Chapter Twenty-Nine: Deviance
Bathed and dressed, the two boys gather in the kitchen of Hell House with supplies in hand. Funny, how they both decided the kitchen would be the best place, without even discussing it. They coexist in comfortable silence now, as they arrange the necessities on their tiny kitchen table. Alcohol and antiseptic ointment, gauze and medical tape. Chalk, and a lone black candle. A sterilized exacto knife.
They discuss placement before beginning the spell, the three sigils drawn stark on notebook paper on the table for reference. They will each be receiving the binding sigil, though in different locations—Matt had chosen his chest, while Jonah had chosen his right hip, for ease of concealment and the performance of the act itself. Their separate sigils—control for Matt, and power for Jonah, had the same placement of the palm of the bearer's dominant hand, for ease of use.
Decided, Jonah lights the candle with Matthew's Led Zepplin Zippo. He touches the pocket watch, Matthew's grandfathers, as he does so, once again a warm, pulsing, living object.
"This'll be our first real spell together," Matthew murmurs, and Jonah can't help but give his create a smile in response.
"Imagine how powerful any spells we do after this one will be." Jonah states, Matt's eyes widening, as if he hadn't considered that.
"Yes, this will definitely amplify things," Jonah mutters, almost as if to himself, his voice tight with anticipation, as he uses chalk to draw out their spell, and the sigils, on the table.
They meditate and pray together, standing side by side, hand in hand, for an unknown, long amount of time. It's like a switch flipping, an appliance plugging in, when their connection finally succeeds, the hum and thrum of their conjoined intentions reverberating in the air, across the planes of existence, throughout the property of Hell House. Matthew is briefly unsettled when he first spies their witnesses, all of the entities standing along the periphery, but a soft squeeze of his hand in Jonah's is all it takes to reassure the occultist.
Jonah is speaking in a language Matt doesn't recognize, something stilted and eerie-sounding that makes all the fine little hairs on Matt's body stand on end. Once finished, Jonah quietly instructs Matthew to state his intention as well. He does, in Latin, and Jonah's smile becomes full-blown, nodding along as he listens to Matt's statements. They both gasp as the eventual blessing of the entities they're praying to wash over them, and they finally let go of each other. Permission granted, Jonah takes the knife in hand, turning to Matthew.
"Sit for me, please?" Jonah asks, and Matt readily does so, shucking his shirt in the process.
He approaches Matthew, places a hand on the man's left breast, as if considering the unbroken skin, pre-marred with Latin. His expression is one of worry, and slight guilt. He raises his dominant hand, the one with the knife, before pausing to consider the angle.
"Knees together," he mutters, before straddling Matthew's thighs, checking the angle again, nodding to himself in satisfaction.
Matt's grinning, a positively wolfish smile, and Jonah sighs, shaking his head, rubbing his face with his hand.
"If it's any consolation or whatever, I am so absolutely fucking honored right now." Matthew states, slightly breathless, his face slowly blushing red.
Jonah decides to completely and utterly ignore the erection tenting Matt's jeans, even if the sight of it causes butterflies to bombard his insides.
"God, you're so fucking weird." He states as he leans forward, concentration taking over as he begins.
"Hey now, I just handle pain well—"
He takes Matt's right shoulder in hand to hold the man still, and to act as a kind of grounding point, as he starts carving with his other, slicing the first initial line of the binding sigil clean and precise into the flesh of Matthew's left breast, right under his collarbone. Matt's breathing hitches, pausing mid sentence, and Jonah can't help the little smile that rises to his face.
"You were saying?" Jonah asks as he continues on to the next line, glancing at the paper for reference.
"I was saying that I handle pain well. And I do. I'm not entirely averse, in fact." Matthew insists, his grin widening, one of his eyebrows raising as he instantly catches Jonah's gaze.
The medium flushes cherry red at the expression in Matthew's eyes, glancing down to confirm for himself that—oh, yeah, Matt isn't averse at all, as his erection hasn't flagged, not even one bit.
"Deviant. Shut the fuck up, Matthew, and stop looking at me." Jonah replies haughtily, seemingly quite ruffled as he continues carving, slicing perhaps a little deeper than he needs to.
