Alexander wakes again when the sun is only just peeking over the neighbor's rooftop to a quiet oath over his shoulder. He's lying on his belly with his face nuzzled into the mattress and Jefferson is peeling himself off of Alexander's back, pulling out of him with a soft, sticky sound. Alex wonders if they'd slept just like that through the last few hours of the dark. It would certainly explain the warmth that seems to have settled into his very bones.
He doesn't move beyond turning his head to watch as Thomas stands and stretches. He watches the muscles of his back flex as he pulls on his shirt, ignoring the hollow feeling left behind in the man's absence.
"Leaving so soon? Sure you don't want to have another go at me whilst I'm unconscious?"
Thomas tenses slightly and Alexander feels his own muscles tighten in response. This results in a slight wince; everything hurts and not just in that satisfying 'sore from fucking' way. Thomas has really done a number on him, and that on top of what promises to be a nasty bout of wine-sickness is not pleasant in the least.
The other man turns around to regard him calmly, an honest to god smirk playing on his full mouth, "You don't look as though you could handle another go," he says matter-of-factly, reaching to stroke the bridge of Alexander's nose with the pad of his thumb in a shocking show that's more presumptuous familiarity than affection.
Alexander's eyes trail down his chest, and he feels as if he's only just seeing him since he arrived in the night. He thinks this must be better anyway, with the way the sunrise, muted by sheer curtains, plays over that dark caramel skin.
All of Thomas's buttons are still undone and so are his trousers, leaving him bare from the wild curls on his head to those below his belt, messy and matted with cum and oil. His cock hangs, not quite soft and utterly without shame, just slightly paler than the rest of him from lack of light. He's still wet, tip to root from having only just pulled himself from Alexander's body mere moments before.
It seems he was correct in his assumptions that it was a respectable specimen of manhood. He refuses to call it impressive, but he finds himself wondering how in the world it had managed to fit all the way inside of him. Alexander feels his cock give an interested little jump as his eyes trail back up over a muscled torso, dark nipples and a few pinked scars he doesn't know the origins of.
Thomas snorts, and his eyes jump to his still smirking face, "You really don't," he says with a tone of smug warning. "Like what you see? I have to say; you don't look bad at all in naught but your shirt and stockings."
"Oh, piss off," Alexander groans, pulling his face back from the trailing fingers and a thumb that traces the arch of one brow to bury his face in the pillows.
"What? It's a compliment," Thomas says, not sounding as though he has any care at all as he pulls back to finish dressing. There are a few beats of quiet, then, "I've never seen a man intact before," he says, his tone curious.
Alexander tries not to think of possible implications of that statement, "I don't think most poor mothers think to have their children mutilated at birth where I'm from."
Whatever Thomas thinks of that he keeps it to himself, humming thoughtfully as he finally does up his buttons. He leaves without any further words exchanged a few moments later, shutting the door behind him with a soft click.
Something tinks gently against Alexander's nails as he stretches, feeling he can now that Thomas isn't here to see him wince through it, and he plucks it from beneath the mussed pillows. It's the small oil bottle from last night. He spins it in his fingers and contemplates hunting for the cap as his eyes droop closed once more.
He falls asleep again with the glass pressed to his palm.
Alexander wakes, again not recalling falling asleep, and this time he manages to sit himself up, though the action takes some ingenuity. He tucks his knees up under himself one slow scoot at a time until he's laying in a downward dog and stays that way a few seconds. Alex takes a moment's pause to breathe through his nose then, slowly, he pushes himself up onto knuckles and knees. He reaches with one hand and then the other to grip the headboard for balance as he twists to sit more on his hip than directly on his behind.
He's sore, and he is sure his heart has relocated to his forehead with the way it's throbbing. He wonders exactly how many times Thomas had made use of him. More than he was aware of, he thinks, as he stands and the evidence of it seeps down his thighs.
