by Hurt
270
Vanka looked up, and said, her voice soft as usual, but edged with a tone she'd never used with him before—a tone he'd heard her use with David, with Sasha—“Galen, this is how I work. I'm in the middle of something, and if I walk away from it now, I'll lose the thread. So, I'm going to finish what I'm doing. Then I'll take a break.”
“All right,” Galen relented, just as Sasha and David had.
“These things are not like adding up a column of numbers,” Khalid said to him in the kitchen, stroking his arm. “With writing, with what Vanka is doing, we cannot just make a mark by our place in the column, and later pick up where we left off. If the thing is coming, we have to let it come. Later, it may not be willing.”
“She's supposed to be taking it easy. Taking care of herself. Did you see her eyes?”
“Galen.” Khalid reigned him in with a deep look from his luminous eyes. “I know this is something you understand, from your work. There's a need to seek, to find the thing which will be the perfect reflection of our talents, of our beliefs, of our heart. That is what Vanka is trying to do, right now. And the fear that we have, that possibly we will never create that one perfect thing during our life, today that fear is very close to Vanka.”
Galen sighed. “Yeah.”
“Hey,” Vanka called over without looking up from her laptop, “you two gonna get in the hot tub? Or are you just going to hang out in the kitchen talking about me?”
“Eh. I think I'm more in the mood to read, anyway,” Galen said, picking up a magazine and lying down on the couch opposite Vanka, not even realizing until he was settled that he'd grabbed one of Khalid's French rags.
271
* * * *
“Vanka.” When she turned Khalid was standing in the doorway, watching her pack. He moved so quietly, if she wasn't looking right at him, most of the time she had no idea where he was. “What are you doing?”
“I'm going home, Khalid.”
“Is this not your home, Vanka?”
“No. It's a lovely place to visit, but it's not my home.”
Khalid sat down on the bed, beside the bag she was filling with tanks and socks and panties, each pair of boyshorts, every thong traveling single, its matching bra stuffed away in the top drawer of her dresser, awaiting the day she decided once and for all she wouldn't be stuffing, and she'd drop them one by one into a sack and drop them off at Good Will.
“Why is this not your home, Vanka?”
“I just need my own space, my own place. You and Galen are the best roommates and the best nurses ever, but I can't be around other people twenty-four-seven.”
“So we've hovered too closely?” he gazed up at her, smiling. “We just wanted to look after you while you've been sick. After the chemo.”
“I know. And you weren't hovering. I just want to be home. In my place with my things, by myself for a couple days.”
“Please sit down with me for a minute, Vanka.”
His eyes worked like fetters, pulling her down beside him.
272
“You seem to me today a little bit as you seemed to me that day Galen left for Chile. But you and I know each other much better now than we did, then. You tell me you are doing something because it is what you want. But as you smile at me, you look sad. Now I think I know you well enough to understand. Again, you are pulling away from your own happiness because you are afraid of being trouble for us.”
“Khalid—“
“Please, Vanka. There is enough pretending in my life already. You cannot be kind to me by lying to me.”
She bit back her retort, her denial. “You and Galen. I'm always between you.
You're never alone with each other, because one or the other of you is always taking care of me. When you are both in the same room, I'm there. Literally between you, half the time. So I know—“
Khalid calmly gazed at her, waiting for her to say it.
“So, I know that you haven't touched each other, not in weeks. Not since I started staying here. Have you?”
“No.”
“I won't stay, Khalid. It's bad enough that I—.” She took a breath. “You and Galen, you have a complicated relationship. It doesn't work with me here. So I'm going.”
“Wait, Vanka.” She started to stand, but Khalid put a hand on her thigh. “This is not some big emergency. This is only a hard time. Galen and I, our relationship is complicated, as you say. But in our way, we have been together a long time, and through some problems more difficult than this, for our . . . friendship.
