You Know My Name Part 3
anonymous
November 4 2010, 00:17:01 UTC
The next several weeks passed with little notice or incident. Alfred followed Arthur like a puppy, hugging him when they stood together, holding his hand when they sat together, talking loudly about food, sports, dismal weather, and whispering things not really worth whispering into his ear. Admittedly, hot breath against his ear made, "D'you wanna get a burger?" a more interesting proposition, but it was still silly.
During those weeks, Arthur found himself for once content in the arms of another. He had had a girlfriend or two, had held them and kissed them, but somehow being wrapped in the warm embrace of the taller man, he felt the warmth of the sun on his pale skin, though the skies were as dark as ever.
They only went so far as kissing, and not very often; Arthur was still unsure, and Alfred was patient. Arthur had never much cared for kissing, but he liked to kiss Alfred, sometimes, just a little, because Alfred was soft, and warm, and Alfred.
Oh, Alfred.
He smiled all the time, and at everyone around or no one in particular. His gentle, friendly ways with other people warmed Arthur, as well, and he wondered why he didn't feel jealous when Alfred received other, possibly more tantalizing offers.
"I like you," Alfred told him all the time, out of the blue, because he could and because he had thought about it.
"I like you, too," Arthur would respond, and Alfred would grin, and Arthur would feel stupid but they would end up laughing anyway. Alfred liked to walk Arthur home whenever he could (and he usually could. Sometimes, Arthur wondered whether the bespectacled fellow did anything other than reorganize his schedule to follow Arthur all day. Of course, no one could possibly want to spend all day every day with him...least of all the bright, beautiful not-so-long-ago stranger who could do so much better.)
Alfred liked to come up behind Arthur, pull him close, and press his face into the messy blond hair. Arthur almost always objected--"Don't startle me like that; you know I hate it!"--but Alfred never seemed to care, and secretly Arthur was glad. He liked to have someone who could grab him and steal him, but wouldn't. He liked to have Alfred's strong arms securing him close; he liked to have Alfred's warmth against his back; he liked to have Alfred clinging to him as though he were the only thing in the world that mattered.
He felt selfish.
"Why do you like me?" he asked once, when they were sitting with the toes of their shoes brushing beneath a table.
Alfred had looked at him with such astonishment, as though he could not believe he was being asked such a thing. Arthur regretted bringing it up until Alfred looked away and laughed easily.
Re: You Know My Name Part 3
anonymous
November 4 2010, 00:31:45 UTC
Oh wow, what an amazing start! You managed to set up that creepy atmosphere right off the bat, and I was already getting chills before I even finished the first part. Please update soon!!
Re: You Know My Name Part 3
anonymous
November 4 2010, 04:01:51 UTC
I'm totally getting Patrick Bateman vibes from Alfred xDD I love the start. Managed to make Alfred seem slightly off, but not totally obvious :D I really really hope you continue!
You Know My Name Part 4
anonymous
November 4 2010, 19:29:32 UTC
(Thank you for the support!)
Arthur didn't ask why Alfred liked him after that, though the question remained, nagging at the back of his mind whenever he had a moment to consider it. He had never exchanged but a few words with the man before that night on his doorstep; he was antisocial, the utter opposite of Alfred's bubbly grandeur; and he was average-looking at best, with no muscles, boring hair he couldn't control, and ridiculous eyebrows. His eyes, a bright green, were the only thing that stood out positively about him, he thought.
Alfred, on the other hand, was handsome and charming. His hair was as bright as his personality; his eyes an impossible, sparkling blue. He was tall and lean, with just the right amount of softness at his belly. (Arthur had noted its presence when they were hugging once. He had smiled for some reason.)
Alfred was the light that had escaped the little town for so long. He could talk to anyone with such ease; he brightened the day of the most displeased residents. He thrived where people crowded about to be noisy and obnoxious, just the sort of place Arthur avoided like the plague. But Alfred would follow Arthur anywhere.
