#this man is gay and in love

[polarwooly]

First Time for Everything

Ukko x Honeywort human!au that I've been writing for a while. This is about their first kiss.

Chapter 1

Cw: Gender dysphoria, slightly spicy flirting

A warm summer wind rustled through the bows of the eucalyptus trees and whistled softly among their ghostly white-barked trunks, carrying their sweet aroma up into the darkening sky. The sparse forest was quiet, the screeching parrots and singing birds having already retreated to their nightly perches and the sounds of other wildlife being drowned out by the babbling of the golden brown stream that ran through the forest, swelled from its normal lazy meander by the spring rains not so recently passed. A small group of antilopine kangaroos grazed by the edge of a thicket. With a thump of a foot, a reddish male alerted the others to the sound of a breaking twig nearby and a dozen pairs of ears perked in search of danger. Where they were pointed, a small, ambiguously humanoid shape descended warily from an apple-gum and hopped out of sight into the bushes. It blended into the backdrop of the forest floor as well as it had into the canopy, continuing its careful sprint further down the winding paths and prey trails that criss-crossed the woods, leaving the herd unbothered in their meal.

Some distance downriver, tents marked with the snarling wolf-head to the Northern Kingdom’s army had been set up behind the partial cover of  rocky outcroppings jutting above the woods. The figure popped its head up from behind a fallen tree and with one last nervous glance behind, took off its hood and approached the pair of guards keeping watch on top of a wind-rounded boulder. They both nodded a greeting as the sullen form of the company’s young healer, Hyoscyamus, or Ukko as he had quickly become known to all of camp, skulked past them. Recently, the skinny man had been running double-duty as a scout, supplementing the two they had already. He didn’t return the greeting, just made his way towards his own tent by the edge of camp and slinked inside. The space was small and had just enough room for three bedrolls arranged around the central pole. His own was in a perpetual state of clutter as always, covered in dry and drying leaves, collections of stones, bones and various clay pots filled with substances other people could only guess at because none were labeled. He tossed his bag among the bound-up branches of herbs and gave one of the other beds a nudge with his foot. 

“Wake up Vala! It’s sundown, your shift.”

With a mock protest, a lanky-limbed woman unfolded from under the covers, rolled over and got her long feet under herself with all the grace of a newborn moose. 

“Hnngh,” she groaned as she stretched out her arms out and grabbed her equipment in the same series of movements. “Hi Ukko. Bye Ukko.” With that, she ducked down and exited the flap, disappearing into the night as silently as he had arrived from it.

