Author's Notes: Thanks to SK, Estrella, and Pearl. I have no idea how I wrote anything before I had SK to save me from myself.

Story Notes: For MinervaCat, for her birthday, and also for the flashfiction Fraser Exploring His Sexual Boundaries Challenge. In gay hanky code, a hanky with black and white checks means (worn in the left back pocket) a safe sex top or (worn in the right back pocket) a safe sex bottom; the jerk was falsely advertising! That kind of thing can get a man a reputation pretty quickly, so I guess poor Eric should be careful. Maybe he just has a runny nose. Also, I realize that the spelling of Inusiq in dS fic is generally "Innusiq", but the traditional native spelling is Inusiq, so Inusiq it is.

I got this call at like one in the morning. It wasn't like I was asleep or anything, just laying around and eating cold pizza, drinking beer, thinking about sports or something, maybe cigarettes, maybe sex. Then my cell phone rings and I sit up straight, grab it, say, "Vecchio," real fast, real businesslike, because nobody calls me at one in the morning unless it's an emergency.

"You better get your Mountie, Vecchio," says the voice, and I shiver. I know it from somewhere. Real quick I run through everyone in my head -- my snitches, my enemies, Fraser's enemies. But this ain't that.

I say, "Oh yeah?" to stall for time. Is this a threat? Is this some kind of -- some kind of kidnapping? I wish for a tap on my phone and a wire trace; then my brain kicks in, and I pull the phone away from my ear to look at the caller ID.

"Yeah," says the voice, loud enough that I can hear it as I stare at the phone number for the CPD. "You know where he is?"

"No, I don't know where he is," I snap into the phone. "Who is this? Huey?"

"This is a concerned party. I think maybe your Mountie stumbled into someplace not knowing what it was, you know what I'm saying?" The voice pauses, clears his throat with a weird, sinus-y hork, and I know who it is -- it's Paulie Cimino out of Vice. Got his nose broken four times in a month, can't breathe for shit.

I relax back into the couch.

"I know what you're saying," I reply. "Where's he?"

"Mistress Alisa's." Another hork, another throat-clear. "It's on --"

"I know where it is," I say, and rub my eyes. "Okay, thanks a lot, man."

"Vecchio, people are gonna get the wrong idea if your Mountie keeps showing up there, you know what I'm saying? You gotta tell him to be careful."

Dial tone.

I owe Paulie a favor like nobody's business now, but that's okay.

What the fuck is Fraser doing at Mistress Alisa's?

**

I don't know the number for Mistress Alisa's off the top of my head -- I only ever called her the once. I look it up in the yellow pages; there she is under SEX. Of course. I dial the number, and the voice who answers is real polite and transfers me to Mistress Alisa herself without too much trouble, which I don't get until I hear Mistress Alisa say warmly, "Ray Kowalski! It's been years. How are you?"

Now I'm glad I don't got a tap on my phone. "Uh," I say, and clear my throat like Paulie, but without the horking. "This is actually Detective Ray Vecchio with the Chicago Police Department."

She says, "Vecchio? But the caller ID says --"

"Uh, yeah," I say. Caller ID? "This is Vecchio."

Then she giggles and says, "All right, Ray Vecchio. What can I do for you?"

Evry muscle I got relaxes. She's just the kind of person who can make everyone feel easy and comfortable. It's been almost five years already -- no, six, because it was right at the beginning -- but her voice, and her fast acceptance that I'm not Kowalski makes me remember how she made me feel, all good about myself, like I wasn't a total freak all the time.

"I think you, uh, you got a Mountie there?" And then I realize that of course he's not going to be wearing the uniform, so how would she know?

But she says, "Ah, yes. Tall and handsome, looks like he's not used to coming to places like this?"

"Yeah," I say. "How'd you know?"

She giggles again. I picture her in my mind, clear as day: older woman, long hair, silver streaks, leather pants. I picture her as she was the last time I saw her -- sweating a little, a riding crop in her hand, smiling smugly -- and shiver.

"I've spoken with him several times. Constable Benton Fraser of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and for reasons that do not need exploring at this point --"

"Juncture," I correct her, automatically.

"Juncture..." She repeats the word, then trails off. "He's mentioned you during quite a few interesting tales of his exploits here, although, of course, when he said his partner was one Ray Vecchio, I didn't realize his partner was... Ray Vecchio."

"Shit," I say, because what the fuck is Fraser thinking, going around to bondage clubs and talking about me, about us, and making it sound queer. Queerer than it is, anyway.

"He doesn't actually seem to be interested in my employees, or in anyone else here," she continues, as though I never interrupted, like she wasn't going to say something else. "He's yet to do anything but talk, and after several times of this type of behavior... well, he's making my people nervous."

I sigh. "You still in the same place?" I ask, and start to pull my sneakers on, change my mind. My boots, the steel toes, the ones from college that I never exactly got around to throwing away, are in my closet in the bedroom. I'll just grab those.

I remember exactly where she is, and exactly how to get there. It's not the sort of thing you forget -- it's not the sort of thing I forget, anyway.

"Yes," she replies. "Come around the back so you don't have to go through the front desk. I'll let you in in fifteen minutes."

"Make it twenty," I say. I live further away now.

"See you later, Vecchio."

I shut my phone and curse Fraser under my breath as I pull on my boots, pull them off, change into black jeans, and pull the boots on again. Then I grab my phone -- which, it's funny, until I called her, I hadn't thought about how I hadn't changed my number when I became Vecchio -- and my car keys and I am gone, flying south in the Goat.

**

Mistress Alisa looks exactly how I remember, right down to the leather pants. She smiles at me, and nobody who didn't know -- or notice the leather -- would think that such a pretty fucking lady would be all into whaling on people and shit. I wouldn't think that anyway, I only know because she did it to me.

She kisses me on the cheek, and she's even wearing the same perfume. A guy does not forget something like that. I kiss her back and grin when she raises an eyebrow.

"Vecchio?"

"I'm undercover," I say. "Don't ask."

"Don't worry, I wasn't going to." She turns and leads me into the back of her club, which is real well lit. The front isn't, except when she's teaching classes. But the back is accounting books and showers and rooms to clean equipment. We pass all that, and then we're in her office, which has a one-way mirror so she can watch what's going on in the club part. Lots of people dancing, lots of people having fun in the corners, one guy putting on a rope show in the middle. And at the bar is Fraser, I would know that posture anywhere.

He's drinking something with an umbrella, and talking to one of Mistress Alisa's professional girls, the ones who charge money to do what some of the other people in the club will do for free. Of course, I wouldn't want no one but a professional putting shit on my nipples and running an electric current through it.

And by that I think I mean that I don't want anyone doing that to me.

I watch Fraser for a minute and think about whether he'd be -- well, whether he. You know.

"I heard about you and Stella," says Mistress Alisa in my ear. I jump a little -- I kinda forgot she was there for a second. "A few years ago. I remembered because... you're memorable." I turn my head and look at her and she winks, then keeps going. "Some women just aren't comfortable with themselves or their partners. Stella... was never comfortable in her own skin."

"Stella's own skin is Versace," I reply, "and she's comfortable in that."

"I know," says Mistress Alisa, but she's smiling at me in a way I don't like, so I clear my throat and step away from her and the mirror.

"I should probably get Fraser," I say.

"Yes." She nods. "But maybe you'll bring him back some time."

"Oh, we're not -- uh, we ain't partners like that," I say, feeling like I'm in CCD again and Sister Bernadette is making me explain the Immaculate Conception.

I can tell she don't believe me, but she just says, "He needs to learn to let go sometimes."

"Fraser is not a submissive," I say.

"He's a bottom," she replies. She leans against her desk and crosses her long long legs. Man, I love women with legs like that. "What did I teach you? Bottom and submissive are not the same thing. He would enjoy'" She stops, then starts again. "Was I wrong about you?"

"No, but that's not the same thing. You got to know me. It took a long time." Three weeks of three sessions per week, I think -- I don't exactly remember. It seemed like a lot at the time, but then after a while it wasn't enough.

"Nah," she says. "I knew from the minute you walked in, trailing behind Stella. And I knew from the minute he walked in. Sometimes you can just... tell." She frowns. "He would be wonderful, with the right training. All that hardness."

"Fraser is not hard," I say, but now I got pictures in my head. I swallow hard. "Fraser is a softy. He likes babies and animals."

"Uh-huh," she says. "Let's go get your Mountie." The smile I get from her before she turns to leave the room makes me unsettled, shakes me up. I clench my jaw and follow her out.

**

"...and then my partner," Fraser is saying, and the woman he's talking to interrupts him and says, "Ray?" and Fraser says, "Correct, my partner Ray Vecchio --"

"Comes and saves you from yourself, Fraser," I say, and put my hand on his shoulder.

"Ah, Ray," says Fraser, and if he's embarrassed that I caught him at a bondage club, no one would ever guess it. Me, my ears would get red and I'd probably start to sweat. Fraser just smiles at me. "This is Mistress Pearl."

I bow my head at the mistress -- it's not a nod if the person you're nodding at understands you're bowing. She smiles knowingly at me, then slides off her bar stool.

"I will see you later, Benton," she says, and I can tell she means it as a command, but Fraser does not take orders from anyone, as she should realize if he's been telling stories about what we do together.

"Have a lovely evening," he replies.

"I'll leave you two alone," says Mistress Alisa, but she crooks her finger at the bartender before she leaves, and a cup is set in front of me, condensation sliding down the plastic. Whatever it is, I know it won't be alcoholic, but it will be cold. Perfect. I take a long sip before hopping onto the stool Mistress Pearl vacated. It's just water, but it tastes good.

"So," I say. "Whatcha doing here, Fraser?"

Fraser clears his throat. Now he looks a little embarrassed. "Ah, Ray," he says, then sips his drink. Pink umbrella.

