RibCage

        Rain hissed in the gutters, slithering in ribbons down the sides of the street, picking up crumpled sandwich wrappers and cigarette butts on its trek.  The downpour was getting steadily heavier.  Businessmen with smart black umbrellas glanced tentatively from beneath the fabric shelter.  Some grimaced at the dampness that seeped into their shoes no matter how careful they were to avoid the growing puddles in every slight dip of the sidewalk pavement slabs; some smile faintly at the cleansing idea of a heavy rainstorm after last night's news reports of the massacres in downtown.  Washing the blood and filth of the city away, down into the sewers, out of sight and out of mind.  That was the best way to imagine the world, now wasn't it?



        Not everyone was so confident of the rain's ability to clean up the city's mess.  In the gray-hazed streets stood a figure with no umbrella or raincoat, head tilted back as he stared up at the sky.  People shuffled around him without paying him any mind; maybe they thought he was homeless, or crazy, or just an idiot who hadn't prepared for the weather and was now cursing himself for it somewhere in his head.  None of those things were particularly true, though all of them could technically be.  ZCD had never been able to call any of the small apartments he'd lived in over the course of time "home."  He strongly suspected he was crazy, if only because he always felt so perfectly rational - surely that had to mean he was actually totally off his nut.  And he hadn't prepared for the inevitable rainstorm, the one he'd long known was coming, but he didn't actually care.



        He just stood there silently, narrow, dark-circled, deep-sunken eyes half-opened to the cold shower.  They weren't terribly pretty eyes by any standards; green, sometimes considered a color of exotic beauty, but they were a murky green, like some sort of layer of scum growing at the bottom of a stagnant pond.  His hair was blade-straight and black, hanging in ratty tangles down his back, unkempt.  The average passerby might get the impression that this rain was the first shower his hair had gotten for far too long, but that would be another odd half-truth.  It reached his waist, but could have probably been longer if it were brushed out properly smooth.  His skin was not so much pale as just ashy, somehow giving a vaguely bruised and mistreated impression.  He had a scruff of half-grown stubble about his jaw and upper lip that never really went away, no matter if he actually tried to shave or not.  His eyebrows were thin and lacked any arch, more of a severe dagger-slash that gave him a meaner look than he already had.  His thin, colorless lips were parted and a now-ruined cigarette sagged miserably where it was clamped between his vaguely yellowed teeth.  His nose was a hawk's beak that was a bit of an overly dominant feature on his face.



        Below his jaw was not much of an improvement.  The man was narrow in an underfed way, bones overdefined beneath his soaked clothes - his shoulderblades looked sharp enough to be used as weapons.  He was lanky, with long-fingered, swollen-knuckled hands ending in ragged nails; his feet were similarly a bit too large for his thin frame, but it was hard to find anything comical in his steel-toed, well-worn massive black boots that had vaguely ruddy stains that could be convincingly explained as blood.  He had on a plain charcoal longsleeved shirt, unadorned save for a hole torn near the collar, and faded black jeans that were patched and had been rather inexpertly stitched along the sides in neon green thread after being taken in to fit more snugly.



        ZCD finally lowered his head, dropping his cigarette to the cement between his feet without concern for the planet's wellbeing, and cast his gaze up and down the street to either side of him.  There, in amongst the crowd, he spotted the satisfying flash of unnatural haircolor and smirked.  The head of aqua-green shuffled between the faceless mass of black-wrapped business folk and bumped a few of them out of the way in an eager lunge out onto a more open swath of pavement.  It was enough to bring a smile to the soaked, sour-looking man's thin lips.  Narwal was always a beauty, in ZCD's inexpert opinion, but the water just made him shine in a way that precious gems would've envied if they were cognizant.  The man had extravagantly noticeable blue-green hair in loose loops just a bit past his shoulders, now caught up in a high tail and left to bounce about and tease the back of his slender neck.  People were free to assume that it was just a very expensive and thorough dye job.  His skin was olive toned, his eyes shimmering bright blue, his mouth full and expressive.  He was slim as well, but it was a lean strength instead of ZCD's emaciated figure.  He was, as well, generally better groomed, and a full three inches shorter than ZCD's 6'2".  Dressed primly in a white button-up shirt, black slacks and shiny shoes, he looked stunning.



