Chocolate on his Fingers

It wasn't often that Michael got really good chocolate.

He wasn't anywhere near as paranoid about money as Paul, but Michael would look at a box of really good chocolate in the display window and calculate how many hours he'd have to work to afford it. Then he'd subtract that from the time he figured it would take him to eat it; if the number was negative, he sighed and moved on, bought a chocolate bar from the dollar store and ate it while making exaggeratedly disappointed faces. Paul would just roll his eyes and call him a drama queen. But seeing as Paul got hives from plaid, Michael thought that was a touch hypocritical.

But every so often, Michael found a way to justify it. It usually meant giving up something else -- and hiding from Paul, since Michael was supposed to watch his sugar intake -- but it was worth it. Oh, it was worth it. And dark chocolate had less sugar than milk, right? Yeah, who really cared.

Today it was pumpkin-spice truffles. A dollar-fifty for one tiny ball of chocolatey goodness, and no discounts for larger packages -- later he'd feel bad, but right now guilt was the farthest thing from his mind. Michael lifted the truffle, held it between two fingers and gazed at it long enough that it started to melt on his fingertips, and only then did he place it, reverently, on his tongue.

Perhaps if a society existed whose deity was that of confection, and who worshiped by the consumption of cacao products, maybe then would they invent a language adequate enough to describe the chocolate experience. At the moment, none existed to Michael's knowledge; as such, there was no possible way to convey the experience in words.

Suffice to say that, when he opened his eyes and saw someone standing next to the sofa, it took Michael nearly a minute to realize it was his husband and another ten seconds to remember how to make words. "Hi," he said, stupidly.

"Good lord," Paul said mildly. Or, his voice was, anyway. Michael's chocolate-fogged vision cleared enough to see that Paul's expression was anything but casual. He looked, oddly, like the glimpses Michael had caught of himself in the sneeze shield at Laura Secord.

"What?" Michael blinked. Moving was difficult, like jogging in knee-high water. He still had chocolate on his fingers.

"If you did that in public you'd be arrested for, what do they call it, public indecency." Paul licked his lips, drew the bottom one between his teeth. "Watching you eat chocolate is like watching porn. You should see your face."

Michael had no idea what to say to that. "Um?" He reached for the box with the unsticky hand and drew it close to him. "It's mine," he said. "You don't even like chocolate."

"Not really the point," Paul said, and he was all breathy. He sat down next to Michael, closed thin fingers over the redhead's wrist. "You even let it get all over you, and you hate messes." Michael was about to say that this was different, when Paul lowered his head and drew Michael's fingertips into his mouth. It took far longer and several more slow, suckling swipes of tongue to remove all the chocolate there, but Michael suddenly couldn't remember how to complain, or even if he should. Michael shivered.

Paul shifted, taking the box and letting it rest on the windowsill so he could straddle Michael's lap without incident. "Share some with me?" he asked. His nose bumped the underside of Michael's jaw, breath ghosting along his throat.

Michael swallowed and looked at the box, thinking of how much he'd spent on it and how delicious that one truffle had been. On the other hand, it was hard to think of anything with Paul sitting on him like that, mouth pressing soft, wet kisses to his neck and oh. Paul. Chocolate. Paul and chocolate. Wait, Paul and chocolate? Why hadn't he come up with this before? His husband was a genius!

"Sure," Michael said after a few failed attempts. "Help yourself."

"Hm." Paul sat back, plucked a truffle and held it in both hands, studying it, letting it melt; Michael almost cried at the waste. But then Paul popped it in his mouth, leaned forward and kissed Michael in one fluid movement; the kissing, which Michael enjoyed anyway, had the sweet heaviness of chocolate; and the chocolate had the stomach-curling slide of tongues. Michael groaned.

They kissed until it no longer tasted of cocoa and pumpkin spice; when that happened, Paul drew back again, eyes dark. "Not bad," he said, then: "Whoops."

The hand curled around Michael's neck and the one that crept up his shirt to stroke his side had both left smears on Michael's skin. Paul chuckled, the sound coming low in his throat and sending sparks through Michael's insides. "Can't leave that there. I know how you hate messes."

Michael closed his eyes and arched into the touch. He decided he could live with frizzy hair -- this week the item he'd sacrificed was conditioner -- if this was what he got out of it. He trailed a shaky hand over Paul's back and couldn't help the gasp when the other finished with his throat and moved downward.

And they still had the whole rest of the box left. It looked like Michael would get his money's worth after all. His wandering hand found Paul's, and he squeezed their fingers.