His heart does a strange little thrum in his chest, but the rest of his ribcage feels somewhat hollowed out. He stands there a few moments before turning to gather his pants slowly, then a decorative throw from the chair by the window to wrap around himself. One of his stockings has come loose from the garter and hangs around his ankle, and he has to bend to slip it off, frowning at the wine-red stains on his soles, lest he ends up on his face on the floor. He leaves the other one on and opens the door slowly.
It's quiet in the house, as it should be this early on a Sunday morning. Most, if not all, of the small staff won't be back from church for a time, and it gives him a chance to scurry quickly from the guest room to the suite at the top of the stairs, then onward into the connecting washroom.
There's a large, high window there across from the centered clawfoot tub and he moves to draw the curtain to dim the room. There's just enough light that gets through the creamy fabric to keep him from bumbling about and hurting himself more than he already has.
What on earth had he been thinking?
He can see himself in the mirror on the vanity. Thomas seems to have marked him up good, and when he turns, he finds his back is even worse off. He wants to flinch from the evidence of the encounter, but he makes himself stand before the mirror and look, even as a telling metallic taste pools under his tongue.
He spots a bite on one ass cheek and frowns. There are more down between his thighs. Bites and suck bruises and he swears there's a lingering scent of saliva under the musk of sex - that his skin is sticky with it along with everything else. He spreads himself a bit and immediately lets go again when more of Thomas' semen leaks past his reddened rim.
Alexander sighs and sits gingerly on the edge of the tub. The plumbing on the second level is brand new and the staff, as well as himself, have been enjoying the fact that he can now run his bath water whenever he likes and doesn't have to ask them to bring it up by the bucket full for him.
He thinks he'd like a long soak, whether he's earned it or not.
Later he's in his study, head still aching and body still thrumming in that way he can't name. He's fully dressed despite planning to spend the day in his home, outfit completed with a stiff, white neckerchief that hides everything below the like of his jaw.
The door opens behind him, and he turns to look.
It's Angelica, and for a moment he is elated to see his friend after the morning he's had. She's smiling, and he's so happy to see her that he misses the edge to it entirely. Then the reality of his situation comes crashing back down on him. He freezes, already halfway across the room, reaching out. He can see the throb of a vein in her temple and the way her smile is fast to grow teeth.
"Congratulations," she says, her tone litting in a way that carries promises. Promises of what, he can't know.
The encounter goes about as well as one would expect.
Alexander doesn't leave the house for several days after that. He writes and writes some more; things for work and a few little poems that are stashed away in a drawer mere moments after he scribbles them down where they will likely never see the light of day again. He forgets to eat, drinks too much, and he tries to tell himself that he isn't lonely, that the house isn't too quiet. Or that the bruise Angelica left on his cheek in her outrage doesn't sting anything more than just his flesh.
He writes to the bank, the solicitor's office, and his wife, ensuring she has access to everything she'll need to have run of their country home without having to contact him first. He will continue to make himself scarce until she wishes it otherwise and makes sure she knows it.
When he finally leaves the house it's late in the evening, and the stars are out in full force despite the heavy rain that had loomed over the day, a lack of moonlight making them a bit brighter in the face of the gas lamps that dot the city street corners. He's not sure why he's come out at all, but the air is warm on his face and does a little to raise him up out of whatever murky places his mind had been lingering.
He's done this to himself, Alexander repeats mentally, all he can do is carry on, and he intends to do just that. To be the best he can for his wife and children in whatever capacity she allows him to. Part of him dreads that she might keep the little ones from him in the face of this horrible insult to her honor and reputation.
He will have brought that on himself too, he supposes, but he hopes and prays that it will not be the case.
Alexander yawns as he rounds a corner, eyes tight shut as his jaw opens wide and pops on both corners. He's giving his chin a satisfied rub when he collides with a large, warm body, and careens backward, heel slipping on the wet cobble. A pair of muscled arms catch him around the waist before his backside can make its acquaintance with the ground and pull him against a solid chest, the scent of cannabis and mint filling his nose.
He knows who it is before he opens his eyes.
