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On the astral plane it is nearly impossible for Jayce to tell where he ends and Viktor begins. Their thoughts are shared like whispers; their desires and impulses inextricable; the amalgamation of their memories forming an incoherent, yet familiar, story.
Despite loving who he and Viktor are together, Jayce appreciates the rare occasions when he and Viktor choose to disentangle themselves from one another and take corporeal bodies. These are the moments when he guess at what Viktor is thinking, and relish his victory when he is right, rather than having Viktor’s thoughts occur to Jayce as if they were his own. Importantly, it is also only in physical forms when they can explore each other's bodies the way they'd spent years refusing to admit to themselves they wanted.
It is one of such times when he and Viktor sit on pillows in front of a fireplace in a cabin that might not have existed before they appeared. Outside a lake ripples with fractured moonlight. Viktor’s hair is still damp and mussed from their earlier swim, and orange flames flicker in his eyes as he watches the fire, draped in a warm blanket.
“I’m sorry if I’m not the best teacher,” says Jayce, disrupting the comfortable silence. “But hey, by the end you were doing something I’d almost call swimming.”
Viktor smiles, his gaze shifting to meet Jayce’s. “Almost swimming, or almost drowning?”
“I’m a glass half full kind of guy,” says Jayce.
“Mm.” Viktor’s eyes return to the fire, and he pulls the blanket a little tighter around his shoulders. For a split second, with his hair falling in limp wet strands in his face, and the indigo blanket wrapped around his shoulders, Viktor resembles the same Viktor that had awoken from death in Jayce’s workshop.
A shadow passes over Viktor’s face.
“Being in the water with you,” he says, “floating, weightless—it reminded me of the very first time we experimented with the Hex crystals. That was the happiest moment of my life.”
Jayce has had similar conversations too often not to recognize the beginning of a self-loathing diatribe.
“You don’t need to feel guilty for being happy, Vik.”
“Don’t I?” asks Viktor wryly, voice laden with grief. “When I close my eyes, I can—I can still see all of them. Suspended in the web. Slack-jawed, eyes vacant, husks of themselves.”
“You did the right thing. You freed them.”
“Those who remained alive.”
Jayce stares at Viktor, knowing that inside his mind he is spiraling. Jayce knows the feeling well, having had to come to terms with his own demons and mistakes. It is so much easier, he laments, to comfort Viktor when their minds are melded into one. He can express so much more when he is not limited to his human vocabulary with its oversights and misunderstandings. Viktor has always been better with his words, easily finding the chinks in Jayce’s verbal armor whenever Jayce attempts to defend Viktor against himself.
Arguing is useless. What Jayce needs now is a distraction.
Jayce scans the room, then pushes himself to his feet and crosses the room to the phonograph that sits on the table in front of the window. He bends a knee and quickly skims through the records boxed beneath the table. The pickings are slim, but he finds one that is suitable enough for his purposes.
Viktor looks over his shoulder at Jayce as the phonograph crackles to life and begins to play a waltz.
“Care for a dance?” asks Jayce, straightening up and extending his hand.
Viktor for a moment looks torn; but then he shakes his head, fondly exasperated, and pulls himself to his feet as the blanket falls to the floor.
“I don’t know how,” says Viktor, crossing the room to take Jayce’s hand. “I’ve not exactly had occasion to learn your topsider dances.”
“As if I didn’t invite you to go with me to the cotillion balls,” says Jayce with a grin, snatching Viktor in by the waist so quickly that Viktor stumbles, catching himself against Jayce’s chest. Viktor’s body is still slender in his arms, but he is not so frail and concave as he was in the latter days of his sickness. He is solid, healthy, strong; the same soul inhabiting a new vessel free of illness and pain.
“Here, put your hand—” Jayce hesitates, realizing that he’s only ever danced with women. He’d reflexively placed his hand on Viktor’s waist, but where is Viktor meant to place his hand? Jayce realizes he’s never paid attention to same-sex partners on the dance floor.
“I’m not entirely ignorant,” says Viktor with a knowing smile that just barely turns up the corners of his mouth. He places his hand on Jayce’s arm without a second thought, and Jayce realizes he’s been overthinking again.
“Just follow my lead,” says Jayce, slowly beginning to move, minding Viktor’s clumsy feet as he attempts to mimic Jayce’s movements in a simple box step.
