nathaniel_kitten | (no subject)

(no subject)

He'd dressed again after his run, putting his socks, shoes, belt, and jacket back on. Nathaniel can smell Asher through the door, and he lingers outside, brow pressed to the wood.

It hurts his heart to think his lover -- oh, he had trusted Asher -- had used him. Paid him for sex. Paid him for what he would have willingly given for free now. Paid for that small piece of himself that had been no one's until Asher.

Nathaniel sighs softly, the fury having bled from him with the run, and he finally turns the knob of the door, walking into the room without knocking. He didn't need to knock. Asher would have heard his very heartbeat through that door.

He's dressed in black from head to toe, the only thing not leather is the shirt tucked into his trousers. His hair is unbound, a little wild from the forest, and he shuts the door, leaning against it as he stares at Asher.

Everything about his posture, his scent, the shadows in his eyes, speaks to not be touched. If he could, he'd have this conversation without being looked at either, but he knows that is impossible.

When he speaks, he can't seem to help the sharp edge to his words, a hardness coming to his eyes as he looks at that beautiful, perfect face he loves so much. "Was I worth it?" he asks. "Worth every penny you paid, or should I be offering you a belated refund?"

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Asher looks up, expectant as soon as he smells and hears Nathaniel at his door. His eyebrows raise at Nathaniel's wild appearance, very different from the leopard he is used to - and even the boy he met, the younger Nathaniel.

His stomach drops as Nathaniel looks at him with cold eyes, his face growing hard and cold in response.

"You remember." He can't decide if that is a good thing or not - judging by the anger, perhaps not.

"I would have paid you the same had you just sat beside me, cher."

"But I didn't just sit beside you," Nathaniel reminds him, the lavender of his eyes quickly bleeding to gray. "I laid under you."

There are two predatory steps forward, the long coat swaying as he stops.

"Why?" he demands. "Why did you do that? I've been trying... so hard... to figure out why, because you said you loved me, and I don't know how you can love me and have done that."

He needs to understanding, and there is a pleading desperation in the shadows of his cat-like eyes.

Asher still doesn't realise just how badly he has hurt Nathaniel. He doesn't understand how his behavior could be taken.

"How could you doubt that I love you?" He's sitting on his bed, looking up at Nathaniel.

"You paid to fuck me, Asher! What I give willingly to you whenever you touch me, you paid for."

Nathaniel's hands ball at his sides.

"You bought me, fucked me, and you..." He shakes his head. "Why?" Nathaniel feels it well up inside him again, fury and love and confusion. "You made me like it! Why? Tell me, Asher, because I don't understand how someone I love, and who says he loves me, could use me like that, and I need to. I need to understand so it'll make this... this... God! Why?" he practically begs.

"Because I love you," Asher whispers, mournfully. "Because I knew what it was like to be used, to not have anyone care for your pleasure." He drops his head, looking down at his hands.

"I wanted to show you that sex is something to be treasured. That pleasure works both ways. I...I was trying to give you hope." He pauses.

"And, yes, because I found you beautiful, as I do now, and the thought of not touching you, when Anita already limits my time with you, was too much to bear."

"That... was not beautiful," he says, looking with disbelief at Asher. "What I was... was not beautiful."

He wants to touch Asher. He wants to be held by him and reassured and all of this made right.

"I did like it. You showed me if I charged more, gave up more of my time, was a little more selective of who I fucked, I could enjoy it. And it led me straight to Gabriel." He crosses what little space is between them and looks down at Asher's bent head. Nathaniel debates a moment, and then reaches out, running his fingers through that beautiful gold hair, and tilts Asher's head back so they are looking at one another. "You laid the foundation to what I am now," he murmurs.

Asher would like very much to hold Nathaniel, and reassure him. But he is afraid that any touch would be rebuffed.

He shivers softly when slender fingers card through his hair, slowly tilting his head up, his eyes wary as he gazes up at Nathaniel.

"You have always been beautiful to me, mon chat," Asher whispers, "Even in Tennessee, when you were filled with corruption. You will always be beautiful." It is a little ironic that, while he cannot see the same in himself, cannot believe that people would love him, even when he was scarred, Asher can still see Nathaniel's beauty, no matter the package it comes in.

"I will not apologise for setting the path of events that brought you to me," he continues, reaching up to grasp Nathaniel's wrist, gently rubbing his thumb against the soft inside of Nathaniel's wrist, just over his veins. "And I will never apologise for showing you that sex could be pleasureable."