Matthew does as he's told, though the smile never quite leaves his face, morphing into a soft, contented expression as Jonah Aickman carves a sigil into him.
"I wish I could look at you."
Jonah just ignores him, choosing instead to focus intently on his task, his jaw clenched. Matthew's reaction aside, this action feels all too familiar to the reincarnation. Blade in hand, he can't help but think about Father, and of all of those poor desecrated corpses. He bites his lip, willing his hands not to shake as he continues.
It's a different experience for sure, though, most notably due to one specific difference—that the flesh parting under his knife is living, this time, warm and pliant, and it bleeds—it bleeds quite a lot, enough that Jonah keeps having to wipe blood away with a rag, just so he can see what he's doing.
Matthew seems to have picked up on the shift in Jonah's mood. The smile has left his face, and his erection has finally vanished. He's still looking away, as instructed, but his eyes keep stealing glances, the expression on his face slightly concerned, morbidly curious, and absolutely fascinated.
"Finished." Jonah sighs, visibly relaxing as he completes the last stroke of the sigil.
"That was fast." Matthew says, startling a laugh from Jonah.
"Apply pressure." The medium orders, shoving the bloody rag into Matt's non-dominant hand. "Do you need a break?"
"Nope." Matt replies, popping the puh sound of the 'p'. "Could I have a cig, though?"
"Yeah, just keep an eye on the finished sigil, and be mindful of the ashes, please." Jonah sighs, leaning down from his perch on Matthew's lap to fish the man's cigarettes out of his discarded shirt pocket.
He takes Matthew's right hand in his, studying the scarred palm as the man lips a cigarette out of the pack, flicking open his lighter and catching the gear, the action awkward within his non-dominant hand.
He almost chokes on smoke, hissing as Jonah starts the sigil for control, his stomach twisting slightly as he watches Jonah slice right through his life line, and quite a bit of faded Latin. Jonah hums sympathetically in response, rubbing the back of Matthew's hand with a free thumb as he continues his work.
Matt watches the witch as he works, smoking his cigarette, doing his best to commit that expression to memory—the teen's eyebrows furrowed, a white little tooth visible as he bites his lower lip in concentration, his unreal eyes even more unsettling with this look of focus in them.
This sigil is comprised of a lot more lines than the other, even if it is technically less metaphysically complex. At some point, Jonah sighs and cracks his neck with a tilt of his head and wipes his damp palms on his thighs. Knife quickly back in hand, Matt's hand back in his, he's just started a new line when Matthew offers him the cigarette, perched between two of the man's fingers, filter first. Jonah pauses, leaning forward to take a long, grateful drag. He mutters his thanks, and Matthew just nods.
"There," he states, when he finally finishes, awkwardly sidestepping off of Matthew's lap, the occultist's un-wounded hand a steadying presence on his side.
Matt goes to stand, but Jonah's hands on his shoulders force him back into the chair. The medium flits away to fetch several more rags, stemming blood flow as best as he can before soaking another rag in alcohol, tutting to Matthew as he cleans both wounds, his creator wincing and hissing at the sting. The teen is practiced and efficient as he applies the antiseptic ointment and gauze, before wrapping securing each bandage with medical tape, the dressing on Matt's hand wound all the way around his palm and secured with tape pressed under a thumb.
"How do they feel?" Jonah asks, as they take a short break, each of them smoking their own cigarette,
"Not too bad, baby." Matt replies, as he finally stands, cigarette hanging from his mouth as he fetches a glass and a bottle of whisky.
He pours out several shots, downing painkillers before offering the drink to Jonah.
"It'll thin your blood." Jonah states, even after he takes a swig, and another, and another of whisky, exhaling smoke through his nose.
The next part of this spell, Jonah's turn, is much harder for Matt to stomach, his uneasiness growing as Jonah sterilizes the knife and shucks his clothing off, down to his undershirt and drawers.
Matt sits and holds the mirror, doing his best to focus on watching Jonah's face, instead of watching Jonah's hands, as the medium stands in front of him. The waistband of his drawers folded underneath a sharp hipbone, the witch uses one hand to hold his skin taut as the other cuts himself, confidently slicing lines into his own skin. Matt helps when he can, blotting blood away, his nausea growing as he watches Jonah's pale, unmarred skin part again and again under a deft blade, blood slowly staining the reincarnation's white clothes.
