Nightsweats

by Speranza

His room at the Consulate is windowless, airless, and very, very warm. He lies on his back with his eyes closed—rest is almost as good as sleep, he reminds himself, really nearly as good. Beneath him, his bedroll is damp with sweat. The fabric clings to him, to the backs of his legs, his biceps, the small of his back. He would turn over but he knows that turning over would just make it worse. Turning over requires energy, and energy produces heat.

The thing is to be still, calm and still, to just relax and let oneself drift off into...

Except he isn't drifting.

He takes a deep breath, but it's difficult to draw the hot air into his lungs. Why is he here, suffering this? What has he done wrong, that he is thirty-eight years old and sleeping on the floor of his office? He has a home. He has built himself a comfortable home back North— only one room, true enough, but he is, after all, only one person. Four years ago he boarded up the windows and came to Chicago. And he has stayed here—but why?

He still has only one room. He is still only one person.

That thought makes him open his eyes. That thought makes him stare into the darkness above his head. Because that's a thought that can keep a man up at night, heat or no heat. He can spend hours contemplating his miscalculation—because it was a miscalculation, somehow he'd played the odds and lost. All these people—and if he listens closely, he can hear them, even at this hour of the morning, scratching and shuffling in their individual pens—millions of people, more plentiful than trees, seemingly more plentiful than stars.

He had heard that one could be lonely in a crowd, but he'd never quite believed it. To be lonely in a crowd seemed like an impossibility, a luxury, a further, decadent softening of people who had already gone sinfully soft. Now he understands—now he knows that there are harder things than hard work and hard winters. Now he understands that softness itself is a suffering; he knows this now that he is soft enough to want.

Even his eyelids are sweating now, and the salt stings his eyes. With a rush of fury, he rolls over, pulling one of his pillows under his face and pushing another down under his groin. Comfort, he tells himself as he curls his arm around the pillow—but that's a lie. That lower pillow isn't there for comfort. That lower pillow is there so he can—

—rock his hips into it, slowly at first, then faster and faster as he decides he can't afford shame. Sweat pours off him as he thrusts, soaking his t-shirt, soaking the pillow beneath his face. He needs this release, so badly, needs to close his eyes and feel the damp (skin) beneath his cheek, the resistance of (muscle) against his erection and—

—if he closes his eyes he can feel spiky, sweat-damp hair curling around his fingers. And if he closes his eyes he can feel Ray's rough lips, dry and lovely, moving across his jaw, the hard, mean strength of Ray's arms around him, the contrasting softness of his abdomen, the soft blond hairs on his muscular thighs and lower legs. He can imagine that he feels the sharpness of Ray's hip against his own, can imagine that that bead of sweat rolling down his back is the ghost of Ray's work-callused fingertip. He can let himself believe that the man who arouses him is here, underneath him, sweat-slick and sharing his bed, his desire for—

He muffles his groan in the pillow and feels a pulse of wetness on his sweaty belly, further dampening his already-damp cotton shorts. Panting, he rolls onto his side and slides his fingers into his fly, meditatively touching the sticky mess.

Perhaps a cold shower would serve more than one purpose.

Perhaps now he can finally cool off.

---

Ray sits slumped against the wall outside Fraser's office, knees bent, feet flat on the floor, Fraser's moan echoing in his ears. Sweat drips from his chin down onto his t-shirt, sweat rolls down his side and puddles onto the floor. He keeps his eyes tightly shut—he is trying to get his breath back, to make his heart stop pounding. He knows that all he can do is to stay calm, because he can hear Fraser approaching the door and he has no explanation for being here in the middle of the night except the obvious, the one that's splattered on his belly. Just breathe, he thinks. Be calm if not cool.

Beside him, the crack in the door widens and Fraser steps out, naked but for his cotton shorts, and carrying a towel. Ray can't bring himself to look at Fraser's face; instead, he focuses on Fraser's knees, on Fraser's bare feet standing in front of him.

"Ray..." Fraser sounds a little shocked to see him sitting there.

Ray licks his heat-cracked lips. "Hey, Fraser," he says, and he can barely get the words out. He wonders if Fraser can see the state he's in. "Couldn't sleep," he confesses in a hoarse whisper. "S'too hot to sleep."

And as he watches, Fraser's knees bend and Fraser crouches down beside him. He sees in Fraser's eyes that Fraser knows exactly where he's at—Fraser's not far from there himself. "Come on," Fraser says softly, and offers him a hand. "Cold shower," but when Fraser tugs him to his feet, and pulls him into his arms, and kisses him—it's not so much like a cold shower as it is like sinking into a warm, perfect bath.  

The End

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