There was sweat, and a lot of it. Drops beaded on Cecil's neck as he rocked back and forth, made Carlo's hands slip as he ran them along Cecil's tattooed sides. Carlos pulled Cecil's hips closer, pressed deeper into him and heard his partner's gasp as he did so. Carlos could taste the salt of Cecil's sweat as he kissed the crook of his neck. He was close now, and he tried to slow down, to draw this out just a little longer. But Cecil was pressing into him and making deep, glorious moans and when he twisted towards Carlos for a desperate kiss it was more than Carlos could take. He came with a shudder and a gasp. He kissed the back of Cecil's head in a daze of fucked out peacefulness and Cecil rumbled "Perfect… Carlos." He turned over and wrapped his legs around Carlos tightly and for a few wonderful minutes neither of them moved, they just lay in one another's arms breathing and sweating.
"I'm not…" Carlos said, lovingly running his fingers through the damp hair at the back of Cecil's neck. "I'm not perfect you know. Not even close."
Cecil smiled, white teeth shining out against the contrast of his dark skin.
"You move like a tide," Cecil purred, "A wave that would crash unexpectedly on to the shore and leave a nice Californian couple on holiday clinging desperately to a palm tree, picnic ruined, but knowing that this was the first time that either of them had really lived." He smiled lopsidedly and brushed some hair off his Carlos's forehead.
"O-ok." Carlos said, and for lack of any response gave Cecil a slightly dazed but probably appreciative kiss. Cecil snuggled his head into Carlos's shoulder with a contented sigh.
From the bedstead, Cecil's phone flashed a bright orange and made a noise like an ambulance crashing into a brick wall at full speed, accompanied by an ominously strong vibration.
"Oh…" Cecil muttered, disentangling himself. "I have to get that, that's the station." He flipped on his bedstand light, illuminating his bedroom. It was decorated like a cross between a funeral home and a spaceship.
Suddenly the ringtone changed to the sound of panicked whispers in a long forgotten language that you couldn't understand, but you could feel was a warning.
"Oh no." Cecil said in a small voice. "That's management."
"You'd better get it." Carlos said, sitting up on his elbows. The last time Cecil had flippantly ignored a call from station management he had descended into lunacy for a good four hours. It had been frightening and inconvenient. "You were so annoyed that you missed 'Too Cute! Kittens'."
But Cecil already had the phone to his ear. Carlos could hear the faint grating hum that somehow was comprehensible to his lovable but excessively strange boyfriend. He lay back on to the still slightly damp mattress and stared up at Cecil's ceiling, trying to tell if there were actually runes painted on it. Sometimes he felt positive that there were, but the next time he would look up at your average brightly colored, non warded bedroom ceiling. For a second he felt a rush of nostalgia for his old apartment back in Arizona. He had a much bigger bed there, but of course nobody to share it with, which gave this spaceship bedroom a distinct advantage.
"yes, yes. Of course I understand." Cecil said, serious business radio voice on. "And none of that happened? Does this come from the mayor? Or… no. I'm sorry. Yes very funny Ha! Ha! Quicksilver I think. That or fire sauce. Condolences, and you're welcome, Cecil."
He hung up.
"This is very bad news" Cecil said with a sigh, not lying down but hunching his shoulders and hugging his knees to his chest right at the edge of the bed.
"Is it Dana?" Carlos asked, pulling himself out of the sheets a bit to put a consoling hand on Cecil's back.
"Our new intern, Rakesh." Cecil said. Carlos bit his cheek. He would not accept an internship at the radio station if it paid $50 an hour. Their turnaround was high, the hours were pretty bad, and he mortality rate was unacceptable.
"It appears that both his mother and father have entered a new plane of existence, and he needs some personal time off."
"Plane of existence, as in, they died?" Carlos asked.
"No, they're still around, but as far as I could tell from the phone they're no longer planary and can only communicate through ear piercing hums and flashes of light."
Carlos stopped stroking Cecil's back for a second.
"Poor Rakesh." Cecil said. "and he only just got over his cat getting arrested by the vague and yet menacing government agency."
'What did his cat do?" Carlos asked.