Back, side, together. Forward, side, together. Back, side, together. Forward—
Viktor is far from a natural. He steps on Jayce’s toes, and tries to step forward when he should step back back, and trips over his own feet; but still Jayce can feel Viktor begin to relax in his arms, safely grounded in the present. When Viktor’s amber eyes finally rise from his feet to meet Jayce’s, Jayce feels his stomach flutter as if it is full of firelights.
“I seem to have two left feet,” says Viktor.
“You’re doing fine.”
“You’re a bad liar,” replies Viktor, and Jayce catches the slightest glimpse of a smile. “Dancing was different in the undercity. Less rigid, less structured. I was never any good there, either.”
“Well, we can’t all be good at everything,” teases Jayce.
They both look at the phonograph as the music ends.
“Here, let me,” says Jayce when Viktor moves toward it. He closes his eyes, still clutching Viktor in his arms, and accesses the powers of the arcane. A moment later the music resumes as the needle is returned with a scratch to the beginning.
When Jayce’s eyes open, Viktor looks amused.
“Abusing our abilities for parlor tricks now, are we?” he asks.
Jayce leans his face in a little closer to Viktor’s, brushing a strand of hair out of his eyes.
“No, no,” says Jayce. “I only use it in matters of grave importance.”
Viktor’s eyes find Jayce’s lips as he steps closer, chest-to-chest. “Like when you are trying to get laid.”
“Yes, exactly.”
“So I suppose I ought to be impressed?”
“Aren’t you?”
A groan tears from Jayce’s throat as their lips crash together. Jayce’s arms wrap around Viktor’s waist as Viktor yanks Jayce down to his level by his collar.
Viktor begins to walk backward, leading Jayce to the sofa where he collapses, pulling Jayce down on top of him. Jayce catches himself on his forearm to keep the full weight of his body from landing atop Viktor.
“You don’t have to be so gentle,” says Viktor. “I won’t break.”
“Sorry,” says Jayce embarrassedly. “I—habit.”
Viktor begins fumbling with the buttons of the loose shirt he’d pulled on after their swim as Jayce presses kisses against his neck and the underside of his jaw.
“Jayce,” complains Viktor. “This would go faster if you—ah—would be patient.”
“I’ll try,” breathes Jayce, nuzzling against the side of Viktor’s face.
“Eager today?”
Jayce groans, sitting up, straddling Viktor’s thighs. “Sometimes I just want to be so close to you.” He grips Viktor’s hips. “Closer than is possible through just sex. I just…” He growls. “These bodies get in the way.”
He has no intention in the slightest of sharing his bizarre fantasy with Viktor—of shrinking him, swallowing him, hiding him away from the rest of the universe. It’s an embarrassing kink he’s had for as long as he can remember, but it is exacerbated now that Jayce has known the intimacy of sharing physical space with Viktor. Still, Jayce can’t help himself but to hint at it as he imagines it, some part of him wanting to share it with Viktor but the saner parts holding himself back.
Viktor looks up, searching Jayce’s face, and Jayce has the unnerving feeling Viktor knows exactly what he is thinking.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” he asks, paranoid.
Viktor quickly averts his gaze, his fingers slowing at the button near his clavicle. “I’m not looking at you like anything,” he says evasively.
“You look guilty.”
Viktor feigns an innocent expression, frowning exaggeratedly. “Do you think? Curious.”
“Viktor,” says Jayce, half a plea, half a demand. A horrible possibility has occurred to him—one he can barely tolerate considering. “You didn’t—you didn’t see something, did you? In my mind, on the astral plane?”
Viktor is silent for several seconds. “Sometimes, when one is trying to avoid a thought,” Viktor says finally, “it only draws more attention.”
“Don’t do that,” says Jayce, his voice a near whine as he holds Viktor’s face to keep him from looking away. “Don’t act all mysterious and vague. Tell me, what did you see?”
Viktor sighs, his arms flumping straight out to either side.
“A certain… erotic fixation of yours.”
Jayce forgets how to breathe. He feels as if the planet has stopped spinning all at once beneath them. “No. No.”
Viktor lifts a hand to caress Jayce’s jaw, knowing Jayce finds comfort through physical touch. “There’s no need for distress,” he says plainly. “I find it… sweet, in a way.”
“Sweet?”
“Do you prefer ‘charming’?” The pad of Viktor’s thumb skims lightly over Jayce’s lips. “Or perhaps ‘flattering.’”
