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Throughout his life, Bård had thought of them simply as the Dreams. When he was a baby, they were formless visitations of terror. Later, they drew their shapes from his daily life. Toys, playmates, teachers -- twisting and distorting into menacing new realities. They were more than simple nightmares, by orders of magnitude; all-encompassing, all-devouring. And from the start, there was one sure way back.
The last Dreams had been back in the days when he and Vegard were wrapping up O-fag’s first season and preparing for Ylvis III. He’d thought for years that they were gone forever. He was wrong.
He was pirouetting across the studio under Thea’s approving eye, as Vegard lounged on the bench near the door, chatting idly with Calle as they waited to run through their own dance moves. Suddenly, a few seconds too late, Bård noticed a pile of black webbing lying on a heap by the wall. He couldn’t stop in time; one foot tangled, then the other. He saved himself from an inglorious fall by grabbing onto the barre mounted on the mirror … then watched in horror as the black net twitched as if awakening, writhed, then began to contract and crawl up his legs, the strands growing ever-tighter, squeezing his calves, cutting into his knees, lapping hungrily at his thighs. Bård howled in pain as the thin material of his sweats split and ravelled, allowing the hungry strands of the net to burrow into his pale, already-bleeding skin. And then the strands began to smoke ….
“VEGARD!!!! VEGARD! HELP! NO!” Bård was thrashing in his bed as his brother rushed into the room and flipped on the light.
“What is it? What’s wrong?”
"My legs. My legs! Oh my god, it has my legs!”
Vegard immediately realized what was happening. Just as swiftly, he was stripping away the covers tangled around Bård’s lanky limbs. “Look. Look! Bård, see? Your legs are fine!”
Bård’s face was a mask of horror, eyes clamped shut, terrified at the mental image of skin stripped from flesh, flesh torn to the bone. The bitter taste of adrenaline flooded his mouth.
“Vegard, I can’t. Please. Oh, God.”
A final tug at the covers, and then his brother’s strong hands were wrapping around his ankles, sliding upward, long strokes meant to prove that skin, flesh, bone were all intact. “You’re fine, Bård. It’s fine. Feel? See?”
As the reassurance spilled from Vegard’s lips and his hands continued to move, Bård’’s features, locked in a rictus of fear, relaxed until finally he was able to open one eye a slit, then the other. He squinted down at his brother, clad only in his battered old Army-green knit sleep pants, half-kneeling at the side of the bed. And then he examined his own exposed limbs. Which were ... fine. His brother’s long, gentle strokes felt good, warm, reassuring. Vegard’s fingers splayed wide as if to chase away the last tattered shreds of phantasm.
Bård drew in one shuddering breath, then flushed with embarrassment. “Geez, Vegard, I’m sorry,” he muttered as he sat up. blinking in the glare of the bright ceiling lamp. “I woke you up. I’m sorry.”
“It’s OK, little brother,” Vegard gave one knee a pat, then sat back on his heels and looked up at Bård. “The old dream again? I thought that had gone.”
Bård blinked. “So did I. I’m really sorry.”
Vegard’s sooty curls were rumpled and standing out from his skull, dark eyes soft and concerned behind the glasses askew on his nose. The pale, faintly freckled skin sleeking over his slim torso was marked by the press of sheets; he’d clearly been asleep. He has never looked more adorable, Bård thought, and then with the ease of long habit, stopped that particular train of thought dead in its its tracks.
Vegard smiled, stood up, and reached over to tousle Bård’s own light-brown hair. “It really is OK. Go back to sleep. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Pliant, as he so rarely was, Bård rolled over on his side. Closed his eyes. Slid immediately into a deep dreamless slumber. Vegard paused in the doorway of the bedroom to survey his brother’s relaxed form, then shook his head ruefully.
On the way back to his own room, he scooped up the slim laptop from the kitchen counter. Once he was awake, that was it -- he was awake. Might as well get some work done.
The magic had worked again. The Dream was gone.
For two whole nights.
