[Mature] Just as It Was

[Tom Cooke]

A Quiet Back Street • Cat's Paw

Evening on the 27th of Yaris, 2716

I
t was going to be a Low Tide sort of evening. That he knew, oes, sure as he knew the way the sky was turning and the way the wind carried its warm dry salt-sea smell through the street. That he knew, sure as he knew where his feet took him through the streets of Voedale, round the alleys where he tossed his tallies to the familiar bowls of familiar beggars.

His heart was full up with it, sloshing over. His head was full of nothing but the sun he’d soaked in, the taste of Hullwen lingering on his tongue; he’d still the faint buzz of it glowing in his veins, making his step buoyant and light.

So he crossed Grasmere and Mary, bowed his shoulders and raised his hat to the tumbles smoking outside Oake’s, who laughed and grinned their gap-toothed grins at him. He passed near the Dogyard, where a laoso-faced tsat cried hoarse-voiced at the crowds that were thickening in the early evening like milk brought to boil; he passed the cages where dogs snapped at the bars, flashing the whites of their eyes at him. He shouted up at the lads working at the almshouse roof, bare backs red and slick with sweat, and they shouted back to him.

The sky’d been brilliant, bright blue all day; that was how he knew what it would look like when the night came. It’d been so for the past week, hot as hell, but the nights had been cool. He knew the way the sky turned pink and red at the horizon, turning the trees and the rooftops to silhouettes, deepening to a Yaris night sky so dark it was almost purple. Most nights he’d had off, this week, and spent in fine company.

Last night’s qalqa he wore in the ache of his muscles and the bruises that purpled along one side of his jaw. He wore it too in the heaviness of his wallet; such was the way as one thing paid for another.

It was the few nights before he wore in the words he mouthed, whenever he could – as if his mung natt tongue’d lose it, if he didn’t keep it close – sana’hulali, he’d repeat, sana’hulali, hama’d helped him say, for all hama couldn’t remember much of Mugroba, for all he said it more clumsily than he’d’ve liked. Imbala, hama could not help him with; imbala, and even hama’s brow knit, and their words wandered elsewhere.

Funny, such things as he thought when he thought of this kov.

There’d been a new scar, this time; Aremu’d found it the first night he’d come to him, still fresh, for all it’d healed enough for the bandages to come off. He hadn’t known how to name the feeling he got when those long, callused fingers traced across it, slanting from underneath his chin across his throat. The imbala’d had more of them, too, some fresh enough to sting. Was the way of their qalqa – they were both tender in new places, tougher in others. The finding of them’d been half the fun, and the pain, and the laughter, too.

But still he’d caught sight of his lopsided, bruised face in a dark window in Voedale, and he’d wondered; even a night apart, and he’d wondered.

A night ago, a long dark walk and a man’s fist in his face ago, he’d told him – they’d lain together, with those fingers tracing Circle knew what engineers’ patterns across his chest, and he’d told him: after your qalqa’s done, and mine, meet me at the corner of Gristwill and Peters, down by what’s left of the old Barley-Fleet warehouses; I’ve somethin’ to show you, dove.

And so now he waited, his hat pulled down over his face, his hair pulled back up off his sweating neck. Was a quiet narrow street lined with derelict warehouses, near empty, with the leering broken-windows bulk of them throwing their shadows over the cracked stones. Wasn’t too far a walk from the King’s shipyard in the Paw, but he’d not go so far as to find the imbala himself; he’d not go so far.

The sky was turning peach – a narrow sliver of it he could see between the tall shadowy walls, cloudless and clear. Close enough to the docks he could hear, a few streets down, muffled sounds of men crying and the clanging of bells.

He waited, as the sky started to turn.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Evening, 27 Yaris, 2716
The Corner of Gristwill and Peters, Cat's Paw

Aremu glanced up at the sky, and the colors which were slowly beginning to run across it.

“Maybe,” Niccolette suggested delicately, fanning herself with something that looked to Aremu like cloth, though it seemed to hold its shape well, “the problem is that he cannot count.” She glanced across the yard, eyes narrowing at the bulky human and the pouch in his hand. “In which case, we will be here all night.”

Uzoji chuckled. “Just wait a little more, my shores and tide,” he said, quietly. He leaned against the wall, comfortable and easy, his hands in his pockets. There was nothing in him that was tense, not in his voice nor his posture.

Aremu shifted, crossing his arms over his chest. It didn't help to think about it, he reminded himself. He would need all his focus, if there were a problem.

Niccolette was the only one of them sitting, on a barrel slightly too high for it to be comfortable. One booted heel rested lightly against the bottom of it; the toes of her other foot were propped against a nearby crate. The Bastian snapped the fan shut, and pursed her lips. “Five minutes more,” she announced, “and then?” She raised her eyebrows at Uzoji.

Uzoji grinned at her. “Is our company so dull to you, beloved?”