Jayce recoils, feeling nauseated from stress. “You can’t mean that!”
“Why not?”
Jayce looks about wildly, mouth forming words but no sound emerging. “Because,” he finally manages, “it’s—it’s humiliating. It’s strange. It’s—”
“It’s much tamer than you are making it out to be,” interjects Viktor. “The depiction of love and devotion through consumption has long been a motif in literature. It stands to reason that for some, this urge is a bit more… literal.”
Jayce swallows and risks meeting Viktor’s eyes. Viktor steadily holds his gaze. “You’re really not disgusted by it?”
“Of course not,” says Viktor. “Give me some credit. Have I not always been open-minded?” He pushes himself upright, and Jayce slides off of him, sitting beside him, stunned and horrified.
“Oh, god,” says Jayce, hanging his head and covering his face with his hands. “I just can't believe you know. You! God!”
“I know it’s embarrassing,” says Viktor. “But you have to trust me that it doesn’t change how I see you, Jayce.” Viktor hesitates and then adds, “If you need the extra reassurance, I could always… prove it to you.”
“How do you mean?” asks Jayce distractedly, too involved in his own distressed thoughts to catch on.
In response, Viktor’s eyes glow with supernatural light, and runes appear over his open palm, spinning and twisting in the air.
“It would be simple,” Viktor says. “It would only require very basic shrinking and protection spells—”
Jayce blanches, and he clamps a hand onto Viktor’s shoulder. The runes vanish and Viktor blinks as his eyes are restored to their original amber.
“You’re ridiculous,” gasps Jayce. “We’re not going to—I’m not going to—”
Viktor removes Jayce’s hand from his shoulder and holds it in his lap.
“You’ve wondered how I would feel, have you not?” he asks, voice so soft, and Jayce shudders. “A good scientist would want to… test his hypothesis.”
“Viktor,” whines Jayce, searching Viktor’s eyes, “insane, sweet, ridiculous Viktor—I’d never ask you to do that for me.”
“But I’m the one asking.” Viktor extends a hand, pressing his palm flat against Jayce’s middle as Jayce does his best impression of a stone statue, averting his gaze as his adam’s apple bobs. “I admittedly would have never considered such an idea on my own, but through your mind’s eye I was able to understand the appeal.”
Jayce feels dizzy. “Appeal?”
“The closeness you spoke of earlier,” elaborates Viktor. “It’s… intimate, like sex. And like sex, it certainly doesn’t hurt that you are very attractive.”
Jayce feels his face grow hot as he looks at Viktor, a small smile twitching on his lips. He sees now that Viktor’s eyes are dark, his pupils blown wide, and a faint blush has spread across his cheeks.
He’s actually, truly aroused by this.
“You’re really serious,” Jayce says, shaking his head slightly in disbelief, his heart hammering in his chest. “What if you hate it?”
“Then I’ll tell you, and we’ll stop.” Viktor’s gaze is soft as he cocks his head to the side. “I really don't think I will, though.”
"This isn't real. You're not real."
"Feels real enough to me," says Viktor, gripping Jayce's thigh. "What do you say? It's your decision."
Jayce searches Viktor's face, chewing on his bottom lip.
“I’ve probably lost my mind, but…” Jayce hesitates, entranced by Viktor’s eyes. “...Yes.” He quickly stops Viktor when he raises his hands to perform the necessary spells. “But first can we, um… Can we, y’know. Warm up?”
Viktor’s brow quirks as he drops his hands. “‘Warm up’? Romance is alive, after all.”
“Don’t start,” says Jayce affectionately as he pulls Viktor into his lap and encircles his arms around his lower back. Viktor is quick to reciprocate, capturing Jayce’s mouth with his own and holding Jayce’s face between his palms, his thumb brushing idly over one of the many scars carved into his skin.
Viktor pulls away to yank his shirt up over his head, throwing it blindly behind him. Then he begins fumbling with the buttons on Jayce’s shirt as Jayce continues to nip and kiss at Viktor’s neck. Finally succeeding in unbuttoning and ripping off Jayce’s shirt, Viktor pushes Jayce back against the sofa, so hard Jayce feels the hard backing against his shoulders, and presses their lips together again. Their mouths part, jaws working as the kiss turns hot and wet.
