Page 29 of In Frame
“Sure…”
“What’s your favorite subject? For photographs. I don’t mean for the job. We’ll continue avoiding that elephant for now. I mean what you like. Your family, those pictures, even the casual ones—you capture such life in them.” Leo regarded him over toast-crumbs and an empty glass. “I thought it felt like love. Not only for your siblings.”
Sam had just picked up the end of the toast as a distraction, and nearly dropped it.
He’d never been asked that before. Not by anyone. Not ever. Before he’d left college he’d had conversations about favorite styles, techniques, specific locations, color or lack of color. The choices of artistic subject had sometimes been assignments, and sometimes just taken for granted: he’d picked what he found interesting, self-evidently. And after…in his job, this job…
Leo had asked. Leo wanted to know.
He said, “People,” and heard the roughness in his voice. “Not necessarily close-ups or anything posed. From a distance, even. In motion. On streets. Farmers’ markets. Concerts. Shopping. Just…being people.”
Leo nodded, taking this in, taking it seriously. “I can see that. The way you see the world. Stories in the ordinary.”
“You’re not ordinary,” Sam said, and their eyes met. Thechampagne sparkled. The toast-crumbs cheered.
They ran back to Leo’s bed hand in hand. They lost clothing and fell into sheets, and Sam tried to kiss Leo from head to toes, every inch of pale English skin, every word he didn’t know how to say. Leo laughed and kissed back and wanted to know more, to discover everything, to get hands and mouths everyplace. Their robes met in a single discarded heap, cheerfully mingled.
Sam refused to let Leo be overly sore and also genuinely wanted Leo to try everything, so they ended up with Leo on top, long lovely cock sinking into Sam’s body as Sam’s fingers teased those pink nipples some more, with the hint of roughness that’d worked so well. They both caught breath simultaneously, rocking together.
They came that way, together, too.
Leo, having come three times and trembling all over in the aftermath of this one—Sam had maybe gotten a bittoorough, he concluded guiltily; Leo hadn’t said to stop, but his nipples were visibly reddened and he’d been shaky and wanting to be held, after—got a little unfocused, sex-hazy, soft and pliable and quieter than before. Sam helped steady him in the bathroom, where Leo’s extravagant shower and tub took up an ocean’s worth of space, and figured out hot and cold taps.
He opted for the shower because it’d be quicker—they’d barely get much sleep as it was—but he kept stealing glances at the tub. He wanted to set Leo into it, surrounded by steaming water and cared for by his hands.
He wanted to let the heat soothe Leo’s soreness, and maybe to get in with him, or just sit on the side and wash that stylish blond hair and maybe tease that delectable cock a time or two.
He wanted more time. He wantedmore.
Leo was tactile, cuddly, wanting to be touched and totouch, under shower-spray. Sam washed his back and cleaned him up. Felt the pang in his chest, beneath his breastbone, as if a drop of too-hot water had slipped into his heart and scalded it.
He wouldn’t mind the scalding. He’d carry this night with him in every form. Every scar.
Back in bed, Leo promptly curled up into Sam’s arms. Sam thought he might be falling asleep, and was prepared to hold him and keep him warm for whatever hours they had left.
Sleep wasn’t important. Holding Leo was.
Leo, who was not asleep, observed, “I’m very tired. But that was…phenomenal.”
“It was.” You are, he thought. “Still okay? Not hurting anywhere?” His own body ached a bit, deliciously so; it’d been a while. He liked the feeling.
“Not hurting.” Leo yawned into his shoulder. “Sensitive, I think…everything’s good but sort of laid bare round the edges. As if I’ve been turned inside out. All the nerves on the outside.”
“That…doesn’t sound comfortable.”
“It’s wonderful, in fact. Twinkling. Tingling. Is this normal for you? So much in one night?”
Sam had to laugh. “No.” Nothing about this night was normal. The opposite. The shining reverent reverse of normal.
“Good, then. I do like to be memorable.”
“You are.” He stroked Leo’s hair. “You are. Go to sleep.”
“Mmm. Tell me something else. Something about you.”
“Anything in particular you want to know?”
“No. Just something. Where you grew up. How old you are. Nothing big. I only realized I don’t even know that.” One of Leo’s eyes opened enough to peek up at him. “Nothing you don’t want to say. I just…like knowing things.”