Tears fill Nathaniel's eyes.

"I wanted to be better than that in your eyes," he whispers. "I wanted to be good and clean and beautiful. I wanted to be something you could be proud of, that you would not want to keep hidden. All I've ever been is used. I don't want to be used by you too. I can't survive that, Asher."

Asher reaches out, tugging gently on Nat's beltloops, with the intention of pulling Nathaniel into his lap.

"I am proud of you," Asher insists, "and you are. You are beautiful, and good." He reaches up, gently brushing Nathaniel's hair back from his face.

"I have done far worse things, mon chat. Things that I can never forgive myself for. Using you, if that is what you feel I have done, would be one of those things." His voice is soft, sadness thickening his words, dripping like rain. "I am so sorry, Nathaniel."

It's almost like raindrops on his skin, and he slowly slides into Asher's lap, straddling him across his thighs.

"I never forgot you. I never forgot that night. But you didn't look like this when I saw you in St. Louis for the first time, and the memory was hidden under all the changes in my life just as you arrived." Nathaniel stares at Asher. "You took me that night because you loved me, right?"

Asher nods, sliding his arms around Nathaniel's waist.

"I loved you, because you were Nathaniel, no matter how thin and bruised and hurting you were. Because I knew what it was like to be used, and I wanted you to feel cherished and loved, for a short while at least."

"And now?" he asks, hands pressed to Asher's chest. "Am I different in your eyes now? Less? More broken? Am I in even greater need of being fixed?"

"You are Nathaniel," Asher answers simply. "I knew a little of your past. Seeing you as you were then changes nothing of the man you are now." He tilts his head, raises one arm to cup Nathaniel's face, his thumb gently caressing Nathaniel's cheek, just beside his mouth.

"I love you. And you are still mon chat, just as you were before."

A tear wets Asher's fingers.

"I wanted to be better than that for you," he murmurs. Nathaniel closes his eyes. "I love you, Asher. As stupid as it sounds, I love you so much sometimes it hurts, and I get so scared that I'll fuck it all up because you're just so... you... and I'm just me. I'm just that boy with a little more meat on his bones and a leopard rooming inside."

"Do you remember what I told you, after we made love?" Asher whispers, kissing the tears away softly.

"Cher, my mistress sold my body for centuries. I was nothing more than her toy." He bows his head, not wanting to talk about this, his past more painful than anything. Anything, that is, bar seeing Nathaniel upset.

"The image you have of me...who I am now...I do not want to disappoint you." He falls silent, memories swimming to the surface, all the times he bedded men, women, couples, all at Belle's command. The humiliation he suffered at her hand, the people he forcibly addicted to the ardeur.

Nathaniel frowns.

"You could never disappoint me."

He was disappointment enough to himself.

"Mon chevalier, remember?" he asks.

Asher nods, tugging Nathaniel closer. He wants to live up to Nathaniel's expectations, be the perfect man that Nathaniel believes him to be. It's part of the reason he refuses to mark Nathaniel further; because then Nathaniel will find out he is a fraud. That he's not good, not at all.

Nathaniel settles firmly against Asher, the leather of his clothes creaking a bit.

"Can I ask you something?" he murmurs, his eyes taking on a serious glint again.

Asher pauses, then nods slowly.

"Of course, mon chat. Ask me anything," he murmurs, though he has a feeling he'll regret saying it.

"Did you want to be a vampire?"

Nathaniel bites his lip, uncertain if he should have even asked, but he figures if Asher got time with his former self, he could ask at least one question.

"I was not given a choice," Asher murmurs, his face growing blank, lest he gave away any emotion stirred up by the thoughts of Belle, of how he came to be as he is now.

"I cannot imagine any other life, now. If I were given the choice now...I do not know what I would choose."

He knows that expression, and Nathaniel ceases any further questioning.

"I know the feeling," he murmurs, looking away.

Asher gently touches Nathaniel's cheek, turning his face towards him, leaning up to softly kiss Nathaniel's mouth, close-lipped, sweet.

"What did the others think of your younger self?" He asks.

"They wanted to save me."

Nathaniel brushes his lips across Asher's.

"You all want to save me, even now."

"You inspire protectiveness in people," Asher murmurs, sliding his arms around Nathaniel, slowly leaning back, until he's half-lying on his bed, Nathaniel sprawled on top of him. He kisses Nathaniel again, distracting him.