"Get off," he growls, eyes shooting open as he plants his palms on Thomas' chest to shove himself away.
But Thomas, apparently, isn't having that. "Well well, just the man I wanted to see," he drawls lowly, and he doesn't look nearly half as sober as he had the night Alexander had last seen him.
"The desire isn't mutual," Alexander snaps, "Off!"
"Christ but you're worse off than last time. How's that possible? You'll waste away completely at this rate." The words pass his lips without a hint of genuine concern. "Just how long do you plan to wallow in all that self-pity?" The man smothers his face against Alexander's shoulder and hums out a breath, "Smell awful too."
Alexander knows Thomas isn't wrong. He's not been looking after himself. He's always been a bit bad at that sort of thing, but the situation of things seem to have aggravated the habit. His hair is stringy and unwashed, and the rest of him isn't any better. The bags he's never truly been rid of in all his life sitting like heavy grey shadows under his pallid eyes. He likely smells of stale wine and doubly stale sweat so he honestly can't fathom why Jefferson insists upon burying his nose in it.
"You'll be worse off in a moment if you don't get back!" he threatens, ignoring his comment on self-pity even as it stings harshly at his pride.
It's then that he notices Thomas' state of dress - or rather, undress. The man lacks a jacket and a belt and even boots, standing unashamedly in front of him in a gauzy, white shirt that hangs off his broad shoulders and a tight pair of dark trousers.
Alexander is quite scandalized, though he'd certainly gotten on in much less as a boy in the Caribbean heat, and opens his mouth to question Thomas' sanity only to be interrupted before the words leave his mouth.
"And what happened to your face?" Rough fingers grip his jaw to angle his head so that Thomas can inspect the bruise Angelica's wedding ring had inspired when she'd backhanded him. There's a little livid scab across the center where the small but wickedly sharp stone set in the band had carved out a strip of flesh, and he hisses when a thumb pad brushes just lightly over it.
"Do you not listen at all!?" Alexander breathes, momentarily shocked to stillness by that action.
"Oh, I hear you. You're very loud when you want to be - and you must want to be often." Alexander's protest at that is cut off as Thomas steps back, hands on his upper arms to keep him from escaping entirely. "You didn't answer my question."
Alexander is quiet for a moment, "Angelica took great exception to my infidelity on her sister's behalf."
Thomas purses his lips.
"You look as though you could use a pick-me-up," Is not the response Alexander is expecting. He blinks owlishly, and Thomas gives him a lopsided grin, pupils swollen in the dim lamplight.
"You look as though you've had enough for the both of us," Alex grumbles, raising a brow.
"Oh, hush. Come on; I know just the place."
Just like that he's got by the hand and is being dragged bodily down the street. It stirs up the memory from a few nights back. Being lead down his hallway, drunken and stumbling, to be debauched in his downstairs guest room.
"Where the hell are you taking me?"
"Hush. You'll like this."
That answers absolutely nothing. If anything Alexander has more questions now.
"And just how is it do you think you'll know what I like and dislike?"
Jefferson rolls his whole head with the motion of his eyes. "You aren't as hard to suss out as you think, Alexander."
He blinks, caught slightly off guard by the sound of his name on Thomas' lips, and follows quietly after that. He's lead around corners, post boxes, and the occasional drunk on their way home for the evening. They pay the two of them little mind, much too focused on not falling on their faces. Alexander notes that Thomas is not nearly so uncoordinated, even with his head full of smoke. He wonders if it's a natural grace or if cannabis just doesn't affect the mind and body in the same fashion as alcohol.
He wouldn't know. He hasn't tried it since he was a boy, preferring the bottle over the pipe.
"Here we are!"
Alexander looks up from decidedly not eyeing Jefferson's behind to see where exactly it is he's been abducted to…
"The city park?" he says, sounding very doubtful about this idea indeed.
"Yes, the city park." There is another nearly violent roll of his eyes and neck that makes the tips of his curls bounce a bit, lending him a distraction from whatever feeling Thomas speaking his first name aloud inspires. "Have a little faith, will you?"