Viktor’s hand slides down Jayce’s torso to his waistband; but then he pauses, meeting the rigid restraint of Jayce’s trouser bottoms, and sighs.
“More buttons,” he says, annoyed, as he unhooks the button at Jayce’s waistband.
“We need tear-away clothes,” Jayce laments.
“Hm. There was an idea I never had the chance to show you. Little hooks on one piece of fabric, loops on the other, inspired by the burrs that get caught on your clothing in the under—ah!”
Jayce grins, smug, palming the bulge through the crotch of Viktor’s trousers once more as Viktor’s hips buck forward into his touch. Viktor responds by reaching into Jayce’s now undone trousers and taking him in hand; Viktor’s thumb slides and Jayce sees stars.
“Don’t want to—unh—finish,” Jayce manages as Viktor leans over to feel for the bottle of lube they’ve buried between the arm and cushion. “Not yet.”
Viktor eyes him with a smirk as he squirts a glob of lube into his palm. When his hand slides downward again, Jayce moans and arches forward into the touch, eyes half-lidded as he watches Viktor. He’s already imagining Viktor—his partner, his soulmate—slipping down his throat as Viktor touches him, and it feels almost too good.
Viktor leans forward and reclaims Jayce’s mouth as he works to bring Jayce to the edge.
“I’m ready,” grits out Jayce after several minutes, putting his hand atop Viktor’s to stop him. “Let’s do it.”
Viktor meets his eyes, and then his gaze flickers down to Jayce’s middle. Jayce wonders briefly what it must be like for Viktor to know he’s going to soon be inside Jayce’s stomach, and the thought makes him pulse against Viktor’s hand.
“Put your hands together,” Viktor says, cupping his own hands in demonstration. “Like this.”
Jayce obeys, quickly bringing his palms together. Viktor closes his eyes and inhales deeply; when he exhales, runes orbit him. His eyes open, blazing blue like starlight, and he raises his hand, making a complicated series of movements as he channels the arcane.
Then there is a flash of light, and Viktor appears to disappear.
The weight in Jayce’s hands draw his eyes, and his mouth falls open as he stares down in disbelief. Viktor blinks up at him, looking just as disheveled and flushed as he had a few seconds prior, but much smaller, now fitting comfortably in the palm of Jayce’s hand.
“Oh, god,” breathes Jayce.
“Incredible,” says Viktor, peering up at Jayce. “I wasn’t sure it would work.”
Jayce glares. “You said it was simple!”
Viktor shrugs sheepishly.
“Simple, not easy,” says Viktor. His eyes settle on Jayce’s lips, which makes Jayce feel shy. Still, there is nowhere he can go to escape Viktor’s gaze when he is holding him. “How is this? My size? Adequate?”
Jayce swallows nervously.
“Yes, I'm certain you would be, um..." He trails off, anxious. "Are you absolutely sure you want to do this? I—I understand if you’ve changed your mind. I don’t—”
“I want to,” says Viktor adamantly.
“Yeah?”
“Yes.”
Jayce idly shifts a thumb to rub at Viktor’s crotch, and Viktor writhes, clenching his jaw.
“Then do you want to remove those trousers?” asks Jayce with a crooked smile. “I promise you’ll have more fun without them.”
Viktor looks down at himself, seeming to realize for the first time he’s still half-dressed, and then begins to shimmy out of his trousers and underwear. Jayce snags the leg of his trousers and tugs them free, inspecting them curiously. They’re like doll clothes—too strange to be real.
He drops them next to him on the sofa and then looks back down, breath hitching as he sees the very naked, very erect Viktor lying in the palm of his hand. Heat coils low in his belly as he wets his lips.
“Hello, gorgeous,” says Jayce in a low voice, running his thumb across Viktor’s crotch.
“Jayce,” whines Viktor, his face flushed, one hand fisting his own hair as the other clutches at Jayce’s thumb.
“You’re desperate for attention, aren’t you?” purrs Jayce. “Don’t worry, love. I’m generous.”
Jayce lifts Viktor to his mouth and drags his tongue heavily along Viktor’s body from his feet to his face. He hears Viktor groan and repeats the action again, slower, with extra attention paid to the stiffness between his legs.
“Fuck, Jayce,” hisses Viktor, clutching at Jayce’s fingers as he trembles. “M—more.”