Niccolette pouted; she glanced away once more. “It is very hot,” The Bastian said, the faintest hint of a sulk in her voice. “I think it disrespectful of him to keep us waiting so long.”

Aremu knew better than to let either of them see him look up once more. The pad of a bandage against the back of his hand tickled, and he shifted to scratch at it.

Niccolette’s fan shot out, and she rapped him lightly on the knuckles. “Do not be stupid,” she said, scornful. “It is wrapped for a reason. You wish to lose your hand?” She raised her eyebrows at him.

“It’s just a scratch,” Aremu objected.

Niccolette shrugged once more. “Fine. You wish for me to clean it?”

Aremu frowned, and crossed his arms over his chest once more.

Niccolette, smirking faintly, turned back towards the other side of the yard. There were two of them, now, Aremu noticed. After a moment, the man closed his fist over the pouch, and set off towards them.

Uzoji was already coming forward, then, smiling. Aremu rose, too, following just at his elbow, sharply aware of the cool metal of the knife at his back. Niccolette held behind, watching, toes tapping softly against the side of the barrel.

“Marks,” Uzoji said with a smile. “Is everything in order?”

“Oes, captain,” Marks said; he wasn’t smiling, but he wasn’t tense, either, Aremu thought, watching the lines of him. He glanced over his shoulder, and then held the bag out.

Uzoji took it, opening the top; he studied the inside of the bag, closed it, and tucked it in his pocket. “It is a blessing to do business with an honest man,” Uzoji said, smiling. “We’ll be sure to let you know if the King has any questions.”

“No need fer that,” Marks inclined his head. “Right proper it is.”

“Good,” Uzoji said. He smiled a little wider.

Marks glanced back behind them. Aremu did not have to look to know how Niccolette would be watching. He inclined his head again; he took a few steps back, and then turned and walked away.

Uzoji turned, too; Aremu followed, close behind once more, his hands in his pocket.

Niccolette extended her hands. Uzoji grinned, and took her waist instead; she laughed, half a shriek, as he lifted her down from the barrel.

“Let us go back to Quarter Fords,” Niccolette said. “It smells here.” She began to make her way out of the yard, towards the rest of Cat’s Paw.

Aremu shifted. “I’ll meet you later,” he said, quietly. He was conscious, still, of the bright peach color spilling across the sky.

Uzoji glanced over his shoulder. Aremu could have sworn his face was blank, but the other man grinned, slowly, something glinting in his eyes. Aremu frowned at him. “Of course,” he said, casually.

“What?” Niccolette glanced over at Aremu, and then to Uzoji. Her forehead pinched, delicately, in a little frown.

“Shall I take you out to dinner, beloved?” Uzoji murmured. “We’ll go home and change,” he leaned down to her ear.

Niccolette paused; her eyebrows lifted, and then she grinned, an entirely different sort of grin. “I suppose,” she said, and rapped his hand lightly with her fan.

Aremu held in the shadows; he didn’t turn away so much as stop, waiting for a few moments. Once Niccolette and Uzoji were out of sight – once he was out of the tangle of their fields, he turned himself, and took off at a half-run.

He’d done his scouting that morning, hoping everything’d go to plan. He knew better than to count on it. Gristwill and Peters, Tom had called It, and the Barley-Fleet warehouses. He ducked onto busier streets, made his way around corners, all the suppressed adrenaline of the hours of waiting thrumming through his veins. They did not quite have street names, here, not in this part of the Rose, but in earlier hours he’d managed to find where Tom would be waiting.

Was waiting, now, Aremu thought, or at least he hoped. There was a part of him that thought he’d get there to find the corner empty, that wasn’t sure – something to show you, dove, Tom had promised him, and he couldn’t have said why it made him shiver. He was, Aremu thought grimly, a fool, and he didn’t slow his stride, not until just before he turned the last corner.

Aremu was damp with sweat at his underarms and down his back; the light colored linen was Mugrobi-made, and didn’t stick, but he could feel the trail of sweat down his back. He hesitated, then, wondering if – but his feet didn’t stop, and he knew it was too late, now, to turn back.

He’d seen Tom the moment he came onto Gristwill – or Peters, because he wasn’t quite sure which was which. There was no mistaking the shape of him from a distance, not anymore, not even with a heavy hat shading his face. Aremu slowed his steps, consciously, walking silently over the roughened cobblestones, and found he was smiling, without quite meaning to.

“Tom,” Aremu said, quietly; he was close enough that he knew Tom knew he was there, that he knew Tom must know he was there. He grinned, a little light-headed at the heady rush of it, and in the shadow of the building, the shadow between them, reached out to touch the back of the other man’s hand with just the barest tips of his fingers.