Yes, Alfred seemed comfortable anywhere. He was happy on boats, with the salty spray of the sea fogging his glasses and mussing his hair. He was happy in planes high above the earth that filled Arthur with fear and dread. He was content in shiny cars, puffing motorcycles, and atop his own two feet, which made up the perfectly-fitted ends of two long, strong legs.
He was happy standing in the rain while he waited for Arthur to finish with work. He was glad when Arthur invited him inside to dry off and watch a some late-night television. He was ecstatic when Arthur insisted he stay the night, and only mildly disappointed when the shorter man put a pillow and blanket on the couch.
You Know My Name Part 5
anonymous
November 4 2010, 19:54:00 UTC
They had been hugging and holding hands for six months when the newspapers began to run headlines reading "Mystery Body Mutilated in Alley," or "Young Woman Slaughtered in Home."
Arthur shuddered at the blurry black and white photographs as he read the articles at his desk. Normally, he read the paper for something to do, something on which to focus his eyes as he allowed his mind to wander. But the headlines were printed in bold ink, demanding the attention of the mostly young men and women in his building. If he were to peer about, he would see his coworkers anxiously scanning the very same page, some of them gathered around the desks of friends.
It wasn't as though they had never had problems with crime before, but it was a small, sleepy town where everyone knew very nearly everyone else, and most people kept quietly to their own business. That business rarely involved anything more heinous than drinking and trying to drive home, however, so multiple cases of what was apparently murder brought about an uncharacteristic hush wherever one went.
Arthur tried to think of similar headlines, and drew a blank.
Almost two years prior, there had been a shooting behind one of the nightclubs, but no one had succumbed to injuries, and it was settled between the families the following week. When Arthur was a child, there had been something of a drug scandal, but he had been too young and disinterested to pay much attention. The troublemakers who eventually saw their names on headlines and their faces in mugshots were almost exclusively from out of town.
Arthur's fingers clenched around the newspaper. He took a deep breath, cracked a self-depreciative grin, and tried to return the newspaper to the pattern after which it had been folded when he picked it up.
He was just being silly.
Serial killers didn't just roll into town with eyes sparkling and smiles flashing, strong bodies strung taut like bowstrings, playful and friendly and handsome to look at until you set them off and they cut you in half.
You Know My Name Part 6
anonymous
November 4 2010, 20:11:17 UTC
"So," Alfred was saying as they walked side by side some afternoon, a few weeks into the storm of bloodied headlines. "I've been thinking..."
Arthur hadn't mentioned the killings to Alfred, nor had Alfred brought them up. It didn't seem as though the man realized that anything was at all out of the ordinary. Arthur had decided that he didn't read the paper or watch the news. It just sounded like him.
"Since we've been together for a while now, we should celebrate."
Arthur raised his eyes to Alfred's face. The taller man was looking at him with the same gentle, warming affection as always. He found his heart in his throat.
"What did you have in mind?"
"Well, I dunno." He turned away, a smirk on his lips. Arthur's curiosity brought him to scurry to Alfred's other side.
"Oh, go on," he urged. He didn't like the game, but Alfred loved it.
"All right, I'll tell you," Alfred said, stopping short and grinning, hands on his slender hips. Arthur almost allowed his eyes to follow, but resisted. He waited.
"Well?"
Alfred giggled. "You have to kiss me first."
"What?" Arthur sputtered indignantly. Alfred's smile widened. "That...that's hardly fair!"
"Oh, come on," Alfred whispered, stepping closer. Arthur suppressed a shudder at the purr in his voice. "It almost sounds like you don't want to kiss me."
"I want to kiss you," Arthur mumbled, arms folded, eyes on the ground.
"So? What's stopping you?"
In the next instant, Arthur's arms were thrown around Alfred's neck and Alfred had to take a step back to keep from falling over. Their lips were pressed together warmly, and Alfred had to fight back a smile. The clumsy movement of Arthur's mouth against his own prompted Alfred to help.
When they separated for air, Arthur's face was pink, and Alfred murmured, "That's more like it."
You Know My Name Part 7
anonymous
November 4 2010, 21:26:16 UTC
Arthur sat in his livingroom floor, eyes trained on the television screen. It was seven thirty--there was not usually a news program on at that time--but due to the rapidly falling population...