        "Stupid, why are you standing out in the rain without a coat?" Narwal laughed, tugging a bit on ZCD's soaked hair and shaking his head chidingly.  "Come on, come on."  He promptly grabbed the taller man's hand and started to haul him away up the street.  ZCD slipped a bit on the wet pavement, but Narwal was sure-footed as ever and steadied him, slowing down a bit to accommodate the other's clumsiness with another laugh.  He settled down enough to tuck himself against the black-haired fellow's side, tugging ZCD's arm over his own shoulders.



        "You're not wearing a coat either," ZCD finally pointed out, pouting when Narwal glanced up at him.  His was not a face made for pouting, and it looked more stormy than anything, but he at least made an attempt.  The impossibly-colored man gave him a shove in the ribs that made him laugh again.  They were quiet, following that, walking hand-in-hand and ignoring those that gave them dirty looks for being two men unashamed to touch each other.  They had no reason to be concerned; ZCD, for all his scrawniness, looked capable of scrapping with anyone to protect his pretty little Narwal.  Not that Narwal actually needed any protecting from the average homophobic Joe on the street, but it was so much more convenient to have someone along who looked dangerous.  Saved everyone a bit of posturing and trouble.



        Narwal's nice flat shoes tapping on the wet pavement, contrasting the faint squelch of ZCD's soaked boots, they reached their destination a few blocks down the street.  ZCD could have waited there for Narwal to stay out of the rain, but he always got such awful looks standing outside a big fancy salon - spa in his ragged clothes with his completely untamed hair.  Some people got an obsessive itch to drag him inside and force him to get something done about it, while others tried to hint that he ought to take his ungroomed, weatherbeaten self and get lost before it upset the nice prim customers.  So he stayed a bit up the street while he waited for Narwal to appear, well away from the place where the beautiful aqua-haired man worked every day. 



        The door slid open to admit them.  Narwal smiled brightly and pounced the first girl he saw in the work-appropriate apron that kept all the hair and products off the employee-standard white button up shirt.  She squeaked a little, obviously still slightly new here, but didn't panic too badly.  She'd been warned about Narwal's enthusiasm upon arriving at work each day.  Narwal didn't just work in the place, after all - he was the owner and manager of the Raindance Salon & Spa.  Those who were of the sort to file harassment suits because their boss tackled them were not the sort that got hired.  This girl managed a fairly graceful recovery, smiling shakily at her boss once she'd been released.



        "Isn't the rain just lovely?" Narwal commented idly as he breezed on past the girl.  One of his long-lasting employees, a huge man with no hair of his own to style, thick meaty hands, and a deceptively light touch, just snorted in answer.  It got a bubbly little laugh out of his boss, and then Narwal had disappeared out of the salon section of the building, ZCD trailing along behind him and glowering at the employees that, as always, glowered right back.  They had to accept that their boss was always dragging his messy ass around after him during the working day, but they certainly didn't have to like it.  ZCD didn't permit them to.  He preferred the glares to forced smiles.  It let him occasionally fantasize about beating the snot out of any of them.  The only person who didn't look at him like he was a mangy stray dog tracking muddy paw prints everywhere was Leo, the aforementioned huge bald man.  Leo was generally the one who tried to haul him in by the scruff of his neck like a kitten and fix his hair by force.  ZCD had a grudging respect for Leo.  But the rest of them, the rest of them he could beat up inside his head.



        "You know they all think you're entirely insane," he commented once he and Narwal were alone and reasonably out of earshot, heading along the employee-only travel routes amongst the various compartments of the building.  The place was organized like a strange hive, with various pockets here and there, but it worked and it gave the reviewers something "nouveau artiste" to rave about.  The only actual reason for the odd space usage was Narwal's utter lack of planning or design skills. 



