Your spirits, dull and dying, hid under a pall. You must have taken time off because you stayed home every day, wallowing in your room and only appearing when I called you for meals. Even then, you ate without tasting, you talked about nothing, you smiles were joyless. You interacted more with Mimi than me, but I didn't mind – I'd make peace with whatever made you feel better. While I did my best to encourage you and inspire you not to lose heart, I understood that the hard blow of rejection from that fuckass gallery hurt you. It was the sort of pain that I couldn't relieve. So, I gave you all the time and space you needed to heal.

And, slowly but surely, time did heal you. You started going to your studio, painting the daylight away. A dark determination was your raiment whenever you entered your studio. Your countenance cut in concentration, your brushstrokes bearing a vengeance, your art took on a new direction. I noticed your vivid subjects, lonesome in the murk of shadowy shapes, grow dimmer and dimmer. It was starkly different from what you painted in the past, still mesmerizing all the same. I loved the bright, magical things you used to paint and I loved the dour things you painted now. How could I not? There was an anathematized beauty in your works now, an emblazonment of anger and spite. Hellfire brilliance engaged halcyon frailty.

So, you painted for hours upon hours, and at the end of it, you always came out seeming refreshed and satisfied and confident. Your natural vivacity enlivened the house. Your quiet, sublime jocundity, your loving and laughing, dancing and frolicking – everything was reborn.

At the dusk of the first workday of this new week, I wheeled homewards, wondering if you were at your shift or at home. You'd returned to work as a part-timer, and I hadn't gotten the hang of your schedule yet.

I conquered the tribulation that were the stairs at the front of the building, easier now that I'd been doing it daily. Leaning on a pillar, I hefted up my wheelchair and unfolded it, plopping my bottom on the seat and heading for the postboxes on the lobby wall. I unlocked our box and collected the mail. Amongst the standard bills and ads sat a sleek, rectangular cardboard package about six inches long and four inches wide. The sender's address sparked an exhilarated fizz in me. I sped to the elevator, my fingers tapping an impatient rhythm on my handrest as I slowly ascended. Hurrying down the hallways, my shaky hands almost dropped the keys as I was unlocking the door. Somehow, I managed to get through, remitting Mimi's greeting with a little scritch on her rump, and rushed straight to the studio. And you were there! Thankfully, you were home!

"Viktor..." you began, startled stare pinned on me.

"I got you something," I said, the widest grin splitting my face.

"Oh?" Setting your brush and palette on the side table, you swiveled on your seat as I approached. "What is it?"

Handing the package to you, I eagerly suggested, "open it. Open it!"

Ingenuous wonder perfused your features and – eyes twinkling, smile aureate – you unwrapped the box. I felt like I was on a caffeine buzz even though I hadn't had coffee at all today. My excitement only grew as your delicate, paint-stained fingers unraveled the brown cardboard. You had merely brushed the contents when an acute stab raced from my stub up to my thigh. The pain materialized so out of the blue, with such sharpness, I doubled over, a cry wrenching from my chest. I wrapped my hands around the leg, squeezing.

"Oh, my god, Viktor!" Quick as a fox, you sprung from the stool and kneeled in front of me. Palms hovering uncertainly, you queried, "phantom pain?"

Before I could answer, my other leg spasmed from a spectral hacking. Biting back a scream, I shifted my attention to it, massaging the muscles so the neurons could transmit actual sensations instead of the deceptive stimuli. A hammer crushed the bones of my ankles, my tarsals and metatarsals splintering. A blade pierced my calves, sliced tendons and ligaments, tore through muscle fibers. I couldn't hold it in anymore; a garbled wail rose from me, tears prickled my eyes and spilled. I clenched my teeth again. "Fuck! Fuckfuckfuck!"

There was a gentle pressure on one of my stubs. I opened my eyes to find you'd removed the sheath and were kneading the fold of flesh there. Our eyes met; calm conviction stared down teary agony. Left hand holding my tremorous leg steady, you curled your right hand into a fist, running your knuckles from the base of my stub to the back of my thigh, then over my knee and descending to my shin. Mild yet assertive, you said, "it's not real. There's nothing there." Nodding, I followed your lead and we caught a rhythm, knuckles working in long effleurages. "There's nothing there," you repeated, "there's nothing there."

