Sunstone 
 

 
 
Hearing your voice is pomegranate wine, 
 
I live by hearing it. 
 
Each look with which you look at me 
 
sustains me more than food and drink. 
 
 
Sometime around three in the afternoon, Xander phones to say that he and Illyria are staying away for the night. He doesn't say where, or why, and Spike knows that Wesley won't ask. There is something going on there, a secret burgeoning of something new and rare, and neither of them want to know until it is clear and real, something that words can be found for. 
 
Spike suspects that once the words are there, once whatever-this-is that is changing has hardened into tangibility, it will be time to go home. He's content with ephemera, perpetual motion, like the tiny piece of sunstone in the twisted fragile cage of silver and gold wire that Wes brought home that night, hanging by a chain from one of the bedposts, and turning, always turning. 
 
Wes brought him the sun in a net. Unromantic, practical Wes, who looks awkward when Xander presents Illyria with flowers, who hates to be given things, brought home glittering light on a dim, rain-filled day, and held it out in the palm of his hand as though he was afraid it would be rejected, as though he were ready to close his fingers over it, banish it, forget it. 
 
Spike wouldn't have done that if it had been the ugliest piece of junk in the whole of Cairo, and he had a brief moment where he thought, half-angry, that Wes should have known that, before realizing that Wes was scared, that he was opening up another layer of himself, the one that finds things beautiful even if they aren't of use, and wants to give things. Wants to give things to Spike, and wouldn't that have made him mock, once, before everything changed, wouldn't it? Wouldn't he have laughed at this man, with his scruff of almost-beard, and his damp shirt and thin, clever hands, holding a little piece of pretty sparkly stone in his palm like it's some kind of treasure? But he can't laugh, wouldn't, doesn't, takes the little thing from Wes and holds it up to the candlelight, turns it until the glitters catch just the right angle and spin in frail translucency across the strips of silk on the ceiling. 
 
He knows what it means, knows every jumbled thought in that clever head like his own, knows how hard it is for Wes to give something overtly, because he doesn't know how to accept, either. Touches and unstinting love and the warmth of blue-grey eyes that have always been on the verge of flickering into steel and gun-metal for everyone else, he'll give those without even thinking, and not even realise that they are gifts, but to choose something, to place his faith in knowing Spike and try to convey that in an object… 
 
Wes can be the bravest man Spike has ever met, and it's always when he's at his most terrified. He's in love with a dichotomy, and it's a wonderful thing. 
 
He can't ever go out in the sunlight again, so Wes brings it to him in a small piece of stone, and doesn't even expect to be understood or appreciated. But he is, he is, always, and Spike strings up the little caged light, and hangs it where it'll glow under the layers of reflected water, and tells Wes the things he knows you need to hear when you give something like that, full of meanings and uncertainties. He makes it real, watches the fear fade and shimmer in Wes's eyes, transmute into relief and then to the look Spike prefers, the one of conviction, of absolute love. 
 
It is rare that he looks any other way, here in Cairo. 
 
Spike doesn't want to leave Egypt, he thinks, over a plate of leftover curry and jasmine rice. Their fingers are stained saffron with it, because Wes feeds him with a pinch of thumb and fingers, head tilted back, and laughs with a puff of air. Wes's lips are pale and ochre, tasting like the humidity of summertime, his own source of heat that Spike teases from him, out into the open world, to lap up greedily. Until he's melting. Here, Wes is allowed to give him complete focus, all that laser-sharp intensity his for the asking. He needs it, craves it, knows that once it is disseminated among the agency and the garden and books and their cases, he will forget how this felt, that the addiction will fade and be half-forgotten. 
 
He wants to keep this, always, like the sunstone in its wire. He knows that the only reason it is so perfect is because he will have to let it go, though, that this time will only attain real perfection in his mind once it is a memory and not happening, not stealing the breath he doesn't need. 
 
He knows that, but he still doesn't want to leave. 
 