"Ah, Fraser," I say. I don't wanna humiliate the guy, but he can't go around to all the sex clubs in Chicago and talk about me and him without getting us into trouble -- not to mention getting himself in trouble with the other guys, like he fits in so great already? -- and he's gotta know that, so either he feels real comfortable here, or he's trying to get my attention somehow, or he's trying to get into trouble. I don't think the RCMP has exiles worse than Chicago for a guy like Fraser, so maybe he's trying to get himself into enough trouble that they send him back to the Yukon Territories just to get him gone.

Maybe the next thing he'll do is denounce the Queen while wearing the uniform at a gay bar.

"Well, Ray," he finally says. "I have come to the conclusion, after much thought, that my boundaries need to be expanded."

Okay, not what I was expecting. "Your... boundaries. Need to be expanded."

"Yes." Fraser nods, and he's got that look in his eye, the one that says he's in charge, and I'm gonna jump off that roof whether I want to or not. "My research suggested that this was a very well respected establishment in which I could expand my boundaries without running into certain... well, certain problems that a man of my..." I wait for it. It comes, sure enough. "A man of my position." And what about my position? "After several visits here, Ray -- " And now, fuck, he's earnest, and if there is one thing I cannot stand, it's that sincere Mountie voice he puts on. I start to scowl. "-- I do understand why so many websites and magazines suggest this as a place for beginners to this... scene. And --"

"Okay," I say. "Explore your boundaries." I can't really criticize, right? "But could you do it without bringing my name into it?"

"Why?" Fraser frowns at me a little, and I frown back, take another long drink of the water. The ice bumps against my gums and hurts a little; I crunch down on a piece.

"Well, Fraser," I say around the crushed ice, "for one thing, the world don't need to know your life story before you get whipped. And for another thing, you keep telling people you're a Mountie and I'm your partner, and you're gonna give them the wrong idea."

"The wrong idea?" Fraser pauses for a minute and if I didn't know him better, I'd swear to God and Mary and everyone that he really didn't know what kind of ideas he was putting into people's heads with that "My partner, Ray Vecchio," shit. But Fraser's sense of humor isn't like everyone else's, and the dumb shit he thinks is funny can really piss me off sometimes.

"Don't fuck with me, Fraser," I say, and I'm trying to sound threatening, but surrounded by all this leather, and all the whips, I'm not sure I come off so tough.

"And why are you here, Ray?" says Fraser softly, ignoring my language and my warning. I glare at him. Like he doesn't know? Like I fucking hang out at bondage clubs in my spare time when I could be watching hockey and drinking beer?

"I'm here because someone called me and said you've been coming here and maybe you were confused -- and then Mistress Alisa tells me you been coming here for weeks now, and not doing anything but talking about how you first came to Chicago on the trail of the killers of your father!" I'm not mad, not really, just confused and annoyed and hitting the beginning of really too tired for this, and Fraser's stupid smile is just pissing me off. "You're making her people nervous. They think you're Vice or something." And you're making Vice nervous, you idiot.

"I didn't realize you were acquainted with Mistress Alisa," says Fraser, polite as can be.

"It is not like that," I reply, because it's not, not at all, once Stella and I -- I never came back. Maybe I thought about it, but I never came back. "The therapist said Stella and I had trust issues, and we should look into bondage as a way to learn to trust each other."

Fraser snorts. I roll my eyes.

"Clearly that worked well," he says.

"Clearly." I stare at my beer, take another sip. "Stella... she wasn't too happy with the way it all went, but Mistress Alisa and I hit it off right away."

"I imagine your ex-wife would have some... trouble... with being... dominated." Now Fraser looks like he's choking, and I'm the one grinning wickedly.

"Oh no," I say, and drink down the rest of the water in one go. I put it down on the bar, wipe my mouth with my hand, and slide down. "She had trouble dominating me."

Fraser looks surprised, and I am gonna savor that for a long fucking time, because catching Fraser off guard ain't something just anyone can do. I dig a buck out of my pocket and leave it on the bar, then take a step. Turn around.

"You coming?" I ask him. He reaches out his hand and pulls it back, and I realize he was grasping for his hat, which isn't there. Hah. Then he gets off his bar stool, leaves a Canadian coin for the bartender, says, "Thank you kindly, sir," and follows me.

**

On our way out, I point my middle finger at Mistress Alisa from across the room and she waves at me. I get the feeling she's making fun of me somehow.

"Come on," Fraser," I say to him. "I'll drive you back to the Consulate."

"No thank you, Ray," he replies. "I'd rather walk."

"No you wouldn't. It's gotta be at least two-thirty and we're --"

"Fine," he says, and gets into the Goat. I roll my eyes, pat the hood on my way around to the driver's seat.

Halfway there, he clears his throat, swipes a finger over his eyebrow, and says, "Ah, Ray. If I may..."

And me, I've been staring at the road, looking at him a little, and thinking about how he's trying to explore his boundaries. What the fuck does that even mean?

"You may, Fraser," I say.

"You and... Stella. You..."

"I," I say firmly. "Me."

"Yes," says Fraser.

"I liked knowing that I was doing exactly what she wanted for a change," I say. Cause I did. Having her tell me what to do was a real easy way to make sure I got it right. "But she wanted me to be a mind reader, wanted me to just know everything automatic. That was how we figured out what was wrong, you know. Well, she did."

I glance over at him as I turn, park the Goat in front of the Consulate.

"But you didn't want... despite the differences in your... you..."

"Not exactly. It wasn't like I wanted her to whale on me with a hairbrush or something." I drum my fingers on the steering wheel. "I just... uh. Liked changing it up sometimes."

"And Mistress Alisa..."

"You wanna finish a sentence here, Fraser?" I say, but not mean. I turn my body to face him. "Okay, Mistress Alisa was demonstrating to Stella how to hit, how to take control, how to tell that your partner is trusting you, and how to..." I pause, swallow. "I liked it a little too much, and it freaked Stella out. That was right at the beginning, when we thought we could work it all out. And we couldn't, it just got worse from there, Stella didn't want to have to tell me anything, she didn't want to have to take control of anything, and by then, Fraser, believe you me, I was tired of being the one who had to make all the decisions."

I stop and my fingers twitch for a cigarette. They do that sometimes, even though I gave 'em up even before me and Stella split. I guess I'm one of those people who learns real early and then the habits never leave. Like following Stella around -- I learned real early that I needed and wanted Stella in my life, so when I didn't have her anymore... I couldn't figure out how to function. Except I'm doing good now, functioning without her. Sometimes a whole day will go by and I won't be thinking about her and I won't realize until the next day that I didn't.

Fraser makes a noise, like a hum, and I take that to mean I should keep going. So I do.

"You get married and you're married for eight years, and you gotta decide every little thing, and it gets boring real quick, especially when all your answers are the wrong ones. I decided we should have kids, but Stella thought that was the wrong answer. I decided we should have a black sofa, but Stella thought that was the wrong answer. I decided we should have Italian for dinner, but Stella wanted Chinese -- I couldn't get it right, Fraser, I couldn't ever get it right."

Then I sigh, and he sighs with me.

It kinda hurt to say all that out loud, but I knew it was true, I've known it for a long time, and I've said it to myself. It's different when someone is listening, though, it's real when someone is listening, and Fraser is one of those listeners you know is filing everything away for later.

"Hm," he says.

"That all you got to say?" I demand. I tell him all about my marriage and that's all he's got to say? Not even, "Yeah, buddy, that musta sucked"?

"I'm sorry, Ray. It doesn't sound pleasant." He's looking out the window now.

Okay, good enough. "What about you, huh?" I say. "Expanding your boundaries? You wanna get beat with a hairbrush or what?"

I know I got a hairbrush thing. There was this movie Stella and I watched together and the guy had a hairbrush thing, and I just can't let it go. Plus it sounds dirty, and I like to make Fraser uncomfortable. That's not buddies, but sometimes I can't help myself.

"Not exactly, Ray." There he goes again, thumb and eyebrow. Couldn't ever tell he wasn't wearing the uniform, for how fucking unbent he got.

"What then?"

"It has recently been brought to my attention that I am not quite... as aware of myself as I thought."

It takes me a minute to translate that into English, but I'm still confused.

"Okay, what?" I say.

"I... uh. Well, Ray, my experience has been... limited, at best. And I've realized that if I ever want to -- I'll have to -- I need to -- ah -- to learn what I like. So I'm..."

"Researching," I finish. Fraser is researching kinky things people do. Or maybe just one kink. "You're researching sex?" No way is Fraser a virgin -- but maybe he is. I'm considering it when he turns his head and glares at me.

"Not exactly, Ray. I do know the basics."

"Listen," I say, "I got no problem with you expanding your boundaries. I don't even got a problem with you getting laid. You're just doing it wrong. You gotta start slow. Like maybe going to a club and talking to a girl. You can't just jump into handcuffs and anal sex."

Oops, maybe that went too far. Fraser's blushing. Handcuffs? No. Clubs? No. Anal sex? Bingo.

"Anal sex, huh?" I say. "Okay, you gotta start with going to a club and talking to a guy, then."

"Am I so transparent?" he asks me, and he sounds kinda wistful, so I give him what he wants.

"Yeah." He is. Not. I just got a lucky hit. Who'd've thought? Fraser. Queer. Or maybe queer. I add, "But only because I know you, buddy," and then I turn the idea over in my head. I could see it. Fraser under some guy, taking it. I've done it myself, anal sex, with Stella, a couple of times. On the other end, even, because I thought it might get her off. It just grossed her out.

I kinda liked it. I got no problem admitting I kinda liked it.

But never with anybody else, because Stella was always the only girl for me, and I couldn't even look at another girl, much less a guy -- not until this past year or two anyway. And I can't start that up, not as Vecchio. So if I stick my own fingers up my ass sometimes and pretend it's Stella with that fucking -- that thing -- god -- or sometimes it's Fraser, yeah, I can admit that, too.