"--no obvious connection between any of the murders." Except that they had been happening nearly every day in the same once murderless town for a month. "No pattern suggesting that the killer is the same person..." Except that no one who had grown up in the town had ever seriously considered taking someone's life. "No evidence pointing officials to the person or people responsible."
Arthur chewed his lip.
When they had parted earlier, Alfred had been laughing, just like always. One of his teeth had been chipped. His glasses were a bit crooked. There was a scar on the palm of his right hand.
Had they always been that way?
The man's soft, suggestive words floated back to him as he took a steadying sip of tea. "Maybe you could come over to my place tonight." Arthur had never been to Alfred's flat. "We could curl up on the couch, catch a movie..." It was what he hadn't said that had sent Arthur into a fumbling blush. "You could stay with me."
The grandfather clock at the back of the house chimed, and Arthur got to his feet. He would follow the map Alfred had drawn for him on a napkin from a restaurant. He would try not to collapse from nerves along the way. -)@(- It was comfortable.
Arthur wasn't sure why he thought it would be so different, but sitting with his head on Alfred's shoulder as they watched an animated film about penguins was very nice. Alfred was watching intently, eyes reflecting the blue-white colour of the ice and snow brilliantly, but his arm around Arthur's waist was reassuring; both men were aware of the other's presence, and that was enough. They didn't need to talk.
Nonetheless, Arthur found himself looking at Alfred more than at the dancing flightless birds. There was a shine on his glasses from the television, and his eyes looked a bit tired, but he was wide awake. His slightly chapped lips were pressed into a thin line. All of a sudden, Arthur wanted to kiss him.
"Alfred," he said softly, leaning to press his lips to Alfred's warm cheek. Alfed was on him in a flash, all interest in the movie gone as he caught Arthur's mouth with his own.
"I'm so glad you're here," Alfred was saying as the penguins chattered on in the background. Arthur's eyes flicked to them randomly, and he noted the irony of the courtship scene. Then he shut his eyes because Alfred was kissing his neck, and he'd never been kissed there before.
"Alfred," he gasped, voice trembling when he realized that Alfred wasn't stopping. They had yet to--that is, he didn't...
"Yeah?" Glasses askew, Alfred blinked at him, cueing into his anxiety. He kissed Arthur's forehead gently. "I'll be careful, okay?" Arthur watched him, trying to relax. "I won't hurt you, I promise."
Arthur liked Alfred. Arthur wanted to trust Alfred. But as Alfred was carrying him to bed, whispering about how pretty he looked, how he wanted to give him the world, everything, Arthur was scared. When Alfred laid him down and ran his fingers through his hair, Arthur shivered with pleasure and terror at the roughness of the skin and the strength of the arm. When Alfred took off his clothes and stroked his slender torso, murmuring that he should eat more, Arthur pictured the dismembered murder victims and silently begged that he wouldn't be next because Alfred wasn't a killer, and couldn't be a killer because he was much too much of a lover to ever hurt a soul.
Re: You Know My Name Part 7
anonymous
November 4 2010, 23:49:12 UTC
I love how even Arthur is aware that there may be dark clouds lurking under Alfred's sunny personality. The writing style seems almost...detached? (I don't know if that's the right word). As if Arthur is passively allowing himself to get sucked in by Alfred's charms, and is fits PERFECTLY. UGH the suspense is killing me, but I'm glad that you updated quickly. I love this fill!
Man, I'm soo late! Forgive me for the REALLY late reply! I read the first update at school on my iTouch but I don't like writing comments on it :/ Its sort of wonky when I try to..
Anyways back to the topic~ I love how you added the dark atmosphere and settings without making it too obvious. And I noticed you got bonus#2 already down! :D
I really love where this is going, because how I see it its just getting darker and darker.. Like a tunnel!
You Know My Name Part 8
anonymous
November 10 2010, 20:26:02 UTC
Arthur woke feeling warm and safe, more so than he could recall feeling since he was a child. He needed to stretch, and upon trying to do so, discovered that he couldn't move.
