*****

I looked down at him while he slept, feeling a little guilty about it. He didn't like it when I did watched him sleep. It made him feel vulnerable. Hell, it had even taken him a good six months before he'd even sleep in the same room with me.

It was his childhood that made him that way. He didn't want to sleep with other people around because too much shit happened to him when he was asleep as a child. We rarely ever talk about it. There was only so much he could stand to tell and there was only so much that I could stand to hear.

As I watched him sleep, I noticed that the skin on his back was peeling. We had played a little too long in the pool two days ago and both had gotten sunburns. Mine was worse than his, but that's because of my fair skin. I resisted the urge to pull a piece of dead skin off. Sometimes peeling skin was like bubble wrap; you just had to play with it like it's some kind of neat thing.

Anyway, I didn't peel the skin from his back. Instead, I ran a finger down his spine, from his neck to his lower back. I would have gone farther if the light sheet hadn't been blocking my finger's path.

Leaning down, I kissed his shoulder blade. I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't really want to wake him up, but I couldn't help but want to kiss various parts of his body. There was just something about him that made me drawn to him. I wanted to be attached to him forever.

He shifted and I pulled away, waiting to see if I had disturbed his slumber. I hadn't. He just turned his head towards me and then lifted it several times, making the pillow dent the way he wanted it. I loved him. There wasn't anything that I didn't love about him.

Well, that was a lie. I didn't love the self-demeaning attitude that he adopted when he was unsure of himself. I didn't love that look that he got when he would talk about something painful and I didn't like how he sometimes wept in his sleep.

But, I did love his eyelashes, and the way they fluttered when he had just woken up. I loved that small hint of a smile that he'd flash me when we were with other people. I loved that he showed me his heart when we were alone and I loved that he once said that the sole purpose of his arms were to hold me. I loved his tall frame and I loved his bone structure. I loved his ears and his crazy little mouth. His voice was something that I couldn't live without and his laugh was a thing of brilliance.

I leaned down again and brushed my lips over his cheek, then his ear, and then his neck. He moaned a little. I moved back once again, just to watch him. He didn't wake up, but he mumbled, "No, Oz, don't stop."

I had to smile. How could I not? His dreams were of me. Of me, not of anyone else.

I leaned back down and kissed him some more. My lips were like feathers, gently gliding over his face. I pulled back again and my smile widened as his big brown eyes opened. They were aimed towards me, but I knew he was still mostly sleeping. "Love you," he mumbled before his eyes slipped shut again.

"I love you, baby," I whispered back at him.

Curling up against my Xander's sleeping form, I closed my eyes, ready to meet him in my dreams.

~end~