Page 15 of The Most Unusual Haunting of Edgar Lovejoy

Jamie

Jamie’s mind was reeling. Edgar was intensely hot and saw ghosts.

The ghost part explained a lot: Edgar’s haunted hypervigilance, his impulse to guard his secret, his terror at the ghost tour––god, Jamie could kick themself for that one.

And honestly, after some of the, er, creative possibilities that Jamie’s brain had spat out late at night, this explanation was a relief.

But even though Jamie was desperately curious to hear everything about ghosts, it was the intensely hot part that currently occupied them. Edgar was gorgeous, yeah, but it was how he responded to Jamie that made them burn for him. Desire, vulnerability, need.

He’d practically come undone at the touch of Jamie’s hand on his cheek. They couldn’t wait to see what touching him elsewhere might do.

Turning off the shower, Jamie wrapped a towel gone stiff with bleach around their hips.

Even two years after top surgery, twenty years of thinking of their chest as something to hide, twenty years of it being sexualized, made the act of casually going without their shirt feel like breaking the rules.

But this was what they’d had to do: practice until the feeling receded.

Until they could deny indoctrination by sheer stubborn habit.

Breathing in through their nose and out through their mouth, Jamie took control. After a minute, their posture relaxed, and their shoulders settled. A few more minutes after that, and breathing was once more automatic.

Jamie pretended they were onstage at the Never Lounge, controlling the crowd with confidence and power. Power was a mindset, and Jamie breathed into it with their whole body. Only when they were full up with it did they walk out of the bathroom and back to Edgar.

He was hovering around the food, the old tube television tuned to a nature program.

Outside, the storm still lashed, but inside room 3A, they were comfortable and dry.

“I’m glad I don’t have to spend my whole life constantly terrified of predators,” Jamie mused as the camera closed in on the terrified liquid eyes of an ibex while a puma burst from the scrubby brush.

Edgar mumbled something noncommittal as he selected a piece of fried chicken, but he wouldn’t meet Jamie’s eyes.

“Do you feel like that?” they asked him.

Edgar appeared to shrink into himself at the question, all his physical strength and size useless in the face of a noncorporeal threat.

Suddenly Jamie wanted to jump on him, to tip his chin up and look directly into his eyes. They wanted the real Edgar. The Edgar that wasn’t trying not to scare them away.

Jamie insinuated their knees around Edgar’s and leaned in. “Tell me,” they said softly but with command. “I want…I really fucking want to know you, Edgar. Tell me?”

“Yes.” Edgar was looking at Jamie’s palms on his thighs. “I feel like I’m always at the watering hole just waiting for a fucking tiger to appear and rip me to pieces.”

He said it in a rush and then squeezed his eyes shut.

Jamie moved slowly but deliberately. They straddled Edgar’s knees and wound their arms around his neck.

They were the same height like this, and Jamie could feel the shuddering breath that Edgar took.

But he didn’t push them away. He rested one hand gently at Jamie’s lower back, keeping them there.

With the other hand, Edgar pinched the bridge of his nose like he had a headache.

“Have the ghosts ever hurt you?” Jamie asked gently. “Are they dangerous?”

When Edgar’s eyes fluttered open again, they were the eyes of a child waking from a nightmare. The eyes of a man who didn’t believe in hope but wanted so badly to be wrong.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“But you’re scared they will?”

“Jamie,” Edgar said in a voice so small, it seemed to come from somewhere deep and choked inside him. “I’m scared of everything. All the time.”

Jamie threw their arms around his shoulders and squeezed him tight.

“Being scared sucks so much,” they said, stroking Edgar’s hair.

With a groan, Edgar’s head fell forward and thunked against Jamie’s sternum.

They could feel his warm breath on their chest. Jamie pressed a kiss to the top of Edgar’s head.

They cradled him in their arms, and it felt so right.

Even though their towel was damp and their hair was cold and the room smelled of mildew and cold fried chicken, Edgar’s presence rendered those things unimportant.

They tilted Edgar’s face up and kissed his forehead, the bridge of his nose, the curve of his cheek. They pressed a gentle fingertip to the teardrop above his upper lip and stroked the thin skin behind his ears. When his eyes fluttered shut, Jamie kissed his eyelids.

“I wanna kiss you so fucking bad,” Jamie said, voice rough with desire. “It doesn’t have to be anything more than that, but I—”

“Kiss me, please. Fuck, please, just—”

Jamie caught Edgar’s mouth in a kiss. At first, it was sweet, but at the tension in Edgar’s thighs and his hand at the small of their back pressing them closer together, Jamie’s control snapped.

They opened their mouth to the velvet swipe of Edgar’s tongue.

