In a Yellow Wood

Blaise woke up tucked neatly in white sheets and the dream of warm limbs tangling in his arms. There was a face imprinted at the back of his lids; a name lingered unuttered on his lips, and his body molded itself to fit the lines of a phantom figure. Through half-closed lids Blaise watched fingers dancing on the skin of his stomach, only to find it was only the sunlight playing with shadows.

But it could have been something else entirely.

^^^

The rain pelted down on him and he was glad for the drying charm he'd cast earlier. Lightning punctuated the black, starless night, and flashes of colored light illuminated it up every now and then. In the shadows he breathed, face masked and covered with tiny beads of sweat, ducking and running and hiding and attacking.

The ground was muddy and his boots plopped and squished and he took care not to lose his footing, and he wanted to be sure he was fine and holding his own, but that didn't belong to his plan so he fought off the urge, and somewhere in the darkness and chaos, in the open air between the trees that stood for protection, before the fumbling for a wand and after black hood fell to reveal olive brown skin and soft brown hair and lashes that fluttered close, he saw green light against black cloak and in an unplanned moment of something between grief and regret, he wished he could have told him.

^^^

Life went as Blaise planned--every important event falling in step to his calculations, each day part of the sequence he'd laid out for himself. Things happened as he expected--no, intended--them to and nothing took him by surprise. He calculated and he manipulated and soon he was Marked, and it was part of the life he knew he'd live so he took it all in stride, the way he wanted to take anything in.

"Did it hurt?" Theodore asked him, face impassive and arms crossed, nodding coolly at Blaise's arm.

"No." It did, though, but he'd known it would, and he'd been able to stop himself from screaming.

"I'm getting mine in two weeks' time," Theodore said simply, and it wasn't Blaise's plan to want to say no, but it was there anyway, and in a moment he wondered how important following his original plans were.

They could have run away.

^^^

It was what he'd expected himself to do, and it was what he did, partly because it was easier, partly because he was already shaking his head, but mostly because he didn't want to believe anything was his decision to make.

The unspoken apology hung in the air between them, thick and uncomfortable and suffocating, so he backed away to give it space, and he wanted to turn away but light brown held blue-gray, and even when they pulled away he found himself looking. He was only a few feet away but it could have been miles, and finally he turned away and miles stretched to a lifetime of lost chances--risks, he corrected himself--and he turned away and that was it. But the uncertainty he thought would go away then clung to him, a chilly, unsettling presence that prodded and questioned and wondered, even as he told himself he'd done the only thing he could have done, because there were no choices, and what else could he have done?

He could have kissed him.

^^^

"I like you," Theodore had said, first looking him in the eye and, finding him looking back with an expression he couldn't recognize from the years they've shared notes and dorms and summer holidays, averting his gaze to the ground. Blaise watched him bite his lip and wonder if he'd made the right decision or gone about it the right way, while Blaise wondered why things could never be simple enough, why decisions had to be made, and why sometimes compromises didn't, couldn't, happen.

The silence stretched out between them, pushing them away, and the doubts that had crept to the back of their minds loomed even more, pulling them apart as they looked for a reason to struggle against it.

It would be easier, Blaise thought. Or it may not be.

What was I thinking, Theodore wondered.

"Look at me," Blaise said finally, and Theodore did.

vvv

It was partly because he wanted to know what it would be like, partly because his feet were already moving toward him, but mostly because he was there and he wanted to and it was the best way he knew how to say what he wanted to say.

Hand tilted chin, blue-gray met light brown, and lips touched lips. He felt him freeze under his touch, but only for a moment, and he felt the smile form on his lips as he kissed back, felt his body mold itself, melt itself into his as he pressed himself closer, and the doubts, niggling at the periphery of his consciousness, voices of what had always been reason and truth alike, were chased away by the hand that tangled into his hair and the fingers that clung to his arm and the lashes that fluttered close against his cheek.

vvv

And there were so many things, so much in between, that he indulged himself, lost himself, and it didn't matter that he couldn't clearly see what he was doing, that he no longer thought everything out, that he felt so much more different and yet so much like himself.

Theodore's smile can do that to a person.

"Let's run away," Blaise whispered into Theodore's ear, smiling impishly as he held the other boy by the waist, resting his head on Theodore's shoulder.

"From what? To where?" Theodore laughed, shaking his head and deciding to play along.

"Everything. Anywhere." Blaise caught the lobe of Theodore's ear, pulling the boy closer.

There was silence, and Theodore nodded.

vvv

He tugged at the buttons impatiently, no longer content with only the warmth emanating from the other side of the fabric of his clothing. His lips were pressed on his in an openmouthed kiss, and he ran his tongue under the roof of his mouth, over his tongue, and he sucked at his bottom lips and he groaned into his kiss.

One by one the buttons popped free, the third one from the top popping off completely, and finally there was skin and he ran his hands over his chest down his stomach up his sides and it was warm and soft and he pressed himself closer and somewhere in between the hungry kisses and the urgent touches, tucked into the spaces where their bodies didn't touch, caught by the air that lingered trapped between their ragged breathing and softly whispered, quietly murmured words, he told him he loved him.

vvv

Blaise woke up tangled in white sheets and warm limbs, dark brown hair snuggled in against the crook of his neck and soft fingers tracing lightly on the space on his stomach. Through half-closed lids Blaise watched as olive brown fingers traced patterns and trailed paths on his skin, soft whispers fluttering at the periphery of his senses.

"Morning," Theodore turned to face him, soft brown hair tickling his cheek, soft soft lips drawing a line down his jaw to the corner of his neck where shoulder began.

It should have been like this all along.