Spurred on by Viktor’s moans, Jayce plunges ahead, sliding Viktor’s legs into his mouth. He uses his tongue to flip Viktor over onto his belly as Viktor clings to his fingers. Jayce, cross-eyed, can just glimpse his head and shoulders emerging between his lips.
The tip of Jayce’s tongue flicks between Viktor’s legs, and Viktor’s whole body tenses as he groans with pleasure. Slowly Jayce uses the full length of his tongue to gently massage back-and-forth as Viktor ruts, gasping and cursing as the friction slowly brings him to the edge.
“I’m—I’m close,” stammers Viktor too soon. “I—ah.”
Viktor goes rigid as he comes before he returns to terra firma with a breathy exhale, going limp on Jayce’s tongue. Jayce holds Viktor securely as he swallows around him, clearing his mouth; and Viktor shudders, overly sensitive.
Then Jayce tilts back his head and pushes the exhausted Viktor fully into his mouth with an index finger. The tip of his tongue prods the perimeter of his teeth carefully, making sure Viktor is safely away from danger, before closing his mouth and sealing Viktor away into darkness.
Jayce closes his eyes, focusing solely on the sensations surrounding the little form on his tongue. Jayce can feel when Viktor’s chest expands with a breath; his idle stirring as he adjusts to be more comfortable; the small hand that strokes at Jayce’s tongue.
There is a brilliant blue glow that permeates Jayce’s eyelids; when he opens his eyes, he sees an astral projection of Viktor standing in front of him.
“How are you feeling?” it asks, climbing into Jayce’s lap. Though Jayce can feel his touch, there is no warmth or weight to the copy. “Is there anything that could be better?”
Jayce responds by pulling the projection in by the back of its neck into a kiss, his other hand settling on the copy’s hip. The projection’s lips against his own, coupled with the feeling of Viktor’s body lying on his tongue, makes him feel feral and starved for touch. He wants to be closer.
The projection shifts to mouth at Jayce’s jaw. Jayce cracks open his eyes to see the projection staring back at him, heavy-lidded, as its fingers trace the opposite side of Jayce’s jawline—starlight digits against tan skin.
Then its fingers slide downward, past Jayce’s jaw and adam’s apple and the little hollow at the base of his throat, and it’s immediately clear to Jayce what silent instruction Viktor is communicating.
Jayce is all too happy to oblige.
Jayce tips back his head and gulps. The projection in front of him flickers in and out of existence, looking overcome, as Viktor slides into Jayce’s throat; but then the extension of Viktor is feverishly kissing down his neck, tracking his own descent as he takes Jayce in hand once more.
“Oh, fuck, Viktor,” moans Jayce as the projection’s hand glides and Viktor squirms. “Fuck, fuck, fuck—!”
A few moments later a deliciously heavy weight drops inside Jayce’s belly, and Jayce nearly comes. He regains himself and manages to hold himself together until Viktor begins to massage at him through the stomach wall at the same time that the projection rubs his middle, still kissing at Jayce’s neck.
“I’m c—I’m com—”
Pearly white cum splatters onto Jayce’s belly as Jayce breathes heavily, his toes curling and uncurling as he stretches. The projection blinks out of existence for a few seconds before reappearing with a towel that he uses to gently clean Jayce up. Then he leans down and presses a chaste kiss against Jayce’s forehead before disappearing.
Jayce is left alone in silence as he struggles to calm his galloping heart.
Well, not entirely alone.
“Viktor?” he pants, craning his neck to look down at his own middle where a sheen of sweat has begun to cool. He half expects no response—that he’d blacked out and hallucinated the entire thing—but then Viktor responds, his voice muffled and small, and Jayce feels lightheaded.
“Was it good?”
“God,” breathes Jayce. “Hell, no. It was much better than good. God, you’re—you’re inside me, Viktor.”
“Oh, I hadn’t noticed,” replies Viktor drily.
He feels Viktor shift, and it takes all of his restraint not to curl up into a fetal position and hug his own middle so tight that Viktor would probably be crushed. He settles for rubbing his middle, pressing against his stomach at Viktor as he feels the ticklish movements of his partner within. He feels unbelievably protective, and possessive, and also so very touched—impossibly moved that his Viktor would do something so ridiculous yet so intimate for his pleasure.
Jayce yawns and his eyes water.
“Do you, um.” He sighs, not wanting to ask, but knowing he ought to. “Do you want to come out?”