His momentary panic faded when he lifted his heavy eyelids to find Alfred curled protectively around him, sound asleep. He couldn't help the small smile that spread across his face, or the appreciative noise that left his throat as he allowed his eyes a moment to wander. He had known, of course, that Alfred had a body like one of those statues that could be seen in ancient art museums, but imagining the lay of tan skin over rippling muscles could not quite compare to actually seeing it.
It was early, and the sun had not yet risen high enough to be blocked by the constant cloudcover. A thin ray of light was peeking through the tattered curtains of the single window, and it played off Alfred's features handsomely. His dark eyelashes cast long shadows over high cheekbones, and his mouth, with lips nervewrackingly rough from neglect, hung slightly open. Arthur resisted the urge to touch them in any way, lest he wake the man and be unable to continue watching him.
Pressed as he was to the broad chest, Arthur could feel each deep, slumbering breath, and it made him sleepy. He stayed awake, however, to bask in the pleasant heat of Alfred's bed, which barely held the two of them, and the semi-silence of dawn in a half-empty flat.
One of Alfred's slightly sunbrowned arms was around Arthur's waist, the other resting about his shoulders. Their legs were entangled beneath the sheets, a scintillating reminder of the last activity of the previous night. Some feet away, in the next room, the television was buzzing irritably. Alfred's breath was warm against Arthur's neck, warm and smelling of coffee and cigarettes.
You Know My Name Part 9
anonymous
November 10 2010, 20:48:43 UTC
At least, he had never smoked in Arthur's presence, and he had never smelled like cigarettes before. Arthur tried to remember what had happened after...after their movements had stilled and they lay trembling with lust sated and meaningless words dying on their lips. He tensed as a shiver went through the languid form beside him.
Leaving their previous target, who was beginning to stir, Arthur's eyes danced about the fairly plain walls of the room. It was where Alfred lived, where he slept, where he stayed when he wasn't following Arthur like the proverbial lost puppy he sometimes seemed to be. Arthur wondered why it did not better match his personality.
The ceiling, walls, and floor were the same unpainted, unbroken khaki. There was a smudge under the window that had probably been there since the building's construction, and the curtains were faded and torn. There were no sports posters, no pin-ups of the scantily-clad models one might expect to see in the bedroom of a college-age fellow. Around the bed, there were piles of clothes and an open book or two, but everywhere else, it was neat and tidy, not a hair out of place. Even the couch, upon which they had cuddled, eaten, and briefly wrestled the night before, seemed oddly unruffled.
There was not a pack of cigarettes in sight.
Alfred's glasses, on the nightstand next to the lamp that didn't work, caught the sunlight and made Arthur bury his head in Alfred's shoulder to avoid going blind.
The air tingled with something a little heart-stopping, before the tension broke around lips smiling against his hair.
"Hi," Alfred murmured, voice heavy with sleep and satisfaction. Arthur shuddered with anxious pleasure, and hesitantly looked up into Alfred's gentle face. The blue eyes were bleary and unfocused, pupils wide, but they looked straight at him.
During those weeks, Arthur found himself for once content in the arms of another. He had had a girlfriend or two, had held them and kissed them, but somehow being wrapped in the warm embrace of the taller man, he felt the warmth of the sun on his pale skin, though the skies were as dark as ever.
They only went so far as kissing, and not very often; Arthur was still unsure, and Alfred was patient. Arthur had never much cared for kissing, but he liked to kiss Alfred, sometimes, just a little, because Alfred was soft, and warm, and Alfred.
Oh, Alfred.
He smiled all the time, and at everyone around or no one in particular. His gentle, friendly ways with other people warmed Arthur, as well, and he wondered why he didn't feel jealous when Alfred received other, possibly more tantalizing offers.
"I like you," Alfred told him all the time, out of the blue, because he could and because he had thought about it.
"I like you, too," Arthur would respond, and Alfred would grin, and Arthur would feel stupid but they would end up laughing anyway. Alfred liked to walk Arthur home whenever he could (and he usually could. Sometimes, Arthur wondered whether the bespectacled fellow did anything other than reorganize his schedule to follow Arthur all day. Of course, no one could possibly want to spend all day every day with him...least of all the bright, beautiful not-so-long-ago stranger who could do so much better.)
