didn’t like the things that made him numb; he loved the things that made him feel everything.
Joe slid his hands around Nicky’s hips and pulled his body in close against his, the sweat on his chest leaving a mark on the front of Nicky’s shirt. Together, they stumbled back into the crowd of dancers, not watching where they were going, colliding with strangers, pushing them further onto the dancefloor. The music made Nicky feel like he was swimming, suspended in a constant moving beat that never ended, ebbing and flowing, carrying him. Everything felt syrupy, and, when he moved, the air was thick against him. In the dark and the smoke he could only see Joe in flashes, the sweat dripping down his chest, his pupils dilating. He wanted to feel him, to feel everything he could.
Joe obviously felt the same, because neither of them initiated it but then they were kissing, Joe’s hot mouth against his, sucking on his tongue filthily. He moaned, the sound going all the way into his toes. Nothing could be heard over the music, and no one cared. They were alone and anonymous in the crowd.
Nicky couldn’t stop running his hands over Joe, the hard leather of his jacket, his sweat-damp skin, the scratch of his chest, each sensation feeling like it was totally new. He tugged at Joe’s chest hair and felt him hiss at the sting, and rubbed the heel of his hand over the point of his nipple, just to feel it. He was aroused, but in a way that sunk through his whole body. He wanted to rub up against Joe, or maybe just groan into the wet slide of their kiss and feel his body set itself on fire. Pressed together everywhere they could be, legs tangled, both of them erratically jerking their hips against each other, they moved with the music more like one person. He breathed against Joe’s neck, his mouth and nose filled with the smell of him, panting through the exhaustion, the high, the flight ever upwards.
“I want to fuck you,” Joe said, directly into his ear, the words cutting straight through the noise and digging into Nicky’s skin, opening him up from the inside. He wanted Joe inside him, he wanted to feel opened and used and alive.
His tongue was too heavy in his mouth to talk. He didn’t need to talk anyway. He just pulled at Joe’s belt loops, and jerked his head towards the corner of the room, where the maze of a building split off into rooms left unlit. Joe’s sly, victorious smile came over his face slowly, sending a little anticipatory shiver down Nicky’s spine.
They pushed through the crowd, Joe’s firm hand between Nicky’s shoulder blades, pushing him on whenever something made him slow, and then stumbled into the first dark room they found, already reaching for each other. Another couple were in the corner of the room, a man and a woman, and Nicky could hear the sounds of them, their heavy breathing and the unmistakable sound of sex.
They fumbled against each other and then collided with a wall, and Nicky put his back up against it, his bare shoulders scraping against the concrete, tipping his head back so Joe could bite at his neck, sharp enough Nicky felt the bright shocks of the pain.
The heat and the dark, the sounds, through the open doorway, of people moving in the hall outside the room, it reminded him of the bathhouse in Constantinople. It was gone now, razed to the ground in an earthquake, 500 years ago, but it had been their favorite place in the city that year they stayed together on the outskirts. Memories of it flickered in his mind’s eye like bad overlay, sliding into the present easily through the white noise of his brain.
“You remember?” Joe said against his skin, tugging at Nicky’s belt. Nicky nodded.
“Yes, yes,” he said, sure they were remembering the same thing, fucking in the bathhouse in 1507, and kissed him, opening his mouth to Joe’s tongue, giving himself up. He was properly flying now, deliriously happy at every touch of Joe’s hands and desperate to feel more, anything. He could have died then and there and risen from the dark, begging only to feel it again.
Joe finally got both their belts undone, and their underwear down to their thighs, and pushed his cock against Nicky’s, no finesse, just their cocks rubbing against each other, their clothes still half on. Nicky loved it. He loved Joe with no inhibitions, because, even less than a decade from the next millennium, they were desperate for each other. It had never dimmed, even after the thousands of steps on this path together, arm in arm, a hundred thousand deaths left unfulfilled. They had drank deeply of the pool of life, but would never be satisfied. He would never tire of love.
“Let me, please, Nicky,” Joe said, the words running together, hands on his hips, digging in tightly.
“Yes,” was all Nicky said, turning to put his forearms against the wall and rest his forehead on his hands. It was exposing. Anyone who came into the room would see him like this, begging with his body for Joe to fuck him, ass up.
“Nicky,” Joe said warmly, and then rubbed his thumb over Nicky’s asshole, dry. He groaned and pushed back into the pressure, every sensation heightened. He heard Joe spit, and then his fingers were wet, working him open. Each push and stretch made him hiss happily, his mouth wet against his own hands. He wanted Joe to fuck him now, fill him up, fuck him where anyone could see, where no one knew who they were.
