Section headings drawn from the utterly bullshit Gay Men Sexual Addiction Screening Test (G-SAST).
1. Do you regularly purchase romance novels or sexually explicit magazines?
It's freshman year, so Oz is fourteen, maybe fifteen. They're in Devon's room with all three locks engaged and half a bottle of Kahlua already killed.
"- and as the baron raised Susannah's chemise," Oz reads, trying to balance the thick paperback with his left hand because his right's wrapped around his dick, "she gave out a little gasp and her full, luscious -"
He pauses to turn the page and the book slips from his hand.
"Her what? Full, luscious *what*, dude?" Devon's voice is strained and high, nails-on-chalkboard, his face red as cinnamon hearts and just as shiny. "Oz, dude -"
Oz fumbles blindly for the book; he can't look away and his right hand won't stop tugging his dick. Devon's fly is undone, too, his wrist bending, flexing sharply, as his breaths wheeze rapidly out his nose.
"-breasts. 'Good my sir'," Oz says, lifting the book and pretending to read. "'It is I, Jack, your lowly squire.' The baron turned, Susannah's luscious form forgotten in favor of the comely youth who stood now in the doorway, chest heaving and cheeks flushed scarlet. 'Jack, my dear boy,' the baron said and rose, allowing his breeches to fall to the floor. His aristocratic manhood jutted out, proud and fierce. Jack bit his cherry-red lip but could not tear his eyes from the sight he coveted all day, every night. 'Come, boy, and attend to your lord.'"
They always start with girls, with a new copy of _Hustler_ or _Love's Luscious Lasciviousness_, but they move, always, closer to the truth. Like warming up before you play guitar or run a race. Like his CCD teacher said once: Faith comes through good practice. Prayer and going to church, it's like exercise, toning the muscles, and before you know it, belief will kindle in your breast like dawn's light, invisible but inexorable.
Good practice, warming-up: Pretty girls, lots of tan skin and breasts rounder than anything seen in nature. Start there, let them fade away as Devon breathes harder, as Oz's hand moves faster, as the careful buddy-buddy distance between them closes up,
Until they're here, face to face, and Devon grabs him by the shoulder, yanking Oz close, then down and Jack the comely squire sinks to his knees and closes his mouth around his lord's proud manstaff and Oz breathes roughly through his nose as Devon's back arches, then seizes, and this is real, true, faith and belief. Hot like sweat and bittersalt come and Devon collapses over him, kissing and sucking at Oz's neck and touching him with shaking hands that are slick and hot and fast.
2. Have you been sexual with minors?
"Happy birthday," Oz says and kisses Michael's cheek. "You're almost legal now."
Michael's as small as he is, all thin sharp bones like a baby bird, spiky black hair that smells like flowers. He's really pretty, and he does spells way better than Amy could ever dream.
Little goth boy, all twitching fingers and roving eyes. He kisses Oz shallow and fast, tongue like a minnow in Oz's mouth, as his hands pluck at Oz's clothes. Enthusiasm and nerves, sparkles of glitter over his eyelids and hard cold steel in his ears, pushed through his belly-button.
"Thanks," Michael says, pulling his shirt off over his head and pushing, butting, his chest against Oz's. "Wanna fool around?"
"Yeah," Oz says. Took ages - okay, just months, but they felt like ages - to get Michael to the point where he could kiss without blushing and running away. Now he's like this crazed virgin in some porn movie, insatiable and anxious, wanting more-more-*more*, all the time.
It's really kind of cool when you think about it.
3. Do you often find yourself preoccupied with sexual thoughts or romantic daydreams?
Sometimes in class - at rehearsal - during Sabrina the Teenaged Witch - over dinner - Oz is daydreaming well before he even notices. It's only the heat in his cheeks and down his neck, the restless roving itch circling his palms and the tight, twisting way his cock's swelling that helps clue him in.
His stepmom says he's a moony boy, full of dreams and false light; his dad says he needs to get a grip and buckle down, stop being such an imbecile.
Oz figures he's probably just normal. Physically, anyway, but probably mentally, too. Even given the content of the daydreams.
It doesn't take much - a shift in the breeze, a pause in the conversation - to set him off. And then he's gone, locked in the library at high noon or dead midnight, and Giles is there, yanking him forward by his shirt hem and Oz is boneless. Pouring through the gap between them, arms wrapping around Giles's shoulders as Giles lifts him, his shirt coming off over his head as his legs twine around Giles's waist. Giles kisses him like they're underwater and sharing the last of the oxygen, mouths locking, tongues tangling, and he tastes like everything Oz has ever wanted. Like black tea, full of smoke and steam and knowledge, like whiskey and pure strength.
"Always wanted you," Giles will say and smile the broad smile that hardly anyone ever sees. "Oz, you're -"
"Ssshh," Oz will hiss and kiss him again, grinding against him as Giles backs him against a wall and dips his head, kissing Oz's collarbone, murmuring, and Oz claws at Giles's hair, over his back, wiggling against the wall and Giles's chest. He reaches between them, manages to tug down his zipper and then undo Giles's belt and fly, and Giles is groaning against Oz's neck. Groans like music, like birds taking flight, rippling and reverberating under his skin until they're wrapping around his spine, pushing open his legs, tightening his arms around Giles's neck.
