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Eli jerked forward and back across the edge of the mattress, jaw hanging open and tongue lolling in rhythm with the hips that pounded into him from behind. Felt so good having Marlin breed him against the bed like this, tail raised up for the stout arctic fox to slam into him from behind again and again, especially with his own hard cock squeezed between his belly and the edge of the bed, the stroking done for him by that same rhythm. He'd been in this spot, this position so often before, and yet it still seemed to get a bit better with each time.

He flicked his tongue over his lips and then let out a breathy moan, raising his head up off the pillows. Those had been stacked there at the start of this get-together, when Marlin had yanked the wild dog's pants and underwear off, pushed him down onto the bed, and hoisted his legs up over his shoulders to bury his muzzle beneath his sack, lips pursed and pressed right against his tailhole with tongue quickly working its way in after. Of course Eli was already hard even before his pants had hit the floor - being around Marlin tended to do that to him. Not that the fox was particularly hot or anything like that. That's just the way it went, after five years of dating.

Sure, there were spaces in between those five years where the two weren't together. Several times, actually. Eli swallowed again and pressed his rump back against the fox's cock, deliciously thick, just the right amount of length to push him steadily past his limit during their harder sessions, and entirely capable of making the wild dog cum hands-free - if he railed him on his belly, at least. There was that time in their senior year of high school where Eli had Marlin blocked for two months, then a year later when they didn't talk for three weeks, then a while after that where Marlin wouldn't respond to his texts for three months... and then now, where four months had passed since the two had decided to mutually end things between them.

Throughout all of those times, though, this remained. Marlin's paws dug into Eli's hips and tugged the dog firmly back against him, squeezing his cock beneath his tail in a few final thrusts, the weight of his orgasm palpable on his ragged breathing. In that space of relaxation following the fox's peak, Eli swallowed yet again, then reached back to wrap his paw around his cock... and give himself the last few strokes needed to bring himself over his own edge and spurt his load down across the side of the bed. Sometimes Marlin hilted deep enough inside him that he couldn't cum until he pulled out again.

Or, he could cum, but nothing actually came out until after the fox's cock had slipped out of his tailhole. Then it usually all spurted out in one messy burst.

Marlin pulled in another breath, swallowed at the end of it, and let it out as he drew himself out. "Haah... God, Eli, I've been needing that..."

Also like usual, it took the wild dog a moment to gather his thoughts back together, after they'd gotten crushed and scattered by that orgasm brought on by this very fox. "I..." Nope. Lick of the lips, swallow, some panting. "...did too..."

Marlin leaned over him from behind to nuzzle at his neck, chin lightly brushing against the collar of his shirt. He'd left that on him when he'd pushed Eli down to the bed to get at his ass: the fox, meanwhile, had been naked as soon as Eli rang the doorbell, and half-hard too. "Mmr. It's been a long week. You gonna stay around for a round 2 later, maybe after a shower?"

If I only... didn't have any plans today... Eli swallowed yet again and lifted himself shakily up onto his elbows, tail still raised. He thought he could feel the fox's load drip slowly down the back of his sack. "I can't. What time is it?"

"Little bit after noon... what could you possibly have to do today? Oh, don't tell me you got a date."

Over the corner of his shoulder, he caught the fox grinning as he went to swipe up a towel from the floor. Marlin kept that beside his nightstand so he wouldn't have to get up out of bed to get cleaned up whenever he pawed off at night - and whenever he didn't have someone else's muzzle or rump close at hand to contain the mess. After picking it up and running it along his own length with a sweet shiver, he smirked and shook his head.

"You? Eli? Naah."

"What?" The wild dog rolled onto his back - and jumped a little bit as that slightly-damp towel thumped against his chest. "Of course not. There's just a store I wanna go to today."

"And it's absolutely fuckin' imperative that you get there, right now?" Marlin held his little white paw out for Eli to toss the towel back to him, which he then dropped right back to its place on the floor. He also didn't wash it until it felt crusty along at least every other inch. "Are they running a sale on skinny jeans or something?"

"Pssh. Come on. You know I'd love to hang around." Shower water made for absolutely awful lube, though. "I don't really wanna wait here alone 'til you get back from work tonight, though, and... I do already have plans." Eli stood up-

"My door's always open." -and Marlin swung an arm in around the wild dog's waist, pulling him close and standing up on his tiptoes to push his nose and lips in against that splotchy-furred neck. Eli shivered with the light bite and lighter kiss. "As long as your legs are open, I mean."

"Mm. Always. You know that. I-" ...love you. Haven't said that in four months. Force of habit, I guess."...um. I should be going."

