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Iker first sees the box outside on a Tuesday. The deliveryman didn't make the effort of lifting it under the porch so it sits, innocuous and huge, on the sidewalk leading up to his house. It's covered in stickers and clear packaging tape.
Iker drinks his coffee and looks at it for a while from the window, the sun blazing down on the grass. His feet are cold on the hardwood floors.
He ignores it for a week and a half. Writes a chapter of a book he'll never publish, pays his bills online, eats four cans of Spam and three cans of albacore tuna mixed with rice. He only remembers the box when he's lying on the couch with his hand on his stomach and hears the rumbling clack of thunder—a late summer storm blowing in from the south.
He puts on a pair of shoes and ties them. Pulls on a gray hoodie that's too big for him and smells like the back of closet, covered with three purple letters of a university he didn't attend. Finally, he slides back the deadbolt, turns the two smaller locks with final sounding clicks.
He's immediately hit with the sensory overload of being outside. The smell of cut grass and trees, stronger with the humidity in the air, and the sound of leaves. Parents yelling for their kids to put away their baseball bats and get inside. Their voices sound weird, tinny and shifting with the wind. Iker can see the storm clouds building on the horizon, tall and flashing with lightning. The breeze is slow and warm and lifts his hair.
Iker leaves the door ajar and goes down the porch stairs. He lifts the head of the box up against his thighs and starts dragging.
It's heavier than he was expecting. He heaves it up, one stair at a time, then lets it sit on the stoop when he gets up all five.
The clouds are much closer and darker than they were when he started. The wind is blowing in different directions. Iker gets the box halfway through the door when raindrops start hitting the ground and the bottom of the stairs, heavy and big as quarters. He shoves it with his foot the rest of the way in, then closes and locks the door behind him. The storm starts pelting the windows.
The box looks big and out of place in his foyer, like a coffin made out of cardboard. The labels are blurred and the tape is yellowed, warped from the sun.
Iker goes into the kitchen for a knife, then cuts along the places where the box marks to cut—the two short sides, and one of the longer ones. It makes a little door, and he pulls it open.
The android is lying inside, face up, hands at its sides. Like it was just—sleeping in there the whole time. Iker wonders if the company was going for a Sleeping Beauty effect, because feels more like cracking open Dracula's casket. Like disturbing something dangerous that shouldn't be disturbed.
He lifts up warranties, guarantees, a manual in a clear plastic bag, and tries not to think about it, even though it's staring him straight in the face. That when he was drunk and sad, he ordered something small and thin with dark hair and dark skin. Younger than Iker, pointedly everything-
Iker calls it an android because that's what it is. People have been moving to call them "companions," bleeding heart politicians who want to sound progressive and cutting edge. They're made out of cloned tissue and machinery and people are getting picky because they're getting attached to them, because they want to make themselves feel better about loving something that's programmed to make them believe it loves them back.
He leaves the android in the middle of the floor, pops pills, and goes to bed.
It lies there for two weeks.
When Iker ends up activating it, it's because he's bored. He reads the manual that's in Japanese first and everything else after, about how he can tinker with its settings like he used to tinker with busted Blu-ray players when he was a kid.
"Use the accompanying CD to add features. For a nominal fee, we will create a chip and send it to you."
There are instructions on how to make it happy all the time, or afraid all the time. Subsections on how you can make it think it's your maid or your slave or your cook. You can make it think it's your boyfriend or your son. There's nothing about conflicting programs in the manual, which Iker assumes means that you could make it think it's both. He remembers hearing about the hacked chips you can buy on the internet, that aren't strictly legal but aren't strictly banned either, stuff that makes him feel sick.
"If you choose to leave your unit at its factory default settings, it will develop its own personality over time!"
Iker looks down at the android, at its strong nose and delicate eyelashes. Its skin is tan, like it lived outside and they caught it just to send it to him. Reaching down feels like poking a jellyfish with a stick on the beach—he touches its face, its neck, the dip under the jaw, where they check on TV if someone is alive or dead. He can feel the ridges of its windpipe, the corded tendons on the side, the soft spot in between where its jugular should beat. Its skin is smooth under his fingers. He slides his hand behind and crooks two fingers at the base of its skull, like the instructions said.
A minute goes by, then it rubs its eyes with the back of its hand and tries to turn over, like it's sleeping in bed and doesn't want to be woken up. It opens its eyes and sees the wall of the box right in front of its face and in that moment, it seems afraid. Like this is not where it's supposed to be, and Iker did something wrong. Then it looks up at Iker, and when it sees him for the first time, all the fear and tension and everything else are gone.
It smiles.
"Hi," it says. It tries to sit up, then looks down at the packaging still covering it. It grins at him kind of sheepishly. "What's your name?"
Iker stares at it for a second, then reaches forward and turns it off.
He activates it again the next morning, when he's had six hours of sleep and coffee's on the pot. He presses with his fingers and takes the manual and goes back to the kitchen, not wanting to watch it crawl of the box like a corpse from the grave.
He hears it in the front room, struggling for a while with the styrofoam and bubble wrap. It seems to take a few minutes to find the kitchen. Iker can hear its shoes on the floor, hesitant steps around the front room.
The coffee bubbles and percolates. Iker opens the cabinet and pushes things around for a mug. He hears its sneakers scuff on the tile behind him. It's at least a minute before it speaks.
"What should I call you?" it asks, which is a very different question than "What's your name?".
"Iker," he says, pouring his coffee. He stirs it, even though he doesn't mix anything in any more. It's just habit.
"What should you call me?"
Iker leans on the counter and ignores it a while, skimming the manual and drinking his coffee. The manual encourages that he choose a name early. That it will help the unit bond to him easier, that it will make the transition more comfortable, that if he needs help, the unit has a list of names stored-
"Choose a name," he says, tossing the manual lightly on the table. He opens the fridge and looks for something for eat.
It shifts behind him with something like uncertainty. "I-"
"List the names you know," Iker says. "And choose one."
There's a pause.
"...Alex." It checks Iker's face, but Iker is drinking coffee and reading the back of a package of microwavable quiche, and doesn't say anything. It continues. "Blake. Carlos. Daniel, Evan, Frank-"
Iker watches it ramble while his breakfast heats up. It looks like a kid who has the times tables memorized, but is miserable and embarrassed about being up front to recite them.
"Geoff, Henry, Ian, Jake-"
"Choose one," Iker interrupts. He's starting to get impatient. The microwave beeps.
It looks at him helplessly. When it starts talking again, it almost sounds desperate. "Lance, Michael, Neil-"
Iker takes his food and leaves the kitchen.
Later, when he finishes breakfast, he brings his plate and mug into the kitchen sink. He rinses them off. It's still standing at the counter right where he left it, looking at its shoes. They’re cheap-looking sneakers, thin leather, made to look functional.
He turns to leave and it says, "Cesc."
"Cesc?" Stopping and turning around feels like an effort.
It looks up at him with big eyes, like it's nervous or hoping for approval.
"Fine," Iker says. He means to go write but decides to lie down on the couch first, just for a little while.
He wakes up with a blanket covering him from chest to ankle. It's warm and comfortable, tucked in around his shoulders.
For the most part, Cesc avoids him. He seems to have picked up that Iker doesn't want to know he's there. He cleans a lot, which Iker figures is his default setting or something. He busies himself with organizing things in the background, scrubbing the kitchen, straightening up the living room. Iker comes out one morning to find the couch cleaned, the entertainment center dusted, the bookshelf organized by size. The carpet is a darker, richer shade of green, vacuum lines marked up and down the floor.
One day, Cesc breaks a plate. Iker comes in the kitchen and Cesc has suds up to his elbows, looking down at the shards with his hands and mouth open.
Iker ignores him, going to his haunches to pick up the pieces. He has five in his hand when he cuts his finger. Blood blooms up and Cesc moves forward, touching his back and shoulder and trying to touch his arm.
Iker shoves his leg harder than he means to. Like pushing away a stupid dog rooting in a mess.
He looks at his finger, then pops it in his mouth. "Go do something else."
Cesc takes an obedient step back, but stays with him until Iker leaves the room.
Iker’s schedule doesn’t change much.