They'll fuck like this, against a wall, rough and needy and urgent, with their tongues tangling up and Oz clawing at Giles's shoulders as he rides Giles's cock and he'll make it so good for Giles, rock his hips just right and clench down and his head will fall back as Giles thrusts in, deeper and deeper, and they'll laugh at the sound of his skull hitting the wall and the laughter will quicken like their thrusts until Oz has to pry one hand free and start jerking himself, rough and fast and Giles will watch, fucking him, eyes widening.
They'll come together because this is a daydream and so that can happen.
4. Do you feel that your sexual behavior is normal?
Xander worries. It's his thing. He furrows his brow and bites his lip and rubs the back of his neck like he's got an insistent mosquito back there.
"But, see, what about -?" he says. Hunched over, sitting on the edge of Oz's bed, one hand on his neck, the other dangling between his legs. Shirtless, and the afternoon light's doing amazing things to the muscles on his back.
Oz lies curled up beside him, tracing the patterns of light and muscle with his index finger. Warm skin, smoother than anything - Devon would *kill* for Xander's tan and smoothness - and he's really only half-listening. Down at the base of Xander's spine, the hollow of his back, right under the waistband of his pants, there's a thin covering of dark hair. Featherlight, more like baby's down than anything, and Oz licks him there.
Xander yelps and Oz smiles. Presses his mouth against the hot skin and sucks up a good-sized hickey, inching his hand over Xander's thigh, into his groin, and skating his knuckles up and down Xander's dick.
Tastes like Irish Spring and sweat and dryer sheets here, clean boy getting more and more excited. Xander wriggles and covers Oz's hand with his own.
"But what about girls?" Xander asks, squeaky-high and breathless. "What about Will? Don't you like her?"
He's been thinking about asking Willow out, it's true. But that's because she's pretty and weird and he likes talking to her. Impossible to imagine doing *this* with her. Wanting to suck at her skin and make her squirm like this.
Oz licks up the bottom few vertebrae, sucking lightly, then blowing cool air over the wet trail to make Xander shiver. "Ssshhh," he croons and squeezes Xander's cock. "It's okay."
"B-but, what I'm wondering is -"
"Don't wonder. Just feel. Feels good, huh?"
Xander nods so enthusiastically that the bed shakes. "Good. Yeah."
"Nothing wrong with feeling good," Oz says, finally getting his hand insider Xander's fly. Hot like stars in here, hard as concrete, and, already familiar with Xander's waterfast changes in mood and focus, he sits up, out of the way, as Xander flops backward. Xander cranes his head up and Oz settles against him, kissing him as he strokes. Kissing's extragood with Xander - less talk, and he tastes fucking *righteous* - and Xander's got a big, strong hand wandering down Oz's side and squeezing his ass.
5. Do you have trouble stopping your behavior when you know it is inappropriate?
The wolf rubs himself against the cage. Mounts a deskchair, fucks the bookshelf, anything to get off.
No one talks about it. It's fucking embarrassing as hell.
Oz felt the wolf sliding through him the morning after Jordy bit him; his eyes hurt and his ears were ringing like elves were playing tin flutes high in his cerebellum. Didn't know it at the time, thought maybe the last nickelbag was laced with something that didn't agree with him.
When he did find out, he showered seventeen times, scrubbed himself pink and oozing. He could hear the water in the walls, smell the traces of his dad's come when he'd jerked off that morning, and his stomach rolled and tipped. Everything so close, so sharp and real and he didn't think he could survive it.
Hell of it is, he does survive it. That's the whole point.
He wakes up in the cage naked. Can't look at whoever babysat him last night, just dresses and heads outside. Before moonrise, his skin pulls and snags and it hurts like hell; the morning after is worse. He's sore all the way through, like his bones have bruises, like he's shoved into an alien envelope of skin not his own.
Like he's a monster.
So, yes. He's dealing fine. Thanks.
6. When you have sex, do you ever feel depressed afterwards?
Rehearsal runs late and Oz is sweaty and exhausted by the time he hoists himself into the van and turns the key. He takes a second to swipe his knuckles over his burning eyes and let the engine catch. When he lifts his head, there's a red spot glowing in the rearview mirror. Small and still, brightening, then dulling.
His eye sockets throb and his throat goes tight and sand-dry as he turns around. Angelus, reclining the back of the van, smoking a cigarette and regarding Oz with half a smile on his ridiculously handsome face.
They stare at each other as scorpions crawl down the center of Oz's spine.
"You -" he manages to say.
"Dropped in? Yeah," Angelus says, spreading his arms, hooking one over a speaker. "You'd hear me coming, smell me, wouldn't you? Can't sneak up on you. Wouldn't want to insult your canine intelligence."
