Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/315385.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Adam_Lambert_(Musician), Tommy_Ratliff_(Musician)
  Relationship:
      Adam_Lambert/Tommy_Ratliff
  Character:
      Adam_Lambert, Tommy_Ratliff, Leila_Lambert, Eber_Lambert, Neil_Lambert,
      Danielle_Stori
  Additional Tags:
      Alternate_Universe_-_High_School, Friends_to_Lovers, Coming_Out, First
      Time, First_Kiss, Semi-Public_Sex, Coming_In_Pants, Best_Friends, Car
      Sex, Marijuana, Bad_Sex, Awkward_Sexual_Situations, Sexting, Piercings,
      Fingerfucking, Premature_Ejaculation, Masturbation
  Stats:
      Published: 2012-01-07 Words: 68791
****** You Only Live Forever ******
by rivers_bend
Summary
     Adam hasn’t seen his best friend Tommy much since his family moved to
     the other side of LA when they were eleven, and hasn’t seen him at
     all since Tommy’s thirteenth birthday party. Then Tommy calls out of
     the blue and Adam discovers the whole thing where he thinks he’d like
     to kiss a boy someday isn’t just theoretical. But Tommy’s changed a
     lot since they were little, and Adam isn’t always sure what he’s
     thinking.
     A story of friendship, love, sex, and figuring out who you are.
Notes
     The Obvious: I do not know any of the people whose names and public
     personas are used in this story and do not mean to imply this ever
     happened.
     Content Notes [Warnings]: explicit sexual content between teenagers;
     libido-based decision making, later regretted; pot smoking; mentions
     of homophobic bullying and hatespeech.
See the end of the work for more notes
                                   Prologue
Shouting so he can be heard from downstairs, Adam’s dad calls, “Adam! Get your
butt in the car, or we’ll be late.”
Poking his head over the banister, Adam sees him standing by the front door,
keys in hand. He has his I-have-to-drive-in-LA-traffic frown on, but it’s
hardly Adam’s fault his parents decided to move to Santa Monica where you have
to drive through LA to get just about anywhere, but especially back to Burbank,
where they had a perfectly good house, and Adam had friends, and― ugh moving is
stupid. “Coming,” he says, and he is. He finally found his other shoe―in the
hamper in the bathroom, because his little brother is a total dickface―and he
has Tommy’s present, and his new school jeans have been washed and dried enough
times that they don’t look starched to the point of standing up on their own.
And he wants to see Tommy. He really does. He just doesn’t particularly want to
meet any of Tommy’s new friends.
“Now, or we’re not going at all.”
Adam shuts his bedroom door tight—his parents won’t let him get a lock even
though Neil always does stuff like stealing his shoes—and goes downstairs.
The party, when they get there, is pretty much what Adam expected. He’s the
last one to arrive, even though they only left like three minutes after the
time his dad said, and everyone is in the back yard kicking around with a
soccer ball. “Go and join them, sweetie,” Mrs. Ratliff says, taking the present
from him and waving out the door to Adam’s dad where he’s idling at the curb to
make sure Adam gets in the house okay. Adam hated soccer when he was little and
his parents thought it would be good for him, and he always thought Tommy hated
it too. He seems to like it fine now though, running around with the other
boys, smiling, barely pausing to say hi when Adam appears at the edge of the
lawn. A tall blond kid gets the ball past another kid playing goalie between a
sweatshirt and a tree, and half the boys whoop and the other half groan.
Tommy does stop then, flaps his hand at Adam and says, “C’mon, you’re on my
team.” Which is something, considering Tommy knows how well Adam plays.
“I’m Mark,” says a kid in a striped polo shirt with hair like Neil’s, and
another guy says, “Kevin,” and actually holds out his hand for Adam to shake.
Everyone else is busy wrestling the goal-scoring kid to the ground, and don’t
seem to notice Adam’s joined them.
Not that Adam ever gets a foot on the ball. No one passes it to him, and the
two guys playing forward on Tommy’s team are pretty good, so Adam just kind of
stands around near Kevin who’s alternating guarding the goal and shouting
encouragement. Finally, Mrs. Ratliff calls them in for food.
There’s a taco bar set up on the kitchen island, and Adam waits until
everyone’s done pushing and shoving to get a plate and help himself. There’s
nowhere left to sit near Tommy once Adam gets to the living room, but no one is
sitting in the big arm chair that used to be Adam’s favorite spot when he’d
watch TV with Tommy’s family when he still lived up the street. Mr. and Mrs.
Ratliff and Tommy’s sister Lisa would share the sofa, and Adam would curl up in
the chair while Tommy took the giant ottoman, using Adam’s wide chair arm as a
backrest. Adam settles into it now, and feels comfortable for the first time
since getting out of bed this morning. The conversations going on around him
become white noise, and he just watches how the boys talk to each other, who
seems to be most popular, who’s nicest to Tommy.
Adam’s idly picking the scraps of lettuce off his plate, watching Tommy watch
three of the other guys talking intently about something Adam thinks might be a
sports team, when Tommy catches Adam’s eye and smiles. It’s not the smile
Adam’s seen on his face all day, the one he’s been thinking of as new-Tommy’s
smile; it's the one Adam remembers. Even as Adam feels his own face grinning
back, he’s overwhelmed with hating his parents for moving, and Tommy’s parents
for keeping him from going to music camp the last two years, and never wanting
to drive him out to Santa Monica, and everything that means Adam hasn’t seen
his best friend in almost ten months. Kevin is sitting on the ottoman, and it’s
on the other side of the room, but Adam wants to push him off it and drag it
over so Tommy can sit next to him again and they can talk about everything,
easy, without having to be cool.
But then Mrs. Ratliff comes in and says it’s time for cake, and when Adam tries
to stand near Tommy at the table, Tommy moves away, stands between two of the
kids who didn’t even bother looking at Adam when he got there late, leaving
Adam standing mostly alone until Tommy’s dad comes out and puts a hand on
Adam’s shoulder like he feels sorry for him. Because Adam wasn’t feeling enough
like a loser already. When it comes time to sing, Adam just moves his mouth and
doesn’t make a sound. It’s the first time Adam can remember having an
opportunity to sing and not taking it.
