Towery City By Jessica Harris Rating: mild NC-17 for m/m situation Summary: Mulder at Oxford, M/O, a "first time" story. Disclaimers: All things X-Files belong to Chris Carter and 1013. Profit? Ha! I'm sending him my cyber-café tab. John, however, is mine. Notes: Thanks to Paula for most excellent beta and for being so nice to John. This stands more-or-less alone but there will be follow-up. Apologies to the Brits if I have grossly misrepresented your culture and/or institutions! Archive: OK, but please let me know. Feedback: Please. Pleasepleaseplease. Oh please. Lumpj@hotmail.com ========================================================= Towery city and branchy between towers; Cuckoo-echoing, bell-swarmed, lark-charmed, rook-racked; River rounded Yet ah, this air I gather and I release He lived on; these weeds and waters, these walls are what He haunted who of all men most sways my spirits . . . - Slightly misquoted, used entirely without permission, and taken totally out of context from 'Duns Scotus's Oxford', by Gerard Manley Hopkins ================== Towery City By Jessica Harris 26/12/98 ================== It was one of those days when the inanimate world seemed to conspire against him. The small gas heater in his room refused even its usual restrained grumble of heat, the damned academic gown he needed for dinner clutched and caught at every sharp corner in reach, and when he finally emerged from his rooms (late, of course) his books slid from his arms with malign determination, intent on the muddy surface of the quad below. A day of lateness and humiliation and missed appointments, of acerbic notes from his tutor in his mailbox, and now this. More gray, chilling, soaking rain and his bicycle chain slipping from its moorings with a ratcheting clatter that sounded suspiciously like laughter. He hadn't thought it would be like this. He had had romantic visions of ivy -covered stone towers, of quietly witty conversation, of strolling by the river and watching the punts float by. Oh, the towers were there, the ivy and the river too, but he hadn't imagined the fishy reek of the water, the never-ending chill and damp, the drafty rooms and hallways. He hadn't imagined the exorbitant prices of everything or the narrow gray streets or the fusty smell of a world where plentiful hot water was not the given it was at home. He hadn't imagined how lonely he'd be. Nothing as noticeable as language separated him here and somehow that made it worse, his struggles with a system he didn't understand, social signals he didn't know how to read. People were civil enough, but it was clear that he didn't quite belong anywhere - not with the sons of sons of sons whose fathers had walked these same halls, not with the scholarship students who wore their poverty like a banner, not even with the other international students who gathered in cosy polyglot groups, comforting each other with the preparation of familiar foods. He was a psychologist, he was supposed to know how these things worked, but he hadn't known how it would make him *feel*, hadn't anticipated the isolation, the hollow ache of homesickness that sat high in his chest. And now the goddamn bicycle. He wheeled it beside him the last quarter-mile home, soaked to the skin by the time he reached his college. He had been firmly reprimanded for not storing the bike with the others before, but he couldn't face the thought of struggling with the chain in front of everyone, all thumbs and left hands and grease. So he hoisted it to his drenched shoulder and climbed the staircase as fast as he could towards his rooms. And of course the bike jammed. The handle-bars caught on something, the wheel turned against the wall, and in his rush he didn't notice until the bike twisted on his shoulder and pinned him where he stood, wedged somehow in the turn of the staircase with the door to his rooms tauntingly in sight. He could hear light and rapid footsteps coming down the stairs towards him now and in near-panic he struggled with the bike, pushing and pulling and only wedging it in further, feeling his eyes start to sting with humiliating tears. The footsteps stopped. Mulder looked up to find a pair of pale blue eyes peering down at him as though he were a flawed equation, a dubious specimen. "You *are* in a fix, aren't you" drawled the other man. Mulder didn't answer, fearing his voice might crack, and simply pulled harder at the bike. Then narrow, long-fingered hands were suddenly maneuvering the front wheel, long slender arms lifting the weight of the bike from him with surprising ease. He squeezed past and found himself jammed awkwardly onto the small landing, crowded now with the three of them, Mulder, bike, and tall blond man. Mulder recognized him now and his heart sank. He was one of the people on campus who embodied much of what he found alien here, a walking archetype with a narrow, attractively bony face, a perfect fall of school-boy hair over one eye, carelessly appropriate clothing and an accent so refined it was almost comic. Almost. It might have been comic if it hadn't been backed with such power, a deep and quiet assurance that simply ignored all opposition. Now there the archetype stood, holding Mulder's bike, mud and grease on his elegant hands. "These your digs?" he finally asked, pale eyebrows climbing high forehead. Mulder blinked and fumbled for his keys, clumsily of course, dropping them twice before he got the door open. The other man followed him inside, leaned the wet bike carefully against the wall, and turned to him. "Well, um, thanks - " began Mulder, then stopped and backed up in confusion as the man walked towards