        "Better than the alternative, huh?" Narwal replied with a bright smile.  "I don't mind being known as the eccentric loonybats boss.  Better than being the boss everybody hates 'cuz he's boring or mean, huh?  I bet that's what kind of boss you would be, you jerk."  He spun himself right into ZCD's chest, arms flinging about the taller man as he giggled.  "They think you're crazy too.  And homeless.  They think you're my pet charity case."  He tugged at one of the ubiquitous tangles in ZCD's hair.  Sometimes he actually did manage to clean the man up, but the effect never lasted long, and it had been quite a while since his last daring attempt.  It didn't really matter.  Other than the tangles and a bit of excess oil that the rain had currently taken care of, ZCD's hair never really got that dirty.  Sometimes Narwal decided it was actually just a fashion statement of its own.



        ZCD, in the meanwhile, just snorted and put his hand on Narwal's face, pushing him back away from himself.  "You're an idiot," he commented.  "I am your pet charity case, other than the not actually being homeless part."  He grinned sharply, amused.  "Anyway, lunatic boss man, you've got your lunatic boss man duties to be getting to.  I'm gonna go hog your steam room 'till you get on break."  Narwal pouted at him playfully, but he just rolled his eyes and turned away.  The aqua-haired man kicked him in his bony ass as he went and he snorted.



        Whenever ZCD decided to spend the day at Narwal's work, he always ended up monopolizing the steam room.  It wasn't so much that he refused to share, although he did find sharing generally disagreeable with a few noteable exceptions, as it was that everyone else suddenly decided they had somewhere else they ought to be getting to whenever he stepped in.  Stripped down to his shorts, ZCD still just looked just as overly skinny as he did in his clothes, plus he looked like he'd been the chewtoy of several very large dogs over the course of several years.  Or maybe sharks.  The scars wrapping around his arms, legs, ribs, and stomach had a scraped look to them, like someone had taken a knife to him and then twisted and dragged it to make sure it was a nice, long, jagged mark that got left behind.  The crescent pattern to them really did look a bit like shark bites, though some were too angular for a shark's jaw to have committed the initial act.  All in all, it made people uncomfortable.  ZCD didn't really mind.  It meant he got the room to himself all the time.



        He slumped back against the wall, folded his arms behind his head, and settled in to just enjoy himself.  A good two hours passed that way, and ZCD never moved a muscle throughout that entire time, still as the dead on his chosen bench.  When the door slid open to admit a mostly-bare Narwal, he unfolded his arms like he'd only just taken up the pose, opening his eyes and grinning broadly at the other man.  "Was wondering if you were just gonna leave me here all day.  Busy day?"



        "Mmmmm," was all Narwal answered, the usual response that meant I don't feel like talking about boring work now.  ZCD had no protests there, not as Narwal flicked the lock on the steamroom door and tugged down his shorts, the last layer of clothing between him and the hot, humid air.  The taller man licked his lips appreciatively at the bared skin, reaching out to scrape his ragged-edged nails over a smooth thigh, leaving thin white lines behind and making the smaller male shiver.  ZCD stood, jerking his shorts down as well and letting them join Narwal's on the floor.  He pressed himself up against Narwal's chest, hissing faintly as he tucked his nose into the man's soft hair, his eyes slipping closed as he took a deep breath.  Despite all the products swirling around in the salon and spa where he worked all day, Narwal's hair always just smelled of clean rain.  It was something reassuring, on those occasions ZCD started to feel vaguely overwhelmed by the chemical perfumes that filled the place.



        Then he let his mouth start downwards.  Teeth setting lightly into the outer curve of Narwal's ear, nipping and tugging until the smaller man squealed and gave his chest a push.  Tongue slithering down the shell, tracing the way it curved until he caught the lobe in his mouth and sucked it, pinching it a little with the tips of his teeth, hot breath gusting up across the dampened edges.  There was another soft squeal but ZCD mostly ignored it; he was intent, he was focused, he would not deviate from his path of travel now.  Down his mouth went, stubble scratching the silk-smooth skin he pressed his mouth against.  His tongue slid, liquid hot, along Narwal's jaw, his lips catching the skin so he could suck a red blotch into place along the sweet curve at the start of his pretty throat.  The smaller male tangled his fingers in ZCD's hair and tugged slowly, shivering as he wordlessly begged that hot, wet mouth to migrate lower on his body.



