La Mer

aka the mermaid fic

Adam has left his tea to cool on the counter—because shaking hands and hot liquids are never a good idea—and he's staring out the window at the multi-colored city lights that all blend together, when he hears the sound of naked feet hitting the floor with unpracticed steps. He takes a deep breath and turns around to see Kris leaning against the door, holding onto the frame with both hands to keep his balance. He looks as if he's just stepped off a carnival ride.

"Adam," Kris says with a relieved sigh, and lets his body sag a little. He seems even tinier than normal in Adam's pajama pants; they hang low enough that Adam can see his hipbones jutting out. His hair has dried in wild tufts—this is the first time Adam has seen it completely dry since the night they met—and it makes him look more adorable than he has any right to be. Looking at his chest, bare and hairless and perfectly smooth, Adam feels the ghost of its warmth against his palms. He's spent three months' worth of nights mapping that skin with his hands and mouth; he knows it by touch and taste and smell now.

"This is not a good idea."

It's a good thing that Adam has been practicing that opening line, because all he can think at the sight of Kris is touch him, kiss him, keep him, make him happy.

If only making Kris happy was that easy.

"What isn't?" Kris says innocently.

Adam pulls his eyes away—it's cowardly but necessary—and looks out the window again, making a show of checking the sky. "We can still make it to the beach before sunrise."

In a perfect world, Kris would now say, 'Sure, Adam, let me get my shoes,' and they would leave for the beach and say their goodbyes, kiss one last time; Kris would swim away, back to his family, and Adam would go on to New York as he'd planned. But this isn't a perfect world, and Kris doesn't even own any shoes. In this not-so-perfect world, Kris chooses to narrow his eyes at Adam instead, shooting him a death glare to rival Brad's.

Adam misses the days when Kris was all smiles. This is, no doubt, Adam's influence. He has somehow managed to corrupt a pure, magical being.

"Why would I go back?"

"Because," Adam says. What kind of a question is that? Adam is pretty sure even a goldfish would be able to remember four hours back. Wasn't it Kris who had blanched and shaken harder and harder the further away Adam took him from the sea? Wasn't he the one who'd shivered uncontrollably from shock until he'd passed out from sheer exhaustion? It's a little annoying that Kris has forgotten all about it, when Adam can't seem to get the image out of his head.

"Because?"

"You don't belong here."

Kris smirks and looks down at his feet. He wriggles his toes. "It sure looks like I do."

Adam loves Kris' stupid, cute, magical feet. But this is Kris' life—their lives—that they're talking about here. It's way more important than Adam's newly developed foot fetish. "Kris. Don't."

Kris' jaw clenches visibly. He looks up, eyes ablaze and determined, and releases the doorframe to take a couple of staggering steps towards Adam. Adam resists the urge to help him, telling himself it'll only prove his point if Kris falls now, but his stupid heart won't let him stand by and watch Kris struggle for long. Kris takes another step, trips over nothing, and falls forward. Adam's arms catch him gratefully—the traitors—and hold him close; Kris' breath hits Adam's collarbone, hot and hard, like he's just run a marathon.

When Kris looks up, his brown eyes huge, Adam's heart skips a beat and his lungs cease to work. He has no defenses against this—and to make matters even worse, a part of him is glad that he has none. Adam used to think he was strong. Actually, he's almost certain that he used to be strong. But this summer has remade him in the worst and best ways possible. Adam can't say he loves this new version of him, but he also can't bring himself to wish the last couple of months away.

"Why?"

"Because," Adam says again, his voice a little whiny this time. Do they have to talk this to death? "Your friends. Your parents. Your whole world. You think you can live with never being able to go back?"

"You think I haven't thought about that?"

Adam smoothes Kris' crazy hair back. It's so soft—fluffy. "I think you made a rash choice. I told you I had to go, and—I didn't give you enough time to get used to the idea."

Kris looks up at him for a second, head tilted like a confused dog, and then rises on his toes to brush his lips against Adam's—once, twice, again, and again, softly, teasingly, and the butterflies in Adam's stomach flutter to the rhythm.

"This is right," Kris says against his lips with confidence, working one hand under Adam's t-shirt to caress the small of his back.

Adam shivers. Kris plays dirty.

"That's what you think now. What happens in a couple of weeks? Months?"

"We go to New York," Kris says, nuzzling under Adam's chin, where he fits perfectly—just the right height, the right shape. Adam holds back a satisfied sigh. He wishes it could all be this easy, that Kris could fit into this world the same way he fits into Adam's body. But Kris has never left the beach before; tonight was the first time his feet touched asphalt, for God's sake. All he knows about city life is what he's heard from others—half real, half made-up. He doesn't know anything about New York aside from the fact that Adam will be going there. This is wrong—on so many levels.