Jonah's face never once belies pain, is the same mask of concentration he'd worn when carving into Matt. Something about it gets under Matt's skin—he downs the rest of the whisky, feeling shaky, noting the way Jonah doesn't even seem to notice him.
The binding sigil takes longer than Matt's did, considering Jonah is working using a reflection, is having to glance at the reference drawing more often. He finishes eventually, nodding to himself as he presses a clean rag to the wound.
"Can you—" he begins to ask, but Matthew has already moved to comply, leaning forward to press the rag to his love's wound, applying pressure.
The sigil for power, carved into Jonah's left hand, takes no time at all, easily being the simplest, the most graceful, of the three markings, comprised of the least amount of lines. It's a little awkward, though, Jonah having to use his non-dominant hand to do the carving. But he finishes it up in only a few seconds, and in almost one unbroken cut, his knife only lifting from the skin once.
Matthew cleans and bandages him up once he's finished, exceedingly gentle as he patches his golem up.
"They'll be healed in less than an hour." he huffs under Matt's ministrations.
"Only if we take care of them," Matthew insists, his tone serious, his hands efficient.
Spell completed, they blow out the candle, dispelling the entities, deities, and spirits in the room in a wisp of smoke, Jonah's mother smiling and nodding at them, the last to leave.
"So, how does breakfast sound?" Matthew asks, as he helps Jonah re-button his shirt, and the teen laughs, that sweet, bell-like sound, his smile genuine, and Matt smiles back.
A beat passes in which the two living dead boys simply consider each other, before Matt's arms are opening, Jonah stepping forward, pulled together like magnets once again, embracing in the kitchen of Hell House, feeling as fresh and new as that first morning of their new life.
Jonah sings along to the radio as they cook breakfast, sauteeing down strawberries and flipping pancakes side by side, finally settled back into peaceful domesticity, the normalcy of coexistence, the last few weeks of pain and strife already feeling like a distant memory. Maybe it will be a funny story to tell, one day, eventually, as the years pass. For now, the both of them bask in their little slice of Heaven, revel in it, as their shoulders brush, as morning lights the kitchen cool and clean, Rusty basking in a sunbeam on the floor.
"So, we are tethered together forever, now?" Matthew asks over breakfast, his irish coffee in hand.
"Yup," Jonah replies, as he douses his plate of strawberry pancakes with an unholy amount of syrup, "together as one entity now, basically. Two equal forces aligned to one sole intention."
"Hmm," Matthew hums, and smiles, his soft brown gaze drinking in the sight of his lifelong devotion, "it's almost as if we're married, now."
Jonah pauses with a forkful of pancake halfway to his mouth, his blue eyes startled and wide as they flick up to meet Matt's. A delicate blush is already coloring his cheeks, the tops of his ears, the bit of neck peeking out from the buttoned collar of his dress shirt.
"Huh, well. Yeah, I guess. I guess so." He stammers, clearing his throat self consciously, looking shyly away as he finally takes his bite.
"And that's okay with you?" Matthew asks, his tone gentle, leaning forward to catch Jonah's eyes again, an expression of hesitance and worry flitting across his scarred face.
Jonah can't help but smile, can't help the soft, fluttering feeling in his chest as he leans forward as well, reaching out, taking Matthew's bandaged hand in his own.
"Yes," he replies simply, aching with love as the worry melts from Matthew's face, "it's more than okay with me. I'm very happy, Matthew. I'm very glad."
And Jonah doesn't think he's ever seen someone wear happiness the way Matthew does now, the years of loneliness and pain entirely erased from the cancer survivor's face, his expression open and contended in a way Jonah has never seen him. Jonah wonders when the last time Matthew felt like this was—certainly before his diagnosis. And Jonah can't remember the last time he'd felt this assured, either. Certainly not since Mother passed on.
They can't seem to part now, their bandaged hands intertwined together, a palpable exchange of energy flowing warm and pulsing between the two sigils. Both of them finish their breakfast one handed, chatting and talking about everything under the sun—everything from church, to cats, to Milo and Otto, to all of the places they're going to visit, now that they're free.