him, walked forward until Mulder was pressed up against the door, until he was pressed up against Mulder. Then he kissed him. It was like an echo of his homesickness, the feeling that swept through him now, a moment of lost strangeness at the lightly stubbled cheek against his own, at the foreign/familiar smell of another man's body. He had never done this before, never even imagined it, and some part of his mind was screaming that he should protest, resist, that this was wrong. But it didn't feel wrong. It felt - it felt so - It felt so good. His nipples were hard against wet cloth and wool now, and those long fingers found them, the other man murmuring a vaguely laudatory sound into Mulder's mouth, as though he had correctly answered a question posed to him. The tall man's leg slipped between his own, pressing rhythmically against the cock now hard behind his fly. Then the long clever hands were stripping his wet shirt from him, leaving smears of mud and grease but he didn't care, and a mouth wrapped hot and wet around one nipple while cool gritty fingers twisted the other. A rustle of movement, a nuzzle, a slight bite through the cloth of his pants and Mulder thrust into it without thought. The man was on his knees now, looking up at him through that perfect hair, a faint flush on pale cheekbones and lips slightly parted. Mulder reached out and touched his hair, feeling strands silky beneath his fingers. It seemed to be what the other man was waiting for. With one swift gesture he opened Mulder's pants and yanked them half-way down his hips, then curled his hand around Mulder's erection, giving that vague approving murmur again at the drop that appeared already at its tip. He licked it delicately away, then blew softly across the wetness, watching Mulder shudder. Then his mouth was suddenly all over him and Mulder found his hands full of slippery blond hair, fingers knotted in it, holding his head as he thrust hard into his mouth. Blue Eyes was squeezing himself through his trousers, eyes shut as his whole upper body rocked with Mulder's movements. Then he reached up and with two deft fingers stroked the strip of skin behind Mulder's balls. Mulder's head snapped back, knocking hollowly against his own door, and he came, jetting down the man's throat, feeling hands on his hip-bones controlling his movements. Then he sagged back, panting, knees weak. He could hear more people coming down the stairs, only inches away from him as they brushed by his door. Hair tousled, the blond man smiled up at him, a languid curling smile that showed no teeth. There was a smear of semen at the corner of his mouth, and Mulder, hands still shaky, wiped it off with his thumb. The man suffered his touch without comment, then rose to his feet, gently but firmly moved Mulder away from the door, and reached for the knob. "Wait!" said Mulder. The other man paused, eyebrows lifting again enquiringly. "Yes?" he said blandly, as if he had been stopped on the street. Mulder was flustered. "Well, don't just - I mean - don't you - Who are you?" The man sighed and ran a hand through his hair, miraculously returning it to its usual languid perfection. "John. I'm John. You've seen me around campus and *please* don't tell me you want to cuddle. Damned sentimental, you Americans." Mulder was suddenly aware that he was still three quarters naked. Hastily he pulled up his pants, tucking himself back into them. "But" he tried again "don't you want - " his mind went blank as he struggled to think exactly what it was he was offering. What was the etiquette in entertaining the Englishman who had just sucked your cock? " - a cup of tea or something?" John stared at him incredulously for a moment and then suddenly, startlingly, burst into laughter. Mulder felt himself go red, felt his eyes start to sting again but then the absurdity of it struck him and in a moment he was laughing too. When they had quieted a little he said "Sorry. That was stupid. It's just that I've never done this before." John looked at him oddly again. "No-one's ever played your flute for you?" "No! - I mean - yes, just never - never another man." He thought he saw a softer light in the pale blue eyes at that, but all John said was 'With that arse? You can't have gone to the same schools that I did." "No" said Mulder, a little sourly now. "I didn't." He didn't need to be reminded. John hooted. "Finding it a little chilly here, are you? Don't worry. It takes us a while to warm up. By the time you're a full Don people may just start calling you by your first name. And by the way, what is your name?" "Fox" he said. "Fox Mulder. Call me Mulder" "Alright, Mulder" John finally moved away from the door. "I will not permit you to attempt tea. But coffee would be lovely, if you have it" he cast a look at the book and paper strewn study "and can unearth it". He stayed for about half an hour. Coffee made, Mulder settled himself on the floor next to where John sat in the room's single chair. There was a moment of awkward silence, and Mulder's mind, overwhelmed so far by the events of the day, began creakingly to function again. Hesitantly he placed his hand on the other man's thigh. "Do you want me to . . . " he asked. "No". The grip that stopped his wrist was the same one that had lifted his soaked and muddy bike so effortlessly. "No" said John again. "I'm fine. Just talk to me. Why are you at Oxford?" He spoke little himself. By the time he left, Mulder had gotten only three things out of him; his last name, which was Brindleigh; his opinion of the college, which was low; and a promise to come back, which left Mulder in a state both hopeful and confused. End.