273
“When you finish chemo, you will be stronger. Galen and I, we both want to help you through it. You being here, it is not some idea of Galen's that I only tolerate. I want you here. I will be unhappy if you go.”
“Khalid, can't you understand what it feels like, knowing it's because of me you can never kiss him, never touch his skin? I hate it, Khalid. I lay awake at night hating it.”
Khalid was quiet beside her for a long time, his arm draped lightly around her shoulders. Finally, he leaned in, kissed her temple, tipped his brow to her crown.
“Yes, Vanka.”
“It'll be fine, Khalid,” she breathed, relieved not to have to argue any more for something so hard to do, already. “I'll still come over and get in your way a few days a week, and—“
“No, Vanka. You stay here. With us. And I will make sure you being here doesn't stop me from touching him. I promise.”
“Maybe. For a few more days. We'll see how it goes.”
She took a breath, realizing the weight of the sadness, the loss of leaving them only now, as it lifted. Khalid's gentle smile, his quiet gaze had their strange effect, making her feel cradled. Warm. Loved. Safe. And then another feeling crept over her, a wanting pull through her gut, a delicious sort of tingle, like an alcohol buzz.
“Khalid?”
“Yes?”
“Would you consider doing something? For me?”
* * * *
“Welcome home, Galen.”
274
Galen finished bolting the door, his heart already thumping hard. He turned. A few feet off, Khalid stood, only faintly lit by the few dim lamps in the large living room.
“Where's Vanka?” Galen asked, amused at how Khalid's ambush had him nervous, how his voice wavered with it.
“She's fine, Galen. Soon you can see her. But not yet.”
It had been too long. Now, just the thought that Khalid would take him had Galen's breath speeding. Had that swelling ache hitting his groin. Had that adrenaline pumping. Had him wondering what the game would be. Khalid wasn't coming at him.
“Come here, to me,” Khalid said softly.
Galen went. He could, because they both knew they had to be quiet, that if he made Khalid come after him, they might make noise. Now he noticed, Khalid was only in his robe. The thought of Khalid's naked body under that robe drove a thrill through Galen's gut.
“So compliant tonight,” Khalid mused, grinning. “Because you want this to go quietly. So Vanka won't hear. Is that it?”
“Yes.”
“Tonight, Galen, we do not need to be quiet.”
“Why not?” Galen heard his voice come out a frightened whisper. But if she'd left, Khalid wouldn't be playing these games.
“Because. Tonight, Vanka is going to watch us.”
“No.” It had been a long time since he'd meant it when he said that to him, but he fucking meant it now. “No, Khalid,” he said, this time with the full force of his fear.
“Yes, Galen.”
275
Quick, quiet, Khalid caught his wrist. Heart hammering, Galen jerked free and balled his fist. Khalid came at him, Galen swung, but Khalid slipped to the side, and as Galen's fist punched through air, Khalid caught his arm, pulled Galen's whole body by and wrenched his arm up behind his back. The hint of a terrible pain tore through Galen's shoulder and he froze.
“Khalid. Please.”
Another twinge of warning pai
n forced Galen forward, then down onto his knees, bent over, propping himself up on his free hand until a push at the center of his back and one more twinge, like his arm coming out of the socket drove him right down to the floor, his cheek pressing into the coarse yarn of the shag rug.
A click, and light poured down on him. And her feet. Her pale, bare feet, toenails polished in black cherry. Khalid had done one foot, he'd done the other.
“What are you doing?” he whispered, lost, not sure who he was asking. Both of them.
Vanka's voice. “You got to watch Khalid fuck me. It only seems fair that I get to watch him fuck you.”
Unable to turn his head, Galen peered up at her from the corner of his eye.
Perched on the yellow armchair, pale legs crossed, back straight, head high, she gazed down on him like a queen contemplating a subject whose life belongs to her. But her voice had wavered.
“Vanka,” he pleaded, because he knew Khalid would never relent, unless he made the threat he was afraid of making, “please. Stop this.”