[Tom Cooke]

A Quiet Back Street • Cat's Paw

Evening on the 27th of Yaris, 2716

H
e saw him in the corner of his eye before he looked, and he didn’t look – not rightaway – not ‘til the tips of the kov’s shoes touched the blurry edges of his shadow. He watched the slim dark shape move closer in the corner of his eye, his shirt a flash of pale, watched him come fast and then slow, cat-quiet as he ever was. Even so he could see the look on his face, or thought he could; he thought he saw that hint of a smile, that was becoming so familiar.

He kept looking away, across and up at the shadowy, dusty window-pane opposite. Maybe it was that feeling, creeping up through him like the prickling before lightning. Maybe he didn’t want to give into it; maybe he wasn’t sure he should, for all this was the moment he’d been waiting for half the day. Been waiting for before that, when he knew he shouldn’t’ve – through that long, laoso walk across the docks – through the moment a natt’s knuckles connected with his jaw, through the moment a riff flashed in the dark and he wasn’t sure there’d be anybody to wait.

Maybe it was ‘cause he was a mung, and he didn’t know what he’d do if he looked over and he saw that smile. He kept his hat pulled down over his head, in spite of the shade; he kept his arms crossed, frowned deep in his beard and sucked at his tooth. Until –

Until he’d’ve felt it, he was sure, the woobly, if it’d been.

Tom, he said, in that soft lilting accent. Like a flooding mung he turned his head and looked; the imbala was grinning in that way he always did, at first. Tom’s lip twitched and his grim face broke. He half-expected Aremu to hang back, but he reached out instead, and the feather-light brush of fingers on the back of his hand prickled all up and down him.

Then he was grinning. He took the hand, first, with its new bandage; he ran his thumb over his long fingers, over the knuckles, over the edges of the gauze. He couldn’t think what to say.

He only hesitated a half-second. If it crossed his face, it was only a flicker. He couldn’t’ve said what it was, or why. Just the old fear, he thought, for all he knew it was more than that. He only looked up and down the street once, though he already knew it was clear.

His grin’d turned into something else when he tugged the imbala closer; he was up against the wall, between the worn old brick and Aremu’s slim frame, one hand on his back where the linen was damp with sweat. Without a word he bent in to kiss him; his lips lingered on the imbala’s – he breathed in the smell of him, the warmth of his breath – and then he kissed him again. A strand of hair slid out of his bun, tickling his cheek.

When he drew away, he was breathing heavy. Looking into his face again, he felt a strange sort of – he didn’t know what – suddenly his grin turned sheepish, too.

“S–” Slipped out before he was ready; he fumbled. “Sana’ – hulali,” he pronounced, careful-like, knowing he sounded a mung Rose natt no matter what. He searched Aremu’s face. He wasn’t sure what his own face was doing; he reached up to scratch the back of his neck, then realized he’d forgot to take off his godsdamn hat. He took it off, tucking it under his arm.

He knew better than to ask after his qalqa. You didn’t ask such things of one of the King’s men, not unless you were yaching the fire; he’d walked along the line with the other man, oes, but you knew never to step over it.

“Far’ye, Aremu?” he asked instead, the Tek more at ease on his tongue than the Mugrobi. Easing back against the brick again, he ran the backs of his fingers along his cheekbone, raising one dark eyebrow.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Evening, 27 Yaris, 2716
The Corner of Gristwill and Peters, Cat's Paw

Tom turned, and looked at him, a grim frown in the shadow of his beard. For a moment – not a second, less than even a second - Aremu thought that he was seeing something inside, something he wasn’t meant to see, something hidden up until now.

Tom’s broad face broke into a grin, then, and Aremu felt it reflected back, and it banished the strangeness, put it aside. Thick, scarred fingers traced over the outside edges of his bandage, the knuckles more swollen and bruised than they’d been two nights ago.

In the silence many words came to him, and all of them choked in his throat. Tom pulled him closer then, and it all melted away, and a low groan rumbled in Aremu’s throat when they came apart. He was grinning too, thinking - his hand was flat on Tom’s chest, fingers digging in ever so slightly.

Sana’hulali, Tom said, lingering on every letter. There was something on his face Aremu didn’t quite know how to name; he didn’t know if he could name it, or what the naming would mean. Tom’s fingers lingered on his cheekbones.

Far’ye, he said, and Aremu knew what it meant, or close enough, and then Aremu, broadening the r, the vowels distinctively Anaxi, the m firm.

I like the way you say it, Aremu wanted to say. I like it on your lips, and sana’hulali too. He couldn’t; he ran his tongue over his lips.

His fingers crept up, traced the edges of the knot of a bruise on Tom’s jaw, steered clear of the swelling and sunk, soft, into the thickness of the other man’s beard. I like the way you say it, Aremu tried to say, with the careful edges of his touch.

And then, too, with the press of his lips; he came up on his tiptoes, the line of him pressed against Tom. He was aware, keenly aware in every nerve of the street around them, bare and exposed. His lips traced a path down the injured side of Tom’s jaw, tickled by his beard, and he pressed Tom back, just a little more, into the firm wall of the building.