They take a blanket from the bed; drape it over their bodies like a cotton tent, feather-light insulation against the surprising cool of the room. He strips Wes with tongue-sticky fingers, smoothing the warmth into that skin, bares him out on the naked threads of carpet, in the patch of light from the streetlight outside, filtered through the fabric. Wes arches, quiet: shifts and shrugs out of his shirt, into Spike's arms, lips soft and sliding wetly, slightly helplessly, over Spike's jaw. Spike shivers, rolls him to the carpet, braces both hands on his face and kisses him until he can't feel his own cold, the stupid, aching moments where he thinks, what are you doing here, with me, like this, here, in this place?  
 
"Can I fuck you?" he whispers, the words are in both their mouths, both their tongues, their lips. His palm finds the beautiful dip of the scar on Wes's stomach; he can feel the shadow of heat against his splayed fingers.  
 
"Fuck?" Wes smiles. He draws it out, the word, until it's glowing, black and bright just above his lips. Spike licks at it, grinning. 
 
"Yeah," he mumbles, and his fingers slide under the waistband, finding hips. 
 
"Here I thought - " says Wes, stuttering when Spike rubs against his thigh, " - I thought, you only wanted me here for conversation." 
 
"Mmph," says Spike, and sits up, hand pressed to Wes's lower stomach, making him watch as he strips Wes of his trousers, his underwear, walking love-numb fingers up his thigh again, spreading slowly. "No one said you couldn't keep talking," he whispers. "You should." 
 
"I should..." Wes sighs, eyes tipping closed; Spike sees that hesitant edge that's always there - this is the most beautiful part, the most tenuous, the place, every time, Spike waits, waits, baited, frozen. 
 
"Should," Wes whispers. 
 
"Yeah," Spike kisses the words into him, his neck, his shoulder, his chest, fingers kneading the skin of his thighs. "C'mon. Wes." 
 
"Should what?" Wes says; his voice is hoarse, muffled by a palm - he runs shaky fingers through his hair, eyelids beginning to flutter closed, making Spike's heart turn and twist, on purpose. "Should let you touch me?" 
 
"Yeah." Spike does. With both hands, with his fingers, smelling like hot spices, like Egypt, with his skin-damp palms, finding Wes's half-erection, pulling it hard. Finding that hot crook, just below, with a press of a thumb, the delicious jerk it sparks into Wes's breathing, that first touch of belonging.  
 
"Yes," Wes hisses. "Should let you, a-again -- " 
 
"Christ," Spike whispers, and tongues at him, thumbs holding him open, greedy for it all, sounds, shivers, goosebumping skin, encouragements - yes, Wes says, yes you're beautiful yes you're good yes you're mine yes yes have me.  
 
He rolls them - Wes straddling, eyes first wide, then quiet, hot, lip bitten - the blanket falls off, twisting around their thighs and ankles. He kisses him; and, and, no, it's they kiss. It's sticky, sloppy, makes him harder because of how it makes Wes rut up against him.  
 
"I - " he gasps. He can't think. "I - Wes." 
 
"Shh. Shh, it's - "  
 
Wes takes Spike's wrist and runs his tongue over the thumb, the fingers, sucking them into his mouth, and now they taste like nothing but each other. He slides his hand down Wes's flank, over his hip, rubs at the dark, damp place. And his fingers are inside him, twisting, crooking, and Wes is bracing himself with bowed head, panting, rutting, eyelashes damp. Their thighs are wet, the press of heat is driving the frantic pace, and he's not in control, he thinks, he doesn't want to be, he wants to give it up, out - he shoves his fingers deeper, oh - let me see, he thinks, let me see this moment mould itself into desperation, to wring the words from your mouth.  
 
"Come on," he groans. "Oh, oh, fuck." He has to shut his eyes; Wes has tipped his head to the side, lolling, the curve of his throat, the back of his neck pale and bared. 
 
"Yes," Wes whispers. "Yes - please, please. Yours." 
 
Spike can't speak, anymore, because somehow, he's asked the right question to get that answer.  
 
Above them, the sunstone turns. 
 
*