Page 5

L eo fell asleep exactly like I knew he would: fighting it until the last possible second. I kept my hand on his stomach, feeling each breath, memorizing the soft curves that he tried so hard to hide. I knew Leo was self-conscious about how he looked, but he didn’t need to be. He was perfect just the way he was, every inch of him. Perfect and safe and mine .

He shifted restlessly in his sleep, making small sounds of distress. Nightmares about the fire, probably. I pulled him closer, pressed my lips to the back of his neck. "I've got you."

His whole body relaxed at my voice. Then, still deep in sleep, he turned in my arms until he was facing me. His face pressed into my chest, right against the health bar tattoo. Even unconscious, he trusted me completely. The power of that knowledge burned hotter than any fire I'd ever set.

I breathed in my scent on his skin. He'd used my soap, was wearing my clothes, sleeping in my bed. Every territorial instinct I had purred with satisfaction. This was how he should always smell, like he belonged to me.

My mind kept returning to that kiss. To the way his body had responded instantly. To how something had shifted in me when our lips connected. It wasn't sexual attraction in the way I understood it from other people's descriptions. I didn't look at Leo and feel that urgent need to get naked with him that Xander described when talking about his conquests.

But there was something else there. Something I couldn't name. A connection that went beyond my usual need for control. Seeing him like this made me realize how much I wanted him to be safe. Happy. Satisfied. His wellbeing had somehow become essential to my own. I didn't need to have sex with him for that to be true, but if Leo needed that kind of connection... maybe? The thought didn't repulse me the way it normally would with anyone else. If it was Leo, maybe I could want that too.

I smiled as he shifted, pressing himself against my thigh. He was still hard and, from the feel of it, having a damn good dream. His body was betraying all his carefully maintained control, all those walls he built up around his want. And he had no idea. I shifted my leg slightly, giving him better access, curious how far this would go. The way his breathing hitched when I moved told me everything I needed to know about who starred in his dream.

I studied his face in the dim light. The long dark lashes against his cheeks. The slight parting of his lips as his breathing quickened. The way his hands clutched at me like he was afraid I'd disappear. This was Leo without his defenses, without the careful distance he maintained to hide how he felt about me. This was Leo at his most honest, his most vulnerable.

And it was beautiful.

The word caught me off guard. Not a term I typically applied to people. Beautiful was for elegant code, for the perfect symmetry of a well-executed exploit, for the transformative power of fire. Not for soft-eyed tech nerds with questionable taste in anime.

Yet here I was, transfixed by the sight of him.

"Look at you," I murmured, petting his hair as he whimpered and rutted against me, still fast asleep. "So desperate you can't even wait until you're awake." My voice softened, surprising even me. "Don't worry. I'll take care of all your needs."

It was my responsibility, after all. Everything about Leo belonged to me. His safety, his happiness, and apparently his sexual frustration, too. The thought should have made me uncomfortable. Sex had always been a gray area for me, a theoretical concept that held little personal appeal. I'd identified as asexual for years, and it had felt right. Simplifying. A clean explanation for why I didn't experience attraction the way others seemed to.

But this—watching Leo seek pleasure even in sleep, knowing I was the cause—felt different. I didn’t want to strip down and fuck him, or have him fuck me, but there was something undeniably satisfying about knowing I could give him this. That I could be the one to break down his barriers, to see him completely unguarded.

His movements grew more desperate, little gasps escaping against my chest. I could feel the exact moment he started to wake up. The way his body tensed, his breath catching as consciousness crept in.

"Oh god." His voice was pure panic. He tried to scramble away, practically falling over himself in his rush to apologize. "Fuck, Xavier, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to... I would never... Please don't..."

I kept my arm around him, preventing his escape. "You're not going anywhere. And if you apologize one more time for having basic needs, I'm going to be annoyed."

"But I was... And you're... And I..." He was practically hyperventilating. "This is so fucked up, I can't believe I..."

"Leo." I cut through his spiral with the voice that always made him listen. "Do you need to come?"

He made a strangled sound. "What?"

