Everything else was insignificant

The hotel was magnificent, but I couldn't focus on anything else. The bell boy led me to a room on the first floor, at the end of a brightly lit corridor displaying artefacts from different countries, different centuries. The corridor made me think of frames, colour schemes, lights, and many other things that could help me capture the true beauty of this place.

For a small moment I thought of Max, and how gorgeous he would look under one of those paintings, offering wine to my lenses. He would be a perfect model. He would look gorgeous in his plain white shirt and khakis, he would look gorgeous in a tailored suit and perfectly done hair, and he would look gorgeous without his shirt on. The thought made me gulp.

Looking back, I made sure he was following me. There, the man who had my life on his hands, flashing that breathtaking smile over and over following me like a pet.

The room was big, with a king-size bed placed in the middle. Once the bellboy was out of the room, mumbling something about my needs and a bell to ring, I pounced on him.

"If you tell me it's all in my head, and you don't want it, I will stop." I kissed him with all I had, every emotion and every drop of life I had. I held him close enough to feel the heat in my skin and feel my heartbeat. I prayed to all the gods and all the devils in the world that he wouldn't ask me to stop. I heard a soft moan, felt his hand grabbing me by my neck, and I stopped for a breath. "If you tell me to stop, I will stop. God knows I don't want to, but I will. Just tell me."

"Don't stop," he whispered in my ear. "Don't stop." He said the words like incantation, the magic words that lit wildfire, the words that made the stars shine, the words that could make a stone heart catch fire.

It was the liquid electric I had been feeling since I saw him for the first time, and it went down my spine. I saw fireworks as he slid his tongue to explore my mouth. He knew what he was doing to me, and luckily for him, I knew what I was doing too.

As my hands roamed over his chiselled muscles, my mouth tasted his skin, he sent me to the precipice of oblivion just by saying some words. "I want you to ravish me. Make me forget everything else." That was all I needed. My vision blurred, all I could see was he, his skin covered in sweat, his mouth inviting me in. My teeth wrote the stories of my lust on his skin. I wanted to give him the bliss I was feeling when I entered him. The burnt patches on his shoulders seemed familiar to me. I shook my head. I wanted to pleasure him. I wanted to hear his moans and hisses.

I wanted him to call my name.

…

"Arin," he said in a tired voice.

"Say it again?" I begged.

"Arin." He started drawing small kisses on my neck. Both of us naked, we watched the sunlight playing with the curtains and stained glasses. "Arin, Arin, Arin…" He chanted my name in that husky voice of his.

I loved my name.

As a thank you, I kissed him back on those thick, soft lips. Those lips were going to end me, I warned myself. Then I kissed him again.

"Do you think I am a loose—"

Interrupting me in a very delicious way, he kissed me again. "The most beautiful man in the world is with me now. I am not thinking about anything."

"We just met a couple of hours back," I confessed, "It is a little promiscuous of me!"

"It was not all in your head." He caressed my face and said what I longed to hear. "I saw how you looked at me. I saw you the same way you saw me." I was relieved. He did not need to put the rest of his thoughts into words. I knew I was not wrong. We both saw each other. He saw how my eyes changed when I looked at him. He saw how I started breathing faster every time he spoke, or smiled. "You may have not noticed, I was at the same place with you," he whispered in my ears.

His voice was fading slowly. My eyes were heavy with fatigue and dreams.

"Your lips touched mine. Everything else is insignificant."

"I feel like I am home." I thought it was in my mind, but maybe it was not. Because I heard him saying, "You are home babe."

I was dreaming of a valley. Not the ones you read about in poetries, the shy ones hiding behind flowers and fragrance and verdant; it was more of a piece of a forest nobody would want to visit in a right mind. It was dark, cold, and it was everything you'd find in your most frightening, bone chilling nightmares.

Beyond the darkness, there was a beautiful sound. A mild, warm light was calling me. "You are beautiful," it said. "I should not feel this way," it said with a hint of regret.

I rushed towards that light. It was the voice I waited for since the moment of my conception. It was the sound of the life I wanted. I rushed towards the light, my restless moves made the others restless too. "No, do not go..." Whispers filled my head as I flew towards the light. "This will bring you only pain," one of them said.

"I agree," I said.

"This will lead you to restlessness," another said.

"I agree," I said.

"Your life will forever be bound to his," the oldest of them said.

"I agree," I said.

"His smiles will be yours, but his tears will be yours too. When his heart swells with happiness and pride, your lips will sing. But when his hearts bleeds, you will not be able to breathe. When he says, 'I love you,' you will say it back. But when he says, 'I am scared of you,' You will not be able to tell him not to be. When he says, 'stay,' you will stay, but he asks you to leave, what will you do?" The old one asked me.

"He will die," the others sneered at me.

"He will forget himself," they said.

"He will lose himself," they sang.

"He will die," they screamed inside my head. "Do you hear us? You will die because of him," they all screamed.

"But I cannot die, can I?" I asked them back.

"That is why you should not go. Because you cannot die, and you will not live," The old one said.

"I agree."

"Arin?" It was his voice this time, Max pushed me with a concerned face. I squinted, my eyes burned. "Arin? Are you okay?"

"I am," I replied in a hoarse voice. Why did my throat hurt?

"You were crying in your sleep." He eyed me putting on a grave face. It didn't suit him. "You should smile more." I said.

"Why were you crying?"

"I don't know." I shrugged and adjusted my pillow. There was a warm light outside the window. What time was it? "Around eight hours back I was thinking about my next project, and now I can't think of anything else. All I can think of is you."

"And I am thinking of you."

I turned to face him. "What are you thinking?"

He said, "Where have you been all this time?"

I pulled him closer. He smelled like a forest after rain. It was comforting, a little scary, familiar yet unfamiliar. "I have been to different corners of the globe. I was at Amsterdam, Cairo, Andaman, Galapagos, Barcelona, New York. I was on the streets, homeless, with no prospects of future. Then I was in the UK, working my ass off. Now that I think of it, I have been everywhere, and nowhere in specific." I sighed and let my fingers play with his hair. There was a wetness on my chest. He was crying.

"And, now, Max, where have you been all this time?" I asked him back. Where had he been hiding? How far from me? How close to me?

"Just here," he sniffed, "Waiting for you."

"That is cheesy," I commented.

"I have a better line." He sat up and gave me a mysterious smirk. "Shall we go for a coffee? A coffee date?"

"I don't know. You have to seduce me first." I stretched and made a lazy face. "I am not particularly keen on leaving this bed, or you." I pulled the blanket and noticed a floral design on the edge of it. "Sing me a song."

"I can't sing."

"Well then do something else. Read me a poetry, or maybe write letters. You know, something romantic."

His eyes turned into a darker shade as he stared at my face. His next words broke my heart.

"The sky sings my love song. The song I wrote for you was lost in rain. I did not know it then, but my love song was a broken melody. The sky sings the song, and I listen."