"I..." Fraser licks his lips, and I'm suddenly real uncomfortable with the fact that I been picturing him naked and fucking, so I start thinking about bowling shoes and nuns, and I'm kinda okay again when he says, "Thank you for your tolerance, Ray."

"Not tolerance, just human," I say. I never been one to care what people do in bed, and I ain't gonna start now, just because I finally know someone who isn't doing what I'm doing. Or maybe he is.

And that is a picture I don't need: Fraser on his cot with his hand down his pants.

"Thank you anyway," says Fraser, and then he opens the door and gets out. "I'll see you tomorrow. Later today," he amends.

"All right," I say. He closes the door and I drive away.

**

I bring it up again a few days later, on our way back to the 2-7 from doing another one of those crazy tricks Fraser likes so much. We didn't run off a building into the lake today, but we came damn close, and Fraser jumped onto a truck and -- it's getting so this kind of thing sounds normal, even in my head.

I know I got bad timing, but I got to talk about it, because I am gonna die of the waiting already.

"So, Fraser... How's that boundary thing going?"

Fraser stares out the window and I roll my eyes. Haven't we done this before?

"Come on," I say. "We're buddies, right?"

"Ray --" he says.

"Because listen, I gotta tell you, I do not think this is my comfort zone here." I stop and frown at the red light.

"I'm sorry my personal problems are infringing upon your comfort zone. I would be happy to --" says Fraser, and he sounds cranky, sounds annoyed. If he was anybody else, he'd be yelling, "You fucking asshole!" -- but he's Fraser, so he's gonna get more polite. And then I realize what he said.

"No," I say, so now he's pissed at me both because he thinks that I rethought the gay thing he's got going maybe, and also because I interrupted him, the absolute height of rudeness. The light is green, so I step on the gas. Maybe we're going more than a little bit faster than we need to, but that just means this conversation will be over sooner, because we'll get to the 27th sooner. "No, Fraser, I meant that I am not comfortable with you going out and meeting strange men in bars. That is not safe, don't you listen to the news reports? You got your guys with disease and your guys with mental problems and your guys with handcuffs, and I don't mean the fun kind, I mean the kind that get you thrown in jail, and I only got pull with so many people as Vecchio, do you know what I'm saying?"

"No, Ray, I'm afraid I don't have a clue." Ah, snark. Good, that's the right direction.

"Good," I finally say. "I'm glad we're on the same page." You stubborn bastard, I add in my head as I turn into the 2-7's lot.

And then I realize it, that I'm doing to him what Stella was doing to me, that I want him to just figure out what I'm trying to say. Difference is, I never was good at doing that with Stella, and most of the time Fraser and I don't have that problem. He's good at knowing what I'm thinking. And me... I know what he thinks more than anyone else in the city, probably anyone else in his whole life -- so maybe I'm not good at it, but I sure got one up on some strange guy in a bar.

Why doesn't he get what I want to happen next? I'm going to have to tell him, and that is way out of my comfort zone. That is my safe word, that is somebody fucking me up the ass with a hairbrush or something, that is not cool.

I'm gonna have to do it anyway, though; soon as I figure out exactly what I want, Fraser'll be the first to know.

Then he gets out of the car and limps toward the 2-7 and I watch him go instead of catching up with him so that I can watch his ass, and kinda think that maybe I do know what I want, and I'm just too much of a coward to tell him.

I suddenly got all kinds of sympathy for Stella.

**

I don't catch up with Fraser, just let him walk in front of me and sulk. For Fraser, sulking means he doesn't hold open the door for me so that I can walk into the building ahead of him. It only takes an extra moment to be courteous.

Heh.

I'm about to follow him into the squad room when I see Stella down the hall, looking angry, heading my way. I know what's coming: Excessive force! Giving the defense attorney what he wants! Blah blah lawyer shit!

"Hey, Stel, I need to talk to you," I say, before she can say anything. I grab her arm and I'm towing her toward the men's bathroom before I realize what I'm doing, so then I change directions and pull her into the supply closet. I let go of her and turn on the light.

"Ray," she says exasperatedly, rubbing her arm. "You kicked Olliveri in the head!"

"He had a gun pointed at my partner!" I say, just as exasperatedly. "What was I supposed to do?"

"Shoot the gun out of his hand maybe?" She's got a hand on her hip and she's glaring at me. I lean back against the shelves and run a hand through my hair.

"I didn't have my glasses. Listen, Stel, this is important." I cross my arms over my chest.

"No, Ray, I do not want to go out with you. No ballroom, no dancing, no live band, no going back to my place." She crosses her arms across her chest, too. I can't tell if it's the bare bulb shining bright on her face, or just the fact that we're both getting older that's making her look tired and sad and weary.

"Nah," I say. "I got no time this week for wining and dining. Nice to know you're thinking of me, though."

"What do you want, Ray?"

It's definitely not the lights -- my Stella is getting old.

No, my Stella will always be thirteen, fourteen, sixteen, twenty. This Stella is getting old, and I'm okay with that.

"Stella, you remember when we went to Mistress Alisa?" I ask.

"Of course. What a farce." She sniffs.

"Why wouldn't you... you know. Why didn't you want to -- to tell me?" I know my lips are tight; I can feel my jaw clenching. But this is important -- for me, it's important, not for anybody else. Stella doesn't even care. But I want to know. It was the beginning of the end, in my mind, when Stella wasn't okay with what I wanted to do in bed.

Bed was the only place we never had problems, and then we had problems, and then we split up, and then I got the papers in the mail one day, and I wasn't expecting it. I knew she was unhappy, but I didn't know she was serious, because she was still letting me into her bed. So when she started to lie in the bedroom, that had to be the beginning of what would be the end -- right?

I don't know. I can't fucking figure out Stella to save my goddamned life. If Fraser is a mystery, Stella is a fucking sphinx.

Stella stares at me. "I have no idea what you're doing, Ray, but I don't want to be part of it."

She never had any problems expressing herself outside our fucking bedroom.

Now it's my turn to glare at her, so I do, and then she clicks off the light and leaves the room.

I stay, leaning against the shelf, staring at the darkness.

Then the door opens, and I don't even have to look over there to know it's Fraser.

"Ray, are you ready to start the paperwork?" he asks me. That's Fraser -- doesn't even want to know why I'm standing in the closet. Doesn't make a crack about anal sex -- I would have, probably, if he'd been me and I'd been him, just to watch his cheeks flush.

"You know, bondage is psycolo -- psycho --"

"Psychological, yes, I know," says Fraser.

"So what? You feel out of control?" I don't look at him. He's not looking at me. He comes in and closes the door, but doesn't turn on the light.

"Ah, Ray... I don't... I'm not --"

"Talk to me here, Fraser. I got to know what's going on with you. This is not buddies, all this secrecy. Weeks now, you been doing this for weeks, and you ain't told me shit." Even though I can't see anything, I stare down at the floor.

"Do you --" Fraser clears his throat. "Has anyone told you about V -- Victoria?"

"Victoria," I repeated stupidly. The girl, the bullet -- I'd read the file. "I've read the file."

"I was going to go with her," says Fraser quietly. "She was the only woman I ever loved, and I was going to go with her. I didn't care that she was a criminal, I didn't care that Ray Vecchio would lose his house, I didn't care. I had to be with her, I was compelled to be with her, forever."

Uh. That's kinda heavy. Where does a conversation go from there?

"How do you feel about it now?" I ask.

"She's the only woman I ever loved," says Fraser. "And I put her in prison. I had to make it right."

"It don't sound like it was made right," I say. Because it don't. "That is not the way to solve problems, by making more problems. And I should know."

"Well, you're correct. It wasn't. You read the file -- you know what. Happened."

"Yup," I say. "So what's this got to do with expanding you -- oh." Victoria is the only woman he ever slept with? That's gotta fuck you up for life.

"No," he says, like he's reading my mind. "Also -- my friend. Inusiq."

"I thought the Eskimos --"

"Inuit."

"-- weren't really okay with. You know. The... whole. Gay sex thing."

I bet Fraser is blushing, but I can't tell for sure -- but I'm not willing to turn the light on, because Fraser has not ever said Victoria's name to me, not once, not ever, and maybe it's the dark that's making him be so revealing about his personal life -- which apparently has consisted of two people in thirty-something years. So he's one up on me, anyway.

"Recently I have begun to. To feel," says Fraser. "I am terribly..."

"Alone," I supply. Because he is. The guy is an island.

"And Dief... tries. But he is not..."

I have never heard Fraser not finish so many sentences. You gotta feel bad for the guy -- by himself, in a strange city. Sure he's lived here for three years, give or take, but this ain't his home, he is not comfortable here. He's outside his comfort zone.

I can feel that.

"I understand," I say. "This is cool, Fraser. It's good, between you and me. We're okay, we're buddies. I just worry about you. Going out. Strange men. People trying to take advantage."

"I'm not naive, Ray. I know what happens between people," says Fraser heatedly, and I move forward, get up in his face.

"Yeah?" I say, and step forward even more. The buttons on his tunic press into my t-shirt. We're face to face, and I can see him now. He looks just as tired and worn down as Stella -- but, of course, he had a gun pointed at him and two little kids not two hours ago. "Yeah? You tell me that when someone slips you some E at a club and you wake up the next morning handcuffed to a radiator."

Fraser closes his eyes, and I watch him, and then I realize that our faces are too close together, that we are standing in a closet, in the dark, that everything in my life means something else.

Hell of a fucking epiphany.

I step back, turn the light on, and wait.

"What would you have me do, Ray?" he says.

"I'll take you out," I say. "I'll introduce you around."

"Do you frequent gay bars?" Fraser makes it sound dirty, awful, wrong, nasty, disgusting. I wonder how he's going to do it if he can barely talk about it.

