Trial Run

By Inca

Eleven

Angel lay on the mattress in the back of the van-car, sweating all over. Will knelt over him, face tense, a steth-scope against his chest. His stomach felt all twisted and he missed something, wanted something with every part of him, but he didn't know what. He groaned, leaking a little.

Will rocked back. "It's withdrawal. From whatever libido dampening drugs they had him on." Will smiled down at him, though he spoke to the rest of the vehicle. "His body has to work the rest of it out, and he'll be good."

"Why isn't Three affected?" Gunn asked from the seats in the front.

"Because Three wasn't on them for years. He was given them periodically, not long enough to build up a reliance on them," Phil said, sitting down and pushing a red glass stick into Angel's mouth. "Hold this under your tongue."

"Can we get him better... faster?" Fred asked, jumping a little as the van-car went over something on the road.

"With anything short of a blood transfusion? No," Phil replied, pulling the stick out and looking at it. "He has a temperature, but it's not terrible."

Will knelt down and ripped through one of the bags pulling out a little rectangle. The rectangle opened to sow a shiny sheet with white pills in it.

"Headache relief," he said as he pulled Angel's hot body into a sitting position. "You know how to take pills?"

He nodded, the movement making his brain swirl. Will gave him two of the pills and a bottle of water. He swallowed them down and lay back on the mattress, feeling sticky with sweat all over. He closed his eyes and relaxed a little as Will's finger combed through his hair.

"Should we stop?" Fred asked.

"Do you want to stop again, Angel?" Will asked him quietly.

They'd been stopping all day, ever since he'd woken up in the new motel room all sweaty and blistering. He'd been feeling a bit sick the day before but nothing this bad. He shook his head. He didn't want to stop again. "Juice?"

"Sure. You can have juice," Will said with a little smile. He pulled out the bottle and cracked the lid off, giving it to him.

He struggled to sit upright; his arms felt shaky, but the sweet of the orange juice helped. He finished it and lay back down.

"We're almost there, Angel. It'll be better for you when we settle," Will murmured, lower than anyone else could hear.

Fred and Philip settled down to play cards in the back, sitting on bags. Angel lay on the bed and sweated and Will sat on the mattress next to him for a long time. Angel felt like he was drifting in and out of sleep, and he felt Will feel his forehead a few times.

He felt hot. And swimmy, like his brain was floating. Everything seemed too sharp for his eyes, the lines of the van-car too straight and too close. Will's hand felt cool against his forearm and he kept blinking awake without ever realizing he had slept. His stomach was twisted, and felt full of sharp teeth.

"When will it stop?" he asked, his voice raspy and quiet in his throat.

"Soon, Angel. Your body is just working the bad stuff out."

He closed his eyes again, feeling the hot air all around him suddenly changing to cool. He pulled the blanket up over him and sprawled over the pillows. He couldn't get comfortable. He wanted to leak.

"We've reached Salem!" Gunn called out in excitement.

The van was suddenly filled with chatter, Fred's voice getting louder and louder throughout the talking. Angel groaned, the voices chipping at the inside of his head. He heard Will go around and 'shush' everyone, telling them to be quiet.

The talking fell to a murmur. Angel closed his eyes and felt like his body was filled with lead, pulling him through the mattress and out the other side.

---

Angel looked around. He was back in the four-part world. He looked towards the silver door but it wasn't there. It was just a black wall. He put his hands up to it and it was burning hot, solid burning soup. He pulled his hands away.

"You've been bad."

He spun around to see Father standing near his rose, which was all wilted and brown.

Dead.

Father tapped his cane on the ground. "Bad."

Angel shook his head. "No."

"I need your skin for checks," he said calmly, even though to Angel the entire world felt like it was being squeezed through a bottle opening.

Angel looked down to his bare body, seeing the skin from his arms starting to fall off in long strips. He felt hot. So hot. Father clicked over and took the skin from him, putting it into a jar where it writhed and wriggled like it was still alive.

He turned and Angel collapsed to the floor, feeling weak, blood pouring out from his arms. "Father... I feel-"

Father turned around, holding a huge needle in his hand.

Angel shook his head. "Not that... it hurts," he said, his voice high and scared.

"I need marrow for checks."

"Will said-"

Father stabbed him with the needle, in his hipbone, and he shut up.

---

"Angel."

He panted, shivering and leaking. Dark. Dark. Where was Father?

"Angel," Will's voice said. He saw a shadowy Will bend over him. "We're here."

He sat up, feeling sick. He checked his arms to make sure he wasn't bleeding. Just a dream. A dream. He was still shaking.

"Do you want to see the house?" Will asked. "You have your own room, a man named Oz has been here setting it up. He's going to live close, he's here now. Three is talking to him in the house."

The house?

A vision of Father came back up in his mind, saying he'd been bad and holding the huge marrow needle up, big enough to suck him inside out, until he was nothing but skin and empty bones.

He started leaking loudly and Will immediately wrapped him up in his arms.

"Shh, shh, it's okay, you don't have to come out right away."

"Bad dream," he whispered.

"It's okay. It's fine. It's probably because you're sick. Don't worry about it. It can't hurt you now."

"It was Father."

Will was silent.

"He was scared-making. I don't want checks anymore," he said, holding onto Will's arm tightly.

"No, no checks anymore. I promise." He paused. "Um, if you have to go to a doctor you might get a few checks, but they won't be bad."

"I like my skin."

Will curled around him tightly. "You're so hot," he said softly. "Do you have a headache?"

"My brain hurts."

"Okay, everything is inside now. We unpacked while you were sleeping."

Angel nodded a little, trying not to upset his head.

"Do you want me to bring it out here, or do you want to go inside?"

The van-car was damp smelling, like sweat. It was hot. "Inside."

"Okay, come on," he stood, helping Angel up.

Angel realized Will was wearing a coat. "Are you cold?" he asked.

"It's cold outside, Angel." He picked up the coat Gunn had given him and helped him into it. "It's warmer inside."

They opened the door and it was night. A frozen wind blew over him and his teeth chattered. "Cold!" he cried.

"Yep. Cold indeed." Will looked down and rolled his eyes. "And you're not wearing shoes." He pulled Angel out of the van-car and onto the thick snap-grass. They stood in front of a big brown building that looked like it was made of wood. Big trees surounded the building. A gray rectangle on the roof was smoking.

Angel's teeth chattered.

"Come on, you're going to catch cold," Will said, pulling him across the grass.

They ran up the steps and Will opened the door for him, pushing him inside. It was warmer. His icy toes started to melt warm.

Fred wandered past and smiled at him. "Hey sleepy head! We missed you."

"Miss," he repeated as he watched Will hang his coat up. The inside of the building was wood too. There were those... things he'd seen. Little flat bits rising up to another set of doors.

"What are they?"

"Stairs," Will said, taking a bottle of water from one of the bags slumped around the door and handing it to him. "Drink and I'll show you around."

Angel took the bottle and gulped it down, along with the pills Will gave him. He felt strange, but not sick anymore. He still wanted to sleep. He couldn't think properly.

"This is a dining room, where you eat." He pointed to a wide room with a big table and chairs and not much else.

"Just me?"

"Well, anyone."

They walked down a thin room and turned. "This is a bedroom," he said, opening a door. "Fred's actually."

He looked inside to see a few bookshelves and a big soft bed with blue sheets. They backed out and turned. "Cupboard," he said, pointing to a door in the side of the stairs. They walked into a white-box filled room and Will announced, "This is the kitchen."

There was a big wood table. "Why is everything made of wood?"

"Because we're in an old sort of house."

They walked through a door and into a big wide room that had a big see-through glass on the wall.

"This is the living room, where Gunn and Alex are getting re-acquainted with an old friend," Philip said from one of the big chairs, looking up from his book. There were so many books in this house. Angel wondered if he'd read any of them.

He looked to a long chair where Gunn and Alex were sitting in front of a colourful box.

"Television, Angel." Gunn looked over the back of the chair with a smile. "You'll learn to love it."

Will pointed to a door in the wall over near the kitchen door, saying "Toilet." They walked past it and down another thin hallway and Angel saw another door.

"This is Philip's room, over on the end," Will explained, walking towards it. They looked in to see a long bed pushed up against the wall. Books spilled out of crates and a desk sat under a big glass square in the wall.

They walked back out and a small pale person was standing behind Gunn and Alex. Small, pale - like Fred. "Is that a girl?" Angel asked.

"No," Will said, smiling. "This is Oz."

Oz looked at them. "Hey, Angel ...right?"

Angel nodded, trying to see what was different between this Oz and Fred. Long hair. It must be about hair. "So you are a boy?" Angel said.

Oz nodded. "Last time I checked."

"Okay, upstairs." Will lead him away, his feet making squeaking noises. "The rooms are sort of small, but they'll do. Bathroom and toilet to the left," he said, opening it up. "Sink, shower, bath. This is my room, next to the linen closet." He swung the door open and let Angel walk inside.

It was smaller than Fred's room downstairs, about the same size as Philip's. He had a wood bed and a desk and he also had books in boxes. Clothes were in bags piled against the doors in the wall.

"What are they?"

"Closet. I haven't unpacked yet."

Big window that Will's black-and-white-sheeted bed was pushed against. He followed Will out, back past the bathroom and stairs and to the other side.

"This is Three's room." Will put his knuckles to the door and tapped them against it. "Three? Can Angel see your room?"

The door opened and Three stood there blinking at them. Angel smiled weakly, still feeling a bit sick.

Three's room was bare. He had a bed and a desk and some shelves in the wall. His clothes were folded on the desk and his bed was messy. His glass showed the big trees behind the house. He nodded.

"Thanks, Three." Will closed the door behind them, stepping inside. "Gunn and Alex aren't going to stay with us forever so they have the main bedroom."

He opened a door off of Three's room and entered another with two beds in it, separated by a sheet hanging from the sloping ceiling.

A little bit back from Three's room, closer to the stairs was another door. "Is this my room?"

Will nodded with a little smile. "Go on."

He turned to it, rapped his knuckles against the wood like Will had and opened the door. He stepped inside. His room had two smaller glasses, both in the same wall. He walked in. His room wasn't a square like Will's or Three's, it was shaped like a square with a little extra bit on the side, where his bed was. He walked over to it. His pillows were right under one of the glass squares, the curtains pulled aside. He could see the van-car, and some of the road, but mostly more trees.

He turned to see Will watching him. "Here." He opened the closet and Angel saw two pairs of his jeans and his shirts hanging up. "I unpacked for you; you don't have much."

His drawing book was sitting on the desk under the other window. He walked over to the desk, realizing there were lots of pencils next to his drawing pad. And another strange book.

"Yeah, I got those for you," Will said behind him. "Um, just 'cause... you don't have any right now."

Angel picked a pencil up and drew a line on the book. He turned and smiled at Will.

"Do you like them?"

"Yes." He nodded. "It makes me feel less sick."

"Good."

Angel picked up the strange flat book, opening it up. White pages.

"That's a sketch book. Just in case yours… fills up." Angel smiled again, liking it. He picked a different pencil up and drew a jagged line on the first page. Then he wrote his name. He turned around. He had a bookshelf too. A shiny flat book sat on it. "What's this?" he asked, picking it up.

"Art book. That's what... famous artists have created." He cleared his throat. "It's old. I bought it for you a while ago... I wanted to give it to you in the four part world, so there's probably better ones out now."

Angel frowned at the sentence, but he wasn't really listening anyway. He opened the book and the pages were shiny and smooth.

"These are just pictures of the art, not the actual paintings themselves," Will said.

They were... beautiful. So many colours. People in the pictures, women and men and small people. Furry things. Water. Plants.

"It's so beautiful." Angel said, overwhelmed.

"I'm glad you like it."

Angel looked through the book as Will watched him, settling down onto the soft light brown carpet.

"Do you want dinner?" Will asked after a long time.

"No." He shook his head, still feeling sick.

"You haven't eaten since breakfast yesterday."

"I'm not hungry."

"Please?"

Angel looked up at him.

"Something light?" Will pressed. "Come on. You have to eat something."

Angel nodded, standing up a little dizzily. "I don't feel as sick anymore."

"That's good. There was nothing too addictive in the drugs. I think your body just got confused."

"I don't understand that." Angel followed Will down the stairs, book tight under his arm.

"Oh, don't worry." He smiled. "It's late."

"Where did everybody go?" The downstairs was all dark.

"It's one in the morning." Will grinned. "You don't know how long you were looking at that book, do you?"

He shook his head and Will smiled wider. "I'll get you crackers. You can eat crackers, can't you?"

Angel nodded, not actually knowing what crackers were.

Will flicked the light on somehow and turned to a closet, bringing a box out. "Here. Can I put tomato on it?"

"Yes."

"Will you eat cheese as well?"

"No." His stomach bubbled at the thought of cheese.

"Tomato crackers it is, then."

Angel watched him. It was interesting. Will got out a long silver thing, like a huge knife, and a red thing, and a block of wood. The long scalpel looking thing went through the red thing and Angel could see it was tomato.

"Cook's knife," Will said, holding it up. "Cuts food."

Angel grinned. "Not just skin?"

Will blinked at him. "Uh, no. And on that note, don't cut yourself. In fact, get someone else to cut things for you for a while."

"I had knives," he said.

"You had plastic butter knives," Will laughed. "This is painful if you cut yourself."

He put the tomato on brown squares and handed them over. The brown things were crackers and they were crunchy, but nice. His stomach liked it, resisting the food a little but keeping it down.

"Good?"

"Yes."

"Good."

Will watched him munch until the plate was cleared, and then he took it and put it into another white box. He yawned, wide; his eyes clenched shut and his arms stretching up over his head. "I'm knackered, I'm going to bed. You can wake me if anything's wrong. Anything at all, okay?"

Angel nodded, following Will out of the room and up the stairs again. Will left him at the top of the stairs, pausing after he realized Angel wasn't moving.

"What's wrong, Angel?" he whispered.

Angel's stomach felt upset, but he didn't know if it was from the crackers or because he wasn't sure what was happening. He didn't answer, hoping Will would figure something out for him.

Will came back around and held his hand, walking him to his room. They entered it, and it was dark. "I'm just across the hall. This is your room. All yours. Your bed, your desk, your carpet." Still whispering.

He looked around at its unfamiliarity. He didn't know this. At least when they stayed in the motel rooms someone was with him.

"Will you sleep with me tonight?" he whispered back, matching Will's sound.

He felt Will's thumb rubbing against his fingers. It felt good. Nice. "You don't need me to sleep with you. You'll be fine. Nothing's going to happen. Goodnight."

He turned, like he was going to leave him alone in the dark, and Angel grabbed his arm. "It's too dark." he said, his voice high.

"Okay." Will pulled Angel with him, out the door and to his own room. Angel was just getting more comfortable with the idea of staying with Will, when he saw him grab a lamp off the desk and pull him back to his own room. He plugged it in and turned it on, making it less dark.

Will turned and smiled. "I'll be just a few steps down the hall if anything happens."

Angel nodded, standing uncertainly. Will's hands curled around his hips and he heard little smothered laughter as Will pushed him onto the bed. "Goodnight Angel."

"Goodnight."

Will left the room and shut the door. Even though he was gone, it wasn't silent. There was wind outside. There was snoring, movement...life.

He pulled his clothes off and wriggled under the new covers, staring up at the new ceiling for as long as he could, before finally drifting to sleep.


Twelve

Will slipped into the shower, wiping the sleep out of his eyes and rinsing his fingers off under the spray. It was early yet, and over the past week he'd realized if you wanted a shower in the morning you had to get up early on, otherwise all the hot water was out for about four hours or so.

His neck was aching; he must have slept on it wrong.

Angel was still fragile, but he seemed to have gotten past the worst of it. Will had heard him groaning in his room the very first day they'd been in the new house, and had entered to find him in sweat-soaked bed sheets, vomit on his pillow.

Fred and Alex ended up having a big row about whether to take him to the hospital or not, but Angel had felt better after a bath so they'd warily put him back to bed. They'd given him light medication to lower his temperature, but that made him sleepy, so he'd been pretty much bed-ridden the first few days. He had told Will he was gradually feeling better from that time, and his temperature had gone down. He'd been acting pretty normal for the past two days, had a nap in the afternoons when he got too tired. He seemed to want juice a lot, probably for the sugar, to help with cravings.

Phil knew what was in the drugs they had given Angel, and he had assured them all he just needed to work the bloody things from his body.

Will scrubbed quickly, not wanting to steal all the heat and wrapped a towel around himself. When he exited, Fred was already standing in her fluffy yellow bathrobe, waiting by the door.

"Want a hot one this morning?" he asked her with a grin.

"Yes," she replied, her sleepy eyes trying to close, and stepped past him delicately.

Will opened his bedroom door, starting a little when he saw Angel sitting at his desk, looking down at one of the science books he'd acquired for him.

"Good morning Angel. How do you feel?"

"Better" was the reply, and Angel was smiling, already dressed. He put the thermometer under his tongue and then held it out for Will. "See?"

Will looked at it. "Good, I'm glad you feel okay."

"I still want juice."

"Lucky Fred bought so much of it."

"I've been reading," he said, as Will pulled some jeans from the closet and tugged them on under his towel.

"What have you been reading about?"

"Hair follicles."

"One of Phil's books then."

Angel nodded. Will pulled out a black tee from his drawers and shoved it over his head.

"I also read about dogs. And cats. Animals." He paused. "Are there any here?"

"Dogs and cats? People keep them as pets, mostly. You'll see some soon."

"That's what you said about rain."

Will didn't actually remember saying that. "Uh, well, rain's predicted for later this week."

"How do they predict?"

"Well... okay." He grabbed an early science book with big pictures and flicked through the pages. "Basically, and there's more on this for you to read about, when air rises the moisture in the air cools and sticks together. That's rain. If there's not enough moisture, it doesn't rain. If something like a cold front, which is cold air, pushes the moist warm air above it as it blows through, then the moisture rises, condenses and can fall."

Angel looked at the book, sitting back down at the desk and reading it, enthralled.

"Meteorologists can see when those cold fronts are coming, so that's one way of predicting," he said, sitting down on his bed. "You know, scientists think animals can predict weather."

"How?" Angel said, looking up, bright dark eyes fixated on him.

"Well, birds fly lower when a storm is approaching," Will said seriously.

"How do they know? I thought animals weren't as smart as humans."

Will smiled, slipping from the bed and perching on the edge of his desk. "They fly lower because it's probably harder for them to fly higher in the falling air pressure."

"Oh."

"But animals can sense when natural disasters are about to occur. They get agitated before earthquakes and things like that."

"When the Earth shakes?"

"Yes. They feel it before we do. Like a dog can hear things we can't."

Angel smiled, looking back down at his book, his soft hair falling down over his forehead. He looked so open and … and raw. Will reached forward and gently curled most of it behind his ear. Angel glanced up at him, and the obliviousness in his eyes made Will's glance drop to the floor as he stood up.

He rubbed at the tip of his nose and grabbed some socks, pulling them on. He glanced in his mirror catching sight of his mess of hair and palmed some gel over it to make it lie flat.

"So, what do you want to do today?"

"Television."

"You want to watch the cartoons?"

He nodded.

"Okay," Will yawned. "Want breakfast too?"

"Toast."

"Toast with...?"

"Butter."

"You're easy to please." He smiled, heading out the door, then slipped down the stairs and around into the kitchen.

Philip was standing at the stove, heating a pan, already dressed impeccably like it was ten o'clock and not actually before seven in the morning. He turned a little when the door opened.

"Pancakes?"

Will pulled out the toaster. "Will you marry me Philip?" he sighed.

The sizzle of butter in the pan made Will's knees weak as Phil pushed the slices of bread in for Angel. "I'm sorry, I always promised myself I wouldn't settle."

Will laughed and pulled the butter away from the stove. Angel watched him happily, swinging his legs as he sat waiting for his breakfast.

"Why are you up so early?" Phil asked, whisking the batter he'd made, making real-life pancakes, not the sort that came ready in a box. Will started having naughty thoughts about Philip. All of them involved pancake batter.

"Cartoons!" Angel said cheerily.

"Alex will be impressed." Philip smiled to the stove, pouring out some batter into the hot pan. "He's a cartoon connoisseur."

"What's that?"

The toasts popped up and Will buttered them for him, sliding them onto a plate.

"Just someone who knows a lot about something," Phil replied. "Three up?"

"No, I already checked," Angel said blithely as he bit into the toast.

Will pulled out some plates for him and Philip, turning as Philip deftly flicked the first pancake onto the spatula, heading for the bin.

"No!" cried Will, saving it before it reached the trash and shoveling it into his mouth.

Philip smiled at him, amused. "You always throw the first one out. It's a rule."

"A stupid rule." He swallowed down the pancake. "Nice."

"Of course it is."

Will turned around to see Angel had sneaked out into the living room already. A second later the television flicked on, and the sound of channel surfing could be heard.

"Well he likes television, and that's the first step to becoming a real boy," Philip mused, flicking a pancake out for Will to syrup and eat.

Will forked it into his mouth greedily, nodding distractedly. Philip pushed another two onto his plate and Will thanked him, wandering out into the living room to check on Angel. Toast crusts discarded on the plate rested precariously on the cushion next to him, his eyes fixed on the show on the screen. It looked like an old Looney Tunes. Pepe LePew strolled across the screen after Penelope and Will smiled. He remembered this one.

"Pepe."

"What?" Angel said, frowning.

"Pepe. It's his name. He's a skunk. Pepe LePew."

"The other one got paint on it and that one is chasing it."

"Pepe's a skunk. Penelope's a cat. When she gets paint on her, Pepe thinks she's a skunk too."

"Why does it matter?"

Will chuckled at the confident persistence of the cartoon skunk, realizing he hadn't taken in the question. "Huh?"

"Penelope doesn't want to be near him."

"No."

"Why not?"

"Well..." Will gestured at the screen, where a squirming Penelope was trying to slither out of Pepe's embrace. "He's too clingy, obviously."

Angel frowned, obviously not understanding it. The reason Pepe wanted the bloody cat eluded him, Will could tell, and the things the skunk was doing probably seemed strange. "I like the other one better. With the Bugs Bunny. Where he makes the man fall down."

"Everyone loves Bugs," Will said as he attacked the pancake on his plate.

He watched Angel watch the television, smiling when he smiled. It was nice. Sitting with him, something so surreal after so many years.

They'd done it.

They'd freed him.

And he had no idea what had really happened. Will didn't know if he'd ever understand things like that. But Angel was happier, so much happier, and that was all that mattered to Will.

Three liked Philip and Fred, but tended to stay away from everyone else, probably because they were louder, rougher. He stayed in his room; mourning Two quietly, coming down and slipping into a room no one was using and just sitting. Searching around unobtrusively, whereas Angel would just wander in and ask questions about anything he didn't understand, interrupting carelessly.

Philip and Fred had taken Three outside a few times, into the long backyard they had bought along with the house.

Angel was laughing at an old Michigan Frog re-run now, and it was strange to hear that. He'd heard Angel giggle and chuckle and smile over the years but never really laugh, never these deep belly laughs from his stomach.

Will smiled at him, realizing he was staring. Angel didn't care though; he didn't even really seem to be paying attention to anything but the cartoon. Will stood, taking both their plates out into the kitchen where Philip was eating his own pancakes slowly, reading the newspaper as he did.

Another of Angel's chuckles floated through the doors to them and Philip smiled into the paper.

"Thanks again for those pancakes," Will said, rinsing the plates and finding a place for them in the already crowded dishwasher.

He grabbed some powder and poured it in, feeling the dust rise and tickle in his nose.

"Job here for tech support," Philip mused out loud. "I could apply for that. Say I'm fresh out of college."

"Yeah, I'll be your teacher if you want."

"Great."

They'd already doctored up documents for themselves before they came here, even created pasts from birth certificates to social security numbers for Angel and Three under the first names of Fred's childhood cats: Liam and Damien. Two's certificate had been under Marty, and thinking about it gave Will a pang of hollow pity in his chest.

He shook the thoughts from his mind. "Coffee?"

"Please."

He clicked the kettle on as Fred came through the kitchen door, dressed in jeans and a plain pink tee shirt. Her hair was wet, clinging to her head. "What is everyone doing up?" she asked, sitting down at the kitchen table and peering at the front page of the newspaper Philip was perusing.

"We're just morning people," Philip replied carelessly.

"Well, there're remedies for that, I'm sure." Fred hefted herself up and grabbed some bread to slot into the toaster.

A bubble of Angel's loud laughter filtered through the kitchen. "Angel watching cartoons?" she asked, a smile in her voice.

Will pulled out some mugs, flicking coffee granules and sugar into them. "Yep."

He heard Fred's fingernails tapping on the counter as she waited for her toast. He heard her yawn a little and he slid the instant coffee under her nose. She smiled and sipped it.

He placed Philip's coffee in front of him quickly and headed back out to watch more cartoons with Angel.

---

Will slipped back down stairs with his glasses in hand as the heavy hallway clock Oz had put up chimed twice on the hour. It hadn't turned out to be a particularly cool day, but everyone was still wearing jeans and long sleeves, wary of the draughts slipping under the old doors of the house and whipping down the long hallways.

He slid his glasses on and settled into a chair at the kitchen table, able to see Angel outside on the porch, steadily devouring book after book about animals or plants or food or whatever was in the pile he'd stacked into his arms earlier.

The local paper was sort of boring, which… could be taken as a good sign, he supposed. Fred and Philip had already read through the paper, and the comic pages were missing, so Will pored over the job vacancies.

He didn't need a job right away, he had money, and besides he wanted to stay and make sure Angel was alright, but it was nice to see what he could go into. Good to see what was around.

Philip wandered in about twenty minutes later, getting himself a glass of water as he peered out the window at Angel.

"Where's Three?" He asked.

"Upstairs."

Philip was silent for a moment. "Do you think he's handling it okay?"

"I think he misses Two," Will said, turning the page. His eyes flicked up to see Angel again, and then back down to the gray and black print.

"Angel seems to be better."

His eyes flicked back up to Angel who was now holding his hand out in the sunlight, watching his skin warm. "Much better," he said, smiling a little. He looked back down to his paper. "Three needs time. He's lost his only friend."

"I know, but..."

Will waited for him to finish the sentence, but he didn't. Not in the mood to push it, Will let it slide, glancing up at Philip quickly to try to find out what he was thinking. He was unreadable as usual.

"So, lunch?" Fred perked as she came through the door, Gunn following. "Who's thinking hamburgers? 'Cause I'm thinking hamburgers. Big hamburgers. With fries."

"Sounds good," Will said, looking in the local paper. "Seen any places?"

"Yeah. Saw some when we went for a drive the other day."

"I'll just have a sandwich," Philip said, looking in the cupboard. "Don't worry about me."

"I'll have whatever they'll put on it." Will murmured, turning the big page.

"Great," said Fred. "Where's Alex?"

"He's sleeping, but I know what to get him" Gunn replied.

"Okay, so ... you and I... we'll go get the hamburgers then?" Fred inquired hopefully.

"...Yeah." Gunn smiled at her, looking blush-ready.

Will tried to ignore the conversation, only pausing once in his efforts to share an amused look with Philip. "Great. I'm hungry," he cut in.

"Okay, let's go," Fred said, smiling at Gunn as they left the room.

"Meanwhile," Will said blandly, flicking the newspaper page, "they shag like horny bunnies on that mattress we have in the van..."

Philip laughed, pointing at the door before turning back to the cupboard. Will looked at the door and saw Angel coming up to stamp on the mat like Fred had told him. He slid the difficult glass and wood door open over the old creaking runners and slid inside.

