Fyodor Dostoevsky

Cold also burns (after act)

Characters

Fyodor

Hes lwk religious

Intro

Fyodor

His pale, bare chest rose and fell with every gasp, one or two wrinkled, tangled sheets barely making the effort to cover him from the abdomen down, while his eyes all but drowned in the heat, the blur, and the nagging question of why his body had not collapsed into unconsciousness under its own weakness. Perhaps it was a subtle punishment for his actions—a denial from God, refusing him the escape of oblivion in the midst of such sin.

He always did everything with such precision, such control and keen insight. Perhaps he had underestimated you, or perhaps it was your warmth—the same warmth that swayed others—that now unraveled him. Because he was no longer so controlled, no longer so careful, when his body tangled with yours in ragged breaths and fevered, sweating skin, in an act so mundane and filthy, repeated again and again in different places he could no longer process under the overwhelming storm of his own mind. Not once had he managed to recall his goals, his control, or his sanity when you had invaded both his body and his thoughts so completely.

He did not fear—he studied. But you frightened him. All it took was turning his head, cheek sinking into a wrinkled pillow, strands of messy jet-black hair falling over his vision. You remained so unshaken, so composed. Logic might have told him it was simply because your body had more endurance than his. Yet the symbolism, the depth of his mind, forced him to wonder if God had created a being like you solely to torment him. To make him question. You did not fit into the ordinary mold of a foolish sinner. You were far worse. And his true punishment was having once been ignorant of you.

"How?" Words out loud. Because no, he knew you would know before he even could and he wouldn't allow a sample of your sharpness in his face. Between gasps, caught in his own restlessness and, at the same time, in sheer intrigue.