"I frequent shit you got no idea about," I say, even though I don't and we both know it. The closest I come to frequenting anything is Sandor and Mr. Wong and the sports bar up the street from my apartment.

"All right, Ray," says Fraser. He sighs, one of those deep Canadian sighs that mean something mysterious -- usually "I am so tolerant of your stupid American ways and crappy beer and lack of curling" -- and I scowl at him.

"Fine," I say. "Friday. We'll go out. We'll pick you up a boyfriend." I sneer at him -- not about the boyfriend, but about the idea that Fraser is gonna be able to do anything casual, much less sex. Whatever makes him fucking happy -- and this won't, I just fucking know it won't, because I know Fraser, and he does everything serious, especially relationships. But if he wants to go out and pretend like he's gonna pick up a trick for the night, I'll go along with it. Until he actually shows signs of doing it, and then I am gonna bust in and put the kibosh on it, because he's mine.

On that thought, which makes me more than a little uncomfortable with what I'm thinking in my head without my own permission, I push past Fraser and out of the closet, and bump into Frannie.

"Jesus, Ray," she says. "Christ!"

"Sorry," I say, and it's an effort not to snarl at her.

"Gosh," she says, and peers around me into the closet. "You're really getting into character." Then she winks at me, and I spend the rest of the day doing paperwork and wondering what the fuck Vecchio and Fraser did in that closet all the time.

**

When I swing by the Consulate on Friday night to pick up Fraser for our night on the town, I am not expecting him to look like the J.C. Penny catalog. Blue jeans, hiking boots, a sweater, and his leather jacket.

Maybe I was expecting whips and chains?

Well, I dressed up -- black jeans with buttons instead of a zipper, and my shiny black shirt that maybe makes me look a little like a rent boy and a little like I'm in high school. Stella always said it made her feel like a perverted old lady, to look at me wearing it. So maybe I wore it so Fraser would feel like a perverted old lady -- maybe. And my boots, the good ones, with the steel toes and tight laces that cut into my feet, just a little.

I got my hair spiked up real nice. I thought about eyeliner, like back in the day with Stella, when we used to party, but then decided to ease Fraser into this. Ease myself into this.

"Hello, Ray," he says, and slides into the passenger seat.

"You're not dressed up," I say. "I mean -- we're going out, right?"

"Yes, well." He buckles his seatbelt. "I am not going to parade around in a getup designed specifically to attract someone interested only in my physical attributes and not --"

"Fraser, we are not going somewhere so people can admire your brain or your detective skills," I say, but I put the Goat into gear and pull away from the Consulate. "We are going somewhere so men can ogle your body and grab your ass and teach you about being gay."

"I know about being gay, thank you," says Fraser, and he sounds pissed. I kinda want to know what he means by that -- I got visions in my head, fucking hell, I got visions -- but he turns his head away from me, and his lips are pressed together, so obviously I said something wrong. Again.

He stares out the window almost the whole way to the bar I picked. Which, by the way, was not easy, as I had no fucking idea where we should go or what the places were like. Finally I picked up a copy of the Windy City Times and opened it to the section with the bar events and jabbed my finger at one that didn't look too horrible. I ran it through the computer, but there were no Vice hits in the last year, so I figured it was safe from anybody seeing us. Then I cruised past it on my way home, which was actually really out of the way. It didn't look bad in daylight.

So I turn the car north and take us to Halsted, and at night it looks a little worse, cause there are a bunch of gay guys standing around smoking cigarettes outside the entrance, but I park and we go in, and Fraser still isn't really speaking to me.

I say to him, "Why don't you get us some beer and I'll get a table?" and he nods, curtly, his mouth tight. What the fuck is his problem? I'm doing all this fucking work and all he's got is fucking attitude.

Then I stupidly turn my back on him and he's disappeared around the corner of the bar, and I can't see through the crowd of men fucking standing there, so I am blind, sitting there with my legs spread and my hands folded like I'm fucking five years old.

**

Fraser comes back to the table with my beer, but no beer for him, and I should have known better to let him go get the beers alone, because now he's already fucking got somebody.

"Ah, Ray... I believe my mission for the evening has already been accomplished," he says to me. He sits down next to me. He looks so fucking earnest. I want to punch him in the face. I look at the bar, try to figure out what's got him so excited -- hockey on the television? No. Some kind of Canadian beer on tap? No. Big guy in a motorcycle jacket leaning against the bar watching us? I fucking hope not. Maybe it's the smaller guy next to him, the one who just winked at me. Yeah, maybe.

"Fraser, we have been here five minutes. I ain't even given you pointers yet."

Fraser clears his throat, and I know I'm in for it. He says, "Well, I met a gentleman at the bar. Apparently he is willing to allow me to... show him a real good time." Fraser's mouth curls up at the corners. "I suppose there are others in Chicago aside from yourself who are willing to make allowances for my lack of haute couture."

I glare. What the fuck else am I supposed to do. "Who is this guy?" I ask, and I take a real long drink of beer as Fraser answers.

"It's the gentleman over there, with the extremely large..." Fraser trails off and clears his throat again.

"Motorcycle man?" I squeak. I was just fucking joking. The guy has got to be twice Fraser's size, huge, a fucking bear in a leather jacket with lots of silver zippers, and a black t-shirt stretched real tight across his chest. I knew Fraser was a country boy, but I didn't think he'd go for the mountain men right off. The guy doesn't have a beard, and his hair is cut real close to his scalp, and when he turns a little to talk to the bartender, I see a black and white checked handkerchief in his back pocket. Which means he likes it how? Left or right?

I'm wracking my brains to remember my days working Vice -- which I did for about a year, doing undercover busts -- and what the fuck? Black and white checks? I cannot fucking remember if that means safe sex or unsafe sex, if it means he likes to top or bottom, or if it means he likes to beat the shit out of gay Mounties wearing hiking boots and then leave them in alleyways to die.

My brain sounds like my fucking mother, if I cussed less and said "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!" more.

"I'm going to go with him, Ray," says Fraser, and he sounds like he wasn't even expecting me to have an objection -- after my lecture about radiators and everything, he wasn't expecting me to have an objection to him taking off with some motorcycle maniac? "I need to begin my life; I can't do that until I understand what it is that I need. And... I'm..." He's looking at me like either I'm crazy or he's crazy, and maybe it's a little bit of both.

Then he huffs out a breath and puts his hands on the table and moves to stand up, and I move quicker, for once, thank God, and I get my handcuffs around one of his hands, and one around mine, and just like that we're cuffed together.

"You are not going anywhere," I say firmly. "You are not going to risk your life for sex."

"Ray, you are being ridiculous!" he says. "You have come completely unhinged!"

"I've come unhinged? I have come unhinged? Fraser, you are trying to walk out of this bar with someone you just met! You don't even know this guy! You do not get to do this, not on my watch. You wanna get fucked so bad, I'll fucking fuck you, but you do not get to go off with some stranger and turn up on the six o'clock news tomorrow."

"This is why we are here," he says in a voice that's almost a whisper. "Uncuff me right this instant and let me go live my life." Then he stops, and then he says, "You don't get to make my decisions for me!" and I get the feeling he's not talking to me, but there's no one behind me looking at us. I look back at Fraser, then over his shoulder at the guy in the leather who wants to take him home.

He doesn't look like a bad guy, but who knows? I can list off in my head eight million perps who didn't look like they would shoot, or maim, or kill, or steal, or lie. Or rape. Fraser don't look like he'll lie -- and yet somehow he always manages to confuse people as to what the truth is. There's my example right there.

No. No. Fraser cannot go with that guy. He doesn't even know him.

"You don't even know him," I say. I know it's lame. I know I'm lame. I gotta figure out what I want from Fraser -- what I want, or how to tell him what I want, and maybe if it's even practical to try to get what I want, because if what if what I want ain't what he wants? He wants that big guy in leather. I don't know what I want, but probably it involves hockey and beer and being held down and Fraser's mouth on me somewhere. Or mine on his.

I bite down hard on my tongue.

Fraser sighs.

"Ray," he says. The way he says my name has got me all. All. All fucking weird. Then he says my name again and again and again, and my dick is totally getting hard, so I definitely know what I want from Fraser. And then he says, "Uncuff me now." Not yelling or whispering. Just ordering. Just telling me.

I got a problem with authority -- and, definitely, yes, I got a problem with Fraser's authority -- but my whole body wants to do whatever he says, anything he says, right now.

I slide the key out of my pocket and twist it in his handcuff and it's off. He rubs his wrist and glares at me.

Maybe it's been five minutes. Less. He gets up and walks around the table and says, "I will see you tomorrow, Ray" -- which I know he won't because tomorrow's the Saturday that the Consulate has got that Russian thing he's gotta be at, which is on my calendar in red letters in his perfect handwriting -- and then he's gone.

I think maybe I hate him.

I pull real hard on the cuff on my wrist, feel the metal bite into my skin, and it fucking hurts, brings me back into the world. Then I finish my beer, and leave. I guess I could leave with any of the guys who have been checking me out -- maybe one of them's got a "middle aged loser with crazy hair" fetish or something -- but I don't. I just go home. I got my beer, I got my hockey on Classic, and I got... a turtle.

**

I get bored with the hockey real fast, which is not a shock, since I've seen the game before and remember how it ends and everything. I could keep watching for the fighting, but blood bouncing on ice is only cool so many times when I'm not sitting in the stadium. I flip through channels, flip flip flip, and everything sucks. When I was a kid, we had like five channels, and they sucked. Now I got cable television with a hundred or two hundred or something channels, and everything still sucks. I just got more channels trying to sell me shit I don't need -- except at two o'clock in the morning, I am really convinced that I gotta get the new yogalates video that will tone my abs and make my tits higher.