They're smoking their post-meal cigarette when Matthew asks Jonah:
"Do you want to test out your new power?"
And Jonah hesitates, looking slightly worried for the first time in hours.
"I don't know. I'm not even sure how it works." The medium admits.
"Well…I know for me, when I use my, ah—control, all I have to do is touch you with that sigil, with intent, and it happens."
"But I don't even know what it'll do to you."
Matthew is already shrugging, taking another sip of his coffee, flicking ash off of his cigarette.
"How else are we going to find out?"
When Jonah doesn't respond, biting his lip and looking at the table, Matthew continues.
"I would assume it simply serves to amplify your existing powers and fine-tune them to affect me specifically. For example, instead of having to wait till I'm asleep to see into my subconscious, you could probably do it whenever, now."
Jonah seems to startle, his eyes widening, setting his own coffee mug down with a sharp clack.
"Really? And you'd be okay with that?"
"More than okay." Matthew shrugs again. "I think it's only fair, don't you?"
They settle into a thoughtful silence after that, as they finish their cigarettes.
"Fine," Jonah sighs, as they both snub out their cigarettes, and stands. Matthew immediately stands in response, approaching him, smiling reassuringly as Jonah steadies himself. Jonah presses his bandaged hand to Matthew's forehead, both of them emitting sounds of shock as the connection is instantaneous, almost forceful.
Matthew's internal consciousness blooms inside of Jonah's skull in a cacophony of color and vibrancy. A veritable live wire of love, so intense it's almost manic, heady and all-encompassing, edged in desperate need and want. Happiness, as loud as a siren, ringing through Matthew's brain with its own doppler effect. Devotion, a warm, weighted emotion that blankets the entirety of Matthew's mental faculties in a misty, dewy haze, crystalline, refracting and emitting a wide spectrum of even deeper intentions and feelings in the form of auxiliary colors.
The man's thoughts, too, are there for Jonah's consideration, spoken in Matthew's own voice as if narrated—but the voice sounds younger, sounds like Matt at seventeen, when Jonah first met him.
I wonder what he's seeing, he looks so—
I can get lost in his eyes for-fucking-ever—and he looks so cute like that—
And Jonah can see himself suddenly, reflected in Matthew's mind, looking entranced, mouth slightly parted, as he observes Matthew's thought processes in real time.
Ah, fuck, focus! Stay focused—
Jesus, that mouth—
Fuck!
Panic flashes, quite literally taking shape in Matthew's mind like a ringing alarm bell.
God, what is he even going to think of me, I can't keep it together, like, at all—
Oh no, why is he laughing?
Jonah is laughing because Matthew's gaze is focused on his mouth, the thought of kissing Jonah playing over and over in his head like a film on repeat.
The medium removes his hand and severs the connection. Matt's body sags, relief washing visibly over his face. The man sits back down, his hands fumbling awkwardly with the pack of cigarettes in his front shirt pocket, his face flushed red. He can't seem to meet Jonah's eyes, can't bring himself to look at him, even though he was literally just staring—
"Is it always like that for you?" Jonah asks, taking the pack from the man and smoothly pulling a cigarette free.
"What do you mean?" Matt stammers, eyes still averted as Jonah lights the cigarette and takes a drag.
"When you look at me? Do your thoughts always scatter like that?"
Matthew's blush deepens, the scarring on his face progressively more apparent in stark contrast. He nods and accepts as Jonah hands him the cigarette, studying the filter for a scant few seconds before taking a drag as well, handing it back to the teen.
"Always. Most of my thoughts have something to do with you, you know. They aren't always about how you, er—look, though, I promise. They're usually just about you in general."
"How many of them would you say are about my appearance?"
"I'd say about forty percent, normally. It goes higher depending what we're doing—"
"Like that afternoon at the creek? When you taught me to swim?"
Matthew falters, his startled gaze meeting Jonah's, before his eyes—always so telling—flick down to the teen's mouth and up again, as the medium hollows out his cheeks, breaths smoke through his nose, a trait that always triggers addled thoughts for the professor.
He can't seem to come up with a response, and Jonah's previously neutral expression morphs into a slow, coy smirk.
"What are you thinking about now?"
