The room was silent, aside from breathless gasps of pleasure. With the curtains drawn, the only light was the pink glow from the heart-shaped string lights decorating Angel’s walls and ceiling.

Angel’s hips bucked, the feeling of Lucifer’s lips on him, his long tongue wrapped around his cock driving him mad. He felt the vibration of Lucifer’s chuckle, of his moan as he pleasured himself with his own tail.

His claws raked down Angel’s stomach, making his back arch, his hands buried deep in Lucifer’s hair, pulling. He felt Lucifer’s hand travel lower, down his thigh to push his leg up and above him, resting it on his shoulder.

Fingers ghosted the top hem of his boot, one finger pushing in underneath it, pushing it down just barely.

 

Angel felt himself grow tense in an instant, Lucifer noticing the change immediately.

His cock fell from Lucifer’s mouth with a soft pop, leaving a string of saliva connecting them. Had his mind not been fully on Lucifer’s hand, he would have loved the sight. As it was, it was just a brief thought at the back of his mind.

“What’s wrong?”

“I, uh…” Angel’s eyes darted between Lucifer’s face and the hand on his thigh. “Your hand… my boot, it’s gonna… It’ll come down if ya… do that.”

 

Lucifer’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion, but he turned his hand, pinching the fabric between his fingers, pulling it back up. He smoothed it out, lifting Angel’s leg off him so he could slide up his body, finally dropping down next to him.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. If you don’t want to answer, that’s okay, but… is there a reason you don’t want to take them off?”

Angel chewed on his lip. “I… hate them, is all. My feet. They’re gross.”

 

Lucifer raised himself up on an arm, peering down at him. “They can’t be that bad, can they?”

“No, they’re nasty.” Raising his arms, he buried his face in his hands. “I can’t even stand to look at’em more than I have to.”

“I suppose that explains why you wore shoes even when Charlie threw that pyjama party last week.”

Sitting up, Lucifer looked like he considered something, Angel watching him between his fingers.

“Wanna see what my feet really look like?”

 

Angel raised an eyebrow, though Lucifer couldn’t see it. He pointed down toward Lucifer’s very human-looking feet. “That’s not what they’re supposed to look like?”

“I’m a shapeshifter, remember?” Lucifer shook his head. “I don’t usually show most people what they really look like, but we’ve made love for a while now, and I trust you, so I’d be okay showing them to you.”

Angel felt his cheeks flush. How Lucifer could refer to sex as lovemaking with such a straight, earnest face, he would never understand.

He sat up next to him, nodding slowly. “I guess. Sure.”

Between one moment and the next, in the time it took Angel to blink, Lucifer’s feet changed shape. The heels still looked mostly the same. What had changed were his toes, his feet now ending in something that looked closer to hooves in need of being trimmed than anything else. He watched as Lucifer wiggled them, legs outstretched in front of them.

 

“I used to hate them,” Lucifer said, staring down at his feet. “Especially the way they move, they’re more like fingers than toes with the control I have over them. And the whole foot, it’s like… I think I wouldn’t have minded as much had they just been proper hooves, but they’re this weird in-between. But I got used to them eventually, so I’m more… ambivalent toward them now, I guess.”

“They look… almost normal.” He’d seen countless people with similar feet in Hell.

“They kinda do, don’t they?” Lucifer laughed. “My point is, you’ll get used to your feet eventually. I did, though it took me a couple thousand years.”

“Haven’t ya been hidin’em just like I have, with all that shapeshiftin’?”

“I’ve been told I’m a bit of a hypocrite.”

 

Angel snorted, a laugh on his tongue. “Whoever told ya that’s right on the money.”

“Hey, I was sucking your dick not two minutes ago and now you’re being mean to me?”

“Ya said it first,” Angel teased, arm bumping against Lucifer’s. He pulled his legs to his chest, wrapping his upper arms around them. “I’m not sure I’ll get there. Lookin’ at’em makes me feel like shit.”

“You will, eventually, if you let yourself. You might not ever like them, God knows I’ll probably never like mine, but feeling kind of neutral about them is a somewhat easier place to reach.”

 

Lucifer slipped his hand into Angel’s, braiding their fingers together. Lucifer’s palm was warm against his.

“I don’t mind helping you with it. Any time you’re ready.”

 

For a while, a long minute, Angel considered it. Lucifer had been kind to him, had indulged his whims and helped him through his most recent relapses. And now, he found that he could relate to his insecurities about his body, had felt that same self-loathing. Maybe, he’d be okay with showing him something he hated so much about himself, eventually.

“How did ya… stop hatin’ yours?”

 

“Exposure therapy, essentially. Started by just letting them be bare in their real shape while doing things where I couldn’t see them, then while doing things where they were in my periphery, things like that. It’s been… a very slow process.”

“I guess ya got nothin’ but time down here,” Angel said, staring into the softly glowing lights hanging from the ceiling.

“Yeah, I’ll be here forever, so I’ve got plenty of that.”

 

Angel turned to look at him, at his gentle eyes, his soft smile. His bare arm was warm against his fur, warmer than that of a human’s skin.

“What if… I took them off but didn’t let ya look at them yet?”

Lucifer’s tail reached out to pat the blanket they’d almost pushed off the bed during their foreplay. “That’d be perfectly fine. If you want to take them off and slip under the blanket, I promise not to peek.”

As he nodded, Lucifer reached out to pull the blanket toward them, letting it fall into Angel’s lap. He closed his eyes. “Let me know when you’re comfortable.”

Angel huffed. “Yeah, that’ll probably be when the boots’re back on, but I’ll tell ya when I’m covered.”

“Fair enough.”

 

Scooting over to the edge of the bed, Angel paused, claws at the top of his boot. He bit his lip, pulling his boots off in quick motions before he could change his mind.

He slipped under the covers, pulling Lucifer into his lap, wrapping his arms around him. He felt Lucifer’s heat spread throughout his body, a warm comfort as he felt his heart thump loudly in his chest.

As he booped his nose with a fingertip, Lucifer’s eyes slid open, meeting his with a smile.

“Ya know… if I could stop hatin’ my body eventually, I think I’d like that.”

Lucifer’s tail slipped around him, wrapping around their bodies.

“It’s a relief, really, when you can let go of at least some of it.” He raised his hands, looking up at him as he cradled Angel’s cheeks. “And since I’ve got all that time on my hands, I’ll help you through it, as much as you’d like.”

 

Turning his head, Angel pressed his lips to Lucifer’s palm. “Thanks.”

He felt Lucifer’s hand move, fingers carding through the hair at the nape of his neck. His smile was as warm as his body, fine wrinkles gathered at the corners of his eyes. “No problem,” he said. He turned his head to allow Angel’s lips to meet his as Angel bent down, their kiss gentle, slow.

Feeling his anxieties swim a little less close to the surface, Angel pulled his legs up again, Lucifer curling up in the space left between his chest and his thighs. His embrace tightened, his cheek pressed into Lucifer’s soft hair.

 

He wasn’t sure how long it would take to stop hating a part of himself he’d spent so many decades finding absolutely disgusting. But he’d give it a shot.

 

At least he knew he had someone to help him through it, just as much as Lucifer had been willing to help him fight his addiction.

That alone made him think that maybe he could at least learn to hate himself a little less, if given the time.

He knew it’d be worth it. He just needed to see it through.

He’d get there eventually.

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