Ukko considered the state of his own mat, now with the added bulk of his herb-filled bag, and elected to sit on the third one instead, neatly kept and arranged and lined with quite a few non-standard-issue pillows. This one belonged to Honeywort, an expert soldier and fellow scout, one of the best in camp. The best if you accounted for height, which Ukko was one to do for his own reasons. He kicked his feet up on the mess flooding in from his side of the sleeping arrangement and pulled his straw cape over himself. He would have preferred to have been asleep hours ago, when the sun had still been fully visible in the sky, but his dumb scout-shift had kept him awake. Now, laying down in the empty tent, he drifted off to muddle-dreamed sleep almost immediately.

~~~

"Scooch over?" 

Ukko's eyes snapped open as he felt the pressure of a light touch on his arm. Even in the gloom of the tent, he could make out Honeywort's face hovering above him. He looked about as tired as Ukko felt, his ruddy brown hair escaping from its ponytail in whisps and deep lines under his pale green eyes. Ukko sat up, instantly alert. He patted the mat and Honey dropped next to him. His shoulder smelled like cooking meat and spices as it settled near Ukko's head-height. 

"Got you on firepit duty again?" he inquired, trying not to look like he was smelling him on purpose. 

"Yeah, it took forever to get the fire going. Wet wood you know. I didn't see you all evening though?" He rubbed soot from his forearm, then looked at his shirt with an unhappy frown. The dark brown fabric had black smudges on it too.

Ukko licked the sharp canine that protruded from under his lip, dislodging a stubborn piece of root bark. "I ate while I was out," he waved a dismissive hand and leaned back to stretch, unintentionally highlighting the ribs pushing on his thin skin. He folded back down quickly when he noticed Honey was watching.

"Plants don't count as real food," he insisted. As long as Ukko had known him, Honey had been an avid carnivore in his diet. He always seemed to manage to come up with a near endless supply of small game or eggs or fish whenever it was his time to spice up the dry wheat rations of the camp. Thanks to that skill, he had that duty a lot.

"Oh?" Ukko cocked an eyebrow wryly. "I brought these all this way for nothing then? What a shame…" Crawling across the floor on his hands, he reached into the bag he'd thrown in the corner and pulled out a small cup made of a folded strip of bark. It was filled with wild strawberries, small and red and slightly soft from the heat. He wiggled it in the air and it was snatched away in exchange for a crooked smile. Honey poured some into his hand and downed them in one mouthful, savoring the taste as he chewed. Ukko watched as he practically squirmed with delight and turned down the offer to share under the pretense that he'd already had his fill. Really, his pleasure tasted sweeter than any berry could.

After the small basket was empty, Ukko took it back, unfolded and stuck it back into the bag for later use. Honey’s pale fingers were now dyed slightly red in addition to the soot. 

"Okay, some plants can be actual food. Thank you.” Ukko grinned like a self-satisfied fox. “You know…” Honey moved to sit closer to him. “Vala won't be back for a few more hours…" He walked a pair of stained fingers playfully up Ukko's arm. It was a familiar game between them. He would tease, the other would parry. But this time, instead of pulling away or making up an excuse to shift the topic, Ukko remained still under the touch. He turned his hand palm up towards Honey. The slightly taller man blinked, a little confused at first, before a smile spread to his eyes and he folded his fingers between the offered ones. Ukko marveled at the softness of his touch and wondered if his calloused and clawed hands must have felt like gravel in return. He didn't want to ruin such perfect skin, even inconvenience it in any way. He wanted to be gentle, for once. Bringing the intertwined fingers up to his mouth, he pressed a kiss on the back of the hand. The taste was intoxicatingly like the scent worn into everything Honey owned, from his clothes to the sleeping mat they sat on. In a moment of boldness, he brought his hand out of the embrace and clasped both of them behind Honey's neck, pulling their faces near. He was so beautiful, he wanted to tell him. How he admired him and the way he fought, his muscles and his beard and his sparkly eyes and his everything. The low light dancing on his face was like nothing he could describe. But he didn't say any of that. He couldn't. He lied so much, so readily. Honey would think he was lying again, there was no way he could understand how he felt. He would probably tire of this new game soon and pull away. His arms squeezed on the neck between them harder without his conscious input. 

To his surprise, he felt palms close around his own cheeks. Honeywort's eyes were soft like his touch and made the nerves in his stomach clench, but the rest of his body relaxed into the other man's hands. Suddenly, his face was very close. So close he could feel the warmth of his breath when he spoke so softly it almost sounded like a purr.

"I like you, Hyos." There was no ulterior motive to the words. No hidden meaning of expected compliance. Just a pure, unfiltered declaration. Like they were two school-boys with crushes. There was something about them that made a red glow appear on the tips of Ukko's ears and spread all over his face. 

"I uh.. I like you too. A lot." 

It felt like nothing compared to how he was feeling. How he had been feeling for months now. Like a bucket of water compared to the ocean itself. He brushed a hair out of Honey's face, lingering in tracing the outline of his temple with his nail. It felt so right. He began to lean in, but lost his nerve at the last moment. He fumbled, blowing a sigh through his nose and clenching his teeth. He chose something that was a little less daunting than the radiant face waiting patiently for him with lidded eyes and kissed the curve of the cheek framing it instead. A hum vibrated through Honey's throat and against Ukko's arms.