He was reaching up into one of the cupboards in the Concorde offices, looking for an empty wine bottle they’d used as a prop in a few music videos. Suddenly his questing fingers encountered something cold, rubbery, yielding, like a huge bladder full of goo. Bård prodded it experimentally … and felt the thin membrane rupture, a gelatinous glop oozing out to coat his fingers and drip down his upraised forearms. As the repulsive liquid reached his elbows, Bård felt a horrible itching sensation, building to a raging burn as the oily, clinging substance began to etch at his skin. Bård stepped back from the cabinet and began to frantically shake his arms, trying to scrape away the disgusting ooze… but instead, felt the skin start to slide off his arms like a pair of gruesome gloves, leaving the muscles and tendons underneath exposed to the caustic kiss of the fluid … blistering, blackening …
“VEGARD!”
By the time his older brother stumbled to his bedside, Bård was already sitting up, slapping and scraping at his naked arms, sobbing helplessly in the grip of the nightmare. “It’s eating my arms. It’s eating ... oh, God --”
Vegard gripped his shoulders, then slid his hands down Bård’s arms, forcing them against his sides as the younger man struggled in his grasp. His strong hands rubbed up, down, then up … digging into the muscles of Bård’s shoulders, calloused fingers pressing firmly against biceps, then gliding down forearms to wrists and back up again before pulling his brother into a tight embrace.
“Fine, fine, fine,” he crooned into Bård’s ear, and the warm, faint, spicy scent that was uniquely Vegard’s surrounded him. “You’re safe. You’re fine, See?”
Bård stubbornly shook his head, eyes clamped shut. “I can’t look. It’s too … It’s all over me, like acid. Oh, my God. It’s too gross…
“Really? The only gross thing I see are those extremely aged jockey shorts. Seriously, Bård,” Vegard’s tone was threaded with wry, gentle humor as he flattened his palms against his brother’s back, “those have died. Give them a decent burial.”
The teasing reassurance, and the feeling of his brother’s breath stirring his hair, acted like a tonic. Slowly, the shudders wracking Bård’s shoulders and ribcage subsided. He opened his eyes and reluctantly leaned out of Vegard’s embrace as he extended his arms, examining them. Flawless, except for a few red, mildly inflamed scratches where he’d flailed and clawed. But wait … Bård’s eyes flared wide in alarm at something slimy smeared across the inside of his elbow.
Vegard looked sheepish. “Sorry. I think that’s me.” He gave an exaggerated snuffle. “Allergies.”
“Ewwww!” Bård shoved at his brother. “Get away, mucus-troll!”
Vegard stood up, chuckling. “The demoiselle must pardon me for not attending to my toilette before rushing to her rescue ... assface.” He scrubbed at his nose with the heel of one hand, then sneezed.
”Tissues on the nightstand there.” Vegard nodded his acknowledgement, pulled one out, and dabbed at his reddened nose as he headed for the door. “And snothead?” Vegard paused and turned back an inquiring look. “Thanks.”
A brief flash of a grin, and a resounding honk as Vegard blew his nose, was the only reply as the older brother turned toward the open door. And Bård allowed himself a brief, appreciative glance at his brother’s compact frame, lightly muscled back arrowing down into narrow hips and -- most particularly -- the thin, worn pajamas clinging to the underside of Vegard’s ass.
Hey, I’ve been traumatized. Rationalizations.
The very next night …
The light wouldn’t come on in the garage … probably burned out again, but t was just a short walk down the steps and to the car, and there was a faint glow of light ahead, probably a reflection of the canal outside. But as Bård approached, he realized the glow had dimension but no form ... a shifting, gaseous mass of mist. Bård could barely discern strangely pearlescent tendrils shifting inside, and he jerked to a stop. But it slowed the inevitable by only a second or two. The lambent mist reached hungrily for him, engulfing his head, filling his mouth and nose with the stench of things long dead, not buried. He could feel a thousand tiny wormlike filaments of corruption wriggling into his mouth, invading his nostrils, steeping into his throat and being sucked into his lungs by one deep, terrified gasp. Immediately he began to gag, then heave as the noxious miasma seeped ever-deeper. WIth the last bit of air in his lungs, he produced a strangled half-moan, half-shriek.
