Title: Change Your Mind
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Josef Kostan/Mick St. John
Fandom: Moonlight
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1,464
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the lovely Josef Kostan or Mick St. John, unfortunately. Please do not sue.

***

"Did you make sure to lock the door?" Josef asked, sitting up in bed as Mick came up the stairs. It wasn't often that Josef stayed at his apartment, and making sure that Mick locked the front door was one of the prerequisites of his boyfriend being here.

He really couldn't blame Josef for that, considering what had happened one of the first few times he'd been here -- and the aftermath, Mick thought wryly, holding back a sigh. He didn't want to remember that night, but he was sure that Josef would bring it up.

Nodding, he crossed the room to the bed, sitting down beside his boyfriend and starting to pull the sheet back. He was certain that the other man was naked under that thin covering, and he'd been aching to have that body under him all day.

"Not so fast." Josef crossed his arms over his chest, raising an eyebrow at Mick. "You didn't tell me if you'd locked the door and double-checked. I do not want a repeat of the time that Beth barged in here and caught us in the act."

Mick groaned inwardly at Josef's words; he'd somehow known that his boyfriend was going to bring up that night again. It wasn't something that he wanted to remember, even though he'd felt a kind of odd relief at the same time.

After the initial shock of realizing that the woman who thought she was in love with him had seen him in the act of having sex with another man, the relief had come flooding over him. All he'd been able to think was that at last, at long last, he didn't have to hide how he really felt.

He no longer had to pretend that his relationship with Josef didn't exist. There would be no more denying that he was seeing someone, no more making up excuses for why he hadn't been at home when she'd just decided to randomly "drop by."

Now he could he honest about the fact that he was in a sexual relationship with Josef -- and that he loved the other vampire. He didn't have to live a lie, or feel vaguely guilty about lying to a woman who he had at one time thought he could have feelings for.

That hadn't lasted long, of course. He'd mistaken his protective feelings for who she had been as a child for more adult emotions; once he'd cleared his head and freed himself from the past, he'd come to realize that she was no longer the child he'd first met.

No, she'd had turned into an obnoxious, brazen woman who somehow seemed to think that she had some divine right to be with him. And the fact that he'd kept her at arm's length, despite all the attempts on her part to attract him to her side, told him a lot.

Seeing him in bed with Josef had been the end of her fascination with him, apparently. She hadn't been in touch with him since that day; and if he was honest with himself, he was glad of it. She had been more and more of a thorn in his side as time went on.

Mick almost wanted to smile at the memory of her face, but he supposed that he couldn't blame her for being shocked. She'd not only seen him in bed with another man; she'd seen him having sex with another man, in living technicolor.

There was no way he could have convinced her that she hadn't seen his cock in Josef's ass. She'd seen it all -- Josef on his hands and knees, Mick behind him with his hands on Josef's hips, thrusting into him and moaning his name.

"What are you thinking about?" Josef asked, that crooked smile tugging at the corners of his lips. Mick laughed softly, leaning forward and kissing his boyfriend as he raised a hand to smooth back of a lock of hair from Josef's face.

"I'm thinking about the night Beth walked in on us. It would have been almost a comedy of errors if it was somebody else in the situation," Mick replied. "I don't blame her for being shocked, though -- that must have been a surprise, to see us having sex."

"And up until then, she'd managed to fool herself into believing that you belonged to her." Josef's smirk evolved into a laugh as he lay back against the pillows and stretched out, his hands behind his head. "I guess that was the surprise of her life."

"I should probably feel bad about it -- but I don't," Mick admitted, finally pulling back the covers and revealing Josef's slender, pale body to his gaze. "Not that I don't consider her a friend, but she wants to be more than that."

"Well, she can't be." Mick's head came up at the note in Josef's voice; that was the first time he'd heard the other man sound .... what? Jealous? Surely Josef couldn't be jealous. He knew that Mick's heart belonged to him.

"I know that. And so does she, ever since that night." Mick shrugged, wishing that the subject hadn't been brought up. "It's not like she's tried to get in touch with since then. It's like she's pushing me out of her life, which is fine with me."

"I hope she stays out of your life," Josef said, his tone still sounding a bit sharp to Mick's ears. "It used to drive me nuts, the way she was always hanging around you and acting like she had some kind of claim on your time and your presence."

"You are jealous!" Mick sat back on his heels, blinking. "Did you feel that way whenever she was around? Because even when there were times that it was obvious you didn't want her around, you were never anything less than charming to her."

Josef shrugged, his gaze not meeting Mick's. "I learned how to be charming to women when I was just a kid. Remember the time period I grew up in. And I don't have to be jealous. I've always known that you had romantic feelings for me, even before you knew it."

Mick couldn't keep the surprise out of his voice. "I just never expected you to feel like you had to be jealous of anybody. Especially not her. You know how hard I tried to keep things strictly friendly between us. I didn't want anything more than that."

"But she did." Josef sighed, shaking his head. "She was always coming up with some excuse to drag you off somewhere. It was pretty obvious that she didn't want you to be around me. I guess she thought I'd be the big bad influence."

"She didn't like the fact that you aren't ashamed of what we are," Mick said quietly. "She was afraid that I'd start acting like you -- and that I'd get to the point where I didn't want to be human and mate with her. She built up this life for us in her mind."

"She was kidding herself," Josef told him, his voice turning cold. "I'd never have let you forget what you are, Mick. I can understand why you want to be human again. I did for a while, too. I think we all go through that phase. But you can't be. Not permanently."

"I know." Now it was Mick's turn to sigh. "I knew when Coraline made me human again that it wouldn't last. And now ...." His voice trailed off, his thoughts far away for a moment before he looked back at Josef. "Now, I wouldn't want to be."

"You wouldn't?" This time when Josef raised an eyebrow, Mick was aware that the other man was truly surprised and not just being cynical. "Ever since I've known you in your vampire state, you've wanted to be human again. What made you change your mind?"

"You have," Mick whispered, moving to kneel beside Josef and lean over him. "Falling in love with you changed my mind. If I was human, I'd age and die -- and I couldn't be with you for the rest of your life. I don't want to leave you lonely."

To his surprise, Josef raised a hand to caress his cheek, blinking rapidly. He hadn't expected those words to bring his vampire lover to tears; he'd thought that Josef would have some kind of comeback that would lighten the moment.

"Now that surprises me," Josef murmured, his gaze not leaving Mick's. "I wouldn't have thought you wanted to spend your whole life with me. Eternity is a very, very long time, Mick. You'd better be sure of what you want. You just might get it."

"Oh, I'm sure. I've never been more sure of anything in my life," Mick said, lowering his head to capture Josef's soft lips with his own. As he lost himself in the kiss, he could almost swear that he heard a knock at the door downstairs -- a sound that he fully intended to ignore.

***