He's then drug through the gates. "Are you mad? It's dark! You'll step on something and cut your feet, you bootless fool!"
"I said have faith. I know my way, you fretful thing."
Alexander watches the back of his head. His insult hadn't been harsh in the least, and somehow he'd expected Thomas' rejoinder to be cattier. Thomas is acting… well, this is different. It's not what he's used to from the man, high or not.
"Come here often then?" he asks with eyes narrowed only partly by the increasing lack of light.
"Absolutely," Thomas replies, either not catching the suspicion in his tone or not caring at all.
He's quiet for a few moments. "For what, exactly…" His tone lacks the ending lilt of a question, purposely accusatory. Perhaps only partially to antagonize him, but Alex means them to garner a reaction in any case.
Thomas does react more appropriately this time. He stops, turning to face him and Alex nearly runs into him in the dark. Thomas stands there as if eyeing him and for a second, only a second, does nothing. Alexander expects some reference to pots and kettles, a slight spark of sour anticipation there in his gut, then Thomas leans down, grasping his chin firmly to tilt it up until the flesh of his throat strains, and claims his lips with his own.
It's not at all what Alexander was expecting, but he can't bring himself to mind too much.
The kiss is rough and dry and hot and for a second, much more than just one, Alexander is consumed by it. Thomas tastes precisely like he thought he might. Clean but smoky and his tongue is a bit dry, but Alex doesn't refuse it's entry though he knows he certainly should. Then Thomas is pulling back, and Alexander swears he can hear that smug smirk of his in his voice.
"Whatever I please," Thomas says in a crooning sort of way. Then he turns and continues onwards, keeping Alex closer to his side this time.
He doesn't ask any further questions or attempt to sling any more insults. Unsure of what would come of them but very sure that whatever is going on here, he's hesitant to go ruining it just yet. That and he's not actually sure he's up for any verbal sparring. This isn't some amorous outing being stolen in the night, but at the very least it's a reasonably pleasant distraction.
They walk along the stone paths, and he's able to start making out more than just vague shapes in the gloom. He thinks Thomas might be leading him towards the children's playground. There's one Alex knows isn't terribly far into the park even though it feels like they've been walking for an hour already before the man suddenly veers off up a grassy slope.
He wants to ask, but he refrains, keeping his mouth shut. The ground isn't as treacherous as he thought it might be, but he feels that if it were Thomas would still have no trouble keeping his footing. The sound of frogs chirping finds his ears, and he realizes they must be nearing a pond when no sound of running water reaches him, but the occasional pluck of a soft splash does. They round a thicket of what Thomas warns to be blackberry bushes and come upon the water's edge where they turn and trek along the bank.
"Not much furth-" Thomas begins, feeling Alexander stumble behind him, but cuts off with a startled sound as two billowing white shapes explode from the brush they are nearing and rush towards them.
Alex yelps and tucks himself more firmly against Thomas' side, thinking them under attack and moving to step forward and block whatever's come at them when the sound of childish, frightened giggling, catches his notice.
"Best your fathers don't catch you skinny dipping! Go on then!" Thomas calls after what seems to be a pair of girls scurrying off in naught but their dripping night clothes, hand in hand.
"What in God's name?" Alex says over his own bought of startled laughter.
"Seems we're not the only ones come for a tryst in the night," Thomas chuckles, dark eyes gleaming in the dim starlight, and Alex doesn't do him the discourtesy of denying it. "Come on, looks like they've left a little something behind."
It's then that he catches the light of a single naked candle, kept upright and off the damp grass by a chipped blue dish. Thomas pulls him over, and they find a blanket has been laid out, mussed by the girls' hasty escape, and a lidded lunch basket. Thomas lets go of him and crouches, straightening the blanket before plunking down and digging into the basket. Alexander watches him, still standing, interest piqued when a bottle makes an appearance.
