Page 96 of These Old Lies

The man pulled off and gave Charlie a few lazy slow strokes with his hand. “What I was trying to say is that I always found that turnabout rule quite limiting. Whereas I like to be a bit more creative.”

Charlie was past games, or words really. “For the love of mercy, if you’regoing to kneel like that, Lieutenant, please stop talking.”

The other man didn’t put his mouth back, even as Charlie’s hips bucked against him. “My name is Ned.”

“What?” Why were they still talking?

“You can call me Ned.” Charlie looked down at the lieutenant—no,Ned—kneeling at his cock, gazing up at him. Like he was someone worth looking at. A shiver ran down Charlie’s spine that wasn’t just from the sex.

He ran his fingers around Ned’s jaw as the other man put his mouth back on Charlie’s cock. “Oh God, Ned, don’t stop. Jesus Christ! Ned!”

???

Ned

“I think I should thank you for taking the initiative.” Ned could still taste the corporal in his mouth. He wanted to lick his lips. Still, he was aghast with himself at what he had done. Eyeing up an enlisted man, even if he was a walking version of Ned’s sexual fantasies with his broad shoulders and soft curly hair, was one thing. Following that said sexual fantasy outside, and sucking him off, should have felt like a horrific mistake. Except it didn’t.

“You get what you wanted, Ned?”

Oh Jesus. He had begged the corporal to call him by his first name. Ned flushed, embarrassed at his complete lack of composure, and even worse, in pleasure at hearing his name in that low baritone.

“Most certainly.” Ned managed to say that with some dignity.

“If you say so.” The man shrugged.

Ned needed to pull himself together. He had responsibilities, expectations to meet. He hadn’t gone to war to fuck handsome boys. “We shouldn’t leave together. Do you want to go first?”

The corporal stood up and reached in his pocket for some cigarettes. “My unit is back from the front in a week’s time.”

No. This could not be repeated. Ever. Ned had gone a year without sex, he could go a year more. Yet his voice said, “I look forward to it.”

33 On Earth as It is in Heaven

Oxford, 25 April 1942

Charlie

Charlie’s first month in the Conchie Corps had been as frustrating as his last time in the army. Too many inane rules and too little common sense. Uncomfortable beds and dull food. Yet the boys he served with looked up to him—God knows why—and listened to his advice. He respected their courage in standing up for their beliefs, even if their idealism made him roll his eyes more often than not. His section had been assigned to guard German prisoners of war, and Charlie was determined that they did so with dignity. On his good days he had been able to nudge the behaviour of the boys and their NCOs in the right direction.

Miraculously, his request for leave had been approved for the week of the 25th April, and if life were poetry, he and Ned would have gone to bed in each other’s arms, sleeping peacefully the night before their vows.

However, deciding to spend their lives together didn’t mean that the rest of the world went away, or that all wounds were healed. Ned was late getting home. Charlie had barely laid his head on his pillow before he started to tremble with fear, memories of the last war dancing in his eyes. He hated that his nightmares had gotten worse since he was in the NCC. Ned had sleepily rubbed his back as Charlie stared out the window and fought to get his heart to stop racing.

Ned’s soothing must have worked, because the next thing Charlie knew, he was slowly waking to the early morning light, bright and full of possibility. He was snuggled against Ned, and he held his lover closer, watching how thesun caught all of Ned’s contours, the lines on his face, the curve of his hip, the long lines of his fingers.

Sometimes life was better than poetry.

“Good morning,” Ned whispered against Charlie’s skin.

“Happy is the groom that the sun shines on, eh?” Charlie’s fingers ran down Ned’s sides, caressing and soothing, letting Ned relax into the sensation of having Charlie’s skin against his, Charlie’s foot stretching against Ned’s.

“I don’t think that is the expression.” Ned had struggled with how to describe what they were doing today—marriage, wedding, husband—these words and states were all defined by the church, by the state. In Charlie’s mind it was simple. Those were the words for the promises they were making to each other, and the rest of the world could be damned.

“I think it is now,” Charlie whispered, gently kissing Ned’s cheek.

As he stared into those hazel eyes, his past, present, and future flashed before him. He saw Ned as an inexperienced lieutenant, shouldering a terrifying responsibility, the brilliant and elegant man he had become, and the man he would age into, generous and wise. Charlie’s throat swelled up with emotion that somehow, in a life full of chaos, he had managed to intertwine his life with Ned’s.

“What would you like, my love?”