"The first boy I ever loved," says Chris, "had blue eyes." He leans back, and JC curls himself around the curve of his hip like a puzzle piece sliding into place.

"Blue like the ocean, or blue like the sky?" JC asks, letting his own eyes slip closed so he can imagine both in his head, distant pale blue horizon and deep cool azure water. Chris shifts a little against him, warm fingers stroking his arm.

"A little of both," he says, and his voice sounds dreamy and faraway from behind JC’s eyelids, like maybe Chris is floating above him somehow, swooping over foaming waves and soaring up to drift alongside fat white clouds. "When we argued, they would flash midnight blue like the sea when there’s a storm."

"Oh," JC says softly, and his eyes flutter open as Chris’ fingers glide gently across his belly, and he can feels his skin rippling with tiny little shivers.

"And just before he kissed me," Chris whispers against JC’s neck, "they’d be the colour of the sky after it rains." His tongue licks across JC’s lips, slick and wet and sweet, and JC opens his mouth underneath Chris’, and imagines a nameless, faceless boy with brilliant blue diamond eyes.

***

"What colour was his hair?" JC asks from where he sits, arms wrapped around his legs, head turned to rest his cheek on his knees. "This boy you loved first."

Chris turns from the window and smiles. "Brown," he says softly. "His hair was brown."

"A brown-haired, blue-eyed boy." JC wrinkles his nose. "He could be anyone."

"He could be." Chris sits down beside him, both of them in the same patch of sunlight, hip to hip, skin to skin where they touch. "But he wasn’t." He tips his head back, and it fits perfectly into the warm hollow of JC’s collarbone.

JC brushes a stray lock of hair from above Chris’ brow, brushes lips across his forehead. "Dark brown like yours?"

"No." Chris’ eyes close and he smiles. "It was only dark when it was wet. Sleek and dark like chocolate when we got caught out in a rainstorm once. And when we went swimming, too. But it was lighter in the sun."

He pauses then, and JC wonders what he’s seeing inside his head.

"Sometimes it was almost golden in the sunlight," Chris says, after a while. "Strands of it, and they’d fall in his eyes, and he’d just laugh and shake his head like it didn’t matter."

He smiles again, and JC feels a tug in his belly at that. "Not just any boy, then," he says quietly, and despite the sunlight, he feels a little chilled.

"No." Chris’ voice is soft. "Not just any boy."

***

JC can’t help but think about this boy—the boy with blue eyes that change and shift, who kisses like a rainstorm and glows golden in the sunlight.

Sometimes he dreams about this boy with no face and no name, and he’ll wake with a start, limbs twined with Chris’, heart racing in his chest, wondering if this boy who Chris loved first is also the boy Chris loved best.

***

"Tell me more," he says one morning, as he looks out of the window at a sky heavy with fat black rainclouds. "This boy you loved. I can’t. I want to know more about him." Even as he says it, he’s not sure it’s true, but he thinks knowing has to be better than not knowing.

Chris slips close behind him, wraps arms around his waist, and JC can feel him warm and solid against his back. "How much do you want to know?" he asks, and JC shakes his head.

"Everything you haven’t told me," he says quietly, turning around to face Chris and knows he can’t take the words back. Not now. Part of him hopes Chris will say no, that he’s said enough, that it’s all in the past and gone and forgotten.

But not forgotten, JC realises, because he knows it’s all right there in Chris’ head. This boy is still part of Chris, and JC has to know.

"Ok." Chris’s voice is soft, and he hands JC a faded sweater. "Put this on, and we’ll go sit outside, and I’ll tell you all that you need to know."

JC pulls it on over his head, runs fingers through his hair and tries to swallow over the nervous lump in his throat. Chris is sitting on the deck waiting for him, leaning back against the railings, smiling. "Don’t look so freaked out," he says, reaching up for JC’s hand, pulling him down beside him. "This all happened a long time ago."

"Yeah, I know." JC settles into the vee of his legs, lets his head fall back against Chris’ chest, feels the steady rise and fall in time with his breathing. He waits, and just when he thinks he can’t wait a moment longer, Chris starts to speak.

"His skin," he says softly, "his skin was smooth ivory, but only in the places where the sun didn’t touch. The rest of him—he was like pale gold. Sometimes he’d tan, but not often. I loved touching him." One hand closes around JC’s wrist; his thumb strokes slow, lazy circles against the soft skin, and JC feels warmth spread gently through him, despite the fat drops of rain that are starting to fall. He closes his eyes, listens to the sound of Chris’ voice.

"I loved the way he tasted," Chris says, and he’s lifting JC’s hand, brushing his fingers across his mouth as he speaks. "He tasted rich and dark and sweet like berries—the kind that stain your lips and fingers." JC feels warm wetness on his fingertips, then a gentle sting as Chris nips at them, over and over. "I could never get enough of that taste."

It’s raining harder now, and Chris is pulling JC closer, and his breath is warm against JC’s ear. "He looked good in anything he wore," he’s saying, "anything at all. He was beautiful, and he took my breath away each and every time I saw him." He dips his head and nuzzles JC’s neck, bites at his collarbone, and JC gasps softly at the sensation, twisting in his arms, surges against him, heat racing along his skin. "But there was one colour," Chris says, "there was one colour I loved him in best."

There’s a roll of thunder and another sting of teeth into his skin, and JC shudders, and it’s not just from the rain that’s soaking them both. "Inside," Chris murmurs, and pulls him up by the hand, and JC nods and stumbles to his feet, and they’re kissing and biting at each others’ lips as they fall into the house.

"Look at you," Chris whispers, stopping JC in front of a mirror, and for a moment JC doesn’t know why— until he turns to see himself reflected back. His hair is sleek and dark and in tendrils around his face, and his eyes are a brilliant blue like the sky after a shower of rain. He looks down at the sweater Chris gave him to wear, the water that’s soaking into it turning it to dark blood red.

"What colour," he says softly, turning back to Chris, and all the air in his lungs is stuck somehow, "what colour did you love him best in?"

Chris reaches up and touches his face, and JC feels shivers race through him, filling him up. "Red," Chris answers, "I loved him best in red."

"This first boy you loved," JC breathes the question into Chris’ mouth, licks the words inside, tastes rain against his tongue. "Did I ever know this boy?"

"Yes," Chris says. "The boy was you."