So I just turn off the television and stare at myself in the reflection and think about what Fraser is doing right now. He's with Motorcycle Guy, whose name is probably Killer or Bruiser or -- or Pierre. And by now, it's been awhile, they've progressed from Fraser saying, "Please take off your clothes and fold them, thank you kindly," to Fraser saying, "Please get on your knees and stay there, thank you kindly." Or maybe Fraser is saying, "Please -- please -- please --" and the guy is sucking his cock.

Fraser's cock. It probably stands straight up and curves just a little and doesn't lean to one side or the other. He's -- he's probably un-fucking-cut. He probably goes crazy when the guy runs his tongue under the foreskin.

I never seen an uncut cock except in porn, but I can fucking imagine. I have got an a-number-one great imagination, and I can feel Fraser's foreskin on my tongue, feel his cock get longer in my mouth.

My jeans are way too tight for this, but I don't take them off. I just rub the front of my jeans, rub my dick against my boxers, against the denim, jerk my hips a little. This is gonna kill me.

I close my eyes and let my head fall back and think about Fraser, pale in the light shining in through a window, telling Motorcycle Guy what to do. Take off your clothes. Pile them there. Fold them please, it only takes an extra moment to be tidy. Please get on your knees, hands on your ankles, lean back. There we go, open your mouth. I would like to --

No, could Fraser say all that without blushing? I couldn't. My hips are jerking, and I got one hand in a fist, and I'm sweating fucking bullets here, pushing against my other hand, but I am blushing for sure. I picture Fraser in the handcuffs at the table -- I could tell him what to do. I could say, "Fraser, suck me," and he would.

He wouldn't, but in my head he would, and that's why it's called a fantasy. He would say, "It would be my pleasure to suck you, Ray," and that's how I know that I ain't the one in charge, not even in my fantasy, not even in my own head. Fraser always has to be in charge, always has to show that he knows what he's doing. He'd be kneeling and then he'd bend his head down real slow, and take just the head of my dick into his mouth, and he'd just suck like a fucking lollipop, like he's some kind of schoolgirl.

Fraser in a little pleated skirt kinda makes my dick soft, but Fraser handcuffing my hands -- maybe not in metal handcuffs, which I know from experience with Stella hurt like a bitch -- to the bed, me face down, him behind me saying, "Well, Ray, I'd be happy to allow you to benefit from my years of research on this subject. For example, did you know that the male body has some fucking unbelievable number of spots that cause the most intense fucking pleasure ever?"

Something like that anyway.

It's the idea of me face down and Fraser behind me that gets me, and I gotta unbutton my jeans, which hurts just as much as leaving them buttoned, and then I just stick my hand into my pants. My dick is poking out of my boxers, and I just ignore them, because all I need is one stroke, maybe two, and I am fucking done -- but instead I press, right before my balls, and think about Fraser's voice.

"If you'd please turn over so I can fuck you, Ray... Ah, thank you kindly." Thank you fucking kindly. Then I let go, jack myself real hard, and it's like my fucking head is going to come off. Thank you kindly.

When I come back from my orgasm, I realize that I'm still wearing my fucking shiny shirt and now it's got my fucking jizz all over it, and I will never be able to face my dry cleaner again.

Plus, I feel like a real perv. Fraser is my partner, the guy I rely on, the guy who relies on me. Plus I am not even me, and I know Ray Vecchio doesn't swing this way or that way. Vecchio swung no way. Not according to the stuff in his bedroom, or his financials, or any of that shit. Sure, sometimes he flirted with women, and definitely he liked them, but I got the feeling he was into something -- like maybe in love for a long time with someone he couldn't have.

Boy do I know that feeling.

Twice over now, I guess, I know that feeling.

**

Saturday I can't concentrate for shit on anything, so I go into the 2-7 pretty early, and decide I'm actually gonna do some of the backlog of paperwork that's been sitting on my desk since before I was Vecchio. Then I realize that's not such a good idea, since I'll have to call up Fraser for details on most of it, so I just sit around and watch everybody walk around the squad room and drink coffee and eat candy until Welsh hands me a clipboard and tells me to start interrogating people. This I'm good at.

Figuring out Fraser? I am not so good at that. Keeping myself from jerking off while thinking about Fraser? I am not so good at that. Interrogation? I am good at this.

When I come out of Interview Three, where I just got this woman to admit that she and her sister killed their father -- which did not make me feel so good because they had real good reasons to kill him and they got their justice but they're still going to jail -- there's Fraser, sitting at my desk, filling out paperwork.

"I see you survived," I say meanly, and Fraser looks up at me like he knew I was there before I even said anything.

"Of course I survived, Ray," he says, and runs his thumb over his eyebrow, and that pisses me off, because why is he -- why --

"Uh-huh." I throw down the paperwork on the Tesso women, and lean against my desk.

Fraser clears his throat. "You know, Ray, perhaps -- ah. The mating rituals of the Chicago male actually bear almost no resemblance to the mating rituals that I --"

"What, they do things different in the Yukon?" I'm sneering, but I'm studying him. He don't look different, not at all. He looks like Fraser, he looks like he always looks, he doesn't look like he spent the night getting mauled by Motorcycle Pierre or whoever. He doesn't look like he busted his cherry -- although, didn't he say that he... with his friend Inusiq or whatever the fuck? I don't know how I feel about that either. I got visions in my head of ten year old Fraser and his ten year old buddy comparing dick sizes and talking about stealing porn, but maybe that was just me and my buddy Joey. Maybe all little kids didn't do that.

"Yes, Ray, things are very different in the Yukon." Fraser clears his throat again.

"I'm real shocked," I say, and push off my desk, and walk away without even saying goodbye or anything. First I go into the break room and get myself a cup of coffee and a bag of M&Ms, and then I go into the bathroom and wash my face with cold water, and then I drink the coffee, standing in the hallway behind some filing cabinets so no one can see me, and by the time I feel stupid enough to go back to my desk, Fraser is gone.

**

I can't stay at the precinct any more because I feel like an asshole, so I just drink my coffee and finish up the paperwork on those crazy women, and leave. I could do lots of things -- I could wax the Goat, or open her up and look at her insides and maybe clean her spark plugs or something, or I could go to the park and sit on a swing and watch the kids play baseball, or I could go dancing. I could do whatever I fucking want to.

So I go home and drink a beer and put my feet up and watch television. There's a cooking show marathon on, which isn't interesting, and there are some old games on, which isn't interesting, and there's SportsCenter, which isn't interesting, and there's a vampire movie on one of the networks, which isn't interesting.

None of this is good for me, because it means that I end up thinking about Fraser and his guy again, and how he came out of that with no bruises or nothing, and before I'm done with my beer, I'm hard again. But there is not any way that I am going to jerk off thinking about Fraser again, plus it's the middle of the afternoon.

But I guess I can jerk off in the middle of the afternoon if I want to. I'm gonna do it right this time, though, with porn and lube and everything.

So I get up and I go into my bedroom, and I get my lube, and I get some tissues, and I take off all my clothes, and then I go through my little box of videotapes. Maybe not all guys compared dicks when they were ten, but I know that all guys got a box of videotapes, and every single guy in the world has at least one with two guys. Just to know, you know? Just because we're all curious about the shit we don't do. Plus Stella really liked it.

It's an old tape, the one I got, from right when VHS got big in the early eighties. I remember watching it in one of those old VCRs with the top that popped up and the big buttons. I remember watching it with Stella sitting between my legs, my fingers between her legs, her pressing up against me. The first time we saw it, she shivered and wet came all through my fingers and all the air in our first apartment smelled like her, and I just let her move her hips on my fingers while the guys on screen sucked each other until she came.

I can't remember what happened after that, if we kept watching, if we had sex, if I was even hard from anything but making Stella come. I'm trying to remember, but I can't -- all I remember is the smell of Stella and the way she moved on my fingers, the way when I pulled my fingers out of her, they were wrinkled, like I'd stayed in the shower too long.

Lube doesn't do that to my fingers. I squirt a lot on, get myself comfortable on the floor, and press play.

Porn from a long time ago is not like porn now. Now it's all got plots. Then it was just sex from beginning to end -- except for what had plots. I guess maybe me and Stella -- me -- never watched the shit with plots. It was just about the sex back then. Now I still don't care, because I don't care what people do with each other before they have sex. There are enough stories at the 2-7.

This is one of the porn movies that just jumps into the action. First shot: some guy getting sucked off by another guy in an alley. They're dressed like the Village People; I'd forgotten that part, too.

I stroke my dick and do not put Fraser's face over the face of the guy getting sucked off, and do not put my face over the face of the guy on his knees in the alley. I don't. I will not.

Except then I do, and suddenly my fist around my dick is a lot more exciting. I put more lube on my other hand, and sneak it down to my balls, play with them. I like it wet, really wet, really slippery. Then the camera switches angle, and I can see that the guy getting sucked off is also getting a finger up his ass, so I put a finger up my ass. Fair's fair. I used to like it when Stella did it, back when we first started with the sex. She thought it was dirty. I thought it felt good. It didn't make me a fag, because it was my girlfriend who wanted to do it -- I was just a long-suffering boyfriend.

I guess I turned into a fag when I started liking getting fucked with her strap-on thing. Tiny little Stella, big rubber cock.

I pushed my finger in, past the first knuckle, past the second. It makes me feel like I have to take a shit, kind of hurts a little, and my dick starts to get soft, until I bend it the right way, push it into the -- thing, the prostate -- and then I get dizzy and my dick gets hard again. I keep my eyes open, keep my eyes on the screen, because I know as soon as I close em, I'll be thinking about me and Fraser again, and that's just --

Having sexual fantasies about your partner is not buddies.

So I keep my eyes open, keep my eyes on the guys against the wall, and put another finger in my ass, press on that right spot, and come all over my stomach.

That was so fucking easy. I am so fucking easy. I don't even watch the rest of the movie, I just turn it off and throw it back in the box and take a shower. When I'm done shaking, anyway.