Tom let him - he’d have to, and Aremu knew better than to pretend otherwise. Aremu’s fingers knotted a fist in the edge of his shirt. He held on, breathless, swallowing another groan, and pulled back slowly, smiling still.

“Good,” Aremu said, softly. It was true, or true now; all the tension of the last hours melted away, the ache in his hand, too. Not the prickling awareness of the street; that was not gone, not quite, and he pulled back from Tom, ever so slightly, glancing back over his shoulder, and then he looked back, and found he was smiling, a little, once more.

“And you?” Aremu frowned. He swallowed, and shifted, just a little; his hand came down, the injured fingers tangling once more with Tom’s, because if he wasn’t sure what was in his gaze or the set of his jaw, he knew the feeling that raced through him at Tom’s touch.

“Far’ye?” Aremu asked, carefully. There was a faint little smile on his lips, for just a moment, before the watchful look in his eyes swallowed it up. It didn’t sound on his lips as it had on Tom’s, not quite. He felt half-embarrassed for trying, maybe more than half.

He didn’t ask more than that. He knew better than to ask where the bruise had come from, or what had happened to the man that gave it to him, just as Tom knew not to ask about the cut on his hand. I thought of you, Aremu didn’t say either; I thought of this. I‘ve been looking forward to it, since; he didn’t say that either. Far’ye, he’d said instead, and he wondered if Tom could see straight through him, if there was pale sunset streaming through his skin.

[Tom Cooke]

A Quiet Back Street • Cat's Paw

Evening on the 27th of Yaris, 2716

H
or a second they was just looking at each other, Aremu’s hand on his chest, fingers spread out. He kept looking into the imbala’s eyes, tingling conscious of his fingertips digging slightly into his chest, waiting. There was a grin on the imbala’s face, easy-like – some of all that not-knowing left back wherever he’d come from, back past that soft groan in the back of his throat that’d just made him moonier for it. But Aremu wasn’t saying nothing, still, and Tom couldn’t help the way the grin on his face slanted and slipped when he tried to hold it there.

The imbala licked his lips, and Tom blinked and held himself back from kissing him again. Would’ve been easier than this, maybe. Maybe he’d gone and fucked it up saying something, ‘cause now his face felt all stiff, his tongue and his lips heavy with his clumsy Mugrobi.

That wasn’t what Aremu wanted him for; that’d never been what Aremu wanted him for. They talked, oes. Even now, hanging fair still and mung like a lass that’s been kissed for the first time, he found himself thinking of it: not just of nights full of hands and lips and heavy breath, of movement that didn’t need or want words, but of quiet voices in the dark, of watchful eyes, of watching his face careful-like to see what he thought of whatever he’d said.

They talked more than just about anybody else that’d ever – but it wasn’t the talking, he thought, Aremu wanted, in the end. Tom Cooke’d never been that kind of man, even if Aremu was.

One long-fingered hand came up to his cheek, where the purpling mottled bruise just peeked over his beard; his fingertips traced round it, just at the edges of the ache, brushed through the hair. Tom was smiling, not sure if he ought to.

Then suddenly Aremu rose up to meet him, the long line of him pressed against him; Tom found his back against the cool brick. When he felt Aremu’s lips in his beard, tingling pleasant-like and stinging both over top of the bruise, he grunted in his throat.

His hat’d slipped out from under his arm, forgotten on the stones by his boots; he managed to forget the whole street. He found Aremu’s hand knotted in his shirt. It was too godsdamn hot anyway – why not just take the thing off –

When the imbala drew away, he was barely conscious of what he’d said; he was grinning. The awareness of the street around them didn’t make it any less benny. Good, Aremu said, and he didn’t ask. He’d opened his mouth to reply when the imbala spoke again.

He almost didn’t recognize the phrase, for all it sounded so different. He burbled over the harder sounds like a brook, lilted the vowels. There was a tiny smile twitching at the edge of those lips, and then that look again.

Tom grinned, and grinned broader, breath catching in his chest. He bent to kiss his scalp. “Fair benny,” he shot back, stroking the hand in his with his thumb. “Now,” he added, grin softening, studying Aremu’s watchful eyes.

His breath was still fast; his heart was still thumping, and all of him was ready. But – olio as the idea was, he had to admit, looking about them at the street still well-lit in the early evening, that’d be a bit much even for him.

Without letting go of the imbala’s hand, he bent to pick up his hat.

There was more he could’ve said. I been waiting all day, wanting to see you – he didn’t know. Godsdamn, he didn’t know nothing. You going to be dockside much longer? You knew better than to ask that, too, in his qalqa.

Instead, he gestured with his hat, where the street started to curve down. “You ever been on this side of the Cat’s Paw?” he asked, clearing his throat, voice still rough and a pina breathless. He was grinning.

