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Evil Sweetness by Silent Kid
(Disclaimed: the character of Krycek off The X-files)
Only you can shine the light
on the dark side of my mind.
And your evil sweetness
leaves a trail of lovers behind.
When you crush me to your heart
I feel just like a queen.
I'm a willing victim.
Tell me, all my life where have you been?
--"My Knight in Black Leather" by Bette Midler
Sometimes, when I feel all alone like the walls are closing in on me and I can't take it anymore, I think about the stranger. He was beautiful and seductive and ephemeral, vanishing, it seems, before we even met him. He wrapped my best friend around his finger and made him worship him, made Darren, who never truly loved anyone but himself, believe that his contentment was entirely subject to this stranger's happiness. He was everything I wanted to be.
I wasn't going to take Darren out that night. He'd been a brat all week, yelling at the band, bitching at me, even going so far as having his meals catered to his room. We hadn't said a word to each other for five days, not since he threw his microphone at my head and called me a "lousy fucker". It's comical when he swears. Such nasty words coming out of that pretty mouth. Half the crew ran after him when he stormed out. I just kept rehearsing the band. They had to get used to his tantrums, though I was having a hell of a time remembering why *I* had to get used to them. I quit that week. It didn't have anything to do with the stranger, but, looking back, maybe it did.
Ben, Karl, Lee and I were going out. Guys' Night. Our one night away from the diva. That week, though, Guys' Night had become something of a necessity--a way of blowing off some steam that might have been more satisfactorily curled into a fist and smashed into a certain pale gut. Then Darren showed up in his leathers and pouted and Lee asked if he wanted to come because Lee doesn't hold grudges, and he was actually going out to have fun, unlike the rest of us. If I'd answered the door, I would have sent him back to his room. But I didn't, so he came, even though there wasn't room for him in the car and he had to sit across our laps. He still didn't say a thing to me, even though he was breathing down my ear and his stubble was chafing my neck. I squeezed my fingers around the door handle so I wouldn't squeeze his throat.
He disappeared when we got inside the club. I sent Lee to keep an eye on him. It's not like I gave a fuck, it's just that he's a stupid drunk and the week had been bad enough without him getting himself into a mess with one of the bohemoths around the bar. I saw Lee's dark head bobbing after him, and I forgot about him in favor of more graceful pursuits. Women, I mean. I'm not like him, after all. I don't mean I don't like... I'm just not stupid about it, like he is. I don't go chasing after people who aren't women in places like this, and by that I mean in public. I get followed sometimes. I don't mind that so much, but it freaked me out the first few times. But every guy needs a warm mouth now and then, or needs to be one, and I can go either way. There's something liberating about some stranger, a non-woman, pushing you against a wall and dropping to his knees in front of you, or putting just enough pressure on your shoulders so you'll go down in front of him and actually be happy about it.
I lost them in the club, Lee and Darren. Ben went off to find them. He doesn't like Lee getting out of his sight. Something about needing to watch out for him. I think he's got a superiority complex. He thinks it's something else. Something like love. Whatever. We had evidently come on 'Everything Goes Against Daniel Thursday' because, despite the club's promising clientele on previous nights, as far as the women were concerned, on this night the only women were too busy making out with each other to notice a famous guitarist, or even a semi-famous one, wistfully staring at them, looking for an "in". I thought of the old quip, 'If a girl who hangs out with gay guys is a fag hag, what's a guy who hangs out with lesbians called? Stupid.' Yeah. So, I wondered if they'd be amused by that. They'd probably laugh uproariously and then suck on my neck until my knees went boneless and I collapsed at their feet. I'd just stepped forward to try out my theory when my best friend returned.
"Dan," he said, which was how I knew he was sloshed. He only calls me Daniel when he's sober, except when he's calling me a lousy fucker like that day.
I turned around and glared at him. He looked at my pants and giggled. I pulled my shirt over my crotch. That's the trouble with being anorexically thin. You can't hide anything.
"What?" I asked, crossing my arms over my chest.