"Let's see… grapes, crackers, " Thomas tilts his head and pulls a wax paper package from the basket. "Cheese?," he holds it up to his nose, "cheddar I think."
"A romantic picnic," Alexader says, eyeing the candle. He's unable to keep the surprise from his voice.
"Turned a lesson in being more discreet. Surely you didn't think we were the only ones in all the city?"
Alexander raises an eyebrow, "A bit hypocritical don't you think?" He pauses for a single beat, "I suppose I did. Perhaps I've grown too used to all these 'upstanding society' people love to chirp about,
Thomas snorts at him and sniffs the mouth of the bottle in his hand. "Wine. Bad wine," he looks over his shoulder. "Come on have a seat. No need to let it go to waste, quality notwithstanding."
"Not everyone is so snobbish with their drink," Alex says as he crouches down himself, feeling only briefly guilty over stealing a pair of teenagers' romantic midnight picnic and sits back on the blanket. He moves the candle out of knocking range, worried that Thomas might catch with his ruffled shirt cuffs.
Jefferson hands the bottle over him wordlessly, and Alexander takes a cautious sip. He swallows, smacks his lips, and is quiet for a moment.
"I've had worse."
Thomas laughs, "So it is bad then? I told you."
Alex takes another sip and ignores him.
"Not to worry. Just about anything will taste good after a few puffs of this," Thomas produces a tin cigarette case from his pants pocket and pops it open. Inside are three pre-rolled paper cylinders and a few matches snapped short to make them fit.
Alexander raises an eyebrow, bottle once more pressed to his lips, "You just carry that around with you?"
"What? Never seen a man carry a flask? This isn't so different," he plucks a cigarette from its place and snaps the tin shut. Thomas leans over Alexander to take up the candle, and he leans back on his elbows to make room and avoid getting smothered by all those tight curls. Thomas blocks the flickering flame from the light breeze coming off the water and lights his cannabis with an end in his mouth.
He catches Alexander's eyes and grins, "Inhale," he instructs, and without any more warning than that, he leans down and presses their lips together.
Alexander sputters a bit, interrupted from a gulp of bad wine, misses his cue entirely, and Thomas laughs out the rest of the smoke, leaving it in a half-wasted cloud between their noses.
"Want to try that again?" he asks as wine dribbles down Alex's chin.
It takes him a moment to respond to that, watching the candlelight flicker across those sharp features and wondering if he could possibly ever look so attractive in full sunlight.
He thinks that he'd like to find out.
"Fine, yes. A little more warning next try perhaps," Alexander scolds shortly, but Thomas is already taking another drag and pressing their mouths together again.
He doesn't miss his mark this time, and too-tangy wine slips across their lips along with the musk of cannabis smoke. The second hand isn't so harsh in his lungs, and he holds it in an act of mimicry as they share a slow kiss. Thomas lays a hand against his chest as he releases and drags it down over his belly before pulling back.
Alexander blows the last of the smoke in his face and allows a slight quirk at the corners of his mouth. Thomas' resulting grin is somewhat maddening in its smugness. He wants to scrub it off with something abrasive - sandpaper, perhaps.
"Oh come on," Thomas complains when his small grin falls away again, "You were doing so well." He tilts his head then goes after the buttons on Alex's jacket.
"Just what do you think you're doing?" he stammers, swatting at those determined hands.
"Helping. How are you going to relax all dressed up for your own funeral?"
He huffs and gives in without much more fuss than that. He does feel a bit overdressed with Thomas sitting before him in just his trousers and flowy, loose shirt. It's not as though he doesn't see those other motivations in the man's eyes, but he allows it anyway, and soon he is divested of jacked, shoes and neckerchief.
He huffs as fingers travel over the marks left on his throat, only just starting to fade, and swats his hands away more determinedly when they go after the buttons on his shirt. "You're awful."
"You like it." He manages to snatch the first few buttons from their holes before he leans back from being struck with a laugh. "Alright, alright. You're so feisty when you're sober, " Alex swats him harder, "Mercy!"