"I, uh—"
When Matthew developed a stutter, neither of them are sure. Jonah steps forward, raising his sigil hand. He tilts his head to the side, as if asking permission. Matthew shakes his head and steps back, looking almost guilty, muttering:
"You know what I'm thinking."
"I do. I can usually read you like a book, Matthew. Even without this newly established insight, shall we say?"
"I'm sorry—"
"Don't be. I'm glad." Jonah passes the cig back to the man, his fixation in this new existence. "I'd say it's about the same for me. About eighty-five to ninety percent of my thoughts are of you, too, and at least forty percent of them are similar."
Matthew's eyebrows raise to his hairline.
"Oh?"
"Mhm. Maybe more…it's gotten a lot worse, recently. There's one thought, a daydream I keep having. Would you want to see it?"
Matt freezes, a deer in headlights, before nodding hesitantly, looking almost afraid. Jonah finishes their cigarette, snubbing it out in their ashtray before stepping forward again, approaching the professor with that same soft, coy expression. He leans up as Matthew leans down, their foreheads pressing together briefly, like two cats saying hello. It's over in a flash, but that flash of thought, as searing, sudden, and shocking as a lit flare, leaves Matthew half-hard and gasping.
Jonah on his knees on the back porch, birds startled and scattering from trees as Matthew groans his release, buried deep in the back of Jonah's throat.
"Fuck, Jonah—"
The imp wearing a smile and a pink blush, his head tilted innocently to the side.
"I meant what I said, that day at the creek, before it all went to Hell. I know I was drunk, but I meant it. I burn for you. I burn for you terribly."
When they came to stand so close together, neither of them are sure. But here they are, suddenly chest to chest, their eyes finally locked—the witch looking up, his devotee looking down. Matthew's hand, the bandaged one, comes up to cup his little love's face, and it's as if a dam breaks, the sudden ferocity of their mouths meeting, of tongues sliding and morphing together into slick synchronized movement.
Matt's grip on Jonah, his large hands wrapped around slim hips, tightens, pulling Jonah with him as the medium simultaneously pushes him back against the edge of the kitchen table. Jonah's arms are wrapped around Matthew's neck, pulling him down as he tip-toes on and off, the two of them bobbing, doing their best to make up the head-height difference between them. Muffled sounds slip freely, one of Jonah's hands coming up to tangle in his partner's long, soft curls.
Their passionate necking session halts briefly as their foreheads brush accidentally, Jonah bunting up and Matthew pressing further forward at the same time. They both startle, grips tightening, a gasp and a groan at the thought that flashes between them, minds meshed for an instant to think the same thing—
More.
Where Jonah falters, Matthew doesn't, leveraging his grip on his creation to lift Jonah smoothly, suddenly, almost roughly pushing the teen to sit on the edge of their kitchen table, bringing him up higher for better access. The action wrestles a strangled moan from the medium, their lip lock releasing at the action. Jonah huffs out a gasp, flushed with the heat, his head lolling back. His gasp breaks, hitching, morphing to a startled expression of excitement as Matthew's head dips, relishing the opportunity to explore the pale expanse of neck revealed to him, his face buried in the sweet crook of it, lapping and sucking at the vessel's frantic pulse.
Jonah's hands fist in Matthew's shirt, where they shake slightly—tremulous at the mercy of Matt, who worships deeper and further, slow drags of his tongue, nips of his teeth, deepening into hickey-inducing ministrations, soothing sharp pains with warm, slick sensation.
"Ah, fuck, Matt—" his voice wavers, eyes staring half-lidded and unseeing at the shiplap ceiling, the knots and whorls of the wood silent eyes witnessing their undoing.
Matthew breaks away at the sound of his name, panting roughly, his mouth and mustache slick, his eyes burning intensely from within. Almost-religious fervor, again, as he drinks in the sight of his love unraveled at the edges, his devotion palpable in the slight shake in his hands. He eyes Jonah up and down, a hellish smile spreading across his face as he observes the thickening in Jonah's trousers, his button-fly straining to contain.
