Archive of Our Own ^beta

Takumi had heard of the concept of “thermal companions” in his paranthropology gen ed class before. It was apparently the textbook example of the kind of social constructs that arose out of the differing biology of paranthropic beings—in this case, vampires, who (as exotherms) have historically needed to find ways to avoid freezing to death in places as frigid as fifteenth century Siberia.

He had mostly thought of it as a thing that they did in fifteenth century Siberia, and had almost completely forgotten it by the time his vampire boyfriend invited him to his home.

“This is Zero,” Leon said, gesturing to a dusky man in extremely form-fitting half-buttoned clothing, “and this is Odin,” gesturing to a blond in an anime t-shirt, while both of these people—presumably vampires, who were people just like humans were people, Takumi reminded himself—slung their arms around Leon, who seemed to begrudgingly accept this amount of extreme physical contact despite refusing to hold Takumi's hand for the entire first three months of their relationship. “They're my heatfriends.”

“You might say we warm his bed,” Zero purred.

“Or name us brothers of the coffin,” Odin exclaimed.

Takumi stared. At last, he managed, “Uh. Hi.”

Takumi came to understand by the end of the day that Leon lived in a home with his two thermal companions, and he was essentially meeting them instead of Leon's siblings, who apparently lived in separate houses in closer proximity to the places where they studied and worked.

There was something very weird about that.

“Is it like a best man at a wedding? You know, how he's no longer there to ward off kidnappers coming for your bride, and it's just a symbolic position. I mean, do you actually sleep together with them for warmth?”

Leon seemed to consider this carefully, like he always did whenever Takumi was asking something particularly insensitive about his culture, and said, “Yes and no.”

Takumi scooted a little bit closer to him in their bed, silently trying to remind Leon that his human body was very nice and warm.

“It's somewhat like the practice of choosing a best man in that the real meaning of thermal companionship isn't necessarily thermal anymore. It has a very old place in our culture. The idea of having people you share half your life with, who's there to help fight back against crusaders who find your resting place—that's still pretty powerful.”

“So they're just... tight bros? How is it a no, then?”

“Well, sometimes,” Leon said, “the boiler breaks down and it's really cold.”

The thing about Leon's thermal companions—heatfriends?—was that they seemed to be around all the time, even when the whole house was a toasty 75 degrees. Takumi would be gingerly kissing Leon on the sofa, and then Odin would come into the room and start playing video games, and then Zero would come into the room apparently in the middle of phone sex (or maybe that was how he spoke in all his conversations—it was hard to tell) and Takumi would have to stop kissing him because it started to feel like PDA.

“Um, you know,” Takumi tried to say once, “I'm endothermic. If anything happens, I've got it covered. Can I have a little privacy?”

Zero and Odin gave him a long look, like he'd just made a garlic joke.

Leon said, “That comment might rank up there with the time you asked if I needed you for feeding.” Leon kissed him on the mouth, in full view of his heatfriends, and announced, “Can we have a moment? My boyfriend's shy and bad at expressing himself.”

“I'm not shy,” Takumi protested. Zero and Odin left anyway, waving good-bye sarcastically.

“Hey,” Takumi said, “so is it 'thermal companions' or 'heatfriends'? Or, I think I heard 'thermobuddies' once—”

Leon let out an airy laugh. “Takumi, no one has said 'thermobuddies' since the sixties. 'Heatfriends' is fine.”

“What about 'thermal companions' then?”

“It's on the clinical side, I suppose. Why?”

Takumi was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “I'm still trying to wrap my head around it.”

“You know, I can ask them to give us space,” Leon said. “They understand that you're a human and it might read differently to you.”

“I don't know,” Takumi sighed. “My family loved you when you came over. You were great. I don't want to come here and make everyone go out of their way for me in return.”

There was a long pause. Then Leon started to say, “You know, I think that's the most—”

“Stereotypically Asian thing I've ever said? Yeah, I know.”

“I was going to say considerate, actually.” Leon reached over and linked his cool fingers in between Takumi's. “It means a lot to me that you want to get along with Zero and Odin.”

Takumi traced his other hand up Leon's arm. “I wouldn't ask you to give up your friends for me,” he said softly, running his fingers down Leon's cool stomach.

Then on Thursday the boiler broke. This was possibly due to the fact that temperatures dipped far below freezing, wreaking mayhem on all the plumbing systems in the neighborhood. Leon, Zero, and Odin promptly went about the house in full winter attire including hats, scarves, and gloves. It looked a little comical, except that the only vampire-friendly HVAC company in the area came and discovered that the solution required custom-ordering a new part that couldn't be ordered until after the holidays. The three of them compensated by boiling pots of water on every burner on the stove, turning on the oven as high as it would go, pooling together all the portable heaters in the house, and huddling together shoulder-to-shoulder in the kitchen.

Wearing only a sweater, Takumi looked at them, helped pour more water into the pots, and thought in that moment that heatfriendship honestly seemed like the least romantic concept in the universe.

