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Jaing didn’t dream when he slept during the day; a vampire’s sleep was deep and dark and so very close to death. Jaing’s dreams were waking.
“My love,” he whispered into the crook of Anomaly’s neck. It was the first time Anomaly had come back and Jaing didn’t know yet that there would be many, many more deaths and rebirths and bumping into a stranger on the street and feeling a piece of his soul snap back into place. They were dancing to the kitchen radio. Jaing had his arms wrapped around Anomaly’s waist, pushed up under his shirt, and he was humming along to the music, arms looped around Jaing’s neck as they swayed together.
“What is it, darling?” Anomaly’s lips moved softly against Jaing’s collarbone.
“Nothing,” Jaing murmured. “Keep singing.”
Anomaly did.
Jaing dreamed that his hands were warm. He had been touching Anomaly for so long that his skin was no longer searing hot against Jaing’s own dead flesh, and Anomaly’s heartbeat reverberated through Jaing’s chest.
He would be a student, Jaing thought. Anomaly his lover, his magician, and he would teach Jaing little bits of magic here and there, although Jaing never picked up the knack for it and could barely spell the kettle hot for tea. They would sleep together, rise late together, and Jaing would try to feed Anomaly breakfast as the sun broke over the city skyline and Anomaly would try to rush out with a coffee and nothing else, always running just a little bit late, and he would kiss Jaing at the door and his mouth would taste hot and bitter but it would press against Jaing’s oh so sweetly. Jaing would go out into the city, the air cold and the sun warm, and he would cram learning into his head all day because there was only so much time—there was only so much of it, and when he came back in the afternoon he would make dinner, and Anomaly would come home and they would stay up late dancing together in the kitchen while Anomaly sang softly to the radio. Jaing’s fingers traced up the warm hollow of Anomaly’s spine and his breath shivered out of him. Anomaly’s voice was low and a little raspy, and he smelled of sweet pipe tobacco.
Jaing’s heart beat in his chest. He could almost feel it. He could almost—
He breathed out in a sudden sigh, air gusting against Anomaly’s neck. He shivered and goosebumps rose up on the delicate skin.
The fantasy clung.
“What’s wrong?” Anomaly murmured. His fingers traced idle, soothing circles over the back of Jaing’s neck and he felt it, he felt the skin prickle into goosebumps and a shiver roll down his spine and over his scalp and he also felt nothing. There was nothing but Anomaly’s touch.
Jaing took a breath. He didn’t need it. Did he? “I,” he said, “I don’t—”
Was that his heartbeat, or Anomaly’s? Was that sweat prickling at the back of his neck, were his cheeks heating in embarrassment? Did his breath come quicker because he was panicking, or because Jaing was thinking that it should? Anomaly stepped back and took Jaing’s hands and his fingers were cool.
“Jaing?”
“I’m okay,” Jaing said.
Tears pricked at his eyes, and he was certain of that, at least.
Anomaly cupped Jaing’s face in his hands, thumbs smoothing over his cheekbones. He blinked and two cold tears spilled over. “Talk to me, beautiful, what’s wrong?”
On the radio, Barbara sang in warbling French about memories that wouldn’t die.
“Am I dead?”
The question fell from Jaing’s lips like an accident.
Anomaly was so, so still.
Jaing asked him again, “ Am I dead?” and then he got a goddamn handle on himself and jerked away. “I’m so sorry,” he told Anomaly. Air rasped in the back of his throat and he was still crying. He wiped at his eyes, angrily, nearly hyperventilating.
What was the word for that again? For—for appendixes, or the muscles around human ears, or—or eyes on cave-dwelling fish. For things that didn’t leave when their use did.
Vestigial.
That was the word.
“You’re not dead,” Anomaly said, and then firmly repeated himself. “You’re not dead.”
He crossed the room and took Jaing’s hands again, squeezed them until Anomaly’s fingers turned white.
“Ow,” Jaing whispered. It didn’t really hurt but some deep part of him knew that it should have. It should have hurt, and his chest should have been full with the strong beat of his heart, and his skin shouldn’t have been able to make Anomaly shiver with its cool, waxy touch.
“You’re not dead,” Anomaly said again, fiercely. “I would know. Okay? You’re right here, Jaing.”
“I know,” Jaing said. He blew out a shuddering gasp, and didn’t breathe back in.