"Mercy me," Alexander huffs, and Thomas laughs.
"Never."
There are a few moments of quiet after that, and it manages not to be awkward. Alexander sits back up as Thomas sits back and puffs on his hemp cigarette. He takes it when it's offered to him and isn't at all surprised when he coughs the smoke back out. Thomas doesn't laugh at him for it, but he does smile and watch him with his black eyes twinkling.
Feisty when he's sober indeed, Alexander thinks as he gulps down a few swallows of wine. It doesn't escape his notice that Thomas is seeing to it that he is well on his way to decidedly not sober. It'll take more than a half-bottle of watered-down wine to put him in the state he's been in a few nights ago, though the cannabis will likely go a long way.
Substances notwithstanding, he thinks he might be far from entirely himself still, and he doesn't know yet if the change is permanent.
Thomas raises a brow at him, and Alex tries to take stock of the face he must be making. He finds his eyes are somewhat narrowed, that he's sunk teeth into the corner of his upper lip. Thomas shakes his head and twists to dig out the bunch of red grapes from the basket. He offers them over, trading them for the cigarette. They burst sweetly over Alexander's tongue, and he makes a sound of contentment as the juice helps cool his throat.
"I take it you don't smoke much," Thomas comments conversationally.
Alexander shakes his head, "Not since I was a boy. And even then I only tried it once or twice in bad company. Put me off it somewhat."
"Does that mean I'm good company?"
"Absolutely not. Much too handsy."
Thomas laughs at that. "I assumed you liked it. Seeing as you keep letting me."
Alexander frowns - an annoyed twist of his lips -and takes another sip of his wine. He says nothing because it feels as though he can't.
Thomas watches him sidelong and offers over the hemp cigarette again, a question in his eyes that seems to be answered when Alexander takes it and puts it to his lips.
"I take it you haven't looked up yet," Thomas says with a tone of purposeful repetition.
"Hm?" His head feels light, and it's suddenly effortless to push that which troubles him away and instead regard the flame on the slowly dying candle with something like childish amazement instead.
"Look up, Alexander."
He does. He gasps.
The sky looks as though someone had taken a billion shards of glowing glass and scattered them across an inky canvas with the intent to cover it completely. Alexander hasn't seen so many stars since he was a boy in the Caribbean. The air is warm and humid and the only thing missing is the sharp tinge of sea salt in the air and the sound of waves against beach sand. He feels the cigarette being plucked from his fingers but forgets the sensation a second later, mind filled with nothing but the glittering night.
"Possibly the only thing missing in the city are the stars. I find a man tends to forget the sight of them completely," Thomas' voice is much closer suddenly, but he finds he isn't surprised. Not even when a chin comes to rest on his shoulder and tight curls tickle his cheek and jaw.
"It's beautiful."
"Isn't it though?"
He looks down and finds Thomas is looking at his face rather than the stars. The expression in his face is not a sweet one, but a flush creeps up his neck regardless. Alexander doesn't know who moves first, but warm lips meet his in a slow kiss. Thomas' mouth is still quite dry, and it seems to suck the moisture from his own tongue. His shirt is untucked but it stops at that, and for a long, simmering moment they stay that way, sharing the flavor of cannabis and wine and sweet, stolen grapes.
The moment is lost, however, when there is a sudden sharp sting at his hip, and it's only then that he realizes that he's been pressed back against the blanket, flat on his back with Thomas hovering over him. He hisses through his teeth and tries to reach for the spot, but a dark hand beats him to it.
"What was that?" he asks, thinking something had bitten him.
Thomas' grin is rueful, "Lost track of the cigarette for a moment," He doesn't apologize, but he looks repentant enough that Alexander doesn't fuss at him for it.
He strains to look at the burned skin of his hip. The cherry on the cigarette had fallen right into the cup of his pelvis and left behind a lived pucker of red, waxy flesh. Alexander knows it must be a nasty little burn; for all the initial sting it only feels numb now.
