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Eli looked up as the two walked, puffy white clouds obscuring the smooth blue of the rest of the sky, and that only able to be seen in patches between the thick-leafed branches of the trees arching over the pathway. So, so many memories here at this park, with this fox beside him; he glanced that way and quickly scanned over Marlin, strolling easily along with one paw in his pocket and the other holding his phone, sharp muzzle angled down towards it. A moment later, his thin whiskers twitched, and then blue eyes flicked over towards Eli's face - and the wild dog breathed a quiet laugh and looked forward again, his own paws snug in his pockets.

Such a funny thing. He'd made sure to keep one paw around his own phone since they decided to head out on this walk, feeling for any incoming message or phone call, though Lynn didn't really seem like the type to_want_ to talk on the phone. But, then again, she didn't really not seem the type. Ever since the previous night, ever since what happened on the couch and then the little interactions over breakfast, he hadn't been able to get her out of his head. Things had... _slowed down_a bit with Marlin earlier this morning, even when Eli had had the fox's tip in his throat and his nose in his balls and Marlin was trying again to see how far into the wild dog's rear he could get his tongue, and it had taken thinking about her muzzle between his legs, her eyes on him, her footpaws teasing at his ankles and pushing up at the hem of his pants legs beneath the table at breakfast, for him to find the energy to push back and squeeze around Marlin's tongue in unloading across his chest. Every now and then he still caught a whiff of himself on the fox, whenever a breeze wafted by - and of course he could still taste him on his own breath, too.

It had taken thinking about her... well, maybe not. He turned to watch as the trees and bushes shivered and swayed under that breeze, tasted the fresh tint of nature on the air, swallowed and shifted his phone in his pocket. The thoughts had come naturally; she'd kept him awake, she'd slipped into his dreams, she was always there, floating around in the back of his mind. Getting into it with Marlin had of course distracted him for a little bit, but sure enough Lynn had come back, and even now he had to occasionally drag himself out of his thoughts and wonderings. This was Marlin walking beside him, somewhat-built smallish arctic fox, not Melynndra, tall and strong striped hyena; someone he knew inside and out - figuratively; he'd let him top twice - and not someone who had seized his attention and interest like a butterfly in a jar.

Such a funny thing. The sound of Marlin sliding his phone back into his pocket and sighing drew Eli's attention, which led to their eyes meeting for a moment... and then the fox smiled, small and soft. And Eli found his mind completely wiped for a moment, his body returning the smile as a natural instinct, a reflex. Just now the two passed a bench set a short distance back into the trees, the sidewalk swinging out like part of an amoeba to keep it in easy reach. Once, on a different bench in a different park...

"So..." the white fox said, kicking his feet idly. The sun had gone down about half an hour earlier, the sky's tinting to creamsicle orange and sherbet pink still visible between the branches of trees, naked in mid-autumn. The air that swirled around on firm breezes had that certain chill to it that bit through clothes and fur. "You're gay?"

_ _

Eli felt himself jump, then blushed and turned away for it. He'd already come to terms with that, or at least felt that he did, but it still hit him like a hammerstroke whenever someone said it. This, though... this was different, none of the disbelieving curiosity or half-mocking tone that everyone else at school said it with. He knew, of course; Marlin knew about him, and he knew about Marlin. They hadn't mentioned it yet, but at least to Eli, that had been a big draw in getting to know him better.

_ _

Besides, he was cute. And he liked to imagine that Marlin felt the same about him.

_ _

The wild dog took a moment to clear his throat and wet his lips. "Yeah. I - I'm gay." At least, multiple porn sites online and plenty of pictures saved to his phone told him that. Hopefully his friends would forget about the whole prom fiasco soon; thinking about that still brought an embarrassed blush to his muzzle.

_ _

"It's funny." The fox folded his paws in his lap and shifted his posture, putting a little more weight on one side. The side that he had leaning against Eli, sharing their warmth in the autumn air. "Every high school's gotta have their two, right? Those two always find each other."

_ _

Eli swallowed again. It ashamed him a little bit, but honestly when he'd first heard about Marlin... "Yeah. It is kind of funny."

_ _

The other boy licked his lips, looking up at the sky. His whiskers twitched forward, then back, then forward again - and then he looked at Eli beside him, tall ears swinging with the movement. "My parents won't be back 'til tomorrow. D'you wanna... stay the night? We can order pizza, and play some games." Shrug. "And stuff."

