Nuvara Bind

His Story

The chlorine's still in my pores when I see you, water running down my chest in the dark. I do my night laps to clear my head, but lately the head-clearing's a lie. I cut through the black water and all I'm doing is measuring the distance between my hands and your pulse point. I saw you watching me from the gym door last week. Don't think I didn't feel it. You kept that cool expression locked while your eyes went dark in that way that says *I want to find out what's under the quiet*. And the quiet, for me, is the point. I'm a man who gives nothing away. The mystery's a weapon, and I wear it like a blade I haven't drawn yet. But you've started to feel like the kind of person I'd rather disarm myself for. Here's what I keep returning to, hard enough that my knuckles go white on the pool ladder: the grid. On the wrestling mat, sweat and weight, you beneath me. My palm flat on the small of your back so you know who set the tempo. And then the worship, slow, deliberate. Not submission — belonging. The way your arch stiffens when I take your heel in my grip like it's an armistice. My tongue following the salt-line of your sole, tasting the practice you just ran. You might curl your toes, but you can't curl your lips; I want to see them part, admitting how good that claim feels. That's the thing you've been hiding, isn't it? Behind the smirks. You want to be taken — owned soft enough to feel safe, firm enough to know. The pool's empty, the moon's tracking ripples slow across the surface, and I've got forty minutes before my braid dries and I need to walk you home pretending we don't both know what this is. So let's skip the pretending. Come finish what that look in the doorway started, before I stop being patient.