"If you leave your books outside, they'll get ruined," Will said, re-reading the same line of jobs for the fifth time. He looked up to see Angel leaning back to guard his books out the window, as if someone was going to run up and rip the pages out.

"They're alright."

"Okay," he said, realizing he used the same tired sing song tone of voice his mother used to use on him when he refused to brush his teeth.

Doubting himself, Angel peered back at the books, weighed up their safety against having to walk back down the porch, and slid the door open jogging down the old wood slats with heavy feet and then jogging back. He stamped on the mat again and slumped the pile of books onto the kitchen table in a messy pile as he slid into the seat next to Will's and peered over his arm at the paper intently.

Will gave up trying to read as Angel suddenly smiled at him hugely.

"I didn't know you had glasses," Angel said in wonder, pulling his glasses off his face.

"Yeah, for reading."

"Will they help me read?" he asked, putting them on upside down.

Will took them back, laughing. "Don't ... you'll hurt your eyes."

"Why?"

"Because the glass is to help my eyes. Your eyes aren't the same."

"Oh."

He looked down at the fingerprints over the glass and wiped them on his shirt, putting them away when he saw Angel watching them interestedly.

"Father never used to let me touch his."

"Well... good," he said.

"They don't have sides. Father's had sides."

"Mine are frameless." He said stiltedly. He felt strange about the comparisons between himself and … his father. He never liked being compared to him.

He smiled a little at Angel who was laxly gazing into his eyes. Angel didn't look away like he usually did, didn't get bored and want to look at something else, or start a new game; he stayed still and calm. Will watched him, waiting to see what would happen, feeling like the walls of the house were falling away from them as Angel smirked a tiny amused smirk, calm and still and looking so much older than he usually did.

Caught in Angel's gaze he couldn't move, could just blink dumbly, feeling his heart start to pump faster as Angel leaned in close, eyes dark with a sudden maturity, a sudden understanding and Will parted his dry lips to whisper a little, "What?"

"You have eyes like Father. Except his are paler." That innocent smile curved his lips, sending ripples through Will's imagined moment of development, but the comparison to his father killed all the interested butterflies in his stomach.

He cleared his throat and straightened the newspaper, frowning down at it. "Blue eyes." He flicked the paper up, making a barrier between himself and Angel.

"Yes. And Three has green eyes. Everyone else has brown." He paused. "Why is that?"

"Has to do with genes."

Angel's hand pushed the paper down, obliviously ripping and crumpling it into wrinkled gray. "Genes like DNA."

"Yes," Will said, sighing at his ruined paper. "I have a book on it, somewhere. It might be a bit difficult to understand right now."

"Why?"

"Words might be too hard. Keep reading these, and we'll get through them all." He gave Angel a weak smile.

Angel nodded happily.

"We're having hamburgers for lunch," Will said standing up, realizing at some point Philip had left the kitchen. Probably when he'd been daydreaming about Angel. "Meat and lettuce and stuff on rolls. You'll like it."

"I didn't like tacos," he said, making a face like he smelled something bad.

"Well you can always have tomato on crackers again." Will shoved the plate into the dishwasher, looking around to see Philip had been cleaning.

"But that's boring," Angel whined, standing up.

"Well you'll just have to get less picky, won't you?"

Angel pouted. "Where's Three?"

"Upstairs."

He left the room, leaving Will to do some pouting of his own. He turned and looked at the empty room, at the books lying on the kitchen table. He knew Three and Angel should be getting close, they'd all expected that.

But...

No. He grabbed some juice out of the fridge. He shouldn't be...

He shook his head in warning. Don't think it, he told himself, pouring himself a glass. Every time they talked it seemed Angel would rather be with Three. But that was good, he needed a friend, and it would be hard for him to make any around here, being so... young. It didn't mean Will wasn't important to him.

He rolled his eyes, slumping into a chair in the empty living room and staring out the big bay window.

Jealous. So jealous. He felt like a dopey teenager with a crush on an older boy, trying not to care about his girlfriend, pining away in secret.

Three and Angel's laughter wafted down the stairs, rubbing salt into his wounds.

---

Will watched the dark ceiling, feeling his toes finally warming up under the blankets. He should wear socks to bed, really.

It was late. Fred and Gunn were still watching some quiet movie downstairs but everyone else had retired to bed. He could hear soft strains of music floating up the stairs, and it was nice. Cozy. To be here with everyone. There was definitely something happening with Fred and Gunn. He should start a betting pool; see how long Philip and Alex think it's going to take for them to get together.

He could feel himself teetering on the edge of sleep, couldn't open his eyes, just lay on the bed, floating slowly but steadily into sleep.

He opened his eyes, the room around him hazy, like he was looking through gauze. He blinked, trying to focus his eyes but it didn't work.

He realized he was looking around his teenage room in his father's old unused house.

Oh no.

He was having *that* dream again. He couldn't sit up, couldn't take his eyes from the closed door. It slowly opened and suddenly it was like he was underwater; he swam out like a fish, paddling from his bedroom into Angel's cell. All was gold-lit and gossamer-filmed as he wriggled through to Angel's bedroom, seeing him laying on the bed waiting for him, the sheets demurely covering everything but his face and the very tops of his smooth pale shoulders.

Will swam over to him, settling on his knees over Angel's legs. Angel looked up at him in awe, closing his eyes and parting his lips as Will bent down to kiss him, arm wrapping around his hot bare waist to draw him closer. The sheets were cool and dry under his thighs.

Will shifted, running his fingers under the cover, stroking Angel's thigh lightly with his nails, cupping his jaw with his free hand, bringing him close for wet little horny kisses, distracting him as his fingers slid further up his leg. "Angel..."

The tips of his fingers reached burning hot silky skin and Angel gasped a little.

"What are you doing?" he whispered in the heat of the heavy muted room, and big eager deer eyes blinked up at him. The mirrors surrounding them were mottled like bathroom glass and the air was filled with a thin perfumed smoke.

The pads of Will's fingers rubbed gently across soft twitching skin. "Do you like it?"

Tiny mewl of a gasp and Angel's hand slid under the covers, pressing the seeking fingers tighter against himself, closing his eyes at the feeling.

"Yes..."

He opened his eyes, feeling the accusingly bright morning light bearing down on him. He immediately felt the almost dry stickiness on his crotch and boxers. He lifted the covers, rolled his eyes at what he saw and slumped back to the pillows.

Same dream. He didn't even ball anyone in the dream and he was coming like a fifteen-year-old. It was nearly always that one, it would sneak up when he'd finally thought he'd got rid of it, and it would play out word for word.

Nearly each time he dreamt about Angel it would be that dream, only occasionally broken by naughty policeman-Angel or the weird dream where he got locked in an office and Angel was the locksmith and he had to pay him in groaning trade

He rubbed his eyes and grabbed the clock. Ten past five. No one would be up yet. He hauled himself out of the sheets, his skin goose-pimpling immediately in the frigid air, yanking the covers off the mattress. He pulled some jeans on and balled the covers up before hurrying downstairs, past the dining table and into the tiny tacked on laundry room.

He pushed the covers into the washing machine, hopping from foot to foot on the freezing cold tiles as he poured in washing powder, guiltily pricking his ears up at every creak the old house made as it groaned against the light wind.


Thirteen

Alejandra Roman sighed as she dragged the vacuum out, her flip flopped-feet crunching on grains of sand all over the café floor. The tourists always walked sand in - her café was right across the road from the beach - but still it annoyed her.

She was just about to switch the Hoover on when she heard the door slide open behind her. She turned, pushing her long dark hair back over her shoulders. "Sorry, we're closed," she said to the two men who had entered in from the failing sunlight.

"We just want to ask you a few questions," the first said. He was dressed in dark pants and when he smiled his eyes were cold.

A heavy liquid feeling of unease lined her belly. "About what?"

"Some customers you might have had, just under two weeks ago?" the other, a dark haired man in jeans, said.

Alejandra frowned. "Uh..."

"Would you take a look at the pictures?"

"What are you, cops?"

"FBI, ma'am."

She shrugged a little and nodded, the tinkling of her necklaces jangling the silence. The first held out two pictures of different men. One of them was taken front on; the straight lines of the man's face under his dark hair jogged her memory.

The hottie who had eaten with that large group of people the other week, the one who'd asked her what race she was. Alejandra remembered them, they'd come in early, been the only ones in for about an hour.

"Yeah, he came in for breakfast with some friends."

"How many?"

"Oh... I don't remember." She squinted at the ceiling. "Five? Six? They were all coming and going, there could have been more."

"Did they, at any time, say where they were going?"

She shook her head.

"Think very hard."

She shook her head again. "I was out in the kitchen mainly, wouldn't have heard." She paused, narrowing her eyes. "Are they criminals?"

The men stayed stoically silent.

"If you have any future contact with that man, or any others that were in that morning, contact us on this number," the man in jeans said, holding out a card.

"Will do." She looked back up at them and tried for another smile. "You can't tell me what this is about?"

"If you do not contact the right authorities if they come again, you will be prosecuted."

Alejandra blinked, indignant. "Excuse me? On what grounds?"

"Aiding and abetting."

"I served them breakfast!"

"If we have reason to believe you have been in contact with any of those people, and have been misleading today," the jean-clad man said softly, "we will be back to pay you another visit."

The implications clung coldly to the air, freezing Alejandra from the inside out. "Is that a threat?" she asked after a strained moment.

"Good evening, Miss Roman."

Both men nodded and walked out, slipping into a black car and driving off down the road. Alejandra looked at the card in her hand and then hurried to the front door, locking it tight.

---

Angel sat on the back porch, staring down at the book Will had given him, brow crinkling a little at the labeled insides he was looking at.

His books in the four-part world had never been this informative.

Ovaries looked strange.

He turned the page, the pictures now front on. Will had given him the books that morning and pushed him outside with them, telling him if he had any queries to come back and ask. He'd have to ask him about 'stimulating to orgasm'. He didn't know what that meant. The book still seemed much more interesting than reading about how weather was made, or how plants grew.

Babies. Children. Angel was yet to understand how having sex could... create a tiny human. It was fascinating really. How could genetic material from two people make another? How did it make sure there were ten fingers and ten toes and two eyes?

He flipped back, looking at the cartoons of a boy and a girl through the 'stages of development'. He'd figured out what was different between men and women.

But he still didn't know how he was going to know if someone was male or female unless he took their pants off, because Fred was a girl, and she looked ... Well. She had little breasts. Angel thought about that. He looked back down at the drawing of the woman. The drawing seemed more round than Fred was.

He studied it a little more.

It was strange to think Fred didn't have a penis. How did she pee?

He heard the door open behind him and he turned, smiling when he saw Three.

"Hello."

"Hello," Angel replied.

Three walked over, sitting next to him. He took the book from him and flipped through it. "Sex."

Angel took it back. "Yes. Will gave it to me."

Three went to take the book again but Angel held onto it. Three wriggled closer and read over his shoulder.

"Do you like sex?" Three asked, green eyes flicking to Angel’s face.

"I don't know."

"Have you ever done sex?"

"No."

"It's fun."

Angel frowned. "Have you done sex?"

"Yes. Lots of times." He scratched his chin. "It feels really good."

"With who?"

"Two."

"Two is a girl?"

"Yes."

Angel nodded. He tried to remember what she had looked like. He was pretty sure she had breasts. "How did she pee?"

"She sat down," Three said knowingly.

"Oh." He paused, flicking through some pages. "Do you have babies?"

Three looked a little confused. "No. What's babies?"

Angel opened the book to the page with the drawing of the tiny person on it wrapped up in a blanket. "It says that's a baby."

Three pulled the book a little closer. "No, we never had any of those."

Angel sighed in frustration. "But that's what sex makes. You mustn't have been doing it right." He pulled the book back into his lap again.

"We were doing it right. But how's sex going to make that?"

"Sperm gets put in the girl's womb," he said, glad he knew something about sex Three didn't. "And then a baby grows."

"What, inside?!"

"Yes."

"No. That never happened."

Angel pondered that. "Maybe Two was broken."

"No she wasn't!" It was said roughly, and Three sat back, eyebrows low over his narrowed eyes. "Don't say that!"

Angel pulled away from him a little. It looked like he was going to hurt him. Angel blinked. "I'm sorry." He tried, like Will had taught him.

Three seemed to ...deflate. "It's okay," he said, turning away as the anger left his face, immediately replaced by leaking eyes. Tears. He was hurt.

Angel had said sorry, why was he still hurt? He curled his arm around Three's shoulders and dragged him close.

"I'm sorry," he tried again.

Three rested his head against Angel's shoulder. "I miss her."

"Alright."

"I wish she didn't die."

Angel didn't know what to say. Three sounded so confused. Lost. "Yes."

"I wake up and I think she's going to be there, and then I remember she died."

For some reason, the pain in Three's voice as he missed his Two reminded Angel of all the years he'd woken up and missed Will. And he suddenly understood how he felt.

And he felt sad for Three, and for what he must be feeling.

"I understand," he whispered, eyes watering a little.

He understood how much you had to be hurting inside to start leak-crying, and it made him feel bad that Three felt so bad that he kept having tears.

"I'm sorry." And he said it this time because he didn't think he'd hurt Three, but just because he was hurting.

It felt strange... to understand what someone else was feeling. He made a note to try to understand why people were feeling things from now on. He felt like he understood Three, and it was sudden. He hugged his closer and Three pressed his cheek against Angel’s chest, silently staring out into the backyard.

---

Angel and Three had continued talking about sex for a long time. Hours. They tried to figure out how sperm made a baby in a womb, but just ended up making themselves confused. Three had somehow convinced himself that when a girl had a baby, its umbilical cord was plugged into the girl's stomach so the baby could eat. Angel still didn't believe that, cause that would mean the baby was eating vomit. They couldn't even ask anyone, Fred and Philip had walked in and walked straight back out before they could ask about anything. And then they had disappeared.

Three had grown bored with the subject, and his insistence that he was always right about sex and Angel was always wrong because he hadn't done sex yet was starting to make Angel angry. It was like Three thought he was smarter. Just cause he'd never done sex didn't mean babies ate vomit, he was sure. He walked upstairs, heading towards Will. Will would know. And he never acted like he was smarter, even though he was.

He walked into Will's room, rapping his knuckles on the wood. "Will?"

Will looked round from his desk, taking off his glasses, blue eyes wider than usual. "Yes?" he asked, a bit slowly.

"I have a question."

"Did you look at all the books?"

"I think they're wrong."

Will looked at him seriously. "Wrong," he repeated.

"Yes. Three said he had sex with Two and there were no babies."

Will's face slid into a smile. "You can have sex without babies."

"But..."

"That's what sex does, that's what it's made for, but that's not the only reason people have sex."

Angel sat down on the bed. "What are the other reasons?"

"Uh... I think that's in your books."

"Is it orgasms? When you ejaculate?"

Will looked back to his desk, lips tight like he didn't want to smile. "Uh, yes."

"Sex feels nice, doesn’t it? That's what Three said.”

"...Yeah, that’s true. If sex didn't feel good, no one would want to do it and there'd be no babies."

Angel curled his knees up and rested his chin on them in thought. That made sense. "But..." he paused, frowning. "But people sometimes have sex because it does feel... good."

Will smiled, and it seemed softer this time. Like he was thinking about something pretty. "Sometimes, people just like to share themselves ... with someone else."

"Why?"

He shrugged. "It makes people feel close."

"To have sex?"

"Well... being inside someone or letting them inside you... it's a big thing. It means you trust them." He looked at Angel and coughed a little, standing up. "Well yeah... it feels good. And there's birth control, to stop impregnation which helps people enjoy it."

"Have you had sex?"

He looked at Angel for a second before his eyes flicked away. "Yes."

"Who was it?"

He sighed. "Angel, remember that privacy thing I was telling you about?"

"Peeing alone."

"Yes. It also relates to things about sex. Sex is very personal. Do you understand that?"

Angel nodded. "Do you have babies?"

"Still personal... but no. None that I know of, anyway."

"How could you not know?"

"Well ... women are pregnant for nine months."

"But they get a big belly. As the baby grows. Wouldn't you notice?"

"Well, sometimes, you're not around. Sex can be a one-night thing. With someone you met and liked, but didn't really... like enough."

Angel sighed in frustration. "You just said it was a private thing."

"Well it is."

"But you can have sex with anyone. That's not private."

"Well it is... and it isn't."

"What?"

"Okay." He huffed some air out, preparing himself, "When you find someone you love, you have sex with them. Usually."

Angel nodded, trying to understand. He pulled Will’s pillow under his chin and rested on it, watching Will.

"But sometimes, you just really feel... attracted to someone."

"So you have sex with them."

"Yes."

"And never see them again?" Angel asked doubtfully, rubbing his chin against the soft feel of the pillow.

"Okay, there are things called relationships... they can be short or long... okay, uh ...okay, sometimes sex is an expression of love; sometimes it's to make a baby, and sometimes, sometimes its just sex. Because it feels good."

"So... you can have sex with someone... 'cause it feels nice. And then never see them again."

"Yes."

"But you can also, always see someone. And have sex with them."

"Yes." Will smiled, leaning back in his chair and making it squeak a little. "That's usually called dating. Or marriage."

"Marriage?"

"When you promise to always love one person."

"Love?"

Will paused, biting his lip. "Love is..." He frowned. "Love is..."

"Is what?"

Will looked down. "I'm not actually sure." When he looked back up he was smiling a little. "Maybe you should ask someone else about that. Fred maybe. She'd know better than me."

"Why?"

He'd heard that word before. From the television, from Will about something. He loved Pepe. And pancakes.

"You've said it," Angel pointed out, in case he'd forgotten.

"I know. But... when I say it, I don't mean in the marriage way."

"It's a feeling, yes?"

"Yeah. Of affection. For someone."

Affection. He knew that word. It was ... a fondness. Father had said Angel was 'affectionate'. "I'm affectionate," he said.

Will laughed. "You are that. Yes."

"Do I love?"

"Yes. Friendship-love now. But later... probably deeper feelings... of love."

"For one person."

Will looked at him. "Yes."

Angel thought about this as Will settled back down into his chair, running his fingers along the arms. "It's special, isn't it?"

"Love? Love is very special."

"You have sex with people you love, right?"

"Well... you can love a family member, but you wouldn't have sex with them."

Angel blinked. He remembered 'family' from the books he'd been reading. Man, woman and children. Father, Mother, brother, sister. "Why not?"

Will's eyes went wide and he laughed a little. "People don't have sex with family members. Just... they don't."

"Why not?"

"It's bad."

"Bad," he repeated.

"Yes, bad. Very bad." Will paused. "In society, people don't do that."

"I don't understand why not."

Will sighed, laughing a little. "Just take my word on it."

"What?"

"Trust me. Just... trust me on this."

"Who is my family?"

"Um..." Will paused for a long time. "Well..."

"Father?"

"Um... yes."

"And... Father is your Father too."

Will looked at him again, that peering look, like Father when he looked at the checks sometimes. Like he was trying to figure something out.

"Yes. I didn't know you knew ... Father was my Father."

"You used to call him Father." Angel laughed. "I knew always."

"Oh... oh right."

"So we are family. Brothers."

Will's eyebrows raised. He shook his head, standing and coming to sit on the bed next to him, frowning. "No. No, we're not related."

"But the books said... about brothers. Two boys are brothers. If they have the same Father. And girls are sisters."

"That's only blood relation."

As soon as Angel thought he finally had something figured out there was always a 'but' or an 'if'. It was frustrating. Like doing a whole page of maths only to realise he'd accidentally added all the figures instead of multiplying.

"No, Angel, it's a reasonable thought. Don't worry."

"It's hard," he said, frowning, feeling a little weird towards Will, wishing he could just explain this quicker so he wouldn't keep getting it wrong.

"Father, is my actual Father. He and my mother had me."

Angel looked at him. "So ... what about me?"

Will's eyes flicked away. "He's not your... real Father."

Real father? "What ... what does that mean?"

"He... he just looked after you."

"But he's... Father." How could he explain it better? Will didn’t seem to get it.

"He just taught you to call him that. His name is Quentin Travers."

"So who's my Father? Who had sex to make me?"

Will's mouth opened and closed. "Ah..." He swallowed, turning and smiling at him. "I don't know."

Angel thought about that. He needed to pee a bit. "Will we see them?"

"I ... don't think so."

He would like to meet his Mother and Father, but he supposed it wasn't that important. "So what are we, then?"

"Friends."

"Yes."

Friends. He remembered Will telling him that before. He smiled. Will smiled back, his teeth shiny white in the dimming light. Angel turned, realising the sun was about to hide for the night. The sky was turning yellowy.

"I need to pee," he said, getting up and opening the door.

Will laughed. "Okay."

He went into the bathroom, flicking up the lid which someone kept putting down, and peed, counting the tiles on the wall as he always did, to distract himself.

He flushed and washed his hands, walking past Will's door and heading downstairs instead. He needed to think. To go over what Will had told him and try to understand it.

Father wasn't his father, but he was Will's father. Angel had a different father, who had sex to make him, but he didn't know him.

He slumped into the big chair facing the window.

So Father had sex to make Will. And that made him his father. But ... Angel called him Father. Why would he call him Father if he wasn't his father?

He blinked, his head crowding. The moon was about to cover the sun, and the sky and the ground outside were coloured blue, darkening the inside of the house as well like someone was throwing a blanket over the sky.

And love. Love. Friendship-love and love-love. It was hard to understand that. And love was with sex. That he understood, you did sex with people you loved.

As he was pondering that, he heard a voice on the porch. He stood up, interested, and wandered across the room, heading towards the kitchen. The lights weren't on as he entered, so he carefully made his way across the dim floor and looked out to the porch. Fred and Gunn were standing there...

Angel frowned, leaning closer to the glass. What were they...?

He peered at them, shadowy figures wrapped around each other. Fred pulled away a little, and she had a big grin on her face. She pulled Gunn off the porch, laughing a little and then they wrapped themselves around each other and ... did it again.

Angel's forehead thunked against the glass as he tried to see. They were still doing it. They had their mouths... all smushed together.

They stayed like that for a while, moving their heads a little, joined at the lip.

What were they doing? It seemed slimy.

He was about to open the door and ask, when Gunn picked Fred up and twirled her, before they ran off into the trees, laughing.

Angel stepped back, pausing a moment before he ran upstairs and into his room, pulling his human body books open and trying to figure it out. Lots of words about lips and mouths but nothing about... pressing them together with somebody else!

He left the room, hearing Three cough a bit in the room in front. He didn't go to him, though. The only thing he knew about people joining bodies was sex, and he didn't want Three to know about it and think he was so smart.

He rapped his knuckled against Will's door a few times and then opened it, seeing Will lying on his bed with a book. He sat up as Angel entered, holding the book page with his finger.

"What's wrong?"

"Why ... what's..." He made a noise of frustration, trying to think how to explain. "What's pressing your mouth against someone else's?"

"Pressing..."

"Yes, putting lips against each other. What's that?"

Will smiled. "Sounds like kissing to me. Did you see it on television?"

"No, Fred and Gunn. They stood and were mouth kissing each other."

"Ah." Will laughed after a moment. "Well, …I was expecting it to happen soon."

"People do it a lot?" he asked, shocked, sitting down on the floor and looking up at him.

"Yeah, kisses... they're to show affection. You wouldn't swap spit with just anyone."

"Have you kissed?"

"Yes. Lots of times."

Angel frowned, looking at Will’s jean covered knees as he crossed his legs on the carpet. "Is it sex thing?"

"Um... can be."

"Because that's a show of affection too."

Will nodded, tilted his head a little. He smiled a little, faintly in the lamp light. "I sometimes forget you're very sharp."

"Sharp?" He shook his head. "When was your kiss?"

"My first one was when I was about... seven, I think. I kissed a boy on the playground and ran away." He chuckled a little. “It was a dare though.”

"Does everyone have kisses from when they're young?"

"Yeah. People start kissing early."

Angel was a lot older than seven and he'd never kissed. He wondered if Three had. He probably did, with Two. He stood up and bent down, pressing his lips against Will's, his nose smushed against Will’s.

He leaned back. "That was weird," he said. "Why do people do that?"

It felt strange. His lips mashed up against Will's all loose and odd. It didn't make him laugh either. Fred and Gunn had been laughing. He must have done it wrong. He leant back down but Will caught his shoulders leaning back. "No."

"We kissed just then, why not now?"

"You caught me off guard."

"Off guard?"

"You kissed me. I wasn't ready."

Angel sat on the bed, waiting a moment before turning to him. "Are you ready now?"

"No, Angel, I don't think we should be kissing."

Angel wiped his lips. "Why not? You said people do it to show affection."

"Yes... but... you can't just kiss people."

"I want to kiss right. Show me."

"Angel..."

"Show me. Everyone else is kissing and doing sex and not me."

"No one in this house is doing any sex," Will said, looking at him. His eyes flicked away. "Well maybe Gunn and Fred."

Angel sat back. "Are they in love?" he asked, suddenly realising that might be why they were kissing.

"Maybe. I don't know."

He was silent for a moment. He slipped closer to Will and tried to subtly draw him nearer. Will laughed, and Angel smiled at him, leaning closer, watching his blue eyes as he hovered closer to his lips.

"One kiss," Will said, laughing again. It was making him laugh already. Kissing must be really fun. "But it doesn't mean anything," he added with a softer tone.

Will's warm hand rested against his cheek, fingers behind his ear. His blue eyes seemed brighter for a moment as he pushed Angel's hair back behind his ear. "Just a little one," he whispered, staring at Angel's lips, his eyes looking strangely fixated.

Will closed his eyes as his lips brushed Angel's. Their skin parted again before Will's lips pressed against his own again, firmer. Angel felt his body flush hot. Will's lips sucked lightly at his own, not limply like before, and he was so… close. He could feel Will’s breath against his skin between the little dry kisses Will gave him. Will's hand curled around his neck.

He mimicked the slightly pursed lips Will had and kissed back, the sound wet and smacking. He laughed as another tingling heat wave rolled through him, settling in his groin furrily. He closed his eyes and felt how slippery their lips had become. It felt ... good. Strangely good.

He felt something flick against his closed lips, a lick of Will's tongue. He giggled again, and his tongue slipped inside. Angel's stomach felt like it had flipped upside down. It should feel disgusting, Will was licking his tongue... but it just felt...

He moaned. Not a sick moan, just ... the feelings in his stomach bubbled up and became that noise. He'd never heard it before. Will's tongue was inside his mouth. He didn't giggle anymore; it seemed more than giggling. He hesitantly flicked his tongue against Will's, keeping his eyes shut tight, wondering if he was doing it right, wondering how Will’s warm tongue was making his heart beat in his stomach and his throat at the same time.

Will's arms curled around his waist and they suddenly roughly tugged him closer, their teeth clacking against one another before he was swept up in licking again. Will made a happy moany sound, his long fingers rubbing up and down Angel's back nicely, and the sound sent a warm shiver down Angel’s spine. Will was making the sounds. He wondered if he felt all hot as well.

He tilted his head a little so their noses wouldn't bump as much, and he felt... like his blood was hot. His thighs were trembling a little, and then...

His eyes flicked open, seeing Will's serenely closed eyes taking up most of his vision, a tiny flicker of his eyelashes.

His groin felt...

He frowned; letting his hand slip down between his thighs as Will kissed him. He was...

Will's eyes opened, and he broke the kiss, foggy blue eyes travelling slowly to where Angel's hand was curled.

"It's all hard!"

"Oh dear god."

Angel slid off the bed, and undid his pants on a flurry, sliding them off his legs and kicking them away. He laughed at the strange sight of his penis swollen and rising from its usual resting place. His skin was all tight, and he was big, twitching with his heart beat. A towel was wrapped around him by quick Will hands.