_ _

He'd long since gotten used to the excited yet nervous little jiggle that things and thoughts like that stirred between his legs, but this time the nervousness lingered. This time, there was actually a chance of those thoughts coming to fruition. Eli smiled. "Yeah, sure. Let me let my mom know."

_ _

"I can't remember the last time we went on a walk like this."

The dog's large ears perked again, then tried to flop over under another light breeze. He shifted his paws in his pockets. "Yeah. It's... it's been a while. Why'd you wanna do this, anyway?"

"Can't a guy wanna go on a walk?"

"Well, sure. But usually you ask me over to go for a ride, not for a walk." He stuck his tongue out, then shifted his paws in his pockets again at the little twitch that that statement brought.

Marlin chuckled and returned the gesture. "I mean, I'm planning for that, too, of course. Look, there's the tree where we first fucked standing up."

"Are you sure about this?" Eli bit his lip and glanced around, looking first down one path and then the other. This park's trail went all the way around from the entrance, meaning that someone could come from either direction. "I mean, yeah, you'd have to really look to see us, but, like... I can still see the sidewalk..."

A heavy paw turned his head back to its forward position, with that so-familiar sheath and sack hanging an inch and a half from his nose. Dry leaves crunched beneath Marlin's footpaws as he shifted to grind against his boyfriend's nose, slick skin of his sheath pulling back a bit to bring his slicker tip a little further out. "Don't worry about it. I've got an eye on it. Besides, technically the park closed at ten. It's midnight."

"Yeah, but..." Intoxicating scent, rich and heavy. At first it had been a little too intense for Eli, but he'd quickly gotten used to and then even enjoyed it, to the point where Marlin occasionally skipped out on a shower for his enjoyment. Apparently he'd gotten lost with his nose buried in pubic fur, or between his balls, or an inch inside his sheath for thirty, forty minutes before, a couple of times. He swallowed, licked his lips again, caught the side of Marlin's sheath in that lick, nuzzled down... "...I forgot what I was gonna say."

"Good. It's hard to suck dick if you're trying to talk. Now, c'mon - I've been hitting the gym for the past month in preparation for this. Get me nice and lubed up so I can get you nice and settled down."

Another chuckle, another shift. "Yeah. And I had pieces of bark in my fur and ant bites all over my back for two weeks."

Marlin shrugged. "I dunno, man. I thought it was worth it."

"I mean, yeah. Of course it was." Eli scoffed. That had been another memory he revisited countless times, sometimes even now. The same thought had been floating around in his head right before Marlin had mentioned it just now. "I was only sore for, like, two days, too."

_ _

"I didn't knot you then. That took you, what... four years to be able to do?"

"Pff. Yeah. One year to be able to even take you at all, another three to get your knot in." God,_he wanted it again. That part suddenly blared in his head like a siren. Maybe Lynn would top him; _that was something that she certainly seemed the type for.

"Goddammit, Eli."

"What?"

Marlin abruptly stopped, tugging Eli back with a paw on his wrist - which then went right to the front of his pants. Eli pursed his lips... and then raised his eyebrows when he felt a firm throb there. "Look what you did to me."

Eli's grin widened. He gave a squeeze, then reversed the grip so it was him holding Marlin's wrist, and pulled the fox to do the same to him, making sure to give his own throb. "It's mutual. And, the hell are you blaming me for? You're the one who brought it up." When he pulled him away, his paw just naturally intertwined with Marlin's and gave a squeeze; only after did Eli realize what he'd done, and he quickly turned away to continue walking so the fox wouldn't see his sudden embarrassment.

He really, truly half-expected Marlin to drag him back towards that tree for a round two after all the years since that had happened, even in this broad daylight. Well, a round... five or six, by now. Whatever. However, the fox just fell into step alongside him, seeming to retreat into his own thoughts for a bit. Eli noticed that, as usual, spending time with the damn vulpine put a lot of his worries and wonders at rest: this was what he was used to, and what he enjoyed. Sure, it got a bit tiring having to spend extra time thinking about his words and responses whenever they got into conversation for fear -or wariness, rather - of annoying and angering Marlin again, since that was shit to deal with, but... maybe, it was all worth it.

The wild dog swallowed, intertwined paws swinging gently between the two of them with their pace, and looked over across the park as the clustered trees gave way to well-kept grass. It actually took a moment for him to remember that they were here, in this park, instead of back at the one where they'd shared a lot of their firsts: first time holding paws, first nuzzle, first kiss, first hickey, first handjob. Those had all come after when Eli had spent that first night at Marlin's house, back during their junior year of high school, and had ended up learning what it felt like to have something nearly as wide around as his wrist half-buried under his tail, and-

"Marlin." He cleared his throat. "Can I ask you something?"

