Author: Indy Baggins Title: Bhagavad-Gita (As It Is) Pairing: Ryan/Colin/Greg Rating: PG Summary: …The most silent and subtle of ways. Author’s comments: I was reading the Bhagavad-Gita (“The song of God”) for school, and I decided to do the “every ten pages” meme on it. It really is a gorgeous text and I certainly did not mean any disrespect by using parts of it. Beta was by Cae, thanks! If He were so affected. If he really wanted to, he would. Put a move on Colin- that is. He never will. Of course not. --- Ryan trails his hand over Colin’s ankle, skin surprisingly warm there, pliant under his tentative touch, up, to the (soft, so soft) space under his knee, where his thumb rubs a small, slow circle on sweaty skin. --- In the desert there is no water, but the mirage suggests there is. He wants to, though. Badly. Colin’s eyes roam over his frame, and he knows, of course he does. He shivers. --- Colin doesn’t make a sound, they’ve only just woken up and Ryan knows it’s plausible that he doesn’t feel a thing, that his careful touch is just the ghost of a dream to Colin, caressing warm skin into goose bumps. He does so anyway. --- There are two kinds of trembling of the body, and two kinds of standing of the hair on end. Colin touches him. He shudders, on edge with the feel of Colin’s skin under his fingertips and he doesn’t know what to do until Colin kisses him again, harder. --- He has so much now, an endless string of memories, acres of silky skin, soft traces of life, eyes and millions of moments to lose himself into, and he finds he doesn’t know where it begins and ends, where touch is supposed to still and where to burn, where to caress and where to mar. He’s lost in a bed between two people. (he loves) --- All these are due to a material conception of life. He closes the door with a silent thud, steps away. Straightens his shirt, and rubs his neck. He isn’t the dreamer, Colin is. There is life, after all. --- Lost but for the hand on his shoulder, (maybe it’s always been there…) a warm presence so tender he feels every finger, ever callous patch, every trace of touch, and he leans into it and exhales, a slow, long giving up of breath, almost a sacrifice but not completely because he’s worn, so very weary inside. --- Envious of the Supreme Personality of God, the atheist will present a number of illicit incarnations manufactured in the factory of his brain. Why what Greg wants feels so different is a mystery, even to himself. There is too much noise, and a silent retreat would be expected, perhaps. Perhaps not. --- Greg doesn’t move his hand away but strengthens his grip in response, the press of four pinpoints of fingers, hot on his morning-cooled skin, and a thumb, the nail tracing the hairs on the back of his neck into a slow burn. --- He sees everything, whether it be pebbles, stones or gold, as the same. There is no pain, after the fall and the door that closes ever so slowly behind Greg. Only lethargy. --- He moves into Greg’s touch, hand tightening into his hair, and fades into a blind, breathless kiss. Greg’s lips barely move against his, Greg’s hand swelteringly warm, so familiar in its touch he burrows into it, the side of his face and his eye and forehead all covered before he remembers to touch his lips to Greg’s again, numbly. --- I can find no means to drive away this grief which is drying up my senses. He misses Colin the most, Greg the deepest. Colin in the way there are no smiles anymore, Greg in a deep solemn pinch that makes him close his eyes, briefly. He won’t go back though. --- Colin is awake now, a slow stirring and a rush of air and he wants to tell him that he’s broken, that he can’t but Colin feels for Greg’s other hand, the one tangled up in the sheets (maybe his eyes are still closed as well), and when his back connects flush with the feeling that is Colin, so full and so grounding he doesn’t tense, just forgets to breathe for a while. --- As fire is covered by smoke, as a mirror is covered by dust… Years dwindle between them ever so slowly. (shouldn’t have kissed back, should have.) (could have stopped him, couldn’t have.) --- He can feel his own heartbeat. It’s no longer a pressing, urgent reminder but a deep, breathless thump under his bare throat. Greg’s lips move over the tense skin, leaving soft and scorching heat there and Colin meets them halfway, kissing Greg, and they lean on his bare chest. (comfort) All he feels is the low and dangerous cadence. --- Even the intelligent are bewildered. Greg notices, eventually he does (with a quick flicker of his eyes he is close again, the faintest touch on his jacket.) Colin wants to but (has been hurt the first time, doesn’t say but it’s there in his solemn eyes, desperate hug.) They meet, tentatively (stage, lights, words, jokes smiles, smiles) and join ranks again in the most silent and subtle of ways.