"Good of you." His hands are cold but slick on the steering wheel. Shouldn't be surprised Angelus knows about the wolf, nor should he waste any time trying to figure out *how* he knows. But. "This a social visit? Or business?"
"Your call."
"Yeah," Oz says. Fear's paler than dropping fangs and sprouting the pelt, but that's so relative it might as well be meaningless. Fear's cold and rough as refrozen ice and he can't move. "Okay. Uh-"
"You seem nervous."
Fuck, yeah, you lunatic. "Pretty much, yeah," Oz says. Words have never seemed as important as they suddenly are now. Nor quite as distant.
"Don't be nervous, wolfboy. What's it gonna be?" Angelus is suddenly right there, right in his face, finger tracing Oz's shoulder. He smells like blood and cologne - midpriced cologne, not as bad as Old Spice, but something you could still buy at the drugstore. "Business? Pleasure?"
Oz squeezes the steering wheel and says the most ridiculous thing he's ever thought *or* spoken. "Can I drop you anywhere?"
Angelus chuckles, fake breath on Oz's face, and pats his shoulder. "Just drive. We'll chat, see the sights."
Oz drives. He can drive. His mind's going very, very slowly, which is weird. He would've thought having a homicidal madman in his van, arm wrapped around Oz's own seat, would make him panic.
Panic usually is depicted as really fast, trains going off tracks and needles skipping in records and heartbeats accelerating. This is syrup and amber, slow trapping things. Fear in suspension, hovering. Just like Angelus's lips, just behind Oz's ear.
"You're quite the puzzle, you know that?"
"Nope," Oz says. Drive and talk. If he's talking and you're talking, you're still alive. "Like to think I'm on the up and up."
"Lots of secrets. Still waters, all that hidden depth bullshit."
"You think?"
"I know."
"Okay." Oz bites down on the shivers; Angelus's lips are cool, their touch light and whispery, hummingbird wings and secrets shared.
"You see, Oz - your name *is* Oz, right? You see, hidden depths are for the birds. All we need to know about other people is in their skin. Their faces. Take their faces, right before you bite 'em: It's beautiful. Seriously, Bernini couldn't do it better in marble. Like they're having the best fucking orgasm of their pathetic little life. Or their hands, clutching at you, fingers skidding off. It's all there, right on the surface. But of course you know that."
Oz is nodding. His head's bobbing as he drives, as his fingers numb away into nothing around the wheel, but he doesn't know what he's hearing. Knows he doesn't agree. That he shouldn't be nodding. "I know that?"
Large hand, patting his shoulder, thumb rubbing the side of his neck. Artery there. Right under the thumb. "You do. Predator, just like me. Probably better at it, once you've had a little practice."
"No," Oz says, before he can help it. "I'm not like -"
"Exactly like-. Shit. Pull over here."
Oz looks around; they're a little outside town, where the houses are both larger and more sparse. Set back from the road, rich people can afford their privacy. Lots of trees, gravel on the side of the road as he rolls to a stop and cuts the engine. As he waits, he tries to breathe. Tries to remember how to breathe. Wonders whether the cross he carries is going to do any good at all.
Angelus swings into the passenger seat and out the door, pulling Oz by the arm behind him. He never releases Oz as they stand in the cool night air and he tilts his head up to the sky. "Nice night, huh? Miss the stars, though."
"Nice night," Oz echoes. Words like smoke, there and then gone. He moves his hand toward his front pocket, toward the cross.
"Whatcha doing?" Angelus asks, like he's honestly curious, leaning in and yanking Oz's wrist up. He's got both hands on Oz now, shoving him against the side of the van. The cross dangles from two of Oz's fingers. "Oh, nice cross. Big cross. *Thick* cross."
He squeezes Oz's wrist, hard enough for tendons to pop and bones to hit and start to grind. The cross falls and Angelus kicks it away.
"Should've left it in your pocket," Angelus says. He almost sounds disappointed. Moves in, pinning Oz's arms against the van. "Could have a whole 'is that a cross in your pocket or are you just glad to see me?' thing going. Pity."
The asshole's *flirting* with him. The realization sinks slowly through Oz, light through dusty attics, water in dirt, and he swallows bile and salt.
"Not the best bargaining chip," Oz says. "Buffy doesn't give a shit about me."
Brows lifting, mouth curving up, Angelus sighs like a mother with overly-taxed patience. "Oh, *her*. No, this - you - this is for me. Call me selfish, but sometimes I need a little *me*-time, y'know? Gets so old, all BuffyBuffyBuffy all the time. I deserve a little break, don't you think?"
Dark eyes, handsome face, and he's *crazy*, wrong, dangerous. Evil. And he's leaning in over Oz, working a leather-clad knee between Oz's own, fucking *smelling* his neck and face.
Oz swallows and stays still. Still as death and marble. Angelus has to get bored soon.
"Answer me." He squeezes Oz's wrists harder, twists Oz's arms until their shoulder sockets start to creak in protest. "Don't I?"
"Yeah. Yeah, of course."