Leaning around the medium, Matt moves their coffee mugs to the windowsill before brushing the rest of the dishes to the floor with a fluid sweeping motion of his arm, careless in his urgency. The sound of porcelain clattering to wood, one of the plates cracking, startles Jonah, the lust-haze in his eyes disappearing into the wide, anticipatory gaze of spotted prey.
"M-Matthew—"
"Fuck the dishes." Matthew growls as he pushes his fixation to his back with a hand to the boy's chest, laying him out gracelessly on the kitchen table.
Jonah's answering laugh is cut short, breathless and halting, as Matt begins roughly pulling at his clothes, trying to find bare skin as quickly as possible. He gets the shirt untucked, popping the first few buttons of Jonah's trousers open. Matthew bends to mouth along the sliver of creamy skin he's exposed, the tender, taut flesh between hipbones, and Jonah makes a damnable fucking sound, a high-pitched, needy sort of whine. Matthew groans in response, deep in his chest, rucking up the dress shirt as much as he can—the pale-green one, one of his favorites—trying to reach more skin. He loses his patience instead, ripping it open with both hands, white little buttons scattering loudly on the table, rolling and plinking to the wooden floor.
Jonah laughs again, loud and manic, as both of Matthew's hands rove across the exposed expanse, the skin of his stomach visibly trembling. He squirms under the professor's exploration, slips of sound escaping him, one of Matt's palms rough against soft flesh, the other cotton-bandaged and sticky with loosening tape. Jonah grabs Matthew by his shirt, hauling the man down to kiss him again, smoothing pale palms down the occultist's scarred flanks. Matt groans, breaking their kiss only for a moment to discard his own shirt, thrown carelessly to the side. He makes himself at home in the boy's mouth, mapping out teeth and gums, answering each sound of satisfaction with his own. His hands find the vessel's nipples, already peaked and pink-shy, and he drinks down Jonah's gasp, revels in the way his love squirms, the buck of his hips.
"Shit!"
The medium's jaw clenches, teeth gritting together, nails biting into Matthew's sides as the sensitive bud is ruthlessly abused. Considerate, one of Matt's hands is sure not to neglect its twin, rolling and pitching it roughly between thumb and forefinger. Jonah hisses, tossing his head to the side. Unsatisfied, Matthew bites down, releasing just before breaking skin, simultaneously soothing and agitating the scarlet-blooming flesh with laves of warm, wet spittle.
Jonah's cry of shocked pleasure is loud in the stillness of Hell House, akin to a wail as he struggles underneath the weight of the other boy. Matthew pauses, pulling away just enough to check on him, studying the wrecked witch underneath him, catching his own breath. The expression on Jonah's face borders on discomfort, his eyes shut tight, his mouth slick and open, his chest hitching rapidly with each panting breath.
"This okay? You okay?" Matthew asks, his voice deep and rough with want.
Jonah's eyes open only slightly, pale slivers of blue, nodding vacantly.
"Fine," he whispers, a grimace flashing across his face.
Matthew pulls away, sighing in sympathy at Jonah's obvious source of discomfort. The medium's erection strains painfully under buttons, blooming needy and damp, staining his white drawers, visible between the part of his half-unbuttoned trousers.
"Darling boy." Matthew sighs, and Jonah shivers.
He does his best to stay quiet as Matt deftly undoes his trousers the rest of the way, quickly going to work on the tiny buttons of Jonah's drawers. His grip on Matthew tightens, white-knuckled as his need springs forth.
It brings Matt to pause, the sight of it, cast in the cool morning light, cherry red and leaking already. Jonah watches Matthew watch him, and he hides his face behind a shaking hand, groaning in embarrassment. Absolutely entranced, Matt watches in fascination as a bead of precum forms rather quickly, tremulous and clear, wavering in stillness for a second before slipping free, running a slick track down the length of Jonah's erection.
"My God." Matthew breathes, his tone thick and low, and Jonah groans again, his shame apparent in the patchy, deep blush blooming everywhere, flushing his groin, his stomach, his chest, all the way up his neck and to his ears, a livid shade of red.
Jonah chokes on a word, a half-aborted sorry, as Matthew presses a fingertip to an already-forming release of precum, his mouth going dry at the delicate string of fluid connecting his fingertip to Jonah's leaking head.
To say things escalate quickly, after that, is an understatement.