“Eventually? Yes, of course.”
“I meant now,” says Jayce before his jaw cracks with another wide yawn.
“Oh, you’re ready to sleep now, aren’t you? Typical of you.”
Jayce rolls his eyes.
“I don’t see why I have to come out for you to sleep,” continues Viktor. “Leave me. I’m comfortable here.”
Jayce wonders briefly if he’s already fallen asleep and is dreaming. He pokes his stomach. “You can’t actually want to stay!”
“I’m comfortable,” repeats Viktor insistently. “Why go through the hassle of coming out and cleaning off and having you steal the blankets all night? Your insides are very warm and soft. It’s hardly a sacrifice.”
Jayce shakes his head in disbelief. He can’t shake the feeling that Viktor is only doing this for him, but curling up beneath the blankets in their shared bed with Viktor tucked away—stolen away from the rest of the universe, belonging only to Jayce—sounds heavenly.
“If you’re certain,” says Jayce, standing slowly, feeling the weight inside slide.
When Viktor resumes massaging at Jayce’s insides on the trek into their bedroom, Jayce decides he could found a religion off of the feeling of Viktor’s small hands pressing against his stomach walls.
“Thank you. For—for all of this,” says Jayce as he sits on the edge of their bed and draws his legs up onto the mattress. “I can’t tell you how much it means to me.”
“You do not need to thank me,” says Viktor. “I enjoyed it.”
Jayce lays down slowly, feeling very heavy and sleepy as soon as his head touches the pillow. He rolls over onto his side, ever cognizant of the effects his movements are having on Viktor, and slides an arm under Viktor’s pillow.
“I love you so much,” says Jayce, feeling the emotions welling inside begin to overflow as sleep creeps on him.
“I love you,” says Viktor tenderly.
"Are you sure this is okay? You're okay?"
"I promise," says Viktor. “I can hear you already falling asleep. There's no need to fight it.”
“Hear…?”
“Your heartbeat. And your breathing.”
“Mm. Must be… strange… Biologists would…” Jayce yawns. “Would…”
Several seconds tick past. Jayce’s eyes remain closed, his breathing steady.
“Sweet dreams, Jayce.”
It’s noisy inside Jayce, but not in a way that distracts or overwhelms. His biological processes are a sort of ambient noise that fade into the background, though currently Viktor is actively listening for them. He can hear the steady heartbeat high above him thumping slower now, Jayce’s lungs inflating with relaxed and regular breaths. It’s peaceful to be so attuned to Jayce’s body and the thousands of complex functions keeping him alive.
Viktor’s head lolls to lay against the pillowy soft stomach wall as he closes his eyes. A melancholic weight resettles on his chest in the absence of Jayce’s company, and Viktor is afraid to sleep and face the judgment of those he’s wronged in his dreams. But every time he begins to spiral, one of Jayce’s murmurs or sighs or snores brings him back to reality—grounding him, reminding him who he’s inside.
Jayce has always been a source of comfort to Viktor. He can’t imagine living this life alone, much less without Jayce, of all people. He doesn’t feel he deserves such a blessing, but he’s thankful all the same.
Viktor is nearly asleep when Jayce rolls over.
Viktor crumples into the opposite wall with a grunt. He collects himself and wipes slime from his face, pushing his sodden hair back out of his eyes.
“Jayce,” he complains. “Did you forget me?”
“Mmn. I’ll finish the schematics in the morning,” says Jayce groggily.
Viktor chuckles to himself, patting a wall affectionately. He wonders what Jayce is dreaming about: perhaps an assignment from when he was in the Academy? Some request from a Councillor that he’d been putting off for weeks?
Viktor’s dreams about his past life are rarely so mundane, so as Viktor closes his eyes again, he focuses on the sounds of Jayce’s body, imagining him lying in their bed, beneath their sheets. When painful memories threaten to overwhelm him, he remembers Jayce’s hazel eyes studying Viktor as Jayce draws him curled up with a book; or peaking out from under a mop of hair as Viktor hesitantly snips with the shears; or looking into Viktor’s own, full of love and contentment and understanding, as they faced the unknown.
When Viktor finally falls asleep, he dreams of lying on the sofa, resting his head on Jayce’s stomach as Jayce drinks a cup of coffee and watches through the window as the sun rises over the lake.
It’s a good dream; it’s a good life.