Angelus nods, a slow satisfied smile curling over his lips. "I do. I really do. Been so *busy*. I kill townspeople. I threaten her friends. I kill that gypsy bitch, and still - nothing. I'm beginning to think she doesn't love me anymore. A break's just what I need."
"And this break involves -?"
Angelus looks at him again, blinking and tilting his head. Like he forgot he just happened to have a kid pinned beneath him. Forgot that he's bent at the knees and waist, twitching his hips and brushing his crotch over Oz's. "Anything you want, baby."
Want to go home. Want to die and get this over with. Want -. "Want -"
"'cause you do," Angelus says, still husky, lowering his lids and drawing his lips over Oz's forehead. "You do, and I can smell it. All over you, little boyslut. Delicious."
"No, I -" Oz makes himself shut up, closes his mouth and turns his face away.
"You can pretend you don't," Angelus says, lightly, almost kindly. He nudges Oz's face back forward with his head like a puppy urging another to play and smiles. "It's fun, playing that way. You ever played that?"
His weight's almost unbearable, pressed against Oz, chest to knee, and he's pulling at Oz's wrist, pulling him until Oz slumps a little onto Angelus's knee and his cock brushes the lump in Angelus's pants.
"No."
Angelus licks the hollow of Oz's throat, cool tongue, not nearly as cold as Oz would've thought. He *has* thought about this, not for a while, but of course he'd thought about Angel. Couldn't exactly miss the guy, for one thing.
"You just let me know, okay?" Angelus tugs him forward until Oz's back is bowed, wrists and hands on the van, everything else flowing toward Angelus.
"Yeah, okay," Oz says. Hung here, like fucking Jesus on the cross, his hands floating on pins and needles and every time the asshole twitches his hips, Oz gets harder. Just friction, he's telling himself and not exactly believing it. Just friction, totally normal.
Angelus drops one of Oz's hands and slides his hand around the small of his back. Right over Oz's ass, and he smiles more widely, tongue caught between his teeth, as he grinds them together, more deliberately, faster, until Oz gasps, once. His cock's all the way hard now and he can't exactly breathe and there's yellow steam in his skull where his brain used to be.
"What're you doing with them, anyway?" Angelus asks, raking Oz's shirt up his back.
No air, just strangled sounds. "With who?"
"Buffy's gang. The kids and that creepy old perv. You don't belong with 'em."
Oz sucks in both his cheeks, tries to hold his breath and gnaw the insides of his cheeks, as Angelus undoes his fly, then Oz's, and wraps one big hand around both their dicks. The whole time, he's humming, then singing under his breath.
Can you tell which thing is not like the others
By the time I finish my song?
Did you guess which thing was not like the others?
Did you guess which thing just doesn't belong?
If you guessed this one is not like the others,
Then you're absolutely...right!
Last line, he pulls Oz forward and jerks him in earnest, covering Oz's mouth with his own, pushing his tongue inside. Tugging and smothering, pinning and pulling him, and Oz feels yellowjackets and fireflies inside his skin. Not bones or muscle, just tight skin and angry wasps, buzzing and swarming around inside him, in his chest and his throat and his brain.
Maybe this is panic, maybe this is lust. Maybe this is what it feels like right before you die.
He'll never know; Angelus releases him and Oz tumbles backward, against the van, pants around his ankles and hand covering his mouth. Empty mouth, sore and stretched open, hollow.
"Not like 'em," Angelus says, hand on Oz's shoulder again, pushing him down. So slowly, sinking like this, until his knees hit the gravel. "Don't belong, wolfboy."
Might as well ask, quiet the curiosity poking up under panic like violets and last fall's dog turds through melting snow.
Oz cranes his neck; Angelus is tall, huge, Sears-tower big over him, the night outlining the careful spikes of hair with little licks of silver and blue. "How -? How'd you know? About the wolf."
Hand splayed over his chest, mouth agape, Angelus takes a single step backward and shakes his head. "I'm *shocked*, shocked and disappointed and *hurt* that you don't remember. Our first meeting, I'll treasure it all my days, but you -"
"The mall?" Oz peers up, his neck aching, trying and failing to understand what the Judge getting blown to smithereens could possibly have to do with the wolf.
Angelus's brows wrinkle. "You were there? No, I meant -." He cocks his head one way, then the other, and Oz wonders vaguely if he's supposed to buy this parody of serious thought. Angelus drops to one knee, close all over again, hand braced on the van wall just beside Oz's head. "You really don't remember?"
His voice's low, a little sad. Oz shudders. He doesn't know why, nothing's different, but Angelus is trailing his knuckles over his cheeks. Looking at him with faked pleading in his eyes, mockery of hope and worry washing his face.
"No," Oz says. "You knew -"
Clucking his tongue, Angelus smoothes the hair off Oz's forehead. "Don't fret. You'll start remembering. Met the wolf. Bigger'n you, very intimidating. Fucking gorgeous." His hand ghosts over Oz's nose, down his chin and throat to the collar of his shirt and then down his bare chest. Shirt's still tugged up to Oz's armpits. Sweet cold things, slushies and mint and lemon sherbet, gather and slide in the wake of Angelus's fingers, and Oz is tilting towards the touch. Canting his hips, holding his breath. "Not like 'em at all, are you? No, no. Pretty little monster."