Matt pushes Jonah's trousers and drawers down as far as they'll go while still attached to the teen's suspenders, forgotten and unimportant in the occultist's sudden rush of lust. His uninjured hand wraps around Jonah, hot to the touch—the reincarnation moans, a long, unbroken sound of desperation, as Matthew pumps him in a loose fist. Matt's other hand unbuttons his jeans, wrestling his own dick free, downright tumescent from Jonah's sounds alone.
Jonah is pushed further up the table, the top of his head thunking awkwardly against the window, neck bent at the perfect angle to watch in ecstatic panic as Matthew leans over him, rucking the teen's legs up around his hips. The medium moans helplessly, his mouth slack, as Matthew presses their hips together, sliding his erection up alongside Jonah's. They bump and brush alongside each other, slick and hot and velvet-soft.
Their gazes catch and hold, need reflected like a mirror. Matthew grabs the kid by the suspenders, wrapping them around his hands, taking up any possible slack, as he begins to thrust, establishing a slow, delicious rhythm. They groan and gasp in tandem, a call and response, breathing in each other's space, faces only inches apart, Matthew's hair surrounding them like a curtain.
Jonah's expression is dazed, his glazed, half-lidded eyes sluggishly traveling downward to watch the slow, slick drag of movement. The blunt head of Matthew's cock bunts against the hollow curve of the underside of Jonah's ribs with each upward stroke. Something about the sight of it—the slick trail of precum running the length of his stomach, the clear little kisses of fluid left with each bump—
"Matt, s-stop—gonna—can't—"
Matthew goes still immediately, his knuckles white with effort. He pants with exertion, his chest flushed a patchy red. He wipes his forehead, pulling the hair elastic off of his wrist, holding it between his teeth instead as he gathers all of his hair at the back of his neck, tying it all into a low pony. He watches Jonah take deep, steadying breaths, trying to bring himself back from the very brink.
Jonah nods up at him after a moment, smiling at the way his soulmate's warm brown eyes flash in recognition.
Matthew's back on him in seconds, somehow fucking up against the other boy harder, rougher, than he had before, his insistence growing as he edges slowly closer and closer. Jonah is panting, emitting muffled half-formed cries of pleasure, trapped as he is underneath Matthew, pressed close to the damp curls furring the man's broad chest. A strong arm is wrapped around Jonah, gripping the vessel by the back of his neck, and one of Matthew's knees has made it onto the table for leverage, each of Matt's thrusts jolting the medium roughly against wood. Matt bends his head, burying his face in the crown of Jonah's hair. The reincarnation can feel his creator breathing there, breathing him in, Matthew's groan of ecstasy reverberating through Jonah's skull.
Matthew's hips stutter, his pace faltering. Hanging on by a thread himself, Jonah urges things along by dragging blunt nails down Matthew's sides, leaving thin, pale-pink lines, satisfied when Matt's rhythm breaks again, stilling, the muscles in his back tensing—
"Fuck!"
The witch watches the professor's dick jump, fascinated as it flexes all on its own. Matthew's thrusts pause abruptly as shakes wash over him, his eyes shut tight, his jaw clenched, wavering on a knife's edge. The devotee doesn't even notice as the bandage on his chest is pulled free, already hanging loose by one strip of medical tape, white imprints on flushed skin left behind by the missing tapes.
"You're so beautiful, Matthew." Jonah whispers in adoration, flattening his tongue against the wound, cleaning away sluggishly-rising blood, catching against raw edges.
Matthew comes loudly, his scream echoing in the wide, still rooms of Hell House. Head thrown back, his jaw slack, tears spark instantly in his wide, blown-black eyes, rolling down his ecstatic face. He bears down, locking up as he paints Jonah's stomach and chest with thick white ribbons of semen. One of his hands, his bandaged one, grips Jonah's right hip hard enough to bruise—inadvertently pressing their sigils, Jonah's binding and Matthew's control, together.
The connection is immediate. It feels like an electric shock, paralyzing, searing—for one dazed, confused millisecond, Jonah thinks it's happening again, his hands flying up to press flat against the scars on his temples, as if trying to hold his head together. The medium's whole body jolts, arching up, entirely still, lost in the electrical current.