He wakes up in the late morning, lies in bed until a little after noon. If he feels like it, he finds something to eat. Usually he stays in his room and types until his stomach or his bladder won’t let him sit there anymore. He showers in the late afternoon, heats up lunch or dinner or whatever in the microwave, goes back to his room and types more. He always feels tired. Around eight, he’ll drink a glass of wine. He pops pills until he goes to sleep.
He’s an insomniac. That’s what he’d tell a doctor, probably, but it’s more habituation than chemical imbalance that has him up until four or five in the morning.
Cesc being there doesn’t mean much except that everything is steadily getting cleaner around him, and that he hears movement outside his room sometimes, instead of the creaks and groans of an empty house.
A few weeks in, if Iker didn’t know better, he’d think that Cesc was bored. When Iker is out of his bedroom, he notices Cesc guessing which room he’ll go into next, like it’s a game. He turns the light on before Iker comes in, ducks out a side door without being seen. Then later, after Iker's left, he turns it off again. The organization of the bookcase shifts from smallest to biggest to biggest to smallest, then goes back again. Some of the books are upside down. Iker fixes them.
One day, he can't find the remote. Which isn't different than normal, really, he's always losing it. But this time, it's especially hard to find it. Finally he tracks Cesc down in the garage, asks if he knows where it is.
Cesc looks up from the box of tools he's cleaning. His clothes are getting dirty, the bright red and white of the shirt he came in going dull.
"I hid it," he says. Then he smiles, proud and shy at the same time. Like he's waiting for Iker's praise or something.
"Why did you hide it?"
Cesc's smile falters a little. "Because you like looking for it."
"Where did you hide it?"
"On top of the refrigerator."
Later, Iker is watching the news and Cesc comes up to the couch. Iker can smell dirt and WD-40 on him.
"I won't hide the remote again," he says, quiet.
Iker waits until a commercial, then waves him off.
A few weeks later, Iker is writing, and for the first time, Cesc crosses the threshold of his room. He always seems desperate to get in here—to clean, Iker thinks—but he won’t come in when Iker’s there too. Today, though, he stands there in the middle of the carpet, patient, until Iker looks at him.
"Can I go outside the house?" he asks.
Iker turns back to his computer. He starts typing again. "Go where?"
"Outside the house."
Iker turns in his chair, annoyed that Cesc is being a smartass. He decides to give him one more chance. "Where. Outside the house."
Cesc shifts from one foot to another, looks as confused and embarrassed as he did when Iker asked him to choose a name. "Out of the door that slides," he says carefully. "Where the grass is. Outside the house."
Iker realizes Cesc means the backyard. And that he doesn’t know anything else exists beyond the fence. He pushes up his reading glasses.
"Whatever."
Cesc looks at him, unsure.
"Yes," Iker says, annoyed.
Cesc leaves.
On the second Friday of the month, Iker's mom calls. She always calls on Fridays, usually sometime in the late afternoon, when she knows he's probably awake and sober. Iker almost always answers, because he knows she's at the point in her life where she doesn't have much to do except play Mahjong and worry about him.
"Hi mom."
"Iker, how are you?"
Iker closes his bedroom door and sits down. He hasn't seen Cesc yet today. "All right. How are you?"
"I'm well." She was always particular about that. "Good" versus "well." She used to teach kindergarten, before him and Unai were born.
"Good." He lies back on his comforter. "Did Dad decide about the tickets?"
"No," his mom huffs. "I told him, 'José, we saved all this money so we could do nice things when we retire, when is the last time we have been to the beach?'"
Iker rubs his eye. "He'll come around."
"Yes, but before the summer is over? It's already August!" His mom has a tendency to make a big deal out of things, even when she knows they’ll turn out okay. Iker gets up and walks, because the tone makes him restless. "Anyways, Iker. What did you do this week?"
Iker straightens papers on his desk, then looks out the window. Cesc is sitting back on his heels in the wet dirt in the flowerbed. He’s picking weeds. "I got a roommate."
"A roommate! What’s her name?"
Cesc is just kneeling there, patiently working at the garden. He's clearly been at it all morning, and he's barely cleared a fifth of it. His fingers are bloody from the stalks. "His name is Cesc."
"Cesc," she repeats, happy. She seems to finally be accepting that Iker is twenty-six and living with boys as well as girls isn't just a phase, or something he does because dating girls takes too much effort. "Well. Is Cesc nice?"
Iker watches Cesc cup something small and green in his hand. It inches across his palm. He examines it at eye level, then carefully sets it down safely on the clean side of the garden. "…Yeah. He’s nice."
Cesc starts spending hours in the backyard every day. He gets the weeds cleaned out in a week, sets them in a neat dry bushel by the gate. Iker sees him digging holes in the dark dirt in the flowerbed, or picking dead bark off the orange tree. He gradually seems to realize that things will grow if they’re watered. He waters anything that has a flower on it, even dandelions and thistles. Sometimes, Iker sees him sitting by the birdbath. He doesn’t seem to understand the birds won’t come if he sits right next to it.
Iker doesn’t care if he’s out there. It keeps him out of his hair.
Cesc’s skin keeps clean on its own, like dirt won't stick to it, but his clothes are getting grungier and grungier. One day, Iker has a splitting headache, and he can't write. He sits in front of his computer for an hour. Cesc passes his door, doing whatever he does during the day. Iker can smell him from here.
"You need to clean up."
Cesc pauses obediently in the hallway. He looks down at himself, like he isn't sure which part of him Iker means.
Iker ignores him, rubbing his temples, until he goes away.
Later that afternoon, he's rinsing out his mug and he sees Cesc in the shadow of the porch. He's stuck there, just out of reach of the sun, the hose stretched as far as it will go. He's holding it above his head, already soaking wet, then he carefully sets it down in the mud. One arm weakly rubs at a stain on his shirt, the other is clutched around his chest.
Iker knows the water is icy cold. Cesc is hunched up. Iker can see his nipples through his shirt, the soft outline of his cock in his shorts.
After a moment, Cesc reluctantly picks the hose up again. Iker watches.
The next morning, Iker emerges before eleven and finds Cesc trying to make him coffee. He goes through the motions of brewing slowly, with a lot of concentration, a determined look on his face—Iker realizes he’s been watching him in the afternoons, covertly, to learn how to do things. He moves carefully in the kitchen, step by step, until he seems to forget what to do. He pauses, shakes his hands with his bony wrists and skinny fingers, eyes searching and mouth open, before he remembers. Grinds in the filter.
When it’s finished, Cesc stirs it with a spoon, grins wide and happy when Iker drinks from the mug. His shirt is stiff from the minerals in the outside water, hair matted and flat on the top. He looks at Iker with admiration that seems impossible to kill.
Iker gets drunk one night, close to shit-faced, and decides he's going to fuck Cesc. He wouldn't even have to fuck him. He could just jerk off on him. He could jerk off on him and then erase his memory too. Cesc wouldn't even remember. And he's a fucking android. This is what people do with androids. People do worse things with androids.
He sets the bottle down on his desk and feels his way down the hallway. He finds Cesc on the floor in the spare bedroom, looking at pictures in a coffee table book about the Grand Canyon.
"Stand up. Take off your shirt."
Cesc closes the book with a dull thump and stands up. He tugs his shirt over his head.
"Lie down on your back."
Cesc lies on his back and looks at Iker, wide-eyed, waiting for instructions. Iker feels a tug in his chest. He hates it.
"Cover your eyes."
Cesc covers his eyes. He doesn't peek through his fingers. His chest is smooth, his stomach flat. Iker's hard. His thumb hovers at the button of his jeans.
Cesc shifts slightly on the bed. He briefly bites his lower lip. It should be the thing that pushes Iker over the edge, that makes him kneel over Cesc's chest and feed his cock into his mouth. Instead, it stops him cold. It's childlike. Cesc is confused. He's wondering why he's not included. If he can look yet.
Iker rubs his face with his hand. "Fuck." He presses the heel of his hand into his eye. "Fuck."
Cesc still isn't peeking.
"Get up. Get dressed."
Cesc pulls his shirt back over his head. His hair looks worse for wear. He sits on the edge of the bed, like he isn't sure if he's going to be scolded. Iker bends down and puts the book back in his lap.
He pops more pills and goes to bed.
He wakes up with a horrible hangover the next morning, and an aching feeling in his chest. Cesc edges around him all day, quieter, like he knows. When Iker finally sits down, defeated, Cesc sits in front of him. Iker’s too tired to push him away. Cesc reaches up and gently rubs his temples.
