The Muse's Undoing

“I feel like I just ran a race. With zombies.”

“Didn’t sound like you were winning.”

His heart happens to be right beneath my wrist, and it’s still galloping. “Guess not.”

“Can I get you some water?”

His hand moves to hold my forearm against his chest. “No. Just…hang here a second. Sorry.”

“It’s no problem.”

I rest my head on the pillow behind his, my nose landing in his great-smelling curls. A blend of essential oils and vanilla. It feels incredible to hug him. To hug anyone besides my parents and sister, really.

Or maybe it just feels good to hug a man. When he brought up my lack of a social life last night, he kind of hit a sore spot. I’ve been struggling with this celibate spell. If I’d known when I offered to help him out that day at the hospital that I wouldn’t be getting laid for several months, I might have made some other arrangements—other than moving into his apartment, I mean—not meaning I’d have pawned him off on someone else.

But I can’t lie—being the only one he trusts to help him accomplish the simple activities of daily living goes to my head, and I’m selfish about it, which is why I don’t let my mom help half as much as she offers to, and why I’m more than happy to be the one that gets to hold him when he wakes up screaming in the middle of the night for however long he lets me.

His heartbeat settles, and his breath evens out. I’m about to ask him about the water again when I realize he’s asleep.

Fischer’s taking narcotics for pain and muscle relaxers for spasms. All of which make him slightly out of it most of the time. And when he’s not out of it, he’s sullen and gruff—never rude, but never overly pleasant either.

As in, I don’t know if he’ll like it if he wakes up with me spooning him, or if he’ll shove me off and ask what the hell my problem is. The idea of that happening is awful to contemplate. It would definitely mess with me. Rejection always does.

I give it a few solid minutes before I try easing my arm off him, but his body resists, crossing his forearm over mine and wiggling closer to me.

Oh fuck—I was not expecting that.

I swallow hard and try to will away the surge in my cock, which only ends with a full erection on my part and my own shirt soaking with sweat. “Fischer,” I whisper, thinking maybe I can wake him up enough to get free.

What I get instead is a rub of his ass crease right up my dick. “Mmm.” I bite back the moan and squeeze my eyes closed. Being turned on by this is sooo not okay.

I try to think of anything else, but with my face in his hair, and his nipple pressing against my palm through his shirt, and—all the rest—it’s impossible.

Rain hits the window, and a soft flicker of lightning illuminates us in midnight blue. My balls thrum. It takes all my will power not to grind against him, get myself off. It is so wrong. He should turn me off automatically, but that is not what’s happening. I want more.

While I can’t say the time we’ve spent together has made him feel like the big brother I never had, he definitely feels like a friend. We have almost nothing in common, but we get along better than I’ve ever gotten along with anybody, and that includes my twin, who’s my best friend.

I might be a lot younger than Fischer, but I’m the one who sets the schedule, takes care of him, and makes sure he’s got everything he needs. The role reversal somehow balances out our age difference. Like—he asks my opinion on his weaning schedule and always checks with me to make sure he’s using his crutches right—he’s partial weight-bearing, and it’s been confusing, but I watched a few videos and came away fairly confident about how it’s supposed to be done.

Point being, I like him. And I like that he seems to like me, too. It’s not exactly something I’m used to. My fear of rejection makes me kind of a loner, as evidenced by the fact that my sister is still my best friend even though she’s off at Parson’s making her own friends and doing her own thing, and I’m trying to talk down an erection while it’s nestled against our brother’s ass.

Not that I’m conceding Mom’s point about sharing a bed—it hasn’t been an issue before, but Fischer might want to reconsider sleeping next to a perpetually horny twenty-year old. I mouth the word, “Fuck,” into his hair as my forehead creases in extreme concentration on the unsexiest thing I can think of: the steps down to the subway.

I think about the grime. The chewed gum. The empty chip bags, the smell. I think of the always oily turnstiles, the stuffy air, the dismay when the car that stops in front of me is packed to the gills.

Finally, my cock returns to its resting state, and I breathe a sigh of relief. After a few more minutes, I pry myself off him, remove my shirt, and manage to fall asleep.

I clap for Fischer as he limps without crutches from the bedroom to the living room. He holds up his arms in triumph. Five months since his surgery, and he’s practically independent.

“Now let’s see those splits,” I say.

He grins wide. “Fuck off. But give me two weeks.”

“How’s it feel?” I ask.

“Not bad at all. A little stiff, but…”

“That’ll get better the more you use it. Speaking of which.”