Adam holds him by the shoulders to keep him away from his neck. If Kris goes for his neck, Adam's sure to lose his train of thought completely, and there'll be no turning back. "You don't know anything," Adam says. "What if you don't like it?"

"I'll be with you," Kris says earnestly. "Of course I'll like it."

Adam huffs out a short laugh. It's terrifying how much Kris doesn't get it. "What if one day you don't want to be with me anymore? What happens then?"

Kris' hand travels around to Adam's stomach and rubs gently. Adam bites his lip. Magic feet and magic hands; that's hardly fair.

"You're my mate. Why wouldn't I want to be with you?"

The sharp taste of blood floods his mouth, and Adam realizes he's bitten his lip a little too hard. His what?

"Mate?"

Kris pushes himself up and melts his huge smile against Adam's mouth. He seems ecstatic, like that one word is the solution to every problem ever—and not the source of a whole slew of new ones.

"That's—We—I don't—" Adam has to try three times before he can successfully pull back, only two of the failed attempts being Kris' fault. "That doesn't make sense." He shakes his head. "We're not even the same species."

Kris rolls his eyes. "You think that matters?" He leans in to lick a stripe up the side of Adam's neck, burning Adam's skin with the wet heat of his tongue, and then he leans even closer and kisses the back of Adam's ear. "See," he whispers.

Adam is too busy trying to stay standing to see anything. He's the one with the newborn jelly-legs now. And even if he wasn't, he always gets the impression that what he sees and what Kris expects him to see are two very different things, anyway. It feels to Adam like Kris is always left a little disappointed in that.

Kris is the perfect blend of cute and hot; Adam sees that, obviously. He's also the best sex Adam has ever had, for sure. And yes, Adam is maybe, possibly, completely in love with him. But those things don't equal mate. They equal Adam wanting Kris to be happy and safe—and possibly to jerking off to mermaids for the rest of his life, but he'd rather not think about that.

"Kris, you don't—"

Kris tugs Adam's t-shirt up, and Adam finds his arms rising to help him. Kris flings the t-shirt towards the kitchen counter and doesn't even look to see where it lands; he concentrates on running his tongue over Adam's nipple instead. "I can taste it," he says absentmindedly as he moves to take the nipple into his mouth.

Adam's head is thrown back and his hands are on Kris' ass. He has no idea when he pushed the pajama bottoms down, but he must have, because they're around Kris' ankles right now and Kris is pressed against him, completely naked. When he tells himself, as firmly as he can manage, to let go and push Kris back before it's too late—they have to rush if they're going to make it to the beach before Kris turns into a pumpkin (or human, whatever)—he finds his hands gripping Kris harder and pulling him closer.

It's like a conspiracy. His body is in cahoots with Kris.

Adam is hard enough to hurt already, and Kris is making those little noises again—the ones that make Adam want to show him off, take him somewhere public and fuck him in front of everyone, so they can hear him, and know that he's Adam's. Being possessive has never really been his thing, but neither were mermaids, and look what happened there. Adam can't even bring himself to be appropriately shocked about it.

Kris kicks away the pajama pants, holding onto Adam's biceps with an iron grip, and attacks Adam's mouth, his legs trying—very clumsily—to climb Adam like a tree. Adam hoists him up by taking a hold of his thighs, and finds himself vaguely wondering how Kris can possibly have thighs so muscular when he's not even supposed to have them in the first place; but the thought drifts away as soon as Kris starts rubbing himself against Adam in an impossibly sinuous way. Adam has seen how Kris moves in the water, so he knows just how far Kris' body can bend, but it's still jarring when he's naked and doing it so that his cock rubs against Adam's stomach. Adam can't say he's never thought of it in this context before—of course he has, he's human—but passing thoughts don't compare to the reality of it.

Adam only realizes that he's been chanting Kris' name when Kris whispers "Sssh," in his ear and runs his tongue along the rim of it. Staying upright was hard enough with Kris doing acrobatics; it becomes impossible when Kris' breath brushes Adam's already-sensitized ear. Adam groans and finally succumbs to the call of gravity, managing just barely to set Kris down in his lap on his way down. Kris doesn't miss a beat before rising on his knees to suck Adam's tongue, taking along with it every ounce of breath Adam had left in his lungs.

Kris may be able to breathe under water, but that doesn't necessarily mean that he can hold his breath any longer than Adam can—and thank God for that, because Adam gets the feeling that Kris would never stop if he didn't have to. Even when they part for air, Kris keeps touching Adam's skin; he nuzzles his neck, smears messy kisses along his jaw line, and purrs, almost like a cat, which Adam finds impossibly hot.

