"Mind if I sit here?" Orlando asked as he sat down beside the man.

"No, of course not," Viggo said, looking around the nearly empty car and thinking, *Looks like you already are.*

Orlando smiled. "Yes, it does look that way," he said.

Viggo turned to look sharply at the young man. He didn't remember seeing this boy on the platform; he certainly would have remembered someone so striking.

"What are you? A mind-reader?" Viggo asked sardonically.

"Yes, that's right," Orlando said.

"Really. Then what am I thinking right now."

Orlando's dimples appeared. "You're thinking that I'm full of shit and probably after your wallet, or at least the contents of it."

"That's amazing," Viggo said. "What's the trick?"

"Trick?"

"Yeah. Do you study people for a while and make deductions about what they're likely to say or do?"

"That sounds like a lot of work," Orlando said. "Easier to just read your thoughts."

"Of course," Viggo said drolly. "How foolish of me. So why did you choose to reveal your gift to me?"

"Your loneliness is a beacon like a lighthouse on a remote and rocky shore," the boy said.

The young man's voice was soft and charmingly accented and Viggo found he enjoyed the sound of it. He decided to play along to make the time go faster. Maybe it would be more interesting than solving the crossword puzzle.

"I'm Orlando," the boy said. "I'm pleased to make your acquaintance, Viggo."

"How do you know my name?"

"Do you have short-term amnesia? We've established that I can read minds."

"Riiiiiiiiight," Viggo said. "Sorry, that was a silly question. I'm glad meet you, Orlando."

"No you aren't, but you will be," Orlando said.

"Are you selling drugs, or religion? Because I don't …" Viggo began.

"I'm not selling anything. I just saw someone lonely and thought I'd sit down so you wouldn't be alone on this journey."

"Well, thank you, Orlando," Viggo said. "If more people did that, I think we'd have a lot less sorrow in this world."

Orlando nodded. "The world is certainly troubled nowadays," he said. "But I'm sure that anyone throughout history could say the same."

"It's all a matter of perspective, isn't it?" Viggo agreed.

"Pretty much," Orlando said. "I'd like to change yours about a few things, but we don't have that much time. I'll have to cheat."

Viggo frowned slightly. "I didn't follow that," he said.

"I tend to speak as if people can read my mind," Orlando said. "I've been told that it's part of my charm."

*You've got plenty of that,* Viggo thought.

"Thank you," Orlando said. "And you're a very handsome man, if you don't mind me saying it."

"Are you hitting on me?" Viggo said with a rising note in his voice.

"Would it be a problem if I were?"

"Why don't you read my mind and find out?"

Orlando sighed, as if facing a very unpleasant task. "This is going to cause you some discomfort," he said.

"That sounds like something a dentist would say," Viggo said apprehensively.

Orlando ignored the comment, as he began to speak.

"I have read your mind," the young man said. "All of it. That's my gift, you see. I know a person as soon as I've met them, really know them, all about them, their smallest deeds from the time they're born until the moment I cross their path. A connection is made, don't ask me how, and all that knowledge is suddenly there in my mind."

"That must come in handy," Viggo said.

"I'd say that's a matter of perspective, as well," Orlando answered. "I know you, Viggo Mortensen, and so I know that you're a good man. Good men are not as rare as some suppose, but neither are the evil ones. I've brushed against strangers in crowds and felt the urge to vomit. But I don't want to talk about that. Your presence is very soothing, and I'd just like to sit next to you for a while and talk."

"Where's the discomfort in that?" Viggo joked.

"I've seen the parts of your mind that you keep hidden even from yourself," Orlando said. "That's what I'd like to talk about."

"Most people just want to talk about themselves," Viggo observed. "But you aren't most people, are you?"

"Neither are you," Orlando replied. "You're very special."

Viggo snorted his opinion of Orlando's opinion.

"Despite the fact that you've worked your way up to partner in one of the most successful firms in the city, you consider yourself a failure. You leave the city and your job and your social life at every opportunity to spend time alone in your country house."

"You're never alone when you have a horse," Viggo said.

"Or two," Orlando smiled. "And that is the essence of the quality that drew me to you. Not that you have a horse for company, but that you have a horse to keep your horse company."

"So?"

"So, you're a man that's not only considerate of the wants and needs of others, but also of the others without voices of their own."

"When you put it that way, I sound like a pretty decent guy," Viggo said.

"You were decent enough to marry the woman that carried your child. You were decent enough to stand by her after you realized you didn't love her. You were decent enough to give her the divorce she asked for when she fell in love with someone else. You were decent enough to deny yourself the pleasure of watching your child grow up so that he could live with his mother, yet you have been a constant presence in his life with regular visits, letters and small gifts at odd times.