The fox untwined himself and took a step back, fresh glistening red of his cocktip still poking out of the end of his sheath. Eli had dug his tongue into that sheath as far as it could go a few times - and just remembering this gave himself another little throb. "Yeah. I should be showering. Fuck, you should too - you _reek_of fox. I'll catch ya later, El."

He reached down to find where Marlin had tossed his clothes. "Yeah. Um..." But when he raised his head again the fox was already gone down the hall, with the sound of the shower hissing on shortly after. And that left him with this odd mix of tingling satisfaction under his tail from that thorough pounding, and something like... like disappointment, like incompletion. Like things between the two of them hadn't yet finished.

I love you, Eli mouthed, not because he meant it but because... why? It felt natural. It was what he'd gotten used to. He missed saying it, and especially hearing it in return. Something was missing and incomplete, and after long nights following their breakup spent staring up at the ceiling of his bedroom with his arms crossed over his chest and the sticky streak of a revisited fantasy still sitting atop his bellyfur, he thought he'd figured out what - who - it was.

Sometimes Marlin still let him stay the night, and on those nights, it was almost as if they hadn't broken up.

Almost. And that was what Eli missed the most, maybe. He tugged his pants back up his legs, adjusting his boxers a bit to try to make sure he wasn't still leaking, and then brought his shirt down to follow. His tongue just ached to say those three little words, and his big dinner-plate ears wanted so deeply to hear Marlin return them.

Finally, he reached over and grabbed his keys and wallet from where he'd tossed them on the nightstand, outline of the as-of-yet unused condom just barely visible through the thick leather. Hopefully the day would come soon that he could again call that goddamn arctic fox his boyfriend. It felt like he was almost, almost done putting together a puzzle, and he knew exactly where the final piece lay - but he just couldn't reach it. Not yet.

On his way out the door, he actually forgot for a moment what his plans today were... and when he remembered that surprisingly tall striped hyena, paws on her hips with that short jacket hanging open, light green eyes looking down at him like a pair of smooth polished stones... she could probably stop a bus with those eyes, with that look.

Lynn. He rolled her name over his tongue when he pulled up to the light at the end of the street, shifting around to get himself into a more comfortable position. There was just something about her, something he couldn't quite put his finger on. She did make him a little nervous, honestly; the wild dog rolled his fingers along the outer rim of his steering wheel, eyes unfocused along a little flower bush sitting at the other corner. Not nervous like she frightened him, or he didn't like being around her. But, rather, nervous as in...

As in when he was still in school and wanted to make a new friend, but didn't know how to go about doing it. Eli had always had a bit of trouble with friends. The car behind him honked, bringing him back out of that bush and his own thoughts, and he put his foot to the gas.

Of course, there was always the chance that she wouldn't be there today. Who goes to the same store, at the same time, two days in a row? That seemed a bit silly. Actually, this whole thing seemed a bit silly: he could have just asked for her number at the end of yesterday. Or would that have seemed like he'd wanted to take her on a date? That thought actually made him chuckle a little. How would she have responded to that? He could see her as equally likely to raise an eyebrow, look him up and down, and nod in acceptance as to bark a laugh, cover her muzzle with her paw in attempts to stifle it, fail, and double over with her paws on her knees trying to apologize between breaths.

Jeez. Eli rolled his eyes and turned down the next street, towards the road that would take him right through that part of town. They'd spoken for maybe three minutes yesterday, and already he was here putting all of this thought into it, and going over scenarios of what might have happened, but didn't. Just like high school. As much as he tried to push those thoughts and worries away, they kept on coming back - right up to when he held his paw out with the button beneath his thumb to lock his car, after pulling up in front of the music shop. Hell, what if she was already there? That hadn't been something he'd considered. What would he say, and what would he do? Not like he could peer through the front windows of the store to see: they'd covered them from the inside with countless overlapping promo announcements and tour posters, and had drawn on the outside advertising the weekend's sale.

I guess I could start with 'hello'. The handle of the door felt warm in the midday sun - which for some reason made him realize he hadn't yet eaten anything, despite the times he'd tried to suck Marlin's tongue out of his mouth and swallow it. Maybe he'd hit up that Vietnamese place across the street for lunch. Eli held the handle for a moment after pulling the door open, ears perking up at the gentle jingling from those same bells hanging over the corner; a tiger wearing a tank top over in the back corner thumbing through the vinyl, a silver fox with his tail in the air leaning in over the front counter talking about something with the clerk. And nobody else.

