The midsummer evenings are so enchanting, don’t you think?

B O Y F R I E N D S

TWO BEAUTIFUL GAYS IN VICTORIAN ERA JUST KISSED BY THE POND DURING SUNSET AND IT WAS DELIGHTFUL

I have come to ask your advice.

A kiss

The first time they kiss James feels like a toddler discovering a new world, eyes wide with the astonishment of what it has to offer. He hopes that what he is doing is right - he has been kissed many a times before, true, but never quite like this. It is as if he has forgotten everything he knew before.

Thomas is all softness, but demanding at the same time, guiding where James is unsure and yet molding himself around him, instinctively adapting to James’ insecurity. James can feel him smiling into the kiss when his arms come up to pull Thomas closer. It’s as much daring as he can procure at the moment but it seems more than enough for now.

When they separate again Thomas doesn’t step away, his hands staying on James’ shoulders. He says nothing, simply smiles, and James feels something inside him give way as it never has before.

“I never thought you’d be such a chaste kisser,” Thomas laughs as James keeps planting kisses between his shoulder blades. They are in bed, limbs entangled in their sheets but leaving enough bare skin for James to spoil Thomas a little. “Miranda didn’t teach you much, did she?”

James only snorts and kisses Thomas’ back again, this time pulling a little with his teeth. Thomas’ skin tastes faintly of the previous night still, sweat and saltiness and that soft taste that is Thomas’ own. Thomas grins but he wriggles a little close to James, humming under his breath when the kisses grow longer and more forceful, travelling down the entire length of his back.

“She certainly tried to,” Flint finally murmurs and the deep laugh that it draws from Thomas makes his chest vibrate. It always feels like a wave that’s enveloping him, that sound of richness and warmth and he wants to feel himself surrounded by it forever.

There is a beard on Thomas’ lips now and for a moment James asks himself once more if he isn’t dreaming all this. But no - the rest of him feels still the same, as incredible as it seems. It is still Thomas, beneath the grime and sweat and the scars, visible as well as invisible, that have accumulated over the years apart. The familiarity makes James’ heart ache, but it is a good ache, like that of a seed pushing its way through what used to be a surface made of nothing but hard rock.

They are both more hesitant and more forceful now, filled with incredulity that this is truly happening. The first kiss is hesitant but grows more desperate and longing soon - neither of them can quite believe that this will last yet, so used are they to fate ripping their happiness out of their hands.

It takes years for them to realise that this time, it truly won’t, that each kiss is a gift that can be given over and over again. As many times as they want.

“You mean everything to me.”