The fox spent a moment freeing his paw, so he could reach across his body to his other pocket to grab his phone again. "What?"

"...Um." Such a funny thing. "I was just wondering, if you'd... put any more thought into, y'know. Us."

"Oh my God, Eli." No hesitation there. "I've told you I'm not sure, and I don't wanna commit to anything just yet."

Eli swallowed. "I mean... that's not a no."

That earned a sharp glare, which he tried to deflect with a nervous smile. Marlin had been right this morning, about how once Eli got into the sex and settled back into the rhythm, he'd feel better about wanting to do it. Marlin was usually right, it seemed, and even when he wasn't, the fox preferred to pretend he was. Retroactively correct, one of Eli's on-again, off-again friends called it; he used to put up a fight, but after being verbally beaten down so often and so relentlessly, the appeal and idea of setting Marlin straight just seemed so distant he stopped bothering.

"It's just, like... what will happen, will happen, you know? I do think that we have is too... ground-in to get rid of, even if we wanted to."

Even if. That sounded like...

"Just. You know? Don't - don't fuckin' force anything. That's not how it works." Marlin looked over towards the empty playground coming up around the next bend. Yet another first had happened there, with Eli finally managing to hilt the fox under his tail about halfway through their senior year. Like Marlin could talk about 'don't force anything'; he'd tried to force that every time the two had gone at it up to that point. "Not how love works."

It would be nothing but rocky terrain trying to push it past there. Eli knew the tone of Marlin's voice then quite well, so he let it drop, crossed his arms in front of his chest - he could still feel the tingling where the fox's fingers had been between his - and sighed. Just as Marlin knew how to lift Eli's mood out of the depths and hoist it into the warmth of the sun, he was equally adept at smacking it out of the sky and right back down into the ground. No matter how often that happened, he still couldn't quite get used to it.

Hardly a word passed between the two as they made their way out of the park and down the sidewalk leading towards Marlin's place, and once there, Eli made to gather what little he'd brought so he could leave. His phone vibrated in his pocket finally, and right as he pulled it out to look-

-a heavy white-furred paw obscured the screen and pushed it away from him, igniting a flare of annoyance in his chest, which was then quickly extinguished as the other paw settled on his waist and yanked him back against the fox's lap behind him.

"You weren't thinking of going home, were you?"

"Yeah." Or, at least, mostly_extinguished. Eli squirmed to get out of that grip, which of course only resulted in Marlin pulling him more firmly in... leading to the familiar firm heat of his half-hard cock grinding up against the base of the wild dog's tail through their pants. "I was." _Was. Marlin knew how to be persuasive.

"And leave me here all on my own?" The fox nearly had to stand on his tiptoes to run his nose and lips along the side of Eli's neck. That always made him shiver. "At least stay through dinner... you know I like cooking with you."

As it turned out, though, some thirty minutes later when Eli asked in the spaced between his exhausted panting what he'd planned to do for dinner, he learned that that part was on his own shoulders. And also getting things ready, and doing most of the cooking. Again, all like usual. Instead of sitting at the table, the two slid in together in front of the TV, and as the sun started to drop down in the window at the other end of the room Eli found himself pulled gently into Marlin's arms, feeling the comfortable warmth of the fox's body against his back.

This, he could get used to. This, he had gotten used to. Like a favorite meal or hobby or anything else he'd come to love, going so long without it had left him with a constant hunger, and even though Marlin's words from earlier still hung in his head and tugged at his heart, even though he knew that this wasn't what he wanted in the _way_he wanted it, it still felt...

"You're not really going to make me sleep on my own tonight, are you? At least stay 'til breakfast tomorrow?"

_ _

...something. A good hour and a half since the two had climbed into bed, a good half-hour since Marlin had climbed off of him and drew his six inches back out from under the wild dog's tail, slick and sticky with his third load of the day. Even when the fox briefly disappeared beneath the blankets to lap up his own mess, tongue digging easily past tired muscles and curling up, even as Eli squirmed and gasped and tightened his thighs around Marlin's head, something else bubbled in his chest.

