Page 68 of On the Mountain

I nodded, though I wasn’t sure I liked it, but then when he smiled, my heart ran like crazy. “What?”

“You… I…have never been loved like this. I know my mom did, but I didn’t feel it daily. Not the way I do with you.”

Oh…oh. “Jesus, Crow. I’ll love you like this every day for the rest of your life.”

The corners of his mouth turned down, eyes softening in a way that almost looked sad. “You deserve more, but you’re mine, so I’ll keep you as long as you let me.”

Keep me. Maybe I shouldn’t. Maybe it was wrong or unhealthy, but I wanted to be kept by Crow. I always wanted to be his.

“Always.”

He nodded, and we got dressed. I sat on my stool while Crow brought me water and my pills, then cooked breakfast. When the bacon and eggs were done, he made one large plate, then took it and a glass of orange juice to the couch.

This was…different. Ever since we’d made my chair and stool, we always ate at the table or the bar. But I followed because I would follow him anywhere.

“Kneel for me, little lamb.” Crow signaled to the floor, his voice deeper than usual.

I shook as I knelt between his thighs the way I usually did when I kept his cock in my mouth. Crow used his fingers to break off a piece of bacon, and then…then he held it out for me.

“You fed me…now I will feed you.”

My stomach got light and fluttery, my chest so full, I worried it would rip apart. This wasn’t what I’d had in mind, but I wanted it, wanted this gentle care Crow offered so easily.

I opened my mouth, and he placed the bite of bacon inside.

Crow watched me chew with fire in his eyes, with possessiveness that maybe should have scared me but didn’t. When I finished, he scooped eggs onto the spoon, then fed those to me too.

“You like this,” he noted.

“I do.”

“Me too,” Crow added.

He fed me a bite of each again before taking one for himself, then back and forth until the food was gone. The entire time, there was a calmness in me, a peacefulness, no, a tranquility I’d never known but wanted to hold on to. My whole life, I’d felt this storm inside me—life with my mom, my own drug addiction. I’d never known what it was like to feel tranquil until him.

“Come,” Crow told me after rinsing the dishes.

We went to the hooks by the door where we kept the winter gear, bundled up and tugged on boots, then went outside. Like always, the frosty air felt like it bit across any bare skin as we made our way to the shop.

“The plants are doing well,” I told Crow after he unlocked the door and we slipped inside. “I made sure to take care of those too.”

“I know,” he said without looking at me. “I trust you.”

My breath hitched when I realized he was leading me to the back, toward the locked room where he would disappear for hours at a time. My stomach was in knots. This had to be something good. I knew that because I knew Crow, but so many times in my life, things had gone wrong, and this felt so big, I worried there was no way it would all work out.

Crow unlocked the door, then slowly stepped aside. My feet must have moved, only I didn’t realize it. One moment I was outside the room, the next I was inside, and…it was me. Right in front of me. A large canvas rested on an easel, with the most beautiful painting I had ever seen.

I was asleep in Crow’s bed, lying on my stomach, with my head to the side. My face was relaxed, as if I’d never seen a bad day in my life. Every freckle on my face seemed to match the exact spot where I saw them in the mirror every day.

My lips were slightly parted, and if I listened closely, I could swear I heard my breath—not from the real me standing there, but from the one Crow had created.

My back bowed beautifully, an indent above my ass, another freckle on my right cheek. The hairs on my legs looked soft, like I could reach out and feel them brush against my skin. I was…beautiful. I had never seen myself as a beautiful man. I knew there must be something attractive about me because men wanted to fuck me, but when I looked at myself through Crow’s eyes, I saw it, the beauty of me.

My eyes went from one painting to another and another. One of me laughing, one of me in snow gear. On the snowmobile. Me kneeling, but Crow not there with me. Another of me in the shower, the first night I stayed here; another curled on his couch with ice on my ankle. There had to be thirty paintings, all of me.

I kept going, studying them all, feeling the love Crow had poured into each and every piece of art.

“I’ve been…obsessed with you from the start,” Crow said as I knelt in front of the one of me from when I’d sprained my ankle.

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