It's like Angelus is tugging out what Oz thinks, every little shred, about discomfort in the library and the fucking wolf and the urge to touch someone else's skin, he's pulling all these thoughts out of Oz's mind and turning them over. Holding them up to the light and crooning at them.
Leaves blow backward when a storm's coming. Pale undersides thundering together, ghosts and inversions.
Oz is going to die and no one's ever going to know why.
Angelus grasps Oz by the hips, pulls him forward, and Oz lets his head drop back. Loll, his eyes closed, and that huge deadly hand wrapping around his cock again, slicked now with bloodflavored spit. Pulling at him in time with the kids' song. Singing against Oz's mouth.
Three of these kids belong together
Three of these kids are kind of the same
But one of these kids is doing his own thing...
Hate is like fear, and panic, and it's slow and cold and Oz twists, arches against Angelus. His spine bows, breath rattling out his mouth, over a swollen tongue licking at Angelus's chin, his fingers clawing and grasping pointlessly on Angelus's broad shoulders.
"Good boy," Angelus whispers. "Just give in. Feels good, so pretty. C'mon, boy. Come for Daddy." He licks down Oz's neck and it feels like it's three miles long and part of Oz's dick, pulsing in Angelus's hand. Singing again, "Now it's time to play our game. It's time to play our game."
Glaciers sliding, snow pouring from the sky, Oz is coming and crying, hating the wolf, hating the hand on him, eyes open to the black and blue sky overhead, bruises on bruises and Angelus is laughing. Laughing at him, at the stupid kid, helpless, asking for it, just wants to go and dry up and finish coming.
Angelus drops him, thump of head on a rock, gravel shoving into his skin, and rises. Huge, everything big, standing over Oz and jerking himself until he's roaring, lions and hyenas and deadly, deadly things, coming on Oz like he's a piece of used kleenex, some trash blown on the side of the road. Cool lemon ice and sour, spattering Oz's mouth and his chest.
"God, that was *refreshing*," Angelus says, kicking Oz in the side. "Get up. What, you're going to lie around all night?"
Oz rolls onto his stomach, arm over his eyes. "Just - just kill me, okay?"
"What?" Crunch of gravel and Angelus is squatting next to him, patting his shoulder. "Sorry, missed that. What?"
"Kill me," Oz says. Salt and lemons in his throat, behind his eyes, tears springing out even though he doesn't really feel like crying. "Just do it already."
"Oh, I'm not going to kill you." Angelus sounds surprised, a little amused. "You thought I was going to?"
Ice on ice, layers of it, clouding everything as Oz sits up and wipes his face. Stupid, stupid kid. "What you do, isn't it?"
Hooking his thumb into his waistband and nodding, smiling, Angelus says, "Yeah, true. But you? Don't think so."
Oz tries to push himself to his feet. The gravel skitters around him and the horizon tilts, but he's still on the ground, still freezing.
"Nah," Angelus continues. "Wolfblood goes right through me. Like Indian that way, so, no. Won't be drinking you." He extends his hand and it floats like a flat white moon in front of Oz. Hating himself, weak and stupid and needy and sicksicksick, Oz grasps the hand and Angelus hauls him to his feet. "Maybe some other time, boy."
Trembling and cold, Oz sways a little on his feet. Angelus pats his head like he's a good puppy and turns around, coat flapping.
"You -" Oz tries. Why is he still talking? He's safe. Loathsome and stupid, all his thoughts inside-out and belonging to Angelus now, but safe.
Angelus snaps his fingers and raps his temple as he turns back. "Right, sorry. Where are my manners?" He kisses Oz, hard and deep, hand on his neck. "Thanks. Good boy. I'll walk from here."
Just touch the skin, just feel good, you don't belong. Oz leans against the van, head knocking hollow metal, tasting rotten citrus and shards of ice in his mouth. His hands flex and curl at his sides.
One of these kids is doing his own thing.
7. Has your sexual behavior ever created problems for you and your family?
"Daniel! Get down here, *now*!"
His dad, at the foot of the stairs, using the Big Important Voice.
"*Fuck*," Oz says and rolls away, off the bed. Xander and Devon are still entwined, giggling and stupidhigh, rocking together like they just invented sex.
His dad's dressed in his weekend leisure finery, crisp golf shirt and crisper chinos, everything angled and sharp; Oz has to shade his eyes and stop halfway down the stairs. "Weren't you going to clean the gutters today?"
"Yeah. Getting to it."
Crisp silver hair, combed off his balding forehead, and his dad shakes his head. "Heard that one before."
Oz rubs his chin, smells Xander on his hand, bittersalt and sweet, and hides the grin behind his palm. His mouth aches a little, his dick and ass a lot. "I'll do it."