Grabbing Kris around the waist, Adam pulls him firmly down into his lap. Kris hisses and wiggles at the friction, making Adam realize that he's way past the point of no return and should get out of his jeans if he doesn't want the seams to give.

"You won't send me back," Kris says, his voice hoarse and unexpectedly vulnerable. Adam pulls back a little to meet his eyes and flinches inwardly at the worry and the false bravado he can clearly read in them. His arms strain, wanting to reach and hug, but he manages to keep them where they are—just barely. He has to send Kris back. Kris doesn't understand how human relationships work, and Adam doesn't want to be the one to explain the concepts of breakups and divorces to him. Kris won't understand. He'll be heartbroken, and he'll pout, and then he'll get that determined look in his eyes and probably decide to become a superhero and save people with broken hearts everywhere.

Adam doesn't want to be the reason Kris' beautiful, magical soul breaks. If he has to throw Kris back into the sea to make sure he stays happy, so be it.

"It'll be better this way," Adam says, running his hands up and down Kris' back soothingly. "You'll see in time."

Kris moans in frustration and hides his face in Adam's neck, biting Adam's collarbone hard enough to leave teeth marks. "It won't be better," he whispers furiously. "It wasn't better before I found you."

Kris' hand gets busy between their bodies, undoing Adam's fly and delving inside, but Adam can't quite focus on the sensation. Before Kris found him? Found him? It's not the wrong word to use, certainly, because Kris did find him in the water, drunk out of his mind and trying to keep afloat, but the way Kris said it—it almost sounded like he meant he'd been searching.

"What do you mean you found me?" Adam asks, but Kris doesn't seem to be in the mood to answer questions. He has the little bottle of lube Adam has been carrying around in his pocket and he's concentrating hard on coating two of Adam's fingers with it. Adam thinks 'oh, no, wait,' but no one listens to him—including his own limbs. It turns out Adam's fingers don't even need his cooperation. They know where to touch and what to do. And they don't seem to be in the mood for questions, either. They want to get to the point. Right. Now.

And that is some point, the way Kris' head falls back, his neck and chest arching beautifully, his body rocking and rocking and rocking. Kris makes the most amazing noises, primal in an oddly soft, delicate way, his mouth slack and lower lip jutting out, begging for Adam to bite it—just lean forward and bite it.

So Adam does.

Sex between them is seamless, perfect. It's no surprise that it would be after months of practice, but Adam doesn't remember it ever being any different. They knew from the start how to move together, how to fit into and around each other flawlessly. When Adam finds himself inside Kris a couple of minutes later, the heat and the scent of him enveloping Adam's every sense, he has no idea who made it happen. Was it Kris who pulled Adam's fingers out? Did Adam put the condom on himself? Adam doesn't know, and to be honest, he doesn't really care. He thinks maybe it should be disorienting, but it isn't. It just works.

"God, yes."

They move to the sound of waves crashing in Adam's head. They're in sync with the sea, even when they're miles away from it. And when Adam leans in for a taste, Kris' skin tastes of salt and seaweed, like a night at the beach, with sand between Adam's toes. He can smell it; it's all over Kris, coming out of every pore.

Adam's arms tighten around Kris, and Kris lets his head fall forward, his forehead resting on Adam's shoulder, his breath hitching and hips stuttering. It makes Adam move faster, his jeans chafing around his thighs. He wants to hear Kris make those tiny mewing sounds again. He wants to ride the waves with him and breathe in that salty scent.

"Perfect," Adam whispers, lips trailing down the side of Kris' face, tasting his sweat.

"Yes," Kris moans in response. He nuzzles into Adam's neck and rubs his face on Adam's skin. "Told you." His breath is hot, burning wherever it touches. "I told you."

Adam never thought Kris was anything less than perfect. That was never the problem. He only thought—he just knew—

Kris twists his hips and chokes on a sob, making Adam feel dizzy—dizzier. It's so hard to think. He had a point to make. Something to fix. They had to hurry. There was something…

The clouds in his mind part for a second; for one second he can think, and he remembers. His hips freeze mid-thrust, and his head whips around to look out the window; still dark, but dawn can't be far off. He grips Kris' waist and holds him still.

"Kris, you have to go," he says urgently. "We can't—you have to—"

"Tell me you don't want me and I will," Kris says calmly. He looks as serious as Adam has ever seen him—sex hair be damned. "Tell me. Come on."

Adam swallows hard. "I can't let you throw your life away like this."