It’s pouring one afternoon, rushing through the gutters and hammering the roof. Iker is making tea. He hasn’t seen Cesc yet today, but that isn’t unusual. He’s rinsing off a plate when he notices a figure in the backyard, blurry in the sheets of rain. He squints at it, then drops the plate with a clatter in the sink. He grabs his shoes.
It’s coming down so hard that it’s hard to hear anything. Water is already soaking through his sneakers. Cesc is hunched over the flower bed, his arms half spread.
"What are you doing?!"
"It will hit my plants," Cesc yells over the rain.
Iker looks at the flowerbed. A few tiny buds are breaking the surface. "Get inside."
He’s expecting an argument, but Cesc immediately trots towards the house. Iker stops him before he opens the door. Their muddy shoes stay on the porch.
"Stay on the mat," Iker orders when they get in. "You’ll drip everywhere."
Cesc stays put, sodden in his socks. His teeth are chattering, his face is white.
Iker gets an old blanket and a towel from the closet in the hallway, then goes into the kitchen. He pours Cesc a cup of coffee from the pot. Mixes milk and three spoonfuls of sugar in it.
He comes back and wraps the blanket around Cesc’s body, and the towel around his shoulders. He gives him the coffee—Cesc immediately clamps his palms around the mug.
"Drink that and sit there, until you’re dry."
Iker goes to clean out the fridge. Cesc organized it, but didn’t know to look at expiration dates.
When he finishes, a carton of tofu and some brussels sprouts in the trash, he looks over. Cesc is still sitting there, small in the blanket, staring out in the rain at where the garden would be.
"It’s good for them," Iker says.
Cesc looks at him.
"The rain is good for the plants."
Iker goes in his room and writes, then sleeps for a while. It’s dark when he comes out, and Cesc is still sitting by the door. He only drank a bit of the coffee—Iker knew he wouldn’t like it. He comes over and feels Cesc’s hair. It’s still a little damp by the roots, but. He realizes Cesc would have sat there all night, until it was bone dry.
"You’re dry enough."
Cesc stands up, legs a little wobbly from sitting on them for so long. He doesn’t have the instinct to fix his hair. Iker flattens it for him.
"It is good for them," he repeats, in a voice that sounds more like a promise than the throwaway comment it was before.
Cesc pulls the blanket around him tighter. He nods.
Iker wakes up at nine in the morning and can’t go back to sleep. He had dreams that he can't remember, and woke up sweaty and shaken.
He sees his living room in morning light for the first time in a couple years. Everything seems brighter. Cesc says hello and smiles at him. He's probably been up for a couple hours already.
Iker makes himself a bowl of cereal and eats it on the couch, zoning out at the black TV screen, thinking about nothing. When the milk and cereal are gone, he realizes that Cesc has been quiet for a while. Long enough for Iker to get suspicious.
Iker finds him in his bedroom. He's taken everything out of the closet, like a kid who got into his parents' room. Sneakers and dress shoes are scattered all over the floor, tissue paper from boxes, magazines, plastic garment bags without their jackets—and Cesc is sitting crosslegged in the middle of it all, holding the box Iker keeps hidden in the back. It's open and Cesc is looking through it, he's touching-
Iker sees red. He grabs him by the collar and drags him to his feet and before Cesc can say anything, he smacks him. Cesc's hand flies to his face. Iker smacks him again, harder.
"You don't go in there!" Cesc is terrified. His mouth moves. His eyes are wet. "Do you understand? You stay the fuck out of there!"
Cesc scurries backwards, tripping over a pair of leather cap toes from a party Iker can hardly remember going to. His palm is pressed flat on his cheek. He hits the wall hard and blindly feels behind him for the door and gets out.
Iker drops to the ground. He scrabbles at the photos on the floor, organizing them, straightening them, trying to fix everything in the box how it was. The pictures in the top left, the worn baseball cap on the right, ticket stubs and luggage tags in the bottom. When he put the lid back on, his hands are shaking.
He sits alone next to it for a while in the mess, leaning on the bed, his head between his hands.
By the time he comes out, it's afternoon. The house is quiet and empty. This is usually when Cesc would be in the backyard, but he isn’t there. The ice machine on the fridge sounds loud and grating when Iker presses the button, zips a handful of crushed cubes in a plastic bag. He wraps it in a paper towel to ease the cold.
He finds Cesc behind the shutters of the closet of the spare bedroom, sitting in the corner and hugging his knees. There's a bruise blooming on the apple of his cheek. Iker feels ugly.
He sits down next to him, and Cesc doesn't flinch when Iker turns his face, presses the ice to his cheek, but he doesn't raise his eyes either.
"I didn't know," Cesc says finally. He chances a glance up at him.
"I know."
One day, out of nowhere, Cesc starts trying to cook. Like he has an impulse to make meals that he can't help. He can only vacuum or clean the windows so many times before he's just wasting electricity and Windex and Iker firmly tells him to stop. Usually he wanders into the kitchen from there, starts taking things out of the cupboards, combining them in a banged-up aluminum mixing bowl he found in the cabinet.
Iker's cupboards are empty—Cesc doesn't seem to realize that just skipping the ingredients he doesn't have won't make edible food. Iker comes in at night to find salad without lettuce, a cookie pan with a mixture of eggs and flour and vanilla dolloped out in neat rows on the stovetop. Cesc portions out tuna casserole without noodles and bread without butter and raw carrots on a dinner plate for him, sets him up a place at the table like you'd see in sitcoms from the '50s.
"Why don't you write a list of ingredients," Iker tells him finally. "And I'll get what you need."
Cesc scuffs his shoe on the floor. "Can I say them to you?"
"...Okay." Iker gets a pad of paper and a pen, leaning on the counter.
"Apples, bananas, confectioners’ sugar, frozen yogurt, jalapeños, mozzarella cheese, pepper jack cheese, rhubarb, tortillas-"
"Slower, Cesc."
"Apples. Bananas. Confectioners’ sugar. Frozen yogurt. Jalapeños."
Cesc’s list requires that Iker go to an actual store. Iker hasn’t been to an actual store in years. The corner mart is closer, and it usually has everything he needs. While he’s there, he picks Cesc up three t-shirts in different colors, and two pairs of jeans. On impulse, he tosses a bag of socks in the cart too.
When he gets home, Cesc is excited. He unpacks bags and stocks cupboards—Iker tells him the shirts and pants are his. Cesc grins and starts changing right in the middle of the kitchen. Iker explains he needs to change in the bathroom, or his room. He puts away the rest of the groceries while Cesc is gone, and throws away Cesc’s old clothes later. They aren’t salvageable, and aren’t something anyone should have to wear.
Cesc starts getting better at cooking. He makes chicken noodle soup from scratch, and apples baked with butter and brown sugar and brie. Sometimes, rarely, Iker comes in and helps make dinner, because he doesn't want to be in his room any more.
One night, he’s dicing tomatoes and thinking about something else, and he slices his finger. The pain registers late—the knife is sharp, and the burn only comes when tomato juice gets into the cut.
Cesc immediately takes his hand and inspects it. Iker lets him. After a moment, Cesc brings his hand up and gently clamps his mouth over Iker's finger, like he saw Iker doing the first week they met.
Iker stays still. Cesc licks once over the cut inside his mouth, tongue soft and wet, then draws back with a single suck. He looks at Iker's finger again—after a moment, blood seams at the cut, then runs over. Cesc takes it back in his mouth again. It's all very clinical, like Cesc thinks this is actually how you fix things. He rubs Iker's wrist reassuringly with his thumb. Iker bends his finger, strokes his tongue. Cesc smiles.
"Do you know how to put a bandaid on?" Iker asks him.
Cesc shakes his head.
Iker leads him into the bathroom and sits him on the toilet seat. The cabinet squeaks when he opens it, the mirror reverberating when the magnet snaps it shut again. Iker turns the rubbing alcohol over briefly on a cotton ball.
"Watch," he says, tilting his hand so Cesc can see. He cleans the cut.
The bandaid tin clanks when he takes out the small size and clips it closed. He puts one half of the adhesive on his skin—"Finger here," he says, using Cesc’s finger to anchor it. Cesc pays close attention. "Wrap it around-" He wraps. "And the lighter square goes over where you’re hurt."