276
There was a long, awful quiet, her gazing down, his heart hammering, Khalid holding his wrist pinned to his back, an inch from real pain.
“'Whatever you want, Vanka.' That's what you said to me. You said it would excite you to do what I asked of you. This doesn't excite you?”
“No.”
“I promise you, Vanka, he is lying,” Khalid's voice came from behind him, rich and smooth. “Aren't you, Galen?”
Khalid folded his weight, his heat against him, his lips brushed the back of his neck, his breath played over the hairs and goose bumps that touch had raised.
“Tell Vanka the truth. Are you hard?”
Galen closed his eyes. He couldn't have said it, even if he'd wanted to. But a spark of pain through his shoulder forced a hissing “yes” through his clenched teeth.
“Yes,” Khalid sighed by his ear, “and so am I.”
Khalid's hand was at his buckle, got Galen's belt and fly undone, worked, side to side, got his pants down. Vanka handed something to Khalid. Then Khalid forced his legs wide with his knees and Galen felt a slick finger opening him, sliding up inside him.
Shaking. Gasping. That choking, falling apart feeling. Galen swallowed hard, breathed hard, deliberately. It would be awful to cry now. Khalid fucking him hadn't done that to him in so long. He hadn't been scared like this in so, so long.
Galen heard the faint rustle of the other's robe slipping to the floor, and then Khalid took him quick, hard. Galen gasped and clenched his fist as that hard cock drove into him, then fought to even his breathing as Khalid started fucking.
277
Khalid's heat, the press of his lithe body flexing and quivering over him. Khalid's panting, growling breath by his ear. Khalid's hard cock pumping into him. Vanka watching. It was like being pulled apart, torn in two.
Tormented by need, Galen panted through his fucking as quietly as he could as Khalid rode him harder, his ragged breath hissing through clenched teeth behind Galen's ear.
“Galen,” Khalid purred, I'm going to come soon. I want you to come with me.”
Resentful. Eager. Hard and, fuck, god, ready to go off.
Khalid's weight shifted against his back, against his pinned arm, and his soft warm touch brushed against his cock, so swollen, so hard that slight touch made him startle and gasp.
“I love the feel of your cock in my hand, lover, while I fuck you. So warm. So hard,” Khalid whispered, revving up with a slow, rhythmic pumping, clinging to him so he felt his trembling, mouthing his neck, his ear, driving shuddering shivers down his back, down the backs of his arms, sending a surge of electricity all through his body.
Even though he was afraid, he couldn't help looking. Vanka's stoic expression had softened. Her lips parted, her chest pumping quick shallow breaths.
“How bad is your need, Galen?” Khalid's hand moved slowly, so slowly Galen struggled to thrust into it, aching for more than the languorous caress. “I think your want is so much, Galen, that you will come for me, just like this. Me barely touching you.”
Huffing and pumping, Khalid rode for his climax, Galen choking back whimpers of need, desperate to come, almost ready to beg, but there it was, every cruel, faint rub of Khalid's touch spiking that prescient thrill, and then he was gasping, his balls clenching, 278
a violent climax hurtling through him, Khalid's desperate groan muffled against his shoulder as Khalid bucked, frenzied, then clutched him, shuddered, then went still.
A kind of terror seized him. Khalid's cock slipped out of him, and his arm fell to his side, freed of Khalid's grip, but numb. Shaking, he got his pants zipped and got up.
Unsteady, he walked to the bathroom without once looking at either of them.
* * * *
Over the sound of the water humming in the pipes, the dull thrum of it against the back of his head and the staccato rap of it on the floor of the tub, Galen heard Khalid's knock—the pattern instantly familiar—at the bathroom door. He knew he didn't have to say anything, and a moment later the door opened, Khalid stepped in, and closed the door behind him. He was still naked. The sight of that naked body, the long cock hanging thick and heavy, spent but still flushed and full, shocked Galen, as it always had, confronting him with such visceral proof that he'd just been fucked by a man.