"May I?" The husky whisper disappeared into Ukko's wild hair as a thumb rubbed small circles into his cheekbone.

What a terrible thing to ask, he thought. Ukko knew from experience he hated being touched, that slightest contact from anyone but a few select people could make his skin crawl and gut twist uncomfortably on a bad day. But it would be different when it was Honey. It had to be. So, he told a very wreckless lie right to the face of the person closest to him. "Please."

Soft fingers traced the line of his jaw, brushing along the light fuzz of his shadow of a beard. Ukko pressed his cheek deeper into Honey's hand. It was so warm. Leaving the other side of his face, Honey's right hand guided a curl behind an ear and drifted down, caressing his neck, gliding over his clavicle and under his straw cloak. The binding was undone and a weight shifted off Ukko’s shoulders as the only piece of clothing covering everything above his waist was half shrugged, half pushed off and fell behind him on the bed. His skin bristled against exposed air, sending a pleasant tickle down his body. Tensing slightly from the familiar sensation given new significance, he hazarded a glance at the man holding him so tenderly. His face was still level with his, but eyes were cast down, following and guiding the trailing touch. 

A pang of desperate love shot through his heart. How much he wanted to just hold him like this, forever. To wrap their bodies together until they melded into one. So no-one else could have him, take him away, even look at him. Because to look at Honeywort was to love him, to bind your very soul into his service until the second Surge wiped this pitiful island off every map, until the sun no longer rose in the East, until the seas boiled off at the end of days. And even longer. Truly, forever. And in this moment, this divine being whose very essence was love itself was looking at him. Touching him. The exploring fingers kept their downward path on his chest, noting every rib, every stringy muscle, and appreciating every single one with drawn out, languid strokes. Like he too had been watching from afar for ages, unable to touch, but drowning in curiosity. Just like him. It was getting to be too much for his heart to handle. A sigh escaped his mouth into Honey's palm. His next breath was shallow. And the next. 

His eyes closed again, so he didn't see Honey's gaze darting up to his face with dawning worry, then down to the binding that was beginning to constrict his breathing. The fingers wound down further, until they rested on the fabric and tugged at it, as if testing the surface of a pond frozen overnight. They moved around the base of the armpit, where the wrap was tucked in and secured with near-sadistic firmness, pressing red and raw into tan skin with every expanding of the lungs underneath. Ukko felt the touch moving back and disappearing over the cotton, then a slight tug and the pressure of a knot being undone. He didn't care at the moment. Honey could take off anything of his that he wanted, expose every bleeding inch of him, if only he kept looking at him. Kept seeing him. All of him. His eyes flew wide as a horrific realization ripped through the pleasant pink haze in his mind like a hunting knife through meat.

"HEY! Don't-" he yelped.

Rail-thin arms shot to Honey's chest to shove him off, but the other man had already recoiled as if the skin he'd been admiring with his touch had turned into molten copper. He fell back, scrambling until he stood, still half-crouched, at the other end of the small hide tent. His beautiful green eyes shone wide and frightened in the dark. Ukko's heart ached with regret, the night feeling suddenly very cold though the weather had been baking hot for weeks. Then another emotion overpowered that one and he fumbled for the thin blanket to pull up over his shoulders. Reaching under his arm, he re-attached the loose fabric. A quick pat confirmed it hadn't come undone any further. His whole body folded involuntarily into a hunch, knees coming all the way up to his chin and arms folding under the moth-eaten fabric to pull it tight. Honeywort seemed to be caught between two instincts. His hands were raised towards his partner like he wanted to replace the comforting embrace of the blanket with his own, but his feet didn't let him move forward towards someone who had so clearly rejected his advances.

"I'm… I'm so sorry. I thought… I'm sorry." He  swayed back and forth with indecision and clenched and unclenched his soft hands like a nervous cat. Guilt eclipsed the unnamed feeling twisting Ukko's insides. How could he have startled him like that? Yelled at him? Like a simple gesture wouldn't have been enough. Like he wasn't the gentlest, kindest man he'd ever known. Ukko reached out a hand from under the cover and it was immediately grasped between two others. Honey sat down on his knees but still remained the taller one of the two.

"I didn't mean to shout," Ukko apologized in a low voice. He pressed his chin on the tangle of fingers without kissing them. The moment was gone, he had shoved it away. Like he always did. What was wrong with him? Why couldn't he just let people touch him? Be normal about it all? He always, always snapped at them and hit them and chased them away, and for what? Looking at him? Seeing who he really was? But it didn't feel like that. It seemed the more they, all of them, looked, the less they saw. Hot tears burned at the edges of his eyes and he tried to blink them away.

Honey's breathing was fast now too.

"No, no, please. It's my fault, I didn't mean to go too far, I'm so sorry. I just… wanted to-" 