"What's this?" The words confuse him. He takes stock of the hand that has drifted down over his thigh and come to rest against a lump in his pocket and forgets the burn entirely.
"Get out of there!" he yelps, but it's too late. Clever fingers slip inside and pluck out a small glass bottle complete with its little threaded cap.
Thomas leans away, holding the bottle out of snatching range, "Still empty? A strange momento to keep," he observes, rolling the glass in his fingers and seeing right to the heart of it. Alexander suddenly feels naked despite not really knowing why he's kept it. He'd just wanted to.
"Pass the damn cigarette," he grumbles, sipping wine and feeling rather sour about having the bottle taken away. He's rather surprised when that's what he gets instead of the cannabis. He blinks, looks up from the bottle on his palm, "Wha-"
Thomas cuts him off with lips on his again, and he nearly misses that he's meant to inhale. He blows it out his nose when Thomas pulls back again, a questioning expression on his face.
"You'll bust a lung. Or worse, draw more midnight visitors if you carry on coughing the way you do," Thomas murmurs by way of answer. It manages not to sound like the silly excuse Alex knows it is.
Alexander tilts his head, unsure of what he's looking at exactly now. Thomas' expression is cool but not cold. Calm and contemplative and eyeing him sidelong as he takes another drag off his hemp cigarette. He tucks the bottle back into his pocket and leans forward to steal Thomas' exhale before it can be wasted on open air.
Musky smoke streams out of his nose as the kiss they share lingers and this feels like an inevitable sort of thing. If Alexander is honest with himself, and he so rarely is, he's been drifting from his wife for years. Once he thought her the best of wives and women, but he also remembers once describing her guilelessly as a good-hearted girl. Not a beauty, but possessing fine dark eyes. He had loved her, and he loved her still. Their spark had bloomed into a warm hearth fire. Something that kept him warm and calm and more than just content, but he'd be lying to ever deny that she was never once a means to an end and only later a spark of passion that helped to fill a charred void left by a brighter flame.
A flame he still now had much trouble putting a name to fifteen years after its loss. He had never been with John in the same way he'd been with his wife, but the nature of his feelings had been much the same, just more somehow. He loved Eliza, desired her, but it was never the sort of love that made him feel as though he was going to go mad with it.
'What am I doing?' he wonders to himself as Thomas pulls back with that smug grin of his, then pushes the thought away entirely. Sinful or not how could this possibly be any worse than what he's already done? He does recall hearing from one priest or another that all sins are equal from homicide to penny theft. He may as well keep digging that hole if he is to be buried in it anyway.
He watches Thomas and wonders if whatever this is may not fill whatever void has been left in him either. It's hard to say when he has no idea what is actually happening between them, and Thomas seems content to keep him in that state.
It feels good though. Maria had been a distraction from loneliness and had known it. Thomas was taking advantage of circumstance but still looked at his face rather than the stars. It's something, whatever it is.
So he allows that closeness. Later he'll allow Thomas to divest him of his shirt and trousers and tempt him into the warm waters of the pond where they'll share kisses and a tight embrace. He'll dig his toes into the silt with the desperate need to anchor himself while Thomas does his very best see him swept away entirely.
Later still they'll wake up in a tangle on their borrowed blanket with the sunrise on their skin and Alexander will linger just long enough to confirm his ideas of what Thomas must look like, bare in full sun. He'll wake him and perhaps even let him follow him back the townhouse. He'll realize on the walk there that Thomas' n idea of a pick-me-up had left him feeling lighter than he had in days and quietly stew in self reprehension for it.
It's not as though Eliza will forgive him any sooner, not that he deserves her forgiveness, thinking him a lecherous creature indeed already. The fact that the thought leaves him entirely as Thomas leans to pass him more smoke is probably high testament to her ideas of him.
Notes:
I have a love/hate relationship with the semicolon but don't tell her that.
PLEASE LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK! COMMENTS AND KUDOS REALLY MAKE ALL THIS SUFFERING WORTHWHILE.