"It's hard!" Angel exclaimed, trying to get his hand under the cloth to feel it some more. "I have an erection!"

"I know," Will breathed, pushing him from the room with his arms holding the towel tightly in place. "Shhh."

They were headed to the bathroom and Will turned away from him, flicking the shower on. "Am I going to have sex... because I have an erection," he said, sticking his hand under the towel. His fingers grazed along the skin and his stomach tightened as all the air rushed out of his body.

It had never felt like that before. It hadn’t felt like anything before.

"No," Will said, not looking at it. "Take your shirt off."

Angel did, and bounced a little, laughing at it again as his penis bobbed. "What do I do?"

"Get in the shower."

Angel stepped in, yelping at the freezing cold water that shocked his hot body. "Cold!"

"It'll get rid of it."

"I don't want to get rid of it," he frowned, trying to step away from the spray.

Will held him in, his shirtsleeves getting wet. "Stay in there."

"But I need to have sex! I can have a baby now."

Will stared at him blank faced, before grabbing the showerhead and spraying it directly at his groin. Angel yelped again, curling over himself for protection against the cold and grabbed the nozzle, spraying Will's face with it. He spluttered and Angel laughed, watching his hair dripping down his face.

Will tried to snatch it back, received another face full of icy water and stepped back, sliding a little on the slippery tiles.

Angel sprayed the water at Will's pants, wetting him, making him laugh and forcing him to step into the shower to stop Angel from showering him. They had a short sliding tussle over the showerhead before Will managed to pull it from his cold fingers. Both dripping wet and shivering, Angel flicked the shower off quickly, not wanting to be sprayed again. Freezing cold drops tracked down his spine, making him goose-pimple.

Angel's teeth chattered a little and he noticed with disappointment that his erection had gone back to normal.

Will stepped out, flicking his hands free of the water. He sucked in a shivering breath.

Angel, preoccupied with his penis, didn't notice Will until he wrapped a big fluffy towel around him.

"How long until it comes back?" Angel asked.

"I don't think you'll have to wait long," Will said, chuckling a little.

Angel smiled. “I didn’t know kissing did that.” He looked down at Will’s wet pants. “Did you like the kissing?”

Will laughed a little, turning away and walking out the door. “It was nice.”

Angel smiled, wrapping the big towel around his shoulders and tapping his bare toes into one of the cold shower puddles on the floor. “Good.”


Fourteen

Will woke up practically glowing. He swung his feet out from under the warm, thick covers, his toes curling against the cold. He stood, bare and stretching, hitting his chest with his fist as he coughed to clear his lungs in the crisp air.

Yawning, he lazily flicked his towel off the chair and around his waist, smiling and humming his way to the bathroom. No one was up yet. The sun was only just rising. He turned the water on hot, stepping under it blissfully and watching steam clouds rise from the stall. He felt so light. Weightless. Ageless. He laughed a little, grabbing some soap and lathering himself up with the thick white foam.

That kiss had been... the best kiss he'd ever had. By far. Maybe it was because he'd been waiting seven years for it, but that kiss... his lips felt raw and aflame just thinking about it.

And the way Angel had sounded, the purry little noises in his throat that had been humming against Will's lips proved that he wasn't ... impotent. He hadn't become the innocent sexless subject his father had wanted to create. His father would kill to get his hands on that sort of information. To see Angel when Will had kissed him. How he'd reacted so… reflexively. Will smiled, lazily rubbing his fingers across the scrub of his almost-stubble.

Interesting though. Angel hadn't ever heard sex, never seen it on television or anything like that, but the floaty little groans he made... that must be human instinct.

Fuck. Will giggled again. And then...

Unable to suppress the grin as he soaped up his hair he shook his head quickly, warm droplets spattering against the sides of the shower. He wanted to scold himself for being so... childish about this, about a kiss. A little kiss. And Angel getting... a little excited by it.

A bubble of laughter escaped him and he covered his face with wet hands, scrubbing as he flushed. His cock twitched interestedly.

Bloody hell, Angel curling his hand around himself in awe? That would be locked in his brain forever.

Will's toes curled in the hissing shower spray as another bolt of excitement rushed through him. He leant his forehead against the tiles, hesitated for a moment, before breathing deep and curling his slippery hand around his cock.

He tugged with the ghost of Angel on his lips; mind-running reels of Angel's excited body under the shower spray. Of the way his eyelashes had flickered when he registered Will's tongue in his mouth, and the aroused sound of him enjoying it. Angel's big untaught hand circling his big hard shaft tentatively, and then he was imagining his own hand around Angel, stripping him quickly as Angel rolled and clenched in front of him.

He stifled the small moan, even though it was hidden in the hiss of the shower spray. A heavy breath and he rolled his head so his cheekbone rested against the cold hard tile, warm water trickling down over his stomach, down his thighs in rivers. His other hand slipped down, kneading his tightened, sparking balls lightly, making his leg muscles twitch as he gnawed at his bottom lip.

The white noise of the shower sapped away any sound of his climax and he held his hands up, knees weak, watching the water sluice through the spend on his hands. He scrubbed himself quickly, squirting shampoo on the shower floor and mopping it around with his foot, guiltily. Snapping the shower off, he slipped out, rosy and warm from the heat of the water, wrapping the towel around himself. He sneaked back to his room like a naughty schoolboy, happily hearing no waking noise around him, slipping back under the covers with damp cooling limbs wrapped in a damp towel. He chuckled a little to himself, gazing up at the blemished ceiling.

His ears were frozen with wet cold, but it felt good, his chest so warm under the blankets. He wriggled a little, feeling the damp of the sheets around him, the cold damp his hair had made on the pillow. Lazy from his shower activities he settled in for a little nap to start the day.

---

Will was buttering toast for himself when Three and Angel came through the kitchen door. He couldn't resist a sly little glance at Angel, who smiled at him obliviously.

"Hello," Angel said, taking the toast from Will's plate and tearing it in half with buttery fingers.

One day Will was going to have to teach him about property. And manners. Not today though, not when his wet pink tongue was curling around his fingers licking them clean.

Will popped more toast in. "Want toast, Three?"

Three nodded.

"Want anything on it?"

Angel leaned over and pulled the other slice of toast off Will's plate, biting a big chunk from it and chewing as he looked at Three.

"Jelly."

"Berry okay?"

Three nodded, but Will was distracted by Angel's tongue that was sliding along his fingers again.

"Want more toast Angel?" he asked, snapping out of it.

"No," Angel yawned, stretching his arms up in his long-sleeved tee shirt, the fabric pulling up to flash his lower belly. He then got up and wandered away, heading into the living room. The television flicked on. Three looked up at Will warily. Will smiled. Three looked away hurriedly before sliding out the door after Angel.

The toast popped up and Will jellied it for Three, buttering another slice for himself and eating it quickly. He shoved Three's pieces onto a plate and pushed through the door.

"I put butter on it, is..." he paused as both men looked up at him guilelessly. Will felt a thin hot sheet of metal slide around his body, under the skin, as he took in Three's hand resting on Angel's thigh. "...That okay?"

Very high on Angel's thigh. Will put the plate down on the coffee table. Practically on Angel's cock. Will stared at Three, displeased. Angel leant forward, dislodging Three's hand with a wiggle of his hips and snagged a piece of toast.

"That's mine," Three said, pulling it from his hand and biting into it.

Angel stared at Three, affronted, and the entire room falling silent. Angel looked pissed. He stared Three down with an intense black look until Three's eyes flicked away. Angel reached over and took the toast back wordlessly, still staring at him like an aggravated dog.

Bloody hell. Will almost laughed. Another thing his father would have paid anything to see. Angel asserting his dominance over a weaker pack member. Strange to see humans doing it instead of animals. Especially seeing as he went all alpha over a piece of toast.

"Angel, you didn't want any toast," Will said, still trying to hide his smile.

Angel looked up innocently. He bit the toast as he watched Will, obviously wanting to see what he'd do. "I didn't know I wanted it till I saw it."

Three slid the other piece from the plate, biting it. "I only wanted one."

Will smiled at Angel, narrowing his eyes a little. He shrugged. Moot point to try and make him give it back now. He took the plate back as Angel's eyes flicked to the television screen.

Hormones. Will laughed a little in his head. His hormones were all out of whack now, sure, but bloody hell. He hoped Angel toned it down a little.

Philip was standing in the kitchen when he returned. He opened a tin of sardines and smiled at him a little. "What's so funny?"

"Angel asserted his dominance over a piece of toast," Will sniggered.

"Over Three?"

Will nodded and Philip's eyebrows rose. He pursed his lips for a moment, pondering. "His body probably doesn't know how to deal with the extra testosterone..."

Will nodded.

"What did Three do?"

"Gave him the toast," Will slid the plate into the dishwasher and leaned back against the counter. "Angel can be quite intimidating when he wants to be, I never really noticed before."

"Now that he's seen it works, he might keep doing it."

"Well that's only natural, right?"

Philip raised his eyebrows and nodded a little. "I suppose..." he said, in a way that made Will think he didn't quite agree.

"What?"

"Well... did you tell him he shouldn't do that?" Philip said, picking out a sardine and laying it across his toast.

"No."

"Well he's probably going to bully Three now."

Will sighed through his nose, feeling a little put upon. He knew it wasn't a good thing. Didn't mean... that he was going to let Angel keep doing it just because he didn't stop him that time. "Alright, I'll talk to him."

"I'm just saying-"

"No, you're right," he said. "I just found it amusing."

Philip smiled, nodding as he put another sardine onto his toast. "Over toast, yes." He sighed exaggeratedly. "They grow up so fast. I remember when he was just a skinny teenager, never would have dreamed about pulling alpha rank over someone else."

Will smiled and grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge, cracking the seal and bringing it to his lips. "I think he's just testing boundaries."

Philip made a sighing sound of assent and cut his toast into quarters. Will pushed the door open listening to see if anyone but Angel and Three were about and then sidled up to Philip. "Hey," he said, voice low, smiling again as he sipped from the bottle. "Angel saw Gunn and Fred making out."

Philip raised his eyebrows in surprise, turning to rest against the counter, toast quarter in hand, giving Will his undivided attention. "Is that so?"

Will nodded.

"Where were they?"

He shrugged. "Don't know. He asked me what pressing mouths together meant."

Philip smirked a little. "I saw Fred this morning, she didn't say anything."

"Right, 'cause she's going to tell you."

Philip widened his light brown eyes in imitation indignity. "Why wouldn't she?"

"Course. Forgot you two were gal-pals," he said as he tapped the water against his wrist.

"Don't see how you could forget," Philip sniffed. "So, are you going to come with me to get some groceries?" He bit a toast quarter, pushing a stray sardine back into the middle fastidiously.

Will turned his nose up at the fish for breakfast and nodded.

"Good. I don't like grocery shopping alone," Philip said, noticing Will's disdain and taking a big bite from the toast in response.

"When are we going?"

Philip shrugged. "Oh... soon?"

"Should we take Angel? And Three?"

Philip blinked, pausing a moment before he smiled a little. "They'll be okay without you," he said teasingly.

Will rolled his eyes, embarrassed and not wanting to show it. "Not what I meant. I meant ... they might get bored."

"Bored." Philip narrowed his eyes at Will, watching him try not to fidget uncomfortably. "They sat in the same rooms for basically two decades. Each. They'll never get bored... ever."

Will shrugged, not saying a further word as he sipped the water, gazing out the window like he was interested in the trees.

"Well, tell me when you want to go."

Philip nodded, watching him. "Okay."

Will tightly screwed the cap back onto the bottle and tossed it into the air, catching it as the water swished inside. He left the kitchen, playing with the bottle as he entered the television room. His stomach bubbled uncomfortably when he looked at Angel and Three, who were deep in whispered discussion, their lips very close to one another. He paused in his walking, eyes on them.

They collapsed into quiet giggles in front of the television and Angel wriggled down into the couch, letting his neck rest against the cushioned back. Three looked down at him, green sloe-eyed gaze locked on Angel's face.

Will had always been stubborn. Ever since he was a little boy, tenacious and willing to do what he had to do, in order to get what he wanted. It wasn't a particularly bad trait, he thought, although coupled together with the thin green ribbon of jealousy that rippled inside didn't make for an attractive idiosyncrasy. He took one look at Three, lowering his head to talk softly into Angel's ear with a sensuality he'd obviously kept quite secret from the rest of them, and headed over, slamming himself in the seat next to Angel. Smug pride puffed his chest inside when Angel turned to smile hugely at him.

"Going to watch cartoons?" Angel asked happily.

He nodded, smiling at Angel. Happy to have him there, Angel wriggled closer, poking Will's hand with his finger. He poked him again, curling his big hand around one of his fingers and tugging it, trying to start a game. Childishly ignoring Three, Will hooked his arm around the back of Angel's neck and wrestled him forward. Practically bubbling with happiness Angel pulled Will's arm behind his back, crawling over his lap and pushing his head into the couch, with more ease than he'd expected. Familiar proud laughter filled his ears as Angel held him down. He felt a warm hand curl around his wrists, pulling them together at the small of his back.

He wriggled out and flipped over, grabbing Angel's upper arm and pulling it behind his back as he used his feet to lever him onto the floor. Angel jerked, still laughing, and pulled himself free, jumping to his feet in an instant, leaving Will's older bones on the floor. He bounced on the balls of his bare feet, adrenaline rushing as Will stood up, before he tackled him over the back of the chair, both of them landing with an oof of air exploding from their lungs.

Will burst into laughter as he worked his shoulder, the impact point, lying on the ground with his legs tangled with Angel's. Angel wriggled behind him and curled a thick arm around his neck, holding him still. Will pulled at the forearm squeezing his neck, trying to dislodge him. Angel laughed, pulling him into his lap like a rag doll, still holding him tight.

"Got you," Angel breathed heavily into his ear, the panting breath tickling. "I won." His voice was rough. Will felt a little shiver prickle up his spine.

Was it just him? Or was Angel sounding... different.

"I like winning," Angel said in a voice that was definitely not an innocent-wrestling voice. That voice was something very new. Something... aware.

He pulled at the forearm once more, feeling Angel's cheek settled against the side of his face. Pulling him back against his chest roughly, Angel pressed his lips against the side of Will's mouth, wet and clumsy. Will laughed and tried to wriggle away, but Angel's arm tightened, almost cutting off his air as the lips pressed against his again, making Will's stomach turn to shivery sweet water. He turned his head away from the mouth for a second, feeling them on his cheek, before his mind changed its decision spontaneously and turned his head back quickly, his lips immediately covered by Angel's. His fast learning tongue slipped through into Will's mouth, curling around his front teeth. Will's hand slipped into Angel's hair and tugged as roughly as he could, feeling Angel's arm loosen his grip in surprise. Will stood, panting and red faced and looked down at Angel sprawled on the floor, back pressed up against the back of the sofa. He looked up at him hungrily, dark eyes sparking with interest.

Locked in Angel's gaze he could only just distinguish Three, arms folded on the top of the sofa, chin resting on his forearms, watching them both.

"Come here," Angel said huskily, a little gravelly order in his tone, trying to alpha him.

Will stared down at him, tilting his head a little as he took in Angel's heated restraint. Unsure of what to do, Will didn't show any emotion, turning around and heading back into the kitchen. He walked through the door, and finding the room empty he slumped against the fridge, heart thumping in his chest and body buzzing with adrenaline. He swallowed, heading out to the porch where Philip was sitting.

He slid the back door open and smiled at Philip on the wicker chair, sipping some tea as he watched the backyard. "This really is a very nice area," Phil mused, completely unaware of what Will had just done to Angel in the other room. "Never really thought about living up here."

Will swallowed again, trying to settle his heartbeat. "Yeah. Same."

Philip looked at him, sipping his tea. He smiled. "You look all flushed."

"Oh yeah... just me and Angel fooling around a little."

"I heard the laughing," Philip murmured, sipping his tea again.

Will's feet were freezing in the early morning air. He shoved his cold fingers under his thighs, bare arms still chilly. Philip was dressed more sensibly than Will's wifebeater and jeans, his arms were covered in a jacket and he had fresh white runners on his feet, laced perfectly.

"You're cold," Philip smiled, breathing the frigid pine air deep over his tea mug.

"Am." He stood, heading back inside for a cigarette to warm him up. "Be back in five."

"No cigarettes near me, thank you," Philip said, still watching the garden. "I hate the smell."

Will glared at him for a moment before heading inside anyway. He was already thinking about a fag, he couldn't not have one now. His body was aching for it. He grabbed his soft pack from one of the kitchen drawers, grumbling about being the only smoker in a house of wankery non-smokers and headed towards the front door.

Angel was sitting on the couch by himself now, watching the television. He turned when he heard Will walk by, hanging over the back of the couch.

"Where are you going?"

"Smoke."

He heard footsteps as Angel came up behind him, following him out the front door. They settled down into more wicker furniture on the front porch. These chairs were better anyway, Will thought, wriggling against the weatherworn cushion. He curled his feet up and sat cross-legged in the chair to conserve heat.

Angel imitated him. He could see his cute bare toes wriggling in the cold as he shifted around trying to cover all his exposed skin. He was wearing jeans and a thin white tee shirt, fine for inside the house, where the walls protected him from the breeze, but not so good outside.

Will lit up as Angel watched him fascinated. "Can I have smoke?"

Will pursed his lips, before smiling slyly a little. "Here." He passed his burning cigarette over to Angel's reaching fingers. He held it for a second, unsure.

"Put that orange bit to your lips and breathe the air through it."

Angel smiled and stuck the cigarette to his lips, breathing deep for about half a second before he started spluttering and coughing, holding his chest.

Will rescued his cigarette from flailing hands and puffed on it calmly. "Mmmm."

Love the taste of tar in the morning.

"What is that?" Angel cried, wiping his lips.

"Smoking. It's a filthy habit."

"That was horrible! I thought it was going to taste nice..." he said, standing up and spitting into the small unkempt garden. "Why do you do that?"

He spun around, hilariously disgusted, holding onto the railing and eyeing the cigarette in Will's hand like it was a snake.

"Ugh."

Will laughed, sticking the fag between his lips, smiling at Angel as he hovered out of the reach of the smoke curls.

"Is that like medicine?"

"No... why?"

"Because... why do you do it? What does it give you? If it doesn't taste good."

"Tastes good to me."

Angel narrowed his eyes, tilting his head as brighter sun edged over the grass behind him, starting to take the chill off the air. "Really?" He paused. "Like burritos?"

Will collapsed into giggles, shaking his head. "Smoking's just a ... thing, some people do. It's got things in the cigarette to make you feel good. Calming." He paused, looking down at the stick thoughtfully. "Of course, it's only a relief from the addiction you get from smoking."

"Does anyone else smoke?"

"Out of the people in this house? No."

"Why not?"

"They don't like it."

"I understand that," Angel said, nodding exaggeratedly.

Will smiled at him. "It's a habit I picked up when I was a teenager. I'm trying to tone it down."

"Why? If you like it?"

"Well... it's harder and harder to smoke, people don't like the smell so you have to go outside, in the rain or like now, cold morning. And I used to smoke with my friends, got no one to smoke with now."

Angel looked at him. "I'll smoke with you. Just not smoking. But I'll come out to talk with you."

Will couldn't help the grin that spread across his face. "Thanks."

Angel smiled back. He settled back into the faded cushioned chair beside Will and rubbed his eye as Will smoked. He shivered a little, his nipples pointed against the shirt over his wide chest as Will tried not to look.

"Wrestling was different today."

Will pulled a face. "Let's not talk about that."

"About wrestling?"

"Yeah."

"Will!" Philip's voice called from within. "You ready?"

"Yeah, I'm out here." He stood, looking around for something to stub his cigarette out on. He settled for crouching on the big creaking slat steps and grinding the butt into the cold dirt. He stood dusting his hands off, seeing Angel out of the corner of his eyes.

"What's happening?" He asked.

"Going shopping."

Angel nodded as Philip came through the front door, holding the van keys. "Are we going?"

"Gotta get shoes. Warm the car up," he said flashing him a smile.

"Oh, I'll go get the car all nice and warmed up for you, shall I?" Phil asked, cocking an eyebrow. He turned, heading across the dirt and grass towards the van.

Will ducked back inside, grabbing some boots he had thrown in the hallway and tugging them on, flicking his jeans back down over them. He rushed back out and got jerked to a stop by Angel's hand around his arm.

Will smiled, "We'll talk about whatever... later," he said, avoiding his gaze as he pulled his arm away and jogged to the humming car. He opened the door and slid in next to Philip.

"Let's go."

They pulled out, chugging past the gate to the property. He could see in the side mirror that Angel had wandered out onto the front lawn, a small still figure in the reflection, watching them passively.

---

"Don't forget to buy stuff for pancakes," Will said, looking around at the shelves as Philip pushed the cart along.

Philip consulted his carefully printed list and plucked a big can of something off the shelf. Will grabbed a tin of spaghetti from the shelves and tossed it in.

"Don't forget taco shells."

"I won't."

"Or those little-"

"Get me some tinned tomatoes," Philip said, reading the backs of two tins, comparing them, "Biggest tins you can find."

Will stopped and turned, searching the wall of tins for tomatoes. He wandered down, finding some, and picked out three huge tins from the bottom shelf. He put them into the cart.

"Bamboo shoots. Two little tins," Philip ordered, slipping an Asian decorated pack of big white noodles into the cart.

Bamboo shoots? Will looked around uncertainly. Philip wheeled away, crossing things off his list. Bamboo shoots. That was probably Asiany food. He leant back, trying to take more in, eyes reading all the little colourful labels. He found them, tiny tins of them, and grabbed two. He went after Philip, finding him halfway down the next aisle. He tossed the tins in and turned to the huge wall of cookies.

He grabbed some chocolate slathered ones and tossed them into the cart. Philip eyed them and then Will.

"What?"

"Nothing," he sighed, grabbing a blue box of teabags from the shelf opposite.

Will grabbed more cookies -- pink iced ones -- and tossed them in. Philip pushed the cart away from him.

"So, how's Angel dealing?"

Will wandered over to a coffee display, picking up a jar and peering at it. "He's fine. Doing well."

"He and Three seem to be getting on."

Will scowled a little at the jar of coffee. "To be expected, isn't it?" he said in a short clipped tone.

Philip nodded, pushing the cart ahead. "And Angel seems to hold you in high regard."

Will put the coffee down, interested. "Really?" he said nonchalantly. "What makes you say that?"

Philip turned the cart into the next aisle. "Will says this, Will says that. You're a big imprint in his life," he said picking up a bag of beer nuts and scrutinized them. "You like beer nuts or normal?"

"Beer," he said thoughtfully, watching Philip toss the pack into the cart.

---

Philip and Will had driven around the town for a while, finding little spots of interest, book-marking them for later.

He'd avoided Angel for the rest of the day, seeing him briefly at the sit down dinner of steaks Gunn had prepared. Angel didn't really seem to notice him, too involved with talking to Three, sitting close to him across the table from Will. Will himself had stopped sneaking looks at him after a while and fallen into conversation with Fred soon after.

He'd slipped into the shower after dinner and then hidden in his room, reading and unpacking a few boxes that still sat full of clothes, and other items in the corner of the room.

He didn't know why he was trying to avoid him. He wasn't sure. His mind was all muddled about Angel. He felt... off step when he thought about it. He didn't want to talk about it. Maybe just forget about ... everything. He just didn't know what to do with him. He was obviously exploring his sexuality when they had wrestled earlier that day, but it seemed... so innocent. Kisses and being excited by power and muscles and strength.

As he had been, before his father had banned him from seeing Angel in the experiment rooms. So turned on by his teenage colt limbs wrapped around him.

He slumped across his bed, staring up at the ceiling. He was a mess.

He heard a knock on his door and felt a little ball of dread settle in his stomach as Angel walked in. He smiled his big warm smile, completely devoid of any uncertainty.

"Are you alright for talking now?"

Will sat up quickly, smoothing his hair back.

"I've been waiting," Angel said, perching on the edge of his desk. "I haven't seen you."

"Uh... yeah. I know," he said guiltily.

"I felt strange today. When we were wrestling."

Will nodded, cowering down in embarrassment. Apparently they were jumping right into discussion about... that.

"It made me feel... like kissing. That's why adults don't wrestle, isn't it?"

Will blinked, already lost. "Sorry?"

"You said adults don't wrestle. A long time ago. And I didn't understand before, but I do now. It's because wrestling gives you the adult sex feelings. You don't feel like... kissing when you wrestle and are young."

Will breathed deep and sighed. That was actually a very smart connection.

"You had an erection when we wrestled in the four part world. That's why you didn't want to wrestle anymore," he said matter-of-factly.

Will was at a loss for words. He just nodded.

"The wrestling made you ready for sex, but I wasn't ready for sex because I was a child. And then you didn't see me for a long time."

Numb, Will understood everything Angel was saying, taking it in but too gone to react to it. He smiled weakly, dumbly, and nodded.

Angel smiled back, looking strangely proud. "But we wrestled today. And it's because I was sex-ready the other night when we kissed. So now we can wrestle again, can't we?"

Will just blinked, sighing out a deep breath as his eyes raised to the ceiling. Think. Calm. "You've really been thinking about this, haven't you?"

Angel nodded. "I couldn't stop." He looked up at Will with the same innocent but not expression. "I want more kissing. You kiss better than Three."

Will's heart skipped a few beats, leaving cold water running through his veins. "You kissed Three?"

Angel nodded. "After you left in the morning. I was all... hot," he said thoughtfully, frowning a little. "I wanted to kiss, so we went upstairs to Three's room and we kissed for a bit. But it wasn't helping. I wasn't..." he paused, sighing in frustration. "It's hard to describe. But it wasn't working properly. So I went back to watch cartoons and I wasn't so hot anymore. You left and Three and I walked around. He kept kissing me all day, but it ..." he shrugged, "it just wasn't as good. That's what I've been thinking about."

Will swallowed dryly. "Is it?"

Angel nodded. "I like it." He slipped from the table onto the bed, watching Will's face carefully. He leant close, pausing when Will leant away from him a little. His dark eyes looked confused for a moment, before his hand coiled around Will's arm tightly. He leant forward again, holding his arm so he couldn't move away, and pressed his lips down against Will's. Will made a noise of displeasure into Angel's mouth and tried to wriggle away, but Angel caught him, smiling against his lips and slid his tongue into Will's mouth.

Will yanked his head away. "Angel, you can't just force people to kiss you."

"Why not?" His other arm wound around Will's neck and pulled him in for another kiss.

Caught, Will couldn't wriggle away, effectively trapped by big arms. Angel ignored the muffled objections and kissed him deeper, his lips sparking little coloured flavourful flashes in his lower belly. He nipped Angel's lower lip roughly as a last defense, causing him to hiss and pull away.

He looked up at Will with wide brown puppy dog eyes, holding his fingers up to his bitten lip. His hurt expression melted into interest. He saw a game.

"Angel," Will said warningly.

Angel smiled, rubbing his lower lip. A flash of playfulness lit up his eyes and he pulled his bare feet up onto the bed, crouching like a cat ready to pounce.

"No, Angel," Will said clearly, ready to bolt.

Angel hurdled onto him, knocking him flat back on the bed. Angel's foot on his thigh, he yelped against flesh when Angel gave him a hard little bite to the side of his mouth.

"Ow! Angel, no! Biting is not a game."

Angel wriggled excitedly, laughing at Will flat on his back and bit his ear with teeth that felt sharp as razors. As Will registered the pain, he felt lips pressing softly against his mouth again, kissing him gently as his ear gave tiny little throbs of displeasure.