Iker smooths out the other side of the adhesive. Cesc rubs his thumb over the soft pad of the bandaid.
"You know when you’re out in the garden, and your fingers bleed?"
Cesc nods.
"Do this then. It doesn’t matter how many you use."
"Okay."
Iker wakes up at two in the morning. He fell asleep in front of the TV, and there’s an infomercial on for androids. He's on the wrong channel at the wrong time to expect any better, and he knows there's worse out there. But still. Jesus.
Suddenly, he notices Cesc in the arch of the hallway. He's wearing the t-shirt Iker gave him, and the sleep pants Iker got him on another trip. "Can I watch the TV with you?" he asks, sleepy.
Onscreen, a man pushes an android girl's skirt up, even as she struggles and tries to hold it down.
Iker changes the channel. "Go back to bed, Cesc."
Cesc leaves and Iker flips around, passes the football channel. He pauses for a second longer than he usually does before he changes it.
Cesc is out watering things, and Iker’s been looking at the phone for close to an hour now.
Finally, he turns it on and dials.
Someone picks up, but there's a silence on the other end. Then a scuffle, a clunk, and a muffled curse. "Hello?"
"Hey, Sergio." Iker looks up at the ceiling. "It's Iker."
"I just burned a pan of eggs," Sergio says. "Like, I think the smoke alarm might go off."
"Open the window?"
There's more sounds, and the slide of a window.
"Crisis averted," Sergio says. He sounds a little out of breath. "How are you?" Like Iker didn't, just—not return his calls for four months.
"Alright," Iker says.
Sergio grunts. Iker hears him open his fridge, condiments rattling on the door.
"I got an android."
"Cool. What’s his name."
"Cesc."
"Cesc," Sergio repeats. "Okay. Is it short for something?" Cereal pours in a bowl.
"I don't know, he came up with it."
Sergio hums and starts eating.
"How are you?" Iker asks, five minutes late.
"Alright. Piece of shit manager got fired. I was promoted."
"Nice."
Sergio chews. "Yeah, it is." Iker hears him laugh, kind of. A bowl being rinsed out. "I get my own name plaque and everything."
Iker smiles. It fades. He rubs the back of his neck. "…Do you want to come over sometime?"
"Friday," Sergio says. "No, wait, Saturday." The bowl clatters in the sink. "And I’m bringing the dog. Good?"
It feels like something that was clenched in Iker’s chest just, disappears. "Yeah. Good."
Iker was expecting Cesc to be nervous about someone coming over, or at least a bit unsure, but Cesc is completely fine with it. He doesn’t even go on a cleaning rampage like Iker’s old girlfriend used to do—he just straightens the cushions on the couch, and wears his blue shirt. (Iker’s figured out, from how rarely he wears it, that it’s actually his favorite.)
He even goes to get the door when the doorbell rings—then he sees the dog.
It’s a different one than Sergio used to have—Odi, was that one’s name—and Iker wonders if it’s really been that long since he’s seen Sergio. He got a new dog and he didn’t even know.
The dog barks at Cesc in a happy kind of way and Cesc lurches back.
In a second, Iker’s at the door. Cesc stays behind him. He isn't hiding, really, but he isn't coming out either.
"Hey," Sergio says, face breaking into a smile. He hugs Iker, and Iker hugs back. Sergio gives him a squeeze, then peers around him.
"You must be Cesc," he says. "I’m Sergio. This is Fandi."
"It's nice to meet you," Cesc says. His eyes are still fixed on the dog.
"Hey, Iker. Bathroom?" Sergio trails off with his eyebrows up, already walking.
"Yeah."
Sergio leaves Fandi behind. She sits in the middle of the floor, staring straight at Cesc.
"She's a dog," Iker explains.
"No," Cesc replies. Like this is something that can be disputed.
Iker reaches back for his arm and then Cesc really does shift behind him. Iker can feel his fingers at his shirt, like he wants to hold it, but isn't sure if he's allowed.
"Look," Iker says. He pets Fandi's head, and her ears go down. Iker can feel Cesc watching. After a long moment, he offers Iker his hand. Iker covers it with his own and pets her nose. Fandi's tail whacks happily on the floor.
"See?" he asks quietly.
Fandi licks the inside of Cesc's wrist and Cesc startles, but smiles a little.
Sergio comes back in to see Iker's android petting his dog in a really wooden, reserved kind of way and Iker just kind of standing there, supervising.
Iker sees his expression. He rubs his face with his hand. "Do you want a beer?"
"Yeah."
Iker heads for the kitchen.
"Hey, Cesc," Sergio says, following Iker.
Cesc looks up. Fandi pushes her head up in his hand again.
"If you want to take her out back, she'd probably like it. I have an apartment, so she doesn't get to go outside much."
"Okay," Cesc says. Iker hears nails clicking on the floor, the glass door sliding open, then shut.
Sergio sits at the bar in the kitchen. Iker has taken out sandwich parts—bread, mayonnaise, lettuce, a half-eaten slab of salami.
"Does he...?" Sergio asks, tilting his head towards the food.
Iker lays the meat on the cutting board. "No. I mean, maybe. Sometimes I'll catch him eating stuff, but. I don't know." The knife makes dull clacks on the plastic. "He might just be copying me."
"He copies you?"
"I caught him trying to shave yesterday."
Sergio laughs, leaning on an elbow. "What?"
Iker takes out bread and spreads the mayonnaise. "He was doing it dry. Almost nicked his face up." He was half-asleep, wandered into the bathroom at six in the morning to find Cesc in front of the mirror, shaving cream clumsily smeared all over his face. He'd already gotten at a swath under his chin and was going for another, even though the skin under the first was red and irritated. Iker took the razor away, held a cool wet cloth to his neck for ten minutes before going back to bed. Cesc blinked at him mildly through the cream.
"Well it's not like anything would happen anyways, right?" Sergio tries to take a piece of salami. Iker glares at him, and he migrates to the table.
"He bleeds." Iker says, putting the meat, lettuce, and mayo back in the fridge. "He says things hurt him."
He sits at the table and hands Sergio his plate. He can see Cesc outside the window, running around with the dog. He found the red ball the neighborhood kids kicked into Iker's yard a year or so ago. It's faded with age and most of the bounce is baked out of the rubber. It doesn't take Cesc long to figure out that Fandi will chase it when he throws. Every few minutes, Iker can hear the wheezing thump of it on the ground.
"Do you believe it?" Sergio asks.
"I don't know."
Cesc's hands are out and he's crouching, a bit. He fakes Fandi out and leaps to the side then Fandi catches up and jumps on him and Cesc laughs so hard his eyes crinkle up, hugging her head. Iker can't even figure out what game he's trying to play.
Sergio shows him his new tattoo, tells him about his job, and how Rene got married. He isn’t dating anyone, but he’s fucking a few people. He likes one of them a lot. He takes her on dates sometimes.
Iker tells him about the book he finished, and the one he’s working on. About his parents, and that no-one’s really heard from Unai, still.
"Dick," Sergio says, getting up to get another beer.
Iker shrugs, looks at the clock. It’s four. "Do you want to watch the game?"
"It's Barca playing," Sergio says, instead of "You haven't asked to watch a game in years."
Iker’s been paying for the channel all along, even if he hasn’t watched it in a while. One of the commentators is the same, one is different. The older one still has shit opinions about everything. Iker tells Sergio that and Sergio laughs and it’s kind of an ice-breaker—Iker asks questions and Sergio fills him in on what he’s missed, and what he wasn’t missing at all. "Last season was miserable."
The sun starts setting, and Sergio finishes his beer.
"I should go," he says. I have a date goes unspoken. He gets up and stretches, takes the empty bottle to the kitchen.
Iker turns down the volume, then looks out the window at Cesc. He's been sitting in the grass under the orange tree for close to an hour now. Fandi is lying next to him, exhausted, and Cesc is talking to her. Iker finds himself wondering what he's saying.
Sergio comes out and links up her leash, says something to Cesc. Cesc laughs.
Sergio smacks the back of Iker’s head lightly on the way out. "Next week. Derby time."
Iker grunts agreement and closes his eyes.
After a few minutes, Cesc plops down next to him, close. He smells like oranges and dirt. "Can I watch the TV with you?"