"It's a simple question." I kept my tone matter of fact, but something inside me was shifting, realigning. This wasn't just about helping him anymore. There was a need growing in me too, not for sexual release, but for connection. For crossing this boundary between us in a way that would make him irreversibly mine. "You're stressed, you're touch starved, and you've had a hell of a night. If you need to get off to feel better, that's fine. If not, also fine. But stop acting like this is some huge deal."

He stared at me like I'd grown a second head. "You're my best friend."

"And?" I shifted my thigh deliberately against him, feeling his cock twitch in response. The physical reaction fascinated me in a detached sort of way, but what really captivated me was the vulnerability in his eyes. The naked want mixed with fear of rejection. "You're also mine to take care of. Anything you need, I'm here for it. I've told you that a thousand times, so stop making this complicated."

"But..."

I paused, suddenly unsure. This was new territory for me too, and I found myself wanting him to be fully on board, not just accepting my decision because I'd bulldozed over his concerns. "I'm offering to help. If you want it. If you don't, that's fine too. But don't overthink this because of some idea that I don't want it."

"Do you, though?" His voice was small, hesitant. "Want this, I mean. You've always said you don't... that you're not into..."

The question hit somewhere vulnerable. Did I want this? Not in the way he probably meant. But in some way I couldn't fully articulate yet? Yes.

"I want you," I said finally, the words feeling right as they left my mouth. "Not in the conventional sense, maybe. But I want to take care of you. Want to be the one who helps you through this. I want to… I want to be the reason you feel safe, happy, and sated." I met his eyes, letting him see the truth there. "Does that count?"

Something in his expression shifted, hope replacing uncertainty. "Yeah," he whispered. "Yeah, that counts."

His hips moved slightly, like he couldn't help himself. "You really don't mind?"

"Mind isn't in the same universe as what I'm feeling right now," I admitted, the honesty surprising me. I tightened my grip on his hip, guiding him into a rhythm against my thigh. "There. Just like that."

"Fuck," he breathed, pressing his face against my chest. "This is... intense."

"Good intense?" I asked, needing to be sure. This was Leo, after all. Not just another variable to control.

"Really good," he gasped, movements growing more urgent. "So fucking good, Xavier. I've wanted this for so long."

The raw honesty in his voice did something to me. Cracked something open that I'd kept carefully sealed. "Me too," I admitted, the words coming easier than expected. "Didn't understand it. Still don't, not completely. But I've wanted something with you. Something more than what we had."

He made a sound that was half laugh, half moan. "And this is your solution? Letting me hump your leg while you psychoanalyze both of us?"

"Effective, isn't it?" I grinned, enjoying the way his breathing hitched as I adjusted my grip on his hip. "You've stopped panicking. Started being honest about what you want."

"What I want," he gasped, movements growing more erratic, "is more than this. Not... not right now. But eventually. I want... everything with you, X."

Everything. Hearing that word from him in this context filled some empty space I hadn't realized existed. I didn’t know what everything entailed, but I wanted to.

He pressed his face into my chest, his rhythm faltering as he got closer. "I'm gonna... fuck, Xavier, I'm close."

"I know," I murmured, tightening my grip to guide him. "Go on. I’ve got you."

He came with a broken gasp against my chest, and I couldn't look away from his face. The way his eyes squeezed shut, lips parting, every muscle tensing, then releasing. It was fucking beautiful. He was beautiful. My beautiful Leo, falling apart in my arms because I let him, because I helped him, because he trusted me enough to be this vulnerable.

Something shifted in my chest as I held him through the aftershocks. I'd always known he was mine to protect, but this was different. Watching him experience this kind of pleasure, knowing I caused it? That filled some need I hadn't even known I had. I wanted to see this again. Wanted to learn every sound he could make, every way his body could shake apart. Giving him this satisfaction felt like the purest form of connection.

And my body was responding too. I was hard. Actually, painfully hard. Was this what sexual attraction felt like? The sudden awareness made me pause. I'd never responded this way to another person before. Did this mean I wanted to have sex with him? The thought didn't repulse me immediately, which was strange enough by itself.

"Feel better?" I asked once his breathing evened out.

"Jesus," he breathed after a moment. "That was..."

