I WOKE in the morning to the sound of overly chipper birds singing somewhere in the distance. I rolled over in the sleeping bag and saw that Fergal was still asleep. He was on his side facing me, his left arm tucked under his head as a cushion, the sleeping bag thrown back enough to bare his upper chest.
My first thought was about how handsome he looked sleeping. His face was serene, his hair tousled and sticking up all over the place. It was nice to see someone seeming so at peace.
My second thought was that I desperately needed the bathroom. I got up as quietly as I could—which, when sleeping in a sleeping bag, is not all that quiet—and searched around for my pants. The shirt proved somehow harder to find, so I decided I didn’t need it just to go outside and pee.
I regretted that decision as soon as I stepped outside of the tent. The morning was brisk, the sky rain-gray. I looked up at the clouds with a frown, crossing my arms over my chest to suppress a shiver.
By the time I returned to the tent from our designated bathroom spot, Fergal was stoking the fire, dressed and looking like he’d been awake for hours. I reminded myself to ask him the secret to his little trick so I could master it.
“Mornin’,” he said, tossing me my shirt.
I took it gratefully and slipped it on, then dug in my pack for the light jacket I’d brought. “I thought about changing clothes, but the only thing I brought was a pair of khaki shorts, and I think I’m going to stick with the long pants.” I zipped the jacket up and moved to the fire. “I don’t know why I felt the need to tell you that.” I noticed something in his hands and frowned. “What’s that?”
He showed it to me: a tin can of Spam. “Yeh thought Oi was jokin’ last night? This is our breakfast.”
“Please tell me there’s something different for lunch.”
“Don’t like Spam?” Fergal opened the tin and quirked an eyebrow at me.
I stepped away from him, closer to the fire. “Let’s just say it’s not at the top of my shopping list.”
Fergal frowned down at the can. “Sorry, Oi should’ve asked yeh about the food.”
“It’s okay,” I assured him. “As long as there’s something else for lunch.”
“Oi promise there is.”
We were soon sitting down to breakfast, where Fergal took the lion’s share of the Spam, much to my relief. I could stomach the amount he’d left me.
“’Ow did yeh sleep?”
“I actually slept really well, surprisingly,” I said, taking a long drink of water to wash away the salty taste of the last of my Spam. “I didn’t think that I would, but I did.”
“It’s the power of sleepin’ in nature,” Fergal said sagely. “Oi never sleep quite as good in a bed.”
“Then you, sir, have not found the right bed.”
After breakfast was finished, Fergal took the time to wash the dishes we’d used and the fry pan with soap he’d brought and some of the water. “So, yeh want to go fer a hike now?”
I looked up at the sky, thinking that would be answer enough.
“Oh, come on. This is normal weather ’ere. Yeh’ve just been lucky with the weather yeh’ve had so far.”
I sighed, knowing there would be no arguing with him at this point. Besides, I didn’t come all the way out here to sit around the campfire all day, and a hike in the beautiful outdoors would probably do me some good.
I didn’t have to say anything and Fergal was smiling, confident in his victory. How did I become so damn readable to this guy, who was a stranger two weeks ago?
“All right, let’s go.”
I got up from the log and followed him.
We hiked all day, meandering our way around the hills. We talked about everything and nothing—favorite school subjects, favorite foods, least favorite foods, favorite music, teachers that we loved and hated.
As the day wore slowly into evening, it began to rain—not a light drizzle, but a torrential downpour. Within minutes we were both soaked to the bone. We took off back to the camp at a run, slipping and sliding along the grass as we went.
“No rain, huh?” I said. As much as I wanted to be angry at him, the whole thing was just too funny to hold on to it for long, and soon I was laughing as I careened around in the rain, Fergal keeping up with me, laughing just as hard.
We reached the tent, shucked off our shoes, and ducked inside. The only sound was our panting, the rain on the top of the tent, and the water dripping onto the floor of the tent. I met Fergal’s gaze for a moment, our eyes locking, and we both burst into laughter once more.
“We should get out of these wet clothes,” Fergal said after he regained some of his voice. “Don’t want to get sick.”
“Uh—what?” I felt a bit dumbstruck by the suggestion—the only thing I was able to even process was that Fergal just asked me to take off my clothes.