Matthew comes back to his senses just in time to witness Jonah's orgasm, awed by the sheer force of it. The witch comes soundlessly, his mouth open in a silent cry as pulse after pulse of cum leaves him, streaking along the teen's stomach, pooling in his navel, painting his chest, forceful enough, even, to spatter the underside of his own jaw.
"God, baby," he croaks, lifting himself further off of the vessel to give the kid room to breathe.
He's shaking hard, great teeth-clattering shakes, his body still arched, tight as a bow-string, and Matt's awe morphs to concern as he realizes the medium's eyes are still rolled back, white and unseeing.
"Jonah?" He asks, finally releasing his grip on the vessel. The second his palm leaves Jonah's hip, the body goes limp, falling back to the table with a heavy thwump. The eyes flutter, rolling back, half-lidded slivers of neon. A whimper, low and wrecked, claws its way up Jonah's throat and out of his slack, drooling mouth.
Matthew reaches for him, intending to comfort, thinking already of aftercare, when his stomach lurches, his eyes widening as he finally notices the blood seeping through the bandage on his palm, the bandage covering Jonah's hip, the sigils clearly emblazoned in red on the cotton.
"Oh fuck, fuck—shit, Jonah, are you alright?"
The occultist staggers to his feet, gathering Jonah up as best as he can into a sitting position, the body limp and clammy, tacky with the mingled leavings of their ecstasy.
Jonah doesn't initially respond, the expression on his face one of open vulnerability, as he looks up at Matthew, his cornflower eyes muddled with confusion.
"Oh God, baby, I'm so sorry—I didn't mean to—"
But then Jonah is smiling, a soft, slow expression of contentment and joy, and he laughs, weak little giggles giving way to deep belly laughs.
"It seems your control may have some interesting uses, hmm?" The golem finally says, his tone lilting and coy.
"Fuck, kid, I didn't mean to—"
"I know. Jesus, that was intense—what even was your intention, during?"
Matthew's intention, of course, had been to make the object of his devotion come.
Jonah wriggles, slipping to the floor with the intention to stand, only for his shaking, coltish legs to give, Matthew catching him just in time. The master sits, pulling his love into his lap, snuggling him up close, doing his best to warm the kid up. Matt looks stricken, absentmindedly petting Jonah's hair as the medium nuzzles his face into Matthew's bare chest, uncaring of the dirtiness between them.
"I won't do it again, I didn't even realize—"
"I know, darling. It's okay, really—as I said, that sigil of yours may have its uses after all. That was the most mind-blowing interaction of either of my lives."
Jonah sighs dreamily, and Matt can't help but laugh in response, bending his head to nose along the crown of his soulmate's silky black hair.
"Same here, silly goose. That was literally the best sex I've ever had the honor of participating in."
This sends Jonah into another fit of giggles, Matthew grinning at him as he leans down to retrieve their forgotten pack of cigarettes from the floor.
"That's a shame, Matt. You're so old, and that's the best you've had yet?"
Matt's face scrunches, his nose wrinkling, offended, as he lights two cigarettes at once.
"Don't be fucking rude, kid, thirty-five isn't old, and you're what, like, ninety-nine? Almost a fucking century—keep acting up and I'll drop your ass off at a nursing home."
"I am. One hundred years old, that is." The reincarnation sniffs, accepting the cigarette, sighing in immediate pleasure as he takes a long, deep drag.
"When did we miss your birthday? Weren't you technically ninety-nine when I reincarnated you?"
"It was mid-October, the 15th? Last week, I think?"
"Why didn't you say anything, honey? We could have celebrated—"
"I have a new birthday now." Jonah states with a shrug, looking nonplussed as he smokes his cigarette in contentment.
This statement, however, doesn't really sit right with Matt, leaving him with a sense of loss and sadness.
"Well, sure, but you're still Jonah Aickman—"
"Campbell." The reincarnation corrects, without missing a beat. "We're basically married now, remember?"
"Hmm, well. Kind of." Matthew hums, pausing inhaling and exhaling, a grin spreading slow across his scarred, weathered face. "Do you know what your ring size is, darling?"
Jonah cackles, turning to face Matthew, absolutely beaming.
"You sentimental old fool!"