After cake, Tommy’s dad sets up a piñata in the back yard. Tommy’s had one
every year, and a lot of times Adam got to go with him and his dad to pick it
out. This year he got one Adam’s pretty sure is supposed to be Freddie Krueger.
Adam overhears a group of the guys complaining that they’re not little kids and
piñatas are stupid. Adam’s never been all that into this part of the party, but
this year he’s glad to get a chance to hit something.
Of course the boys who complained the most about having a piñata at all are the
ones greediest with the candy when it spills out onto the ground. They’re
grabbing it up and filling their bags when parents start to arrive. Adam
doesn’t see his dad in the cluster of adults near the door, and he wishes he’d
just hurry up already. Somehow when the phone rings, Adam knows it’s him, so
he’s not surprised when Mrs. Ratliff comes over to say his dad’s going to be
about half an hour late. Adam wonders if he can go wait on the curb. Probably
Tommy’s mom won’t let him, though, even if Tommy would prefer it if he did.
But as the last of the other kids leave, Tommy smiles at him again, taking
Adam’s hand and pulling him toward the stairs. “C’mon, I want to show you
something,” he says, eager. Happy.
The floor is littered with books instead of comics, bits of electrical junk
that might have been an amp at some point instead of legos, video games instead
of board games, but thanks to the discarded clothes, looks a lot like it used
to when they were little. Tommy’s bouncing on his toes like he did whenever he
got a new toy he couldn’t wait for Adam to see, and Adam relaxes back onto the
bed when Tommy puts him there, saying “Hang on,” heading for the dresser in the
corner.
Adam’s not sure what he’s expecting, but it definitely isn’t a crumpled packet
of Marlboro Menthol Lights, a lighter peeking out of the torn corner.
“Where’d you get those?” Adam hisses, not wanting to draw the attention of
Tommy’s parents. He’s sure they wouldn’t approve.
"I lifted them. Want one?" Tommy flops down on the bed, head under the open
window, holding out the pack.
"Won't your mom smell the smoke?"
"Nah, that's why we blow it outside. You'll have to come over here though. It's
no good you sitting on the end of the bed, it's too far away." Tommy scoots up,
pulling a pillow over and propping his head on the window sill. Torn between
being scared of getting caught and scared Tommy will go back to ignoring him,
Adam moves closer as instructed. A challenge in his eyes, Tommy hands him a
cigarette and the lighter.
Adam’s never smoked, but he’s paid attention to people lighting cigarettes.
Putting the filter in his mouth, he flicks the wheel of the lighter. It takes a
few tries to spin it fast enough to spark the gas, and Tommy’s watching the
whole time, mouth twitching. Adam wants to say, “fuck you,” wants to shove the
cigarette back at Tommy and tell him to light it himself if he wants one, but
he just keeps trying. When Adam finally gets the flame to touch the end of the
cigarette, he sucks in too hard and ends up coughing violently, flailing,
dropping the lighter and nearly burning Tommy in the face with the glowing
butt-end.
"Hey! Watch it!" Tommy plucks the cigarette from his fingers, putting it
between his own lips. "And quiet down will you? Mom will be up here if you keep
that up."
Adam leans over Tommy to get the other pillow to muffle his coughing, and feels
a warm brush of fingers on his waist, making him jerk backwards and nearly fall
off the bed. When he finally gets the coughing under control, Adam looks at
Tommy over the top of the pillow, finds him watching Adam through his
eyelashes, cigarette held loosely between his fingers, ribbon of smoke trailing
out the window. He probably thinks he looks like a rock star or something, but
he just looks stupid. Adam keeps the pillow over his face. What the hell
happened to his best friend? Since Adam saw him last he’s turned into kind of a
jerk.
They sit in silence, Adam wishing his dad would just get here already, until,
taking a final drag, Tommy stubs out the butt on the windowsill and pushes
himself up on his elbows. "You okay now?" he asks.
Still watching from behind the pillow, Adam nods. Tommy’s staring at him like
he’s not sure if Adam’s telling the truth or not. Adam doesn't know what to
say, so he just stares back.
Shifting his weight to one arm, Tommy reaches out and draws the pillow away.
Adam lets him. Reaching out again, Tommy takes Adam's wrist and pulls him
forwards, ignoring Adam's resistance, tightening his grip so Adam overbalances
and falls onto Tommy's chest. Adam doesn’t have the first clue what’s going on.
His heart is fluttering against Tommy's ribs, and Tommy’s face is so close Adam
can’t focus on it, then there’s a hand on the back of his head and Tommy's
mashing his lips into Adam’s, sliding his tongue wetly between them, tasting of
smoke and chocolate. He’s kissing him. They’re kissing. Kissing, and it’s not
like they’re playing spin the bottle or truth or dare or any of those other
games Adam was glad he wasn’t going to have to worry about when he found out
Tommy wasn’t having girls at his party. They’re just here in Tommy’s room and
Tommy’s kissing him for no reason at all.
Planting his hands on Tommy's shoulders, Adam shoves away, slides off the bed,
runs down the stairs and out the front door. He’s four streets away when he
sees his father's car turn the corner. Luckily, his dad’s got his bluetooth in,
and by the time he’s finished his phone call, he forgets to ask Adam why he was
in the street instead of at Tommy’s house.
===============================================================================

===============================================================================

It’s the tail end of summer, and Adam’s watching Rachel Maddow with his dad,
waiting for it to be over so he can steal the remote and watch Project Runway.
He started watching it in self defense because his friend Danielle’s obsessed
with it and talks about it all the time, but it’s kind of fascinating how they
turn all those scraps into actual outfits, and how do you not like Tim Gunn?
Even Adam’s mom watches sometimes because she thinks he’s a sweetheart. (Adam
isn’t sure that’s the word he’d use, but whatever.) When the phone rings, Eber
doesn’t even glance away from the television, so Adam goes to get it.
“Hello?” He’s hoping it’s for his dad so he can maybe get the TV early and
doesn’t have to risk Eber trying to watch whatever’s on after Rachel. But the
voice on the other end says, “Adam?”
Since he finally got his own phone when he started high school, Dani and the
kids from his theater group mostly call him on that. The voice definitely
sounds like someone his age, though. “Yes?” he says.
“Hey, it’s Tommy. Whatchu doin’?”