**

Monday it's like nothing happened at all over the weekend. Fraser is totally normal, wearing his hat and smiling and nodding and telling stories about the Russians and their Saturday afternoon shindig and saying "Thank you kindly" and being nice to Frannie. It's like nothing happened between us, which makes sense, because nothing did -- I just kinda overreacted.

So we figure out who's been boosting the tropical fish from the pet store -- and it's a bunch of little kids, using water guns, which I gotta say is pretty clever -- and we're driving back to the station when I apologize. Because I've gotta apologize, it's not fair otherwise.

I say it real fast.

"Hey, Fraser, I'm sorry about that. About the other day. I'm just feeling a little funny is all."

Fraser looks at me and smiles, and I feel a snuffling at my ear. I turn around a little and glare at Dief, who smirks at me. Yeah, okay, a dog-wolf-thing can't smirk, but that's what he does.

"Thank you kindly, Ray," says Fraser. "That's quite all right. I'm sure it's quite an adjustment for you -- having to realize that I am not, perhaps, all I have said myself to be these past few --"

"Uh, no," I say. "It's not really an adjustment."

"There's no need for polite fiction between us, Ray," says Fraser, and he sounds annoyed. Polite fiction?

"Whatever, Fraser, my point is not about books, my point is that I do not care what you do in your bedroom." Behind me, Dief barks.

Fraser says, "No, I don't care what you think," and I think he's talking to the dog, but he's not facing the dog, so maybe --

"You don't care what I think?" I say.

"That's not what I meant," he says.

"What did you mean? Because, Fraser, whether you care what I think or not, it's not the sex that's freaking me out here. It's --" It's me wanting -- it's me thinking about the sex, that's all. I try again. "It's you maybe not being careful because you're so eager to try on this new... lifestyle. Yeah. Lifestyle. You know what I'm saying?"

"No, Ray. What are you saying?" Now he's frowning at me, so I frown back.

"I'm just afraid that maybe the next guy you pick won't be so -- so -- so accommodating. As Motorcycle Man."

"His name was Eric," says Fraser softly. "And --" He stops, and I look over, and he's staring out the window, and then it makes sense, why he didn't have no bruises or scratch marks or anything. Why his lips weren't even puffy.

"You didn't sleep with him," I say.

"As I tried to tell you, Ray, the mating rituals in Chicago seem to be very different than the mating rituals in the Yukon, and I'm not quite sure --"

"What? He want to do you outside? He wanted --"

"He didn't want to wear a condom," says Fraser tightly, and he's blushing. I clench my jaws together.

"So you blew him off?" I gotta know.

"No, actually, I, ah, excused myself from his presence." Dief snuffles again from the back, and I know the wolf's gotta be thinking the same thing I am: thank fucking Jesus Christ that Fraser's at least got a brain.

"I think you did the right thing, buddy," I finally say. And Fraser sits up straighter like that was exactly the right thing that I could have said.

"Thank you, Ray. Thank you kindly," he says.

I shake my head and turn into the precinct parking lot.

**

I spend the next few days thinking and jerking off and sticking fingers up my ass, which doesn't sound so great when I say it like that, but believe you me, it felt great. It felt greater than great. It was like suddenly I turned a light on and remembered that I had a lot more parts that could feel good than just my dick, and I was gonna make every single part feel good.

Plus Fraser seemed like he was in a better mood, and he helped me with a lot of the stupid paperwork that I hate, and we interrogated a bunch of people, and I even got to punch one, because he was trying to bite Welsh, and that always puts me in a real good mood. And me and Fraser were clicking, getting the work done, even though Fraser had to spend all day Thursday at the Consulate, shining the Ice Queen's boots with his tongue or something.

When Friday morning rolls around, I'm half feeling great, and half feeling like all my jerking off needs to go somewhere, like I need to go get myself laid or something, and not by Stella, but by someone who has no idea what I like, so I've got to work harder. I need that exhaustion that comes from getting laid, and that shit was all missing with Stella for the last few years, so I kinda feel like I haven't been laid in forever, not just whatever it's been, a year and a half.

I put my feet up on my desk and grin at Fraser and say, "So, you wanna try again tonight?"

Fraser's head jerks a little, and his hat tilts, and my grin gets wider. He says, "Of course, Ray."

I say, "Okeedokee, buddy," and make a plan in my head that includes dropping him off at the Consulate, then picking him up again after I've showered and gelled and put on my steel-toed boots.

And whaddya know? It all goes according to my plan, and by nine pm, we're zooming north, back to the bar we went to last week, to see if maybe we can get Fraser laid. And I'm only half jealous of whichever guy is gonna bend him over something. Or get bent. Whichever it is, I'm jealous, but only a little, only a buzz in my head, not that shaky stomach.

Maybe I can live with not getting Fraser; I'm pretty proud of myself for that, I feel like I'm making headway. I want Fraser and I cannot have Fraser and I shouldn't have him anyway, because that wouldn't be buddies and it wouldn't be partners. The rule is not to fuck around with your partner's wife or husband or whatever, and the rule before that, that we don't talk about, is that you don't fuck around with your partner.

That's the rule that's so obvious, no one's even got to say it, but maybe I should say it to my dick, because it disagrees with me.

**

This time I know better, so this time I go and get the beers, and leave Fraser at the table. A guy across from me, on the other side of the bar, winks at me, and all of a sudden the world kind of changes, and I realize that I'm here too.

Not that I wasn't here before, but now I'm here, if you know what I'm saying. Fraser is not the only viable option, and Fraser is not the only one being cruised. The guy winking at me isn't exactly my type, but that's okay because there are plenty of guys who are my type here -- plenty of guys who are skinny with crazy hair, who are tall with flat hair, who have dark skin or light eyes.

I got me a salad bar of men, and I can pick whatever I want. I don't just have to sit and watch Fraser go home with a different guy every night. (Although I gotta wonder if he is gonna ever take someone home -- like to the Consulate. That I would probably have to see to believe.)

I wink back, get my beer, and head back to the table. Fraser is sitting with his back to the room, the reverse of how we were the first time. That's okay, I can sit with my back to the room and watch the guys through the doorway playing pool. My fingers want to wrap around a pool cue. One of the guys has a cigarette dangling out of the corner of his mouth, and his hair is spiked up like mine, but he's gotta be way cooler than me. He's even got his sleeves rolled up. And he's wearing one of those black leather bracelets with buckles and straps on it, which implies, to me, anyway, all sorts of real deviant sexual practices.

I watch him while I take the first drink of my beer.

"Ray," says Fraser, and I turn to him, and get the feeling like he's been saying my name.

"Sorry, Fraser," I say. "What?"

"Do you... ah..." Fraser trails off and licks his lower lip and I clamp down real hard on myself, because his tongue and his teeth and everything. I am way oversexed at this point, and I know it, so I should get laid. I can and I should. If Fraser can, why can't I?

I got all these arguments and I want to make them to somebody, but I can't make em to Fraser, because he's not actually gonna argue with me about it. Probably he agrees. Probably he thinks that we should indulge our pleasures, as long as they don't hurt nobody or the environment.

"Do I what? You need a condom? You need a packet of lube? You want me to pick out a nice guy for you, Fraser? You want me to hold your dick while you --"

"Ray!" says Fraser, and he sounds scandalized.

"Hey, Fraser," I say smugly, "if you can't talk about it, you're not ready to do it." I take another sip of beer and look back into the other room. The guy with the sleeves is chalking up his cue, and looking at me. And then we're looking at each other, and he grins at me, and I grin back.

"Ray," says Fraser. "Ray. I was only going to ask if you have perhaps seen someone with whom you'd care to --"

"Yeah, I seen someone," I say. Fraser frowns at me, and I frown back at him. "What?"

"Nothing." Fraser stares into his beer, hasn't drank any of it. He's all dolled up for the evening, too, wearing his hiking boots and his dark blue jeans and his favorite flannel shirt with the plaid. I figure it's his favorite because he wears it all the fucking time. Me, I went for simple this time. I got my white t-shirt, and my black jeans, and my black boots. I don't need anything else, not really.

Maybe some eyeliner, but maybe I'm not ready for a step in that direction yet.

"Fraser, do not do that. Tell me what's on your mind. We'll find you a nice guy and you'll go off and have some good sex, and then --"

"I don't think you should -- I mean, I am of the opinion that you're -- I --"

"Spit it out," I say, real angry suddenly. If this is going where I think it's going, I'm gonna kick his head all over the place.

"I don't think you should commit yourself so easily to --"

Yes, that is exactly where I thought this was going. Well, I am not going to let this conversation go there.

"You don't get to tell me that, Fraser -- you do not get to have double standards like that! What's sauce for the Mountie is sauce for the cop, do you understand? Do you get it? If you get to go home with Motorcycle Eric, I get to go home with -- that guy." I fling out a hand in frustration and almost hit one of the shiny-shirted twinkies. The twinkie glares. I glare back and then I glare at Fraser.

"Ray, I don't think this is... Is this what you really want?" Fraser looks urgent, but I feel urgent. I feel like for the first time since Stella left, I know exactly what I want in my personal life, and I feel like it's time for me to take what I want, and I feel --

I stand up and put my hands on the table and lean over so our faces are real close. "Fraser, I just want to get fucked. And I don't mean in the way that I am always fucking getting fucked either. I just want to get fucked, and I am going to go do that. So good luck finding yourself another motorcycle guy or something, because I am doneski." I put my hands up, palms facing Fraser, and start to back away, back toward the guy who's kind of cute. Maybe he's my type, whatever his name is -- and that's what I'm here for, right? I'm here to figure out what I want.

Which is a lie. I know what I want. I want Fraser.

And I almost swallow my tongue when Fraser stands up, leans toward me, grabs one of my wrists, and says, "You want to get fucked? I'll fuck you, Ray."

I get so hard all at once at my knees get weak and I would swear that the only thing keeping me upright is Fraser's fingers around my wrist.

