These Things
by Nancy Brown (nancyelizabrown@aol.com)
Copyright 2004
NC-17

Disclaimer: DC and Warner Brothers would be
very mad at me if they knew about this.

Feedback: Sure. I haven't written smut since
the days when I was still available for sacrifice
at the local temple of your choice, so public or
private crit will help me, um, serve your needs
better. Ahem.

*

These are the things he should not think
about.

After his sixth double shift this week, he
should have been too exhausted to think, to do
anything more than collapse into his bed. 
He'd timed his last cup of coffee so the
caffeine would be out of his system now, not
flickering through his veins, forcing his eyes
open to watch the ceiling, or worse, in his
restlessness allow his arm to wander too far
from his side of the bed and meet no
resistance beside him.

He ought to have been far too tired to think
of her.

Instead, streetlights streamed in through the
chinks in his blinds, making small, bright
patterns on the wall and floor. It was too
muggy tonight for much activity on the street,
but he could still hear the mutter of cars go
by, and in the silence of his room, every
noise from outside amplified into a sleep-
robbing ruckus. Too noisy, too bright, and far
too hot to sleep.

She was always cool, her resting body
temperature about six or seven degrees below
his, and curling around her tonight would be
like resting in the shade after a long day in
the sun. He would wrap his arms around her
waist, and he would be so very careful not to
pinch her wings this time, and she would make
a soft noise in her throat as he slid his body
behind hers, covering her everywhere.

He had to stop thinking like this. Had to
stop it now, because his mind had provided
more than enough information for his body to
react.

John got out of bed, ran water in the bathroom
sink until it was icy cold, and splashed his
face. The chill caught him off-guard, but
only for a few seconds. The water picked up
the heat off his skin and the night, and then
instead of being wet and cold, he was just
wet. But cooler.

In the corner of the mirror, he saw the bath's
small trash can. He only ever used it for the
rare tissue or dull razor blade, but she ...

"What are you doing in there?" The shower
had gone silent a good ten minutes ago, and he
knew she wasn't shy.

She paused. "Preening."

"Do you need a bigger mirror?" he teased.

"Not what I meant."

He tapped at the door, opened it slowly so as
not to hit her with the knob. Shayera gave him
her "You're in my way" frown, but continued
her work while he watched. She was still
entirely nude, and this made his observation
that much more pleasant. She ran her hands
through the layers of feathers on her left wing,
and plucked two, no bigger than quarters in her
palm. She dropped them in the trash.

"Doesn't that hurt?"

"They were about to fall out."

"Oh." He wanted to ask her more, ask if she
did this every day, but then she was done and
she had her smile back on, and she pressed up
against him, and then the bathroom was really
far too small.


He didn't look in the trash can, wouldn't
look. He knew he hadn't emptied it in over
two months, and she had only been gone for
one. He pulled the chain for the light, stood
in the warm darkness in front of his mirror
and he was just another shadow.

Back in his bed, the heat wasn't as bad as
it'd been. He pulled the sheet back up and
over, thinking maybe he could change it out
with the sheets in the closet, and have cool
linens for a few minutes before they absorbed
his body heat as well.

Headlights drifted across his ceiling again
and again.

Every morning when he'd made the bed — her
concept of making a bed meant throwing the top
blanket on the crumpled sheets — he'd expected
to find to find tiny grey feathers. Not one,
not ever, and maybe that's why she was so
fastidious about her wings. And he'd washed
these sheets twice since she'd left, and the
others three times, and was he really thinking
about laundry at two a.m.?

He had to stop thinking about her. He could
do it around the others, had to. He couldn't
stand the way they looked at him, or tried not
to look.

J'onn's great sad eyes told him he understood,
but John didn't want someone to understand. 
Wally spent every spare minute trying to
"cheer him up." John felt he'd shown
remarkable restraint in not decking him the
last time, an instant pride that made J'onn
look even more somber. Superman and Diana
were being very careful not to mention
anything in his presence that might possibly
remind him of her. And Batman, well, he had
gotten over it, and acted as though he assumed
everyone else had too.

