It's warm in here...hot even.

The sound of the wind and the sound of breathing are the only sounds you can really 'hear'. It doesn't mean that these are the only sounds filling the space. It's just that the rest of the sounds have blurred themselves with other things. They aren't just sounds anymore, having become mixed with feelings...impressions. The slight scratching sounds from fingernails scraping against sheets as he tries to find something to hold on to is being mixed up with the feeling of the soft material against his fingertips. The sound of lips brushing against skin and the sound of a breath floating its way through the fine hairs at the nape of his neck are no longer distinguishable from the heat and the wet...

...the incredible heat that flows out of one and slides over the other.

If he were to open his eyes right now he's sure that he wouldn't be able to see a thing. It's on account of the same problem he's having with hearing anything other than their breathing and the wind. Everything is getting all mixed up and he's sure that the things he knows in his mind are there would appear nonsensical given the place he's in right now.

...In any event, he doesn't need to see this to know.

He's moving his face across the pillow now and now he can 'hear' something a little more than he can feel it. He can hear morning stubble travelling across the material of the pillowcase and he realizes now that he can 'hear' this because for a millisecond or two this sound was louder than all the others were.

A millisecond or two and then it was gone. It had fallen back into the blur and all he could hear again was his breathing and the breathing that echoed his own.

He can feel the strong muscle of a thigh behind his own and he can feel a hand tracing across his side. Now he can feel heat on his hip and a little pressure follows the heat.

Justin's hand is hot and he's holding him...Tight.

He pushes up to rest his weight on his forearms and the other man follows him. Just above him and just behind him, Justin is matching his movements. He's been matching his every movement for the last little while. Breathing with him, moaning with him, losing control with him...losing what little control they had to begin with.

He'd made things a little harder for Justin by moving to rest his weight on his forearms so he eases his chest back down against the mattress. He's folded one arm across his stomach and the other arm and hand are still making that 'unheard' scratching sound as his fingernails try to gain purchase in the fabric of the sheets. Minute passes over minute and then blurs into the next...and then something else starts to happen to them. Stroke for stroke it starts to happen to Brian first and then to Justin. Things are starting to get compressed again...first sound became compressed with feeling and then sight became compressed with feeling and now feeling is becoming compressed with...

Brian moans a little and then Justin answers him. He's dropped a hand to find Brian's hand under the pillow by their heads and now a flattened palm is meeting and merging with Brian's knuckles. They're not looking and it's dark under the pillow so they can't see...but both sets of knuckles, Brian's and Justin's are pale from the pressure. They're both holding on so. Tightly. Tight.

Feelings are becoming compressed with...heat. Every feeling and every sensation is being compressed into one sense of the heat. Brian pushes back into it and Justin presses forward to meet it. Both sets of closed eyes, both sets of choked expressions, both sets of tightly clenched fists and both sets of flushed lips give testament to the rising temperature in this space.

The wind picks up a little outside and the leaves voice their concern. You'd almost think they'd been heard and obeyed because the air settles to a near calm in the seconds after the rustling complaints. It's still cool outside but it's hotter in here than it was since that last rustling had begun.

Brian moves again and this time Justin isn't following. If you'd been paying attention when it happened you would have noticed it too. This time Justin didn't have to follow the other man's lead because he'd heard the command as well. He understood the messages that had been driving them all along. This time Brian moved and Justin moved with him...in unison.

Brian's fighting the urge to sit up on his forearms again. He needs to get a break from the heat of the mattress. He feels choked with it but he feels cold in the instant that his chest leaves the sheets beneath him. He's burning in the glow of something but any movement will bring on a cold that he doesn't want to feel. He thinks that Justin feels it too. He'd seemed uncomfortable when Brian had tried to sit up before and now Brian decides that it wasn't the change of position that Justin didn't appreciate, it had been he cold.

'Fuck,' Brian manages a conscious thought and he decides that he feels high. The things he sees before half-opened eyes and the things he's thinking are senseless. These are the kinds of thoughts that only make sense to him when he's high. His body feels like he's ingested E through K of his pharmacologist's repertoire, but he's not high. Aside from a little of the hair of the dog that bit him, he's not drunk. He's lucid and he's telling the honest to God truth when he says he's swinging between feeling like he's being incinerated and feeling ice cold when he tries to do anything about it.

Dropping face first into the pillows again, the heat washes over him. Justin calls his name and he hears himself answer it. He feels the heat drilling a tunnel inside him and he's calling for it to go deeper. He's burning and drowning and he's not fighting it. He's calling for it to happen. Calling for it to happen faster. There are fingers crawling across his ribs towards his waist and he knows what they want him to do. He doesn't sit up completely, he only moves ever so slightly so that they can continue their journey lower. That heat that has been drilling into him is overcome with this new sensation as these fingers reach the end of their route.

Justin's hand is hot and he's holding him...Tight.

He rolls his face against the pillows again and lets his lips part. His jaw seems to have lost the ability to tighten itself as nearly every muscle in his body relaxes...and...for every ounce of relaxation he feels, the heat continues to build. It streaks across his skin as Justin's hips make contact with him on each descent, on each thrust.

"Definitely...high," Brian breathes these words against the sweat-soaked sheets. He has no other explanation for what's happening to him and this announcement falls on Justin's deaf ears. Brian's words having become unintelligible to Justin because for now, words don't belong to any language that he understands.

Justin opens his mouth to the taste of sweat on Brian's shoulder. He opens his eyes and he can see Brian's face... can glimpse something of what there is to see about him now. Justin doesn't own any words to describe what he sees and he has only seconds to see before the heat claims him again.