Eli let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding, and slid his paws into his pockets as he started making his way down one of the rows. He hadn't planned this thing out: what should he look for? He'd forgotten to give Marlin the new group that Lynn had picked out for him, since his mind and his ass both focused on six inches of fox just about as soon as he entered the room. That would have to be for next time.

What was her thing, anyway? What kind of person just... came over to another in a story, gave a suggestion, and then left? Put like that, that interaction felt a bit rude. The wild dog splayed his fingers out and ran his pads along the smooth plastic edges of the disc cases, hundreds - probably thousands, actually - stacked sideways in the bins, some pristine and still wrapped, some cracked, some weirdly greasy.

What kind of music does she like? Seemed like she knows her metal. What was that - mellow techno? Death? What?

That jingling caught his ears again, and before he could stop himself he glanced up towards the door. Not Lynn. Wait, won't it be weird if I look up when she comes in, and we make eye contact? Am I just gonna say 'hello' when she gets here? If. I guess that's still 'if'.

High school, all over again. He swallowed - could still taste Marlin there, could still smell him on his lip - and turned the corner, briefly eyeing the wider stacks of vinyl. He'd always meant to get a record player, but had just never actually gotten around to it yet. Another jingling; likely that would be that silver fox making his way out the door.

Is 'hello' too... meh? 'How are you doing'? Could I go the joking 'Fancy meeting you here' route? Or - hell, what if she doesn't even show up and I'm just wasting all my time?

_ _

What the hell am I even doing? I-

"Hey Eli."

He jumped, losing hold of the CD he'd picked up and then scrambling to catch it before it clattered to his feet.

"Fancy meeting you here."

The dog swallowed, and turned, and sure enough there she stood, one paw on her hip with her other at her muzzle, idly chewing on a claw. Those pale eyes flicked down to his; the striped hyena nodded greeting.

"Oh." Another swallow. Eli clutched the CD to his chest, drumming his fingers along the case. He hadn't even looked to see who this was: it'd been something he'd grabbed just to give himself something to do. "Hey Lynn. What're - um, why're you here?"

Shrug. Today she'd left that short leather jacket at home and opted instead for just the crop top, showing shoulders with sleek curves of stripes that unfurled and marked their way down along slim yet firm arms. Maybe it was just a hyena thing that her fur looked a bit frizzy, even though at the same time it was obvious she'd brushed it.

"Just lookin' around," she said. "Brian's here today."

"Brian?"

Lynn nodded behind her, towards the front desk. "Owner of the place. Friend of my brother."

"Ohh. Yeah, I remember you mentioned that." Eli glanced down at the CD. "Um..."

"Are you gonna buy that?"

He looked back up at her before realizing what she'd meant. "What? Oh - no, I was... just looking. Do you know them?"

The hyena shifted both paws to her hips and bent forward closer to Eli, squinting just a little bit. He instinctively leaned back to give her space - and then there was her scent again, tickling at his nose. Her little tail swished behind her.

"Nah. This isn't really my type of music."

Then, a few seconds of silence between them that felt so heavy Eli got the urge to roll his shoulders and pop his neck.

I never thought about what I'd say to her if she did show up. And here she is, now.

As if she didn't feel that awkwardness at all, Lynn shrugged again and reached over to run her claws along the edges of the cases. "You know," she said, flicking her gaze sideways towards the wild dog, "I don't really have anything I'm looking for, either. I also haven't eaten lunch yet." She adjusted her shirt on her shoulders and looked him straight-on again. "Wanna run across the street here and try that Vietnamese shop with me?"

"Actually I-"

Eli's stomach growled, giving its own answer. Lynn kept her eyes on him for a moment, then shifted them down, then brought them back up - and raised her eyebrows, a faint amused smile lifting the corners of her lips. "What were you gonna say?"

Every time his friends had asked him to go out to eat with them, they'd ended up shoveling the bill entirely off onto him... "Um," he patted at his pocket, "I only have, like, ten dollars..."

"I'll cover you." That smile remained as it was, though something about how the hyena held her ears and how she looked at him told him that it had turned from amusement to... something else. "I - meant to go yesterday, but got distracted and ended up... well, not doing that. So, how about it? I've been dying to try their pho."

That was new. For a moment Eli wasn't sure how to respond; what came out of his mouth was a mess halfway between a chuckle and a scoff. "Well I mean, there's really no reason for me not to if you're gonna pay-"

"Yeah, you'd be stupid to not come along. And you're not stupid, are you?"

"I'm not." He licked his lips and looked up at her. "Let me rephrase that: conditionally, no, but don't overestimate me."

"I like it. How_ever_..." A short-clawed finger poked against his sternum. A light prod, though the force behind it still made the upper half of his body lean back. "I asked if you want to. Do ya?"