"HUSH! Carlos! We don't speak of it." Cecil looked around at his room as though apologizing to his inescapable government surveillance team. Carlos smiled. If they were being watched at least they had given them a pretty good show a few minutes ago.
"What are you going to do about Rakesh?" Carlos asked, staring to run his fingertips along Cecil's well muscled back, moving away from condolence touching and into a better kind. Cecil sighed and arched.
"Send him a gov't issued condolence card mmmmm…. Probably. And… ooh, yes, um, not run his story on the elementary school annual fall bonanza and ritual sacrifice." Cecil leaned back into Carlos, who began to kiss his neck again. He was reaching his arm around to see how things were coming along on Cecil's end when the phone went off again, making both men "grr" in frustration.
Cecil picked it up.
"Hello? Oh." He hung up quickly. Carlos tried to touch Cecil's back again, but he jerked away.
"What happened?"
"Rakesh died. He tried to join his parents on their new plane of existence but it ended up… oh. I can't talk about it right now." Cecil's voice sounded close to tears, and Carlos wanted to cheer him up but from the way Cecil pulled himself into the covers it seemed like he needed a bit of space. Last week he had taken the news of 30 local deaths from what was only described as "The Street Fair" with aplomb and a comment about appreciating the arts. This must have hit him a little harder.
"You want to get some sleep?" Carlos asked. "We can make an announcement on the show tomorrow. Maybe his parents will appreciate that, wherever they're existing."
"Sweet Carlos." Cecil said, blankets tucked up to his chin. "It's just… with Dana and… oh." He nestled deeper into the blankets, expression dark and distant.
Carlos moved over the few inches he could spare on so small a bed, to give Cecil some space. The night was dark and vaguely purple. Cecil's breaths grew more deep and even. It was time to begin the nightly bargaining process with his subconscious that determined whether he was going to sleep or toss and turn all night.
Pleasant vague thoughts. Carlos had read an article that said sleep was brought on most quickly by thinking pleasant and yet vague thoughts. He thought about kittens jumping out of baskets, like the ones on Too Cute! Kittens last week… oh but that was no good that was when Cecil was still garbling and chanting around his bloodstone circle with his eyes all unfocused. And why did all those nightvillians have bloodstone circles anyway? He never used his. And of course he couldn't just ask Cecil, he had a way of getting all shocked and lectury about things he took for common knowledge. Poor Cecil, station management shouldn't make him go mad like that, it had been so scary and how could they even inspire mental derangement via telephone? Could they have some auditory thing that triggered an emotional response in Cecil's brain that turned him into that drooling, frightening, mess?
The pillow was intolerably hot. He rolled to his side and let his eyes focus in the darkness on Cecil's back. His tattoos of runes and symbols glowed ever so slightly in the darkness. Cecil had nervously told him they were protection runes, the first time Carlos had unbuttoned his nondescript striped shirt and stared at the little black markings scattered across his chest. Carlos had kissed each of them prayerfully. Cecil seemed to like that, even though Carlos wasn't exactly the praying kind of man. He found the whole concept of protection runes vaguely problematic and medieval until he was eyeing them on his partner's skin hungrily. But if Cecil wanted to protect himself from whatever it was they were supposed to protect him from so be it. And if he wanted to rise too early in the morning and wake Carlos up with ritual chanting from the bloodstone circle, well, then Carlos would grumpily rub the sleep out of his eyes and go make them coffee.
He rolled on to his back again, staring at the blackness of the ceiling. It must be nice having faith and hope the way the Cecil had faith in whatever it was he prayed to. Sleep was still far away, he felt hot and uncomfortable and slightly dizzy for some reason, and Cecil was breathing so evenly and comfortably. How could he just stop thinking like that? Carlos was always thinking and the thought of not thinking was worrisome because it led to thoughts of not being able to think ever and not being able to perceive because without thought and perception what was there? And someday his body would shut down and he wouldn't be able to think and perceive. And that was a certainty. Someday he was going to find out what happened when you cannot think and perceive, everyone was, Rakesh had, Carlos almost had that day at the bowling alley, and what about then?
