Author's Website: http://uk.geocities.com/asylum_girluk/utopia.htm

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As long as I can remember, the slightest sound has woken me; no doubt it's something to do with my upbringing, when to sleep too soundly was to risk death. Whatever the reason, light sleep is now a habit, so it is no surprise to wake suddenly, deep in the night, listening for the echo of the sound which has disturbed me.

Just a voice; a voice which I hear every day. It's a voice which has many different cadences, from loud and aggressive through to the soft almost-whisper which is only ever for me.

I turn my head, trying to track his location by the sound of his voice, and realise that he is in the living room, so I climb, somewhat stiffly, out of bed and make my way over to the door.

He's stretched out on the couch with Diefenbaker half lying across his thighs, and as I watch he pulls on Dief's fur and continues speaking, quietly so that he won't disturb me. I shift into the shadows, aware that I am intruding in some way, but I want to know what he is saying; what it is that he can say to Diefenbaker and yet not to me.

"I dunno, Dief," he says. "Sometimes I just look at him and it hurts to breathe, d'you know what I mean? I don't understand what he's doing with me."

Dief snuffles slightly and moves to lick Ray's hand, making Ray smile.

"Yeah, that's how I am when I'm with him," he says. "I'd roll over and play dead if he asked me. Did you hear what he said to me today?" he pauses and laughs softly. "Oh, well obviously you didn't, sorry about that. He said, and I think I quote it right, `Ray, my friend, life is unpredictable. It cannot be contained or controlled.'"

I'm surprised by just how pompous I must sound. I can't believe that I would ever use a phrase as condescending as `Ray, my friend.'

"I thought he was going to die." Ray's voice pulls me back to the here and now. "When I found him outside Warfield's club, I didn't know what to do. There was so much blood and he looked so ... old, so defeated, and I got...," he stops and sighs, shifting position slightly on the couch.

"I got scared," he whispers. "I look down that tunnel, you know that tunnel where you try and see into the future? I see us, I see him and me, growing old disgracefully together, and then when I saw him lying on the ground, I thought that maybe I'd been wrong. What if I grow old alone? I need him, Dief, I need him like I've never needed anybody in my life, and he just goes ahead and risks his idiot neck for some kind of, I dunno, belief, and he doesn't think, not even for a second, that he might die and leave me alone."

I can't keep silent.

"Ray," I push away from the wall and enter the living room, quickly covering the ground between us. He jumps, but doesn't move, and so I kneel at his side, one hand stroking his face, loving the rasp of the ever-present stubble.

"Hey," he says, those incredible eyes of his dilated in the darkness of the room. "Thought you were asleep."

"I was," I whisper, putting my other hand on his chest so that I can feel his heart beat. "I heard you talking and wanted to know that you were okay."

"I'm fine," he says, putting his hand over mine where it rests on his chest. "Just a little bit freaked out, that's all."

"Because of Warfield?" I ask, and he nods.

"I thought I was gonna lose you," he says softly, and looks as if he wants to say more, but doesn't know how.

I look down at our hands and see that our fingers have intertwined automatically, and I lift my hand up, bringing his with it, holding it against my lips.

"I can't promise that nothing will ever happen," I say, "But I do promise you this, Ray Kowalski; you will never lose me. More than that I can't say."

"More than that I can't ask," he says, half-smiling. Then his expression changes and becomes very serious. "I'm sorry," he says.

"Why?" I ask. "What could you possibly have to be sorry about?"

"I should have listened to you today," he says, rubbing one of his fingers against my lips. "I should have realised that you wouldn't give in to somebody like Warfield."

"Even after both you and the Lieutenant told me that what I was doing was pointless?" I ask.

"Yeah, especially then," he replies, sliding his finger into my mouth. "'Cos you believe in people, don'tcha? You believe that there's good in everybody." He pauses. "It scares me sometimes, y'know? Because that belief is gonna get you into a lot of trouble. A lot more trouble," he amends.

My tongue being occupied with Ray's finger, I don't answer, but reaching down I push Dief away and climb onto the sofa, half beside Ray, half on top of him. He's got a blanket around him and I push it away with one hand, knowing he will be naked underneath it. He is. Gloriously and wonderfully naked.

He pulls his finger out of my mouth and puts both arms around me, pulling me so that I am completely on top of him. His strong fingers begin to search out my bruises, trying to knead the tension away, and I rest my face in the crook of his neck, relaxing under his ministrations.

"You feel cold," he whispers, his hands stroking down my back. "Are you?"

"No," I shake my head. "I'm good." I feel him smile as I use one of his favourite phrases and I raise my head so that I can look at him. He looks back at me and neither of us speaks, but I feel him tremble.

"What about you?" I ask. "Are you cold?"

He doesn't answer, but I reach down to the floor and wrestle the blanket from Dief's determined grip, pulling it so that it covers both of us. When I stop my fussing I look back and find my mouth captured in a long, leisurely kiss, and I happily give myself up to the sensation. It's a thing Ray has taught me during our short time together; not to analyse everything, but simply to enjoy the feeling.

It's impossible to sort through all the feelings he engenders in me anyway; on the rare occasions I have tried I get bogged down trying to find the right words; love, possession, lust, frustration, amusement... so many words; so many feelings.

Ray breaks the kiss and smiles lazily at me, and I feel myself smiling back.

"Do you wanna fool around?" he asks. "'Cos, you know, I'm real happy to help you along, but I don't think you can actually move can you?" He shifts slightly underneath me and his smile grows into a grin. "Of course, the part that actually needs to move is doing that all by itself, so you just give the word..."

I laugh quietly and move my hips experimentally. It hurts, but not much, and it does have the bonus of causing my growing erection to brush against Ray's hardening cock, making him flinch and move his hips in an almost involuntary thrust.

"Fooling around's fun," I say, "But for a while do you think we could just ... what's the American word ... make out?"

"Oh, making out's good too," replies Ray, and reaches up to kiss me again.

For what seems to be a long time, we kiss, sometimes hard and deep, and at other times just teasing each other with the lightest of butterfly kisses. I have Ray's face cupped in my hands and he, being who and what he is, cannot stop his hands roaming over my body, teasing and playing as they go.

"S'nice," he says when we finally break apart, and I nod, settling my head back in the crook of his neck. His arms come around me, holding me close and I feel the lightest of kisses against my temple. "You're tired," he says softly, squeezing when I take a breath to deny it. "You sleep. I've got your back."

I find myself lulled by the gentle movement of his hands on my body, the occasional brush of his lips against my temple or my hair and, more tired than I realise, I begin to fall back to sleep, aware, in a small part of my mind, that if we stay like this for the rest of the night, Ray will be as sore as I am.

Softly, from a great distance, I hear Ray's voice.

"You'll never lose me, either."

The End