“I― Tommy?” It’s been three years. First Adam was too embarrassed to call, then
he was mad that Tommy didn’t call since it was his fault things were weird,
then it had just been too long, and he had no idea what he’d say, anyway.
“Yeah, so do you wanna get some pizza tomorrow night?”
Adam’s heart is racing, his face and chest are all prickly, he can hardly
breathe, and Tommy just sounds like they’re ten again, playing all day and
Tommy wants to know if Adam can stay for dinner.
“Pizza?” It would be really awesome if Adam could do anything but repeat
Tommy’s words back at him.
“CPK at Hollywood and Highland. Six o’clock okay for you?”
“Won’t it be kind of crowded on a Friday night?” Which sounds nothing like Why
are you calling me after three years to go have pizza in tourist hell? which is
what Adam’s thinking.
“It’s usually worse after seven. It’ll be cool.”
Adam wants to ask why now, and why pizza, but apparently the part of him that
still lies in bed at night and wonders what Tommy’s doing, and wishes he at
least had a Facebook so Adam could see what he’s up to without having to have
that awkward, so remember how you kissed me that one time? conversation, is in
charge of his mouth right now, because he says, “Okay, six o’clock,” instead.
On the plus side, it doesn’t seem like Tommy’s planning on having that
conversation anyway. Adam is grateful for that as Tommy says, “Later,” and
hangs up.
“Who was that?” Eber asks as Adam sits down on the sofa again. Rachel is
talking to the guy with red hair, so the show must be almost over.
“Tommy.”
“Tommy Joe? How’s he doing?”
Adam’s starting to wonder if he’s the only one who noticed that he and Tommy
haven’t said one word to each other in three years.
“We’re having pizza tomorrow night. I guess I’ll find out then?”
“Your mom and I are going out, so we can’t drive you. Are you meeting somewhere
you can take the bus?”
Adam forgot his parents had their supper club. At least he doesn’t have to
watch his brother. “Yeah,” he says. “Hollywood. I’ll be fine.” Adam can’t wait
til he’s sixteen. Having to get the bus everywhere blows.
“Text us if you’re going anywhere afterwards, and absolutely no getting in a
car with anyone under eighteen.”
Eber reminds Adam of this rule every time he leaves the house. Adam’s stopped
saying, “I know, Dad,” or trying for sarcasm; he just says, “Okay.” He doesn’t
even know anyone under eighteen who drives except Marco from his theater group,
and he’s a total stickler for rules and would never risk losing his license
driving other kids around.
“And tell Tommy your mom and I say hi,” Eber says as he hands Adam the remote
of his own volition and wanders off in the direction of the kitchen. Ignoring
the bizarre turn his life has taken in the last fifteen minutes, Adam gets his
phone out of his pocket and texts Danielle: “So who you think’s gettin
eliminated 2nite?”
 
Tommy was right that even on a Friday, at six o’clock there isn’t too bad a
wait for tables. Adam doesn’t see a sign anywhere that all parties must be
present before anyone can be seated, so he puts his name down even though Tommy
isn’t there yet. It’s about ten past six when they call him, and no one
protests when he says his friend is on his way, they just ask if he wants a
drink while he’s waiting. By six thirty, Adam’s starting to wonder if this is
Tommy’s idea of a joke. Scared the waiter’s patience is going to run out, Adam
orders garlic bread he doesn’t really want, then wonders why he bothered. He
looks like a total loser, all alone on a Friday night in a crowded restaurant.
The ice is melting in his Coke, making it taste slightly bitter. Adam’s flicked
his phone open and closed a hundred times even though it’s useless because he
doesn’t even know if Tommy has a cell, and it’s not like Tommy has Adam’s
number to send him a message, even if he does.
“Anything else?” Adam’s waiter interrupts his internal argument about staying
or going. Fuck it. Adam doesn’t have to put up with this. There’s bound to be a
movie starting somewhere nearby just after seven, and at least in a crowded
theater it’s not so obvious you’re alone.
“Just―“ Adam starts, intending to get the check and get the hell out, but then
a familiar shape slouches through the door. Tommy’s taller now, has a ring in
his lip, and another in his eyebrow, and his short brown hair has been bleached
bright white, but he still has that hungry-eyed look Adam remembers from the
last time he saw him. The waiter follows Adam's gaze, flaring his nostrils
slightly at the boy in baggy jeans and an oversized black trench coat weaving
his way through the tables. Tommy doesn't exactly blend in with the crowd.
"I'll come back to take your order," the waiter says, sounding totally
unimpressed. Adam isn't impressed either, and wishes again that he'd left after
the first twenty minutes.
Pulling out his chair and sliding bonelessly into it, Tommy stretches out one
booted foot and nudges Adam's ankle. "Hey. Sorry I'm late. Places to go, people
to do…"
Even though he’s pissed, Adam shrugs like it doesn't matter. Tommy’s―god. He’s
like David Bowie meets Bender in The Breakfast Club (which is still Adam’s
mom’s favorite movie, even though it’s like a hundred years old). If Adam’s
really honest with himself, he’ll admit that there were a few moments since
Tommy’s call that he’s thought about Tommy maybe wanting to kiss him again. But
there is no way this kid wants to kiss Adam. That would be like Bender wanting
to kiss Brian or something. Not going to happen. Tommy’s hot. And cool. And all
the things Adam isn’t. This was such a bad idea.
"We eating? I'm hungry." Tommy manages to sound like Adam’s the one nearly
forty-five minutes late. Like it’s his fault they aren't already ordering
dessert.
You’re the one who’s late,” Adam snaps. “We’d be eating already if you'd gotten
here on time. What do you even want from me?” Adam isn't usually snippy to his
friends, but he’s not even sure Tommy still falls into that category.
Tommy's lip ring twitches in amusement, but he snags his menu and doesn't say
anything.
Adam chose when he first got here, but picks up his menu again for something to
look at. He sees movement out of the corner of his eye and looks up to see
Tommy picking up Adam's Coke and putting Adam's straw in his mouth. The tip of
his tongue darts out for a moment, making Adam's stomach lurch uncomfortably.
He stares dumbly as Tommy sucks up a mouthful of soda, pulling the straw out of
his mouth before swallowing. "Kind of watery," Tommy says.