        ZCD obeyed, but only by increments.  He worked his way with painstaking slowness down Narwal's neck, nipping at the corded muscle, sucking the small but legitimate adam's apple, sinking his teeth in along the collarbone hard enough to make the man gasp and squeak.  He left teethmarks and grinned at the little depressions, sliding his tongue over them possessively a few times.  Narwal whined at him for delaying in his path downwards, tugging on his hair, pleading with him.  ZCD glanced up and let himself get a little lost in those shining blue eyes, so pretty and big and hungry for him.  Then he grinned and ducked down again.  He dragged his tongue over one pert, dark nipple, tweaking the nub back and forth a little with his mouth.  Narwal let out a sweet moan as he fastened his teeth over it, sucking slowly as he squeezed it a little, tugging it out from the smaller man's chest.  He let him go and attacked the other, sucking it hard, scraping his teeth over it aggressively.



        "Fuck, ZCD," Narwal whimpered, digging his nails into the man's skull.  It stung but it was a good sort of sting, satisfying.  It let ZCD know he was pushing Narwal's patience, nudging his limit, edging him towards a more feral desperation.  That was always when things got fun.  He slithered his tongue down the firmness of the other man's breastone, nipping along the center of his chest, down along his belly.  He paused to suck just under his ribs, making the man squirm a bit ticklishly, and then he ducked down and had his tongue in Narwal's navel.  It earned him another of those delicious, hungry squeals.  He swirled his tongue slowly in the little divot, nipping at the edge of it, tormenting his lover.



        "You make the best noises," he growled, voice husky.  Narwal hissed and scratched him again, and he chuckled, letting his tongue starting to edge downward.  Narwal was completely smooth, not a single hair on his groin, or really anywhere below his face for that matter.  ZCD didn't really mind either way; he was perfectly happy to suck on the bare skin just above the root of his friend's cock, listening to Narwal yowl and hiss like a cat.  The aqua-haired man's length was slender and shapely, but not terribly large.  Another thing that ZCD didn't really care about, just feeling it bump up against his neck and chin as he sucked insistently on that tender patch of skin, letting it get red in his mouth.



        "Fuck, come on!" Narwal growled at him, voice deeper, more urgent.  He bucked his hips and succeeded in dislodging ZCD's mouth from its torment; he shoved down hard, hands locked in his lover's hair, trying to get him to go where he really wanted him.  "Please!"  The exclamation was not really a request, and ZCD opened his mouth.  He accepted the slender cock hungrily, slurping on it with lazy pleasure.  Narwal was a bit more urgent about it than his friend - he snapped his hips quickly, fucking ZCD's mouth harshly, clinging tightly to his hair in desperation.



        The taller man didn't protest.  He just dragged his teeth lightly over the sweet cock on each thrust, making his lover squeal and curse every time.  He scratched Narwal's hips and curled his tongue around him, eyes closed as he devoured him skillfully.  There was no way Narwal could last, not with how much ZCD enjoyed his flesh, groaning in the back of his throat and making the aqua-haired man's cock buzz pleasantly in his mouth.  It didn't take long before he came, hips snapping up against him erratically, letting out a long, slow hiss.



        "Mmnnn, that's good," ZCD said with a happy growl, licking his lips as he withdrew.  He gave his lover a feral grin and stood slowly, pressing their bodies together.  Narwal slowly released the grip he had on the tangled black hair, blinking his eyes open with a heavy sigh and leaning forward, relaxing against the taller man.  ZCD's thick erection poked him in the belly, but he ignored it for a moment, since he knew his friend wouldn't really mind waiting a moment for Narwal to get his bearings back.