“In our search for a home, we should have prized the hearth,” Odin said through chattering teeth. (The scientific part of Takumi thought it was interesting that vampires shivered even though it wouldn't help them get any warmer.)

“Good luck finding one in the middle of Loulan,” Leon said. His eyes watched Takumi hungrily as he came back from refilling the pots on the stove.

Takumi looked at the three of them and felt the tiniest bit smug as he asked Leon, “So, do you want to cuddle or something?”

Leon, narrowing his eyes with vampire pride while the rest of his expression was lost under his scarf, retorted, “I think we should've gotten a cat.”

“I'd like to cuddle,” Zero interjected.

Everyone looked at Zero. He nuzzled his head against Leon's shoulder. “We can even include the endotherm,” Zero added. “I'm feeling generous.”

Takumi stared at Zero, who seemed to be in the process of seducing his boyfriend. “Before you ask,” Leon said, looking a little annoyed at the nuzzling, “this is just a Zero thing.”

As if to contradict him, Odin also squeezed a little closer to Leon. “The chill does unlock the doors to my barren, black heart,” he said. “I find this to be a momentous occasion for parting the waters of thropic divide and extending our sacred ties to one of the sun.”

“Wait,” Takumi said, “you mean—you want me to—”

Leon sighed and said, “It would appear that my heatfriends are of the opinion that we should cuddle.”

“You mean, with all three of you?”

“We're all cold,” Leon said dryly. “I assure you, there's nothing sexual about it. I'd like my legs to stop feeling like they're dead weight, and I wouldn't ask Zero or Odin to suffer without me.”

Takumi gave the three of them a long look. Odin did talk like he was insane, but as far as Takumi could tell, he was just a massive fantasy nerd and could probably be trusted. “Maybe Odin,” Takumi said.

“Zero will behave himself,” Leon said, seeming increasingly more receptive to the idea, even a little desperate.

Well, Takumi thought, he was the most alert of the three of them. If it was too strange he could easily change his mind. “I'm not how sure this will work, physically.”

“Come here,” Leon said, taking his arms from where they had been wrapped tightly around himself and holding them out to Takumi.

Takumi raised his eyebrows. “You want me to sit on your lap.”

“Takumi, I am suffering. I will embarrass myself in whatever manner you desire after the boiler is fixed. Please come here.”

Takumi sighed, wondering to himself if it was really a plea when humiliation was Leon's kink anyway, and went and sat on his lap. Leon instantly hugged him about the middle and pressed against his back, sighing with relief. He popped his nose out from under his scarf and laid it against Takumi's neck, seeming to want to even capture his warmth through the air he breathed.

For a moment it was actually kind of cute.

Then Zero and Odin took one arm each and Takumi felt like a human-shaped warm pack. He thought to himself that Leon was indeed right about it not being sexual. He did not even feel like a friend in this position.

“Is this seriously how it's done with four people?” Takumi wondered out loud. Despite everything, it still sounded very sexual.

“No,” Odin volunteered.

“You're warmer than most people,” Zero said.

“Traditionally, four people spoon together in a chain,” Leon said.

Takumi thought it was a very strange statement for something that followed the word “traditionally.” Then again, this whole thing was the strangest experience of his life.

Later, in Leon's king sized bed where the two of them had just had sex the night before, Takumi laid there with Leon nuzzled against one side and Zero and Odin spooned up against the other side, three down blankets stacked up over him, thinking deeply about the ectothermic experience and wondering why he felt strangely okay about being cuddled by three guys at once and if this meant anything about him as a person.

“So,” Takumi said, “I just have one question.” One more question. He had aired plenty of questions.

To his disappointment, it was Zero that gave a “go on” grunt in response.

“What would you be doing if I weren't here?”

“Hibernating,” Leon said.

“So you wouldn't just freeze to death?”

“No,” Leon said, “but if I go into hibernation I'll miss out on enjoying winter break.”

“Oh, to sleep while the world moves on without you,” Odin lamented.

“Hibernation sucks like a virgin,” Zero added.

“Okay, I get the idea.” Takumi thought to himself that he would definitely be taking up Leon on that favor he was promised. Being a personal heater was not what he had planned on accomplishing with his own winter break.

The Christmas miracle happened: The HVAC guys found a local supplier with the part they needed and came to repair the boiler three days later.

Leon's sheets still smelled a bit like his two friends.

“Thanks for keeping us warm these last few days,” Leon said. He had been kissing and touching Takumi a lot throughout the day—it must've been his way of trying to make amends. “You know, if there's anything you'd like to do before break is over...”

“There is one thing,” Takumi said. He had been thinking very carefully about it over the last few days.

“Mm?”

Leon's hand was cool and smooth where it laid on his arm. His breath was very clean, smelling faintly of his toothpaste. Takumi inched a little closer and muttered, “I've—always really wanted you to bite my neck and drink my blood.”

Leon was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “You're into vore?”

“What? No!”