"The point is, these things happen.  You
just have to deal with it."

Like he could do that.  Like he could just
forget everything, and go on like a robot. 
Hell, Batman probably did expect that, would
have done that.

Batman didn't know what she was like, not
really, although maybe John didn't know her so
well either if she could fool him so easily
into believing she cared.  No.  She hadn't
been pretending.  He'd known then, knew even
when he'd seen her with Talak, knew it now.

He knew her.  He knew her eyes, knew
her smile, had made a careful study of every
other inch of her.  He remembered the taste
and scent of her skin, how his mouth curled in
amusement every time he breathed in the
apricot scent of the soap she favored, the
clean smell of her shampoo.  He knew the soft
place just under the swell of her breasts
where one swipe of his tongue would make her
shiver, would raise gooseflesh along her arms. 
He knew just how much pressure to apply with
the tips of his teeth to bring her nipples
into hard peaks, and just how long to suckle
at them to make her moan.

The calluses on his own hands were long
familiar on his cock, and it wasn't like he
was getting to sleep any other way.  He wasn't
even surprised to notice he'd already removed
his briefs.

He ran his hands over her, down her sides
to touch and tickle as he continued loving her
breasts.  It wasn't long before his fingers
slipped down, cupped her tight ass, making her
squirm even more, because she knew what he
wanted.  His fingers slid around to her front,
slid inside her and she was so wet he
groaned.

Pre-come slicked the head of his cock, and he
ran his palm through it, lubed himself, kept
his pace slow even as his breathing quickened.

Her breathing quickened as he lay her back
— gently! — as he left soft kisses on her
stomach, as he took that first, heady taste of
her.  Every woman was different, human or
alien or what have you, and each one had her
own unique shape down there.  He explored her
now, and her soft places were unlike any other
he'd known, so he placed kisses everywhere,
though not at her center.  She wriggled again,
trying to coax him to her most sensitive
places as he teased and tasted.

"Dammit, John," she said, but the irritation
was a thin cover.

He pulled off the sheet.  No use for it here
and now, and he was steaming.  His fist jerked
faster.

He flicked her central exposed ridge with
his tongue and she shouted, grasping for
purchase in his too-short hair.  Now that he
was through teasing, he nibbled and lapped at
her like he was licking a melting ice cream cone
on a hot July afternoon.  He felt a soft rush of
fluid from her in his mouth, and again he knew
her ancestors had crawled out of a different sea. 
Her cries came from deep inside her throat. 
God, he wondered what the neighbors thought,
if they ever saw her come into his apartment,
if they whispered and pointed.  Then she drew
her legs up around him, rested her heels on
his back and he didn't give a damn about the
neighbors or anyone else.

He prayed like mad the commlink wouldn't go
off again.

"Now," she said, and he pulled away from her
with one last touch of his tongue.  She pulled
him to her, and they kissed, and he knew she
tasted herself in his mouth as her own tongue
probed deep.  They rolled, and he was on his
back, still trying to kiss her even as she set
her legs to either side of him.

She wasn't always on top, but it was the
easiest, safest way, whether they were in the
bed or on the rug.  He loved backing her
against the shower wall, helping her balance
as her own weight pressed him deeper inside
her and the water slowly went cold.  Once he'd
had her on her knees, holding onto the couch
and panting as he'd taken her from behind,
both of them turned on after she'd mentioned
it was how things were traditionally done back
home; even that paled in comparison to having
her in the same position an hour later, with
her face buried in his pillow, and her knees
spread wide on his comforter.

He lost it then, lost the rhythm, almost lost
his erection.

Before, when she'd told him she'd had other
lovers, he'd seen them as abstract, unreal
figures who had come into her life and were
gone like the women in his own past.  Now he
had a name and a face to go with her most
recent lover, and his mind helpfully provided
a clear image of Shayera on her knees with
Talak behind her, thrusting again and again as
she cried out her pleasure.

