Bougainvillea
It's raining, and Gareth can't get out of bed. His boyfriend helps.
Gareth lay on the blue bedspread, the room lit only by the scant light which filtered through the window. It was an overcast summer day. The air was tepid with unreleased moisture, and Gareth's fur felt damp even though he wore nothing but a threadbare tank and a pair of briefs. He was a spindly, lanky thing, a coyote with big paws and ears he'd never grown into and twiggy limbs knobbed at the joints. As much as they let him, he was curled into a tight ball. Xavier would be home soon, and Gareth hadn't done the dishes.
He'd taken the trash out, but that was easy to remember to do; they lived in a small shotgun house in a warm, humid city, and he had a coyote's nose. Besides, he'd said he would. But Xavier had had work today. He was a roofer, slaving away all day in the sun while Gareth sat at home, theoretically freelancing as an artist. And he still hadn't done the dishes. He wanted to do them, tried to get up, uncurl, get off his lazy ass, but his limbs wouldn't move, as if his nerves were cut.
He curled up tighter. Of course his muscles could manage that. Useless. He was useless. Xavier would come home to a dirty sink and no food made.
Gareth had changed out the dishwater. And he'd washed a cup or two, and a handful of silverware. But the sink wasn't empty, and there wasn't any food in the oven, warm and waiting, so what was the point?
So Gareth's thoughts spun, tractionless as a wheel stuck in mud.
Then it started to rain. The stagnant air slackened, the sky loosed its burden. But the cool air brought no refreshment to Gareth. A greyer weight preyed on him, undeterred.
Xavier's key clicked in the lock, he exuberantly yelled, “Honey!" and dropped his pack on the floor with a thud. Gareth did not move. “Sweetheart?" Xavier's head popped in the open door to the bedroom. “Oh, honey." A few steps, then his weight shifted the mattress as he sat on its corner and laid his hand gently on Gareth's back. “A bad day?"
Joltingly, Gareth uncurled and squinted up at his boyfriend. Xavier was a puma, well-built and hale, tall but with an extra heft of fat that softened his muscles and put pudge on his belly. The wet tank he wore clung to the curve and bulge of him, and the sweat and rain made him glisten. A glimmer of desire sparked, then died in Gareth's stomach.
Xavier frowned. “You been up today, Ger?"
Gareth scrunched his eyes, which stung. “I, uh, I did a little. Took out the trash. But I didn't do the dishes, I'm sorry, I—"
“No, nope, none of that," said Xavier. He reached and untangled the miserable knot of his boyfriend and bundled him into his arms. Gareth pressed straight into the crook of his neck, breathing in fitful gulps of his scent. It did less to comfort Gareth than usual. “I've said it before, baby. Did you do your best?"
“I, Xave, I tried, but I didn't do anything, really."
“Ger, honey. You did the trash. That's a chore."
“Yeah. The easiest one, I guess. But I didn't do any of—"
“Wait, wait." Xavier pulled Gareth back to look at him. “You didn't do any of the dishes?"
Gareth sighed. “I, uh, changed the dishwater. And did a few spoons. But—"
“Again,"—Xavier hugged him tight, tighter—“no buts. Even if you didn't do the whole thing, you helped. And I bet after soaking in two changes of soapy water, they're basically clean anyway."
Xavier's tone was placating—like that of a parent to a child with a scraped knee. Gareth's fur stood on end. “I didn't do a good job, Xave," he snarled, “I did one chore."
“One and a half."
“Ugh, fine, one and a half. So much better. I just." He slumped into Xavier. “I just feel like a burden."
“Hmm." They breathed together a moment.
Then Xavier tightened his grip, but before Gareth could settle into it they were lurching up, Gareth held in Xavier's arms. “What, Xaves, put me down!"
“Nope. C'mon." And Gareth held tight as he was carried through the screen door in the kitchen and out into their narrow backyard. The small patch of land was demarcated by a wooden slat fence that had, once, been painted white. Greenery was sparse but for the patchy grass, a young live oak they sometimes referred to as their “son," and a small patch of vegetables Gareth had planted: okra, tomato, basil. And the neighbor's bougainvillea, pink as Valentine's Day candy, climbed over and through and under the fence, undeterred.
Xavier carried him to the middle of the yard and held him there as the rain fell, darkening their fur and making the plants dance and quiver.
“Xavier, what are you—"
“Shush. Just. Ger, just be here with me, for a bit, yeah?"
Gareth sighed. He looked up at the pale grey sky, but a droplet fell into his eye and he flinched. Xavier chuckled and kissed him on the forehead. “Just be here in the rain, in my arms."
And so he was. He felt Xavier's breath expand and contract his broad ribcage, as he felt the plants around him—the live oak, his okra and basil and tomatoes, the bougainvillea, the grass—drink deep of the rain and breath with their thousands of stomata. And the insects, hidden, surely did the same. And, for a moment, a miracle: his mind was tranquil and wielded no weapons against istelf. And Gareth breathed. He smelled the not-entirely-pleasant scent of his boyfriend's wet fur, the spice of his sweat born of labor. Desire woke in his groin, then, and blood filled his cock.
Gareth licked up Xavier's neck, then bit it gently, just held it in his teeth. “Ah, okay," whispered Xavier, his voice sweetly hitched into a low drag, “Okay, honey, all right." And they lowered into the wet grass.
Their open mouths met and they kissed with closed eyes as hands fumbled for hems. A slight note of male arousal penetrated the clean of the air and loamy petrichor, only perceptible to Gareth with his coyote's nose. His boxers were pulled clumsily around his knees, and the rain tickled his bare thighs, his sheath and balls, as paws nimbly rubbed him. Sparks sang on his nerves. He whimpered, thankful again for the hide of the slat fence, their safe and tender garden.
Xavier worked him and he fell into it, rode the rhythym and crescendo of pleasure until he arched and spilled over his trembling stomach. With two fingers Xavier took the come and put it in his mouth. then kissed Gareth, sharing the bitter salt. Gareth moaned. He moved his mouth to Xavier's neck, then sought down, down over the curve of his belly, the trail of scruffier and slightly longer fur, till his mouth took the already hard length in. And he sucked and thought of nothing but the cock in his mouth, the sounds he could hear coming from Xavier, his boy, the scent of of him, then—a second release, another joyful, pleasured mess.
They lay on the grass, their chests fluttering. The grey of the overcast sky seemed silvery, shimmering before it was mere grey again. The swarming disquiet bit at Gareth's edges, so he looked away, to the bougainvillea. So pink, those bracts and flowers, so un-grey and stubborn. And then Gareth rolled back into Xavier's chest, and was held.
Eventually, Xavier picked them up, muttering about taking a shower, “a hot, real one. With soap," and that they would make dinner together, Gareth chopping while Xavier handled the pots and pans. They went inside, and Gareth looked again at the grey and silver sky, the green of the grass, the pink of the bougainvillea. And they closed the screen door, but left the inner open, to let the cool air in.