He started moving, and he wouldn’t let go of Aremu’s hand ‘til the imbala let go of his, still pleased at how bold it felt.

“I got some folk I’d like you to meet,” he offered, then – paused, thinking of the set of his shoulders at the bar, thinking of the way he walked the streets to the airship last month. “If you want to meet ‘em,” he added.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Evening, 27 Yaris, 2716
The Corner of Gristwill and Peters, Cat's Paw

Tom had made a noise that echoed through him like the thrum of an engine; Aremu was deeply conscious of the press of the other man. It was easier, he thought, when he didn’t speak, sometimes. There was no space for truth or lies in silence. There was no need to worry about what Tom thought, or didn’t think, what he knew or didn’t know; there was no need to wonder whether a truth had turned to a lie in his mouth, by lack of context.

He wanted to ask, sometimes. What do you think of me? What do you think I am? What do you know? He tried to imagine the answer; he tried to imagine what he’d have to say, if Tom…

There was something blissfully easy in this not-quite silence. He understood the groan that rippled from Tom’s lips; he understood the pounding of the other man’s heart against his chest, through layers of shirt that seemed suddenly too many. He understood what Tom wanted, pressed between them, and he didn’t need it to be more complicated than that.

But Aremu had pulled back, the awareness of the street nudging at the edge of his mind, something in the breathless kisses a reminder of it, too, an odd tingling excitement. Tom didn’t let go of his hand; his thumb was stroking, softly, over the skin at the edges of the bandage, finding the scars and rough patches, the places where his veins traced the skin. He relaxed, letting go of something he'd clenched very tight, when the grin spread across Tom's face, however delayed.

Aremu followed the gesture of Tom’s hat; he glanced up at the other man, a soft smile still playing around his lips. He felt drunk on the taste of Tom, on the whiskey on his breath, on the warm press of his body and the soft brush of hair against his cheek. “No,” Aremu said, shaking his head. “I don’t think so.”

Something to show you, Tom had said.

The sunset, Aremu had thought; a view of the Mahogany, some place tucked amidst the boards and broken down buildings where one could sit, and watch the wharf. He’d liked the thought of it, when he’d tried to imagine it. If he was honest with himself, and he had been, although he didn’t wish to be, it was the idea that Tom wanted him to see it, that Tom had – thought of him, thought of them, although he knew better than to let himself believe it too well.

Folk, Tom said. Aremu’s hand was still tucked in his; he didn’t let go, although his brow furrowed. Aremu glanced up the street, although he didn’t need to look to know it was empty still. He glanced back at Tom; he wasn’t quite sure what to say. If you want to, Tom said, and Aremu didn’t know what to make of it.

He’d met Jaeli. Tom had made Jaeli’s place in his life clear, very early, and Aremu didn’t mind. He hadn’t been sure, when he’d met the man, what – he wasn’t sure, still, quite where he fit, however comfortable it had been in the trying. Jaeli was Mugrobi, at least, for all that he was a wick. They had their own ideas, Aremu knew, about what he was, but that was a more familiar sort of uncertainty.

Folk. Aremu ran his tongue over his lips; he was frowning, still, he knew. Why? That was what he really wanted to ask. Why would you want – with me – he swallowed through a dry throat, the excitement he’d felt wilting somewhat in the heat. Tom was looking at him, just looking, his face inscrutable in the dark set of his beard.

Well, Aremu thought, squarely, if this hurt, he had only himself to blame. He knew better; he’d known better. He could take a bit of pain. He knew that about himself.

“All right,” Aremu said, quietly. His fingers were still tangled in Tom’s; he squeezed, softly, and met the other man’s gaze again. He wasn’t sure what he was searching for, but he found himself smiling. He knew better than to tense before a blow; he relaxed, instead, slowly, because flinching before it came down never helped.

Slowly, unsure which of them he was reassuring, he lifted their hands; he bent, and brushed his lips over Tom's battered, swollen knuckles.

[Tom Cooke]

Overlooking the Flooded Streets • Cat's Paw

Evening on the 27th of Yaris, 2716

W
hen was it he should’ve thought? Before, maybe, before – he didn’t know, he reckoned. He’d had Ipadi and Arlo in mind the night before last, and he’d not given it a second thought; he’d thought, well – he hadn’t thought at all. The smile stayed on his face, even as he studied Aremu’s furrowed brow, watched his eyes move someplace else.

He paused in his step. Had he thought at all? He knew someplace in him he should’ve; there was shit to think about. There hadn’t been night before last, in a cloud of smoke, drunk on Low Tide and Aremu’s touch. He’d just got the idea, and told him about it, and thought he’d sort out the rest of the thinking later. Then, the night after, he’d been thoughtless with pain and seeing red – just the thought of seeing Aremu again’d been enough, and he’d reckoned he’d sort out the rest later.