"The ice melted while I was waiting for you. What are you doing drinking my
Coke anyway?" Adam fantasizes about pushing away from the table and striding
out of the restaurant, leaving Tommy alone to pay for the glass of watery soda
and the cold, rubbery garlic bread. He can sit there like he’s the one who’s
been stood up. Instead, Adam snatches the glass back, plucking the straw out
and throwing it on the table, and drinks down the rest in one swallow.
The waiter’s back. "What can I get you?"
Tommy goes first. "I'll have a Margherita pizza and a beer."
"I don't think so. Pizza and a Coke, maybe."
Tommy looks for a moment like he’s going to argue, but backs off under the
waiter's stare. "Fine, I'll have a Coke."
"I'll have a Giardiniera and another Coke too, please." Adam’s aware he’s being
extra polite out of embarrassment but he can't stop.
"Margherita and a Giardiniera and two Cokes." Rolling his eyes, the waiter
tucks his pad into his apron and heads towards the back.
"Did you really think he was going to bring you a beer?"
"I've gotten beer before. Some places don't ask for ID. They can't do anything
to you for asking."
Adam doesn't know what to say to that. Tommy’s fifteen. There’s no way he's
ever been served alcohol in a restaurant. Tired of whatever game Tommy’s
playing, Adam says, "So what are we doing here?"
"I like it here. The pizzas are good."
"But what am I doing here? Why did you call me? We haven't spoken in three
years. Why now?"
Tommy worries at the ring in his lip with his teeth. "I just thought you might
like to get a pizza is all. No special reason."
The waiter comes back with their drinks and Adam turns his attention to the
other customers as he toys with his new straw. The other one―the one that’s
been in Tommy's mouth―is still sitting on the table, right by Adam's wrist. He
can feel Tommy's eyes on him, but works hard to ignore them. It’s awkward as
hell, but Adam isn’t going to be the one to break. Tommy’s the one who wanted
to do this, he can be the one to make conversation if he’s not even going to
answer Adam’s simple questions. They’re still sitting in silence when their
food comes out. Adam picks up his knife and fork and starts cutting.
Like he was just waiting for food to loosen his tongue, Tommy says, “So do you
really like all those vegetables, or do you just order them to be a good boy?"
"I like vegetables." Adam tries to match Tommy's look of disdain. "Isn't that
pizza boring? You could have gotten pepperoni or something."
"I like it better like this." Tommy sounds irritated, but then he breaks,
grinning, looking for the first time like the kid Adam remembers, and he twirls
a piece of cheese around his finger with a flourish, popping it into his mouth.
Adam can't help but smile back at the display. "Classy."
Still smiling, Tommy says, "Simple pleasures."
After that things start to get easier. Tommy drops some of his attitude and
they just talk. About school, and music, and what movies they've seen recently.
Definitely not about Tommy’s birthday party and what happened afterwards,
though every time Tommy starts a sentence with ‘remember when’ Adam cringes
inside, but Tommy just brings up old games they used to play and teachers they
used to have, and the summer they taught Adam’s bunkmate how to swim in the
pool at camp. By the time they’re nibbling at the last edges of crust, Adam’s
actually glad he came.
They split the bill 50/50, even though Adam’s pizza cost more and Tommy didn’t
eat any of the garlic bread. “Least I could do for making you wait,” Tommy says
when Adam tries to argue. Adam takes it as the apology Tommy clearly intends it
to be.
"Can you hang some more?" Tommy asks as they push through the doors of the
restaurant into the street.
Since Adam’s parents won’t be back until late, and it’s not like he has a fixed
curfew anyway, he nods, and they head away from the madness of Hollywood
Boulevard until they get to a quiet street where the trees and parked cars seem
part of some stage set, illuminated by the never-really-darkness of the city.
Seeing a little pocket park at the end of the block, Tommy skips ahead,
twirling round and walking backwards so he can watch Adam. He narrowly avoids
trampling a small dog pulled out of the way by its owner at the last moment,
and then falls off the curb, laughing at Adam's wide eyes. "Come on. Hurry up,"
he calls, and Adam quickens his pace until they’re side by side. They cross the
road to the park.
Under the shadowed side of a tree, Tommy stops and leans against the trunk. He
looks dangerous, his spiky hair the only thing Adam can see clearly in the
dark. It’s the exciting kind of dangerous, though, not the serial killer kind.
Adam’s pretty sure that under the lip ring and bravado, Tommy’s still the kid
who let Adam drive his KITT car the first day they met. Not a hundred percent
sure, though, so Adam stays in the circle of light from the streetlamp.
Tommy gestures Adam closer with two slim fingers protruding from the overlong
sleeve of his coat. "C'mere."
Adam takes a step closer. Impatiently, Tommy gestures again, and Adam steps
close enough for Tommy to grab the front of his jacket. It’s still not serial-
killer scary, but Adam is definitely reconsidering the idea that Tommy’s
forgotten all about his party and would never want to kiss him. Looking down at
Tommy's hand fisted around the edge of denim hanging open over his t-shirt, he
imagines he can feel the heat of Tommy's knuckles on his stomach through the
thin cotton and millimeters of air between them. Tommy tugs until Adam has his
right foot between Tommy's boots, until their thighs are nearly touching. Adam
can't fill his lungs. He stops breathing altogether when Tommy's hand releases
his jacket and snakes around his waist instead.
"No running off this time," Tommy says, before pulling Adam against him with
the hand on the small of his back. Adam feels Tommy's fingers twist in his
hair, and then they’re kissing. Nothing like it looks on TV, it’s all sloppy
with open mouths and sharp teeth, and it kind of feels like Tommy is biting
Adam’s lips, which is not something Adam would have said he liked the sound of,
but when it’s actually happening, it’s pretty awesome. Adam even likes metal
taste of Tommy’s lip ring. They’re in a park, and it’s not that late, and
anyone could see them, but Adam can’t seem to tear himself away from Tommy’s
grip. He’s known for a while now that if he ever kissed anyone he hoped it
would be a boy, but he never imagined it out in the open like this. He’d
thought more like his college dorm, or at least someone’s house. Adam checks in
with his legs, but they definitely don’t seem to be planning on running.