"So you say," his dad says and turns away. "Don't know why I bother with you. Fucking retarded."
Something about genetic inheritance, like father like son, but Oz's brain is on the fritz, all lava-lamp swirly and impossible to catch. So he nods and smiles like a good boy. Talking-to apparently over for the moment, he takes the stairs back up two at a time, bouncy and sweaty and raring to go again.
"That better not be marijuana smoke I smelled earlier!" his dad calls after him. "You know my position -"
Oz wants to slam the door to the attic, but that'd just bring Himmler up after him, so he latches it carefully and leans against it. See, that's nice, and he missed the beginning. Devon's on his knees on the floor, head bobbing like the pro he probably could be in Xander's lap, and Xander's leaning back, fists planted against the mattress and mouth hanging open. Sweaty dark hair in his eyes.
Fucking Dad screws *everything* up.
8. Have you ever sought help for sexual behavior you did not like?
Hot outside, full weight of July, but in here it's cool and sad. The gloom of the apartment is tinged with green and gold. Depths of forests, glades at midnight and still stagnant pools wreathed in ancient algae.
"Giles," Oz says. He keeps his voice low, soft. "It's just that -"
"I don't know what I'm supposed to do, Oz. I-I'm hardly the, the best person to consult on -. On such matters. Of the heart, and the -"
Oz squats in front of Giles, middle of his living room, and braces one hand on the couch cushion. "But you are. Perfect person. Best."
Giles raises his head and smiles. Briefly, thinly, but it's something.
Oz takes Giles's hand, out of the splints now but he's still in physical therapy, and kisses the swollen knuckles, the twisted-broken-reset bones. From pinky to index finger and he's moving toward the thumb when Giles sighs.
Long, low noise, like wings unfurling, smoke rising into the night, and Oz leans in, presses his cheek against Giles's palm.
"He hurt you," Oz says. "Want to help."
There are lies that have nothing to do with the truth: The moon's made out of green cheese, the earth is flat. Those are real lies.
Most other lies, though, they're harder to track and kind of flimsy. Difficult to pin down. Oz does want to help, of course he does; he also wants to suck Giles's finger into his mouth like he's doing now just because. Because Giles is tall and handsome, shuttered and secret, and there's something so still and constrained about him that Oz gets red in the face and hard in the pants just *thinking* about him.
These are the lies that rule the world, the kind where you get what you want and hopefully you don't hurt someone.
"I-I can't," Giles tries to say. "Oz, no, it's not -"
Oz nods, pulling his tongue up the underside of Giles's finger, then twisting his lips. Of course it's not right, it's really far from right, that's part of the appeal. He's an animal and Giles is an animal and he wants this. Wants to taste the ink sunken into Giles's fingerprint, the tea and the bookrot dust and the sweat. He wants to taste everything, and, tasting, push Giles gently back into the cushions, run his hand over the buttons of his soft formal shirt, cup his dick through his trousers and moan a little. Get a moan from Giles, just like that, throaty and constricted, then sit back on his haunches and pull off his own shirt.
"Won't tell," Oz whispers, putting Giles's hand on his chest, right over his heart. "Promise. Just want to feel you."
9. Have you made efforts to quit a type of sexual activity and failed?
Angel won't look at him. He moves sideways across the mansion's big room, shoulders hunched and head tucked in, eyes downcast. He's barefoot and his hands are in loose fists, arms crossed over his chest.
Full, high noon out there, so he's not going anywhere.
"For a guy who's all about the repentance, you're kinda slow with the apologies," Oz says. Sitting on the edge of the couch, one leg swinging, and Angel's not the only one who's not making eye contact.
He thought this was a good idea. He got to thinking, more and more, about the shit that Angelus pulled on him, all that half-believable bullshit about skin and monsters and feeling good. Forgot, conveniently, that he'd already believed it, already thought it.
Angel stops just on the other side of the fireplace. Keeps his head down and his voice low. "What do you want me to say?"
Oz stands, empty inside. Like an elevator shaft in an action movie, cable snapping and the cab plunging downward, accelerating towards nothing. "Nothing. Just an observation. Sorry."
Angel catches him by the shoulder as Oz tries to pass, then yanks back his hand like Oz is something sacred - cross, holy water, sunlight - and about to burn him.
"I am sorry," Angel says and looks away.
"Alter egos suck," Oz says. Hell, he ate Jack O'Toole; no one thinks he remembers, but Angelus was right. He's starting to remember stuff. Not just in dreams any more. "Forget about it."
"Can't. Won't."
Oz sighs and touches the knob of Angel's wrist. Presses his finger there until Angel looks at him. "Sorry I bothered you. Just - just trying to make sense of shit. Thought if I came, punished you, I don't know. Things would make sense."
Angel's kissing him. One second, he wouldn't look at Oz, and now, he's got his arms wrapped around Oz's shoulders and he's kissing him like - like Oz kisses Willow, gentle and shy, just the tip of his tongue, don't want to scare her, just taste and make her coo. He tastes like blood, like bouquets.