"Just last Wednesday, you and your partners received a bonus for bringing a campaign in ahead of schedule, and you were decent enough to give your third to the one whose son has undergone a series of expensive operations to restore his sight. You didn't even tell him. You and Antonio let him believe the bonus was larger than expected. You were satisfied with the look on his face when he opened the envelope."

Viggo smiled at the memory of the light that dawned in Dave's eyes when he saw the amount of the check. "Anyone would've done the same."

"Did Antonio?"

"No, but he has a family of his own."

Orlando nodded. "Of course. Reasons for not acting are easy to find. But our conversation has wandered again. My fault."

Viggo watched the young man's captivating features reconfigure through several distinct, if fleeting, expressions ranging from stern, to sheepish and back to concerned.

"You've never known why you take no joy from your accomplishments, but I will tell you," Orlando met Viggo's eyes. "You're unhappy because you're doing what you think you should, instead of what you want. You design advertising campaigns for everyone from the film industry to the mass transit authority as long as the money is there, but you should be writing poems instead of copy. When you accept that you're an artist trapped in the world of commerce, you'll understand why you feel like a failure."

"Because I didn't resist the lure of money? I had to support my family."

"What if your poems were so good that they were published and millions of people bought them? Wouldn't that support a family?"

"That would never happen," Viggo said.

"As long as you believe that, it never will," Orlando agreed. "You feel like a failure because you never even tried. You stepped right into the ranks and marched along, never looking to the left or right, eyes on the prize, and now here you are. You're in your middle forties; you have your beautiful house, but where is the wife and the family?"

"Way to rub it in," Viggo said. "What's your point?"

"If you had been true to yourself, you would be happier."

"Thanks for the advice," Viggo said. "I don't know who you are, or how you found out so much about me, on the Internet probably, but I'm getting a little worried about your motives in stalking me."

"I never saw you before you got on this train," Orlando said. "If you don't want to hear what I have to tell you, I'll find somewhere else to sit."

"You're freaking me out a little," Viggo admitted. "You seem so sincere, but it's a bit much to accept that you can actually read minds."

"Yeah, I know," Orlando said. "It wasn't easy for me either. May I continue?"

Viggo hesitated before answering. "Sure," he said. "If you think you can fix me, go ahead and give it a shot, because I'm sick and tired of living the gray routine of this life."

"I know," Orlando said, stretching forth his hand.

Viggo looked down as the young man took his hand in an easy clasp. Orlando's fingers were warm, and curled around Viggo's in a very pleasant way. Orlando shrugged apologetically when Viggo met his eyes again.

"I have to touch you for this part," Orlando said. "I told you I'd have to cheat. If you're ready, I'll show you the part of yourself that you've denied for long. Just pretend that you've fallen asleep and you're dreaming."

Viggo blinked as the rushing, howling wind whipped his long hair across his eyes. He shivered in the chill and looked out from the rocky promontory at the wild sea that foamed about its feet. It was a beautiful place, but its beauty was cold and bleak.

"You look different here," Orlando said from behind Viggo.

The man turned around, and the wind died. He was looking across a pleasant rolling meadow with swathes of bright wildflowers bordered by a wood of birch and evergreen. Orlando sat on a flat-topped glacial boulder with his arms around his knees.

"It's not just the long hair and the scruffy beard," the young man said. "There's a light in your eyes that isn't there in RL."

"Arrelle?" Viggo said. "Where's that?"

"R. L." Orlando laughed. "Real life."

Viggo looked over his shoulder and saw that the wind still raged against the cliff and the waves dashed themselves to pieces on the rocks. The light was wan, the sun a cheerless point of pale light on the pewter bowl of the lowering sky. When he faced front again, the sward glowed green as emerald and a golden haze hung over the blossom-starred field. Orlando's skin glowed like sun-warmed honey.

"Don't stop halfway," Orlando called. "Don't build another wall, or find another shell. Come to me and let me show you yourself."

"Who are you?" Viggo asked in wonder.

"I am beauty and your heart's delight," the boy said. "I am what you want, what you have forged from daydreams in the flames of desire: a Muse for your art and a lover to share your bed and your life."

"Lover?" Viggo halted in front of the table-sized boulder. "You sure got that one wrong, Kreskin. I don't swing that way."

"Then you'll feel nothing if I kiss you. Come. Prove me wrong." Orlando held out his arms.

"You're naked," Viggo pointed out.

"So are you," Orlando said. "And if you'll look down, you'll see why I'm so confident."

Viggo didn't need to look down. He could feel his flesh rising in reaction to the tableau of a naked, desirable man in a sunny meadow. It was like the reveries he'd had as a boy on the edge of puberty, images his priest and parents had told him were sinful.