Iker doesn't say no, so Cesc stays. After a while, Iker opens his eyes.
The EPL’s on now, Tottenham versus Manchester City. Cesc is staring, riveted, at the screen.
"Do you know what's happening?" Iker asks.
"No," Cesc replies.
Iker explains the rules. Cesc is hyperwarm on his side, like being in the sun all afternoon heated him through. He absorbs information quickly, and only has to ask questions once. Iker feels him tense when anyone gets near the posts. He jumps a little when Tevez finally scores, grinning a huge wide grin.
After the game, a highlights show comes on.
"Why do you watch it?" Cesc asks, resting his head back on the couch. Iker looks at him and Cesc smiles, lolls his head to look back.
For a second, Iker forgets what he was going to say.
"Because you like one of the teams," he says finally.
"I like the red and blue ones," Cesc replies, sitting up with firm resolve.
Iker looks at the screen to see who it is. He laughs and Cesc grins, seeing him, even though he can’t know what’s funny.
A new game starts after the highlights show ends. Iker takes a long breath, relaxes back on the couch. He’s tired from beer and socializing, and he feels comfortable. Before he drifts off, he feels Cesc’s head lean lightly on his shoulder. He doesn’t nudge him off.
When he wakes up, it’s completely dark outside. He rubs his eyes and half sits up, feeling a little thirsty. His shoulder feels light, and he looks at Cesc.
At some point, the game ended and Cesc figured out the remote. He flipped the station and his eyes are locked on the screen, expression horrified.
Iker sits up straighter, wide awake now, and sees the international news channel. They’re doing coverage on a genocide somewhere, and he wonders how long Cesc’s been hearing machine guns, seeing kids with swollen bellies and blowflies on their face. He carefully pries the remote out of his hand and turns the TV off.
Cesc keeps staring at the black screen.
Iker takes his wrist and leads him through the hallway, then to his room. He goes in the bathroom and brushes his teeth and changes, and when he comes out, Cesc is still just standing in the middle of the floor.
Iker gets into bed. "You can lie down," he says.
Cesc does. Iker turns off the lamp. After a little while, Cesc shifts closer to Iker. When he doesn't get into trouble, he scoots even closer.
"Do you know how to sleep?" Iker asks him quietly. It's too dark to see his features, but he can tell that Cesc is looking at him.
"Yes."
Iker wakes up in the middle of the night. His eyes adjust to the dark and he sees Cesc is half curled up near him, eyes still open.
"They killed those people," he says.
Iker moves forward, half-asleep. He folds him in his arms.
"Go to sleep."
Cesc inches closer until their bodies are pressed together.
When Iker wakes up in the morning, Cesc is sleeping soundly, his hand holding on to Iker's shirt.
The orange tree blooms. Cesc tries just bringing the flowers in that have fallen off; Iker tells him where to cut twigs, so it won’t hurt the tree. A few sit in a jar of water in the middle of the table. The house smells good for days.
Holding Cesc is always comfortable. When they get into bed, Cesc lies close until Iker sets the alarm and silences his phone, then cuddles up against his body when Iker wraps his arms around him. When Iker feels too hot, just out of the shower, Cesc feels comfortably cool. And when he's too cold, which is most of the time, Cesc is warm, but not hot. He sleeps with his hands under his chin—sometimes he turns one around, rests his fingers against Iker’s collarbone.
It gets to the point where it’s hard for Iker to fall asleep without him there.
One day, it’s bright and sunny.
"Do you want to go outside?" Cesc asks.
Iker looks up from his toast. Most people would repeat the question with a "please," but Cesc just stands there, looking very hopeful.
Iker finishes his toast and puts his shoes on. He goes to find a sweatshirt but Cesc tugs his sleeve, moves to the door.
"It isn't very cold."
It is cold, but not in a wintry way. Just a morning way. Iker remembers being happy about that when David first moved them out here, that fall and winter never really happen.
The air smells a lot cleaner outside. Cesc shows him the birdbath, which he's washed out and refilled, and a bald spot where some grass is growing. He takes Iker to the orange tree, ruefully nudges a fruit on the ground with his shoe. "These are all falling off. I don't know if we can make food from them."
The flowerbed comes last. It looks completely empty. Iker wonders if some of his buds died.
"There's one plant here," Cesc says, pressing the soil with his finger. He must have replanted. "And here. And here."
He lifts up a leaf on what might be a blackberry bush, looking inside. It occurs to Iker that Cesc is doing all this, coming out here every day, and he doesn’t even know what will happen. He’s taking care of dirt and brambles when he doesn’t even know what a garden in bloom looks like.
"I find these sometimes," Cesc says, grinning and reemerging. He puts a caterpillar in Iker’s hand.
They watch nature shows on Thursday nights. Cesc likes the HD ones, with the rainforests and the frogs leaping in slow motion. Usually he’s asleep before ten, slumped on Iker’s shoulder.
Iker doesn’t know how he sleeps. If he’s actually recharging, or—he thinks it’s something like a computer hibernating. That he pulls inside himself and rests when he’s comfortable, but his body keeps breathing and his heart keeps beating, ready to wake up later.
Iker figures it isn’t that much different than how he sleeps, really. He fixes the blanket up over Cesc’s shoulders.
One morning Iker wakes up and Cesc is lying close to him on the bed, fully dressed. He’s placing gentle kisses on Iker’s lips.
"What are you doing?" Iker asks.
Cesc strokes his cheek with two of his fingers, looking down at Iker’s mouth. "Kissing," he replies.
"Where did you learn that?"
"On TV."
Iker lies there for a few minutes, waking up, then takes Cesc's hand. Each of his fingers is wrapped in clumsy bandaids.
"Did you garden this morning?"
"Yes."
Iker rubs inside his palm, then brings his hand up. He kisses the pad of the bandaid on his ring finger. Cesc blinks slowly, watching.
Iker notches their hips together. He rests Cesc’s hand on his side, then lays his own over Cesc’s. Cesc bends his knee a little over Iker’s thigh.
"Like this when we kiss, okay?"
Cesc nods, his forehead pressed against Iker’s. He kisses Iker again. Iker kisses back.
Cesc sees a zombie movie on TV and it takes a long time for Iker to convince him that it isn’t real, that not all things on the TV are real. Cesc doesn’t sleep for a week until when he moves, it’s halting and sluggish, and Iker realizes it’s actually hurting him, not going to sleep.
Iker sits him down. "They aren’t real. And they aren’t even people," he tells him.
"They bite. They look like people."
For some reason, Iker can’t repeat it to him. That just because something looks human, that doesn’t make it human. Instead, he naps with him during the day and shows him how the bathtub works. The first time, Cesc smells the water and submerges to his nose, smiling. He stays until his skin goes pink.
They make an attempt at a blackberry ricotta soufflé. It’s one of the most complicated recipes they’ve tried, one that Cesc doesn’t know. They have to follow a recipe book. Iker beats the egg whites, Cesc hovers on ingredient duty. He hands Iker the butter when he needs it, and the yolks, and the cheese.
"Vanilla," Iker says over the beater.
Cesc hesitates. "…Which one?" There’s six bottles in a tight circle on the counter, different shapes and sizes.
Iker can’t look up, really. "The one that says ‘Vanilla’."
After a moment, Cesc hands him almond oil.
The soufflé ends up falling in the oven. Iker Googles "what do fallen soufflé," and they mix it with chocolate pudding from the pantry. It still tastes good. They eat it while they’re watching Almeria versus Mallorca. When they show the line-ups, Iker takes a quick glance at the screen, then checks his phone. He takes his time replying to a text, then puts it away.
"I missed Mallorca’s. Who’s playing?"
Cesc pauses with the spoon halfway to his mouth. After a moment, he sets it back down in the bowl. He won’t look at Iker. "I don’t know."
After the game starts, Iker rubs Cesc’s wrist with his thumb. "Okay."
On Friday, Iker calls his mom, asks her how to teach someone to read. She’s confused at first, because Iker doesn't know how to explain that his roommate is an android and that his android can’t read, because most people don’t buy them to read anything at all. Finally she explains some things to him, phonics and all that, then agrees to mail him books to help.
Iker sits with Cesc on his bed in the evenings after dinner.
("You already know the alphabet," Iker says the first night.
Cesc stares blankly at him.
"Every time you list something. It’s."