Wincing as another harrowing spike jolted through my left leg, I strained, "there's nothing there..."

"There's nothing there," we said, almost in unison.

My nerves came to terms with reality, sensing past the Potemkin; the pangs abated to a fading ache. You continued to work the muscles of my leg as I did with the other.

"There's nothing there. There's nothing there. There's nothing there..."

My haggard breathing mollified, my teeth unclenched, and I dropped my limb to press my fists against my forehead. Shutting my eyes, I focused on my controlled respiration. I looked up when you asked if I was alright. I watched your hand reach for my face, my heart fluttering as your thumb wiped the line of tears from my cheek. "Are you okay?" you asked once more, your whisper wisping across my mouth.

Trapped in your enticing daze, in the thrall of your nightlike irises, lungs filled with the smell of your skin, I could barely bob my head in assent. Your hand lay on my cheek, clement and emphatic. My disembodied voice spoke. "Thank you."

My tongue was too heavy; I licked my lips. Your gaze strayed to where my fingers encircled your wrist, and you rose. The tip of your nose brushed the corner of my mouth, your lips covered mine – simmering, cajoling, and it flooded my mind. Your taste made me greedy. I took ahold of your jaw, angling us so I could reciprocate your kiss. I grabbed you, pulling you snug in between my legs.

"Viktor," you mumbled, your teeth snagging my lower lip. I made a sound, my response incoherent as I savored your grenadine kisses. "Wait," you entreated, pushing at my chest. Worried that I'd gone too far, I immediately released you. Standing, you began unbuttoning your shirt as you headed out of the studio. "Come...?" The husk in your invitation was thicker, richer.

I went after you, my throat drying when you dropped your shirt on the floor, kicked off your pants, and led me into your bedroom. A phoenix – supple lines and luscious colors distinct to your art style – flew across your back, veering towards the valley inked above the dimples of your petite buttocks. One of its wings twisted over your right shoulder and its tail folded around the curve of your belly. I'd glimpsed snippets of your tattoo before, yet the full splendor of it made the blood rush to my extremities.

Stopping the wheelchair as close to your bed as possible, I maneuvered myself onto it. I fumbled with my belt buckle until you stilled me, instead lifting my arms so you could take my tee off. I traced the plumage flaming up to your sternum, thumbed the elastic edge of your binder in inquiry, but you stepped away, arms crossed protectively over your chest. "I..." you tried and broke off, swallowing. "I want to keep this on," fell forth, the embarrassment painfully evident in your diaphanous tone.

"Sure," I responded quickly, "of course. I don't want you to do anything you don't want to."

"Thank you." You smiled, closing the distance between us in coquettish strides. Placing my hands on your waist, you clambered atop me and settled on my hips. The warmth betwixt your thighs left me coiled and wanton, taut as a drawstring. In those same breaths, I was also lost and unsure. You showed me mercy, conceding by grinding against me. It wasn't quite merciful though; the friction made me throb and I hissed.

Pulling you down, I claimed another heady kiss, and bestowed my own along your jaw, your throat, tasting the silken salt on your collarbone, teething your quivering pulse. You moaned, the sweet song flying free like the distant call of a seaside skylark – the reward for my devotion. As clumsy as we were euphoric, we tussled to grasp, to feel, to touch and relish as much of each other as we humanly could.

Our lips met for another dalliance as I palmed your sides, reveling in how suasible your flesh was, in how you arched into me. In the way you wrested me into kisses by pulling my hair. In the way your nails scraped over my ribs, igniting points of scintillation so dense that I felt like I was on the cusp of a star's collapse. In the wake of your libertine love, your caresses, your bites, your glistening gyration, I was a supernova.

And later, while we luxuriated in the afterglow, you propped yourself on your elbows, a pinky wandering through the downy curls of my chest. You stretched up and twirled a lock of my hair about in your thumb and forefinger. "I see why your mother called you Fae Prince..." you observed sotto voce, "you're gorgeous. As ethereal as the Fair Folk are fabled to be."

I chuckled, and pressed a kiss on your chin. Seizing the opportunity to bare all truths, I told you exactly how I saw your pixielike pulchritude and how much you meant to me. It all ended in, "you're the best thing that has happened to me."

It ended with you beaming at me. It ended with your head resting in the space below my neck as we cuddled into the night.

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