"Jesus," Oz says, pulling back. "The hell?"
"Sorry," Angel says. Touches his lip and looks at his fingers like he's expecting to find a clue there. "I -"
"Dude. I don't know what you're -"
"Just sorry." Angel twists away, shoves off from the wall, and Oz watches him go. Big guy, hunched and sad, weight of too many worlds on his shoulders.
"Need to chill," Oz calls after him. Angel stops but doesn't turn around. Doesn't even lift his bowed head. Just waits. Of course, he's immortal. He's got all the time in the world.
Oz catches up with him, and Angel grabs him again. Kisses him, hard. Not Angelus-hard, but insistent, opening Oz's mouth with his teeth and muttering something until Oz starts kissing him back. Syrup, warm and golden-thick, in Oz's arms as he wraps them around Angel's back, moves his hands up and down the thin sweater and then underneath, over Angel's broad back.
"Haven't touched, haven't, can't -" Angel's muttering as he walks them into the bedroom. "Need so much, can't, Buffy -"
Oz digs his fingers against rolling, restless muscles and kisses as hard as he can, mouth as wide as he can make it, swallowing all the guilt and fear that Angel's giving him, taking it inside where it's dark and hollow and nothing matters.
"Sssh," he whispers, just under Angel's ear, shifting them back onto the bed, straddling Angel's hips. "Just skin. Chill. Enjoy."
10. Do you find yourself having multiple romantic relationships at the same time?
"Dude, where're you -?" Devon's croaky and half-asleep, barely able to lift his head from the pillow.
Oz yanks his sweater over his head and grabs the doorknob. "Late. Call you later."
Giles is impatient, shooting him weird, pissy looks when Oz finally makes it to his place. He apologizes, a lot, but Giles just shakes his head and says it's nothing.
It's good, then, for a little while. They listen to a Jam album and make pizza from scratch and Giles goes down on him, and Oz tilts and wriggles until he's facing the other way and he can take Giles's cock into his mouth and they ripple like waves, slow and sure, sixty-nining like they were born to it.
But then it's later and Oz is getting dressed after the shower, scrubbing water from his hair and putting his bracelets back on while Giles sits on the edge of the bed, shoulders a little slumped.
"I'd like it if you could stay."
Oz turns, reaching past Giles for his shirt. "Can't, though. Things to see, people to do."
Giles circles one arm around Oz's waist and pulls him, breathing hot air over his chilly chest. His tongue's broad and warm, circling one nipple and Oz sways on his feet, grabs the back of Giles's neck for balance.
"Christ, Giles -"
Giles looks up at him, crafty smile on his face. "Will you stay?"
"Hell, yeah," Oz says, nudging him back on the bed. "Gotta go early in the morning, though."
He sleeps best with Giles; he doesn't know why, but they fit together well and there's something in the rhythm of Giles's breathing in Oz's ear that keeps away nightmares.
Oz wakes as the sun's coming up, all wan light, cloudy sky like the inside of a seashell, mother of pearl and pale. Untangles himself from Giles and creeps down the stairs, fingers working his hair, trying to make it lie down.
"Where were you last night?" Xander asks when he meets Oz in his backyard. Lets him into the basement. Just the laundry stuff down here and couch with broken springs, and Oz is sleepy and sore as he curls up in the corner.
"Giles's place," he says and pulls Xander against him, nosing his neck and hair. Smells like sleep and sweat. He loves sitting like this, Xander's weight against every inch of his skin, heavy and warm. "Sorry about that."
Xander is still in his arms. Still and tense, even when Oz sweeps his hand over his chest, back and forth like a windshield wiper. "Talked to Michael. Turns out he was trying to hex me."
"Oh?" Oz asks. "Weird."
"Yeah." Xander's voice is flat, asphalt and glittery sheets of mica. "Turns out he's got - got this *idea* that you're his. That I'm -"
Oz laughs; he can't help it. Xander sounds hurt and small, so he really shouldn't laugh, but he has to. "Dude. I'm not his."
Xander turns a little to look at him. Wide brown eyes, soft trapezoid brows lifting hopefully. "Yeah?"
"Yeah. I'm not anybody's."
"But -"
"Xander," Oz says and traces the outline of his lips with his thumb. "Xander."
He doesn't have anything else to say. Just this, soft little brushes against Xander's lip, nose in his hair, arm tightening over his chest. Warm and safe. Comfortable.
He really likes Xander. Wants him, too, as much as he wants Devon, and Wesley, and Angel. Nearly as much, but not quite, as he wants Giles. The weird thing is, usually liking and wanting are totally different things. They happen to coincide in Xander and Giles, but there's no reason for them usually to coexist.
Oz likes Willow a lot - probably even loves her - but he doesn't particularly *want* anything from her, of her. He wants Wesley, almost frighteningly so, wants to touch pale damp skin and pull silky hair and make those blue eyes widen, but he doesn't *like* Wesley. At all.