Releasing Adam's hair, leaving his scalp tingling, Tommy drops his hand to
Adam's ass, canting his hips forwards, grinding against Adam's thigh as he
pulls Adam hard against his hipbone. Adam can't tell if the soft noises
reaching his ears are coming from his throat or Tommy's, or if they're swapping
moans as well as spit. He pulls away, gasping for breath, flushed hot but with
gooseflesh stirring the hair at the back of his neck.
Dropping his head back against the tree, Tommy breathes, "Fuck. When do you
have to be home?"
Adam takes a second to figure out what the words mean and another to get what
the question implies. He tries to extricate himself from Tommy's grip, but
Tommy’s stronger than he looks.
"No. Come on. You want this." Tommy rubs lewdly against Adam's hard-on. "Let me
touch you." The hand on Adam's ass moves towards his fly. Gripping Tommy’s
wrist tightly, stopping him, Adam looks wildly around to see if anyone’s
watching them. "Or come home with me. No one's there. Just for a little while.
Please."
Adam does want this. He never thought he’d get it, not for years, anyway, and
not with someone who looks like Tommy looks, and he’s still not sure he’s ready
to admit he thinks about boys like this to his parents or his friends or
anyone, but there is no way he’s saying no.
When Adam nods, Tommy kisses him once, hard on the lips, and taking his hand,
runs for the metro.
They have to stand on the train, but once they get off the metro and emerge
onto the street again it’s quiet. Too late for commuters and too early for the
nightlife crowd to be heading home, the bus when it comes is almost empty.
There are four girls near the front laughing and shrieking over something one
of them is holding, and a guy sleeping with his head against the window, but
Tommy and Adam are alone in the back. Tommy’s hand is on Adam's dick through
his jeans, the skirt of his coat draped over Adam's lap. Adam wants to stop
him, wants to thrust into that hand until he comes, wants to suck on Tommy's
lip ring and tongue. Instead he sits, stock still, watching Tommy's reflection
in the glass as Tommy smirks in the direction of the giggling gang.
They wind through Studio City, Tommy's hand a constant tease making Adam's
breath catch and his thighs clench so tightly they ache. When the girls pile
off the bus Tommy leans in and bites Adam's earlobe. "Next stop," he whispers,
and squeezes to emphasize his point. Adam bites his tongue and shuts his eyes,
wishing desperately that Tommy would just leave him alone for a minute to let
him get some air in his lungs.
A group of older boys, sixteen or seventeen years old, push and shove their way
to the fare box. Tommy apparently has some sense of self preservation left; by
the time they’ve paid the driver, his hands are in his own lap and he’s leaning
away from Adam, looking out the opposite window. The bus lurches, knocking the
smallest boy hard into the biggest. The tall one shoves him into a seat. "Hey,
faggot, watch where you're going."
Adam thinks he might throw up. The Tommy he knew would never talk to strangers
on a bus, never do anything to call attention to himself, but this new Tommy
might do anything. Adam’s night can only handle so much excitement.
Nothing else happens though. The small boy holds out a placating hand, and
says, "Sorry, sorry. I just lost my balance." Everyone ignores him.
When they've all settled into seats, Tommy stands and presses the bell.
Hunching in an effort to hide the bulge in his jeans, Adam follows him over the
obstacle course of sprawling legs to the stairs. The cool air when the bus
doors open to release them into the night is a relief.
They’re still several blocks from Tommy's house, one street up from the corner
where Eber picked up Adam after the first time Tommy kissed him. “Shit,” Adam
says. “Gotta text my parents.” He doesn’t say that he’s pretty sure his dad
meant the movies or something, not Burbank, when he said Adam could go
somewhere after dinner, because he doesn’t want to seem like a dork who has to
check in every time he does anything, but Tommy doesn’t comment. Adam’s had
plenty of practice texting and walking, so letting his parents know he’s safe
but will be home late doesn’t slow them down. He’s about to slide his phone
back into his pocket when Tommy grabs it from him.
“Giving you my number,” Tommy says before Adam has time to protest. Adam’s
distracted by Tommy’s fingers as he slides the phone back into Adam’s pocket,
and doesn’t notice that Tommy doesn’t put Adam’s number in his own phone.
By the time he’s over the brush of Tommy’s fingertips, they’re passing Adam’s
old house―painted something dark now, instead of the pale gray it was when he
lived there―then they’re in Tommy’s front yard, then on his porch, then inside
with the door shut and nothing but the way Adam seems to be totally paralyzed
to stop them kissing again.
“Want a drink?” Tommy offers.
Adam shakes his head.
“Wanna go upstairs?”
Licking his lips nervously, Adam nods.
Tommy's bedroom is no cleaner than the last time Adam saw it, and Tommy has to
kick aside a pile of books and clothes to clear a path from the door to the
bed. The bed Adam’s sat on more times than he could count, the bed he’s slept
on when Tommy was being generous and taking the sleeping bag on the floor, the
bed where Adam had his first and only kiss. Until tonight. Tonight there has
definitely been kissing. And now there’s a bed and they’re going to do more
than kissing, probably, if Adam can just keep breathing.
Like all of this isn’t remotely terrifying, Tommy flings his coat casually over
his desk chair and urges Adam closer so he can push Adam's jacket off his
shoulders to get lost in the general mess on the floor. Adam can hear his own
mom preaching about hanging things up when you’re done with them, and Tommy’s
mom telling Tommy that Adam will have to go home if he doesn’t get all the
dirty clothes in the hamper by the time she counts to ten, and Adam really
doesn’t want to be thinking about anyone’s parents right now. “C’mon,” Tommy
says. “Don’t you wanna―“
Adam does want to, except now Tommy’s tugging at Adam's shirt like he’s
planning on taking it off. The lamp on his desk is shining on Adam like a
spotlight, and Adam isn’t ready to be shirtless in the spotlight. Not with
Tommy, who seems to have skipped the part of puberty where your height hasn’t
quite caught up with your weight, and who doesn’t seem to have any pimples or
freckles or any of the other things that make Adam frown when he looks in the
mirror. It’s not like when they were little and it didn’t matter what either of
them looked like. Tommy wants to kiss Adam now, and Adam would like him to keep
wanting that. Squeaking a little in protest, Adam takes Tommy’s hands off the
hem of his shirt, lifting them around his neck, then puts his own on Tommy’s
waist like they’re slow dancing.
