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[abrightboy]

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[abrightboy]

It’s probably a good thing he doesn’t know Malcolm assumes he did that because he has an erection.

He gets up and wanders in that direction at a respectful distance.

“Do you… want me to leave? I could go back to my room.”

[conning]

He is, to his private horror, well on his way to that state.

"No. It's. I'm fine."

He pulls on a robe from the back of the nearest chair, a silk, billowy thing that gives him a generous amount of space for privacy around the hips. Neal gives Malcolm an awkwardly questioning look. "Have you ever heard of an erotic dream having... Aftershocks?"

Is that a thing? Should he be worried?

[abrightboy]

Malcolm considers that.

“Did you have an orgasm?”

[conning]

God, he doesn't need coffee, he needs alcohol. He pulls a bottle of wine from one of his storage spaces, pouring a generous glass. "Do you want any?"

FFFFF-- "Not orgasms. Wine. Do you want any wine."

He can feel laughter stir the hairs on the back of his neck, and a whipcrack of pleasure goes through him that he thinks he manages to disguise fairly well.

[abrightboy]

“No thank you,” Malcolm tells him. “But if you’re experiencing intense arousal and you haven’t completed, it might be for the best to finish the job.” He gestures towards the door. “That’s why I offered to leave,” he clarifies.

[conning]

WHY IS THIS HAPPENING.

"I can go to the shower if I need to--"

That little laugh again, and this time Neal turns around to see if anyone is there. No one is.

"I think I'm going to take a shower."

[abrightboy]

“Okay,” Malcolm says, unconcerned. “I’ll make some coffee.” Probably not the best to start the day with wine.

[conning]

Neal goes to the shower.

It takes him longer than it usually does--the shower, not that part, oh my god--because he keeps getting mentally interrupted by the vision of Lestat looking at him like there's no one else in the world. The words come to me play as a delicious echo in his head.

He's a little shaky when he comes out, but clean and decidedly more put together than he was going in.

Beeline for the coffee, though, because he thinks if he goes back to sleep they'll be back at square one. "Thanks."

[abrightboy]

"Feeling better?" Malcolm asks, watching him carefully.

[conning]

Neal does not, generally, blush easily. He's blushing again now.

"Yes." He focuses very hard on making his coffee, and not on the way he feels every time he thinks about the words that keep repeating themselves like a mantra at the back of his mind.

[abrightboy]

"Nothing wrong with finishing it up," Malcolm assures him. "It's a physical need, just like... food. Want some eggs?"

[conning]

"Sure." He takes a deep drink of coffee, looking at Malcolm. "You're very. Phlegmatic about..."

A vague gesture. "Personal things."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm shrugs, getting a couple eggs out of the fridge and setting them on the counter. “You know, most of the emotional and psychological problems that happen around sex and sexuality come out of making a normal biological need into something taboo and mysterious. We don’t talk about it.”

[conning]

Neal stares at him a little, not affronted or confused or weirded out, just… surprised. “I can’t argue with that.”

Humanity’s taboos all arise from a refusal to expose a thing to light, really. Making it secret or private or embarrassing in some way. Shame is a hell of a motivator, and doesn’t Neal know it.

A pause, while he waits to see what Malcolm does with the eggs. “Do you have someone back home?”

Neal has a guess.

[abrightboy]

Malcolm cracks them into a frying pan, glancing over.

“What do you mean? Like. A relationship?”

[conning]

He shrugs. “A relationship, a friend with benefits. I know some people consider the Barge a kind of interdimensional Vegas in terms of its impact on things back home.”

He doesn’t think Malcolm is one of them, but still.

[abrightboy]

Malcolm glances at him again, then pushes at the eggs with his spatula.

“I’m not seeing anyone.”

A big surprise, he’s sure.

[conning]

He takes his coffee to the kitchenette table and sits down, fiddling with his mug. “Is there anyone you’d like to see?”

[abrightboy]

“I don’t know,” he says, scrambling the eggs as they start to solidify. “I sort of… kissed a colleague of mine not long before I got here, but… I don’t think she really… likes me like that. Maybe that’s for the best. Maybe I’m not really in a place for that anyway,” he reasons.

[conning]

“Norton asked me when this flood started—we were talking and it came up— the question of if either of us wanted a family.”

He doesn’t elaborate on that, maybe just giving himself and excuse for this line of questioning. “Why wouldn’t you be? In a place for that? At least for kisses.”

[abrightboy]

Malcolm looks confused. Isn’t it obvious?

“I’m a mess. Who needs that?”

[conning]

Neal opens his mouth, closes it. Pauses. Tries again. "Malcolm. You've spoken to other human beings. You make a whole study of human nature. Who isn't a mess?"

[abrightboy]

“There are messes and there are messes that will always be a burden on anyone they’re with,” Malcolm tells him. “I have a lot of problems.”