Adam thinks of Kris' parents, his people, his life down there; Kris has told him all about them. It would have been one thing if Kris had been a loner, an outcast among his own people, but Adam knows, even with just the stories he's heard from Kris, that Kris loves being part of that family. Adam welcomes the responsibility of having to take care of him, but these are things he won't be able to provide. If Kris ends up hating this world, missing his own, Adam doesn't know what he'll do.

"You don't understand. This is how it's supposed to be. All of my friends have found their mates and moved away. That's what you do. It's not the end of the world."

Adam splutters. "Right, when you choose a mate who's the same species!"

Kris smiles at him indulgently. "You don't get to choose your mate," he says.

"You don't," Adam says inanely.

Kris shakes his head. "You either find them or you don't. There's no choice."

Adam leans his forehead against Kris' and tries to quell the growing panic inside him. This is like getting married after only three months—and Kris is already telling him, up front, that there's no escape clause. It's everything Adam thought he'd never do in one miraculous package. Adam knows love only lasts so long. There is no forever. It's not magical. Life is not a fairytale.

But Kris is magical, and he's willing to bet his life on Adam.

"Don't be scared."

Kris trails his fingers down the side of Adam's face and follows the trail with small kisses; on his temple, his cheek, his jaw. He pauses at Adam's mouth and fits their lips together, giving Adam the slowest, softest kiss of his life. Like the last note of the perfect song, it resonates in Adam's heart and makes him want to listen to the whole thing all over again. He breathes out, shaky and loud, and falls.

Kris whoops in delight when Adam holds him up, and laughs as Adam lays him down on the cold floor. Adam enters him in one long stroke, shuddering at the feel and the heat of his body—so familiar and right. He growls low in his throat and pushes into Kris again and again, like waves rushing to the shore, and Kris takes it all eagerly, tangling their limbs in wildly creative ways. Adam doesn't know if they'll ever be able to unknot them, but he'd be lying if he said he cared.

It's hot and wild, and Adam thinks if he moves any faster they'd catch on fire. Kris grabs Adam's hair in his fists and pulls as he comes, dragging Adam down close enough to kiss—but he's so far gone, all he can manage is a sloppy meeting of lips. It makes Adam inordinately proud to have reduced him to that, so he licks Kris' lips and into his mouth possessively and fucks him through the aftershocks.

Adam sees moonlight creating sparkles on the surface of the sea, horizon painted pink by the sunrise; he sees endless waves rushing to the shore, washing away the sand, crashing against the rocks; and he sees Kris—smiling, kissing, touching, singing, sleeping, licking the inside of Adam's elbow, moving over Adam with sweat dripping off his brow… After months of confusion, he finally feels the panic recede, leaving behind a perfect dawn.

Adam comes with a sharp sob.

~

"I'm a starfish," Kris says, lying spread-eagled on the floor.

Adam rolls his eyes at him and hands over a piece of pineapple. So far, they've determined that Kris loves pineapples, won't even touch a strawberry, and thinks that apples taste like sand. Judging by the way he's still lying on the cold floor completely naked, Adam would guess that he doesn't get cold easily, and it seems that it'll be a challenge to get him into clothes. Not that Adam minds—he's been enjoying watching the way the sunlight dances across Kris' sweaty skin—but they'll have to go out sometime.

"How are your feet?" Adam asks, taking one of Kris' feet in his hands and massaging the sole of it.

Kris sighs in contentment. "Okay."

Adam runs his fingers along the sides, trying not to tickle, and studies the shapes of his toes. He's been kind of scared that Kris' feet might suddenly disappear; it's irrational, but he can't help it. He wraps his hand around the ankle and caresses the soft skin.

"Do you like them?" Kris asks, eyebrows raised, curious.

Adam blinks at him. "Your feet?"

"Yeah." Kris wriggles his toes and looks completely weirded out by the way they move. "They look funny."

Adam almost chokes on his next breath. He can't believe Kris hasn't noticed… Raising Kris' foot up to his lips, he licks a slow path along the side of it, from heel to toe. When he's done, he teases the underside of the toes and sucks two of them into his mouth.

Kris' gasp makes him smirk around the digits.

"I like them," he informs Kris when he's done, voice gone raspy.

Kris whimpers.

Adam tickles the sole softly and moves down to suck and bite at the heel, getting lost in the sounds he draws from Kris. That's his only excuse for not noticing Kris moving his other foot until it's between Adam's legs, pressing against the seam of his jeans and kneading the rapidly hardening flesh underneath.

"Fuck."

Kris chuckles. "Let's."

Adam drops the foot in his hand and pounces. He was wrong. Kris will fit right in.

The End

January 5th, 2010