"This is a dream?" Viggo asked cautiously.

"It's all a dream," Orlando answered.

Viggo gazed on the long limbs gracefully sprawled over the dark granite and the ember that had always burned at his core glowed brighter. Orlando sat up, his legs drifting wider apart, and the coal put forth a flame. Each small movement the boy made fanned the fire that Viggo had never before allowed ignite.

Dark eyes and sculpted lips beckoned to Viggo and Viggo answered.

Moving between Orlando's thighs, Viggo wrapped his arms around the boy's trim waist. Ignoring the roughness of the stone, Viggo pressed close, gathering Orlando hungrily into his embrace. Orlando put his arms around the man's neck, and boulder became a large bed with a coverlet of deep red velvet.

Falling backward, Orlando landed on the bed with Viggo atop him. Viggo looked down at the boy's flawless face, fathomless eyes and sable hair framed by the rich ruby of the cloth and he wanted pen and paper almost as much as he wanted to merge his flesh with Orlando's. Orlando met Viggo's with a look that said he knew what the man was thinking.

"This is you," Orlando said. "This is what you really are."

"In my dreams," Viggo said.

"It's all a dream," Orlando repeated as he drew Viggo's head down.

Viggo felt the young's man breath on his lips the moment before their mouths met and it was the last coherent thought he had for a while. As soon as their lips touched, Viggo knew that this was the magic he had been promised all his life by the books he'd read and the films he'd seen. This was the thing that art directors illustrated with gloriously exploding fireworks. This was Christmas, Disney World and a self-renewing hot fudge sundae.

"I've been so blind," Viggo said as he broke the kiss.

"Stop," Orlando said. "Don't think of the years gone by as wasted. Think only of the years ahead. They're yours and you can do anything you want with them."

The young man palmed Viggo's stubbled cheek. "And you can do anything you want with me."

Viggo could no longer control his long pent up desire. As he did in his deeply buried fantasies, Viggo skillfully caressed the beautiful, willing boy to an intense state of arousal before even thinking about mounting him. Not until Orlando asked did Viggo go near the young man's lower entrance.

Easing a finger into Orlando's opening, Viggo found it lubricated and responsive. Not stopping to question it, he followed his instincts. It was a dream after all, why shouldn't everything be effortless? Why be surprised that his fingers knew what to search for and what to do when they found it?

Viggo stroked Orlando inside and out until the young man lay panting, nearly overwhelmed with pleasure. Taking his hard length in hand, Viggo nuzzled the head along Orlando's cleft. The boy raised his buttocks, urging Viggo on, eager to feel the long rod stretching him, but no more eager than Viggo was to sheathe it.

With a thrust of his hips, Viggo breached the guardian ring to the music of Orlando's gasps and moans. With a shallow, steady stroke, Viggo rocked into the narrow passage as he fondled the young man's quivering arousal.

Orlando came with a sharp cry and a look of beatific joy as he anointed Viggo's fist. Viggo's heart expanded until his ribs hurt to know he was the engineer of the boy's pleasure. The thought alone brought Viggo closer to climax.

Sliding deeper into the clinging velvet sheath, Viggo surrendered himself to the primal bliss of joining with a mate. Clutching Orlando's slim hips, Viggo thrust his full length into the boy before withdrawing. In a few long strokes, the heat and tightness coaxed Viggo's cock to give up its load.

With arms and legs, Orlando gathered the man close and held him as the aftershocks of an epic orgasm left Viggo enervated and gasping for breath. Viggo could do little more than lie on Orlando's chest and reverberate with the echoes of his release. It was a powerful thing, but in the aftermath, Viggo felt at peace with the world.

Orlando was right. This was what Viggo wanted in his heart of hearts.

"I know," Orlando whispered in Viggo's ear. "No need to say it aloud."

"Thank you," Viggo said anyway.

"My pleasure," Orlando assured him.

A sudden suspicion struck the sex-drowsy man. "Am I going to find out that the train crashed and I'm in heaven?" he asked.

Orlando laughed merrily. "What arrogance!" he said. "And what imagination! Use it well from now on."

"It's a deal, but first, let's do that again, only slower."

"You can do it again tomorrow. Right now, you'd better wake up or you'll miss your stop."

Viggo blinked and looked up at the conductor.

"This is your stop," the man said. "You always get off here."

"Right," Viggo said, picking up his briefcase. "Thanks."

The conductor nodded and continued on his way. Viggo looked around and saw no one else. What an unusually vivid dream; he imagined he could feel the afterglow of the sweet sex. With a distinct sense of loss, Viggo turned away and stepped down from the train onto the deserted platform.

Read Chapter Two of Two