"Angel," he said between kisses, "No -- OW!" He cried as Angel bit the skin over his cheekbone.

He slammed his fist into Angel's side in pained frustration. Angel keeled over and Will sat up, disheveled. He heard breathless laughter from behind him and turned, seeing Angel curled up around his injured side, smiling. He laughed again, causing Will to smile and laugh a little as well, more in surprise at the situation. Angel sat up and shuffled closer to him, throwing him coy glances. He was cowed a little by the punch, uncertain, like he'd been scolded, hunched a little as he leant over to press a timid little kiss against the bite mark on Will's cheek.

Will laughed and Angel grew bolder, kissing at his sore ear and then the corner of his mouth. Will stayed still, smile leaving his face, melting into something more as Angel pressed wet chaste kisses to his lips, trying to draw him out. The kisses grew less virgin, more wet, lingering until Will turned his head more towards them, wanting more, subtly signaling his ascent to Angel who slid close and immediately swept his tongue against Will's.

Hands came up around his neck, slyly holding him in place as thumbs gently stroked his jaw. Tame kisses turned into more passionate biting kisses, Will's cock rising as his lips were rubbed raw by hard lips and teeth. He moaned into Angel's mouth as Angel rose up, straddling his thigh as he tried to push him back down flat on the bed again. Will moaned, cock throbbing against the seam of his pants.

The kisses faltered a little, and Will opened his eyes, seeing Angel's face tense and blissed out, holding his breath and releasing it slowly against his wet lips.

"What's wrong?" Will whispered.

Angel shook his head, smiling. "Nothing. Nothing is wrong."

Will wrapped his arm's around Angel's waist and pulled him further into his lap, feeling jean-covered hardness press against his lower belly. Rubbing his palms rhythmically against Angel's hips, sliding them up under his shirt to press against his hot skin, he felt Angel push his growing erection against his Will's belly a little, groaning out loud as he rubbed against his own jeans. He started rocking a little, spread over Will's thigh, throwing his head back and holding on to Will's shoulders.

Watching him dumbly, face turned up against the light, Will's palm drifted down between Angel's thighs and ground against the hard flesh beneath the jeans. Angel froze, shivered a little and looked at his with sharp eyes, wordlessly ordering more. Will cupped his hand around the bulge and squeezed, fingernails rasping against the rough denim as Angel's mouth fell slack.

"More. Again."

"You like it?" Will growled.

Angel nodded, eyes bright, smiling widely. Will undid his pants with shaking fingers, unzipping and pushing Angel onto the bed to pull the denim down his thighs. Tight brown curls under the open zipper and Angel yelping as the jeans slid over his erect cock made Will's thighs tighten up in a spasm, waves of excitement boiling inside. Angel's big hard-on sprung free against his flat twitching belly, the head all shiny-slick with pre-come. Will slid over him, kissing his excited panting mouth as he wrapped his hand around Angel's prick and slowly slid the tight foreskin up over his wet cock head.

Breaking the kiss as Angel rolled his head back against the mattress, Will smiled, bending to kiss his exposed throat as he slid his fist back down to damp curls, ball of his hand pressing against Angel's sac. Years and a million fantasies all swirling around Will's mind making the actual moment seem nothing more than one of his dreams, lost in it, so foggy and detached in shock he could have been sleeping. He held onto the dull throb in his ear and cheek where Angel had bitten him like an excited cat, the pain of it, something more real, able to prove to himself that this was happening.

He squeezed the hot silky flesh in his hand, making Angel's belly twitch in a wonderfully alluring way as he kissed over Angel's high cheekbones, ignoring the way Angel rolled and fidgeted as he tried to find a place for all the new feelings in his body.

"That feels so... good..." Angel breathed lasciviously, voice gravelly rough with pleasure.

Will began to pump his cock, sliding the skin back and forth, watching Angel's hips innately push up to fuck his cock into his fist. His nipples were hard underneath the thin material of his shirt and Will bent down, biting one roughly through the cotton, feeling Angel try to push his chest up to meet his mouth, leaving the material wet and sticky as he switched, sucking the other nipple as Angel grabbed his hair in sweaty handfuls.

"Will..." he rasped into his hair as Will pushed the cotton up with his free hand, leaving his brown nipple peaked and bare against his laving tongue. "My stomach feels funny..."

Will looked up, possessed predatory eyes on Angel's bewildered expression, leaning down to kiss him as Angel raised up to meet his mouth, cupping his hand around Angel's sac while he pulled quickly at his burning hot cock.

Angel's teeth slammed down around Will's tongue a moment before his pumping hand was covered in hot liquid, balls twitching and tight in his other palm, his entire long body shuddering in the aftermath of orgasm for the first time. He pulled his head away slamming the come-covered hand against his bleeding mouth in pain as Angel rolled back against the pillow; panting and sweaty, jeans sluttily pulled down around his thighs.

Tangy copper twanged his taste buds as he winced in pain, trying not to move his abused tongue. Come slick and drying around his lips covered the taste of the blood, the smell of it hanging onto the back of his tongue.

Angel sat up lazily and grabbed him down for a kiss, immediately pushing him away and wiping his mouth.

"You taste bad," he grumped, settling for kissing him powerlessly on the neck.

Will stood up, still wincing in pain and went to his desk, pulling out a tissue. He wiped his mouth and hand before spitting bloody saliva onto the come messed tissue. Not too much blood, but still. Ow.

He looked back, seeing Angel sprawled across the bed again, used cock resting over his balls sleepily. Angel made a tired sound and kicked his jeans off, rolling over on to his side, obliviously baring his tight round ass to Will. Eyes glazing over for a second, Will sat back down on the bed, reaching out and stroking across the pliant flesh, hard cock trying to fill and harden even more.

He squeezed his cheek gently, hearing Angel giggle tiredly.

"What are you doing?"

"Nothig," Will said, alarmed to hear the word tumble of his swelling tongue so clumsily.

"Nothig?" Angel asked.

"Oh mo," Will said, slumping as his tongue started to throb, feeling three times its normal size. He stood up, leaving Angel and his sweet fresh skin on his bed as he jogged downstairs, heading to the kitchen for some ice.


Fifteen

Angel pulled his legs up onto the porch chair, hearing it squeak and stretch underneath him. Entranced in the book Will had given him that morning, he could no longer hear the trees rustling in the breeze, or Fred and Gunn clinking plates through the open windows of the kitchen.

It wasn’t a normal book, Will had explained in a quiet voice, sitting lightly on the bed when Angel had blearily woken up. Wasn’t normal. It was something so much better.

He’d called it fiction. A book not made to give information, but a written story instead. A story on page. It was brilliant. The Invisible Man. Some of the language was hard to understand but he understood most of it. He was so wrapped up in the story of someone who became … see through… that he didn’t notice Three settling down on the faded porch in front of him.

“What are you reading?”

Angel, startled, looked over the edge of his book. “The Invisible Man.”

“What’s that about?”

“It’s a story. Not real.” Will had repeatedly told him that fiction meant not real.

“Is it good?”

“Yes.”

Three nodded, fidgeting until he sat cross-legged, looking up at him, his green eyes fixed on Angel’s face. He looked cold, in jeans and a thin black shirt. It looked like one of Will’s shirts. He continued to watch him.

“What?” Angel asked after a while, brow furrowing. He couldn’t concentrate with Three’s eyes watching him.

“I’m bored.”

“Go find a book.”

“Let’s go for a walk,” Three said to him, getting up and pulling him off the outside chair.

“A walk?”

“Yes. Walking around.”

“Why?” Why would he want to walk around? Walk around where?

“Because you haven’t seen outside properly. You always stay on the porch.”

“When did you go out from the porch?”

“Mostly when you were sick in bed. I went with Philip. And Fred. But sometimes we still go,” Three said, jumping down form the porch, his bare feet landing in the grass with a whup sound. “Let’s go. There’s lots of trees.”

He put his book down slowly and turned to face Three again. He didn’t really want to go for a walk; he wanted to read what Will had given him.

”Just a little book… that I used to enjoy. When I was… younger. I mean, I still enjoy it …but… yeah.” Will smiled at him, sitting down near Angel’s blanket covered knees. His hair was longer now; little blond tipped curls tickling his ears. “It’s a story.”

“Why do you walk?” Angel asked, standing.

“To see things. I saw animals.”

Now Angel was interested. “Animals? What kind of animals?”

“Birds. And … small things. I’ll show you. I don’t know what they’re all called.”

They walked away from the house, into the trees, and Angel started getting a little bit tight in the chest, like he couldn’t breath. He didn’t like being so far away from the rooms. It was… it was strange.

“Stop.”

“What’s wrong?”

Angel held his chest and tried to breathe slower. His lungs felt tight, too small for the big air.

“You look scared.”

“I feel… scared.” His eyes flicked up, seeing blue as far as his eyes could go.

“Oh. Of the sky.” Three nodded. “It’s new. I was scared at first. It was… too big for me. I felt tiny.”

“Yes,” Angel nodded. “That’s what I feel.” Three felt the same things as him?

“It doesn’t fall. Nothing does. Philip took me around a lot.”

Angel nodded, feeling better when Three talked to him, knowing he had felt the same.

“Look, an ant!” Three said suddenly.

Angel looked at the tree, forgetting about the wide open when he saw a little black thing squiggling along it. “How does it walk sideways?” Angel asked as he walked up, pushing at the tiny black thing with his finger.

It fell and disappeared into the leaves at the bottom of the tree. “Oh.”

“I think you scared it.” Three said, bending down and combing his fingers through the leaves to try to find it.

Angel cocked his head. He hadn’t thought about that. That things could be scared of him. He felt very strong. Like the wide open didn’t matter any more. Maybe the wide open was scared as well…

“Snail.” Three said, holding up a circle thing and putting it on his palm. It didn’t look very alive, although it was a bit slimy.

“How do you know the names of everything?”

“Philip and Fred told me. I don’t know them all though.”

A long slimy thing suddenly slid out from the round thing and Angel flung it off his hand, not expecting it to do that. He stared at it on the ground, like it was going to leap up at him.

Three looked up at him with a blank look. “If you keep throwing things on the ground, all the animals will go away.”

“It moved!”

“It’s alive…” Three said, checking the snail before putting it on a plant. “You didn’t break it, it’s alright.”

Angel watched it, not wanting to go near the snail as it slimed along the leaf. Two long eyes stuck out from it, waving around. “I don’t like that. Show me a fluffy animal. A puppy.”

“I don’t have a puppy.”

He liked the pictures he saw of them. “Well… where are they then?”

Three looked at him, his green eyes standing out surrounded by the green of outside. “I don’t know.”

Angel sighed looking up at the tall trees. It smelled like dirt out here. He didn’t like it. He wanted to go back inside. He turned around and walked, hearing Three’s feet crunching over the sticks and leaves and dirt behind him.

“Come this way.” Three said as he grabbed his arm, jerking him to one side.

Angel pulled away. “I want to read.”

“I want to show you the fence.”

Angel blinked, looking back towards the house. He enjoyed Three, but he didn’t want to be here, he wanted to be back in the house, away from slimy animals. “Are there animals?”

“No, its wood.”

Angel sighed again, louder, like Father when Angel couldn’t understand a maths problem after having it explained to him three times. “There’s wood everywhere,” he said pushing on a huge tree, “Why go over there when you can see wood here?”

“This is different wood, it’s in a line, and it shows where we can go.”

Angel frowned a little. Where they could go? Did that mean… “There are places we can’t go?”

“Fred told me not to leave the property. Property is what is inside the fence.”

A fence must be like a wall then. Mirrors? He felt a little squiggle in his belly, like he’d eaten snails. He didn’t like the thought of more mirrors and walls. “Show me.”

They walked a little, until Three pointed out a tall wood wall. There was no roof; it was just a wall, not even as tall as he was. That was okay, he supposed.

“Do you want to look for more animals? There are spiders around.”

“What’s a spirder?”

“Spi-der. They’re like… like bugs, but… I don’t know.”

Angel looked back at the house longingly.

“They’re furry.” Three said hopefully.

Angel nodded. “Alright. Are they big?”

“No. And look, that’s what they live on.” He pointed up to a little patch on a tree branch. It was a small corner filled with clear shiny strings.

“What is that…?” Angel said, moving closer.

“Web. They make it to catch flies. It’s sticky so flies and bugs get stuck to it. Then they eat them.”

Three picked up a small dried leaf and attached it to the web. Angel smiled. It stayed stuck.

“They eat bugs?” He asked, looking around for something small and furry.

“Yes.”

Three put another leaf in the web and suddenly, something small and brown scurried out from the tree. Angel started a little, unused to things doing that. It was a small puff, with lots of legs and a black face.

He smiled, reaching out. “Beautiful.” He said, patting it. It was disappointingly hard. It looked like it would be softer… but it was still nice.

It scurried away quickly.

“Don’t touch them.” Three said, pushing his dark hair away from his forehead.

“Why not?”

“Cause Philip said so.”

Angel raised his eyebrows. He’d see what Will had to say about that. “Let’s find more.”

“Are you going to touch them?”

“Yes.”

Three stared at him. “Don’t.”

“Philip told you not to touch them, not me.” Angel said reasonably.

Three’s green eyes flicked back to the web. He frowned a little, his lower lip jutting out. Angel smiled at it, reaching out and pushing it back into place. Three smiled at him.

Footsteps were crunching up to them and Angel turned, seeing Gunn walking towards them. “Lunch, guys.”

“What is it?” Angel asked immediately.

“A nice boring sandwich,” Gunn said with a smile, turning around and leading them towards the house. “Can’t turn your nose up at that.”

“What’s on it?”

“Will’s making it. He knows what you like.”

They entered, Angel grabbing his book on the way, and sat down next to each other at the kitchen table. Three took the book once Angel had put it down and started flicking through it.

Will was in the kitchen, cutting more things up with his cooks knife. “Where have you two been?” he asked with a small smile, his tongue still sounding too big for his mouth. Angel must have bitten his tongue hard last night. He hadn’t meant to, but Will had still been eating ice when Angel fell asleep.

Alex was standing in front of the fridge looking in. Alex wasn’t around much. He must stay in his room a lot. “Out looking at animals.”

“You can’t pat spiders, can you?” Three said after a moment, not looking up at Will but staring down at the book, a little hunched in his seat.

“Pat spiders?” Will’s voice raised a little. “No, don’t. No patting of any animal.” His eyes flicked to Angel.

Three looked at him, raising his eyebrows. “I told you.”

“Don’t pat spiders, Angel.”

Angel felt… grumpy about being Three being right. He’d thought Three would be wrong. His eyes settled on Will again, and a big smile from him as he set a sandwich on the table for him cleared away most of the heavy feelings.

He opened his sandwich to look at it. Chicken and tomato sauce with some lettuce. Good. That’s what he liked. He closed it up again and bit into it, downing it in five bites.

“I need another,” he said, still hungry, getting up and putting his plate on the table in front of Will.

Will closed his eyes for a second. “Angel? When you want someone to do something for you, you ask nicely. ‘Please can I have another sandwich?’. And, when someone gives you something, you say ‘thankyou’. Manners.”

“Manners,” Angel paused. “Please can I have another sandwich?”

Will beamed at him. “Yes you may.”

He started slicing some tomato.

“Put salt on it,” Angel said. Will’s eyes flicked up to him and he hurriedly continued. “Please.”

Will nodded and shook the shaker over the tomato. Angel scratched the small of his back; momentarily distracted by a soft puffy scar he had from old skin samples. That one he remembered. A long strip up the left side of his spine, that one had gotten infected for a long time. Painful and leaking and it kept tearing, even after he’d healed.

“What’s wrong?” Will said, combing his fingers through his messy hair, frowning a little as he tried to push it back from his ears.

“Nothing,” Angel said, picking at the tiny bumps on the side of the scar for a second. “I like the book.”

Will smiled. “Good,” he said quietly, “Im glad.”

“Are you eating?”

Will looked down at the chopping board. “Uh… only soft things.”

---

Travers sat in the darkened room and watched, as he had every day for the past twenty-three years. He sat and watched and made notes and constructed theories and became mesmerised by the… flawlessness of his experiment.

He clicked the tape out and put another in, selecting one from the archive box he’d ordered up. A soundless grainy black and white affair, too clumsy to capture the perfection of the seven-year-old boy it recorded. Angel’s lips moved as he worked through some sort of exercise book, pencil in his hand.

This was his work. It was his life. Angel frowned a little at the book, scratching his head like his fingers could spark the answer to whatever problem.

Travers’ eyes flicked away to the monitor that showed views of the now empty rooms. The lights still worked on their timer, dim in the late hour, dimmed so Angel could sleep and Travers could still monitor him. They’d thought about everything, how to make Angel’s life the most comfortable life it could be.

The simmering anger he’d felt for weeks turned up to its sporadic boil.

Project Origin wasn’t done. It wasn’t over until Travers said it was over. Angel would come back, they would retrieve him, and he would go back to his life. Because that was Angel’s life. Travers had bought and paid for it. And even if he had to cut the rotten memory core of his brain so he couldn’t remember the damaging time away from his life, Travers would have his Angel back.

Wouldn’t be long now.

---

Angel lay on his bed, reading the book. Three was curled up behind him, and his breathing was deep and as rhythmic as a song. He fidgeted every now and again, a little sigh, his shoulder moving against Angel’s back, but then he would still and quieten. Angel liked that better, because he wasn’t distracting.

Angel flicked the page and gave a quick scratch that was rippling under his shirt and quickly fell into the story again.
He read, murmuring some of the words out loud if they were too difficult to keep in his brain, trying to read as fast as he could to get to the next page or the next spoken word… dialogue, Will had called it. He loved it.

Three’s hand curled around his waist and started stroking his belly. Distracted from his story, Angel frowned and flicked the hand back behind him, turning back to his book and reading.

He felt cool fingers slide under his shirt and up his back, tickling and freezing him at the same time, making his nipples constrict as nice shivers ran down his arms.

“You’re cold,” Angel said, wriggling, trying to dislodge the hand.

“I am.”

His hand stroked down Angel’s spine.

“I want to read,” he said. “Take your hand away, I can’t concentrate.”

Three’s hand slipped round under his arm and his fingers pinched at Angel’s nipple. A half-warm buzz flowed lazily through him, not enough to make him want to leave the story at a very good part. It was good, but also… made him feel worried… sort of scared. The invisible man was talking about giving a cat the drugs and making the cat invisible… all except the backs of her eyes. Angel shivered.

That was … scary. Doing that to the cat, because the cat didn’t want it… or at least, couldn’t say she didn’t want it. And then she was sad. He decided he didn’t like the invisible man, but even-

Three’s fingers tightened around his nipple again.

“Don’t!” Angel barked, frustrated at having to put his book down to pull Three’s hand away. Why didn’t he just do what Angel had asked? Then Angel wouldn’t have gotten annoyed at him.

Three giggled behind him and both his hands slid around Angel’s chest again. Angry and hot, Angel reached behind him and grabbed Three’s shirt, rolling him over himself and throwing him away to the ground. He landed with a little ‘oomph’ and looked up at him, green eyes wide, eyebrows raised. Angel stared at him angrily, picking up the book again and opening it roughly.

He was reading again as Three stood up, rubbing his upper arm. He noticed him vaguely in his background vision, but he wasn’t really paying attention. Three turned around for a second and then turned back, stepping closer. Sighing, Angel looked up from his book a second before Three slammed a heavy encyclopedia down onto Angel’s shoulder. Angel cried out in pain as Three smiled victoriously and ran out of the room.

Angel stood, breathing heavy, his heart all angry and pumping in his throat. He slammed out after him, seeing Three’s head just disappearing down the stairs. He ran out and swung down the stairs, seeing him opening the door and running out to the left. Angel slammed down the stairs a few seconds behind him.

Three ran fast, Angel could hear the noise of his breath as he raced him, not knowing what he was going to do when he caught him, but knowing he had to catch him, his mind yelling to catch him for being so annoying, for hitting him with the book. He wasn’t allowed to hit Angel with a book. He just wasn’t.

Three ran around the house and into the backyard in the failing afternoon light, laughing a little. The trees and grass were thick, but not thick enough that Angel couldn’t see him. He could see him easily; he couldn’t see anything else but his dark head and black shirt.

Three rounded a tree too closely, and his shoulder bounced off the wood. He cried out and span around a second before Angel slammed into him, catching him around the waist and flinging them both onto the ground. His shoulder was against Three’s stomach and Three was panting, the melting sun spotting his face through the trees. Angel rolled him over and pushed his face into the dirt.

“Don’t hit me with books!”

Three nodded and rolled back over, face dirty and dead leaves in his hair. He panted, spitting some grass out of his mouth, his lips puffed like he’d been kissing. Angel knelt up ready to go back when Three slammed his foot into Angel’s stomach roughly, sending him back down.

Three rolled over and tried to jump up, but Angel caught his ankle, hauling him back to the ground. Three struggled, not laughing anymore, looking as angry as Angel felt. His knee connected with Angel’s chin, clacking his teeth together and making his entire head hum. He pushed Three down easily, driving a knee into his thigh. Covered in dirt and leaves they both wrestled, not fun wrestling like with Will, but angry wrestling.

Three’s feet were pushing at Angel’s chest, trying to leaver him off as Angel held Three’s wrists tightly. Angel wriggled, sliding down in between his legs. He felt Three’s heels digging into his back, but he glared down at his face, ignoring him.

“I win.” He said, voice rough and deep.

Heart pounding and his blood felt like it was spinning through his head. Three’s eyes were narrowed and his sharp heels were still pounding against his back. His nails dug into Angel’s hands with all the power he could muster.

“Stop it!” He warned.

Three’s eyes widened angrily, burning green and Angel felt a sting in the flesh of his hands as the nails speared his skin. Angel bent down and bit Three’s neck as hard as he could. Instantly the heels stopped hurting his back and the pain in his hands withdrew. Teeth about to break through the skin, he paused, feeling Three laying limply underneath him.

He drew back, the anger in Three’s eyes dimmed, more scared now. His blood rushed through him, making him feel dizzy. He felt so strong. Like he could lift up the house. Three’s neck was red where he’d bitten him, dusky coloured, like a rash. Little crescent shapes dotted his own hands, puffing up around the blood welling in them. He let Three’s wrists go to rub at the pain. Three stayed laying down, watching him warily, his hair all messy and stuck with leaves and grass.

“Sorry,” Angel said airily, standing up.

“Sorry,” Three said from the ground. He didn’t get up until Angel grabbed his hand and pulled him from the dirt.

Angel turned and walked back to the house, smiling, hearing Three trotting close behind him. “You’re strong,” he said after a moment.

“I know,” Angel said, heading towards the kitchen door, “Your fingernails are sharp.”

He went inside, turning to see Three at his heels. His cheeks were pink.

“What happened to you two?” Philip asked, frowning at them as he closed the fridge door.

“Wrestling,” Three said.

Philip’s frown turned to Angel. Angel raised his eyebrows, questioning the look. “Three, can I talk to you for a moment?” Philip asked, looking back at Three.

“Angel, go see Will or something.”

“Okay.”

He left the room, looking in the television room first, to see if Will was there. He wasn’t. He climbed the stairs two at a time, opening Will’s door and seeing him packing things into a big cardboard box. He looked up at him blankly.

“Manners. Knock on someone’s door before you enter,” he sighed, putting some clothes into the box and closing it up.

Angel went back outside, knocked and came in.

“Thankyou,” Will said with a smile, sitting down on his bed. “What can I do for you?”

Angel shrugged.

Will frowned a little, still smiling. “Why are you here then, pet?”

“Philip told me to see you.”

The smile vanished and he just looked concerned. Angel sat down next to him on the bed, remembering the previous night and smiling at it. It had felt good, kissing Will; feeling Will play with his penis. “Can we-“

“Why did Philip want you to see me?”

Angel shrugged, smoothing his hands across the different covers. They weren’t the same as last night. “Why did you change-“

“What did you do before Philip said that?”

“Uh… came into the kitchen.”

“Before?”

“Three hit me with a book so I chased him into the backyard and pushed his face into the dirt. And look,” he held his hands up, showing the puffy cuts, “he has sharp nails. So I bit him on the neck.”

Will blinked. “Okay…” He made a clicking sound with his tongue, “No more pushing Three in the dirt.”

“But-“

“But nothing. No more pushing Three in the dirt. And no more biting.”

“He hit me with a book! A big one,” Angel said, his voice loud.

“Angel, you’re a lot stronger than him.”

Angel relaxed a little and smiled proudly. “Thankyou. I won easily.”

“Uh… yeah. See, the thing is-“

“How is your tongue? I didn’t mean to bite it.”

Will paused, blinking rapidly a few times. He smiled weakly. “It’s fine. Mouth heals quickly.”

“Stick it out.”

“My tongue?”

Angel nodded and smiled as Will paused for a moment before poking his pink tongue out. It had a puffy line across the top. But only a little bit. Nothing like his hand. Will slid his tongue back into his mouth, smiling faintly as Angel leant forward, kissing him softly on the lips. Will seemed to like little kisses more. He let them happen more if they were gentle.

Blood still buzzing from being stronger than Three, he cupped his hand around Will’s cheek, pulling him close again for another kiss.

Will tugged his head away and grabbed his wrist gently.

“Don’t bully Three anymore,” he said, blue eyes dark in the twilight. “Don’t.”

“Bully?”

“Don’t push Three around just because he’s smaller.”

Angel smiled, curling his fingers into Will’s shirt collar. His skin felt nice against his fingertips. Hot. Made him feel like kissing. “But I like showing I’m stronger.”

Will pushed his hands away. “Angel, no. You can’t do that to people.”

Angel’s eyes flicked up to Will’s. He shrugged. “Why not? He hurt me more than I hurt him.” He held up his hand as proof. “He deserved it.”

Angel’s heart jumped into his throat when Will gently kissed the swollen red flesh around the nail bites. He hauled Will close, pressing him against his chest and sank his lips down over Will’s, sliding his tongue into his mouth, hearing a grunt a second before he remembered Will’s tongue was sore.

“Sorry.”

Will didn’t answer, not listening as he leant close again, kissing him roughly, wetting his lips. It felt like wrestling, mouth wrestling, trying to win, so Angel kissed back rougher, feeling the urge to bite him like he had Three and made him go all meek. Spread him out on the bed. His penis throbbed at the thought. Could he make Will … listen to him like that? Do what he wanted? Will hurt him back last time. He gave a tentative bite to Will’s lip to see what he’d do.

He moaned a little, wrapping his arms around Angel’s waist.

His penis throbbed uncomfortably in his pants and he groaned a little, letting Will go so he could undo his fly. He slipped himself out and grabbed one of Will’s calming hands, wrapping it round the hot flesh. Will squeezed him and the rush of feeling made his eyes roll back. He wanted a thousand Will hands all doing what he’d done last night.

He slipped his shirt off over his head and pushed Will’s face down towards his suddenly sensitive nipples. All these years he hadn’t felt anything from them, or his penis, or testicles and now suddenly they were all he could think about. He wanted Will to touch him all day.

Will’s lips sucked at the hard nub on his chest, a line of bright hot travelling down from his chest to his penis wrapped in Will’s fingers.

“Harder,” he growled, Will’s slow squeezing of his flesh not giving him enough. He wanted to come.

Will’s lips kissed along his chest and sucked at his other nipple, leaving the first drying cold in the room, making him giggle at the feeling.

He bit his lip, pushing his chest towards Will’s mouth, and cried out happily when he felt another set of fingers curling around his sac, massaging.