“Aww, jeez, Bård. Oh no. I got you,” Vegard rasped as his brother retched helplessly against his shoulder. “You were lucky I had to get up to get some more cough medicine, I barely heard you.”
Bård shoved his brother back violently, gestured to his throat, made choking motions.
“Ayieee. What’s this?” Vegard looked at his brother with real concern. “You’re having trouble breathing?’
Bård’s blue eyes were wide, frantic, darting. He made the strangled noise again. Acting instinctively, Vegard’s hands slid up, fingertips colliding to cradle the base of Bård’s neck, thumbs stroking over his Adam’s apple to the base of his throat. Bård sucked in one labored, shuddering breath, then another. Keeping one hand on his brother’s neck, Vegard slid the other down to rub gently at Bård’s heaving chest.
It seemed to be working. Bård gagged, coughed, sucked in even more air and slumped in his brother’s grasp..Vegard could feel his pulse pounding wildly under his fingers as he continued to gently rub the back of Bård’s neck, fingers sliding up into his brother’s hair, inscribing little circles on his scalp then stroking back down the nape, crooning in his raspy voice before breaking off into a fit of coughing.
For the first time, Bård registered how scratchy Vegard’s voice sounded, how hot and dry his skin was. With his head still buried against his brother’s collarbone, he mumbled, “You’re sick. Really sick.”
Vegard drew in a deep breath, then coughed a few more times. “Not too bad. It gets worse when I lay down or” cough, cough, “talk. Think I better sleep in the chair.” With the crisis past, he was clearly flagging, his eyes bleary.
“I have a better idea. Go get your pillows.”
Vegard looked an inquiry at his brother.
"You don’t have enough pillows to prop you up. Neither do I, but if we put them together we can get you comfortable.” It made Bård feel good to think that he could repay his brother just a little for all the sleep he’d lost in the past week.
Vegard blinked at him, tried to formulate an objection, but could not. He stood, swayed a bit and then padded off to his room to gather the pillows.
Bård got up too and went into the kitchen. He came back to find Vegard sitting on the side of the bed, duvet trailing on the carpet, and a combined pile of pillows on Bård’s bed. Bård added a few throw cushions from the couch.
“Here, drink this,” Bård handed Vegard a steaming mug and two Ibux. “That throat tea, and I put lemon and honey in.” By the time Vegard set the empty cup down, Bård had arranged a nest of pillows in a tight semicircle against the headboard.
Vegard blinked blearily at the bed as his brother hit the remote to douse the ceiling light, leaving only the faint glow from the lamp in the hall. “Where will you sleep .. Oh.”
Bård leaned back into the nest of pillows and then answered the question by wrapping his arm around Vegard’s shoulder to pull him down, settling his brother’s head against his shoulder and then tucking a thin cushion under the other side of Vegard’s head, feeling his brother’s curls tickle his nose. “There,” he said, “this way, you won’t slide down.”
Vegard opened his mouth to object and then visibly reconsidered, his exhaustion -- and the promise of comfortable sleep -- defeating him. “ ‘S totally gay, though,” he mumbled as he burrowed more deeply into the pillows and Bård’s side.. One hand hovered briefly in the air before settling on Bård’s hip. And slowly, his raspy breathing slowed and evened, as he fell asleep in his brother’s arms.
Bård closed his eyes briefly and felt a small smile curving his lips. There was no way he was sleeping though this. For long minutes, he simply reveled in the feel of his brother’s head tucked into the hollow where his shoulder curved into his neck, relished the way his chest lightly brushed Bård’s side every time he drew a breath, breathed in the teasing scent of cough medicine, soap and slightly sour sweat combining with the intoxicating fragrance of Vegard himself.
Then, judging that Vegard was safely unconscious, he let himself wind one black curl around his thumb, rubbed it between his fingers, let it spring back. When Vegard didn’t rouse, Bård grew more daring -- grazing his fingertips across the slim bridge of Vegard’s nose, stroking across his cheek and then gently, lightly, across Vegard’s lips. Strange, brother, he mused. When you pull me from the Dreams, your hands are all over me and I’m too fucking terrified to appreciate it. When we’re both awake, you barely allow me to hug you unless we’re performing. And now I have you close as skin, at my mercy … only you’re asleep.