Cesc’s eyebrows go up, waiting for Iker to make the reveal.
Iker sighs. He gets the book.)
Iker goes through the alphabet with him over and over. Then laminated phonics sheets. Then children’s books.
Once he wakes up at six in the morning, automatically reaches for Cesc, but Cesc isn’t there. The blankets are tucked in carefully around him. Iker gets up and pulls a shirt on, peers into the spare bedroom. Cesc is on the floor with his books spread out in front of him. He’s following words with his finger, like Iker taught him to.
"The cat sits on the mat," he mumbles. "The hen is in the… pen."
Iker goes back to bed.
They start watching more football. On Sundays, Sergio comes over and brings Fandi and a six pack. They eat shitty finger food and Iker starts learning new faces, is amazed that he still loves Madrid as much as he does, even when he only recognizes a third of the players anymore.
One night, after a game that got them into the semis of the Champion’s League and after Sergio's left, Iker’s high on a few beers and happiness, and Cesc is high on him being happy. They’re making out on the couch, heavier than they usually do. Cesc is in his lap and Iker has a hand up his shirt. Cesc likes that, wiggles in this sexy way. Iker pushes his hips up. He kisses him and reaches down and gropes him—and Cesc isn't hard.
Cesc seems to notice that something's off. He pauses, still grinning. His hair is sticking up. The post-match commentator drones on in the background. "What's supposed to happen?"
Cesc isn't into him. That's Iker's first thought. He isn't into him and he's pretending all of this, he doesn't actually want it. But then, the only thing Cesc really does is Be Into Iker. And Iker remembers ordering him through a haze of liquor, skipping pages and pages of chips and customization options. He thinks about people adopting him as some kind of surrogate child and not wanting him to get hard. It makes him feel sick about everything.
Cesc touches Iker's hair. He leans forward and kisses him again, a gentle touch of lips. He tastes like chips and soda. "What's supposed to happen?" he repeats.
"I'll fix it," Iker replies.
"Can we kiss more for a while?"
"Okay."
In a few weeks, Cesc chews through all the books Iker’s mom sent. It’s cold and stormy out and Iker puts a knit hat and a scarf on him. He drives him to the library.
Cesc takes the car ride better than Iker was expecting, and he isn't afraid of all the people either. Mostly he acts normal, a little excited to be out of the house. Iker doesn't really know what level he's reading at, so he lets him browse around. Cesc chooses a young adult novel Iker doesn't know, and "A Tale of Two Cities." He tries to pick up something by Michael Crichton, but Iker puts it back. He doesn't want try to convince Cesc that dinosaurs aren't real, or admit that man-eating gorillas might be real, but they live far away from here.
Cesc lingers in the children's books, possibly under the impression that the colors mean they're more interesting. Iker expects him to take to "The Adventures of Pinocchio" in some kind of final irony, but Cesc hates it. "The Swiss Family Robinson" ends up being his favorite. Iker suspects it’s the tiger, and all the plants.
Two weeks later, the chip comes in the mail. Iker was expecting an actual computer chip, like they used to use when he was a kid. It’s more of a black box, flat and thin, and apparently all Cesc has to do is hold it in his hand for a while. For ten minutes, the instructions say.
Cesc holds it. He sits next to Iker on the couch while Iker’s eating oatmeal for breakfast, stays stock still, like a kid with a thermometer in his mouth. Iker feels him keep looking at the clock, but he doesn’t put it down until Iker takes the chip away from him, sets it on the coffee table.
Iker told himself he'd wait a while, that he wasn't going to fuck his android at eleven’o’clock in the morning, but Cesc seems eager to find out what will happen. (They’ve been experimenting for a few weeks now, with shirts off and mouths open. Cesc figured out Iker likes his mouth on his neck, and his shoulder. He’s been taking advantage of it ever since.) He swings his legs over Iker’s thighs and scoots up next to him, wraps his arms around his neck. He ducks in and licks at his ear. Finally, Iker sets his oatmeal down and turns to kiss his cheek, then his neck.
Cesc smiles and hunches up like always. He tilts his head with a slack-jawed grin and lets Iker nose up into his hair. Iker touches his stomach, then rubs his nipple over his shirt. He can actually see the exact moment when Cesc’s expression shifts. When he feels that his body is reacting differently than it used to. Cesc immediately looks down at his dick.
"…Okay?" Iker asks.
"It feels," Cesc says. He moves on Iker’s lap. Iker waits for him to finish, but that's all Cesc wanted to say. His mouth is open. He seems baffled.
"It's," he says. He hesitates, then reaches down and touches himself. His eyes go big, and he looks up at Iker with his brows drawn together, like he actually can’t believe how it feels.
Iker shifts underneath him and kisses him, takes over and palms his cock. Cesc fumbles backwards, spreads his legs, and Iker follows, moves between his knees and presses with the heel of his hand. Cesc clamps an arm around his shoulders, struggling to get his balance. He humps up against Iker’s hand.
It’s clumsy. One of his feet is slipping off the couch, and he’s pulling Iker down on him with his weight. Iker lets him go for a few minutes because Cesc is so eager for it, seems so capable of getting off just like this, just from Iker pressing with his palm and rocking with him. Finally he gathers himself, pulls back.
Cesc looks up at him, mouth wet and cheeks pink. He looks stunned.
"Come on," Iker says, gently taking his wrist.
"Why?" Cesc asks, breathless. He’s wobbly when he stands, following after Iker with a funny gait.
"Because your first time shouldn’t be on the couch," Iker says.
Cesc blinks at him, but obediently sits down on the bed, then lies down when Iker tilts him back. Iker lifts his shirt and kisses his stomach. Cesc bites his lip. He alternately tries to watch and lies back on the bed. He makes a strained sound when Iker dips his tongue in his navel, his belly jumping under Iker’s mouth.
Iker wants to take his time, to rut against him, suck at his neck and his nipples, but he can feel that Cesc is wired and close to coming off, so he moves down to unbutton his jeans.
Cesc’s cock is full in his underwear, a dark wet spot around the head. He seems surprised. He half sits up, looks down at himself distrustfully.
"It’s okay." Iker moves up to kiss his mouth again. He rubs him over his underwear. Cesc’s eyes slide shut.
Cesc doesn’t open them again until Iker peels back the elastic and his cock sways free. Iker is steadying him in his hand, about to go down on him, when Cesc tugs his arm.
"In your mouth?" For all the kissing they've done, Cesc still doesn't entirely trust mouths.
Iker looks up at his face, jacks him a few times. "I won't bite you."
"Don’t bite me," Cesc repeats. His hips move up slightly.
"I won’t."
At first, Iker just mouths at the tip, enough to swirl his tongue before he pulls away. He doesn’t want to overwhelm him, and if Cesc is scared, he wants to stop. Cesc makes a sound, when Iker's mouth touches and again when the air hits his skin. Iker licks his lips. As he watches, a thick drop of precome beads at the slit.
Cesc is watching too. He takes his bottom lip between his teeth when it dribbles over, his hands fisting in the sheets. Iker ducks down and chases it with his tongue, catches it and slides back up to take the head in his mouth.
Iker hasn't had a cock in his mouth in years. The weight and feel alone would turn him on, but the taste—it’s real, familiar. He can feel Cesc twitch against his tongue. He can’t remember the last time he’s been this turned on.
Cesc is making choked moaning sounds. His fists are tight in the sheets, and Iker wants to tell him to slow down, let him do this, he can make it really good. But he remembers his first blowjob, vaguely, and that technique didn’t matter as much as how hot and wet it was inside. He relaxes his throat and lets Cesc fuck up into his mouth. It’s sloppy and without finesse—Cesc can’t even keep a rhythm—but it’s the hottest thing Iker can ever remember doing. The sounds are messy and lewd. Iker reaches up to touch Cesc’s nipple, and Cesc’s hips stutter.
"Iker," Cesc says. He gently tugs Iker's ear. Iker knows he wants to come, but he doesn’t know how to say it. "Iker," he repeats, more urgently.
Iker slides his hand up his stomach, rubs reassuringly. He fondles his balls and suddenly, Cesc tries to sit up. Iker swallows him down and Cesc curls up, whimpers.