“It sounds to vore like me,” Leon teased before falling silent again. When he spoke again, he said, “So it's a vampire fantasy.”

“Maybe,” Takumi confessed. “I know it sounds kind of dumb, but... there's something intimate about the idea. Putting myself at your mercy. And my lifeblood going into you. I don't know.”

Leon withdrew for a moment, laying on his back with his hands crossed upon his chest. Then he said softly, “Are you into me because I'm a vampire?”

Takumi almost laughed, but he bit it back. “Honestly, when I found out you were a vampire, I was disappointed. I wanted to go to the Sundance Film Festival with you, but I guess you wouldn't have much fun slathered in 100 SPF sunscreen while breaking out in hives.”

“You know, there's Moondance.”

“Yeah. I know. I just felt like it wasn't the same. I kept going back and forth between it not mattering at all, and it being something that'd always be in the way. But you had the best taste in film and gorgeous eyes and this adorable way of being picky with your tea, so I felt like trying anyway.”

Leon was silent for a moment again, and Takumi wondered if he'd fucked up again by talking about Leon's vampirism like a problem.

Then Leon turned toward him, laying one arm over his chest and murmuring with a small voice, “That's the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

“Really?”

“Really.” Leon cuddled into his side, and Takumi turned a little to lay an arm over him in return. “I've... always wanted someone to like me, find me interesting for who I am.”

And you're really adorable when you let down your guard, Takumi thought to himself as he kissed Leon on the forehead, but didn't say it because Leon hated being called cute.

“I'll feed from your neck if that's what you want,” Leon said.

“I do want that,” Takumi said, pulling the neckline of his pajamas lower than they needed to be.

Leon raised himself from the bed and sat next to Takumi's head, brushing his fingers tenderly over the side of Takumi's neck where his pulse hammered in anticipation. “With or without numbing?”

“What?”

“I can numb you first, but you'll hardly notice it until tomorrow, so I don't know if that's what you want. Or I could just bite you. I hear it's painful, however.”

“Numb me halfway?”

“I can try.” Leon brought his mouth down to Takumi's neck, and Takumi held his breath as Leon lapped his tongue across his neck, skin tingling and going numb in its wake. Holy shit, he had to ask Leon to lick him like this again sometime.

“I should warn you,” Leon said, “this is only the third time I've bitten someone since I was an infant. Not that I've ever missed the vein.”

“You can miss?” Takumi said nervously.

“Of course. In fact, Odin missed twice at his commencement. Well, he was turned, which might explain his poor aim.”

Takumi circled his arms around Leon. “But you won't miss. Right?”

“Naturally.” Leon laid a kiss on his jaw. “Are you ready?”

“Yeah.”

There were two jolts of pain in his neck, surrounded by the cool dampness of Leon's mouth. Takumi gasped, his fingers gripping the back of Leon's sleepwear as he felt the wound sting with each pulse, Leon latched onto him with his hands on Takumi's shoulders and his head buried against his neck.

Takumi's eyelashes fluttered, his mind lost in the feeling of being held there, Leon's teeth in the most sensitive, vulnerable part of his body. He felt strangely conscious of his blood, the way it moved in his body, but he did not feel its motion into Leon—simply the presence of Leon's enamel plunged into his flesh, foreign and yet all right, something that he knew would cause him no real harm.

Then Leon gently pulled away, pressure lifting from his neck, and lapped at the wound until Takumi no longer felt blood pooling out.

“Wow,” Takumi murmured.

“Good?”

“Yeah.”

Leon rearranged himself on the bed, pulling the blankets up to his chin, leaving one arm across Takumi's body. “Vampire fantasies satisfied?”

“Yeah. I mean. Different from what I thought it'd be, but good.” Takumi touched his fingers to his new wounds, finding them lightly scabbed over. They probably made an impressive pair of love marks. “How do I taste?”

“... Fresh?” Leon said, sounding a little caught off-guard. “Rich. Pretty good. Admittedly, I find it strange to think about you as food.”

“That's fine. Thanks for indulging me.” Takumi leaned into Leon, taking in his calming light scent. “Do you want to see something at the new theater tomorrow? I think they have some pretty good nine o'clock showings.”

“That sounds pretty nice.”

“Um, I guess you can bring your heatfriends if you want...”

Leon chuckled and kissed him. “It's all right. It's the twenty-first century. I can go on a date by myself.”

He could feel his pulse stirring as his awareness slowly came back to him. It was warm where he was, with two familiar bodies around him, the air a little stagnant from their slow winter breaths. As he stirred, they stirred and began to wake with him.

Leon reached up, unlatched the cover of their bed, and cracked it open to check for light—an old habit, despite the safety of their castle. It was dark, without even the blue glow of moonlight. He pushed it all the way open, shivering in the cool, fresh air that carried the faintest whiff of spring.

His daybrethern roused at the scent.

“Welcome to the new year,” he said to the two of them, stubbornly half-asleep against his legs.