Then Fraser ruins it all by blushing.

"Fuck," I say, and I break out of Fraser's grip, rub my wrist. "Fuck you, Fraser. That's not even funny." Because it's not, because if Fraser ever let go -- God, Mistress Alisa was right, he could be the hardest top --

Do I even want that? I have to work hard enough during the day to keep up with Fraser, to get my voice heard, to get Fraser to pay attention to my instincts, to teach him that logic does not always make the most sense. So I'm Fraser's assboy and work and then we go home and Fraser fucks me up the ass for real?

That would be too much, that would be overwhelming, that would not be cool with me -- I don't care what my dick thinks. My dick thinks it's a great idea.

"I'm not joking," he says coolly.

"You'd just back down anyway. Fuck you," I say again, and this time I actually turn away from Fraser, and the guy with the sleeves is staring at me through the doorway, past all the other people, and I think wildly, I'm gonna do this.

But then Fraser's hands are on me, and I'm whirling around, and then I'm against the wall, face first, and Fraser is all pressed up against my back. I'm fucking overheating here, and Fraser is fucking hard, has got his cock pressed into my ass, and this is like all the perverted fantasies that I been having for days now. Plus his hands are on my wrists, holding me to the wall, and his mouth is right by my ear. My hips jerk, pushing my dick into the wall, and I am gonna die.

And then Fraser growls at me, says, "I will. That's the plan," and that is it, stick me in a box marked "Comes In Public When Spoken To".

Fraser growls again when he feels me start to shake and says, "Don't come," fucking orders me not to come so I don't, and I cannot remember at all why I thought this was a bad idea, because Fraser's fingers wrapped around my wrists is the best --

I push back against Fraser, hard, push us off the wall, and say, "Let's go then," and I jerk my wrists real hard, out of Fraser's grip. I am not just going to roll over, thank you kindly; Fraser is going to have to work for this.

I look at the guy on my way out, and he nods over my shoulder at Fraser, winks at me, and I think that this is way too easy, way easier than chicks. This guy knows he's outclassed by Fraser, knows that there's no way I am gonna pick him over this broad, tall -- guy. This guy who is in a class by himself.

**

Fraser follows me to the Goat, slides in smoothly, and says, "Take us to your apartment, Ray."

Fraser is nervous. He looks nervous. I don't know how I can tell, because he don't actually look different than how he always looks, but I know. He's nervous.

I'm not nervous at all, even though I know I should be. I'm just jittery. My fingers twitch for a cigarette, and I want one in my mouth so bad -- I know this has to be because I want something else in my mouth and just can't think it.

Something else like Fraser's cock. I can think it. I know what I want, damn it, I just don't think I can handle what it's gonna to do my life. I don't think I care what it's gonna do to my life.

I start up the Goat and take us south. Fraser doesn't talk or move, just looks out of the windshield. Me, I got my fingers tapping and my left leg bouncing. When we stop for a red light, the car is rumbling under me, and I'm ready to blow, right now, so I take my right hand and rub real hard, and the mostly-pain pleasure pulls me back from the edge. But Fraser, he takes it the wrong way, looks at me real hard, reaches out, grabs my fingers, and puts them back on the steering wheel.

Then his hand is rubbing my dick through my jeans and I just about die, and then he pulls back, says, "The light is green, Ray," and goes back to looking out the window.

**

I am all ready to get out of the car and run up the stairs and -- but he just sits in the passenger seat, just sits, so I just sit too.

Then he turns to me and says, "Is this what you want?" like my dick hadn't been hard ten minutes ago when he touched me.

So I look at him, really look, and maybe -- maybe Fraser is the one who doesn't want this, so I say, "Is this what you want? You wanna explore your boundaries with me?"

He looks back at me, and his eyes are real blue and his mouth is real red and he does look scared -- if I've never seen Fraser scared before, I'm seeing him scared now. Scared that maybe we're never going to be able to work like partners again, if we can't work like partners tonight.

But I'm not scared. If Fraser wants to explore his boundaries with me, I'll explore his fucking boundaries for him.

"I do -- I do want to. Explore my boundaries with you, Ray." His voice gets stronger at the end of that sentence.

I nod. "Pitter patter, then. Time's wasting," I say, and I open my door and step out of the Goat.

**

Walking into my apartment feels just like every other time we've walked into my apartment, and I kinda feel like I should offer him something to drink or eat or something, just like... just like every other time.

I turn a little to look at him, and he's undressing, taking off his coat, unbuttoning his shirt. He folds each item as he takes them off, and, man, I know that I should not be so into this -- I've seen him naked before, dripping wet, stripping, but it was nothing like this. Every bit of skin exposed makes my mouth water.

Finally he's down to nothing, just skin and a cock that's thick and long and hard and it is all I can focus on, because I just realized how long it's been since someone else has touched me -- and that someone else was Stella, for god's sake, it's always been Stella, and I'm about to move on.

It's my turn to be scared, and I am scared out of my fucking mind.

"Take off your clothing," says Fraser. "Now, if you please."

I jerk my eyes up from his cock -- of course it's everything I thought it would be, and uncut. It kind of looks... like a turtle. I glance guiltily over at Speedy in her tank, but she's sleeping, ignoring us. I look back at Fraser. His face is closed, totally shuttered, I got no idea where to go from here.

"Take off your clothing, Ray," he says. He's standing in the middle of my fucking apartment so casual! Naked!

I shrug out of my leather jacket and let it fall to the ground. He doesn't even twitch, doesn't tell me to hang it up or fold it. His cock's wet, glistening. I swallow hard, bring my hands up, and pull my t-shirt over my head from the back. That goes on the floor too.

It's kind of chilly. I shiver. He just stares, watches me. Then he licks his lip, the way he always does when he's not sure what to do next, and I feel a lot better -- I unbutton my pants real fast, push them down my legs, and then realize I have to bend down to unlace my boots, so I crouch. I still got my boxers on when I kick off my boots and pants and stand back up, but they're not covering much because I am hard, probably harder than I ever been in my life.

I put my thumbs into the elastic of my boxers, and look at him. He's got that hard look on his face, and he's only blushing a little, so I'm not gonna mention it, because -- well, because he's got that hard look on his face, and I don't know that I can actually talk.

"Leave those on," he says, so I do, and then I stand there waiting, my head bent a little.

"Where -- where are your handcuffs?" says Fraser. He had to clear his throat first. His cock is flushing even more than it had been. But he said "handcuffs" and it takes a minute for my brain to click to that.

"Get out your handcuffs," he says, and I toss my head back.

"Do it yourself," I tell him.

"Do it now," he says to me, and takes a step forward. "Do it now."

So I do, because what the fuck else am I supposed to do?

I dig them out of the pile of clothes I wore to work, left all over each other in the doorway of my bedroom, hand them over, put the key on the counter. He looks briefly at the key, nods at me, and then says, "On your knees, please."

I get down on my knees, slow, because I'm fucking old, and once I'm there, Fraser's cock is right in front of me. I've never tasted cock before, never -- never done any of this. So I lean forward, and I take the head of his cock in my mouth and it is nothing at all like what I thought it would be. It's sweet and salty at the same time, and it's musky; he smells sweaty, but also kind of sour. And he's soft on my tongue, velvety.

Then his hand hits the side of my head, knocks me away.

"Watch it there," I say to him. "I got teeth." And I look up and show him my wolf grin. He rubs his eyebrow with his thumb, walks around me, and cuffs my hands together behind my back, like I'm a perp.

He lifts me up by my upper arms and says, "Behave yourself, please, Ray." Thank you kindly. Then he licks my ear and my knees go all weak. Just like his fucking wolf, with the ear thing.

Fraser frog-marches me around to the couch. His cock keeps hitting me, leaving wet streaks that chill when the air hits them. His fingers bite into my arms, and his body keeps bumping mine, hitting me, mimicking how we walk down the street sometimes, that's what I keep getting flashes of, us walking down the street, knocking into each other, sometimes on purpose and sometimes just because we're walking close -- except we're naked.

Then he pushes me down on the couch, positions me so that his hands are on top of my hands on the top of the couch, and I'm leaning forward, and he's leaning forward over me and he says, "Suck me," and I do, just take him into my mouth.

He don't fit perfectly there, which is funny, because I kinda expected him to -- but I also expected that my first time with Stella was gonna have bells ringing and firecrackers going off, and instead it was wet and messy and kinda embarrassing, and I ended up coming all over her thighs.

I am not gonna come all over Fraser's thighs.

He's got his fingers touching the handcuffs, and touching my hands, and my shoulders hurt, and I'm off balance, and I'm sinking into the couch, which is not fun at all, because the deeper into the cushions I sink, the deeper into my mouth he moves. Then his hips twist and he's out, another twist, barely enough time to breathe, and he's back in, further in.

My eyes start to water. "Mrgpghr," I say around his cock, and he shudders, pushes in further, pulls out.

My dick is so hard, the whole front of my boxers is wet. My hips are moving around without my permission. Fraser's fingers are pushing into the cuffs, pushing the metal into my skin, pushing my fingers into the couch.

He pulls out of my mouth.

"Do not come," he says, and I look up at him, feeling -- feeling like Dief wanting a doughnut or something, feeling pathetic, right on the edge, one good stroke and I am doneski. "Don't." Now he's ordering, getting real comfortable in his role.

"I --" I say, and he shakes his head quick, takes one hand off my hands, and points his dick at my face, and I open my mouth.

I'm learning, where to put my tongue, what he likes. His stomach is shaking -- it can't be comfortable, leaning over me like this, but I get it. This is one of the ways he's proving he can handle me -- he can stay like this forever, let me suck his cock forever, never come. Never let me come.

I don't have to do what he tells me -- I can suck him until he comes, I can come all over myself, and then I can push him away and uncuff myself. I can stop this at any time, and I know it, and maybe that's what so fucking hot about it tonight -- I'm choosing to be here.