Then he’d got up and had a couple shots for the pain, and then he’d gone to the Quince to have a drink and sort his thoughts out, but he’d had more than one drink, and he’d got to talking with the lads, and somewhere it’d all blurred itself into the honeyed glow of seeing the imbala again – like he’d sort it out when it happened, like he’d…

Well, so fucking what? He was sorting it out now.

Maybe it was the way of his lips when they was just starting to smile, the way they curled up at the edges; he’d recognize them anywhere. Even if it didn’t touch those watchful eyes all the way. Or maybe it was how, when he raised Tom’s hand to them, every thought went straight out of his head.

He felt the tickle of warm breath on his skin. Brushing over scuffs and scratches still-healing, like these was the knuckles of some kind of gentleman – anybody but a tallyboy.

He felt a jolt of something made him think maybe this street’d do after all. Was a second before he could pull his thoughts back together. He took a deep breath to smooth out all that wanting, to put off that persistent feeling almost like a pain.

He grinned instead, thinking maybe doing his thinking later was a good idea after all. Still wasn’t sure what he meant by all right, but – he didn’t think those lips was lying. He just nodded, and still hand-in-hand, buzzing with the touch, took Aremu down this familiar street and into familiar others.

Wasn’t long from Gristwill he found it, a doorway just tucked into a short, damp alleyway.

The door was hanging off its hinges on the inside; except for a boarded-up door, it was just a stairwell leading up a few floors, cramped and creaky. It was dark, but for a gap in the ceiling, through which a pina manna deepening gold sunlight streamed down. The air was full of sparks of drifting motes.

“In here,” Tom said, quiet-like; if Aremu’d follow him, he’d lead him in, stopping on the second step. “This ain’t the only way,” he said, reaching in his pocket for a cigarette; “this ain’t even the fastest” – he lit it, a spark of bright illuminating both their faces in the dark – “but I, uh… I wanted t’ show you this, too, hey?”

He’d offer the imbala a spur, too; if he took it, he’d light it, leaning close enough to catch the smell of him again – sweat, mingling with the tang of smoke in the warm, dark air. He’d settled his hat back on his head, though his bun’d half come loose from where he’d leaned his head on the brick.

Something sheepish about his grin, as he drew away – something uncertain, too. As he started up again, already missing Aremu’s touch, he sucked at a tooth. The imbala hadn’t asked, after all – maybe he didn’t – he didn’t know if he ought to…

“They’re tekaa,” he said anyway, on the first flight, looking back; it was too dark to read his expression. He took a drag and kept on up, past more peeling wallpaper, past chittering racing shadows and more boarded-up doors. “Kint moves round, with the floodin’ an’ the brigk – they’re Mugrobi bootleggers. Best eza this side of the Tincta Basta, I’d bet a handful of birds. An’ – more, if you know what to ask for.”

Wasn’t far, just a few flights. Another doorless doorway gave out on a makeshift wooden walkway.

Water rushed a ways below, a thin canal sandwiched between two flooded tenements, the sky darkening overhead. Above, the Yaris breeze tossed the remnants of laundry-lines; below and at eye-level, all along the canal, wooden walkways and rickety stairs and makeshift metal bridges criss-crossed, crawling down to where this waterway met another.

There were walkways below them, stretching all the way down to the lapping water, but this was the highest.

He looked at the imbala as he emerged, dark eyes glittering. He tilted his head, taking a drag on his spur. “Some years,” he said, gesturing, “the water’s got all the way up here. Was a flood in oh-five, when I was a lad, an’ the Mahogany didn’t fall back for a few maw.” He took his hat off. “Ever since, ain’t many folk as come here.”

He reached for his hand again. “You said you liked high places,” he added, grinning now. He hadn’t looked down; the height was only one of the flutterings in his belly.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Evening, 27 Yaris, 2716
The Corner of Gristwill and Peters, Cat's Paw

The match flared in the dark, glowing, glinting off the coarse hairs of Tom’s beard and the softer strands of the lock that had tumbled, down, by his cheek. Aremu took the cigarette, and Tom came almost close enough to kiss, lighting it, close enough that Aremu could smell him – earthy sweat and sour whiskey, and perhaps it shouldn’t have sent a bolt through him, but it did. He breathed in the tobacco, inhaling it in. He didn’t smoke, much, really, but he’d thought it might settle his nerves.

Folk, Aremu kept thinking. Folk. He tried to picture them; his imagination conjured up other brothers he’d known, worked with, flown with. He kept out of their way, mostly, on the Eqe Aqawe. Shipside, no one doubted Uzoji’s authority, or if they did they kept it to themselves. That extended, too, to him, stretched under his feet and held, steady, so he knew where to stand. He knew well enough what most of them made of him on the ground, what he’d’ve thought Tom, too, would make of him.