Carlos jolted up with clenched fists and short, panicked breaths, and reached for the first thing that felt whole to him. He kissed the back of Cecil's head.
"Buh?" Cecil grumbled, turning over to face him, ascending slowly into consciousness.
"I…" Carlos bit his lip, then continued. "I was momentarily overwhelmed by the vastness of the universe so I kissed the back of your head Sorry."
"Oh." Cecil accepted that with a nod and gave Carlos a peck on the forehead. "I don't think the universe got any smaller because you kissed the back of my head, but hopefully that made it more manageable."
"Mm…" Carlos felt less panicked, death felt further away.
"I mean, there's definitely more to the universe than you kissing the back of my head, or me kissing your forehead, but we can only experience our little corner of the universe, and that only from our own limited perspective."
"Extremely limited." Carlos agreed, nuzzling into Cecil's chest.
"So for us those kisses were everything, at least, for a second, and it was a beautiful second."
"True."
"So, whatever kind of frightening universe it is," Cecil's voice was getting softer and grumblier as sleep advanced up on him. "We made ours wonderful."
"I can't believe you exist sometimes." Carlos admitted.
"Neither can I, but I usually feel better after 10 minutes and a cup of coffee." Cecil said, and drifted off to sleep.
The sound of Cecil chanting, a deep, rumbly, mysterious noise that had used to freak Carlos right out, softly nudged the scientist into consciousness. He listened for a few minutes, trying to make out words, but only gave himself chills doing so. He groaned and rolled out of bed. Coffee.
In a few minutes they were both ready for work, Carlos in his regular labcoat, Cecil in his suit. He looked so normal in his suit, like any other brown guy with an office job. The first time Carlos had met Cecil in person he hadn't even noticed him. Until, out of the crowd of strange looking reporters that had been struggling understand the scientific anomaly that was Nightvale, a calming, pleasant voice had asked a pertinent question. His voice gave Carlos feelings. He had since become an avid listener of Cecil's show.
But to look at Cecil, he was immediately forgettable. He looked like the people around you at bus stops or extras in the background of an episode of Law and Order. It wasn't until you knew Cecil that you found out how strange and miraculous he was. Of course, Carlos had to consider as he kissed his boyfriend on the cheek and started heading towards work, even extras in the background of Law and Order were strange and miraculous to somebody.
He ended up jogging into his laboratory about 10 minutes late. It wasn't much of a laboratory, really, it was more like an old factory with some computers and tables. And it always smelled kind of like old cheese.
"Carlos!" Intern Robert lowered a test tube that he had clearly just picked up to look like he was doing something. "Top of the Morning!"
Robert said that every single morning, and every single time Carlos got closer to actually hitting him in the face.
"You have a letter." Ashley, an intern who was tolerable, said from behind some beeping equipment.
"Where?" Carlos asked, reaching for his goggles from the antique coat rack by the door.
"Envelope's on your desk." Ashley said, turning her attention back to a grandfather clock. She was making a little mark in a notebook every time it ticked. She'd gone through three dozen black and white composition books so far.
Sure enough there was a manila envelope waiting on Carlos's desk, a little bit banged up around the edges but with a very professional looking header. The name on the corner was recognizable, his old advisor, Dr. Arun Hassan. Just reading the printed name brought back memories of late night study sessions fueled by coffee and terror in the Arizona lab space.
He smiled. Last week he'd mailed Dr. Hassan some particularly unique findings from his work in Night Vale, he was pleased to receive a response so promptly.
The letter read as follows.
Carlos,
It is a pleasure to hear from you again, I was beginning to believe you had dropped off the face of the planet. The enclosed report is certainly different from the work I came to expect from you when I was your advisor. For one thing, I would recommend investing in a word processor. I haven't received a typewritten report in so long I felt like I was in the bad old days. Where did you even find purple ink? And was it signed in blood? Secondly, and I'm not sure how else to put this, are you all right? I'm sure that once you look at what you've sent me you'll understand my worry. You were always a good student, and this report is almost incomprehensible. There is a paragraph in what I believe is iambic pentameter. And your hypothesis, that "Time is the least accurate form of measurement within Night Vale city limits" is so obviously problematic that I'm not sure what to tell you. Come see me the next time you are in town. We'll have some coffee.