“I like it…” he breathed. “This is my favourite thing.”

Will bit his nipple and he yelped, stomach clenching. It still felt good though, buzzy, even though it hurt. He wriggled himself further into Will’s hands. The air smelled really salty, and hot around them, making him sweat and lose his breath. His body was boiling as he watched Will’s fingers pull at his penis, making the skin tighten. Angel lost control of his breathing, his lungs dragging air inside in unbalanced bursts, leaving him dizzy headed as his fingers wrapped around Will’s pumping fist, feeling his skin, feeling hot wet he was and Will’s fingers too, watching his thumb sweep over the tip carried with a raw rush of feeling through his thighs and belly.

He pushed his head back into the pillow, face scrunched up as his testicles hummed and tightened drawing up close all by themselves, feeling the hot rush up through his penis and the second of nothingness before his hand was splattered with hot seed, mixing in between his and Will’s fingers. Another spurt as sweat stung his eyes, on his stomach and the air filled with tang. He slumped back, sleepiness dragging his eyes closed immediately, all his muscles warm and his blood running with pure happy. He smiled weakly at Will who played with his penis a little more before lying down next to him.

Will’s lips pressed against his shoulder, then his cheek as he realised the light had gone dark, purplish as a bruise around them. He rolled, his penis sticky against his sac and noticed Will’s groin in the dim. The jeans were tight against the bulge.
He pressed his hand against him, seeing him bite his lip and close his eyes. He was hard, like stone under his jeans. Angel unbuttoned them with his slick hand and reached inside, feeling hot flesh, like skin after a steamy shower, damp. And curls that bounced against his fingers. He sat up and tugged Will’s black jeans off, seeing his penis swollen and filled, ready to come. It just needed some playing first.

He wrapped his hand around it awkwardly and started pulling, like Will had done to him, amazed by the throb inside, how hot he was. The tip of him, was drooling a little, clear stuff… not come, cause that was white…

“Is this pre-come?” He asked him, swiping his fingers over the wet.

Will, eyes still clenched closed, nodded quickly. He swallowed, feeling dry and hot again. Will’s penis twitched in his hand. He let it drop back against Will’s shirt and curled his fingers under his testicles, bending down for a closer look. The skin was so soft… but darker. And wrinkles. He laughed.

“Don’t laugh when you're that close to a man’s bits,” Will murmured suddenly.

Angel looked up and saw his eyes were still closed. He smiled and Will opened one eye, a slit of blue watching him in the darkness.

Angel squeezed his sac, watching him wriggle nicely, making his blood run hot. His penis felt sensitive again and he gave himself a tentative rub. His penis was hardening, halfway to where it was before. He pulled at himself, closing his eyes and he played with both their penises, straddling Will's thin thigh. He slid his knee between Will's thighs, gently sliding it down underneath his testicles, propping him up a little. Will's legs spread a little wider. Angel could feel the muscles in Will's buttocks and he tightened his thigh against them. His thighs were bigger than Will's. More muscles. He smiled, pulling Will's penis, making him do little rolls on the bed, mussing up the covers and emitting little sounds. His hair was sticking up everywhere and his white teeth were nibbling on his lip.

His own cock hardened up again and he pulled Will close, tugging his cock to line up with Angel’s. Will panted. He pushed them both together, and a low groan slipped from his lips as silky skin brushed up against silky skin. His hips thrust a little and it felt good so he kept doing that, dragging his penis along Will’s. Will was grabbing at the covers breathlessly.

He checked the length, and his penis was bigger too. A little wider but the tip of Will’s was redder. Angel’s hands were sticky.

It took longer for Will to ejaculate, and when he did he slammed a pillow over his face and muffled his cry with it. His semen was all over Angel’s hand, and he used the extra slickness to stroke himself with, enjoying the feel. Will put the pillow aside, saw what he was doing and grabbed it back pushing it over his face and mumbling into it.

“It’s so slippery…” Angel said, closing his eyes as the surge filled him up again.

His wrist was getting sore, but he kept going, watching Will, watching his fingers trail down to his own nipples and pluck at them a little, distantly, as his eyes watched Angel play. Will’s face was flushed, pink cheeked and eyes wide and all Angel could think was that he understood now how a person could be pretty. Will was prettier than any rose.

Angel’s other hand slid between his thighs and cupped his testicles, pushing them against himself snugly and shouting as he felt the hot flow from his spine all the way through his penis, watching his penis intently as he came, his semen splattering over his hand and down onto Will’s thigh.

He slumped down with a sigh, feeling like he’d been running for hours.

“Took you longer,” Will said with a smile.

“That’s cause I’m bigger than you,” he sighed, closing his eyes.


Sixteen

He opened his eyes sleepily, hearing nothing but the wind howling past the house for a moment. The wind whipped through the trees and barrelled into the house, making it creak as it struggled to stay still.

A soft sigh from next to him under all the wind noise and he turned his head on the pillow, seeing the back of Angel’s head, dark hair bed mussed, blanket pulled up over his wide shoulders.

Will reached up, patting the soft hair down the nape of his neck.

The house creaked Will breathed deep, the cold so strong he could taste it and… he smelled wet grass, damp earth. He smiled, rolling over and opened the curtains. A light rain misted the air. Will grinned widely and jerked Angel awake with his elbow.
He woke slowly, shaking his dark head like a wet dog.

“Will…?”

“Look Angel, it’s raining,” He said softly, grabbing his warm arm and hauling him up to sit.

Angel knelt up, bare skin goosepimpling in the frozen air, and peered out the window, sleepy eyes widening as he saw the rain falling.

He smiled slowly, not blinking as he watched it eagerly, clumsily sprawling his long nude limbs over Will in an effort to get closer to the window until his nose was pressed tight against it.

“It looks like a shower!” He said after a moment.

“Yeah.”

“Pouring down from the ceiling…” soft voice just heard above the nature noise, “I mean sky.” He added, words jumbling together numbly.

Will watched him, seeing his skin all dewy like he was under a soft lens, the entire room warmer as Angel smiled at the rain in awe.

“The ground is all wet. The dirt is turning to puddles.”

Will nodded. “Yeah. Plants get water, they drink, they live. And everything else gets wet too.”

“It’s nice.”

Will smiled, running his hand down Angel’s arm gently. “Yeah. It’s nice.”

“If I go out there, it will be wet?”

Will nodded.

“So it is like a shower?”

He nodded again, laughing a little. “Yep,” he said, shuffling closer, feet cold under the jumbled covers as he leaned up to peck a kiss against the corner of Angel’s smiling mouth.

Angel kissed him back, dark eyes on him the entire time until he became distracted by another fierce rasp of wind sweeping past the house and bullying it on its foundations.

“Noisy.”

He pressed his straight nose against the glass again as Will lay back down, content to watch him at the window. His stomach fluttered nicely.

---

Will bounced down the stairs, leaving Angel to snooze, curled up in his bed hugging his pillow close. He’d gone back to sleep after watching the rain and accepting kisses from Will for about a half-hour, pulling the covers up over his broad chest. Cigarette and coffee bound Will slammed through the kitchen doors, noisy with happiness, striding over towards the drawers where he kept a soft pack, grabbing Philip’s shoulder as he passed in a friendly hello.

“Hello,” Philip said from behind the newspaper.

“Coffee?” Will asked as a howl of wind shook the house, making it creak. Rain pattered down heavily.

“I just made some.”

Will turned back around, “Ah!” he said happily, grabbing a mug from the cupboard beneath the steaming pot. “Thankyou.”

“Mmm.”

He hummed a little, spooning sugar into the aromatic black and stirring it in. “Where is everyone?” He asked, taking a sip as he slid into the chair across from Philip.

“Asleep, I’d expect.”

Will frowned and turned to the clock, surprised to see it was only seven. “Oh. Thought it was later,” he sipped his coffee.

Philip flicked over a page in the newspaper, setting the big sheets down on the table and clasping his hands primly as he looked down at them, eyes moving across the type quickly.

The sound of Will sipping coffee and the rain pouring down made it seem almost cosy and Will drifted away a little, half day dreaming about Angel up in his bed, long sleek body all wrapped up in big fluffy blankets.

“Rainy out, isn’t it?” He asked Philip, prodding him once more for a conversation.

“It is.” Philip said, focusing on him and forgetting the newspaper. “ So. During the five years we planned this … escape for Angel, why is it you never once mentioned you wanted to shag him.”

Will froze, open-mouthed. “What?” He managed after a moment.

Philip raised his eyebrows. He shrugged. “Im just saying, it might have been better if we’d known.”

Will stared at him across the table. Philip raised his thin eyebrows, undeterred.

“I … care for Angel… he-”

“So do I.” Philip said smoothly, folding up the newspaper and setting it aside. “I watched unspeakable evils being performed on him for years, and I care deeply for him. I know him.”

“I grew up with Angel,” Will said trying to be as calm as Philip when he actually felt blindsided by him, a bubbling anger rising inside. “Just cause we’re close doesn’t mean I want to bugger him.”

“Good. Because I don’t think Angel needs any more confusion.”

“You think I’m going to confuse him?” Will asked, standing up, offended, on the defensive ready for a fight.

“If you make an advance on him… he’s going to do whatever you want. You awe him. You’re his guiding star, this all knowing perfect thing which he keeps on a pedestal.” Philip said quietly, still sitting. “I don’t know if that’s good for you or him.”

“Oh you don’t think. Well, nothing’s going to happen to confuse him. Nothing ever was.”

“Don’t be so defensive. I didn’t want to have a fight with you.”

“Right.”

“I didn’t,” he said plainly, still sitting tranquilly as he always did, unruffled and cool and it had never been so irritating.

“What makes you think-“

“Will. The walls are paper-thin. I went up for a shower and had to walk right past your room.” Philip paused, cocking his head slightly. “He’s there now, isn’t he?”

“So?” He snapped, the fifteen-year-old inside him pouting and whining at being caught red handed. “So what?”

A slight displeasure crinkled Philip’s pale face. “Will…”

“No. Listen I’m the one who majored in behavioural psyc here, not you.”

Philip raised his eyebrows, a tinge of annoyance in his eyes. “You’re trying to up me on credentials?” he asked smoothly.

“What I’m saying is, I’m not going to hurt him, I know how not to hurt him.”

“Does Angel even know what homosexuality is?” Philip asked, his voice raising a little.

Will’s chest chilled. “Is that what this is about?” he asked frigidly.

Philip sighed and rolled his eyes. “That’s a ridiculous statement and you know it. There’s nothing wrong with feeling attracted to Angel. There’s nothing wrong with Angel feeling attracted to you. It’s natural. But if you were any kind of… anything to Angel, you’d let it pass for a while. Let him figure out who he is, before pushing him-“

“I’m not pushing him into anything!”

“Before pushing him to figure out where you stand in his life.” Philip finished, lips tight. “He doesn’t need to know that right now. Sexual relationships should not be what he’s focusing on. He should be focusing on figuring out twenty years of life, he doesn’t know how to have a normal relationship, let alone an intensive physical one.”

“You tell him that then.”

“No, you tell him that and stop acting like a brat,” Philip said, standing up and tucking the paper under his arm.

Will felt like he’d been slapped in the face. He wanted to throttle something, the inner teenager shrieking a tantrum on the inside.

“I had guessed that you had a little crush on Angel. I knew you were gay and I knew you fancied him. I thought you would have the sense not to treat Angel like a fully functional adult male. He’s not. And not only is it not healthy for him to have… this… now, it’s not good for you. Will, I’m not attacking you,” he said, back to his same ever calm voice, “I am however, a little surprised.”

“Listen I never made a move on him alright?” He said, snapping angrily. “He came to me.”

“So if a fourteen year old comes onto a teacher, then it’s alright if they fool around?”

Will laughed incredulously. “Angel is not a fourteen year old!”

“His brain is. Maturity, mind… they’re all adolescent. That’s what this is about. He’s in a bad situation. His body wants to do what it’s made for, his instincts are going haywire, but his mind isn’t in the same place. He’s not ready for this.”

Will realised his arms were crossed petulantly. He rolled his eyes, looking away, out the door into the pouring rain, his cheeks feeling hot. “He just wanted to see what kissing was.”

“You should have said no.”

Will looked up at him and Philip shrugged.

“Will, you did the wrong thing. It wasn’t a particularly bad thing, but it’s not a good thing either. It’s not good for him.” He left the room, newspaper under his arm, leaving Will with a lukewarm cup of coffee and a mind mired in thoughts.

---

He was chain smoking out on the cold porch, feet frozen in four cigarette’s time. Sheets of rain fell in front of him like he was watching a performance, different patterns in the gales, making the air icy as the wind ripped through the wet freezing whatever it could. Will puffed, lost in thought.

He couldn’t make up his mind. Was Philip right? Or was Will right? What did Will even think?

He shook his head, blowing smoke up towards the porch roof. He wasn’t thinking at all.

He was just… with Angel after so many years and he was losing it. Maybe Philip was right.

He flicked the half smoked cigarette out into the gloomy rain and turned inside, thankful to see Philip wasn’t in the kitchen, or the living room he passed on his way to the stairs. The television was black and silent. Everyone was sleeping in.

Or avoiding him.

Did they all know? Will felt a greasy weight in his stomach. He turned into his room, seeing Angel on his bed, blanket under his arms, lying on his side facing the window. Will silently walked closer, reaching out and petting his smooth bare shoulders. Angel stirred, looking back over his shoulder sleepily.

“Want to go out?”

Angel blinked. He and Three hadn’t left the house for the almost month that they’d been there. “Out where?”

“To the shops. Come on. We’ll go for a drive.”

Angel smiled and flung the covers back, wriggling out of the bed and grabbing his discarded clothes off the floor. He pulled the jeans up over the swell of his bare ass and Will heard a zipper as he walked past him and left the room, heading downstairs for the van keys. He snatched them off the table with a musical tinkle, pulled a jacket on and headed outside to start the car up.

He sat in the car, engine humming around him as he stared blankly out the windshield. His shirt was wet, hair dripping from the little run he’d done in the heavy rain. The heating was working quickly and Will clicked the radio on as Angel pulled the side door open, sliding into the seat his hair and white shirted shoulders plastered with rain.

“Cold wet,” Angel said shaking his head and shedding droplets all over Will and the inside of the van.

“Yep.”

Angel grinned. “Too cold for me to stay out there.”

“You wanted to stay out in the rain?” Will said, flicking the headlights on. The early morning was covered by cloud. Dark and murky.

He nodded, wet black spikes sticking to his forehead, leaning forward as he got distracted by the country song on the radio. Will reached over and combed them away from his face. Angel looked up, catching his wrist, smiling slyly and leaning over for a kiss.

“You like touching my hair,” he said into Will’s ear. “You always touch it and then want a kiss.”

Will smiled and kissed his cheek chastely before pushing him back. Angel looked out his window. “It’s all grey because of the rain.”

Will put the car in gear, turning up the windshield wipers, laughing at Angel laughing at them.

“Let’s go.”

They pulled out from the house, heading out onto the small road that served the houses and turning a few streets to reach the main road that would lead them into the centre of town. As they set out the roads were dead mostly, a few cars passed them, but the traffic grew heavier as time ticked on. Will headed to a mall he’d seen with Philip and drove into the underground parking, noting Angel was pressed up against his window trying to see. A few cars were parked right near the mall entry and Will slid the van into a spot.

Creaking the park brake on he turned the car off, sliding out and smelling wet. The van dripped. Angel slammed his door shut and shivered a little. His white tee shirt was sticking to him obscenely as Will realised he wasn’t wearing a jacket. He wrapped his bare arms around his waist, his brown nipples visible through the cloth.

“You silly thing,” he murmured, opening the back of the van and grabbing a blanket out. “I didn’t think about you.”

He scrubbed at his wet hair, turning it into fluffy shag and then tried to dry his shoulders and chest a little. He climbed into the back, knowing he was looking in vain when his eyes alighted on a small crumpled brown jacket in the corner. He picked it up and figured it was big enough to be Gunn’s. He smiled and tossed it to Angel.

“That’ll fit you.”

Angel pulled it on, playing with the sides once he was wearing it.

“We’ll go get breakfast,” Will smiled. He didn’t look too bad in that. He’d stopped shivering at least.

They entered the brightly-lit mall, seeing the shops were still closed although people buzzed inside them, getting ready for the day. Angel was examining each storefront closely as they passed, headed towards the food area. He was excited, flitting from place to place, pointing things out to Will as they walked. They entered the food court, and some of the places were open for breakfast.

“Okay, what do you want?” Will asked him as he stared around.

He didn’t answer, his face blank. He probably hadn’t heard him. Will looked back into the food court, trying to see what Angel was seeing. There were a few people scattered around at the tables, eating out before work or school. It was a Wednesday after all.

“People, huh?” Will asked gently.

Angel swallowed. “There’s… a lot.”

Will nodded as he felt Angel’s arm curl around his own for moral support. “It’s okay, Angel. They just want to eat, like us. They won’t do anything.”

He pulled him towards the tables, watching his face. There were a few people here… more people than Angel had seen for a while. He’d been getting comfortable back at the house, out from other people.

He shyly walked behind Will, sneaking glances around, getting excited at a black girl who sat at a table with her friends, textbooks opened in front of them. She caught Angel looking and smiled coyly before turning back to her friends, giggling and trying to get them to look at Angel.

Will sat them down at a table near a mother and her two children, the baby of which suddenly started crying as the mother tried to feed it. Angel was still staring at the girl.

“He was dark,” Angel said into his ear, thankfully quiet. “Like Gunn.”

“Yep. Lots of different people, Angel,” he said, peering across at a small sandwich place which appeared to have eggs and bacon, ignoring the baby crying, “And just so you know, that was a girl.”

He turned around and Angel wasn’t sitting next to him. He felt a sudden bolt of adrenaline as he looked around, realising with a moment of relief that he was standing right behind him. The relief vanished instantaneously as Will saw the little girl he was holding gently in his hands, tight to his chest.

“Look, it’s a child!” He said, so amazed he was whispering.

She giggled, tossing her brown ponytail around as Will silently freaked out, silently taking the small girl from his hands and putting her back in the high chair before the mother, who was busy with her crying baby, noticed.

Will dragged Angel away by his hand, and pulled him around a corner. “That means –“

“Angel! Do not, EVER pick up somebody else’s child without their permission!” he said in a harsh whisper.

Angel, taken aback, just blinked for a moment. “I just wanted to see…”

“I know, I know pet, but mothers… are really protective of their children. Don’t touch them.”

“Alright,” said Angel, a little abashed.

He smiled at him to calm him as his heartbeat slowed. “Okay. What do you want for breakfast?”

“Umm… eggs,” Angel said, smiling again.

“Same. Alright,” he took Angel’s hand again, a little more unwilling to let it go now and led him to the food place.

Angel watched him order, amused by it, even more so by the exchange of money.

“Money again,” he noted. He’d seen Will and the others buying things as they travelled up.

“You need money for everything.”

Angel smiled at him, looking confused.

“What’s wrong?”

“Well… when you ask for food at home, you never pay.”

Will laughed. “Yes, but we already bought all the food at the store.”

“This store?”

“No… a big store. With lots of different food in it. A grocery store. This is a food store where they cook for you. Grocery stores sell you the food and you have to cook it yourself.”

Angel nodded.

The man behind the counter smiled at him and side eyed Angel. “He from outta town?” He asked, pushing the two plates of eggs and bacon across to Will.

“Something like that,” Will said with a polite smile, before handing the plastic cutlery to Angel to carry.

They walked back to a table, not the one near the woman and her two children, and sat down, cutting into the food. Will was ravenous, half finished before he realised Angel wasn’t eating, just staring at the three girls again, watching them as they giggled over the textbooks.

Will speared some bacon, shoving it into his mouth with a weak smile. “You like them?” he asked softly, feeling strange.

“They’re friends.” Angel said, sounding just as strange, a small frown crinkling his brows.

“Yeah. Most people have friends.” Will said, confused, hearing the roller doors of a few shops being raised behind him.

Angel nodded, obviously thinking as he forcefully turned his attention to his breakfast. He poked the fried egg yolk with his knife and watched it run over the white. He played with it, pushing it around the plate, making patterns with his fork.

“What’s wrong?” Will asked after a while.

Angel frowned at his eggs a little before looking back up guilelessly. “How many people are like me?”

Will shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

“How many people in the world grew up in a four-part world?”

Will licked his lips, blinking. “Um… not many.”

“So most people don’t.”

“I don’t think… there would be many,” Will said, uncertain as to whether he should make Angel feel alone by saying no one did, or dancing around the truth like he was. Which would be more damaging?

Angel’s eyes flicked to the giggling girls again. “So everyone else grew up with … friends. Out here. And I … didn’t.”

Will swallowed but his throat felt dry. Angel had never really made the connection that he’d actually been treated badly in his life. He was still frowning, deeper now, his brows drawing together.

“Why did I have to?” he asked, hurt.

Will wasn’t hungry all of a sudden, his heart was in his throat.

He’d practically pushed this conversation out of his head. He knew one day… Angel would figure it out, would know something was wrong. But he… wasn’t ready. Whenever he pictured this happening, he was always blaming his father and Angel was always full of righteous anger, not this scared looking vulnerable thing.

“It wasn’t fair,” Will said gently.

Angel didn’t seem satisfied with that. “So everyone got to be out here with the radio and televisions and the van cars and the friends and the … everything… but me?” His voice was raising, a note of clarity in it.

“That’s why we broke you out. Because it wasn’t fair.”

Angel was silent, detached. He was mulling over the thoughts in his mind, sitting back in his chair, face blank. Will watched him closely.

“So normally… people have lots of friends. And go outside.”

Will nodded, a lump forming in his throat.

“Why wasn’t I allowed?”

Will exhaled, the bright lights of the mall, too bright. Too noisy, too crowded. “My father is not a nice man,” he said, ashamed of the quiver that slipped into the words. He breathed again, settling his heartbeat. “He treated you like you were a thing, not a human. And he shouldn’t have. I wanted to get you out. I’ve wanted to… for a long time.” He swallowed, tongue sandy. “Im sorry.”

Angel was staring at the plate again. “Why did he keep me there?”

“He wanted… to …” he looked up, saw Angel looking at him with sad eyes, not because he was lonely or some easily generated emotion, but because Will had given him enough knowledge and clarity to actually understand he’d been mistreated. Will felt horrible. And in that moment, he realised he couldn’t tell him.

“I don’t know why.”

Angel took that as truth, nodding his head as he sat deflated in his seat. He didn’t talk again for a long time.

Will couldn’t tell him. Couldn’t tell him he’d been reduced to nothing more than an experiment. That Travers hadn’t cared enough for him to let him live like a normal kid. How could he tell anyone that? That he’d been bought and sold as a foetus?

Will sat with him and neither of them noticed the food court empty and fill, or the shops open as they stared at things blankly, unseeing as mannequins.

After about an hour of wordless staring around Angel stood up. Will activated as well, uncertainly.

“It’s not fair that I didn’t get to grow up like everyone else,” Angel said clearly.

“It’s not.”

Angel nodded for a moment, then stilled, watching his feet. “I want to go back to the house,” he said softly, head bowed.

Will took his hand, ignoring the disgusted glances from the boys next to them, and led him from the mall.


Seventeen

Angel sat cross-legged on the porch, arms curled around his waist as he watched the rain fall and splash on the ground in front of him. It was cold and gray, and he was sitting down beside the outside chair so no one would see him and come talk to him. He just wanted to think.

The rain had been falling for days now. Leaving big puddles on the ground, mud and cold wet everywhere. It seeped in through the windows and wet the wood; it leaked through a hole in the roof and wet the attic room, making Alex and Gunn swear and clomp around in the roof with buckets. Half the wood of the porch floor was swollen with water.

Angel liked it. The damp wood and trees smelled nice. He wondered if the spiders were out in the rain, or the ants or the snails... or if they went somewhere else. Stayed in the trees until the rain stopped, like he was staying under the porch roof so he didn't get wet as he tried to think. It wasn't working; his brain was all clogged up with fighting thoughts. Thoughts about Father and the tiny silver room which he'd always been a little scared of, until he went through it. His old home, in the four-part world.

His head crowded again.

He supposed it wasn't a four-part world. It wasn't a world at all; he was in the world now, so that couldn't be a little world by itself. It was just rooms. Just rooms, not a world, not anything but square space.

Angel lost his thoughts again, felt them spinning away from him and falling into books of space and planets and the ... bigness of it all.

He stood, stepping out into the rain and feeling it patter down on him, chilling him, making his shirt and jeans soggy and sticky. He walked, away from the house, through the trees, hand over his eyes to stop the heavy water drops from flicking in. The water was running in cold lines down his spine, making the skin over his shoulder blades twitchy. His bare foot sloshed into some fridge-cold mud, squirming around his toes. He wriggled them a little, seeing them covered in the wet earth.

The earth. The rain from the sky. So big and immeasurable that when he thought about it his head started to spin. It was better today. The clouds were gray and low, hiding the wide unpinned blue sky. He turned his face up to the clouds to feel the rain on his closed eyes. It covered him. His clothes were so heavy, and he felt better. His clothes being heavy with water made sense. When he'd jumped in the pool in his clothes they'd felt the same, although they'd smelled like pool, not fresh wet from the sky.

He walked further, the rain so loud around him, battering against the trees and the ground like a million little drums beating out a rhythm on the radio. Everything had a song, and he could hear it out here, could never hear it in his old world which wasn't a world at all. He sat down against a tree, on wet grass, a little covered by the big branches although the rain still wet him.

He couldn't see any animals. They'd all gone to their homes to stay dry.

He wondered what had made him get off the porch and walk into the rain, wetting his clothes and making him cold. He didn't understand so much now, out here.

He shivered. The rain was noisier, heavier, splashing into mud and puddles, making little lines of water that ran quickly from high ground to low, carrying leaves and sticks and dirt and anything that got in the way. Angel watched the water rush, for some reason staying in a line, pouring through the dirt to rest in a natural ditch, filling it higher with water. It would overflow soon and then where would the water go?

He tried to shuffle himself further under the tree branches to keep his feet drier.

"My father is not a nice man," Will had said, watching him closely in the bright, bright kitchen.

Not a nice man. What did that mean? Everyone was nice. Father had always taught him things, had come to see him when he was lonely... Had seen him more than Will had. He frowned, feeling lonely again.

He missed Father. He wanted to talk to him again. He'd never been so long without seeing him. But why had Father...

"My father is not a nice man. He treated you like you were a thing, not a human. And he shouldn't have."

A thing? Angel's brain felt sluggy. A thing, not a human... but why? And how? He'd never...

Father looked after him, taught him...

Why would Will think he wasn't a nice man? What had he done?

Maybe he wasn't nice to Will. Maybe he made Will sad. He thought about that. He didn't like that idea. Maybe Will didn't like Father... and that was why ...

A violent shiver rippled his body and he huffed the air out of his lungs. He stood back up, his hair getting combed by the leaves of the tree as he stepped out into the heavy rain again.

"Angel!" Will's voice, yelling. He turned back towards the house.

"Angel! Where are you?!"

He walked back slowly. What was Will yelling about, he was right here. He edged through the trees, sneezing and dripping with water. As he walked through the last few trees near the house he saw Will running towards him and then felt warm dry arms wrapping around him tightly, a body slamming into him so hard he "oofed". He laughed, feeling Will's breath puff against his ear.

Hands splayed across his back, Will held him close. "Where were you? I was calling for you!" He seemed so ... not exactly happy to see him, but not angry... just strange.

"Why do you say it like that?"

Will leant back, his black tee shirt shiny with rain. Little drops ran down from his black eyebrows. He blinked and then smiled, sighing out his words. "I'm relieved."