Khalid came to the edge of the tub, gazed at Galen from a few inches away.
"I think it would be better for me to go."
They stared at each other. Galen could feel that he was shaking. Why was it so fucking hard? He opened his mouth. Willed words to come. They wouldn't. He couldn't say what he meant to say.
But as he stood there, looking at Khalid, whom he'd known for so long, for years now, he saw him as he'd never seen him in the moments after. As he'd only seen him in the terrible longing that came before. And as he saw the friend he could admit he loved when days or weeks had lapsed between fucking. Beautiful. More beautiful than most women. A beauty that lay, really, in a quiet grace that suffused all Khalid's movements, 279
his words, his presence. But Galen saw his beauty magnified, lit from inside, by a tender feeling made even more tender by its perpetual suppression.
Galen smiled.
When Khalid saw that smile, he smiled too, but he looked like he might cry.
Galen put out his hand.
"Don't go."
When Khalid took his hand, Galen drew him in, into the shower, to his body.
Then Galen did something he'd never done before: he caressed Khalid's face, and kissed his lips.
"I'm sorry, Khalid. I'm sorry. I don't know why you've put up with me all these years."
"Because I love you, Galen."
Galen saw the fear in Khalid's eyes. Galen had never responded kindly to that phrase.
"I know, Khalid."
He stroked his thick black hair, dampening in the steam of the shower.
"I love you too. I think you knew, but I'm sorry I've made you wait so long to hear it."
"Yes, I knew. But it is good to hear, Galen. Very good to hear."
"I don't want to hurt you, Khalid. Especially . . . now. But I don't want any misunderstanding . . ."
"It is fine, Galen. I know. But say it."
"I love Vanka."
280
Khalid laughed. Something he did about as often as Mr. Spock, though he was placidly playful almost all the time.
"What?"
"Where is the sense, Galen, in telling Vanka that you love me, and telling me that you love Vanka?"
"I don't know."
"Well, I trust you won't make her wait three years to hear it."
"No."
"I'm glad. I think she's good for you. Good for us, even, though it's ironic."
When they'd finished showering, Khalid went for a run and Galen went to find Vanka, a little disappointed at not discovering her in his room, and hurt, almost alarmed, to find her already settled in the guest room. She'd left the door open
and gave Galen a welcoming smile when he entered.
* * * *
“Don't be mad at Khalid.”
“Why not?” His voice was so cool, so flat, it scared her.
“He only did it so I would stay.”
“You were going to leave?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because. I don't like being in the way.”
“In the way of me and Khalid?”
“Yes.”
281
"Well. Do you feel safer now?" Galen asked in a low voice.
She was trying to decide what that expression was. Anger?
"Safer?"
"Having Khalid fuck me—like that—in front of you. Do you feel safer, now that you've neutralized the threat?"
"What threat?"
"The threat of you ever having to fuck me again."
He was confusing her, and she was about to stutter out some defensive explanation or try to clarify what the fuck he was talking about, but his aggressive tone, the way he was looking at her pissed her off.
"Yes," she said coldly, "much."
"You didn't have to turn me into a fag, you know, to get me off your back. All you had to do was tell me you wanted to be left alone."
Holy fuck. Now he looked, sounded like he was going to cry.
"Galen . . ."
"You don't get off that easy, Vanka. I love Khalid. I've loved him for a long time."
Galen moved in on her so quickly, and with a look of such violent torment she flinched and drew back instinctively, as if he were taking a swing at her. He sunk his fingers into her hair, closed his fingers into fists, holding her captive as he brought his face close to hers.
"But you don't get to pretend that changes how I feel about you."
"Galen, that's not what I thought. It didn't even occur to me that . . ."
"That what?"
282
Her brain was sifting through a hundred thoughts and memories, trying to grok Galen's ideas, seeing the disjunctures between his thoughts and hers.
"That you being with Khalid could change anything."