That sent a small shiver of something through his chest, something different from the pressure from her claw and fingertip. Whatever it was, though, simmered away out of his senses before he could grasp it.

"Yeah." As soon as his tongue flicked out over his lips right there, he realized - he could _still_taste that damn fox. Hopefully Lynn couldn't smell him on his face, or his breath. The wild dog coughed into his fist to cover what might have been a blush. "I do. Um - are we going right now?"

She grasped his wrist for a fraction of a second to pull him in the general direction of the door, then released it. "Sure. It's literally across the street, and I haven't eaten today yet. C'mon."

Eli noticed that she hadn't stopped to talk to Brian, or to browse the selection, or anything.

~ ~ ~

"So what's Eli short for, anyway? Elias? Elliot? Elijah? ...Eliahu? That's one, right?"

The wild dog worked at slurping a noodle up from his plate, repeatedly squeezing his lips against it, sucking, chewing, again and again. The sauce - salty-savory, barely a sauce at all; more a suggestion, really, or a liquid seasoning - made that more work than it was worth, so at one point he just bit it off and curled his tongue around the rest. Lynn watched him from across the two-person table, a sheaf of her own noodles held lightly between her chopsticks and that same amused expression on his face.

Eli pointedly ignored it, though it was hard not to smile as well. "Yeah. Elijah."

"That's pretty cool." She nodded, then took down her own noodles with much more ease and grace. That wasn't really a fair comparison, though: she got the pho, of course. "That's... biblical, right?"

He struggled for a moment with a small chunk of pork, settled in among the nest of noodles. A car went by along the road outside. "It's a lot of things. But, yeah, biblical." After flicking it into his mouth, he looked up at the hyena across from him again. "Which is funny. My parents're the kind who're only Christian on Easter and Christmas."

"Do you live with them?"

"No, no. Not since college."

"No shit? What's your degree?"

Hardly fifteen minutes here, and already the ease he felt in speaking to her... usually he tried not to bring up his college days in conversation. "Oh, it's - nothing big. Just an associate's in, like, general science. Didn't continue since I realized the longer I was there, the less I wanted to do it." The most common reaction he got to revealing that was a curled lip, or a frown, or a scoff, or something along that vein.

Lynn, though... she was looking down at her soup bowl, though still nodded. When she raised her muzzle back to him, there was no real judgment in those green eyes. "Yeah. I getcha. What do you do now?"

"You know the library?"

"Which... one? I'm not really in town too often."

"Oh. There's one just - down the highway that way," he pointed over his shoulder, "near the lake. I'm front desk there. Full time."

"Oh! That sounds nice." Lynn picked up another pair of noodles, though one of them slipped out and splashed back into the broth. In that quick second, her eyes flicked up to Eli, and he thought that she tried to suppress a smile.

"It is. I mean - it's slow most of the time. Nice and relaxed. And it pays enough, so."

"Get a lot of reading done?"

He chuckled. "Not as much as you'd think. But I guess that's on me."

In that moment the conversation lulled, and the dull worry hit his mind: am I talking too much? Hard to tell. Whenever he went out with Marlin, the fox didn't really let him talk, and never put much effort into maintaining the conversation; though Lynn remained focused on her meal, those tall triangular ears perked forward towards him, and if a noise somewhere else in the restaurant pulled them away, his voice always brought them back. Sometimes the small rings near the base of her right ear jingled as it flicked; Eli had noticed that she had little triangular notches in each ear, too, not quite symmetric. Maybe that was a hyena thing.

He coughed. "What's Lynn short for?"

The striped hyena straightened up a little bit and gave a warm grin. "Guess."

"Mm... Linda."

"That's my mom's name."

"...Melinda?"

"That's my sister's name."

Eli tapped the ends of his chopsticks together while he though. "...No, I dunno."

"Melynndra."

"You just said it wasn't-"

"Melynn-dra. It's got Lynn right in the middle of it, but thing is, it's L-Y-N-N."

"Oh. Wow." He sat back. "Linda, Melinda, Melynndra. That's awful."

Before he could worry about whether he shouldn't have said that, though, she let out a rich laugh, sharp enough to make the waiter over at the next table visibly jump... and warm enough to spread a little bit of her enjoyment to Eli. "It really is, isn't it? That's the kind of people my parents are. I'm just glad that my name's the coolest."

"It is. You said you have a brother too, right?" Eli paused to take a sip of his drink. He'd thought about getting the boba, but would've felt rude doing that while knowing that Lynn said she'd pay. "What's his name?"

"Len."

"You're kidding."