        Finally, he slid down to his knees, smirking up at the taller man with a smug little glint to his eyes.  ZCD watched him, sliding his hands through Narwal's silky hair, toying with it a little as the smaller man situated himself.  ZCD was thick - not huge, just thick - and very ready at the moment, the slit of his cock dripping slightly.  Narwal caught the droplets on his tongue, swiping up over the crown, sighing in a content fashion as he let the head slip past his lips, suckling it slowly.  ZCD groaned and tossed his he head back but stayed still; he had a number of years' experience over Narwal, he was always very in control of himself.  Except if he let himself be taken, but that was quite a rare occurrence.  For now he was easily capable of holding still as the aqua-haired man swallowed his cock, massaging his scalp slowly with his fingertips as he was sucked on.  Narwal rubbed his tongue along the man's foreskin, pushing it back a little bit as he bobbed his head down slowly, letting the tips of his canines brush over ZCD's skin teasingly.



        The tall man groaned deeply when Narwal pushed the whole way up, deep-throating his thick length, making him quiver just a little.  The wet heat wrapped around him was thrilling, and he expressed as much in his voice, moaning to let Narwal know how well he did.  He had no reason to hold back, so he didn't last too long - no point in making Narwal's jaw hurt, really - before letting himself go, grumbling in satisfaction as his lover swallowed his release.  Narwal sat back and wiped his mouth, then shifted up to sit on one of the benches.  ZCD took his place at the man's side and let Narwal lean against him, the both of them just relaxing a while.



        "S'good," ZCD commented at last, his voice a low mumble into Narwal's hair.  The other man snorted softly and smiled lazily without looking up, giving his lover a light smack on the thigh.



        "Of course it was," he said, "it always is.  You're such a dumbshit."  ZCD's only answer was a low thrumming noise in the back of his throat and laying a hand on Narwal's head, perfectly at ease with the namecalling.  It was all affectionate, after all.  Just something that Narwal liked to do.  His own variation on pet names.



        They only got about twenty minutes to just sit there together, still.  Then Narwal sighed heavily and pushed himself away, fetching his shorts and slipping them on.  "Back to work, back to work..." he muttered, shaking his head a little.  He loved his job, loved running the place, but he was always just a bit frustrated when he first had to leave his lover's side.  ZCD just watched him with a faint smile.



        "I think I'll head on home," he said after a thought, "an' come back when you're about done, all right?"  He didn't really want to hang about the place all day long.  He did have things he had to get done himself, from time to time, and while it usually wasn't terribly urgent business, it was still good to be ready for the occasional emergency. 



        "All right," Narwal replied with a huff.  Then he smiled brilliantly.  "I'll see you then."  He unlocked the door and trotted out, once again eager to be about his job.  ZCD just snickered after him and shook his head, getting into his own shorts quickly just in case someone decided to peek in and see what was up in there.  Not that he was a modest man by nature, he honestly didn't care at all, but Narwal would complain if he scared off customers by walking around in the buff.



        He fetched his clothes off the shelving outside the door and slipped into them, stomped on his still-wet boots, and headed on out.  His back got glared at as he went, but he just smirked toothily at them.  Some of the more squeamish ones looked away at that expression; it made his eyes look hard and feral.  Then he was out in the rain again, the comfortably heat fromt he steam room quickly sapped out of him by the cold drizzle.  He was glowering stormily by the time he reached his own apartment, and again thought about giving in and buying a car.  He hated the things, the way they smelled, the rattle they made, but damn he had to admit that it would be nice not to get soaked when it rained.  An umbrella would work as well he supposed, though it wouldn't keep him out of puddles.



        As he stepped in the door he paused to glower at himself in the mirror.  He held a hand out towards it accusingly, pointing at his reflection, then smirked as it reacted to his will.  The reflection of a wet, grungy fellow with tangled hair and sunken eyes faded off like steam; from behind the dissipating image loomed something altogether more terrifying.  ZCD nodded in satisfaction and his inhuman reflection followed the motion, as any proper normal reflection ought to.  "You," he addressed himself in the mirror, "are one ugly bastard."



        Then, laughing, he shuffled further into his apartment, shedding boots and coat and wet clothes on the way, and fetched himself a beer from the fridge.