“It’s a bit chilly,” he clarified, sounding confused at my confusion. “We don’t want to get sick.”
It’s sound logic, part of my brain tried to tell me. My hands began pulling at the material of my shirt, peeling it away from my body. Fergal followed suit. The corduroy pants were hard to get off, but after much jumping around on one foot and nearly knocking the tent over, I succeeded. The only thing I was left with was my underwear.
“Do we need to take off our….” When I looked up at Fergal, he was already completely naked. “I guess that’s a yes.” His chest was coated with a light dusting of hair, and lower… well, I did my best not to look, but couldn’t help it. I saw a thatch of red hair, a lighter shade than that on his head, and the base of the shaft before I tore my eyes away. It made getting naked a little more difficult, because I was fighting with my body’s response to a visual stimulus that I very much liked.
It’s not like it matters, I reminded myself. Wet briefs cling very tightly, anyway. Throwing caution to the wind, I pushed them off as well.
“’Opefully it’ll stop raining soon and we can get these out by the fire,” Fergal said, pushing his clothes into a pile in one corner of the tent.
I watched him in my peripheral. His backside was as great to look at as his front.
No longer able to stand the exposure, I hurried over to my sleeping bag and burrowed into it, grateful for its warmth and its concealment. Fergal was slower about it, taking the time to go and push my clothes into the other corner. I couldn’t help but track him with my eyes, and I’m pretty sure he was aware of it.
He finally got under his own sleeping bag. “Sorry about the rain,” he said at last, flashing me that charming half smile of his.
“It’s not like you have any control over it,” I said with a shrug. “This is actually pretty nice, just sitting here, listening to the rain outside.”
“Yeh really are an Irishman at heart,” Fergal said approvingly. He leaned back, propped up on his elbow, looking at me. “Not that Oi ever doubted that.”
I didn’t know why, but it felt great to be hearing that from him. I liked the idea of belonging here, of fitting in where my mom came from, a country where my roots were.
“Yer shiverin’,” Fergal said suddenly, scooting his sleeping bag closer to mine and taking my arm, pulling me in closer. “Fer warmth,” he explained at my questioning look. His voice was low, now, though, a whisper when it didn’t need to be.
“Right, warmth,” I agreed, feeling like an idiot. I kept staring into his eyes, as if they were magnetized and I could not pull my gaze away.
After that, moments of time went missing, memory gaps, because one moment I was looking into his eyes, and the next my lips were pressed against his, feeling the soft pressure and welcoming caress of them.
Hands followed, painting a long, slow path down my back and leaving molten heat in their wake. It was like anywhere he put his hands caught fire, the heat spreading rapidly until my whole body felt infused with it, like it could not contain it and it was bursting forth. I deepened the kiss, wrapping my own arms around Fergal, pulling him closer to me so our bare chests could touch. I needed more contact, needed to help spread the fire to him as well.
“What are we doing?” I asked, breaking the kiss as much to ask the question as to take a moment to breathe before the power of the fire inside me burned me up. “This is crazy!”
“No, it isn’t.” Fergal made those three words sound like they were the most sound reasoning possible, and our lips were back together, our bodies crowding closer. “Are yeh okay?” he asked, caressing my chest with his right hand, his thumb brushing across my nipple and sending electric shocks straight to my cock.
“Yes,” I breathed. “Yes.” I was okay—more than okay. I grabbed Fergal and pulled his mouth back to mine. My other hand slid down Fergal’s chest and clenched in his chest hair, and Fergal moaned appreciatively. “You’re sexy when you moan like that.”
In response he tilted my head back, his lips zeroing in on the rapidly fluttering pulse at my neck. I swallowed a gasp as his teeth grazed it. “Oi think we can keep even warmer, don’t yeh?”
“How would you suggest we do that?” I asked.
“Well, if we were both in the same—fuck—”
I took that chance to return the favor, trailing my tongue along his neck gently.
“—in the same sleepin’ bag—”
“Brilliant idea,” I said, wiggling out of my sleeping bag without any further encouragement. Before I could make it into Fergal’s, a gust of wind blew a sheet of rain into the tent. The droplets of water were surprisingly cold against my skin, and I hurried to zip the tent closed.
“Okay,” I said, turning back around. “Where were we?”