The stairs creaked beneath them. Aremu knew the balance of them; he knew the sway wasn’t enough to topple them over, however it might feel.

I like eza, well enough, Aremu thought to say, but he couldn’t quite make the words come out. Tekaa, Tom said, and then Mugrobi, and he felt something which was like a fist in his chest loosen. He wasn’t sure he understood, still. Why? He wanted to ask, looking up at the broad shape of Tom’s back in the dark, whatever faint light crept in gleaming in his hair.

They came out above onto a wooden walkway, nailed into place and secure enough; Aremu knew by looking that it’d take their weight together, though he wouldn’t have tested it jumping up and down. Tom was watching him as he came out into the slanting sunset light. Aremu took another drag on his cigarette, too, gray smoke pooling around them both.

Aremu looked down, not holding onto what railing as there was, admiring the gleaming traces of the water below. He grinned, looking back up at Tom. You don’t, Aremu wanted to say. I know you don’t – I saw you, on the deck, although you never said anything before. Tom’s fingers were tangled in his again. I wanted to show you, Tom had said, of this too.

Aremu looked down once more, at the thin silver lines of the river beneath, glowing, streaming out into the Mahogany. Between them, like a puzzle, walkways stretched between buildings, all different angles and heights. He could see, he thought, still smiling, how to climb them. It’d been like a game, when he was younger, running and leaping between. That knowledge served him well, since, even if it was rarely a game anymore.

“I do,” Aremu said, softly. “I like this one,” he turned more towards Tom, one hand tangled in his, thumb sliding slowly over the patches of rough skin, the soft hair on the back of it, the veins and the strong, slender bones that ran from the knuckles to the wrist.

“I like,” Aremu smiled; he came a little closer, “seeing how it all fits together,” he said, quietly. He looked down at Tom’s hand in his; he tucked the cigarette in the corner of his mouth, and turned the hand over. He traced his fingertips over the bones and veins, followed the lines of them, skirting the edge of bruises and cuts, but following the scars, too.

“Thank you,” Aremu said, very softly, so softly he wasn’t sure he’d gotten it out around the cigarette. His gaze was still on Tom’s hand; he held on, lifting his gaze once more, looking up at the other man’s face. In the sunset light he could see the purpling of the bruise all the more clearly, the rough-neat lines of his beard, the slopes of the face beneath, the crookedness of Tom’s nose. All of it came together; for a moment Aremu almost thought he could make sense of it. He was smiling, still; he let go with one hand, long enough to ash the cigarette away, and tasted tobacco-flavored lips.

[Tom Cooke]

Overlooking the Flooded Streets • Cat's Paw

Evening on the 27th of Yaris, 2716

C
ouldn’t look down, ‘course. He’d have to, eventually – leastways, a pina manna, climbing down some of the stairs – but he couldn’t now.

He’d eyes only for Aremu’s face, anyway. The imbala’d looked up at him, first; he’d felt his eyes on him through the tangle of loose dark hair at his cheek, though he’d been unable to look over and meet them, for some reason he couldn’t guess. Something like embarrassment, something like pleasure, something like pride. He’d kept his head up, watching the lines sway above, watching the dark shapes of birds dart across the pink-orange sky, ‘til the imbala’d looked away.

Now, he watched him, the way the light caught and limned his profile, wrote deep shadows underneath his cheekbones. His dark eyes moved from place to place, criss-cross the canal like the bridges and the stairs, climbing up and down some path Tom couldn’t guess.

Was it the twitch of a smile at the edges of his lips? He couldn’t tell; his look was thoughtful, watching in that way it always was, but not – he thought – worried. He wasn’t sure when it’d gone, or why, but the furrow’d left his brow. He remembered seeing him crouched in the gloom at the refinery, studying the machines, and he didn’t think this look was too different from that one. Like something was working behind those eyes.

Never more’d he looked the voo, neither; leastways, Tom always thought so, whenever he noticed the fine, strong lines of his cheekbones, the set of his slim frame, and expected – for a second – to feel something woobly about him, instead of nothing. The thought made him feel funny. He’d almost’ve shivered with it, if Aremu hadn’t looked up at him; for a half-second, he wondered if Aremu could see his thoughts.

But then he felt his thumb trace across his hand, and a tug went down through him as the imbala took a step closer. The smell of those cheap spurs was strong.

“Oes,” he murmured, looking away, looking out – he almost looked down, as if he wanted to try and see it, too, for all he knew he wouldn’t – but his eyes caught on the whirl of all that below them, and moved back to the imbala.

He’d taken his hand in both of his. He looked every bit the mechanic now, too, the spur at the corner of his mouth.

What d’you see in it? he wondered, feeling callused fingertips trace the back of his hand. He didn’t look away from Aremu’s face, so he couldn’t tell which scars he might be following, old or new, which veins. Vespe’s blessing, kov, trying to figure out how I fit together, he thought, but it felt bitter and coarse.