They haven't been here before. They haven't known how to get here before and yet here they are. They're here now and it's a wonder that they'll be able to find their way back.

Brian closes his eyes tight as Justin squeezes him. Justin closes his eyes tight and Brian squeezes him...and...

...Outside in the wind the leaves are talking again. They're louder now and they're more demanding. They sense that something is about to happen and they shout warnings to the two men. They shout warnings and they listen as the heat and the breathing give way to some other sound. This new sound speaks of pleasure and need and desperation and desire and pain and urgency and recklessness and fire and oblivion. The sound speaks of a tightrope between consciousness and unconsciousness. It speaks of the tightrope between biting your cheeks to keep from yelling and screaming release. The rustling gets louder and the breathing is getting louder and with each cool draft outside and each moist breath between them, the heat continues to build.

He can feel Justin kissing the side of his face and he turns toward the sensation. Their hands are still clamped together under the pillow and Brian feels Justin's fingers stretch and close over his own again. Justin pushes against him...into him...and the heat explodes before his closed eyes. He sinks his teeth into the pillow to keep back the sound because he's remembering something that he told Justin five lifetimes ago. He's remembering his ten-cent explanation for the pleasure and the pain of this. He'd told Justin that the pain was a part of it...a part of the pleasure and he hadn't lied. For every push Brian feels an equally powerful pull, for every feather light touch he feels the sting and for every sting he feels ecstasy. He's biting his cheeks to keep from crying out and biting down the edge of his release. He doesn't want to say the words that will make Justin end this because he doesn't want to admit this torture and he doesn't really want it to end.

He's smiling now but he's too far gone to notice and too far gone to care.

The rustling from the wind outside has made its way inside this room and Brian finally recognizes it for what it is. Justin is whispering to him...whispering something to him...making him hear something. He's saying it over and over again and Brian draws the sound in. He can feel the sweat on his back and he can feel Justin's weight against him. He can hear the words teasing against the skin of his neck. Feel them being washed over his shoulders, feels them tracing their way back up towards his ear. He wants something. He wants Brian to hear him...he wants Brian to lie there and hear him say something. He doesn't want Brian to refute the claim, he doesn't want him to respond with a bullshit answer, and he doesn't want him to pretend not to hear. He wants Brian to hear his confession, so he says it over and over again.

They hadn't been here before and yet here they are. He's already given more than he thought there was. He swears that there's nothing else. He's sure of it. He didn't lie to himself when Justin pointed out the fact that there wasn't anything that he wouldn't do for him. He hadn't tried to refute that claim, not really. He is giving and has given everything.

Biting his cheeks isn't working anymore and now Justin's whispered words are starting to run together into a mantra. He's starting to sound choked and dry and now Brian can only feel the words against the skin on the back of his neck...he can't hear them any more. He can't hear them because Justin's voice has dropped below a whisper and he can't hear them because his own heartbeat has risen to overpower the sound of the wind and the sound of his own breathing.

...But he doesn't need to hear what Justin is saying in order to 'hear' him. He doesn't need to hear Justin's sentences anymore because he could recite them verbatim even in this altered state. He opens his mouth to the sheets again and wills himself not to cry out. Not to give in just yet. He's trying to move. He's already holding one of Justin's hands and he wants to find the other one. His hand under the pillow spreads its fingers to a renewed invasion and the hand that had been pressed between his body and the bed sheets moves lower. He shudders slightly. Control wearing thin. Justin's hand is hot...has always been hot...is holding him tight...has always been holding him tight...and his own hand closes over top of Justin's.

Whispers and rustling and breathing and pounding and touch and pleasure and heat. He meets them all as his hand closes over top of Justin's. He opens his eyes, tries to find Justin behind him and finding blue eyes, he lets it all escape from him. He's not biting his cheeks anymore and everything flows out of him, into him. He can feel the heat of Justin's lips by his ear now and he can feel the other man pulling him up. It's time to finish this and Justin has heard and accepted his cue. He's pulled back and he waits as Brian gets to his elbows and then pushes up on flattened hands and then bent knees. He's waiting motionless, trying not to breathe too hard and trying not to think too hard.

He's waiting until Brian tells him it's time...to finish.

Slowly. Slowly. Slowly.

Justin moans and Brian closes his eyes. He is giving and has given everything.

Neither of them can breathe and neither of them cares. There are no finites for Justin when it comes to Brian. The same is true for Brian when it comes to Justin. There are no confirmed wins or losses. There is nothing lost or gained. There isn't anything given that isn't given back tenfold. Pleasure and need and desperation and desire and pain and urgency and recklessness and fire and oblivion. In this moment these are no longer singular states.

Brian can feel Justin's weight draped over him. He can feel his heat inside. He can feel his own pulse and he can feel the echo from Justin's. There wasn't much more that either of them could have taken and Justin is the first to go. He's the first to lose his footing and now Brian is following him. Brian calls out Justin's name and he'll swear that that's all he said. He'll swear that's all he said, but Justin knows different.

Brian has heard everything that Justin whispered to him and now he answers Justin by telling him words that he's only ever told him once before. Words that in the freedom of release, he's given over to Justin only once before...

Hands and kisses and sweat and breaths...

.... Now the wind is calming again...the rustling is still there...blue eyes meet indescribable eyes...there's no sound but the rustling and their quiet breathing...it sounds a little like they're whispering things to each other...maybe secrets or maybe common knowledge. You'd have to learn their language to understand.