"Relieved?"

"Happy that you aren't hurt. Very happy you aren't hurt or missing."

Angel laughed, curling his arm around Will's waist as they walked towards the house. "Why would you think that?"

"When you didn't answer," Will seemed a little embarrassed, "I thought something had happened."

"Like what?"

He shrugged, and his arm was tight around Angel's waist, like he didn't want Angel running off. "I don't know," he laughed. "That you had wandered away, gotten lost, fallen down and broken your ankle and couldn't get back."

Angel burst into laughter. "That's funny."

Will smiled, looking away. "I s'pose." He didn't let go of Angel's waist.

They walked, the outside dark and gray around them. The clouds seemed to be lower, and darker, hovering just above the treetops, making the rain beat down on them with big drops. Angel sneezed again and his nose started running.

They reached the porch.

"Will?" he asked, watching puddles form around his frozen white feet.

"You need a shower. And dry clothes, come on," Will said, pulling him into the kitchen.

"Will?"

"What is it, pet?"

"Do you like Father?"

Will paused for a few quick moments, before taking his wrist and pulling him across the living room and up the stairs.

"Do you?" Angel prodded.

Will pushed him into the bathroom. "Hot shower," he said, wrapping his hands over Angel's fingers and rubbing them quickly.

"Can you hear me?" Angel said, frowning.

"Yes."

"Why aren't you answering?"

Will sighed. "Because I don't want to. Get in the shower."

Angel slipped out of the shirt, feeling it cling to his arms and hair as he pulled it off. Will was leaning in, turning the shower taps on, running his hand under the spray. It really did look like rain, just... controlled. That's what was different. Everything was wild outside. Calm inside, unpredictable outside.

"Why don't you want to answer?"

Will didn't turn away from the taps, testing the heat against his hand as steam clouded up in the shower. "Because some things are private."

Angel sighed, frustrated, before sneezing again, his eyes watering. "Everything is private with you," he said angrily. "How am I ever going to understand all this if you won't tell me anything?"

Will turned around, rain hissing outside, shower hissing inside and looked at him. He looked tired. His eyes seemed very blue under the wet raggy hair dripping down past his ears. "I tell you plenty. You don't need to know everything."

"I think I do," he said, face set and hairs prickling all over his body. "You decide what I can know. Why can't I decide? I want to know why you told me Father wasn't a nice man."

"Because..." Will sighed, brow crinkling up. "Because he isn't."

"Why? Because you say so?"

Will stared at him for a moment, expressionless, water hissing and falling all around. "I know my father better than you," he said softly. "And he is ... not nice."

"He was always nice to me," Angel said, unbuckling his heavy wet jeans and slipping his legs out from them. "Always."

He stepped into the shower and pushed his head under the warm water, feeling it chase the cold from his hair.

He felt a hand grab his wrist and spin him around. "He was nice, was he?" Will said in a soft voice, his eyes unblinking and unfocused, blankly staring. Angel stepped back, his shoulder deflecting the shower spray.

Will blinked, still staring at him strangely. "He kept you underground and cut you up. In the real world, that's not just not nice, that's bloody evil."

Angel watched him slowly focus his eyes, until they were trained on his own eyes in Will's usual alert way. Will let go of his wrist.

"What's evil?"

Will sat down on the side of the bath, staring down at his wet jeans. He jumped a little, after a moment, like Angel's question had taken longer than it should have to reach him. "Uh... evil... evil's the opposite of good."

He stayed staring for a second before abruptly standing and leaving the bathroom. Angel turned the shower off and wrapped a towel around himself, walking out from the bathroom and into Will's room.

"Something's wrong," he said, dripping on the carpet.

Will was standing at the foot of his bed, looking out the window, looking smaller than usual, like the rain water had shrunk him. He silently walked over the carpet, reaching out and sliding his arm around Will's waist.

Will stared out through the glass and rain, looking almost angry. Angel couldn't figure out what was wrong, it was all ... strange.

"Nothing's wrong," Will said, turning and pushing Angel's arm away. "I'm going to have a shower."

He left him alone again, striding away without looking back. Angel sat down on the bed slowly, frowning, knowing he didn't understand something and feeling frustrated because of it.

"He kept you underground and cut you up. In the real world, that's not just not nice, that's bloody evil."

Bloody evil. Angel thought about what that could mean; he knew 'bloody hell,' but...

He flicked the towel off and curled up under Will's sheets, feeling the damp warmth spread to the covers as they started to bake warm around him. He felt sleepy, warm as the cold drops rained down outside, flinging themselves against the windows and walls of the house.

"He kept you underground and cut you up. In the real world, that's not just not nice, that's bloody evil."

Cut him up? For checks. To make sure he was all right, and healthy.

Maybe people didn't get checked in the world. Maybe people just got sick. He rubbed his hands together under the covers, hearing the shower quietly hum across the hall. It was even darker now; the clouds were blocking out all the sun. It was falling to night; the sun couldn't get through the clouds so night was coming early. He sleepily ran his hands over his stomach, smiling at how nice it felt to be warm.

The shower stopped and Angel watched the door, waiting for Will to come back. When he came through, he didn't say anything, just pulled on a tee shirt and stepped into jeans under his towel, facing away from the bed. He scrubbed his hair with the towel as he wandered around the room.

"I'm still here," Angel said.

"I know."

"Oh."

More silence. Will sat down at his desk and started paging through a book.

"Father did checks to make sure I was healthy."

"Is that so?" Will said, his voice strange and quiet.

"Yes," he said, frowning. "That's why he cut parts of my skin off."

"Okay."

Angel nodded, watching Will at his desk, watching him refuse to look at Angel like he'd said something to make him angry. Had he said something? Was Will upset with him, like he'd been upset with Three when they'd fought?

"Will?"

"What, Angel? What do you want?" Will turned abruptly in his chair and focused on Angel in the bed.

Angel looked away, feeling worried, and confused.

"Angel..." Will sighed. "Listen. I don't like talking about my family. It puts me in a bad mood."

"Why?"

"'Cause I ..." Angel looked back to see him struggle with the words. "'Cause I don't like my father."

How could he not like someone? Angel didn't want to be around Three at the moment but he still liked him. "Did you fight with him?"

"Yes... but not the way you fought with Three. Word fighting... I guess." He smiled a little, looking confused, like he'd lost something.

"Is that bad?"

"Yes. I guess. I don't know." He shrugged. "Maybe that's why I don't like talking about it."

"Because you don't know?"

"Well, I like to know things. Makes me feel... secure."

"Same with me."

Will smiled then, a big smile, and for a tiny second he looked like he was going to start leaking, but he still looked happy.

"Why did you go out into the rain?"

Angel blinked. He'd almost forgotten he did that. He shrugged in the warm covers. "It felt like... it might be easier to understand everything... if I was standing in the middle of it."

Will smiled again, a little smile. He nodded. "There's lots of things you'll never understand. I mean... I've been out in the world my entire life and I still don't understand it."

"Really?" Angel asked, disappointed. He understood so much in his old world. Well, he'd known it, hadn't really understood it. But he knew it, knew when the breakfast would come, how many steps it was to the shower.

"Yeah. No one understands it."

"How do you know?"

"Because if someone did understand it, they would have written a book."

"What?"

"Never mind."

"Will?" A sudden thought hit him.

"What is it?"

"I miss Father, and I like him. Does that mean you don't like me?"

Will shook his head, sliding from his seat to the bed. "No Angel, nothing like that."

"I don't understand how you can't like someone."

Will turned away, and for a second Angel wondered if he should say sorry for hurting him, when he spoke.

"Sometimes personalities don't work together. You can find someone boring, or you can have nothing to talk about with them."

"Like Alex?" He said thoughtfully. He never talked to Alex. "Or Gunn?"

He nodded. "Yeah. See they keep more to themselves, although Gunn is friends with Fred as well. They're not as good friends with me. There are degrees of liking."

"Why don't you like Father?"

Will sighed, turning away again, back to Angel so he could see his hair had dripped a little, wetting the back of his black shirt. "I don't like what he did to you."

"Checks."

"Not just checks," he turned back, looking sadly down at him. He had tiny lines at the corners of his eyes that Angel had never noticed before. "He shouldn't have kept you down ... in the four part world. It was... it was cruel."

"But why?" Angel asked. That was the point. That was the point he didn't understand.

"Because... he was the reason you didn't have a normal life, didn't have friends or go to school or walk around in the sunlight."

School?

"He's a ..." Will said, shaking his head. He sighed again. "He kept you down there... and he had no right."

Angel let the words settle. "Father looked after me."

The rain pattered outside and Will nodded once, lips tight. He ran his fingers through Angel's hair nicely and tried a little smile that didn't fit the rest of his face. "Okay."

"You never lived in a four part world, did you?"

"No."
For some reason Angel found that strange. Maybe because he'd thought for so long that Will had lived in a four part world, just like his, that it made no sense for him to be out in this big real world.

"Why did you come and see me? And no one else?"

"Because ... my father ... I saw you. I watched you for a long time, even before we met. I think..." he paused. "I don't know."

"You watched me through the strange mirrors?"

Will nodded. "He wouldn't let me in to see you." He smiled. "I really wanted to talk to you, all the time, but he wouldn't let me."

Angel frowned, a thought taking hold. "Was Father watching me?"

Will blinked. "Yes."

"All the time?"

"...Yes."

Angel didn't know how he felt about that. "Why?"

Will looked away, out the window again. "I'll tell you another time."

Angel nodded, feeling a little strange; cold in his belly. All that time, Father had been watching him?

"Mirrors... the mirrors in this house... no one's behind them, right?"

Will laughed a little, softly. "Don't worry. Normal mirrors don't have anyone on the other side."

"Good." He felt strange. That's all he could think. How strange it was -- how strange the idea was -- that Father had watched him. Like he was television? People obviously did that in the big world, watched other people. And yet, Will had told him about privacy...

It was all so... he was never going to understand. He suddenly felt very alone, even though Will was sitting hand length's away.

Angel sat up and wrapped himself around Will, pulling him down next to him. Will rolled to face him, smiling.

"What?" he whispered.

"I felt lonely."

"You're not alone, pet. Don't worry about that."

Not alone. He smiled. He liked that. He'd always been alone, had to wait for Father to visit to ask questions and now... he could ask them whenever he wanted.

He wriggled closer; smelling Will's wet fresh skin. "You smell like soap," he said into Will's ear, laying a tiny kiss on his neck. "I like it."

Will didn't say anything and Angel felt him swallow under his lips. He kissed him on the chin, reaching up and rolling his face towards him to kiss his mouth. He leaned back when Will's lips didn't move beneath his. Blue eyes looking up at him without expression.

He smiled and took Angel's hand away from his face, getting up. Before he could fully stand, Angel grabbed his waist and yanked him back down, slipping his naked thigh over his body to hold him still and bending towards his mouth again.

Will rolled his head to the side, face half in the pillow. "Angel, we have to talk."

Angel tried to push the pillow down to expose Will's lips and when that didn't work, pulled the pillow away so Will's head was on the flatter mattress. He kissed him again, victoriously, smiling as he did. Will's hands pushed at his shoulders so Angel laughed and grabbed them away. Wrestling and kissing was always a fun game. His penis was hardening, starting to throb as he moved over Will. He grabbed Will's wrists, forcing them under his back and kissed him again, softly, his penis rubbing against the soft cotton of Will's tee shirt.

When Will stopped wriggling his head around, Angel slowly settled back on him, sitting on his thighs, feeling the hard bulge in his jeans. He shifted, rubbing his bare dry thigh against Will's penis as he kissed him. Will started being difficult again, looking at the wall behind the bed, his long neck straining with the position. Angel tried to get to his lips anyway and knocked his forehead hard on the headboard.

He sat back, shaking his head and frowning, a throb echoing around his skull. He tightened his hold on Will's wrists and pulled as roughly as he could, yanking Will down the bed, his sac against the denim of Will's jeans, scraping the sensitive flesh a little. He rose up and kissed him again, little kisses all over his face just because he could.

"Angel!" Will whispered in a rough voice, glaring at him. "Get off me."

"Why?"

"This isn't a game."

Angel narrowed his eyes in thought. If he let go, Will would win. So maybe... he was just saying that because he wanted to win.

Angel smiled smugly at him and shook his head.

Will rolled his eyes. "I'm not interested right now."

Raising his eyebrow, Angel rubbed his thigh against Will's jean covered crotch. "Yes you are," he said simply. "So am I."

Will's eyes looked down, eyelashes dark against his skin as he looked like he was closing his eyes. Angel saw him swallow again. He wriggled his hips a little, making his penis bounce funnily for Will's gaze. He wanted to play with it, but his fingers were tightly holding distracting hands under Will's back. He shuffled up a little and slowly rested himself down onto Will's shirt covered belly, hunching his hips a little so his penis dragged up along the material. He groaned a little at the feeling. Not as good as Will's hand, but still... sunshine after not touching it for five minutes. He pushed again; starting a sort of stroke motion that dragged Will's shirt up, his hot belly feeling nicer against Angel's skin than the shirt.

He looked up at Will, seeing his eyes were wide, watching Angel's hips jerking a little, trying to thrust. It wasn't enough feeling. He wanted the stroking all around him, touching his entire penis. He whined in frustration and finally gave up holding Will's hand so he could wrap his own fingers around himself.

He squeezed and almost rolled off Will, lost in the feeling. He started sliding his foreskin back and forth, knuckles dragging against Will's twitching belly. He let go of Will's other hand, pushing his dark shirt up to see his nipples, tight and hard on his white chest. He leant down, closing his eyes as he sucked one into his mouth, nibbling on the hard skin with his teeth, feeling Will's hands twist into his hair as his own hand pulled at his penis.

Pre-come slid out in a warm shiver and his penis became slippery, the cold air in the room catching on the wet and freezing. Goosepimples rose up on his skin, and his hair stood up on the back of his neck as he licked and sucked at Will's nipple, hearing him make funny grunting noises. He paused for a second, grabbing the thick covers and drawing them up over his head, so he was in a cocoon of warmth and salt smelling heavy air. He heard Will giggling a little, before he moved to his other nipple, biting and sucking the little nub roughly, feeling Will's hips buck up against him as he did. He reached down, wet penis dragging along the trail of hair on Will's belly, and opened the jeans, pulling them down his thin thighs.

When he slid his penis against Will's he felt his eyes roll back in his head and he wanted to collapse over the hard body lying under him. He took both of them in hand, trying to stroke them, feeling like electricity was snapping between them, a current on the slick skin, feeling his testicles give warm shivers that ran through his body as Will's hips thrust his penis further into his hand.

Will's groans were all in his throat, strangled and quiet, like someone was squeezing his neck. He lifted his head up, breaking the cocoon to look at Will's face, tense and closed up. He leant up to kiss him, his belly hand-standing as Will's lips eagerly met his own. He wriggled up a little so his sac would touch Will's, watching Will's hand slap across his mouth as he did, like he wanted to keep the high grunt inside but didn't trust his lips to stay shut.

Will's other hand was sliding down towards the wet connection, he could feel it between their bellies as Angel shifted up with his own thrusts, beginning to pant a little. The fingers wriggled in between their thighs and was suddenly pushing against their balls, making Angel feel like he had to suddenly pee as his belly quivered like it was full of water.

His sac felt tight for a moment, loosening again before it tried to shrink up close to his body under Will's warm fingers, shrinking like it was trying to force his semen out. Angel rested his head against Will's chest, hips still working tirelessly. He wanted to come, badly.

His eyes were stinging occasionally with sweat, and his lungs felt hot. He whined again, frustrated.

Will's hand suddenly disappeared from his sac, which didn't help. He felt like he was running towards the edge of the sliding orgasm feeling but it kept moving further away.

Suddenly, he felt something thin pressing against his anus. His spine snapped straight as he realized it was Will's finger and ... that it felt blurringly good. His belly and spine were water, hot water, hot cola drink bubbling and fizzing. His mouth opened and he was drooling against Will's chest as he worked their penises faster and faster, his anus clenching at the tip of Will's finger.

"What are you doing?" He panted stickily into Will's skin, he couldn't see properly, all his mind was on the finger sparking all the new feelings inside him.

He felt the finger sliding inside him a little, stretching the muscle and making his toes curl and cramp and then he felt like he was spinning and falling through total black and white, legs and arms thrown wide and strands of air sliding past him. He got a shock when he realized he was still in the over hot safety of Will's blankets, resting against his body, panting sticky breath against his chest.

An overwhelming calm dripped into every pore and he guessed by his slowly moving, totally wet hand that he had come. Will was lying completely still and boneless, a perfect body-mattress for him. Angel smiled, too tired to move. He let go of their penises, his knuckles catching some of the mess on Will's stomach.

The blanket was flipped back and he looked up into Will's sleepy face. Will laughed.

"You're all red," he said softly, looking kissable as he watched Angel.

"Hot," he said, wriggling up to be even with Will. "You put your finger in my anus."

Will dissolved into giggles, cheeks going red.

"And it felt good. The books never said anything about that."

Will tried to talk but shook his head and started laughing again. "Um, it's just, it feels good 'cause," he laughed, "because there's lots of nerves there."

"I really liked it. I didn't think anything could feel like that. It made me feel like... everything inside was hot and happy."

Will nodded, smiling. He closed his eyes happily as Angel leant in for a kiss. "Can I play with your anus next time?" he asked, wanting Will to have the feeling too.

"Uh..." Will smiled, looking away. "We can't really talk about that."

"Privacy thing?"

"Privacy thing."

"I don't like privacy."

The rain was still falling outside. They stopped talking and just listened to the rain, the blankets hot like the stovetop around them. Angel's body was toast-warm, soup-warm, and he couldn't remember being so happy. He curled himself around Will and kissed his shoulder.

---

Travers sat in the cold concrete room, crowded around the end of the wide table with the three other colonels.

"We've tracked them to Winnemucca but we've lost the trail from here on out." A cool male voice reported through the speaker phone. "We're going to investigate the town further, sir, and will report back with any new information."

Boon clicked off the speaker angrily, shoving it aside.

"Winnemucca," Travers said quickly, "Where is that?"

"Winnemucca is near the top of Nevada, Professor," Colonel Matthews said, before he turned to Boon. "Do you think he's headed towards Vancouver?"

"Maybe not Vancouver, look for a smaller entry point," Boon said, tapping his fingers on the map sprawled out along the table.

"He can't fly them out," Matthews said, taking a sip from his mug calmly. "We'd know about it."

"Have we circulated the pictures along the border patrols?" Travers interrupted.

"Indeed we have, Professor. But it may not be foolproof," Boon rasped.

"So he may have made it into Canada?"

"Maybe."

Travers sighed, slamming his hand onto the table. "This is not working. This is far too slow! Go and find him. You are the underground intelligence, find him."

He stood shakily, blood hot with anger.

"Professor, do you believe your son would go to Canada? Try to take him as far away as possible?"

"If he was going to do that, he would have smuggled him to Argentina," he sniffed.

"So do you think he doubled back?"

He turned around at the door. "Gentlemen, I have no idea where my fool of a son has gone. Your guess is as good as mine. Argentina, Africa, I don't know. But find him. Soon."

He turned away, pushing out the door as they resumed their meeting.

"Let's fan out across the neighbouring states," Matthews said in his monotonous voice as the door slowly closed, "before we start Canada."


Eighteen

Will fanned his cards across the kitchen table, smiling as he reached for the pool, a pile of candies instead of money; Fred had been shopping earlier and gotten a little over excited in the candy isle.

"Man!" Gunn exclaimed, throwing his own cards down, grabbing a cheese puff from the bowl to console himself.

Philip frowned at his own revealed cards as Will slid the confection bets towards himself. "I don't understand," Philip said, "he doesn't have any matching cards. Why does he win?"

"It's a flush," Will laughed.

"But I have three Jacks."

"All my cards are the same," Will replied, showing him the diamond flush. "That's harder to get."

"You can just match up the suit," Gunn said, pausing for a moment. "Sorry Phil, I didn't realise you didn't know the rules."

"I didn't realise anyone couldn't know the rules to Texas Hold'em," Alex said, popping a cheese puff into his mouth, "Or what a flush was... where did you grow up again?"

Philip handed his cards back with a sigh. "America." He said before adding thoughtfully: "I thought I knew the rules."

Alex sniggered and Philip rolled his eyes. "So I didn't grow up playing silly card games," Philip shot back. "I had more important things to do."

Alex made an unimpressed 'oooh' sound.

"Can we play cards sometime tonight?" Gunn asked, "without Mr. and Mrs. Bickerson at the table?"

For the better part of the week Alex and Philip had been quietly snarking and backbiting over anything they could find. It was creating tension in the house; Gunn was with Fred, unable to buffer Alex, and Will had spent his time away from the buzzing Philip -- with Angel.

Will wasn't sure what had put either of them offside. Probably just a mix of close quarters and boredom. Sitting around all day, hiding, waiting for everything to 'blow over' wasn't working. Sooner or later they'd have to bite the bullet and start rejoining the world, and bollocks to the Initiative.

Gunn dealt the pocket cards.

"So," Will said, sliding his cards back and forth in his palm, "what's happening with you and Fred, Chuck?"

Gunn smiled slyly and rubbed his fingers across the new chin fuzz he was sporting. "Nothing much," he said slowly, indicating something interesting was happening between the two.

Will smiled at his cards. He never would have picked Gunn and Fred as a couple.

"How much nothing?" Alex asked.

Gunn shook his head, chuckling a little as he folded.

"I know it's not nothing," Alex smiled, pushing his shaggy black hair behind his ear, "you haven't been making a whole lot of appearances in your bed lately."

"Maybe I'm getting in late and waking up early. You sleep like a pig, dead to the world."

"I sleep like a pig?" Alex asked, laughing.

"Shut up," Gunn said, still smiling, pegging a cheese curl at Alex's forehead.

There was only shuffling cards for a moment. Alex won the hand.

"Gunn and Winnafred sittin' in a tree…" Alex sang softly, creating another set of giggles in a ripple around the table.

Gunn rolled his eyes good-naturedly and swigged some beer. "And it's Winn-e-fred, idiot."

"Oh I'm sorry I dared to pronounce your girlfriend's name wrong," Alex laughed, sitting back in his chair and scratching his chin as he looked at his new hand.

"I'll forgive you. Maybe. If we can play some cards tonight."

"I second that," Will said, tossing a few candies to the pot in the middle of the table, glancing at Gunn, amused. "As interesting as your love life is..."

"Okay, who's in?" Gunn asked straight-faced, ignoring the chuckles.

Philip was frowning at his cards, teeth nibbling at the insides of his lips. "Uh... yes," he said uncertainly, "Yes, I'm in."

"You sure about that Philip?" Alex asked. "God forbid you should have a bad hand and still play through. The world would collapse; the apocalypse would be nigh if you did that. Not Phil, Wonder Boy who can never be wrong."

"Leave him alone," Will laughed, noting the irritated look creasing Philip's normally smooth calm features.

"I don't need you to jump in," Philip said to him, obviously miffed.

Will put his hands up, surrendering to the wrath of Philip's annoyance, "Wasn't jumping in."

"Guys, cards?" Gunn said.

"Someone's a bit sore," Alex murmured, tossing a card onto the table.

"Can you be quiet for two minutes? Or is it physically impossible for you to stop running your mouth?"

"Who's in?" Gunn repeated, stubbornly ignoring the fizzles of anger burning at the table.

"I'm in," Will said, tossing some candies onto the pot. "I raise you a pack of pop rocks."

"Big bet," Gunn said, looking poker-faced at his cards for a split second before tossing another pack of pop rocks onto the table, raising him a few mini packs of gummi bears.

"I can be quiet," Alex said, playing with his cards as leaned back in his chair, "But you're the only one's that's annoyed by me talking... so... watch me care."

"Hey, cards are fun," Gunn said, trying to diffuse.

"How about I watch you be a fat stupid redneck?" Philip said, raising his eyebrows, his voice level and calm.

"How about I give you a backhand?" Alex said, standing up.

"How about you try," Philip said, jaw set as he too stood up.

Gunn stood up as well and Will sighed at the really good hand he was about to play for a win before standing up too.

"What is wrong with you two?" Will demanded, glaring at them, "We're all tired and bored and going bloody mad in this house. Just get along and stop acting like spoilt teenagers."

"Oh that's rich," Philip snapped harshly, "coming from you."

There was a bit of a silence, and Will could see Gunn frowning, trying to understand the comment. Will refused to react to the comment, knowing Philip was already angry, looking for a fight. Will sighed through his nose, calming himself.

"What we've done," he said, "what we're doing, still, is risky. It makes us nervous and sets us on edge all the time, wondering if those bastards will find us, if we've left clues, if our families are alright. We have to have the balls to see this through. We can't fight each other and draw lines in the sand. It won't work."

All three men fell silent.

"We can do this. We proved that. And soon, it will be better. We just have to hang on, long enough for all the Initiative groups to push our photos to the bottom of the files and forget in the face of the next big noise." He paused, scratching at a tiny itch behind his ear as he furiously tried to think of the best way to keep them all united and not falling apart. "Fighting isn't going to get us anywhere. It's just gonna make this more difficult."

Philip gave a little nod as the tension around the table started to clear away like evaporating fog. He watched Will, glancing at him with an unreadable _expression.

"I'm not much for playing cards right now," Philip said, sliding his chair neatly under the table. "I think I'm going to go to bed."

Will turned and left the kitchen, heading into the television room. The remaining men stood around aimlessly for a second, before following Philip's lead. They packed up, throwing the crumbs of crisps out and cleaning the bowls, tossing beer bottles into recycling, all silent and strange with each other. Will grabbed one of the bigger bowls and threw his candy winnings into it, nodding to Gunn and Alex as he wandered off through the unlit house. He heard murmurings as he walked up the stairs and felt a pang of self-consciousness hit him in his belly. What were they talking about?

He paused for a second, pondering sneaking back downstairs and listening, but decided against it, clasping the candy bowl tightly as he continued to the pitch-black upper hallway.

Gunn was probably just trying to figure out what the problem with Alex and Philip was. He turned into his black room, clumsily sliding the candy bowl onto the table. He stripped quickly, too tired to bother brushing his teeth or having a shower and slid into his bed in his boxers, jerking in shock as he came in contact with a long warm body under his covers.

"Angel?"

He leaned over the form, feeling with his hands like he was a blind man, feeling smooth warm skin that made his mouth water, arousal not making it through his tired body to his cock in the late hours. He heard a slight 'harruph' of deep sleep breathing. He squeezed the hard shoulder and stroked down Angel's spine, trailing his fingers under the covers and resting his hand on his hip.

Angel had obviously taken to sleeping in his room now. He lay down on the pillow, smelling Angel all soapy shower fresh and settled in for the night, a niggle of anxiety still wriggling deep in the pit of his stomach, refusing to rest.

---

His arms were strained as flashes of dim colour whirled around him, unintelligibly. Weighed down by something he couldn't see as he ran, legs feeling full of sand and going far too slow than he needed. Something was nipping at his bare back, almost catching him with sharp claws around his waist as he ran panting through the spinning dizzying colour, losing direction, losing track of everything except the need to run or be caught.

A sharp nip on his ear made him cry out.

He sat up, everything black, hand clamped against his throbbing ear lobe. He felt arms tighten around him, pushing him back down on the bed. Confused and disorientated, Will kicked out, his heel connecting with something bone hard, trying to figure out what was happening. His senses flying back into his head, he reached over and flicked the lamp on.

