Page 46 of The Bairwick Witches
“I don’t understand. You’ve been right here for twenty years?!”
“Time isn’t really a linear concept when you’re dead. Feels like no time passed at all, but you also feel every minute.” Devion stretched out his hand, and the journal floated to him. “This was always meant to be yours. But typical Adriana, even after my death, she found a way to ruin my life. She never gave this to you, like I’d asked her.”
“I don’t think your mother ever liked me.”
“Oh, she didn’t. You weren’t a girl; you were never going to win. I don’t think she liked me much either. So why my stupid ass left her instructions to do something, I’ll never know. But I couldn’t give it to you directly at the time.
“Schuyler, I am so sorry. You were supposed to do this spell, like, right after they buried my ass. It’s why I’d blocked myself in here, so no one could find me ’till after you did, and I could explain everything.
“When I realized you didn’t have the journal, it was too late, and I was trapped here. I couldn’t reach out through spirit boards; I couldn’t pop into your dreams and make them dirty. Well, knowing you, dirtier.
“I couldn’t do anything but sit and wait. Even the other spirits here couldn’t sense me. I wouldneverhave left you in that silence intentionally. To make you think, even for a second, I didn’t love you, because I did.I do.I always will.
“Speaking of,Dimmtis.” Dev threw his arm to the sky and twisted his hand as if turning the knob of a combination lock. The red-black energy, visible and pulsing under his skin, rushed up to his fingertips, and electricity shot out against the unseen barrier, bringing the walls down.
“There,” he said, kissing Schuyler. “Once this is over, I’ll be able to answer you from now on.”
Over?
“Yeah, sexy bearded guy, this—” Dev motioned to the vessel, his hand lingering around his crotch. “Doesn’t last long. You want to do the explanation stuff now, or after?” he asked with a sly smile.
Schuyler recognized the playful glint in those dark eyes. It was the same desire he felt, the same thought quietly lurking beneath all his emotional fretting. “After,” Sky confirmed, lost in the dreaminess of his beau in front of him, remembering nights when he stood on the porch, delaying their goodbyes so he could memorize every inch of that face.
They tumbled to the ground, kissing, but only momentarily before floating up into the air. Their clothes soon evaporated. Skin to skin, they rose higher. Dev’s earthy scent, with just the right amount of musk, filled Schuyler’s nostrils. Sky pulled him closer, taking in more of the scent and refilling his memory banks with the details of his smell, his taste.
Dev held him tenderly, without a drop of urgency in his touch or in the kisses to his neck. There was no rush to move forward. He savored the moment, his hands gliding over Schuyler’s body.
They lay next to each other in mid-air as if lying on a king-size bed. Schuyler found his memory of Dev’s body remained accurate; the nights he’d spent reminiscing of his hairy swimmers build as he pleasured himself. Devion enjoyed discovering the newness of Schuyler’s body, verbally broadcasting his delight with the thickness and beard. He rolled on top of Schuyler and they spun around, kissing and spinning, rising higher into the air.
Devion positioned Schuyler to straddle him just as a broom appeared under Dev. They flew up beyond the clouds, stopping before the glorious, full, unobstructed moon. Sky shifted his body, pushing Dev’s large erection between his cheeks. He paused their kissing to wet his fingertips; then, he reached under him and lubed himself up. Dev cried out when Schuyler’s hole swallowed the head of his cock.
He rode Dev for a few minutes until the broom swooped them around—and Schuyler found Dev riding him. “Do you remember our first time?” he asked Schuyler, who moaned loudly.
“Yes, of course.”
Dev smiled and waved his hand; the broom dissipated, and they fell softly like leaves returning to the earth, still wrapped around one another, grabbing at each other until they landed on Schuyler’s bed in his teenage bedroom.
Candymanwas muted on the television.
Devion moved Schuyler to be in front of him, just like their first night, admiring his ass before sliding back in. Sky, remembering the moment, felt all those inaugural sensations again, reliving them. The first time he’d been penetrated, the feeling of a hard dick sliding in him, touching places he was unaware existed.
Eventually, Schuyler broke from the momentum.
They changed positions.
Schuyler rolled Dev down onto his back, slamming him against the ivy-choked side of a large crypt. Dev lifted his left leg up over Schuyler’s arm as Sky fucked him up against the cold stone wall. The night they spent their six-month anniversary in the cemetery was a cherished memory.
Devion pushed Schuyler to the ground, laying him face-down across the graves, and buried his face between Schuyler’s firm cheeks. Schuyler moaned and clawed at the dirt, digging into the grass that became like the fabric of the backseat of his car—on the side of the road, where they’d pulled over having a fight driving back from a friend’s birthday party.
Schuyler lay on his back, Dev on top of him, kissing his body as the uncirculated air in the car grew thick. Schuyler reached his hand up, wanting to smear it across the fogged window, but instead, Dev found his way to Sky’s armpit.
As Dev pumped into him, perspiration began to trickle down Schuyler’s forehead. He wiped the sweat away, only to feel water returning, spraying his face, followed by the cold sensation of tile against his body.
Dev continued to lick Schuyler’s armpit as the showerhead in the steam-filled shower was on full blast, hosing them down after gym class. Schuyler broke away, kneeling and taking Dev’s erection into his mouth as hot water poured over him—water that became the soft, black sheets of Dev’s bed in his gothic styled, dimly lit bedroom.
Sky, hidden under the covers, slowly and silently went down on him as Dev’s mother yelled from the doorway about some minor offence, unaware of what was going on. He could smell the Palo Santo incense in the room. The warm water of Dev’s waterbed rolled under them.
The bed opened, and they fell through their shared pool of memories past, inhabiting moments when they found bliss within each other—memories that flowed together, one after another, until Schuyler realized they were somewhere foreign: an empty apartment.
