HOLD THAT THOUGHT

By McJude

July 27, 2003

Fandom: Hercules

Pairing: Hercules/Iolaus

This tiny bit of drabble came to me this morning. It could be fleshed out (maybe not the best word for it - ay?"), but it has a certain charm in its simplicity.

HOLD THAT THOUGHT

By McJude

July 27, 2003

I have often been chided for my love of sleeping late.

He questions my desire for a few more minutes on the hard ground saying that they produce nothing but MORE stiffness. He is an early riser with a regimen of exercises and an inexplicable desire to run nowhere on a day when we will travel miles on foot. I guess that is his god-side; my human side usually opts for more stiffness.

So this morning when I awake first, in the first traces of dawn or the last vestiges of night, I am surprised to see that he is still asleep.

Other than the strand of his long hair that has fallen in his mouth, he looks totally at peace with the world oblivious to the fact that he is sleeping on his back with only his carry sack as a pillow. I scratch a new insect bite on my exposed stomach and wonder why these pests never bother him.

I watch his long lashes flutter and his head turn toward me.

I am very sensitive to his motions, learning to read them as a child learns to read the basics of our written language and then memorizing and evaluating them with the expertise of an academic. Usually I like what they say, especially on mornings like this.

He slowly, not overtly, raises his left arm from his body to create a space between the arm and his body.

That space is for me.

I know it and feel a shudder of delight that is impossible to explain. I scoot across the space between us, thankful that it is grass and not stones, to position myself in this void.

Still without opening his eyes, he shrugs his right shoulder.

Almost involuntarily, my right hand goes there. I am curled against him, my groin against his hip, separated by layers of leather.

In this position, I can feel rather than see the messages his body is sending me. The usual next step is to curl my left leg up and over his body where we often fall back to sleep intertwined. It is most desirable in the cold winter months, less so in the summer when our bodies generate their own heat to blend with that of the day.

I lift my leg to begin the swing, my mind contemplating if I should continue the motion and plant a soft good morning kiss on his lips, when it happens.

The sound carries in the silence of the morning. We seem to over-slept the cicadas and woken before the birds.

A toot, a honk . . . somebody step on a duck? His eyes pop open and he stares at me with unmoving eyes.

"Thanks, Iolaus."

"Sorry, Herc. It’s just my body in the . . ."

"Does that mean you have to go to the bushes?"

"Nah, I can wait . . ."

My left hand has moved lower from the shoulder, moving across the soft chamois of his vest to the hard woven leather of his pants.

What I find there cannot be taken as a total shock. It is often an innocence by-product of dreams or a need to pee.

I always delight in its presence and curse the fact that pants made by one’s mother are not only difficult to open but fail to accentuate its presence. My fingers trace its outline and I see his face relax.

I am not a clairvoyant and his mind is probably the most difficult to understand.

My hand stops and rests on the hardness in the front of his trousers. I have often fallen back to sleep in this position only to awaken sleeping on my stomach, lips open in the dust, while he has taken off to face his morning. It is not a pretty sight, but there is no one to see it but him.

"You sure?" I feel the hand that has been wrapped around me inching lower down my back, toward the end of my vest and the tight leather that incases my cheeks. Hot damn!

A quick trip to the bushes, ones with good leaves and perhaps a stream, probably would be in order. A few agonizing minutes while I attempt to rid the product of my last night’s drinking through an outlet which has totally different ideas of its function.

I should have realized when decided to use the pack for a pillow. That is where he keeps his bottle of oil.

There are some days when you don’t mind getting up early.

Some days when regardless of what thugs, monsters and problems come along you are willing to face them bravado.

You are the chosen of a super-hero and some mornings he makes it all worthwhile.

I give his log a quick squeeze and look up at his light blue eyes.

"Hold that thought, Herc.

I will be right back."

McJude

July 27, 2003