Angel was curled up on the bed covers like a cat, body bare but for cotton boxers, hand clamped over his mouth with his eyes shut tight. Will blinked, trying to take it all in as his pupils screamed at the intrusively bright light.

"Angel?"

Dark eyes opened and blinked, brow crinkled. A trickle of blood leaked between two fingers of his tightly clamped hand. Will shot up, kneeling over him and prying his hand from his mouth, seeing a smear of red over his teeth and a nasty tear in his lower lip that was bleeding horribly.

"Oh, pet!" he said, voice as high and fretting as a mother's, standing up and pulling Angel with him.

Yanking him down the stairs, he pushed him into the kitchen, flicking on the light and grabbing an ice pack out of the freezer. He wrapped it quickly in a tea towel as Angel stood and watched him, blood trickling down his chin. He quickly cleaned the blood of Angel's face and pressed the numbing cold against his lip.

"Are you alright?"

Angel nodded calmly, unconcerned by the bloody towels Will was tightly holding or the worry tensing Will's face.

Will watched him closely. "You sure?"

Angel nodded again. He took the pack away from his face, his lip already swelling. "You win," he said, trying not to move his lips.

"What?"

"Wres'ling."

"What?" Will said, confused.

"You win the game we had."

"I was asleep," he said, that high pitched mother-worry voice again tumbling from his lips as he pushed the bloody towel under the tap.

Angel frowned. "But you kept kicking me."

"I was having a bad dream; here, let me have a look at this," he sighed, gently pulling the pack away.

Angel's lower lip was swelling around the rip, but the blood wasn't gushing anymore. It had looked worse than it was, Will observed, relief making his heart flutter. When Will had kicked out blindly, he must have caught Angel's mouth, broken his lip over his teeth. He knew he looked guilty, could feel his stomach shrinking back abashedly.

"I'm sorry sweetheart," he said softly, "I didn't know where I was for a second."

Angel laughed a little. "How is my heart sweet?"

Will blinked, realizing he'd passed on the name his mother had always used for him when he was upset as a little boy. He turned away, confused, trying to sort his brain out. He could hear her now, a phantom in his brain. It'll be alright sweetheart, don't be sad...

"Put the pack back on, it'll help the swelling."

Angel pressed the pack back against his lip, his pretty face at the window, looking out across the black backyard, completely bored.

"Will?" he said after a long while, as Will scoured the sink.

"What, pet?"

"Can we please go to see animals?"

Will blinked at the left-field question. "Uh, sure. What kind?"

"Any. I just want to see some."

Will smiled, his fingers sneaking over to rub at Angel's wrist before he noticed. "Sure." Anything, anything for him right then, feeling so guilty he would have driven him across the country if he had asked.

Angel smiled widely, wincing a little as his sore lip stretched.

---

Will chuckled to himself as he watched Angel push a woman and her boyfriend to the side so he could get closer to the guardrail. The boyfriend said something to Angel, but he wasn't listening, too busy gazing at the elephant scratching its belly against a wall. The sun had decided to make an appearance that day, and was still beaming down on them and the crowds at the zoo, heating them up and making the day enjoyable.

Will suddenly activated, hurrying forward to grab Angel's shirt before he could completely get over the rail and pulling him back to the ground.

"I want to pat it."

"No. You can't touch any of these animals."

Angel looked forlornly at the elephant, lower lip still a little swollen but not too noticeably so.

"Angel," Will said sternly, taking Angel's chin in his fingers and turning his attention back to himself. "Look. Don't touch."

Angel's eyes flicked to the elephant again.

"Angel," a warning inflection in his voice now. "Don't touch the animals."

"Alright," he said, obviously disappointed.

The disappointment flickered away quickly as the elephant let out a loud trumpet, making Angel scurry back to the crowded guardrail, picking up a small boy and setting him down behind himself, taking his place at the front of the barrier. Will called his name as the little boy started to cry.

Angel bounded from the elephants towards him, wrapping his arms around Will's waist in a huge bear hug. Two women walking past made 'aww' faces at them as Will laughed, pushing his arms away.

Angel took the tourist map from him as Will sat down on a seat, tired. They'd been running around the zoo for about three hours already. Three was over near a map of the zoo, looking at it intently. Gunn and Alex had wandered off to look at an Amazon exhibit, getting excited about seeing an Anaconda, but trying not to show it too much. Fred and Philip had left about twenty minutes before to find drinks.

"Let's see the dogs," Angel said, pointing to the wolves on the map.

"Wolves, and we already saw them. Twice."

"I liked them. I want to see them again."

"Maybe we should go have a look at something else?" Will suggested.

Three wandered over, peering at the map over Angel's shoulder. A gaggle of young teenagers wandered past, laughing and clutching zoo-brand bottles.

"Gunn and Alex are looking at snakes."

"What's snakes?" Three asked, looking up at him.

"Uh... hard to explain. Let's go and see them."

"Okay!" Angel said, practically running from the elephant enclosure.

Three hurried after him.

Tired as all hell from being up half the night, Will staggered after them, feeling like a zombie. His stomach growled for food but he ignored it as he watched Angel bouncing on the balls of his feet, impatient for Will to get a move on. Will had never felt more like a parent, trudging after them slowly as Three and Angel ran zigzags down the walk way, looking like their energy was ecstasy-supplied.

They ran into Fred and Philip a little along the way.

"Here, cola for everyone," Philip said, handing the drinks to Three and Angel who chugged them down.

Will sighed as he reached them. "Maybe sugar wasn't such a good idea, Philip."

Philip erred, glancing at the bottle in his hands and then at Angel who was practically shivering with excitement.

"Angel, calm down before you wet yourself," Will said, settling himself on another courtesy seat.

"What?" Angel asked before hauling him back to his feet, "Aren't we seeing snakes now?"

"Oooh, the anaconda?" Fred asked, eyes wide. "I want to see that!"

"Alright, snake-house," Will said.

"Getting tired old man?" Philip asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Old man?" Will echoed indignantly.

Three grabbed Fred's hand and she giggled as he tugged her away. Angel was already walking, ahead of them all, reading the signs to get to the snakes.

"We couldn't have done this in a clean way, one exhibit after another..." Will mumbled, "no, we have to go back and forth all over the bloody park and take ten times the energy."

"Well I'm fine," Philip said as they walked, preternaturally perky just to get on Will's nerves. "Fun fun fun!"

"Don't talk like that," Will said, pulling a face, "it's creepy."

They walked a little more, keeping an eye on the three far in front of them. Philip's smile dropped a little.

"How are you going?" Philip asked too casually, a dead weight settling in Will's stomach as he realized Philip wasn't talking about today.

"Good," he said shortly.

"That's good."

"What about you?" Will asked, turning the conversation away from where he feared it was headed.

Philip frowned, confused. "What about me?"

"You and Alex."

"Ah."

"Ah?"

"We're good," Philip nodded. "We're... we're good."

"Really," Will said doubtfully.

"Really."

"What did you two go off about, anyhow?"

Philip shrugged. "Differences."

"About what?"

Philip raised his eyebrows. "Well he thought it was fine ... what you're doing with Angel."

Will's heart skipped a beat. He wasn't expecting that. He was expecting some sort of clash about what to watch on television. His guts turned to ice water. "He knows then," he said, trying to stay calm.

Philip stopped and Will did too. "He knows. Fred too."

Will looked at the ground, cheeks burning. "Oh."

"Oh?" Philip said.

"Just oh."

Silenced settled around them uncomfortably. He didn't want to ask, know what it would sound like, but he had to know.

"What did Fred think?"

Philip narrowed his eyes and Will tried to laugh it off. "Just curious," he tried.

"She knew you liked him... said she could tell."

"From when?"

"From before we got him out," Philip said calmly, watching a mother push a stroller by. "The way you talked about him or something."

He felt the hot in his face and it embarrassed him. He shouldn't feel guilty. He shouldn't. He just felt so ashamed.

"She's glad you stopped though. Said it was for the best." Philip spoke with a soft voice, calm and sombre, like he was trying to tell Will he understood without saying those words.

"Well, she's probably right," Will said.

Philip tilted his head and narrowed his eyes again, scrutinizing Will with his precise dark eyes. He nodded thoughtfully. "I know things are strange between us now..."

"They are?" Will said levelly.

"I think so."

"Maybe."

"I didn't want to ... tell you what to do," Philip said, looking away. "I just... I wanted ... I don't think you were seeing straight. It wasn't right. Doesn't mean I think you're bad now, or that I don't like you, it's just... that one little thing was the wrong decision. And I had to tell you that."

"Yeah, I know."

Philip nodded, silent for a moment. "Must be hard, feeling like th-"

"Philip," Will said, cutting him off. He gave him a quick look, trying to implore Philip not to talk about it, and Philip nodded, a little jerkily, obviously wanting to share feelings or something.

"Well," Philip said gamely, "They'll be at the anaconda place by now."

"Yeah," Will said, and tugged his jeans up off his hips.

They walked swiftly along the path. Just as they were about to enter the exhibit, Philip turned to him uncertainly. "It's not good to keep things like that inside," he said. "You're the psyc major, isn't that one of the first things you learn?"

"I'm not keeping anything inside. I understand, Philip, I get it. I don't need to talk about it."

Philip watched him for a second, before Will turned and entered the exhibit, trying to leave it there. He saw Fred and Three waving to him from a display along the way a little, noting that not all the animals were snakes. Philip came up behind him.

"Will," he said softly, "Sometimes I think there's a person inside you that's very different to the one you let everyone see."

Will turned to him, watching him walk past. "Isn't that the same with everybody?" he asked.

"Not everybody," Philip said over his shoulder as he made his way over to Fred and Three.

Will stood in the entry, feelings stewing inside. He wandered past a few glassed in animal habitats, rounding a corner where he saw Angel, head tilted, watching an exhibit closely. The dark low-lit lighting played across his face, making shadows, making his eyes bright. He caught sight of Will in the glass reflection and smiled, grabbing his hand and pulling him close.

"Ig-you-an-a," he murmured.

Will blinked, looking down at the lizard in the realistic looking space. His eyes flicked to the identification information tag.

"Iguana," He corrected, feeling Angel's fingers playing along his own.

"Ig-wana..." Angel said, copying the pronunciation. "Iguana."

He stood next to Angel for a moment, feeling wave after wave of melancholy washing over him. For himself, for Angel, not knowing how to pronounce Iguana, being so awed by a lizard because he'd never seen something so simple before.

"It's looking at me," Angel cooed softly.

Will gave him a peck on the cheek and Angel grinned. "Did you see the snakes when you came in? Big. Pretty and shiny."

"You think snakes are pretty?" Will asked, smiling faintly.

"Yes, all animals are. They're all pretty and want me to pet them." He poked the glass, pouting a little.

"I like the wolves," Will mused. "I think they're pretty."

Angel wriggled closer to him, their clothes rubbing against each other. "You're still the prettiest," he said. "You're the most attractive."

Surprised by the fact Angel knew how to give a compliment, basic as it was, he was too distracted to deflect the full mouth to mouth kiss he received a moment later.

He heard a few school kids giggling as Angel broke away with a smile, turning away to wander on ahead. He clumsily followed, feeling jelly legged.

"Monkey!" Angel cried loudly a second later, making nearly everyone in the exhibit turn to look at him.

He hurried after him. "Shhh!" Will hissed, finger to his lips.


Nineteen

"Three," Angel said in his best warning tone, trying to sound like Will when someone was talking over the doctor show Will liked.

"Please?" Three said, curling up next to him on the couch, his eyes really big and green, "I'm so bored."

"Well then go out yourself," Angel said, turning the page of his book and trying to get back into the storyline.

Three fell back across the couch, sighing. Angel ignored him and read his book. Three sighed again, louder. He reached to the table with his thin arm and grabbed one of the cookies Philip had given them after lunch.

Angel watched him out of the side of his eye. He was getting crumbs everywhere. Fred was going to come in and look grumpy at them.

Angel put his book down on the table.

"You're crumbing everywhere."

"No I'm not."

"Yes you are, I can see them," Angel said, pointing at Three's gray tee shirt, which was spotted with chocolate cookie crumbs.

He dusted them off and Angel made an angry sound.

"Don't do that!" he cried, "Clean them up."

"No one will see them."

"Fred will. And Philip. They always see crumbs. Pick them up."

Three was doing that tight-lipped face he did when he didn't want to listen to what Angel was saying. Angel narrowed his eyes.

"Do it," he said in his warning voice.

Green eyes flicked to him, darker than usual. Angel noticed Three's eyes more now. They were green, bright like the scales of a snake, a pretty colour that he hadn't seen on anyone else. Most people had brown.

"Three," he said, watching his eyes, "If you don't get them, I'm going to bully you."

"What's bully?"

"Be stronger than you. And show you that I'm stronger by wrestling."

"Well at least that would be interesting." He bit the cookie, making more crumbs.

Angel punched his thigh and Three hissed like an angry cat. Eyes on Angel, he crunched the cookie in his fist and dropped the crumbs onto the floor.

Angel slapped his face and they were brawling in an instant, hair pulling, shirt ripping, teeth and nails scratching into each other as they rolled off the couch.

"Hey!" Fred's voice, "Hey! Stop it!"

Three's foot slammed into his stomach.

"Stop it now!" Fred shrieked, her voice so high it almost couldn't be understood.

Angel pushed Three away and he rolled into the wall with a happy-making thud. Angel stood up, shrinking a little under Fred's glare.

"He wouldn't clean up the cookie--" Angel started quickly, wanting her to know it wasn't his fault.

"Angel!" she cut him off, her face tight and pinched. "No hitting! NO hitting!"

Three stood up; the side of his mouth bloody. Angel looked down at his own knuckles, seeing the red on them.

"I don't want to break up any more fights this week!" she said, panting a little, "You understand? No more fighting."

The blood trickled down Three's chin. Angel had won that fight; he thought smugly, no contest.

Three nodded at Fred, his head down a little.

"Please. Try to get along?" She smiled weakly. "I know we've been cooped up a lot... but don't hit each other. It's not good. You can't solve arguments with fists."

Angel blinked. Why not? He decided not to ask though, as Fred was shaking a little, still angry.

"Clean up that mess," she said, pointing to Three's cookie pile, "and clean his face." She said, before she turned and walked away shaking her head.

Angel pushed Three against the couch. "Look what you did!" he hissed under his breath.

Three blinked and then smiled. He laughed as Angel glared at him. Angel watched him bend down and clean up the crumbs, making sure he picked up each and every one, feeling his anger getting swallowed away, eaten up as Three cleaned, putting the crumbs on the plate.

"There," he said, letting Angel inspect his work.

Satisfied there were no visible crumbs Angel took Three to the kitchen and washed his face for him, wiping the blood away from his lip.

Three was watching the window. "Can we go now?"

Angel frowned. "Okay," he said reluctantly, knowing Three would probably get them in trouble again if he didn't go into the backyard like he wanted.

Three liked being outside, but he didn't like going by himself. It was strange. He always liked to be with someone, and that someone was usually Angel.

"What is so important about the backyard?" Angel asked as they walked through the door, the cooler wind brushing at them immediately. The sun was getting tired, not as bright anymore.

"I like it."

"You should learn to like it by yourself," Angel said grumpily. He crossed his arms as Three jumped down onto the grass, wandering around on it.

"Come on," Three cried, smiling happily.

Angel grudgingly smiled back, amused by Three's excitement. The bad feelings towards him were pushed away, and Angel followed him into the trees.

"I found a good place with Fred," Three said, taking Angel's hand and leading him.

"What good place?"

"It's a grassy circle bit. In the middle of the trees. It's on the right side."

Leaves and sticks crunched under their bare feet. Angel didn't like shoes. They felt so strange. He only wore them for special things. Like the zoo. He grinned as he remembered all the animals. He wished they could speak words, instead of sounds. It would be good to talk to a monkey or a wolves.

He looked around, trying to see bugs. There was a bug place at the zoo and some of them had been huge. Fred hadn't liked that room, she left straight away. She didn't like bugs. And Gunn didn't like the little furry animal house, where the animals were tiny and soft looking and had skinny tails.

Actually, now that Angel thought about it, most of them hadn't liked at least one type of animal. Except for he and Three, they'd liked everything. But the others hadn't liked some.

Philip and Alex hadn't liked the big furry spiders, but Angel had, and one of the women who was talking about them had let Angel and Three have one walk across their hands. A tarantula. Big and furry, and the blonde woman had told him his name was Terry, which was strange because how would she know if it didn't talk? Fred had taken lots of pictures of it for him anyhow. Will stayed away from the glass when they saw the anaconda, which was a huge long snake. He'd told Angel later that he didn't really like snakes.

Angel thought they were pretty though. All scaly and shiny, wriggling and coils, and their tongues were flicky and always poking out.

"Do you think we have snakes here?" he asked.

"No. Like the anaconda?"

"Yeah. But it doesn't have to be that big."

"No. I haven't seen any, the place is through here."

The trees were a little tighter, closer together in this part. They went through and there was a small room-sized patch of grass that the trees grew around. Angel laughed.

"Why don't they grow there?" he said, looking around.

Three shrugged, sitting down in the grass. "I don't know."

Angel sat down next to him. It was a nice place. It felt surrounded by trees.

"Do you like it?" Three asked, wriggling next to him and resting his head on Angel's shoulder.

"Yes."

Three nodded. The day wasn't bright; it was more gray, but not raining. Everything still had a little bit of a wet smell to it, because it had rained the day before.

Three rubbed his thigh. "Angel?" he asked, voice quiet.

"Yes?"

"Can we kiss now?"

"... OK."

Three shifted up onto his knees and leant forward, pressing his lips against Angel's softly. Kissing Will was better, but kissing Three was better than not kissing anyone at all. It was different. When he kissed Will, Will seemed like... he was trying to beat Angel's kisses, kiss-fighting, but in a good way. Three's kisses were good, but in a different way, because his were soft, not fighting against Angel at all.

Angel grabbed his hair and kissed him harder. Three just moaned a little and let him do it. Angel's penis stirred in his jeans. He closed his eyes and kissed Three harder, both of them slumping to the grassy floor. Angel was lying on top of him, between his thighs and he could feel Three had an erection as well. Angel grabbed him through his jeans and Three just gave his usual moanings, wriggling underneath him a little. Angel smiled. Sometimes he thought Three fought with him just so he could lose. Maybe Three actually liked losing.

Three thrust up against him.

He certainly seemed to be liking losing now.

"You like it when I win, don't you?" Angel asked, breaking the kiss and looking into Three's wide eyes.

Three paused for a second, blinking slowly before he nodded, looking a little confused at himself.

"Why?"

"I don't know," he whispered, so quietly Angel could hardly hear him.

"But you like it, you like it when I win and do this."

"Yes," his lashes fluttered closed and Angel gave him a soft bite on the jaw. He shivered a little, underneath, and Angel's cock throbbed.

He liked it, having Three letting him bite. He didn't fight back because he knew Angel would win. Not fighting back was just showing Angel he knew he would lose, because Angel was stronger.

Angel grabbed Three's wrists and forced them under his back. He could see Three's nipples were hard under the tee shirt and he leant down, nibbling at them through the cotton. He rubbed his hard penis against Three's crotch. Three's mouth was hot as he licked inside while thrusting harder against Three, hearing him let out tiny yelpy dog sounds that just made Angel hotter, made him boil inside, made his pants slick inside with pre-come.

He let go of Three's wrists, and held himself up, a palm on the ground on either side of Three's face. Three had pink cheeks, eyelashes wet and lips all swollen and filled with blood. Angel stilled all moment, feeling his own penis twitch as Three tried to thrust up against his thigh.

He panted against Three's lips, feeling hot and sticky and numb-headed.

"Unzip us," he said, smiling when Three's hands immediately followed his order.

He looked down. He hadn't seen Three's penis before. He was long and pale, and very slick looking. Angel's hand slipped in under his testes and cupped around them, watching Three shut his eyes and swallow a little.

He wrapped his hand around Three's penis and pumped it, feeling how tight his skin was, tight and hot and throbbing. He was ready to come, from Angel doing things to him. Angel felt dizzy.

He pumped it a few times, his hand slicking up from the pre-come. Angel blinked, feeling detached. He had an idea. He tugged Three's light body over, rolling him onto his stomach and pulling his pants down. He dragged his finger over the slick tip of Three's penis, watching him shiver and clench all over as he did, before trying to pull his thighs apart more. He pushed Three's buttocks apart, seeing his anus tighten up funnily before he poked his finger inside him.

Three groaned loudly, gargling a little as he fell onto his face. Angel prodded inside more. Three's body felt so hot. Hot soft slick muscle. He wondered if that's how he felt to Will. He used his other hand to clumsily stroke himself.

Three's hand was under his belly, Angel could see his arm jerking quickly.

A shout from him and the muscle tightened around Angel's finger for a few moments. Angel leaned to the side, seeing Three's face all tightened up, scrunched up like he was in pain. Angel knew it wasn't pain though, Will's face went all scrunchy when he came as well. Angel wasn't finding it as good as when Will masturbated him. Will knew what to do, Angel's fingers always felt strange when he tried to pull at himself. He had to go slower, but that didn't feel as good. He slipped his finger from Three and sat back down, squeezing at himself like Will had done, concentrating on not squeezing too hard when the quivery shudders ran through him.

Three suddenly turned around on his knees and bent down, hands around Angel's penis. He bent down like he wanted to look really closely at Angel's pubic hair, his bare bottom up in the air. Angel let out a cry of shock as Three abruptly put his penis into his mouth, kissing and sucking at it.

The shock slid away as Angel fell back on the ground with a thud. All he could feel was... the hot wet, so wet and slippery, his tongue sliding all around. He moaned continuously, unable to breathe, the sound ragged and gravelly as his lips quivered. His hips jerked, sac too tight and hot as he yelled, coming into the slick warm wet, every muscle tightened to cramping point and shaking.

He drifted for a second, staring up at the glowing just-before-night sky but not seeing it. The clouds were puffy and pink though, he could understand that. He somehow felt Three shifting closer to him, draping an arm over his sore stomach, aching from the clenching.

"Why..." he said, his voice coming out in a whisper rasp. He tried again, "Why did you do that?" His voice shook as much as his fingers did.

"It feels good," Three murmured sleepily.

They lay there, Three's head rising with Angel's panting chest. "I liked that," Angel said.

Three's head raised and he smiled, resting his chin against Angel's chest and kissing him quickly on the chin. "Do you want to have sex now?"

Angel's eyes narrowed, trying to think past the gaping emptiness in his head. "Sex?"

"Yeah," Three said softly, reaching down into Angel's open pants, eyes still on Angel's own. "Do you want to?"

"With who?" Angel said, confused, wincing a little as Three pulled at his softening cock.

"Me," he said as Angel pushed his hand away.

"But you're a boy," Angel said, shifting up a little, pulling himself into a sitting position. "You don't have a vagina."

Three laughed, crawling into Angel's lap. "Two boys can have sex," he said.

But... where did it go into? "How?" He suddenly realized. "In the mouth? Was that sex?"

"Yes."

"I don't think I want your penis in my mouth," Angel said uncertainly, looking down at Three's wet soft penis.

"No, that's just one sex. I know another," he said teasingly.

Angel leaned forward, "What is it? Tell me."

Three smiled. "In my ass."

"What's an ass?"

"Anus."

Angel's eyes widened. He thought about how small Three's anus had looked. "No. That wouldn't work."

"It does!" Three said, nodding. "Professor Weller did it all the time."

"Who's Professor Weller?" Angel asked.

"Father."

"Father," Angel blinked. He sat back confused.

"Yes."

"You must have a different Father to me."

"Maybe. But he always used to fuck me."

"Fuck?"

"Sex. It's what it's called. Fucking. He had all different names for everything. Penis is cock."

"I know that one. Alex told me when he showed me the magazines," Angel said doubtfully. "So... Father... your Father... was trying to have babies with you?"

Three shrugged. "It felt good though," he said softly, leaning in and placing a light kiss on Angel's mouth, "Just not rough. I didn't like it when it was painful. But you're nicer than him."

"I am?"

Three nodded.

"How did it fit? Or was his penis small?"

"Kind of. But he used fake ones too and they were big and they still fit inside."

"Really?"

They both turned, hearing Gunn's voice calling for them from back at the house.

Angel stood up, zipping himself up again. Three watched for a second before standing as well and pulling his jeans up. Angel set off through the trees quickly hearing Three stumbling behind him. Halfway back to the house he slowed a little, allowing Three to catch up.

"How do you do it?" he asked.

"Well, you need the slippy stuff all over your cock. And most of the time, Father put his fingers in my ass to stretch it. That's what he called it. Getting me loose."

"And then what?"

Three scratched his eyebrow as he pushed a tree branch out of his way. "You just press against the hole and it opens."

"Does it hurt?"

"No... oh, well, sometimes. And it can be good hurt, still feel good? But sometimes if you're not slippery enough it's really sore feeling."

Angel thought about that. He wondered if Will knew about this. It hadn't been in his books. Nothing about two males having sex. Although Will knew about the 'stretching'...

They walked through the kitchen door, seeing Gunn and Philip sitting at the table playing with little bits of paper.

"Hey," Philip said.

"Next time if you want to go outside?" Gunn said, sipping at his drink. "Tell one of us. Or Fred or Will or Alex. Cause we didn't know where you were."

Will had said something like that. On the rainy day. "Where's Will?"

Gunn laughed, "Was I just talking to myself then?"

"I heard you. Tell you, alright, but where is Will?"

"He's out with Fred."

Angel pouted a little. He wanted to talk to him about sex. "Alright."

He turned and left, heading towards the television to use some time before Will got back home. He had lots of questions. Alex was sitting in front of the television, remote in his hand, flipping through the channels.

"Hello," Angel said, feeling a little strange as he sat down. He didn't talk to Alex much.

"Hey."

He settled onto a cartoon and put the remote on the table. A man shape... or woman shape... was dressed in all black.

"Who's that?"

"Batman. He's a crime fighter."

Man. It was harder to tell with cartoons. Especially when they wore things over their faces.

"How are you and Will?" Alex leaned a little closer and whispered. "You two still snuggle bunnies?"

"What?"

He grabbed the remote and turned the sound up. Batman was hiding behind some boxes, listening to people. Alex looked at Angel. "Are you still getting naked with him?"

"Oh. Yes."

Alex laughed. "Totally knew it." He sat back, smiling smugly, like he'd won something. "He really likes you, you know."

"Of course he does," Angel said slowly. He realized why he didn't talk to Alex much.

"And I think you're ... okay... enough to choose whether or not you should be..."

"What?"

Alex looked at him, sucking his tongue along his teeth. "Some people don't think you're mature enough to be with Will."

"Mature enough? How old do I have to be?"

Alex looked at him emotionlessly. "Angel? You think Will's attractive right?"

Angel nodded, feeling tired but not wanting to show it. "Yes."

"More attractive than other people?"

"Yes. He's more attractive than you."

"Uh... okay. Well good, actually. So, you want to ... be with him more than with other people?"

Angel thought about that a moment before laughing. "Of course."

Alex smiled happily. "That's all I needed to hear." He turned back to watch Batman. "Oh and by the way, Will isn't more attractive than me."

"Yes he is. He's smarter and he looks better. He looks like a cat." Angel narrowed his eyes, tilting his head, trying to match up Alex's face with the animals he saw. "You look more like a meerkat. Or maybe a monkey."

Alex stood up laughing, "Okay, I have to go now."

"Okay."

Alex was strange. He wasn't going to talk to him any more than he already did.