Part of him would always wonder if she'd slept
with Talak during the invasion, if only for
old time's sake.  He was almost certain she
hadn't, but then, he'd been certain of plenty
of things about her right up to the moment
she'd hit him.

"It wasn't personal."

She'd only hit him once before, and it had
been to save him from Brainiac's control. 
This time, he could argue that she'd actually
saved his life because Talak was coming with
hundreds of troops, and John would have died
before being captured.  She knew that.  She
knew him.

It was two-fifteen in the morning, and he was
allowed his delusions here alone in his
bedroom.  He could pretend he knew for sure
that she had taken him down to save him.  He
could pretend he knew she would never betray
him, not in her heart, that she had intended
to set them all free when she'd gotten away
from the watchful eyes of that Lieutenant.  He
could pretend he knew she loved him, wanted
him still.

"I want you," she breathed when they stole
a moment alone in a storage room in the
Watchtower.  Like some horny kid, he fumbled
at the closure to her top and she arched as he
placed a kiss in the hollow between her
breasts.

His cock stiffened in his hand again, and he
restarted his slow pace.  A fingertip against
his glans was like her tongue the first time
she'd taken him into her mouth.  Her throat
was deep and slick and he'd bucked against
her.

"Need you," she said, and his heart beat
even faster than it had when she'd brought him
back to life hours before.  He let her set the
pace, let her lead him to what she wanted
because he was so tired, and so bruised, and
he wanted her so very badly.  Her hands were
on his briefs, pulling them down and away.  He
watched her watching him, and wondered which
of the million questions they needed to ask
each other would come out first, and then
she'd bent and kissed him, and he knew he
loved her more than anything.

The bed was firm against his shoulders, and he
was hard.  He licked at his hand, tasting the
salt, and then gasped at the wetness against
his cock.

She was above him and beautiful.  Her hand
guided him in, and she was tight and cool like
nothing else he'd ever known.  His hips rose
to meet her, and then she shifted, just an
inch, and now he could feel his cock rubbing
against that sensitive ridge, could see her
biting her own lip to keep from screaming at
the contact, instead making the tiny whines he
knew meant her climax was close.

He thrust harder, watched her jiggle in all
the right ways as she rode him.  God, she was
gorgeous.  He wanted to touch her, wanted to
stroke her face, her neck, her wings, her
legs, but all he could do was hold on to her
small waist.

"I want to watch you," he gasped, "want to see
you come," and her face looked almost pained. 
He moved his hand between them, placed his
thumb just above where she made contact with
his skin, felt her ridge at his thumb tip, and
pressed in just so.

He was right there, right there, and he fucked
his fist like he had countless times before
but it was Shayera he was fucking, and he
squeezed.

"Oh god!"

She cried out something in her own
language, dug into his side with her sharp
talons — later he would see that she'd drawn
blood — but the bright pain in his side only
heightened the pleasure of her internal spasms
surrounding him and he came with a shout, felt
her crest a second, lesser time even as his
thrusts abated.

She pulled his face to hers, and kissed him,
and pressed her forehead to his, and stared
into his eyes as their breathing returned to
normal.  He was so sensitive now, and he
gasped again as he pulled out of her, still
staring back.

"I love you so much," she said, and he could
only nod, and place a tired kiss at her lips.

There was a mess on his chest and stomach.  He
reached beside the bed, grabbed his discarded
briefs, and cleaned up the best he could.  One
good toss landed the abused underwear in his
hamper.  The bedclothes had survived
unstained, so he didn't have to change them
after all.  John pulled the thin sheet over
himself again.

His heart rate slowed.  His sleepy thoughts
drifted to a half-memory, when they'd gone to
her favorite lonely spot in the mountains, and
lain together in two sleeping bags they'd
zipped into one big bag, watching as the stars
wheeled around above them.  She'd curled
behind him, enfolding him in her arms and her
wings and her love, and he'd never felt so
safe, or so happy.

His last conscious thought was a hope that she
was safe and happy, wherever she'd gone.  But
he couldn't make himself believe that, not
even at two-thirty in the morning, not even in
his dreams.

*