Alfred liked to come up behind Arthur, pull him close, and press his face into the messy blond hair. Arthur almost always objected--"Don't startle me like that; you know I hate it!"--but Alfred never seemed to care, and secretly Arthur was glad. He liked to have someone who could grab him and steal him, but wouldn't. He liked to have Alfred's strong arms securing him close; he liked to have Alfred's warmth against his back; he liked to have Alfred clinging to him as though he were the only thing in the world that mattered.
He felt selfish.
"Why do you like me?" he asked once, when they were sitting with the toes of their shoes brushing beneath a table.
Alfred had looked at him with such astonishment, as though he could not believe he was being asked such a thing. Arthur regretted bringing it up until Alfred looked away and laughed easily.
"Because you're you."
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I love the start. Managed to make Alfred seem slightly off, but not totally obvious :D I really really hope you continue!
I'm just gonna leave this here...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwicLgOGJOI
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Thank you for that lovely bit of brainfodder, by the way. I love it.
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Arthur didn't ask why Alfred liked him after that, though the question remained, nagging at the back of his mind whenever he had a moment to consider it. He had never exchanged but a few words with the man before that night on his doorstep; he was antisocial, the utter opposite of Alfred's bubbly grandeur; and he was average-looking at best, with no muscles, boring hair he couldn't control, and ridiculous eyebrows. His eyes, a bright green, were the only thing that stood out positively about him, he thought.
Alfred, on the other hand, was handsome and charming. His hair was as bright as his personality; his eyes an impossible, sparkling blue. He was tall and lean, with just the right amount of softness at his belly. (Arthur had noted its presence when they were hugging once. He had smiled for some reason.)
Alfred was the light that had escaped the little town for so long. He could talk to anyone with such ease; he brightened the day of the most displeased residents. He thrived where people crowded about to be noisy and obnoxious, just the sort of place Arthur avoided like the plague. But Alfred would follow Arthur anywhere.
Yes, Alfred seemed comfortable anywhere. He was happy on boats, with the salty spray of the sea fogging his glasses and mussing his hair. He was happy in planes high above the earth that filled Arthur with fear and dread. He was content in shiny cars, puffing motorcycles, and atop his own two feet, which made up the perfectly-fitted ends of two long, strong legs.
He was happy standing in the rain while he waited for Arthur to finish with work. He was glad when Arthur invited him inside to dry off and watch a some late-night television. He was ecstatic when Arthur insisted he stay the night, and only mildly disappointed when the shorter man put a pillow and blanket on the couch.
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Arthur shuddered at the blurry black and white photographs as he read the articles at his desk. Normally, he read the paper for something to do, something on which to focus his eyes as he allowed his mind to wander. But the headlines were printed in bold ink, demanding the attention of the mostly young men and women in his building. If he were to peer about, he would see his coworkers anxiously scanning the very same page, some of them gathered around the desks of friends.
It wasn't as though they had never had problems with crime before, but it was a small, sleepy town where everyone knew very nearly everyone else, and most people kept quietly to their own business. That business rarely involved anything more heinous than drinking and trying to drive home, however, so multiple cases of what was apparently murder brought about an uncharacteristic hush wherever one went.
Arthur tried to think of similar headlines, and drew a blank.
Almost two years prior, there had been a shooting behind one of the nightclubs, but no one had succumbed to injuries, and it was settled between the families the following week. When Arthur was a child, there had been something of a drug scandal, but he had been too young and disinterested to pay much attention. The troublemakers who eventually saw their names on headlines and their faces in mugshots were almost exclusively from out of town.
Arthur's fingers clenched around the newspaper. He took a deep breath, cracked a self-depreciative grin, and tried to return the newspaper to the pattern after which it had been folded when he picked it up.
He was just being silly.
Serial killers didn't just roll into town with eyes sparkling and smiles flashing, strong bodies strung taut like bowstrings, playful and friendly and handsome to look at until you set them off and they cut you in half.