Thank you, he thought Aremu might’ve said, though the wind just about plucked it up and carried it away. It touched him someplace he hadn’t meant to leave open; he couldn’t’ve said why. “Never been able to,” he said, still without meaning to; he knew this man didn’t want him for his words, but he couldn’t seem to help it, not after that soft, thank you. “See the way it fits – start to look down, an’ all I see’s everythin’ at once, an’ I…”

The imbala looked up when he ashed. Tom took that hand in both of his this time, careful with his own spur between two fingers, came closer – bent to kiss him again, tasting the spur and salty Yaris sweat and more. His lips lingered, reluctant to leave.

When he draw back, looking into Aremu’s face, he felt funny – exposed sort of funny, though there was nothing of him underneath his clothes Aremu hadn’t seen. Funnier, it was the same kind of prickling heights gave him. He eased back; he looked out over the walkways at eye-level again, letting his hair fall between him and the imbala again.

“What d’you think of how this place fits together?” he asked, starting along the creaky walk, careful in spite of his heavy step. “Been the qalqa of so many hands, dove – floods comin’ an’ wreckin’ shit, shit bein’ built over it again – can’t see where it starts or finishes, an’ all that’s holdin’ it together’s some bolts an’ rotted wood.”

[Aremu Ediwo]

Evening, 27 Yaris, 2716
High Above the Streets, Cat's Paw

A curtain of thick dark hair, tangled, fell between them. For all Aremu liked Tom’s hair – liked the feeling of it against his fingers, lovely and always softer than he expected, although he thought he was starting to remember it. He thought he could picture it, in the way of things he’d felt – the prickly skin of a coconut, the smooth metal and familiar grooves of his wrench, a cracked valve, and now, too, Tom’s hair, silky around the tangles. Aremu found himself half reaching up to brush it away.

Tom shifted away before he could, and went on. Aremu wasn’t sure if he was finding the line he’d started before, the one he’d interrupted with the brush of his lips. He hadn’t meant, he wanted to say, to interrupt. He didn’t know if Tom would have filled in the silence with more words, or if he’d left it blank, still. Aremu looked down, not focusing, now, but trying to see it at all once.

But he’d known for a long time that whatever it was that made some men afraid of heights, he didn’t have. It was a lack he was glad of, and he was scarcely alone in it. He knew himself; he knew what he could climb, and where he could balance, and if he had a few scars, here or there, leftover from childhood or teenaged experiments which had sought confirmation, the knowledge lay deep inside him, now, along his bones, in his muscles and the prickling of his skin.

“Like any plan, I think, made real,” Aremu said, thoughtful, tasting Tom’s words, too, tobacco-sweet. He followed Tom along the wood, leaving space between them, aware of the places where the boards overlapped. There was more than enough space for him, here, though he’d always found it easier barefoot; even sandals seemed to get in the way, and boots were worse still.

Dove, he thought; he tasted that, too.

He remembered trying to show Tom in the refinery – only months ago, but when he’d been a stranger, a tall, strangely handsome man with a dream of a garden who’d kept his distance – the line of the piping, the way the machines came together, and Tom following the line of his gestures, though with nothing like understanding. He’d felt foolish, then, for wanting to share it.

He knew better now than to try and show Tom the line of it here, for all that he wanted to. It was, Aremu thought, a selfish ache; he knew the other man wouldn’t like to look down.

Aremu glanced down at himself, at the scars on his hands, the bandage on the back of one, crisp white against his skin. He thought of Tom, too, and the lines of scars and bruises and scuffs beneath the clothing, the ones that hid tender places and the ones that didn’t. He wasn’t such a fool as to not see the metaphor.

“When you’re putting something together,” Aremu said, slowly, “you can be sorry it’s not as you envisioned, or you can follow the way it wants to go. It holds together, for all that,” he thought better of stamping the boards to prove his point, looking at the careful way Tom held himself, although he knew he could’ve, without dislodging either of them, or breaking anything. He didn’t, all the same.

Tom came off the edge of the board at the other side, first. The roof had collapsed, on the building at the other side; the light streaming in through the dust made it look as if it were crumbling, still, and the piles of shingles and boards beneath had the slumped, old look of a mess long since made. Aremu followed him the last step off the wooden platform; he took a last drag of his cigarette, and flicked it off over the edge, watching the wind catch it and rip it apart as it sailed towards the water below.

“What do you think of it?” Aremu asked, softly. He came closer; he took the other man’s shirt in his hand, once more, and held on, although he couldn’t quite have said why. The wanting burned through him, raced up and down his skin and tingled, coiled and burned low in his stomach. He wanted to hear him, though, more than he wanted anything else, but he couldn’t help pressing a little closer – couldn’t help his fingertips creeping beneath the hem of Tom’s shirt, wandering softly over the skin beneath.