For just this moment -- just now, and never again -- Bård willfully abandoned the rigid control that always governed his actions around his brother. Buried the shameful, burning thought that this was his brother. Buried even the fleeting consideration of how horrified Vegard would be if Bård ever dared to touch him like this when they were both awake.
Fuck it. I’ll take what I can get.
So he settled back into his vigil, noting that the drugs were taking hold; Vegard’s fever had broken, and his breathing seemed slightly less wheezy. And so they stayed, propped up in the wide bed, one brother deep in slumber and the other smiling and content, occasionally chancing a feather-light caress.
But Bård had been missing sleep too. As the first faint stirrings of dawn stained the white curtain across the room with pink and gold, his eyes drifted shut and he fell.
The club was hot and incredibly crowded, a writhing mass of bodies packing the dance floor, dozens of perfumes clashing and every surface sticky with spilled liquor. Bård tried to edge past to reach the bar, but one slim arm reached out from the crowd, curled around his bicep, pulled him in.
He turned -- no small feat, with the press of people around him -- and faced the most purely gorgeous woman he’d ever seen. He’d never been a fan of redheads, but the coppery waves rippling over her bare shoulders were glorious, and her wide-set green eyes seized his gaze as she pulled him toward her, draping one arm around his neck and snaking the other behind his waist to pull him tight against her. They fit -- perfectly -- and as her hips began to move, Bård moved with her, not thinking, just feeling.
She came on even stronger, grinding against him as he slowly retreated. Bård blinked,and realized he’d been maneuvered into one of the shadowy banquettes around the bar’s perimeter. One shove, and he was sprawling backward, and now the redhead’s hands … no, wait, her hair was brown … were expertly manipulating his belt buckle, one beautifully manicured hand tugging down the zip before sliding inside and curling around his already-stirring cock.
Fuck, he breathed, spearing his fingers through her sable curls as she slid down between his knees. He could hear the faint breath of her laughter stir the light hairs on his thighs, sending a reaction jolting up his spine. That’s the idea, she growled in a low smoky voice, and she looked up … her dark … dark? .. eyes meeting his as she licked her thin lips. Then she smiled, purely predatory, and bent her head, letting him watch as her pink tongue swiped roughly against the head of his erection before her lips parted … slid down. And down. Bård’s back arched as his fingers fisted in the crisp, short curls at the nape of his seducer’s neck. The sensation was blinding. He’d never felt anything like this, almost as if his soul was being pulled through the base of his cock by the hot, wet suction.
And suddenly, she pulled back violently, Bård yelped as even white teeth scraped across his aching glans … and then stared into a much-too-familiar face contorted with rage; clever, mobile mouth spilling curses. One blunt-fingered hand reached up to feel a jaw now rough with black stubble. Even in his sleep that fucker protects you, she .. it … snarled, and the voice was Vegard’s.
The features shifted again, pale fine skin going leathern and then scaly, nose collapsing into a revolting slit, mouth rearranging itself to a lipless maw of razorine teeth. Bård scrambled backward but the creature was faster, pulling itself to its full height and glaring down with eyes of angry, dull scarlet. Long, crooked fingers tapering into venom-dripping nails clawed at the air in front of his cock, but something stopped them …. one talon actually breaking off, skittering across the floor as the creature howled in pain. Bård scrambled backward, one hand frantically attempting to shield his erection, only to watch as the revenant snarled. He won’t always be around to save you. He’ll meet someone. He’ll marry. Someday, and now the snarl was a hungry sneer …. someday, I will catch you alone. And the creature vanished, leaving one last venomous statement quivering in the air.
You can’t stay awake forever.
“Bård? Bård!” Something is shaking him to consciousness. A body rolls on top of his; arms sliding underneath his back to pull him into a fully sitting-up position, chest pressed against a broader, warmer one, hips bracketed by the pressure of his brother’s muscled thighs.