Best,
Dr. Hassan.
After the sixth rereading of the letter, Carlos shakily pulled his report out of the envelope. He'd been so excited last week, sending it, but now he looked at it with the eyes of a man who had NOT been attacked by vibrating energy monsters on his first date. It didn't look very good.
Dr. Volney's tendency to write in rhyme had used to confuse him but when he included in the report last week he hadn't thought twice.
Robert came over.
"Carlos, big news! We've been watching all of the clocks all morning and it's actually earlier than it was 20 minutes ago." Robert's eyes were bright with excitement, test tube still purposelessly in his hand.
Carlos continued to stare at the now empty manila envelope, eyes glazed over in defeat.
"That is not physically possible." He said.
"It…" Robert looked down at the notebook in his hand and then back up at his boss. "But… we wrote it down." He whined.
"It's not physically possible. With physics." Carlos explained.
"But, look at the clock though." Robert suggested.
Carlos didn't.
"It could be possible with string theory!" Ashley called out from her post by the grandfather clock. Everyone in the lab groaned.
"Everything's fucking possible with string theory Ashley!" Dr. Volney shouted from the other side of the lab where he appeared to be microwaving a peanut.
"Yeah, just shut up about string theory Ashley." Robert groaned.
"I don't even like strings." Another scientist muttered under his breath.
"I have to go outside." Carlos said.
In a few minutes he was standing in the empty lot out back of Big Rico's pizza with his hands in his pockets. A slightly acidic scent of burning, wafting his direction from the pizza place, reminded him that he had not lived up to his government obligations and eaten there yet this week. He'd have to either get lunch there or go to prison. Again.
Rubbing his forehead in irritation he began to walk down the street, lab coat flapping, heading in no direction in particular. Sometimes tension needs to be shaken out with exercise. His head throbbed with a dull caffeine ache that was just strong enough to make everything worse.
The streets were hot and dry and generally desertlike. There were no clouds and the sky was a sickly pale blue and purple. He was beginning to sweat into his lab coat, but he decided to just let it stick to him rather than let the residents of Night Vale see him without it on.
All of a sudden a feeling of sickness made him stop and lean against a streetlight. The hairs on the back of his arm started to stand up, and a low, maddening hum began to pulse through his ears. Woozily, he read the sign next to the streetlight and gasped.
He was standing directly in front of the Dog Park. He had never really known where it was, because, as any decent Nighvalian would tell you, it did not exist.
Putting his hands in his pockets again and keeping his eyes glued to the pavement, Carlos tried to hurry away. The feeling of sickness lingered, and was now accompanied by an ache at the pit of his stomach. He walked more quickly. The edges of his vision became fuzzy, like his periphery was a television set that had gone snowy. Pressing forward desperately he ran with a THUNK into something that gave a little bit. It was a tall, dark figure. In a hood.
Dazed, dizzy, and almost certainly at the end of his very brief existence on this planet, Carlos used what last instinctual elements of scientific inquiry he had to gaze directly into the mysterious figure's hood.
It was the feeling you got halfway down the skyscraper, picking up velocity. It was the twin in the womb being consumed by its brother. It was the tentative step of a spider onto the blazing hot face of a spotlight. It was the three minutes between hearing your diagnosis and realizing it was going to be on your obituary. It lasted a million years.
Carlos woke up in Big Rico's pizza, rubbing a slice of lukewarm "cheese" "pizza" all over his face. No one looked at him.
His phone buzzed, and the name on the front was Cecil. When he flipped the phone open he saw he had several dozen missed texts.
"Hello?" He asked, and his voice sounded like it had been echoed back from an extremely deep cavern.
"Carlos." Cecil said, normally. "Rakesh's grandmother is here. I'm in the men's room, hiding behind the cat."
"…How?" Carlos asked.
"What should I say? The weather's almost over and I can't face her."
It was at that moment Carlos decided he needed to take a break from Night Vale. Just for a little while.