The kiss deepened, and Edgar moaned, the sound ripping through Jamie with a jolt of lust. They cradled Edgar’s face and feasted on his mouth until he was writhing beneath them.

Heat pulsed between Jamie’s legs, and they wanted to press into Edgar, feel him from the inside. But they forced themself to end the kiss.

They were both breathing heavily, looking into each other’s burning eyes.

“Jesus,” Edgar murmured, sounding surprised.

Jamie kissed him again. This time, their tongues met and tangled, their lips barely containing the kiss.

Jamie moved closer, and their nipples brushed Edgar’s chest. They shivered at the delicious sensation, and Edgar’s arms tightened around them.

Desire burned in Jamie’s gut. They threaded fingers through Edgar’s hair and pulled gently.

Edgar shuddered and then froze. Jamie did it again. Edgar’s nipples hardened, and he shut his eyes.

“Mmmm.” Jamie pressed against Edgar, helplessly turned on.

Edgar pulled them closer, and their lips reunited. This time, the kiss was slow as honey and hot with promise.

Jamie trailed kisses across Edgar’s jaw and sucked lightly at the skin of his throat. Edgar’s hips bucked, and Jamie felt his erection.

“Sorry, I—” Edgar began, but Jamie clapped a hand over his mouth.

“Shut up,” they said. “You’re fucking exquisite. Don’t apologize.”

Edgar swallowed, and then he pressed a kiss to Jamie’s palm.

It was as if, denied the ability to explain, Edgar let his body speak for him. He slid the hand at Jamie’s back slowly down their spine to the swell of their ass. Jamie’s breath caught. Even through their towel, they could feel the strength in Edgar’s hands, feel how gently he applied it.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, Edgar’s responses were driving Jamie wild.

They replaced the hand over Edgar’s mouth with their mouth, and as they both melted into the kiss, Jamie tightened their hand in Edgar’s hair again.

This time, they tugged a bit harder and longer.

Edgar gasped and shuddered, pulling Jamie to him and burying his face in their neck.

“S-stop. I—”

Jamie gentled their hand and stroked Edgar’s hair. “Are you okay?” they asked with a soft kiss to Edgar’s cheek.

“Uh-huh. It’s been a really…really long time, and I just…” He shivered.

Jamie eased off his lap. For a moment, Edgar looked bereft. Then he saw the hand Jamie held out to him, and his expression eased. He took it, and Jamie led him to the bed.

They were relieved Edgar had called time-out, because they weren’t sure they could have.

“Cuddle with me?” they asked.

Edgar hesitated a moment, looking lost, as if he wasn’t sure Jamie was serious. They got beneath the covers, wincing as the wet towel bunched beneath them. They pulled it off and dropped it on the floor.

When they patted the bed beside them, a flush burned high on Edgar’s cheeks, but his eyes were soft. “Yeah. Okay.”

He lay on top of the covers for a moment, then got underneath as well, shedding his own towel.

“C’mere,” Jamie said and put out an arm.

Edgar arranged himself so he lay on his side with his head resting on Jamie’s shoulder and draped his arm across their stomach. Jamie gathered him in so they could stroke his hair.

“You’re…” Edgar began, but he seemed unable to finish the sentence. He trailed off and began tracing patterns on Jamie’s skin.

Jamie grabbed a handful of his hair. They didn’t pull, just squeezed, and Edgar’s eyes fluttered. He squirmed. Finally, he looked at Jamie.

“I’m?” Jamie prompted.

“You’re very hot,” Edgar said.

“You’re very hot too,” Jamie said. “We’re not gonna go any farther tonight. Just kissing.”

Edgar bit his lip. “Thanks.”

“You have permission to keep grabbing my ass though,” they added with a grin.

In one effortless movement, Edgar switched their positions, pulling Jamie onto his chest so his large hand could cup Jamie’s ass.

“Good to know,” Edgar said, and Jamie laughed.

“Your enthusiasm is appreciated by my ass.”

“Your ass is appreciated by my…uh…enthusiasm?”

“Is that what the kids are calling it these days?”

Edgar kissed Jamie’s lips gently, sweetly.

“Hey, can you reach my phone?” he asked.

Jamie contorted themself to snag the phone from the windowsill where Edgar had plugged it in.

“Checking the weather?” they asked. The storm seemed to have quieted a bit. Or maybe they’d just been too distracted by Edgar to notice it.

Edgar shook his head. Jamie traced Edgar’s ribs, the planes of muscle smooth between each curve of bone. Edgar balanced his phone on his stomach and tapped the screen, revealing something pixelated and dark.

“What am I looking at?”

“You’ll see.”

Edgar tapped a settings panel and then something that looked like a switch, and the image onscreen brightened and resolved.

“Oh. My. God. Is that…?”

“Yup.”