At least, he hoped they didn't.
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Arthur hadn't mentioned the killings to Alfred, nor had Alfred brought them up. It didn't seem as though the man realized that anything was at all out of the ordinary. Arthur had decided that he didn't read the paper or watch the news. It just sounded like him.
"Since we've been together for a while now, we should celebrate."
Arthur raised his eyes to Alfred's face. The taller man was looking at him with the same gentle, warming affection as always. He found his heart in his throat.
"What did you have in mind?"
"Well, I dunno." He turned away, a smirk on his lips. Arthur's curiosity brought him to scurry to Alfred's other side.
"Oh, go on," he urged. He didn't like the game, but Alfred loved it.
"All right, I'll tell you," Alfred said, stopping short and grinning, hands on his slender hips. Arthur almost allowed his eyes to follow, but resisted. He waited.
"Well?"
Alfred giggled. "You have to kiss me first."
"What?" Arthur sputtered indignantly. Alfred's smile widened. "That...that's hardly fair!"
"Oh, come on," Alfred whispered, stepping closer. Arthur suppressed a shudder at the purr in his voice. "It almost sounds like you don't want to kiss me."
"I want to kiss you," Arthur mumbled, arms folded, eyes on the ground.
"So? What's stopping you?"
In the next instant, Arthur's arms were thrown around Alfred's neck and Alfred had to take a step back to keep from falling over. Their lips were pressed together warmly, and Alfred had to fight back a smile. The clumsy movement of Arthur's mouth against his own prompted Alfred to help.
When they separated for air, Arthur's face was pink, and Alfred murmured, "That's more like it."
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"--no obvious connection between any of the murders." Except that they had been happening nearly every day in the same once murderless town for a month. "No pattern suggesting that the killer is the same person..." Except that no one who had grown up in the town had ever seriously considered taking someone's life. "No evidence pointing officials to the person or people responsible."
Arthur chewed his lip.
When they had parted earlier, Alfred had been laughing, just like always. One of his teeth had been chipped. His glasses were a bit crooked. There was a scar on the palm of his right hand.
Had they always been that way?
The man's soft, suggestive words floated back to him as he took a steadying sip of tea. "Maybe you could come over to my place tonight." Arthur had never been to Alfred's flat. "We could curl up on the couch, catch a movie..." It was what he hadn't said that had sent Arthur into a fumbling blush. "You could stay with me."
The grandfather clock at the back of the house chimed, and Arthur got to his feet. He would follow the map Alfred had drawn for him on a napkin from a restaurant. He would try not to collapse from nerves along the way.
-)@(-
It was comfortable.
Arthur wasn't sure why he thought it would be so different, but sitting with his head on Alfred's shoulder as they watched an animated film about penguins was very nice. Alfred was watching intently, eyes reflecting the blue-white colour of the ice and snow brilliantly, but his arm around Arthur's waist was reassuring; both men were aware of the other's presence, and that was enough. They didn't need to talk.
Nonetheless, Arthur found himself looking at Alfred more than at the dancing flightless birds. There was a shine on his glasses from the television, and his eyes looked a bit tired, but he was wide awake. His slightly chapped lips were pressed into a thin line. All of a sudden, Arthur wanted to kiss him.
"Alfred," he said softly, leaning to press his lips to Alfred's warm cheek. Alfed was on him in a flash, all interest in the movie gone as he caught Arthur's mouth with his own.
"I'm so glad you're here," Alfred was saying as the penguins chattered on in the background. Arthur's eyes flicked to them randomly, and he noted the irony of the courtship scene. Then he shut his eyes because Alfred was kissing his neck, and he'd never been kissed there before.
"Alfred," he gasped, voice trembling when he realized that Alfred wasn't stopping. They had yet to--that is, he didn't...
"Yeah?" Glasses askew, Alfred blinked at him, cueing into his anxiety. He kissed Arthur's forehead gently. "I'll be careful, okay?" Arthur watched him, trying to relax. "I won't hurt you, I promise."