“I want to,” he says when Tommy looks at him quizzically.
Fortunately, Tommy doesn’t ask questions, just takes advantage of his new grip
to pull Adam down, kissing and biting the spot under his ear. It feels so
fucking good, like when Tommy was grinding on him in the park, and Adam forgets
all about wishing Tommy would let him leave his shirt on, and sinks onto the
bed, pulling Tommy down on top of him.
They grapple, mouths and hands hot on each other's skin, Adam thinking, this is
making out. This is making out. This is making out, until he’s not thinking
about anything at all except how Tommy needs to be closer. Everything is hot.
So, so hot, and clothing gets pushed and tugged and stretched, legs tangle and
press, and Adam wonders if it’s actually possible to go on kissing forever.
Finally they lie panting―Adam with one foot on the floor, Tommy half on top of
him, his booted feet hanging off the side of the bed. "No shoes on the bed,”
Tommy says, somehow sounding both firm and like the rule is a surprise to him
right now.
Disentangling his fist from Tommy's twisted t-shirt, Adam allows him to sit up
and unlace his boots. Adam would like to take his own shoes off, but Tommy’s
sitting between his splayed legs and he isn't sure he can sit up. Or convince
his fingers to work. Besides, he likes watching Tommy taking his boots off. He
likes it even more when Tommy takes his shirt off next.
When he realizes Adam’s just lying there, Tommy nudges his thigh, then fingers
the hem of Adam's shirt, running the flat of his hand across Adam's stomach.
"Shirt off too." That idea’s still not Adam’s favorite, but the bed’s mostly in
shadow, and the need to have Tommy closer is still buzzing under his skin, so
Adam lets Tommy pull him upright. While he’s toeing off his shoes, Tommy takes
care of his shirt for him. Despite his determination to be as casual about it
as Tommy is, Adam crosses his arms over his chest and shivers in the draft
coming around the edge of the window.
"Do you want to get under the covers?"
Adam nods.
They lie down next to each other, comforter up to their shoulders. Adam thinks
now that they’re actually in Tommy’s bed it might be like when they were six
and hiding under the covers with a flashlight trying to finish the Lego Death
Star after final, final lights out time, but it’s nothing like that at all, and
he isn't sure what he’s supposed to do. But then he doesn't have to think about
it because Tommy’s pushing him down onto his back and kissing him again, and
Adam's arms wrap around Tommy's waist of their own accord.
Making out with no shirts on is totally amazing; Adam could probably get off
forever on just thinking about Tommy lying on top of him like this. The heat
and weight of him, the slightly sticky friction as they shift and move, and
god, the way Tommy feels under his hands. Tommy’s skin is thin and stretched
tightly over his bones, but it moves under Adam's fingers, softer and more
pliable than he expected, not really that different from Adam’s own. Then
Tommy’s hand is on Adam's stomach again, fingers teasing under his waistband,
and all thoughts of skin are replaced with a need to have those fingers wrapped
around him, tempered, as Tommy’s fingers grow more determined, by a fear of
Tommy touching him there without the dubious protection of denim.
Tommy apparently has no such fear because he’s fumbling with Adam's button and
zipper, pushing Adam's boxers out of the way, and sighing into Adam's mouth as
his hand reaches flesh. "You're so hard.”
Adam face heats up and he starts to protest, but Tommy’s kissing him again and
it seems that wasn’t a complaint. Tommy’s hard too―Adam can feel it against his
hip. He must want this, or he wouldn’t be here, his thigh heavy on Adam's leg,
his fingers cupping the back of Adam's head. Taking a deep breath, Adam thrusts
into the hand stroking him, tilting his head back, remembering how it felt to
have Tommy kissing his neck. Tommy chases his lips, and Adam turns his head
more, dragging air in through his mouth against the intensity of the hand
moving on his dick, hoping Tommy will get the hint.
“You okay?” Tommy asks, slowing down to a torturous pace.
“Fine,” Adam gasps, going to kiss him again. He doesn’t want Tommy to feel like
he’s doing something wrong.
“What d’you want?” Tommy speeds up again jerking Adam off, but he’s propped on
one elbow, out of reach of Adam’s lips.
“Nothing,” Adam tries, too embarrassed to ask Tommy for anything more that what
he’s already doing. “That’s good.”
But Tommy nudges Adam’s face to the side again with his nose, and kisses the
spot below Adam’s ear. “This?” he asks.
Adam can only jerk in response, the whisper of a whimper escaping his throat.
“Yeah,” Tommy says, does it again, mouth open this time, wetter, the ring in
his lip sliding over Adam’s skin. “Yeah. You like that.”
Adam really, really does. It doesn’t even matter that Tommy’s getting
distracted from the smooth tugs on Adam’s dick, his rhythm going ragged,
concentrating too much on the base. Adam’s clutching him with abandon, fingers
digging into ribs and ass and waist, up to grip his shoulders, then back down
again, trying to pull him in while he arches up into Tommy’s mouth.
“More?” Tommy asks, breathless, and Adam starts whining, “Yeah, yeah, yeah.”
Licking, sucking, kissing his way down Adam’s throat, getting rougher as he
goes, Tommy nips at the skin over his collarbone and then bites hard into his
chest, sucking a bruise up into his mouth, edges defined by the twin curves of
his teeth. It hurts more than Adam expected, the blood throbbing against
Tommy’s tongue and in Adam’s cock, and he gasps, twisting against the weight of
Tommy's leg, thrusting hard into the fingers tightening around him, coming
messily over himself and Tommy's hand and the sheets.
When he looks down at Adam, Tommy has a gleam in his eye that makes Adam look
away. It’s like Tommy can see every thought Adam’s ever jerked off to in
secret, and Adam can't face anyone else knowing about all that. "I should go,"
he mumbles into the pillow.
"Not yet." Tommy takes Adam's hand and places it over the bulge in his jeans.
"My turn." And god, right, Adam totally isn’t going to be that guy. The selfish
lover guy who only cares about his own orgasms. It’s not like he spends all his
time reading his mom’s magazines or anything, but he’s read enough to know
that’s not cool. Besides which, wow. That’s Tommy’s dick, like right there, and
Adam is really into that. Like, super-a-lot, being-gay-is-not-just-a-theory
into that.