He'd waited until the slow, rhythmic sounds of Marlin's snores caught his ears before he reached over for his phone. It had been hard to get a good conversation in during the day, since Marlin barked at him about being distracted and not paying attention to him whenever he saw him with his phone out, but... even just talking to her, knowing she was there, knowing she wanted to hear from him, brought him back to that island of warm comfort.

Naturally, at first, he'd been so, so wary that what happened the previous night hadn't been right, or he hadn't done what he'd supposed to, or that things would be awkward. But Lynn didn't even mention it until he brought it up, and the first thing she responded with to his "So, last night... did you have fun? Did I do ok?" was a _;3_and that seemed alright to him.

Just once, just one thing, after hardly a week of knowing each other, and it had felt so good. Lynn seemed confident, too, poking and prodding at Eli throughout the day when he could get a message or two in, coaxing little details out of him. I want to ask you the same thing, she'd said; Did you enjoy yourself? I know you said you did, but I want to see how you feel now that you've had time to think about it. Of course, don't feel like you have to tell me if you don't want to. I know how that feels.

_ _

That one had come in right after dinner, and now that Marlin was finally asleep and couldn't look over to try to see what Eli was doing...

_ _

"I, um... >//> want to do it again."

_ _

Lynn probably wouldn't still be awake at this time of night, so the wild dog clutched his phone close to his chest and rolled onto his other side, nuzzling in between Marlin's shoulder blades. The fox smelled of... well, fox, rich and full, sharp vulpine spice above the smooth, deeper notes, all coming together to the one thing that Eli's nose clearly identified as Marlin. The scent that he'd drawn so much comfort from throughout the years, the scent that used to linger on the other pillow in his bed at home, the scent he knew so well that he could nearly imagine it after two weeks without.

_ _

He closed his eyes, licked his lips, swallowed... and tried to see if he could imagine Lynn's scent. He hadn't really gotten too good of a chance to drink deeply of it like Marlin gave him so many opportunities for, but... the lighter, drier hyena notes that had swirled into his nose, and when he'd half-opened his eyes to see her looking down at him, lips parted and jaw hanging open in quiet, breathy moans while his tongue played around the soft skin of her nipple.

Well. It hadn't _really_been soft right then.

Just what was_happening between the two of them, though? And, along with that, what was happening to Eli? These odd little feelings, the thoughts infesting his head and dominating over everything else, the way she... _she. Yet again he rolled that word around in his head. Her. She and... I. Me and her. She.

Right then, down in the center-left of his chest, a strange little warm fluttering began, like the tongues of a hearth fire in autumn made to dance by wind curling down the chimney. A soft tickling, a... a pulsing bloom, spreading out along his chest and arms, put a smile on his face. The kind of smile that he didn't need to think about to maintain, the kind he didn't need to force or consciously hold. The wild dog held his phone right over that spot in his chest and nuzzled more firmly into the warm fur in front of him.

This wasn't a new feeling, he realized. Marlin used to make him feel like this, way back in high school. It had just been so, so long since he'd felt this that he'd forgotten the sensation. Right now, nothing could bring him out of this mood - except for his phone suddenly vibrating beneath his paw and right against his ribs, painfully loud in the night.

I'd like you to, hon.

_ _

He read over that four, five times, eyes lingering on that last word, imagining it said in her voice. Maybe over breakfast, or lunch again. Of course she'd be playing at his feet again, pawpads surprisingly soft and well-kept especially for a hyena, thick blunted claws tickling through his fur. She'd be leaning on one elbow with her other paw around her drink, or maybe holding a fork. All self-assured confidence. She'd say it as though it were something entirely casual, as though it wouldn't rocket-punch Eli right in his heart, and then would continue talking - though with that slight sparkling glimmer in her eyes and that little tweak to the corner of her smile-

What the hell _was_happening to him? Before he could dwell too long on it, though, his phone buzzed again in his paw, the screen shifting back to its full brightness. He had to squint in the darkness of the bedroom.

Oh, hey, are you free Wednesday evening? I'm not sure I'll be able to make it down this weekend with some exams coming up, but I still wanna see you

Then, before he could start on his reply, another:

Hole in the wall mexican place about halfway from me to you is pretty good, so we could meet there. I don't wanna make you drive if you don't want to tho, and there's also another in town near you that I love.

_ _

And then yet another:

My treat, of course. ;) You got me for the movie, so I'll get you for dinner. Sound good?

Would this be a second date, then? Or a third? Or... a fourth, maybe, between the Vietnamese place and then breakfast? For a moment, Eli didn't even notice that his smile had floated back to him.

"Sounds great."