Arthur liked Alfred. Arthur wanted to trust Alfred. But as Alfred was carrying him to bed, whispering about how pretty he looked, how he wanted to give him the world, everything, Arthur was scared. When Alfred laid him down and ran his fingers through his hair, Arthur shivered with pleasure and terror at the roughness of the skin and the strength of the arm. When Alfred took off his clothes and stroked his slender torso, murmuring that he should eat more, Arthur pictured the dismembered murder victims and silently begged that he wouldn't be next because Alfred wasn't a killer, and couldn't be a killer because he was much too much of a lover to ever hurt a soul.
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Anyways back to the topic~ I love how you added the dark atmosphere and settings without making it too obvious. And I noticed you got bonus#2 already down! :D
I really love where this is going, because how I see it its just getting darker and darker.. Like a tunnel!
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Yes, Bonus 2 had been on my mind since I started to write this. I'm glad you're enjoying it, and I hope I can continue to please!
(Gotta be careful of those dark tunnels. Of course, nobody ever turns around once they get inside and realize they forgot to bring a light...)
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His momentary panic faded when he lifted his heavy eyelids to find Alfred curled protectively around him, sound asleep. He couldn't help the small smile that spread across his face, or the appreciative noise that left his throat as he allowed his eyes a moment to wander. He had known, of course, that Alfred had a body like one of those statues that could be seen in ancient art museums, but imagining the lay of tan skin over rippling muscles could not quite compare to actually seeing it.
It was early, and the sun had not yet risen high enough to be blocked by the constant cloudcover. A thin ray of light was peeking through the tattered curtains of the single window, and it played off Alfred's features handsomely. His dark eyelashes cast long shadows over high cheekbones, and his mouth, with lips nervewrackingly rough from neglect, hung slightly open. Arthur resisted the urge to touch them in any way, lest he wake the man and be unable to continue watching him.
Pressed as he was to the broad chest, Arthur could feel each deep, slumbering breath, and it made him sleepy. He stayed awake, however, to bask in the pleasant heat of Alfred's bed, which barely held the two of them, and the semi-silence of dawn in a half-empty flat.
One of Alfred's slightly sunbrowned arms was around Arthur's waist, the other resting about his shoulders. Their legs were entangled beneath the sheets, a scintillating reminder of the last activity of the previous night. Some feet away, in the next room, the television was buzzing irritably. Alfred's breath was warm against Arthur's neck, warm and smelling of coffee and cigarettes.
Alfred didn't smoke.
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Leaving their previous target, who was beginning to stir, Arthur's eyes danced about the fairly plain walls of the room. It was where Alfred lived, where he slept, where he stayed when he wasn't following Arthur like the proverbial lost puppy he sometimes seemed to be. Arthur wondered why it did not better match his personality.
The ceiling, walls, and floor were the same unpainted, unbroken khaki. There was a smudge under the window that had probably been there since the building's construction, and the curtains were faded and torn. There were no sports posters, no pin-ups of the scantily-clad models one might expect to see in the bedroom of a college-age fellow. Around the bed, there were piles of clothes and an open book or two, but everywhere else, it was neat and tidy, not a hair out of place. Even the couch, upon which they had cuddled, eaten, and briefly wrestled the night before, seemed oddly unruffled.
There was not a pack of cigarettes in sight.
Alfred's glasses, on the nightstand next to the lamp that didn't work, caught the sunlight and made Arthur bury his head in Alfred's shoulder to avoid going blind.
The air tingled with something a little heart-stopping, before the tension broke around lips smiling against his hair.
"Hi," Alfred murmured, voice heavy with sleep and satisfaction. Arthur shuddered with anxious pleasure, and hesitantly looked up into Alfred's gentle face. The blue eyes were bleary and unfocused, pupils wide, but they looked straight at him.
"Good morning."
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BUT WOW! I'M JEALOUS OF ARTHUR, the way you had him described Alfred's seriously handsome features, boy I wanted to melllttt..
I wonder though when you mentioned his breath smelling like cigarettes, I imagined his serial killer side to be a southern gent. But that's just me :D
Another amazing piece Author!Anon~ I'm looking forward to the next update!
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