None of the porn or the jerking off or the fantasizing prepared Adam for the
feel of another guy's dick in his palm. It isn't like having his hands on
himself; it’s the wrong angle and a different shape. But even with the wrong
hand, it feels good. So fucking good. But still the wrong angle and Adam hasn’t
got the first clue what the hell he’s doing, and Tommy is seriously in a hurry,
undoing buttons, shoving Adam’s hand down and in.
"No, I'm right handed," Adam blurts at the first touch of skin. He’s got no
hope at all of being good if he’s doing this with the wrong hand.
Trying to get a better position, Tommy rolls further on top of Adam, but
there’s no room on the other side of him to lie. "Stupid single bed. Scoot
over." Tommy lifts up a bit to give Adam wiggle room.
It shouldn’t be this difficult, but it takes forever to get themselves situated
so Adam can use his right hand. When he’s got it, though, it feels even better.
It’s still an awkward angle, and it’s strange to have all the sensation in his
hand with none on his dick, but Adam is definitely into boys. He can feel the
weight of Tommy, the heat, and the softness of his skin, and even better,
they’ve pushed the covers off in their maneuvering and Adam can see the way
Tommy’s dick pops out of the circle of his fingers, how red it is, how it’s
getting so so slippery the more Adam squeezes and pulls.
“You’re―“ he starts, but it might be rude to point out that Tommy leaks a lot
more than Adam does, and besides, Tommy’s shaking and his eyes are squeezed
shut tight, and there’s no way he’s even listening. Adam always likes it fast
and tight right before he comes, and he hopes Tommy does too. Everything’s so
much, hot and close, Tommy’s breath on the side of Adam’s face as he stares
down at Tommy’s dick in his hand, watches Tommy’s hips lift as he shoots up
over his chest and belly, and Adam thinks maybe he could go again. That it
could be like an endless cycle of handjobs and kissing. But when Tommy drops
his head heavily to the pillow, all the tension leaking out of him, Adam rests
his head on Tommy's shoulder, sharp need dialing back to a satisfied hum. He
did that. He made Tommy come all over himself. Curious, Adam runs a finger
through the cooling streaks on Tommy's skin and puts it to his tongue.
Tommy shifts, twisting to look at him. "What are you doing?"
Adam doesn't know. "I don't know."
"You're different than I remember."
Adam tenses. Tommy’s obviously done this before. Maybe Adam’s doing it wrong.
Probably you’re only supposed to taste a guy’s jizz when you’re actually
sucking his dick.
Tommy pokes him gently. “Never said that was a bad thing."
Adam pulls the blanket back up so it’s covering Tommy’s dick and the come that
Adam still kind of wants to play with.
“Really. It’s cool.” Tommy sounds like he means it.
Adam relaxes a little under Tommy's stroking fingers, says, "So seriously,
why'd you call me?"
Tommy squeezes him tighter. "This wasn't a good enough reason?"
Giving himself a moment to think of an answer, Adam pulls the covers higher,
tucking them in. And realizes that’s an answer in itself.
"Thought so," Tommy says into Adam's hair.
 
No curfew doesn't mean Adam can stay out all night without calling, but by the
time he wakes up again, the buses have stopped running. The rule is that it's
never too late to phone, but the chances of his dad wanting to drive out to
Burbank at half past two in the morning are pretty slim. Adam's not sure if
Tommy's parents are out for the night or if they're away, or maybe they came
home while Adam and Tommy were asleep and they're gonna freak out if he's still
here when they wake up. He's not sure what to do.
"Stop wiggling," Tommy mutters, pushing Adam's chest with a sleep-heavy hand.
"Sleepin'."
"I think I have to go." Adam whispers, in case the Ratliffs are home.
"No buses 'til like 4:30." He still doesn't open his eyes, but Tommy moves his
leg, making Adam realize he has no feeling at all in his left foot where
Tommy's been crushing it.
Adam really has to call his folks. But the last thing he wants to do is get in
trouble with Tommy's parents. "Are your parents home?" At least he can know how
quiet he needs to be.
"Nah. Hawaii."
Adam would be pissed if his parents went to Hawaii without him, but Tommy just
sounds bored. Actually, Adam might sound bored at two in the morning, too, and
he'd be fine if they went to New Jersey to visit relatives without him, and
Adam's pretty sure he remembers that's where some of Tommy's family lives.
"Sorry," Adam says, still whispering, but not as quietly. "I've really gotta
call my dad." He tries to lean over Tommy to get to his jacket on the floor,
but it's too far to reach. "Sorry," he says again, and starts climbing over
Tommy's legs.
"Gotta piss anyway," Tommy grumbles, finally opening his eyes and squinting at
Adam in the light from his computer screen. "C'we go back to sleep after,
though?”
That at least answers Adam's question about whether Tommy wants him to leave
now. While Tommy's in the bathroom Adam checks his phone. Two missed calls and
a text saying that if ‘I’m going to Tommy’s house’ meant spending the night he
should have said that.
Adam calls his parents and explains that he's safe and still has his bus pass
and will be home in the morning. “You need to tell us what you’re doing, Adam,
your mother and I aren’t mind readers.”
“I did text,” Adam reminds him. Even though it will just mean a more long-
winded version of the SMS lecture his dad already sent.
Tommy comes back while Eber is droning on at Adam about being more precise when
he’s sending texts and telling him to get some sleep and they'll talk more in
the morning. Tommy's not wearing any of the clothes he fell asleep in. He's not
wearing any clothes at all.
"Oh," Adam says, thumbing the hang-up on his phone.
"Fucking jizz all over my pants," Tommy mutters, climbing under the blankets.
He holds them up like he's waiting for Adam to join him.
Adam would love to join him. As soon as his legs unfreeze and his eyes stop
trying to bore into the shadows to see Tommy's dick.
"Should I―" he says, trying to encompass take my jeans off too and get in and
jump you again or let you sleep in a single gesture, but probably failing to
convey any of them.
"Just fucking get over here," Tommy says.