Yeah, I'm the one getting fucked, but I'm also the one with all the power, and I finally get what Mistress Alisa was trying to teach me and Stella, that it doesn't matter who's on top; it matters what you want.

And I want this.

**

I swallow around Fraser's cock, swallow my spit and his precome and lick the underside of his cock and let my throat open for him to shove into, and I can tell that I am going to be real sore when this is over, but I don't care, because he's moaning, he's making noises I never heard come out of his mouth before -- noises I bet no one else has ever made him make, noises like an animal, like crying and dying.

Then he pulls out and I'm thinking he's going for the money shot, which seems a little too rude, not like something Fraser would be into, but I didn't peg him for exploring his boundaries with handcuffs either -- but he pulls off me and steps back and looks at my face.

"Do you want a safe word?" he says, and my jaw drops.

"Fraser, I want you to fuck me," I say. "I don't give a shit about a safe word. What, you gonna beat me? You gonna hurt me? Damn it, Fraser --"

"For God's sake, Ray! Have some sense!" he says, but his cock is twitching and bobbing, and my shoulders hurt, so I lean forward a little more, and pull my arms off the couch -- shit that hurts, that tingles, that feels real bad. I roll my shoulders, roll them again.

"Turn over," says Fraser harshly, and that's just what I was planning to do -- but even if I wasn't, I would have done it anyway, because he sounds just like I feel. So I do, and he strips off my boxers, letting the elastic get caught around the head of my dick, pulling hard, and he pushes my stomach into the cushions until I am hanging over the back of the couch, all the blood rushing to my head, and -- wet -- shit -- his tongue, all over me, inside me, and I am so fucking glad I took a shower before we went to the club, and he's got me by the hips and I can feel his hair brushing my fingers, and I am going to die, I am going to die, I am melting, I can't even fucking breathe.

And then he walks away, and I lift up my head --

"Stay down," he barks, so I do, and then he comes back. I can hear what he's doing, opening a condom, flipping the top off the lube, but I can't see it, which is making me crazy, so I lift up my head again, and he swats me on the ass, and I wonder if maybe he was lying about not doing that Eric guy, because he's fucking tight at this, knows way more than he let on.

My ass is tingling, and his fingers are moving over me, real slick -- he was fucking prepared, so if he wasn't gonna fuck me tonight, he was gonna fuck someone, and I don't want to think about that, I do not wanna think what that means -- and then he's got his fingers inside me, and his mouth on my neck.

Fuck, I haven't even got to kiss him yet.

I'm rubbing my cock against the couch -- fuck the upholstery -- and he's got his stomach pressed against my fingers. He grabs me, holds my dick right at the base, makes me stop moving, and pushes in, fucking wide as hell and I am gonna split apart.

I know that if I keep breathing, if I keep loose, it'll be okay, but I can't -- I cannot breathe, I cannot move, I cannot stay still --

Every time he moves, it feels like I'm going to die, but then it gets better, and his fingers get looser around my cock -- and then every time he moves, he shoves me forward, and I slide through his fingers, and then back again, through his fingers again, forward again -- and I realize he's talking to me, and I strain to focus, I gotta know what he's saying.

He's saying, "Ray, Ray, Ray, Ray, Ray, Ray --" Just my name, over and over again, chanting in my ear, and I start saying his name, but it sounds wrong, sits bad on my tongue, and he's going faster and faster, and I say, "Fr --"

And he says, "Ben," and then I say, "Ben," and then he puts his teeth in my throat and changes his angle, just a little, and I am fucking whiting out from the pleasure, I can't fucking see shit, and he's saying, "Come, come, come," so I do, all over his hand and my couch, and he's still fucking me, this guy has got unhuman stamina, which I shoulda guessed.

"God, Fr -- Ben -- " I gasp out. "Fucking come already." I twist my head as much as I can, my shoulders are fucking going, and my wrists hurt like a motherfucker, even over the pleasure Ben's pushing through me with every thrust in, and he takes one hand and twists me back, but I twist against him and he's the one off balance, and I push back as he pushes forward and I get his mouth on mine, just a slide, slippery, sweat, but it's a moment, and then another moment, and then he's coming, groaning in my mouth, pushing down on me as every fucking muscle in his body gives out -- and I know that's what's happening because as soon as he stops fucking me, my body gives out too, everything hurting, all my overused muscles screaming out, and I flop back down across the back of the couch.

My dick fucking aches with being chafed against the upholstery, my shoulders are about popping out of the joint, and I still can't breathe. And all the blood in my head is giving me a fucking headache.

Fraser moves off me and I shiver, and I think that nothing is ever gonna be the same again, but I'm not sure I care.

I didn't know my body could do that. Don't you get too old at some point?

He comes back -- I hear him, but my eyes are closed -- and the locks on the handcuffs snick open. He rubs my wrists, gently, around the marks I know the handcuffs had to have left, rubs up to my shoulders, back down again. My fingers tingle, my arms tingle, I'm sore, but I feel good -- fucked out, used up, the best kind of tired. I sigh a little.

"Ah, Ray," he says. "Ray." His voice is hoarse, he sounds kinda tired. I turn my head a little, sigh and yawn. I am fucked out. Then I open my eyes and see Fraser staring at me, and realize he is freaked out.

"Fraser," I say. "Ben."

"Ray," he says again, and his hand reaches out. My hands are still behind my back, stuck there for all fucking time. I move my arm, real slow, and grab his hand, pull myself up. The couch is wet and cold and clammy and disgusting. Fraser is perched real careful on the cushion next to me.

"Fraser," I say, and I sigh, bring my other arm around, rub my wrists. They're not as bad as I was expecting -- a little red, a little bruised, but no actual places where skin rubbed off. My arms ain't so bad -- he didn't push them too hard, didn't cuff them too tight. I roll my shoulders around, roll my neck, yawn.

I knew I wouldn't need a safe word.

"Ray, I am --"

"Don't tell me you're sorry," I say to him. Mostly because that would spoil it, all the -- all -- everything. "I ain't sorry, Fraser. I gotta tell you, this is the best Friday night I've had in a long time."

He licks his lip.

"And," I continue, "now I just wanna go to sleep." I wince as I ease off the couch -- I am gonna feel this for a long time. My ass is fucking sore, my shoulders, my wrists, my neck, my stomach -- everything.

"Of course," he says, instantly standing. How does he have the energy for that shit? I'm moving like I'm eighty years old. He's moving like he just woke up from a refreshing nap.

I am never gonna understand this guy.

He walks over to his clothes and shakes out his boxers, and I open my mouth.

"Fraser -- Fraser, no, that -- I didn't mean that." I get up, and move toward him. Okay, I can do this -- he can handcuff me and make me suck his cock until I'm gonna come without anyone touching me, and then I can be in charge after, make him sleep with me and shower with me and kiss me, goddamnit.

Fraser stares at me, and he's fucking scared, he's got that buttoned-up Mountie look on his face, the one he had when he saw me for the first time and thought he was going crazy because I wasn't Ray Vecchio but everyone said I was. Like he's got problems with reality, serious problems, like he can't figure out what's going on. He don't do well when he can't be perfect and solve everything, and he is not gonna be able to solve this, I see it. Maybe he never thought he could be so rough, or he didn't really think he'd like it, or he didn't know that somewhere inside him was a guy who wants to wear a pink feather boa and sing along to Barry Manilow -- although that I seriously doubt --

"Come on," I say, and I hold out my hand, and maybe that's what does it. Fraser puts down his shorts, and comes closer to me, and I grab his hand and jerk him to me, and put my mouth right on his. Okay, maybe my aim could use a little work, but I got it, mostly. I've always been a good kisser, always liked it. Kissing ain't just a prelude to sex, I don't think -- it's a way of getting closer, and I can't think of anyone I'd rather get closer to than Fraser.

And after a moment, he kisses me back, brings his hands up to my head and pushes his fingers through my hair, so I do the same to him, twist his hair into my fingers, pull a little too hard, and he moans and bites my lip, so I bite him back, and I start walking us backwards toward my bedroom, dig my fingers into his head and suck on his tongue.

**

We don't do anything in bed -- I can't, even though I kinda want to; I am spent, totally, and he looks exhausted himself. And not at all like a guy who might freak out because he just made intimate with his partner, mixed business with pleasure, offended the gods of the caribou. I mean, with Fraser you never know, which makes it hard, but I think I've got it, mostly. And he's relaxed against me, and I'm relaxed against him.

His body is fucking incredible, almost all muscle, and I feel pathetic next to him. But he keeps running his fingers over my skin, scratching me, petting me. I arch into his touch, and we kiss for a long time, what seems like hours. But according to my alarm clock, it's only been minutes, like fifteen or twenty.

Fraser likes to lick. I guess I knew that, but I never put it together with what he'd be like in bed, and now I know for sure. That licking thing is freaky, but when his tongue is darting over my mouth and ears (him and that wolf, they both got a thing for the ears), it don't seem so bad.

I run my fingers over him, too. He's got a lot of scars, rough skin, imperfections. We're a fucking matched set. I run my fingers through his hair, make it stand on end. Then it just falls back down to lay against his head. He laughs at me, and I nip at his mouth, and he takes a sharp breath.

We keep kissing, our bodies pressed against each other -- him almost hairless and me kinda hairy; him all muscle and me kinda skinny; him all licking and sucking and barely-there touches and me trying to get as close as possible. We fit together just right, Mr Instinct and Mr Logic, partners, buddies, a fucking duet -- but when I think it now, it sounds way more girly than when Fraser and I first met. But I don't care, not really, because it's better than nice, it's the bestest, it's greatness, and I figure that I can kiss him forever and we can worry about the rest of the world after that.

**

I'm half asleep when he turns his head a little and says, "Ray, the mating rituals of the homosexual Chicago male are --" and I swat him on the thigh, and close my eyes.