"Iker-"
Iker has to pin his hips. Cesc pulls his ear and makes a keening sound and Iker feels him twitch and start coming. He pulls off, lets Cesc see himself come on his tongue. He swallows. Cesc watches him do it with a pained expression on his face, then falls back on the pillows, boneless and exhausted. His chest is heaving.
Iker kisses the ridge of his pubic bone, then his belly, then moves up to lie next to him.
After a minute, Cesc turns his head and noses at Iker’s cheek. "What's that called?"
"Which part?"
"When it feels."
Iker considers. "Coming."
"Coming," Cesc repeats reverently. He reaches down to grope himself, like he wants to do it again.
Iker stills his hand, trying not to smile. "You have to wait a while."
Cesc grins dopily and turns over on his side, wraps his limbs around him. He mindlessly strokes the back of Iker’s hair and falls asleep like that, limp, breathing loud and heavy.
Iker feels like he understands, for the first time, why David liked doing that so much.
One afternoon, Iker takes the box out of the back of the closet. Cesc is sitting at the table, looking at the bird feeder, and Iker sits next to him. He sets the box down and opens it. Cesc watches. Iker hands him a picture.
"This is David."
Cesc carefully takes it in his hand. They're all physical, flat shiny rectangles—David liked old photography. Never really took to holograms. This isn’t Iker’s favorite picture of him, but it might be close. He has Iker’s cousin on his hip, and she’s reaching up to pull his baseball cap down over his eyes. David is laughing.
"He died?" Cesc asks.
Iker nods.
"How did he die?"
"His car was hit by another car." He stands up. He suddenly feels like he has something to do.
"Can I look at them?" Cesc asks.
"If you want."
Iker starts chopping celery for dinner, a long time before they’re going to need it. He takes his time, snaps off the leaves, makes sure the cuts are even, then puts the pieces in a big ceramic bowl. He covers it with saran wrap. When he puts it in the fridge, he sees Cesc paused on a picture that Iker knows, even from here.
They were on the beach. David took it at forearm's length, his arm slung around Iker’s shoulders. He’s wearing a puka shell necklace. Iker has the beginnings of a sunburn across his nose and shoulders. He's laughing, looking at David instead of the lens.
Iker watches Cesc pass the tip of his finger over his face.
Iker goes shopping every week now, because there are new things Cesc wants to make. He gets home and tosses some flower packets on the table, checks the message machine, then idly searches around the house for Cesc. He picks two books up off the ground and sets them on the table, moves Cesc’s shoes out of the hallway.
He finds him in the spare bedroom, his jeans around his ankles. He’s just out of the bath, concentrating, trying to jerk off. Iker’s sleep shirt is clutched in his spare hand.
Cesc’s head snaps up and he opens his mouth, but doesn’t say anything. It’s clear he thinks he might be in trouble. Iker toes off his shoes and sits next to him. Their shoulders touch.
"It’s okay. You can do that."
He looks at Cesc’s hand. His fingers are far apart, his palm barely touching the shaft.
"Fingers closer together," he says gently. "Tighter." He arranges Cesc's hand. "And wrap like this." He turns Cesc's wrist so it’s more perpendicular to his body.
Cesc tries again. He smiles.
"Better?"
Cesc nods. He works himself for a few moments, then pauses, places Iker’s hand on his leg. He nestles into Iker’s shoulder and breathes, shirt forgotten in his other hand. Iker watches him, the way he figures out that a steady rhythm feels better, and that touching his own stomach with the tips of his fingers feels good too. He rubs Cesc’s knee with his thumb. When Cesc gets close, his shoulders go pink and his heel pushes against the bed. He looks up from Iker's chest and says "Your mouth," pleading.
Iker kisses him and settles him against the pillows. He moves down his body. Cesc rests his hand in his hair.
(One day, it's raining, and it's been exactly three years to the day. Iker feels the same crushing sadness he always did, like it never really lifted at all, like he can't even remember what it's like to not feel this way.
Cesc crawls into bed with him. He lies close. The liquor stays in the desk.)
Sergio lets Fandi stay at their house one night, because Cesc wants her to. She whines unless she’s in the room with them and finally Iker gives in, but he draws the line at her getting on the bed. Cesc sleeps on the very edge of the mattress, one hand on Iker’s chest, the other dangling off to rest on her head.
Sergio picks her up in the morning before work and sees the circles under Iker’s eyes and laughs.
It's nine'o'clock and for the first time in years, Iker is in bed before midnight. He's lying on his back, wearing sleep pants and a thin shirt, and Cesc is naked, covering him, kissing his neck. They've been making out for half an hour and Cesc has been naked for at least half of that and Iker is painfully hard. And Cesc keeps rocking back on his dick, like it turns him on and he doesn't know why.
Iker rests his head back on the pillows, looks at the ceiling like something there will give him the strength not to-
"Fuck me," Cesc says.
Iker groans. His hands tighten on Cesc's hips. "You don't even know what that means."
"People do it," Cesc says.
"That's true."
"You should do it to me." He presses his nose hard in Iker's neck, rutting as best as he can against his stomach. The movement is making Iker's shirt ride up. Iker doesn’t respond and Cesc says, "Did you hear, you should do it to-"
Iker gets a hand between them and jerks him off. Cesc shudders and goes limp on top of him, mouth open against Iker’s neck. He whimpers after a second, pushes himself into Iker’s hand.
Later, Cesc is resting on Iker's shoulder, watching him do taxes. Iker doesn't know how he could possibly find it interesting.
"You did that to trick me," Cesc says, lazy.
"Did what?" Iker pushes up his glasses, catching himself before he checks that there are two residents in his house.
"Touched me, when I was talking to you. You heard me, right?"
Iker grunts noncommittally.
He did hear Cesc. And he knows he's tricking him again, really, by acting like he didn't.
In the end, Iker does fuck him, late at night on a Wednesday. He’s lying there afterwards, coming down and breathing, and Cesc gets up. After ten minutes, he doesn’t come back.
Iker finds him in the bathroom by the sink, carefully cleaning himself out with a washcloth.
"You did know what it was all along, then."
Cesc looks up. "No. But when you did it, after—it's like. I remembered." He looks to the side, like he always does when he realizes something's different about him.
"You don't have to do that," Iker says, stepping forward off the wall.
"No, I do," Cesc says, intent. "If it stays inside, it will-"
"I mean you don't have to do it by yourself." Iker rubs his hipbones with his thumbs. "And you don’t have to shut yourself in the bathroom."
Cesc shuffles closer, flush against his body. Iker spreads him and gently slides a finger inside, checking how much he’s gotten. Cesc presses his nose in his shoulder. He breathes out a long breath in his shirt. Iker cleans him, careful, and Cesc turns his face into his neck. He holds on to Iker’s shirt. Iker rests his hand on the back of his head.
The next time, the lights are off and Iker holds Cesc close until he’s done shaking, then moves down and spreads him with his hands, licks and sucks until most of the taste is gone. Cesc’s muscles are loose, his movements slow and languid. He comes again on his belly. Afterwards, Iker takes him to the bath and sits in there with him, smoothing soap on his arms and shoulders until both of them fall asleep in the water.
It’s late afternoon and raining again. Cesc is lying on his stomach, mostly naked in bed. He’s tangled in sheets. Iker’s in boxers and a shirt and his glasses at the desk, typing.
"You writes books?" Cesc asks. "That’s what you do?"
"Yes."
"What are your books about?"
Iker pauses and looks at him. Cesc is looking back. Iker realizes, suddenly, that he doesn’t want Cesc to know that he sold out. That he writes graphic gritty techno-thrillers instead of the novels he came out of college to do. And that he makes money he doesn’t even need off of war and rape and "realism."
"Nothing good," he says finally.
Cesc rolls over on his side to see him better. He pulls the blankets up to his chin. "One day, you'll let me read one?"
"…Yes."
That night, Iker deletes the old document and opens a new one. He starts writing.
Eventually, Iker has a meeting with his publishers that he’s put off for as long as he can, and he has to drive a town over for the day. He knows, rationally, that Cesc would be fine by himself, that he’s fine by himself every day, but if something happened-
Iker calls Sergio, and Sergio’s happy to take him out for a couple hours. And Iker’s happy about it too, until he sees Cesc sitting in a car and it’s just.
"I’ll take care of him," Sergio says. It’s not even something real people say, outside of movies or whatever, but Sergio’s sincere about it.
