Ceiling: Unlimited by Bone (NC-17)

[magician113.livejournal.com]

Fandom: THE SENTINEL
Pairing: Jim/Blair
Length: 31K
Author on LJ:  thisisbone
Author Website:  http://www.mrks.org/~bone/

Why this must be read:    Because sometimes you just get a hankering for a classic, don’t ya?

Bone’s were some of the first stories I read in the TS fandom. Hers are also what I would classify as “best loved” – they’re the ones I’ll never tire of re-reading. Apparently I’m not alone, since her stories have been recommended here and on every list I’m a part of. Still, it’s been a couple of years since someone recced her here, so it’s time to remind everyone just how good her stories are. 

 

Bone’s hallmarks are getting Jim and Blair’s “voices” to ring so true and writing scorching “first time”sex scenes. In Ceiling, she also shows the tender side of the guys after they have been a couple for a while. They are still hot for each other, but also do the day-to-day things that reveal a loving couple. Neither is the designated caretaker – both are equally strong and equally yielding, as it should be. Here, Blair recognizes Jim is experiencing burn-out. He plots to fix the problem and Jim sees right through Blair but appreciates him at the same time:

 

"What do you want me to do?" I ask him. "Tell Simon to take over our caseload for a few days so we can go commune with nature?" I think that's a reasonable approach-make him see we can't just drop everything because the planets have aligned, or whatever. He's new to all this cop shit-maybe he just doesn't get how different it is from cutting a class.

"Carpe diem, man," he says.

"Seize the day," I translate.

"Fuck me now," he says dreamily.

"Excuse me?"

"I always thought the practical idiomatic translation of 'carpe diem' was probably more along the lines of 'fuck me now,'" he says. "Either that or 'another round on me, bartender.'"
 
Why doesn't that surprise me?

"So come on, live a little," he says, popping me on the shoulder with the flat of his hand.

Wheedling. He's moved from whining to wheedling.

"Live a little? Why didn't I think of that?" I tell him. "Let me write a memo to all the crooks out there and tell them we're taking a few days off because there's an unlimited ceiling."

"Works for me," he says. God, he's got a smart mouth on him.

The sad part is that I want to do it. Getting out of Cascade sounds amazingly good. Getting away from buildings and asphalt and assholes sounds even better. I can see us up in the woods, on sleeping bags under the stars, stuffed with marshmallows and turkey dogs. I can see him seizing the day and I can see me fucking him now.

I'm almost forty and I'm giving serious consideration to playing hooky for the first time.

 Yet one more life mutation to lay at the feet of Blair Sandburg.

 

Jim and Blair trade off POVs, and besides Blair’s description of sex with Jim, we get his opinions on the Boy Scouts and using Skin So Soft as lube. Jim’s observations are just as much fun. Bone shows us an old married couple who are still lusty men *and* tender, considerate partners. In other words, Blair and Jim to a tee.

Ceiling: Unlimited 
 
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