Joe wrapped an arm around his stomach to pull him closer, and then Nicky felt the head of his dick push between his fingers, the thick head holding him open and slowly, not nearly fast enough, pushing into him. It was too dry for Joe to properly fuck him, but he spit again and the next inch of his dick pushed in and Nicky groaned, full and still desperately wanting more.
It hurt, but that was the point, it hurting, cutting through every other feeling to empty him out, pull the core out of him. Joe growled, the sound rumbling through their bodies pressed against each other, and Nicky craned his head backwards, trying to arch his back and expose his neck at the same time.
“Joe, darling, my love, ah, God, fuck, I love you, don’t stop, please don’t stop,” he could hear himself, he knew was speaking, and he was sure it wasn’t German. He didn’t know what language it was or even if Joe could hear him, the words were just spilling out of him. Joe bit him, his teeth closing over his shoulder, and held on, a bright, growing pain that reached up into Nicky’s brain and built behind his eyes, till he felt like he would burst. Joe’s dick pushed into him, deeper this time, and he cried out, his body reacting in waves, his chest heaving and, he could feel it, his hole clenching and releasing, letting Joe into him. It felt endlessly, overwhelmingly good, like his whole body was under Joe’s control, like all that mattered was Joe all around him.
Joe thrust into him, his hips slapping against Nicky’s ass, shaking both of their bodies. He was gasping, shaking, his face pressed against his hands and his chest against the concrete, held up by Joe’s hands and the cold press of the wall. He wanted to come, but he didn’t want it to end, he wanted Joe to fuck him for an hour, an evening, till the rave was over and the whole place was empty, just the two of them making love until the sun rose and set on another day. Joe fucked him, thrusts shaking his body, his nerves screaming, pushing him up against the wall, and Nicky tried to hold out for as long as he could, just feeling it, just taking it.
FInally, when he couldn’t take it anymore, he dropped one of his hands from his face and wrapped it around his dick, the feeling like dunking himself in cold ice water. He groaned once, long and low, and Joe fucked him hard enough to make Nicky fuck his own hand, his foreskin sliding perfectly over the head of his cock, working him closer and closer to the edge. He couldn’t even name what it felt like. Everything just felt.
For a second, it was perfect, the building pleasure inside him, the thick pounding of the music through the walls, Joe’s cock thrusting into him, and then it all collided, suddenly, into a moment of overwhelming noise and he tumbled over the edge, his come catching on his fingers and dripping onto the wall. Joe didn’t even pause, just fucked him through the aftershocks, holding him up when he went limp with release.
“Fuck, Nicky,” Joe said, in his ear, his voice wrecked, and Nicky groped for him in the dark, not caring about the angle or the mess, just wanting to pull him closer.
“C’mon,” Nicky said, leaning back against Joe’s chest, feeling the leather of his jacket catch against his arms. “Fucking do it, come inside me, let me feel it,” he said.
Joe choked, his forehead falling onto Nicky’s shoulder, the rhythm of his thrusts all gone, just jerkily moving their bodies together, and then Nicky felt his cock jerk and the rush of his come, the dirty, powerful feeling of being filled.
“Fuck,” Joe said with feeling, after a moment, and Nicky laughed. He still felt over-sensitised, his shoulder and ass sore, and his adrenaline was up. He could go all night.
They didn’t bother trying to clean up. What would have been the point? It was Tresor. No one cared. They danced smelling of each other, Joe’s come leaking out of Nicky’s asshole, the crowd adding another layer of sweat over it all. They danced until it was the morning, or the semblance of it, and they stumbled out of the club to see the sun rise over Berlin’s flat skyline, and walked home leaning on each other, the last dregs of the high burning away. They passed sleepy people headed to work, in normal clothes and shoes, and other ravers, dressed like the world was ending, finding their way home to abandoned buildings or crowded apartments or another party. Berlin was a strange city, but Nicky loved it. It was like them. It endured. It thrived.
At the squat, Andy was asleep face down on one of the mattresses on the floor, one hand laid possessively on Booker’s chest, the other over the handle of a sheathed knife tucked underneath her. She barely stirred when they fell into the space beside her.
“You smell rank,” she murmured, half-asleep, and Nicky laughed. He was exhausted, like he’d run a marathon, or died a hundred times, and when he closed his eyes to blink, he struggled to open them again.
“Nice to see you boss,” he said, nonsensically, and fell asleep, Joe half on top of him.