"This is Alex," he said, and I noticed for the first time that someone was standing next to him. I offered my hand before I looked at him, and it was a good thing because if I'd looked first, I would have done nothing but stand with my mouth hanging open. I have been to every continent save one. I have seen sunsets, and the remaining wonders of the world, and rainfalls, and forests, and laughter, and despair. I have seen beauty at the edge of the earth and within the darkest night. But I have never seen all of it within one man. His hair was as dark as Darren's, but naturally so; his eyes as green as precious jade; and his body, perfect, pulsing with false relaxation as though he were a giant cat, ever watching, waiting, for some prey to come along. He smiled at me and my knees quivered. Darren grinned. He was proud of himself for bagging this one, disgustingly so. For a moment, I wanted to forget that it was none of my business and tell him what Darren was really like, but Alex slid his hand down Darren's back until he stopped fidgeting and the vain look all but disappeared from his face.
"Do you have a last name, Alex?" I asked, simply because I didn't want him to go off yet and it was the only thing I could think to say aside from "take me".
"Krycek," he said, with half a smile.
"Krycek," I almost repeated, but Darren beat me to it. "What is that, Polish?" He giggled and wiped his mouth with his shirt, which looked suspiciously like one I'd "lost" three weeks earlier.
"Russian," Alex said. His eyes drilled into Darren who fidgeted and grinned. Like I said earlier, he's a stupid drunk.
"Sorry," Darren said. He looked it, too, or maybe it was fear washing over his eyes. It's so hard to tell with Darren since he never really apologizes unless there's something in it for him. I wanted to look away when Alex grabbed his chin and leaned down and kissed him, I really did, but I couldn't. Alex looked like he might eat him, and I don't mean in the good "you're so sexy" way, I mean in the carnivorian "chew your ear off and leave you to the vultures in the morning" way. I knew I was turning red, watching my best friend get devoured while my body did nothing but betray itself.
"Let's go," he said, and for a moment I fooled myself that the lust-filled command was directed at me. But Darren was the one who obediently followed him, not me. I watched them go, and Alex disappeared into the crowd even as Darren stood out from it. I didn't want to follow them, but I did. I left Ben and Lee and Karl behind, and I went after Darren because I wanted to be near this stranger. It's insane, I know, but if you could have been there, you'd understand.
Darren's a moaner. I know this from years of adjacent hotel rooms. So I was standing on my bed, my ear pressed to the wall, and expecting a reprise of every other night. With the stranger, though, he was screaming. I almost knocked down the door except not really. Except I didn't move. He is, after all, my best friend, even if he's impossible and pisses me off constantly, even if he is my best friend simply because he is around and is the sole constant in my life. So, I almost knocked down the door, but in the end I couldn't take my ear away from the wall and in the end the screams turned to moans and I wanted to join them with my own cries, ones that begged Alex to release me from the psychoses I'd wrapped around myself. Then Darren went quiet and I got worried again until I heard a gentle slam and I knew a bedside drawer had been opened. Then the moaning started again. I admit, I gave myself a little rub through my pants. I'm not proud of it or anything. It's not right to do that over your best friend. But Alex, maybe he wouldn't mind so much. Darren screamed Alex's name. Alex didn't make a sound. Clothes shuffled and Darren whined. I couldn't hear the words, just his pitched voice, but I knew what they were saying. 'Don't you want to stay, baby? I've got connections. I can make anything happen for you.' He's a stupid drunk and he's a pathetic lover. Not in the physical sense, in the goodbye sense. Laughter then, Alex's laughter, and Darren shut up. Something hit the wall, probably a shoe. I knew without knowing that he was sitting on the bed, arms crossed petulantly, chewing on his lip and glowering. I heard his door open and close.
I didn't hear my door open, so it's understandable that I fell off the bed when Alex said, "Did you like what you heard, Daniel?" and I looked up to see him leaning against the television. I picked myself up and gaped at him like a trout.
"I thought the door was locked."
He shrugged. "I've never been bothered by locks."