"Messy," I finished for him, reaching for the tissues by my bed. Now that the moment was passing, I noticed the wet spot spreading on his borrowed sweats with growing discomfort. Right. Bodily fluids. The reality of what had just happened crashed back in. Usually, the very thought of cum made my skin crawl, made me want to scrub myself clean. The fact that I'd been so caught up in Leo's pleasure that I'd temporarily forgotten about my aversion was... significant.

"Here." I tried to keep the sudden revulsion from my voice. It wasn't Leo's fault that I found bodily fluids disgusting. "I'll grab you fresh sweats."

"You don't have to..."

"You want to sleep in cum-soaked pants? Because I'm not letting you in my bed if you do."

He took the tissues with a shaky laugh. "Right. Yeah. Okay."

I got up and grabbed him clean sweats from my drawer, tossing them over. As he changed, I found myself thinking about what had just happened. About the boundaries I'd thought were fixed suddenly becoming permeable. About the growing need to define what we were to each other now.

"So," Leo said once we were both cleaned up and back in bed. "What does this make us?" He was curled against my chest again, more hesitant this time, as if afraid I'd changed my mind.

"It makes us us," I said, pulling him closer, letting him settle into his usual spot against my health bar tattoo. "Do we need a more specific label than that?"

"Maybe not," he admitted. "But I need to know where the boundaries are. What's okay and what isn't. What you want from this versus what you're willing to do for my sake."

I considered for a moment, trying to articulate feelings I'd never bothered to examine before. "I want you. I don’t mean that in the way most people do, I think. I don't look at you and think about fucking you. But I think about you being mine. About taking care of you. About being the person you come to for everything. Including this." I paused, fingers threading through his hair. "I like making you feel good. I like being in control of your pleasure."

He was quiet for a moment, processing. "So this doesn't weird you out? My body's reaction to you, I mean."

"The only weird thing is how you keep expecting me to be freaked out by this," I said, tugging him closer. "I know my own boundaries, Leo. If I didn't want this, it wouldn't be happening."

"Okay." He relaxed against me, the tension finally leaving his body. "And what about you? About your... needs?"

The question caught me off guard. No one had ever really asked about my needs before, not in this context. Most people assumed I didn't have any because of how I identified.

"I need control," I said finally. "I need to know you're safe. I need to be the person you rely on." I hesitated, then added, "Beyond that... I'm still figuring it out. Is that enough for now?"

He nodded against my chest. "More than enough." His voice dropped, vulnerable again. "Just don't shut me out while you're figuring it out, okay? Talk to me. Tell me what works and what doesn't."

"I will," I promised, surprising myself with how much I meant it. "This is new territory for me too, Leo. I'm not used to... feeling like this."

"Like what?" he asked, genuine curiosity in his voice.

"Uncertain," I admitted. "I've always known exactly who I am. What I want. What I'm capable of. But with you, it's like the rules keep changing." I tightened my arms around him. "And the strangest part is, I'm okay with that. I want to figure it out. With you."

He made a soft sound of contentment and settled against me. Just before he drifted off, I heard him murmur, "Thanks, X."

I held him while his breathing evened out, my mind spinning with new questions. Were we still just friends? Best friends who got each other off didn't seem like a category most people had. But 'boyfriends' felt wrong, too. Too simple, too conventional for what we were building. Still, we were friends, and boys... So did that count?

People always acted like there was this clear line between friendship and romance, like one day you woke up and suddenly everything was different. But I'd loved Leo for two years already as my best friend, as my favorite person to game with, as the one who understood my code and my fire. Did making him come change that? Make it more? Less?

Maybe romance was just friendship with orgasms? But that felt too simple. I wanted to possess him, protect him, please him. Wanted him to wear my clothes and use my soap and sleep in my bed. Wanted to learn every way to make him fall apart. Was that romance? Or just an extension of him being mine?

What I did know was that whatever we were, whatever label eventually fit, Leo was mine now. Mine to protect, mine to care for, and now mine to satisfy. And I never half-assed anything when it came to taking care of what belonged to me.

I pressed my lips to his hair, breathing in my scent on his skin. Whatever this was, friendship or romance or something else entirely, I knew one thing: I wanted to keep exploring it with Leo.