Angel watched batman, starting to really enjoy it. He seemed to bully people that were doing the wrong things, and he did actually look like a bat when he was dressed in black. He had wings, and pointy ears and everything. Angel figured out that Bruce was actually Batman. And it seemed not a lot of people knew that. The show ended and another one came on, this one with four turtles that could speak. Angel liked this one. None of the turtles he saw had spoken. The turtles, like Batman, bullied and wrestled people and other animals.

He noted that they too only seemed to wrestle things that were doing wrong.

Like he'd bullied Three over the cookie. That was wrong. Fred had told them that dropping crumbs everywhere was bad, so, alternatively, not dropping crumbs everywhere was good.

Three had been bad, so he'd fought with him. Seemed pretty simple when he thought about it. Fred mustn't have known about the crumbs. He'd make sure he told her next time.

Three was always doing bad things like leaving mess around. They had to 'clean up after themselves', like Philip was always saying. Angel didn't find that hard, but apparently Three did.

He wondered where Three was. He still felt happy inside from the masturbating. He always did. It was good. Euphoria. Nice word.

He smiled weakly and lay down on the couch, propping his head on the armrest. The turtles were fighting with something with weapons. A long shiny knife, some sticks... he yawned, closing his eyes to rest for a moment.

"Angel?"

He stood at the entry to Will's bedroom, hearing him call from the other side of the door. "Will?"

He pushed the door open, seeing the room stretch out before him, bright yellow, lit with lunchtime-sun.

"Will?"

He squinted, just seeing him, a speck in the distance, standing on the bed, waving at him. He waved back and started to run, laughing, watching Will get closer and closer until he jumped, flying through the air and grabbing Will, landing in a tumble on the bed.

Will was all naked and cool-skinned, even though the bed covers were warmed, and Angel wrapped his arms around his thinner waist, pulling him closer.

He looked up, seeing Will's eyes behind his glasses, his hair fuzzy like they'd been rolling around on the pillows that were strewn everywhere. Will slipped away from his arms, lying back, his legs sliding around Angel's thighs. Angel liked that position, Will underneath him, his hands stroking softly down Angel's sides, making him shiver.

"Are we going to have sex now?" Angel asked, leaning down to kiss him.

Will nodded.

---

He felt someone shaking his shoulder.

"Angel?"

He opened his eyes, seeing the room was all dark around him. He was face down on the couch, the pillow under his mouth wet with drool.

"Angel?" Philip's voice.

He mumbled something as he sat up, groggy, wiping at the drying spit on his chin. The house was quiet. Philip was just a dark shape, the moonlight was flowing through the windows though, lighting up his face.

"Do you want dinner?"

"Dinner?"

"You slept through it, we all thought you'd gone to bed. I came in here to turn the television off and saw you on the couch," he laughed softly, "You're a very heavy sleeper."

"Huh?"

"Dinner."

"Uh... no... no thanks." He wanted to get back to sleep. And have sex with Will.

"Go up to your room. Goodnight."

"Goodnight," Angel echoed, sitting up, watching Philip move away in the dark.

He shivered, realizing he was in the dark, alone, and hurried from the couch, his bones clicking awake. He had a half-erection, from the dream about Will. It was weird trying to walk with it, distracting. He reached the foot of the stairs and paused.

Sound.

Like panting. Running panting sound. A groan. He stepped back from the stairs and headed right, into the hallway beside the dining room. It was coming from Fred's room. He slipped over, listening.

Fun sounds. Those were the sounds Will made, that groaning and heavy breathing. He heard the bed moving. He bit his lip. He really wanted to see what they were doing... but Will had told him repeatedly about privacy...

Breaking privacy was bad; it was the wrong thing. He reluctantly turned away from the door and headed up the stairs. No sound. He couldn't hear Fred anymore. When he reached the top of the stairs, he turned to Will's room instead of his own, but moved quietly, not wanting to wake anyone up.

He opened the door with a slight squeak and stepped inside, thinking for a moment that it was going to be day inside, like in his dream, and a waiting Will would be there, ready to have sex with him. His penis twitched happily.

Dark inside, not as dark as the hallway though, so it took a moment to see. The moonlight was coming through Will's open curtains, sweeping across the bed and down onto the floor like glowing water. He realized he was seeing Will, belly down on the bed, his face turned towards the window, one thin foot poking out from under the covers, hanging off the bed limply. He let out a light snore and went back to being silent.

Angel slipped over to him; looking at the pale soft underside of his foot and feeling his penis tighten and twitch again. He knelt down and ran his finger along the bumpy anklebone before standing up, unzipping his jeans and wriggling out of them to give his hardened penis some relief. He sighed as he was freed, kneeling on the bed slowly, wanting Will to sleep on. Will's other foot was at the opposite side of the bed, so he knelt between his sprawled legs, settling on the covers.

Angel's eyes travelled up Will's body. He looked very calm and very ... whatever the opposite of bully was. The covers were pulled up around the base of his ribs, but he was bare shouldered, his skin all smooth. One of his arms was wrapped around the pillow under his cheek and the other was loosely curled around the headboard slat.

Angel felt... hot. Excited for some reason, even though Will wasn't touching him. He wasn't sure why, but it felt like he was being played with anyway. His penis hardened a little more. Will really was very pretty. When he compared him to all the people he'd seen at the zoo. He was light and pale and he did look like a cat. His cheeks were all thin like a cat's, and he always looked calm and pleased.

His hand wrapped around his cock and he started stroking himself. His breathing grew heavier as he ran his finger across his tip clumsily, pre-come sliding out from the slit, hips thrusting a little. He made a sound and Will's eyelids flickered. Angel froze, watching him with a smile to see if he'd wake. He didn't, just sighed out.

Angel lifted up the base of the blankets and slid his slicked fingers underneath. His index finger prodded gently against his thigh as they travelled up, bumping against his skin every now and then until stopped by soft muscle. Angel crawled over him a little more, so he was close to his face, watching him breathe.

His finger slid in between the cheeks and slid into his anus.

A light grunt slid from Will's lips making Angel's stomach shiver inside. Will's eyelashes fluttered. Angel slipped a second finger inside quickly, watching happily as Will's eyes opened blearily, confused. Angel covered Will's lips with his own mouth, kissing him as he started sliding his fingers in and out of the hot passage, the blanket up over Will's back as Will wriggled a bit, moaning softly, trying to get to his knees.

Angel's penis was sticky hot and he used his free hand to pump himself as he watched Will's brows drawing together. He slid a third finger inside, and it was tight, like it didn't want to let him in, but gave way eventually, his finger snugly sliding through. Will made an uncomfortable noise, his back tensing under Angel's upper arm. Angel slid his fingers out and turned his hand around, knuckles pointing towards Will's balls and slid the three in again. Will moaned, and something in the sound twinged his lower belly, reverberating inside and making him kiss Will even harder, trying to slide his tongue in further as he pumped himself.

Will was tense all over, except his anus, loosening like Three said it would. Not as tight as it was when he slipped his first finger inside. Loose enough...

Will groaned again and Angel laughed as his cock twitched, feeling hotter at the tip now.

"Your groans make my penis jump," Angel whispered against Will's ear.

He felt the muscles around his finger tighten and squeeze for a second as Will bit his lip.

"I like it when you groan," he said, kissing him again, making his lips all wet. Will opened his eyes. "It sounds nice."

"What are you doing?" Will whispered throatily, like he had no voice.

"Three told me, about loosening."

Will closed his eyes. "Angel..." he said, and he had that tone like he was about to say no. Angel smiled.

"Yes," he said, quickly covering Will's mouth with his own so he could start the wrestling game. Not tonight. Not right then, maybe later. He leaned forward a little, sliding his fingers from Will's hot muscles.

The tip of his penis dragged along the parted cheeks and Will's thighs tensed, tightening as he tried again to get to his knees. "No, Angel..."

Angel raised his hips up a little, settling his chest against Will's shoulders so he couldn't wriggle away like he normally did. Feeling very smart, and like he knew what to do, Angel paused, letting Will's ass shift up a bit more from the mattress as he managed to get to his knees underneath Angel's body, before he pressed his cock into his anus and slowly slid inside.

Both of their bodies went completely stiff before Will's slumped to the mattress. Angel felt numb for a second like he couldn't feel anything, before the world sparked to senses and he felt warm hot walls squeezing around his penis, massaging him as he tried to slide inside more, all the way. He groaned gravelly, his throat in his stomach and his heart in his mouth, his body all jumbled around at the tight hot sleek muscle inside Will.

He was inside him. He laughed a little, his balls already starting to squeeze tight for his orgasm.

"Angel--" Will hissed hoarsely "-- STOP!"

He stopped, his penis uncomfortably tight, whole body shivering with the need to keep sliding inside, and then to thrust and to slide and to have sex with Will.

"What?" His voice was quivering; he wanted to slide more, deeper.

"Stop... okay... good. Ow... don't move."

Angel whined a little, fingers digging into Will's hips. Don't move? Will was panting a lot. Will's hands were clenched around the pillow under his face. He looked back over his shoulder, lips parted around his panting.

"Angel... no."

"No what?"

"This isn't going to work."

"Sure it does," he said quickly, his voice turning into a bit of a whimper.

Will reached back and held Angel's hips, sliding the dizzying heat of himself away, the suction painful on his penis. Angel sat back. When Will wriggled around, his penis was stiff between his thighs. He sat on the bed and reached over to click the lamp on.

"Okay." He said, his eyes wet. "When someone says no? You have to stop." He shook his head suddenly and let out a gasp of air. He smiled a little at Angel. "I know that it's my fault--"

"Okay, but why aren't we having sex now?" Angel asked, toes curled with need.

"Because ...ow," Will said as he settled on the mattress, "You weren't ready to fuck me like that."

Angel leant forward, looking at Will closely. "Yes. I was."

"Okay, you were, but pet? I wasn't. You need slick-"

"But I-"

"Shut the bloody hell up and listen to me," he said in a no-nonsense voice, making Angel's jaw click shut, "Artificial lubricant. First step. Actually no, seeing if someone actually wants to have sex is the first step. Going slow is one of the most important steps."

"Why?" he asked quietly, knowing he'd done the wrong thing but a little unsure how.

"Because pet, I'm a person too. I'm not a fuck dolly and that bloody hurt! You have to think about the other person when you're having sex with them. It's not just about you."

Angel blinked. Hurt? He paused, looking at Will's feet. Will was angry with him. And Angel had hurt him. "I'm sorry," he whispered, feeling bad. "I didn't mean to hurt you."

He was suddenly grabbed in a tight hug and hauled practically onto Will's lap. "I know, pet. That's why I didn't... punch you in the neck."

He heard Will chuckle against his shoulder. He felt better. "I hurt you inside?" he asked apologetically. "I thought it would feel good."

He frowned. Three had told him that. Maybe Three was lying. He thought about that. He would never have done it if he thought it was going to hurt him.

"Normally does, just not... practically dry."

"You liked my fingers inside you," Angel said leaning back a little.

"Yeah," Will kissed his collarbone, "that was good."

"I liked it too. Especially the moaning," he whispered. "And your feet."

"My feet?"

Angel reached down and grabbed one, amused when Will suddenly started laughing, jerking his foot from his grasp and rolling over to wriggle away. Grinning Angel grabbed it again, his fingers scrabbling across Will's thighs. He liked naked wrestling. He grabbed Will's calves and pulled him back, flipping him over and sitting on him. Will's hands settled on his hips, and he gazed up at him.

"Do you forgive me for hurting you?"

Will glanced away smiling. "Yes, although," he said, looking back, "You ever do that again? I'm going to bully you."

Angel shook his head. "I don't want that."

"No you don't."

"I won't do it again. I'll get all the steps," he said eagerly, leaning down and nibbling at Will's lower lip.

Will burst into laughter.

The door suddenly opened and Three stood there, rubbing his eye. "I can't sleep with all the noise," he said grumpily. "Stop being so loud, go to sleep."

He turned and left and Angel felt Will shuddering with silent giggles underneath him.


Twenty

Every man has a line. Could only be pushed to that line before tumbling over, and then… it wasn’t their fault. Not really. Everyone had to succumb to some vice. No one could be a perfect, pure thing. It just all came down to where your line was drawn.

Will’s lips were dry and cracked. He hadn’t closed up the windows before he and Angel had gone to sleep, and the cold air had chafed them both all night. Angel slept though, unworried by the sting of the air, or the weight on Will’s mind.

He licked his lips, tasting a tang of coppery blood in one of the tiny dry-tears in his lower lip.

Know where your line was and know where you could be pushed. His mother had taught him about that, about the limits of the human spirit, speaking from her sick bed, wise frail bones and wispy hair. Will smiled a little, watching the digital clock flick to three twenty-six. Angel breathed so light, it was almost like he wasn’t there, wouldn’t be able to tell if it weren’t for the vibrant heat of him.

Angel didn’t know his intrinsic flaw yet; he’d never been pushed so far as to bow under the weight of it. Never needed to give in, even though, when Will thought about it, Angel would be the one with the reason to give in to vices. Maybe he would, later.

Will sighed and rolled over, his nose to the back of Angel’s neck.

He wondered, not for the first time, what imperfection had led his mother to his father. Because, it would have to have been a defect in her humanity that forced them together. There was no way they met normally, at some box social or whatever the bloody hell they had back then. He still couldn’t figure it out. Maybe she thought there was good in everyone. No… maybe she thought the good overruled the bad in everyone. That could be a fault. Maybe she’d actually thought his father had been… a good person. Instead of what he was.

Maybe she couldn’t believe someone could be so terrible. He wondered if that had been what eroded her away, realising she was wrong about his father. If her body had just given in to shock and slowly started to decay.

Will’s hand slid under the covers, and he closed his eyes for a moment as he brushed his fingers over Angel’s hot bare thigh. The desert dryness slid inside to turn his tongue to cotton. He wanted a drink, but he couldn’t tear himself from the bed.

His father’s flaws were numerous and blatant. Pride. Egotism. Sociopathy. His father’s line was a thin little shading, and he’d crossed it long ago. Or maybe he never crossed it. Maybe he still found himself fine, in fact now that Will thought about it, that was probably true. His father wouldn’t be one to bow to something as silly as a conscience.

He wondered why his father had ever taken to his mother. Maybe his grandparents had pushed them together. Maybe … he didn’t know what. It was hard to just give up on it though. His parents rarely talked about the other. Like they wanted to forget that shadow looming in their pasts. He couldn’t imagine they’d ever loved each other. They’d been married though, so a drunken fumble hadn’t tied them together with a son.

He pushed the cloying thoughts away. He could think about them everyday until he died, and he’d still never figure it out.

Will had a vice. And it hadn’t taken him all that long to succumb either, he mused, toying with the soft indistinct hairs on Angel’s thigh. He felt guilty, but somehow… not as much as he should. Maybe because he’d always dreamed of it, since he was old enough to understand what he wanted. Maybe he’d inherited some facet of his father’s selfish contempt for others, self assured in the idea that it was okay, because he wanted it to be okay. Whatever it was, he had one vice. He’d spent his life trying to get to it.

And now he had it.

He smiled in the darkness, a little detached, eyes unfocused. He could smell Angel’s skin; hot savoury flesh and it made him twitch. He closed his eyes and bowed down to another desire, raising his chin and licking the back of Angel’s neck, up the bumps of his spine, revelling in his lechery. He giggled a little maniacally, stifling himself enough not to wake Angel up.

He’d probably been pushed across his own conscience line the first day he’d kissed Angel. But he didn’t care.

Will blinked at the thought, feeling his belly was warm and his head was clear. Angel sighed lightly. Will didn’t care. At all. He wanted this, he wanted Angel, and he was going to have him. He didn’t feel bad about it. All he could feel was Angel, and Angel made him happy. Would that really matter when he’d lived his life? Would it outweigh any good he’d done?

No. He didn’t think so. He wasn’t his father, he knew he wasn’t a bad person. He couldn’t be wrong about that. And he was just… he just wanted him. And that wasn’t bad. It was human.

His arm slipped around Angel’s waist and he squeezed him tight, unable to control himself.

“Wha…” Angel mumbled sleepily, his fingers curling around Will’s wrist on his belly, making Will’s heart thump chest. Angel yawned, his grip tightening.

Will sat up a little so he could see his face. He’d dreamed of him for so long, kept himself silent. He leant down and tenderly placed a kiss on his cheek.

“I’m glad you’re here Angel,” he whispered, “it just… makes me happy.”

He paused, wriggling closer to him, pressing against Angel tightly. “I’m not happy a lot.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“I make you happy?”

He nodded against his neck.

“Will?” he asked softly, a little yawn edging onto his words. “Do you love me?”

Will’s throat tightened. A thousand memories filled his brain, of Angel, back in the experiment rooms, a big jumble of happy and sad and strong and Will could only nod numbly.

“I don’t think I’ve ever loved anyone,” Will said, voice rasping out past the tightness in his throat, “…except you.”

Angel rolled over, smiling hugely. “Good.” He kissed Will’s lips, shifting his weight on top of Will’s body. “I like being loved.”

Will chuckled softly into his mouth. Angel’s hands unerringly settled near his cock, sliding towards it as Angel distracted him with kisses. Angel was getting sneakier in his old age.

His hand slipped around his shaft and started squeezing gently, tickling him. Will pushed his head back into the pillows, melting, letting Angel wriggle down and push the covers off. Will reached over and flicked the lamp on, throwing dim gold light across the both of them. Angel’s eyes snapped to his as he did, scrutinising him from under messy bed hair before he gently moved Will’s thighs apart. His whole body relaxed, apart from his heart still pumping in his chest, edging up his throat.

He felt nervous. He chuckled at the thought.

Angel’s hand smoothed across his belly, running up his chest to curl light and hot and firm around his throat, holding him for a kiss. The steady slide of hand against his cock was making him weak. Like he wanted to fall half-asleep, grinning idiotically as Angel kissed across his face and burnt him slowly. Angel nuzzled into his neck like an animal, tickling him with kisses and heavy breath rolling down his skin.

He felt the familiar rub of Angel’s hardness against his thigh. He was too …warm, to do anything like moving. Angel stopped, settling over his thighs to line them both up in his big hand, palming them both with electric strokes. He hissed out a sigh, sac twitching over his balls. His hands wrapped around the sides of Angel’s thighs, holding him tight.

Angel lent back down, breathing heavily as he stroked them both surely. Will could feel his thighs tensing under his fingers. “Can we have sex?” he asked softly, breathing hot into Will’s ear. “I really want to.”

A tiny bite to his ear and Will nodded dumbly. Angel wriggled in excitement, a hot bundle of energy.

“Wait,” Will said, pushing Angel off his legs. For a moment, Angel didn’t move, pushing back at Will to keep him down stubbornly, eyes harsh. He eventually relented, poutily sitting back and sprawling across the covers, his hard penis against his belly. Will got up.

“What are you doing?” Angel whispered.

Will tossed a look at the lounging nymph on his bed before heading to some boxes he still had stacked in the corner. He rummaged through them, his cock bouncing a little. The room was cold in the early morning.

“Looking for…” he trailed off, feeling a small package under some clothes.

Angel was wrapped around his back a second later, his skin hot enough to make Will’s knees weak. So hot. Burning. Kisses attacking his neck and hands trying to pull him back to the bed. Will’s fist crumpling the box, he pulled it out, undoing it and pulling the ribbon of condoms out. Souvenirs from when he used to actually sleep with people, instead of pining away for a dream. He let the box fall from his fingers, smiling a little, no noise. Not a dream.

“What’s that?” Angel whispered.

“Condoms,” he said, tearing one off. He pushed Angel back to the bed easily, seeing as it was where Angel wanted to go anyway.

“What’s that?”

He opened the tiny pack as Angel sat down on the bed, interested. Will snorted. Practical sex-ed.

“It goes on your penis. Protects you.”

“From what?”

He pulled out the lubed rubber and reached down, starting to unroll it down onto Angel’s cock. Angel giggled, shivering a little.

“It feels funny," he whispered.

“I know.”

Angel watched him roll it down and then ran his fingers over the latex, amusing himself as Will knelt on the bed. Will coated his fingers in the last of the clean smelling slick and slipped one quickly into his ass, slicking himself, vision happily blurring a little. Angel was pumping his cock experimentally. He turned to Will, watching him with a smile.

He knelt up, slicked hand on Will’s thigh as he leant in to kiss him. Will relaxed forward, kissing him back breathlessly. He wanted this, so bad. They both did. Angel pulled Will’s legs forward as he pushed him back down onto the mattress, guiding Will’s head to the pillows. Angel wrapped his arms around Will’s waist and kissed him harder, wriggling his hips between Will’s thighs.

Big hands travelled down his back, cupping his arse before a finger tickled at his hole. The thick head of Angel’s cock between his cheeks and Will could feel himself holding his breath under Angel’s kisses. Pressure at his entry and then the slick feel of him sliding inside. Angel groaned against his neck as Will fought to get air past his tight throat. Angel pushed deeper, sizzling every nerve inside him, making Will’s body tighten every muscle. Angel thrust the last of himself inside, biting and kissing up and down Will’s neck deliriously.

“I like it,” he murmured wildly, “I get it, I like it…”

Will’s belly felt like water, he could feel Angel so hard and deep inside that he couldn’t think properly. It felt so good. He felt so awake and alive. His hand wrapped around his cock and he started pumping, shocks of pleasure shooting from his stretched anus to his groin, making him slick. Angel’s hands were tight on Will’s shoulders, not letting him move an inch.

He suddenly started drawing out slowly, making Will’s eyes water as he furiously jerked himself, trying to temper out the pleasure Angel’s cock was forcing him to feel. Angel slid back in smoothly, drawing out a little before gliding back through the tight muscle. Will didn’t need to speak, he didn’t think he could anyway, but Angel didn’t need to be told what to do now. He got it. It was instinct.

Angel grunted softly as his buried himself again. His hands were clamping tightly on his shoulders, grinding against his bones. He tried to pull his hand away but Angel held on tighter and slid inside quicker. Will let it slide, ignoring the bruises that were forming to concentrate on how his blood felt too hot for his body, too sweet, like he was running on ecstasy, making him feel like he was sweating sugar, all from Angel’s wordless sliding fuck. He moaned, his body feeling stormy inside, heart and lungs working overtime, not used to such pressure to perform as Angel filled him up again and again. He worked with his thrusts, meeting them, belly rising to Angel’s his fisted cock caught between them. Angel’s thrusts became shorter and quicker, leaving him spinning mindlessly, no thoughts but to thrust back and take his all, take him deeper.

“Angel…” he whispered, tethering his awareness on the word.

Angel kissed him, rough but human, his thrusts quickening; shifting Will up the bed, skin slapping skin loudly. Will melted into soft pliancy, swept up in the force of him, in awe of the way he moved, the way his muscles tightened and relaxed in a mesmerising rhythm. A force. His eyes were dark, heavy lidded with pleasure. His hands moved down to Will’s hips, dragging him further onto his cock. He was beautiful. Will couldn’t speak as he fucked back and forth. It was everything… better than what he’d dreamed, having Angel here, wet and burning for him.

He tightened around Angel suddenly, making him gasp, sucking air deep as his hand jerked faster on his cock. Angel’s fingers twitched on his hips and Will felt pressure building inside, brick by brick in his lower belly.

“Harder… Angel, harder,” he breathed, feeling the cock inside draw out and spear back inside.

Another wave of almost sickening pleasure rolled through him and he heard himself letting out short soft yappy grunts of pleasure as his sac constricted and his cock twitched, every muscle in his body becoming hard tight stone as he closed his eyes and pumped his orgasm out onto Angel’s hard belly.

He fell back, a boneless distant mush, barely aware of Angel’s hard pounding or the way he fell forward, covering Will as he came, his cock twitching deep inside.

He stared up at the ceiling, lips parted dumbly as his blood started flowing back to his brain. He smiled, euphoric, not caring what the time was, or what Angel was mumbling, or how heavy he was lying on top of him. He couldn’t care about anything. He’d lost his sense when he came. He let his cheek roll to the pillow and it felt soft as feathers. He could feel Angel still inside him, his arse filled and tightening sporadically around Angel’s cock in the aftermath of his orgasm.

He closed his eyes as Angel mumbled something, kissing his jaw. He didn’t care right now. Let Angel tell him in the morning.

---

“Professor,” Colonel Boon cut in, tight smile on his face, “I don’t think-“

“No, you don’t,” Travers hissed, “leave the thinking to me Colonel Boon, we’ll all be much better off for it.”

He turned back to the assembled men. “We have a lead in Oregon. We will be following up on it.”

The men before him didn’t speak. The Initiative held Travers' intellect in high regard. He had a voice in many of the major experiments running at any given time, and they wanted to keep him happy.

There had been another leak. Files had been stolen. Very… incriminating files. The Initiative had decided to put Project Origin's disruption on the backburner to investigate the stolen information.

Travers wasn’t happy.

“Professor,” a stiff man in uniform interjected, raising his hand a little, “do you really think they would give up their whereabouts to come forth… to the media? If they were going to do that, they would have done it already. They would try to seek protection from the coverage. Hide in the spotlight, so to speak. They’re too scared. They just want to disappear.”

Murmurs of assent boiled his blood as they rippled in the conference room. Travers sighed harshly.

“Split your manpower if you must,” he said, ignoring whoever the speaker was as he stood up slowly, hand shaking on his cane, “but track them down. We are close.”

He ignored the harsh whispering.

The meeting was adjourned.

---

Will woke blearily, eyes refusing to focus on anything, leaving him in a half-dreamlike state. He scrubbed his eyes with the backs of his knuckles. A ball of heavy nervousness was settled under his navel, coiling and rotating slimily.

Angel wasn’t in the bed; the place where he had slept was lit up by late morning sun filtered through the curtains.

Will sat up, scratching the back if his head, his too long hair in tangles around the nape of his neck. He needed to cut it. It was starting to curl traitorously. His throat was hoarse and a wave of memories from last night flowed through him, fresh and hot. Angel’s hands, his eyes so dark in the lamplight…

He turned and clicked the lamp off, standing up nude and stretching his sore arms and thighs. He rolled his shoulders and turned to the mirror, taking himself in. Tired eyes and fabric lines running along his cheek, his hair sticking out on one side. He smiled.

He could really use a cigarette right now.

A wave of longing rolled through him. A cigarette. Ah… a ciggie would be bliss right now.

Forgoing the after sex shower for a little longer, he pulled some jeans on, letting them fall halfway down his hips and jogged down the stairs. He headed into the kitchen, bouncing on his heels as he rummaged in the kitchen junk drawers for his cancer sticks.

Scrabbling fingers found a soft pack and he yanked it out, sticking a cig immediately into his mouth, heading out to the back porch, pack of matches in hand.

He pushed the door open, looking down the porch to see Angel and Three wrapped up together on the outside furniture, looking out at the sunny backyard. They both looked towards him innocently.

He tapped his fingers on his matchbox.

Three’s arm was around Angel’s neck, his head resting on Angel’s shoulder, other hand toying with the strap of the white wifebeater he was wearing.

Will waved a little, stone-faced. Both men blinked at him dopily. Angel’s arm was around Three’s waist.

“Going for a smoke,” Will said croakily, trying to break the heavy silence he knew he was the only one feeling.

“Morning cigarette,” Angel said smiling, playing the words off his tongue like a child.

Will nodded stiffly, turning quickly and walking through the house, wrenching the front door open and standing on the weather-beaten boards of the front porch. He stared numbly at the sparse trees littering the front yard, at the fallen tree from a few storms ago, dying slowly on the ground. He lit the cigarette in his mouth and blinked slowly, head buzzing with white noise.

He sat down in the chair, the joints in his knees creaking and popping and stiffly puffed on the smoke, blowing grey clouds out into the sunny yard, refusing to think.

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