Iker nods. He stands in the doorway and watches them drive away.
The meeting is long but not as boring as usual, because he tells the board that he started a new book and deleted the old one. There’s a lot of yelling and phone calls. He doesn’t regret it, any of it, but gets home with a headache and he can’t find the right key on his keyring. Then the door flies open and in a second, Cesc has him enveloped in a hug. He’s small and warm.
Iker relaxes. He hugs back. Presses a slight kiss to the side of his head.
"Hi," Cesc says from his shoulder.
"Hi."
Sergio is sitting at the bar, boots on the bottom rung of his stool, covertly stealing slices of steak for the quesadillas. Iker moves the cutting board out of reach and sits next to him. Cesc goes back to slicing.
"We went to an aquarium," Sergio tells Iker, swirling his beer bottle.
Cesc hands Iker a piece of steak before he moves on to peppers. Sergio glares.
"Was it cool?" Iker asks.
"Yeah," Cesc says. He looks up at Iker and grins, then realizes he needs to look down to chop. "There was a tunnel you can walk through with sharks, uh-"
"It’s built into the tank," Sergio supplies.
"Yeah." Cesc turns on a burner and melts a thin slat of butter in a pan. "And there was this thing where you can touch stuff. Before you go."
"A tide pool?" Iker asks.
Cesc makes an agreeing sound, rotating the skillet. "Shaped like this." He sets it down and outlines a star in the air.
"A starfish."
"No." Cesc gives him a look before he lays a tortilla down. "It wasn’t a fish."
"Duh, Iker," Sergio says.
Iker kicks him under the bar.
That night, Cesc gets tired early. When Sergio’s leaves, just after nine, he’s falling asleep sitting up. Iker goes to bed early with him, even though he isn’t tired.
"We can go to the beach sometime," he tells Cesc, when they’re under the comforter and Cesc is rearranging in his arms.
"The beach," Cesc repeats, sleepy.
"Where the starfish are."
Iker can’t see Cesc smile; he just knows.
Cesc falls asleep fast, and Iker shifts his arm around his stomach, rests his nose in his hair. He rubs Cesc’s wrist with his thumb when Cesc smiles, dreaming—Cesc does dream, he’s told Iker about them—and Cesc melts a little further into the bed.
Iker kisses the back of his neck and closes his eyes.
The next day, Iker goes food shopping. He buys asparagus and slabs of clean white meat, most of the ingredients they’ll need to make stuffed chicken later in the week.
When he gets home, Cesc is sitting at the counter. Iker ruffles the back of his hair, starts putting things away in the fridge.
"I bought a duck. We can roast it tomorrow. Okay?"
"I need to go to the doctor's."
Iker pushes the eggs back on the shelf and straightens up. He looks back at Cesc. The ice machine clacks new ice down into the tray. "What?"
"I need to go to the doctor's." Cesc's eyes are blank, his hands still on the granite. Iker walks over, turns his face towards him.
"What's wrong?" he asks quietly. "Did you hurt yourself?"
Cesc blinks, and seems to recognize Iker for the first time. Iker feels his stomach go cold. Cesc takes his wrist.
"I need to go to the doctor's," he repeats, pleading.
"Okay, hold on. Just sit here, okay?"
Iker goes into his bedroom, digs around on his nightstand for paperwork. He finds the number he's looking for, printed on the bottom of the manual that came in the box. He dials it. It rings twice.
"Welcome to Andromech Tech Support, my name is Allison. How may I help you?"
"There's something wrong with—there's something wrong with my android. He keeps saying he needs to go to the doctor's-"
"What is the unit's model?"
Iker squints down at the numbers and letters at the bottom of the page in the bold red rectangle. Cesc's sneakers sit next to his on the floor. "NF64C. What's wrong with him?"
"That's a general error message, sir. You'll need to make an appointment to bring the unit in for diagnostic testing."
"Okay. Can you set that up?"
"Yes. Hold please." Iker hears rapid typing. He looks out of the room—Cesc is still sitting at the bar. "Our next available appointment is the twenty-third."
"...That's in two weeks."
"Yes, sir."
"No, I need something sooner."
"Is the unit repeating the message, sir?"
"Yeah," Iker says quickly. "It's like he can't say anything else-"
"Powering down the unit in the interim will not damage the system."
Iker blinks, then feels himself getting angry. "I need an appointment sooner than the twenty-third."
"I am required to advise you that there will be a large additional fee, your warranty does not cover-"
"I don't care."
He hears a mouse clicking. "There's an opening tomorrow morning at 11AM," she says curtly.
"Fine."
Iker leads Cesc off the barstool and into their bedroom, changes him into his blue t-shirt and a pair of Iker's pants. He gets him into bed and covers him with the sheets and the comforter and the fleece blanket he likes, makes sure the pillow is close enough to his shoulders and supporting his neck. He lies down over the covers, close and facing him.
Cesc looks tiny under all the blankets. "I need to go to the doctor's," he says. He's scared.
Iker strokes his hair. "I know. I'm taking you tomorrow. It's okay."
He rubs Cesc's cheek with his thumb. Cesc won't stop looking at him.
"Go to sleep," Iker says quietly.
Cesc closes his eyes.
Iker stays with him. The milk and duck go bad on the counter overnight.
Iker hasn't been in a hospital since David. This isn't a hospital, not technically, but it feels like one. He's sitting in a room with chairs and end tables, magazines a few months old in plastic racks on the wall. There are three other people—a hulking man who looks like a fucking pervert, and two older people, a man and a woman. They're holding their hands together. The woman's trying not to cry.
"Mr. Casillas," the girl at the front desk calls. Her nametag says Caroline.
From the counter, Iker can see Cesc waiting in a room with a one-way window. He's sitting next to a girl model, Asian, in a stylized maid dress and pinafore. They both look nervous. Iker watches Cesc turns to the girl and give her a weak smile. He says something to her. The girl lifts her head. She smiles back a bit.
"Your unit has been repaired," Caroline says. "But you may continue having problems with it."
"Problems," Iker repeats.
"Your unit is an older model. If you're interested in upgrading-"
"I'm not."
She smiles at him like he doesn't understand. "In three years, your warranty will be up and we can no longer guarantee that your unit will remain in working condition. However-" She spreads a magazine on the counter in front of him. "We have a wide selection of-"
"I'm not interested," Iker repeats firmly.
He pays, and they bring Cesc out to him. As they leave, Caroline calls a name. The pervert stands up.
In the car, Cesc makes sure Iker's wearing his seatbelt, then spends the ride looking at the trees. Iker takes his hand.
In the mornings, Iker wakes up. If Cesc isn’t awake, he lets him sleep—usually Cesc will totter after him into the bathroom, half awake, warming up in the spray while Iker washes his hair.
They make breakfast and eat. Iker peels the crusts off of Cesc’s toast. Sometimes they go out, to the park or a museum. If they stay home, Iker writes and Cesc goes into the backyard to read or plant or prune the blackberry bushes.
In the afternoon, if it’s not raining and they feel like it, they take Toronto on a walk. Or Cesc does, holding tight on the leash and stumbling when she bolts, and Iker comes along. Cesc tells him the names of plants, if he thinks they’re interesting. They come home and make dinner, or order out. Cesc likes Thai food, but not Chinese.
At night, Cesc sits next to Iker on the bed and listens to him read what he wrote for the day. Sometimes Iker doesn’t feel like it, or his eyes are sore, and Cesc will read something to him. They’ve been working at "Don Quixote" for a few weeks now. Cesc does a voice for Sancho Panza.
They fuck sometimes, before they go to sleep. More often, they don’t. Cesc likes Iker’s mouth, and he likes putting his mouth on Iker. It’s enough. Iker doesn’t need anything else.
Today, Sergio’s supposed to come over to grill, and Toronto is dirty from digging by the fence. (They got her in the spring. Cesc named her that because he heard it on TV, he liked the way it sounded. So.)
Cesc checks how cold the water is before they get her wet, but it’s summer again, and the rubber is warm. Toronto shakes as soon as they get her soaked and lathered and Iker laughs with surprise, hugs her to his chest so Cesc can wash her body.
Cesc smooths soapy fur back from her eyes, grinning, and looks up at Iker’s face. Iker’s still laughing, kind of, and Cesc touches his cheek like he touched the photograph, months before.