by Raletha
Written for the 'whisper' challenge on the livejournal community, gw500.
Not unlike a cat, Trowa could sleep anywhere. Quatre had envied this about him often in the past. But for the present envy was far from his mind.
The late afternoon sunbeams fell like shards of glowing glass upon the surfaces of the library. Among them, amidst the geometric reds, golds, and greens of the thick Afghani rug, Trowa lay sleeping. He sprawled, half on his side, half on his stomach with his head pillowed on the bicep of one outstretched arm. His other arm was folded near his torso, and his hand kept his place in a dog-eared paperback. A few feet away rested his reading glasses.
Quatre left behind the cool darkness of the corridor and stepped into the room. His silent footfalls stirred dust motes, and they shone and spun in the warm cascade of light.
A long-sleeved linen shirt modestly draped Trowa's upper body, the stark white of it contrasting with Trowa's sun-kissed complexion. It made his skin appear an even more mouthwatering shade of dulce de leche caramel than usual. His long legs—one lay straight, the other crooked at the knee—were bare all the way up to the tops of his slim thighs, to a pair of cut-off denim shorts.
They were the remnants of the jeans he'd worn throughout the war and had been transformed from a garment of utility into their current impractical incarnation. Nevertheless, despite their comfort, Trowa never wore them anywhere but at home—and never when they had guests.
The result of his wearing them had become pleasurably predictable. In fact, they had become something like a tacit invitation.
Quatre tugged off his tie, slipped free from his suit jacket, and dropped to his knees. The dense pile of the rug cushioned his hands and knees as he crept toward his somnolent partner. When he reached the foot of Trowa's straightened leg, he lowered his head to kiss the fine bump of Trowa's anklebone and brushed the arch of his foot with his thumb.
Trowa neither twitched nor flinched, merely breathed a sleepy and affectionate, "Hmm... hi."
Not asleep after all—it was hardly a surprise.
Quatre glanced up to see Trowa's eyes remained closed and placed a second kiss a few inches above the first. Hotter than body heat from the sun's attention, Trowa's smooth skin intoxicated Quatre with its scent. The sharp, herbaceous fragrance of lavender and rosemary overlaid the richer, warmer personal scent. The familiar stimulus burrowed into Quatre's hindbrain, reinforcing that he was with the one he most desired.
His lips grew more fervid in their ascent. Following the line of bone up the side of Trowa's calf, and then detouring across the back of his knee, Quatre laid a string of hungry kisses up Trowa's leg until he reached the ragged hem of his shorts. Trowa's breath came faster after the passage of Quatre's lips over the back of his thigh.
"Had a good day?" murmured Quatre as he slid Trowa's shirt up to bare his lower back. Trowa twisted and stretched, easing forward to lie flat on his stomach. Quatre's gaze riveted on the tawny skin over the slowly turning muscles, and he tried to catch his breath.
"Mmm," Trowa replied.
Trembling with anticipation, Quatre's hands caressed the firm swell of Trowa's backside beneath the feather soft denim, and he placed a kiss at the small of Trowa's back. His lips lingered, and he willed the question he no longer needed to speak: Do you want me to continue?
Though the question would remain unspoken, a verbal response was sought, for though Quatre might apprehend the answer in other ways, he refused to assume his lover's receptivity. He waited, worried that he would not hear the reply over the drumming blood in his ears. As always, his fear proved to be false.
Trowa's body shifted lazily beneath Quatre's lips to encourage, and he sighed drowsily, "Yes."
the end