Mortality

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Human frailty has always been a challenge for John Kennex, but sleeping next to a man who doesn't age had the tendency to send him into absolute fits of desperation interleaved with insomnia, ceiling staring, and mattress thumping.

Dorian, perfect and untouched by time or disease, locks into stasis when he charges and almost never wakes to John's late-night paroxysms. He also doesn't wake when John rolls himself up in all the covers or spends undue hours playing tap games on his phone.

Tonight, John can't get the image out of his head of himself as an old man, standing next to Dorian who looks as perfect as he does right now. He swallows hard and looks up, waiting for the unshed tears to absorb back into his brimmed eyes when a soft hand lands on his belly, snakes around and draws him in close.

Fuck. If there was any chance of not crying now, he'd missed it.

"S'wrong?"

Dorian knows he isn't going to tell him, his hands rubbing circles, smoothing lines.

John presses his face into the soft shirt.