One hand curves around his tear-stained cheek, brushing away wetness. Bård meets his brother’s worried brown eyes, and this time it really is him; the so-familiar face haloed by the watery late-morning sun shining through his tumbled curls. The love and concern on Vegard’s face can be nothing but genuine.'
“Don’t leave me,” Bård pleads helplessly. “Don’t ever leave me.”
“Sshhhhhhh,” Vegard soothes, and his eyes search Bård’s azure gaze, widening before his lashes sweep down and he pulls his brother forward so their foreheads are touching. For two long, shuddering breaths, they stay like this. And then the hand on his cheek shifts just a tiny bit, cradling his jaw, tilting his head to one side, then back. “No,” Vegard breathes across his lips. “No. I will never leave you.”
Lips slightly chapped yet soft, so soft, slanting over his own. The faint taste of salt tears dissolving, and Bård is frozen, not daring to react lest he shatter this fragile moment. Until, against his skin, he feels Vegard’s muscles tense and coil, preparing to pull back
Bård gasps, and pulls Vegard back, all the way down. Now it is his hands sliding across his brother’s face, and he is not content with soft kisses -- no, he plunders Vegard’s mouth like he’s always longed to, lacing his fingers together at the base of his brother’s skull, holding his head immobile as he demands entrance. Vegard shudders and surrenders, head bending forward, jaw falling open, and the taste, the heat of him is overwhelming. Bård slides down in the bed so his back is flat against the sheet-covered mattress, pulling his brother down with him, sweeping his own roughened fingertips down the curve of Vegard’s spine.
With one boneless wriggle, Vegard straightens his legs, flexing his knees so they are braced slightly against the mattress.The maneuver brings them, abruptly, into full-body contact; Bård whines and flexes his hips upwards into his brother’s heat, feeling the unmistakable evidence that Vegard is at least partially aroused. Vegard breaks the kiss, raising his head to search Bård’s face with anxious eyes. His lips part, but he clearly doesn’t know exactly what to say, and for one timeless moment the brothers remain locked in frantic, mutual contemplation, each pleading silently with the other to acknowledge what is happening.
It is Vegard, as always, who breaks. “Bård,” he says, pressing a kiss against his brother’s temple. “Bård,” he sighs, letting his lips travel down to the sensitive skin under the ear. “Bård,” he breathes, and then looks up, eyes solemn.
“Are you sure?” Vegard asks, even as Bård flexes his back again in a wordless plea. “Because I am. I want this. If this is just you being scared from your dream … I understand, it's OK.
"But I .. I love you.”
It may be the most magnificent gift Bård has ever received. With his simple declaration, even more than their kisses, Vegard has laid himself bare, set the stage for Bård to shove his brother away, proclaim his disgust, snarl that Vegard is taking advantage of a vulnerable moment. The pure courage demands complete honesty.
“I have loved you always,” Bård confesses, and those are words enough for now. Vegard’s lips burn a path down Bård’s neck and his hand gropes his way down Bård’s ribcage, down to his waist as his lips capture and torment one aching nipple, then the other. His fingers are splayed on Bård’s hip, and in one quick movement he slides them under and jerks up, grinding his pelvis into Bård’s just so. Another twist of that clever hand, and Bård realizes he’s being swiftly, expertly stripped of his briefs, his aching sex springing free. Vegard sits back on his heels, surveying his brother’s slimmer, paler body as he chews on his bottom lip, then bends again. Bård feels the heat of his brother’s breath across the head of his straining cock. One soft kiss, and the raven head sinks down, mouth surrounding Bård in liquid heat before pulling back just enough for Vegard’s tongue to swirl around the head as his hand circles the base of Bård’s cock, stroking upward.
It is immediately clear that his brother knows exactly what he is doing, but it feels so incredibly good that Bård can’t really stop to think about that. In fact, he is embarrassingly close to erupting, and Vegard must be able to tell; as Bård’s hips jerk involuntarily, his older brother takes one deep breath then tightens his lips, sinking down again until he’s taken Bård’s entire length. Gentle fingers cradle Bård’s balls, sending a jolt of ecstasy down his spine. With a wordless cry, Bård spasms once, twice, and the contractions as Vegard swallows coax even more from him.