There was that laugh again. "Yeah. I am. It's Richard."

"Linda, Melinda, Melynn_dra_, and... Richard."

She shrugged over her drink. "He likes Dick."

Small glimmer in those green eyes, hard to catch right as they disappeared behind the frosted blue plastic of the cup. It was definitely there though when she set it back down, that little... playful sparkle, also tugging at the corners of her mouth, daring him to take the bait and make the joke.

How was he supposed to react to that? There was no way she already knew about him, unless... the wild dog uncrossed his legs, setting them side-by-side under the table instead of one hanging over the other. Lynn definitely didn't seem like the kind of person to react badly to that - would she make that kind of joke, otherwise? Was that even a joke? - but Eli felt as though he couldn't really be too careful. Maybe it would be good for him to-

"You don't have to think about it that hard, hon." Lynn slurped up another noodle. "You've never seen th-? He's gay. I was making a joke."

"I thought you were."

"Y'oughtta meet him sometime - he's really great. He's usually who I stay with whenever I come into town." Lynn shrugged. "Been doing it since I started attending school, so I've got my own room there with all my shit in it. It's a pretty sweet deal."

"Oh, you go to school?"

"Yeah! At the college just-" She pointed in one direction, then frowned, then pointed in another. "Over there? It's the next town over. Like fifty minutes out. Not far enough to not be doable, just far enough to be a hassle, y'know? So I come down on weekends, when I feel like it."

"You work, too, I imagine?"

"Yeah, when I can. Shifts are weird and sometimes I just ain't got the energy to come down." Another shrug. "I'll probably be down again next weekend - there's that movie coming out, and for some damn reason, the theater just a few streets down from here is the closest showing to my dorm."

"Oh yeah? What movie?"

"That new sci-fi one! Galacticarus. It looks cool as shit."

Eli pushed another bit of pork to the corner of his mouth. "Oh damn, really? I was thinking of seeing that one with m-" Should I call Marlin my boyfriend? My ex? My...? I mean, we're not together, as much as I want it, but- He tried to cover his pause by swallowing. "-my friend."

No luck. Lynn smirked, squinted, and jabbed her chopsticks towards him. "You hesitated. I heard that. More than a friend? Mm... girlfriend? You're in a relationship and don't want me to know, huh?"

"No, it's-"

"Boyfriend, then." She nodded, pushing around some of the noodles in her bowl. It looked like she was avoiding the bean sprouts.

Eli chewed on the inside of his cheek. "We're - not together. We broke up. A few times."

"That's already not a good sign."

"No, no, like - it was my fault, a lot of the times, and he... I don't know. It's complicated."

"It always is, isn't it?"

Again the conversation lulled between them, though this time Eli felt no pressing need to pick it back up. Just the quiet clinking of their chopsticks against their bowls, and the quiet pop music the restaurant had playing in the background. They had a plant in a vase sitting atop every table, and even from this close he couldn't quite tell whether it was real or not. While he ate - he was getting close to finishing, and it looked like Lynn was, too - he snuck a glance at her every now and then, peering at the shape of her muzzle, the angle of her ears or any of the several piercings that hung from them, the thick mohawk-mane that disappeared with some difficulty down the back of her shirt. That must be hell to brush every morning.

Abruptly, she looked up and levelled her gaze with his. Eli missed his mouth and ended up pressing a slick noodle against his cheek.

"If your whatever-he-is cancels on you, wouldja wanna go with me? Richard's the only person I ever hang out with down here, so it's... it's nice to have another friend."

Was she asking him on date? No, there was no way; she just found out he was gay. There was no worry or nervousness on her muzzle, anyway: ears up, short whiskers relaxed, one paw lightly holding the side of her bowl and the other on her chopsticks. Marlin didn't really like him hanging out with other people if he didn't know about it, but again, they weren't together right now. He didn't have to know. Without thinking much longer about it, Eli nodded.

"Yeah. Sure."

"Can I get your number?" Without waiting for his answer, she leaned over to slip a paw into her pocket and grab her phone. "I mean, I don't imagine you spend every day of every weekend looking blindly through the racks at the CD shop, huh?"

"Oh, that? Well, I just..."

"Saw something you like," she tapped on the screen a bit, then slid it across the table towards him. Her background image was a drawn character from something - maybe a webcomic Eli didn't recognize. "And wanted to go back to see if it was still there?"

"Yeah..." Weird settings, or maybe he just wasn't used to the screen. It took him four tries to put in 'Eli'. "Something like that."

After taking her phone back, Lynn looked at it for a moment and then shifted her eyes to the wild dog, without lowering her paw. "I know the feeling."