Angel is, of course, a whole other case. Oz wants him, sure, but one minute he likes the guy, the next he's bored out of his skull. Might be because Angel's only half a man, pretending Angelus is someone else, a distant cousin who lives halfway around the world.
But Xander? Yeah. He likes and wants Xander. Just like this, sleepy and warm and moaning soft as a kitten against Oz's mouth.
11. Have you ever worried about people finding out about your sexual activities?
The utility closet smells like lemon disinfectant and pine disinfectant and something that might be chlorine mixed with bubblegum. Oz perches on the edge of the rickety metal table, breathing hard, swallowing the groans that keep bubbling up his throat.
"Did you hear that?" Wesley asks, head snapping up, looking around wildly. The tendons in his neck stand out like angel's wings, white and strong.
"It's nothing," Oz whispers, looping his hand around the back of Wesley's neck and tugging him back down. "Don't freak out."
"I'm quite sure I -"
Oz kisses him, shutting him up, and wraps his leg around Wesley's back. Wesley's cleaner than all the chemicals in here, clean as spring water, just as clear, just as boring. There's something about that, about the extra starch in his perfectly striped shirts, the strangle of his ties and the bright worry in his blue eyes, that makes Oz want to mess him up. Rub all over him, grind sweat and dirt and come into that skin that's pink and white and perfect, tears his shirts, bind his wrists with a blue silk tie.
He settles for this, Wesley pushing and thrusting against him, gnawing at his throat and keeping his eyes closed. Wesley's skin is cool, almost vampire-cool; he sweats, sure, but it's chilly. More like dew and fog than real sweat.
Wesley fucks, though, like an animal. Always white and clean, chilly, but his hips rocket and his fingers claw and he does this thing where he twists Oz's dick in his hand one way, then the other, while he jabs and rams inside that sends starbursts and massive snowflakes wheeling past Oz's eyes, it feels so good.
Blue eyes gone feral. Oz *lives* for the moments when Wesley's coming and muttering some truly filthy shit in that perfect Masterpiece-Theatre accent of his, all fuck, you stupid fuck, take it boy, making you take it, yeah yeah and he shoves even deeper inside and Oz did this. Oz made it happen, made those perfectly sharp cheekbones flush red and ugly, made the Watcher lose it, got Wesley dirty.
12. Have sex or romantic fantasies been a way for you to escape your problems?
It's wrong to like sex this much. It has to be.
He doesn't think so.
Losing himself in touch, in the orchestration of nerves. No, *not* losing, *finding* himself, resolving out of dim swirling shadows into something real. Taking nerves as they spark, catch, and glow, stoking them and making them bright. As the other guy reaches for him, needs him, and Oz can reply, can answer their need, help ease the hurt. Make them smile and get himself off in the process.
He wants to live here; if the world was fair, he *would* live here, all the time, an expanse of skin twisted over the constant fireworks of nerves.
No brain, no heart, just electricity and need. No language either, besides the literal grunts and sighs.
Perfect here.
He *is* here, everyone is; they just pretend they're not.
13. Do you regularly engage in sado-masochistic behavior?
By the time Oz gets to the mansion these days, Angel's already got himself mostly chained up. He keeps one hand free so he can unlatch his belt in front of Oz. It's almost like a ritual, dark eyes burning into Oz as he pulls the belt from his pants, folds it in half, and passes it over. Then he blinks, once, and closes the other iron cuff around his wrist.
Angel waits. Oz circles him.
Something like art, the muscles in Angel's torso so finely drawn and twisting that it's almost inhuman. Is inhuman. White skin, dead but alight, taking the marks from the belt. Red welts, stormy sunsets warning off sailors, that fade way too fast.
Oz strikes harder, wasphiss of leather cutting the air, then skin. Drops of blood appear in the welts.
Angel heals too quickly. Mind and body, and that's his curse, Oz is sure of it. Their curse, both of them. Hardly any scars, all unbroken skin that needs touch to feel alive.
They're silent. It's like church, but without the bullshit.
14. Do you ever think your sexual desire is stronger than you are?
Oz needs.
The wolf comes in his sleep. Sometimes it's about sex, sometimes it's just excited when it gets a kill. Oz wakes up on cold linoleum with come all over his belly and thighs and blood in his mouth.
Easy enough to say the wolf's in charge, that he doesn't remember anything. That Oz is like a sheet of newspaper, blown ahead on the wind, helpless and hopeless.
Not true, but *easy*.
The wolf fucks and hunts and kills in his dreams. *Oz* fucks in his dreams, masses of people, Willow and Buffy and Giles and Xander, Devon and Michael and Angel and Spike and Drusilla and Wesley and the guy who pulls lattes at the Espresso Pump and the assistant janitor with the blond hair and Snyder, once, but that was more a nightmare, where he sucked Snyder's little dick, thicker than it was long, and made him squeal like a pig.
Oz fucks around, waking, dreaming, it doesn't matter. Animals with pelts and naked apes. Oz, wolf; desire, skin.
No difference, not when you get down to it. No line between him and lust, never was, never will be.
He believes that; it's the best kind of faith.