"Your turn." he said, a faint blush painting his cheeks.

He looked positively adorable with his wet hair hanging over his face.

I didn't look down at the scars I knew were there. If I was right about this, I could look them over in my own good sweet time. I nodded and he let me up.

I took the quickest, most effective shower I could. He had left the bathroom a mess, puddles of water, towels on the floor. I just added to it in my haste. I gathered up my clothes, and wondered what to do with them. I ended up wadding them into a big ball that I wedged on top of the toilet. I wiped the fog off the mirror and realized I looked old, considering myself. Could have used a shave, badly, but I didn't want to chance a razor in my shaking hands. Crap, I hoped I wasn't reading this wrong.

He was sitting on the bed, leaning against the windowsill with one arm, the quilt slung low over his hips. As he saw me, he kicked the quilt off, casually and just lay there naked.

Those scars so vivid I flinched when I saw just how extensive they were. God, he was magnificent. I couldn't stop my eyes from gravitating to what had been pressed against me moments before. The legends were true. He really wasn't human. Nothing human could be that size.

"Feeling better?" he asked, innocently.

I meant to say something, I really did. What came out was a sound something between a moan and squeak.

He leaned back onto the bed, tucking his arms behind his head and smiled. Inviting as hell.

Come here Nick.

With as closely as I was watching his mouth, I hadn't seen his lips move. "Vash?" I asked, unsure.

I said… Come. Here. Nick.

No, he hadn't moved his mouth. Well. That was all right, then. So long as I wasn't going crazy. If this had been nothing more than an elaborate wet dream, I would have had to shoot myself the second I finally woke up.

I walked to the door, locked it, and then on second thought wedged a chair under the doorknob. No chances. I moved over to him and just stood next to the bed, looking over his body. That magnificent flesh, those incredible scars.

Impatient, he grabbed me by the towel and pulled me down on top of him. There was a 'be gentle' spoken or thought, but I couldn't tell you who issued it.

My fingers knew exactly where to go.

Be with a person long enough, you know what pressure points to hit to send them into heaven. The first time out you inevitably do one or two things wrong, just out of lack of familiarity. But with Vash somehow I knew. Like a reflex. I didn't think, I just did.

Nick?

Vash was as clearly confused as I was.

"Shh… just… just go with it." I said.

So strange… it had never been like this. Not even with Middy. This intensity, this desire this ingrained instinct that I never knew I had. Not even when we were together in that horrible saloon outside of July, both of us quickly going from drunk to pissed. When we had gotten back to the hotel she managed strip me, saying I owed her for loosing the last poker game, and she knew how I preferred to pay.

But Middy didn't play poker. Certainly hadn't drunk, least not around me. But the memory had to be real; she was calling me Preacher in that sly, knowing way she had always had. That silent, smirking knowledge of our double life that turned vicious as I left on business.

But in memory it wasn't the business for the church. Something else. Damn she had been jealous, hell if I knew why. I hadn't been eyeing anyone else but her, for years before and after. But she had almost throttled me to death when I had told her I was going out again. Kept on yelling at me to tell her outright that I wanted to fuck him, just say it once, you coward.

Her hands as they wrapped around my neck were too big to be a woman's.

What…?