Spent, Bård collapses back into the pillows, feeling his cock slip from his brother’s lips. Two more soft kisses along the shaft, and then Vegard sits up, face flushed, lips swollen and wet, chest heaving as he meets Bård’s dazed eyes. Bård holds up trembling arms, and Vegard crawls forward until he can nestle down with his head against Bård’s chest.
“I want you to fuck me,” and Bård doesn’t realize he’s going to say the words until they are hangng in the air.
“What? Now? Nei,” Vegard murmurs. “It’s not something you rush into.”
“But you …” and now Bård’s hand is sliding down. He can feel the heat, the weight of Vegard’s fully erect cock through the thin pajamas, and he gives himself a few minutes to simply explore the dimensions before grasping the elastic waistband and tugging downward.
“There are much easier ways of dealing with that,” Vegard says, and though he tries to sound matter-of-fact his voice trembles a bit. Lifting his hips, he pulls the garment down, then kicks it off as he takes his cock into his own hand.
“Let me,” Bård’s fingers curl around his brother’s length, and slowly he begins to stroke, smiling as Vegard moans. A few moments of experimental fumbling, and Bård has settled into a rhythm that clearly works for his brother; it doesn’t take long before Bård feels a hot gush spill onto his wrist., then another as his brother’s body convulses.
For a few long minutes they simply lie there and breathe together, until Vegard reaches over, grabs the discarded pajamas and mops at the cooling mess splashed across Bård’s hip and groin. Untidiness is not a condition Vegard Ylvisåker could ever tolerate for long, and the action draws an exhausted chuckle from Bård before both slip deep into a dreamless sleep.
When they awake again, it’s late afternoon and rain is pounding against the window. Sleepy brown eyes meet blue again, but this time, there is no uncertainty in either gaze; beyond the gasped pleas and moaned endearments of a few hours prior, wordless promises have been offered and accepted. Bård raises one hand and traces his brother’s lips. “You’ve stopped coughing.”
Vegard takes a deep breath. “So I have,” he says. And then he smiles. “Guess I’ve discovered a sure cure for bronchitis.”
Bård’s answering grin is wide, sunny, utterly captivating. “And nightmares, brother,” he says, and takes one long, drugging kiss.
Epilogue
It’s been a weekend spent mostly in bed; even most of their meals have been scavenged from the kitchen and brought back to be fed to each other in quick, darting bites -- though Vegard grouses a bit about crumbs on the sheets. With considerable coaxing, and then demands, from his younger brother, Vegard divulges exactly how he got to be so good at blowjobs (gay roommate in college, lots of vodka). And after what seems to Bård like hours of patient, deeply pleasurable preparation, Vegard finally, gently turns his brother over on the bed, positions himself at Bård’s slick hole and slowly presses home before fucking him thoroughly into a quivering mass of sensation.
But real life eventually comes back into play, and they are up; for the first time in what seems like forever, dressed in actual clothes with zippers, buttons and sleeves. For Vegard, of course, the first order of business is setting Bård’s bedroom to rights. He strips the sheets and pulls out fresh ones, then grabs the broom. As he sweeps, he hears something slide across the floor.
"Hey, Bård, something was under the dresser; it’s over by the bed now. Grab it?”
Vegard only looks over when he hears his brother gasp.
There, in Bård’s hand, is something hard, and gray. Vegard frowns. “What is it?”
“Nothing.” And Bård drops the thing into the bin by the wall, staring down at it for a minute before turning to flop down, belly-first, on the bare mattress. He gulps, then turns his face to his brother, summoning up his best come-hither grin. Within minutes, Vegard has him panting, cursing -- and stammering out pleas that are quickly, and satisfactorily, answered.
It’s a long time before he remembers the object Vegard found: Curved -- like a small horn. Or more accurately, like a wickedly sharp talon, with a base that’s broken and ragged.
But when he looks in the bin, there is nothing there but dust.
And when he sleeps, he does not dream.