He grabbed my arm and I let him pull me across the room, away from the wall adjacent to Darren's room. I sighed when he put his arms on my shoulders and gently guided me to my knees. I didn't register that one of his arms was plastic, beyond a brief moment of confusion, but he didn't make a big deal out of it, so neither did I. When he opened his pants, he wasn't wearing any briefs and my first thought was that he'd just finished fucking Darren. My next thought was that my own pants were growing unbearably tight. Then he slid his fingers into my hair and pulled me forward until I had taken him into my mouth and I could think of nothing but his smell and the soft pressure on my head as he commanded my movements. I started to raise my hands, but he growled, soft and deep, so I contented myself with clutching his knees simply because I wanted to hold him. He came into my mouth without warning and I ignored his attempt to pull me off. I wanted all of him. With the others, the ones who follow me, the ones who cannot begin to compare to him, the ones who cannot even be in the same sentence as him, I would abandon them before the first drop hit my tongue, before my clothes could be soiled by it, but like I said, he couldn't be compared to them.
He pulled me up and kissed me so hard I almost didn't notice that he'd tugged my pants down and had wrapped his hand around my very interested self. He kissed me until I came in his hand, then he dropped me on the bed and leered at me as he licked his hand clean. I swear, I almost came again watching him.
"Where are you going?" I asked because I wasn't Darren, and I couldn't ask him to stay.
He shrugged. "I'm going to disappear. Go on invisible for awhile. You know about that, Daniel?"
He stared at me and I thought that he knew something about me that no one else did. Something I'd been hiding.
"I know about being invisible," I said, after staring back at him and then at his feet. I knew all about not being noticed. Photographers manipulating my body like I couldn't do it myself, fans knocking me down to get to Darren. Yeah, I knew all about it.
"Yeah, I thought so," he said.
I wanted to ask him to teach me how to disappear, to tell him that going invisible wasn't enough when I still had to be here, aware of everything. I wanted to beg him to stay and show me how to escape, but he was zipping up his pants and I couldn't ask him anything.
"You made Darren scream," I said. "I thought you were killing him."
He chuckled, darkly. "You wish it was you doing it."
"What?"
He shook his head. "It wasn't a question, Daniel. You *know* what Darren needs."
I shrugged. "He's my best friend." I meant it as an excuse, friends don't make friends scream and all that, but he took as a reason, as acceptance. Maybe it wasn't the screaming that bothered me so much. Maybe it was the moaning.
He smiled at me, and a spark passed over his eyes like he'd found his prey. He zipped up his leather jacket. "Don't worry about it, Daniel," he said. "He'll love you."
After he left, I knocked on Darren's door. He was right. I did know what Darren needed, but I'd never had the guts to give it to him before. It's just one of those things, if it's not the right moment, you can ruin everything. But maybe that week, with all his tirades and petulance it had been enough to send me over. Maybe even without Alex I would have realized it. But probably not.
Darren had the good grace to stifle his groan when he opened the door and saw me standing there. He folded himself onto his bed again. I stood over him.
"I suppose you heard everything?" He said snidely.
I nodded.
"Well?" He snapped.
I looked down at him and waited. He shuffled around and pulled his foot up. When I didn't speak, he cracked. "Daniel, you lousy fucker!"
That was enough. I grabbed him by the arms and pulled him to his feet. His astonishment lasted long enough for me to push him to his knees. Then he knelt in front of me, swaying slightly, but he still found it in himself to sneer up at me and ask what the hell I was doing. I put a finger over his lips. His breath was hot and steady. He glared at me silently.
"There are going to be some changes from now on, Darren," I said, in a voice far more authoritative than my own.
He blinked and shook, slightly, beneath my gaze. I pulled my finger away. "Do you understand?"
He nodded. Then he dropped his head, and if I hadn't been so focused on him at that moment I wouldn't have heard the whispered, "Thank you, Daniel" or seen the grateful tears that pooled in his eyes.
Sometimes, when I'm all alone, I think about the stranger, Alex, and how he saved me. I never told Darren that I wanted Alex to teach me how to disappear. It was enough that he taught me how to take care of Darren so I didn't go insane and run off or kill him myself. It was enough that he came into our lives for one night and freed us from ourselves before disappearing forever. Sometimes, when I'm all alone, I wish that he would come back and remind me of when I could make Darren scream. I wish he would come back and teach me how to love again and bring my best friend back to me. But he's disappeared, like he said he would, and sometimes I think that I never saw him at all. It should be a crime to have such beauty and keep it all to yourself.
It should be a crime.
~finis~
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