"You don't have to pretend." Ukko didn't mean for words to sound as pointed as they came out as. He tried to soften his tone, but only managed to make it quieter. "I know you only like men. I overheard you talking with Xyris about it." Hah, he laughed in his mind. 'Overheard.' As if he hadn't been eavesdropping on purpose. Like he hadn't been sore with envy at how easily his brother had spoken about the topic. How little it meant to him.

"Aren't… you a man?" Honey gave an odd look, seemingly frantically combing over every conversation he'd ever had with or about the thin figure sitting on his bed.

"Yes!" Ukko blurted out, almost offended. He took his hand from Honey's and rubbed it through his own hair. "But what I'm saying is, I don't really look… I mean… You wouldn't like some parts of me. I wouldn't." I don't. The thought remained unspoken. There was nothing to be done. Not with oils and herbs or magic words and charms. His body had been wrong since his birth and it would continue to grow crooked for the rest of his life.

"That doesn't matter to me, silly!" Their eyes met in the soft light of the campfire shining through the tent’s seams. "I like men. You're a man. I like you. The whole you."

Ukko stared at Honeywort. His face held nothing but openness and honesty… and love. He wasn't lying to save his feelings. He really did… like him. He was willing to accept all of him. Ukko blinked. He searched for the feeling of joy that was supposed to be blooming in his chest. He should have been grateful. He should have embraced his lover like he was in danger of flowing out from between his fingers like morning mist, like the most precious jewel in the world, like a steady stone in a hurricane. He wanted to want that. But instead, the miserable little man sat on the bed, shaking. Shaking with anger, frustration and bitterness. Trembling because his most beloved didn't want to share his enemy, if that enemy was his own body. Because he didn't understand. A raspy gasp ripped from his throat. He really was broken, incapable of accepting a good thing when it was handed to him. Why couldn't he just be happy? Just let Honey touch him like he wanted to? Tears dripped into his lap as the hunch deepened and he tried to become just as small as he felt.

Honey was still sitting across from him in the dirt, looking no less panicked than when he'd been shoved away, afraid to even move for fear of shattering his lover completely. Hesitantly, gentler than brushing the wing on a butterfly without breaking it, he reached out a hand and placed it on the head of the weeping lump. Hearing no protest, he began to stroke the messy dark hair. He leaned in and pressed his body on the other's, enveloping him in his comforting warmth. He searched for words for a while before speaking.

"I won't ever touch you like that again. I'm sorry. Just say the word and I'll stop. Always. About anything. But please, just… let me hold your hand?"

A head of frizzy hair rose slowly from between Ukko's hands, eyes like saucer-plates looking directly into Honey's. The tears were still falling like rain, but the choked sobs mixed with gasping laughter. Ukko turned and grasped both sides of Honeywort's face, cupping his cheeks roughly, yet with so much love he could never hope to put it into words. So he didn't try. He simply yanked the jaw in his hands forward and laid a full, deep kiss right on the lips of the most wonderful man he had ever known. He tasted like wild strawberries.

[mygaythoughtsblog]

Ronney Rebelle (@saucyrio) & Martin Schmidt (@smith93marty)

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[ivanpinor]

📸@ivanpinor

[mwagneto]

FUNNIEST WAY TO DESCRIBE THIS SHOW

[i-love-sufjan-stevens]

Vintage Photos of Queer Couples of Color

[gayrotic]

[t4transsexual]

trans people who are anti t4t make me so sad. because beyond just not knowing what being t4t means, the fact that they believe that t4t is just being a chaser is indicative of a deeper issue, being that cis people have ingrained the idea that we are unfuckable and unloveable, disgusting by nature, and that anybody who would voice attraction to us, a step further, ONLY CHOOSE TO DATE TRANS PEOPLE, would be a pervert with a disgusting fetish who wont see them as equal.

thats not what t4t is.

t4t is the rejection of the idea that we are inherently disgusting, just because we are in the eyes of a cisnormative society.

t4t is the understanding that we are safer and stronger together as a community than apart.

t4t is seeing your trans boyfriend try on clothes from your old boy wardrobe that you hated growing up but now your least favorite shirt is your favorite because its the perfect shade of red that brings out his eyes.

t4t is teaching your trans girlfriend that has been scared to do her own makeup how youve learned from other trans women, who learned from other trans women, who learned from other trans women.

t4t is doing your testosterone shots together and kissing each others sticks after you put the bandaid on.

t4t is holding the door for your trans girlfriend and showing her the chivalry she didn't get from her dad growing up, but its ok because you can show her now.

t4t is being on the phone with your partner who just came out as trans/nonbinary after seeing you, YOU, live your truth, and them asking you to help them find a new name, the perfect name for them, and you hope theyll carry that part of you forever.

you are trans and that is beautiful. your transness is beautiful. trans love is beautiful. dont let ANYBODY make you feel unworthy of sex or love. THATS what being t4t means.

[catsharky]

Presenting: King Sidon, his wife Queen Yona and his boyfriend Link.

Yona is very supportive of everything except Sidon forgetting his ceremony cues.

(I had an atrocious week and TotK has been coming in clutch for keeping me sane.)

[ethebarbie]

If you love 😘 this pic you own me a reblog 🥰😍

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[antomatkoen]

cheeky bastard soap at it again 🙄

[ivanpinor]

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[trygod]

Thank you for 7k followers!

[shadesofgayness]