In a fit of panicked compromise Adam takes off his jeans and leaves on his
come-stained boxers, crawling under the sheets into the tiny space Tommy's left
for him. Single beds kind of suck for sharing once you've hit puberty. Except
for how he's forced to lie practically on top of Tommy. Naked Tommy. Oh god.
Probably some, like, eighty-year-old guy with prostate cancer or something
could avoid getting a boner sharing a single bed with a naked dude who just
gave him his first hand job, but Adam is so not that guy. He tries to hunch his
hips and keep it to himself―since turning over now would be completely
obvious―but Tommy throws his arm across Adam's waist and wriggles closer.
"We're both guys," he says, but his voice is all slurry like he's almost asleep
again, so that obviously means, I don't care if you're hard rather than, here
let me take care of that for you.
Adam's actually pretty okay with that. His dad and Tommy can't both be wrong;
he probably should get some sleep. It won't be the first time he's drifted off
in the middle of the night with a tent in his shorts.
 
Tommy's still asleep when Adam wakes up again, this time with the sun glinting
into his eyes. Adam squints at the offending reflective surface and finds a
cheap-ass sports trophy, the same one that's still on the top shelf of his
parents' bookshelves at home, from Adam's one year playing soccer when he was
eight. Despite how much Adam had sucked, his team had made it to league
championship even with the requirement that all the players, including Adam,
played at least half the game.
The trophy seems out of place with all Tommy's goth rocker paraphernalia, but
looking around there are other things too that are clearly just left over from
another era: a flocked kangaroo coin bank Adam remembers Tommy getting for
Christmas from his dad's friend when they were seven or so; a handful of
Matchbox cars; an old clay handprint they made in kindergarten; a plastic
slinky. That's the thing about not moving. You don't ever have to sort through
your stuff.
Adam finds the dim glow of numbers coming from Tommy's clock. 7:37. He really
should go. It's gonna take like two hours to get home from here, and he doesn't
want to try his parents' patience. He tries to wake Tommy up, but only gets a
grumble in response, so he finds his clothes and uses the bathroom to get
cleaned up and dressed before trying again.
"I'll call you," Tommy murmurs when Adam finally gets him to understand that he
has to leave.
"I'm not some girl," Adam says, because he's not, but he really kind of wants
to see Tommy again, even if they don't do the sex stuff―the sex stuff is
awesome, but he really did miss his best friend―so he adds, "I'm going to see
that Hitchcock thing at the ArcLight next week if you want to come."
"Hell, yeah, Hitchcock," Tommy says, but his eyes are closing again and he's
tucking the covers up under his chin.
Adam sees himself out.
===============================================================================

Tommy doesn't call, and doesn't text back when Adam texts him to check if he
wants to meet up first or meet at the theater for the Hitchcock retrospective.
It’s not that there's any reason Adam can't call Tommy, except once he's texted
him three times and gotten no reply he feels like calling might be edging into
stalker territory. Cosmo and Teen Vogue don’t exactly tell you what you’re
supposed to do when the guy you were best friends with your whole childhood
calls you up after three years, acts like a jerk, gives you a handjob in his
bed, then doesn’t return your texts.
Since he was going to go on his own anyway before he asked Tommy, Adam just
does what he’d usually do, which is turn up at the box office forty-five
minutes before doors to get tickets, then go get fish tacos while he waits for
the doors to open. He doesn’t text Tommy to see if he should get an extra seat,
but he does maybe send one just to let Tommy know he’s over at Baja Fresh, just
in case. His phone buzzes two seconds after he hits send, and his heart jumps,
but it’s only Danielle telling him to have fun and not let The Birds give him
nightmares.
Sitting in the theater on his own waiting for Rope to start, Adam reminds
himself it's not like they're boyfriends. They used to know each other and they
had some pizza and they hooked up. Tommy probably hooks up a lot. He's really
fucking hot, and cool and all confident and shit. And sure, after a rocky start
it had been almost like old times, talking and joking around, but that doesn’t
mean Tommy wanted to be, like, best friends again. They still live on opposite
sides of the city, and the buses are really fucking slow, and obviously Tommy
is busy and stuff. Adam’s busy too. School’s gonna be starting soon, and he’s
got drama and choir, and his mom said he can start voice lessons again if he
wants to, now that his teacher’s back from her trip to Africa, so maybe it’s
better if he and Tommy don’t try to hang out or anything.
Except Adam really, really wants to. When he was just watching GayTube late at
night with the sound muted, jerking off to the pretty guys touching each other,
Adam was okay with waiting until he went to college to have actual sex with an
actual boy. But now that he knows what he’s missing, he can't stop
masturbating.
He hasn't worried that his dick would fall off since he was twelve and his mom
told him that Gary Stukey was lying and if touching yourself feels good you
should do it as much as you want as long as it isn't interfering with your
schoolwork and blah blah some other stuff that frankly Adam was too embarrassed
to listen to once he got the message that he wasn't going to lose his junk if
he played with it too much. But he's been doing it so often lately that it
doesn't always feel good. Sometimes it hurts. And not in the fun way he read
about in the magazine Danielle found under her dad's toolbox in the garage.
More a raw, red, chaffing kind of pain. And he'll promise he isn't going to do
it again until the redness goes away, and then he'll smell tomato sauce, or
hear a bus going past, and the memory of Tommy's hands on him is so strong it's
a kick in the gut, and he's got his hand in his pants before he knows it. Being
fifteen sucks sometimes. Especially when it's so much like being thirteen,
because he really thought he'd outgrown this.
If the theater weren’t so crowded, Adam would probably have his hand in his
pants right now. Or, not really, because that’s just creepy and gross, but he’s
thinking about it, and that can’t be a good sign. He’s always fucking thinking
about it, and that’s the problem. Shoving Tommy and his hands and mouth and bed
and― Yeah. Not helping. Shoving all the thoughts out of his head, Adam tries to
concentrate on the conversation the girls next to him are having while they
wait for the lights to go down. But they start talking about how the murderers
in the movie are really gay, and they couldn’t show it because it was like 1950
or something―Adam doesn’t correct them on the year―but everyone knew it, like
in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and wasn’t Paul Newman like the hottest ever, and
that isn’t distracting Adam from sex at all. He considers going and jerking off
in the bathroom, but he’s in the middle of the row, and the lights are dimming,
so he ends up just pressing his ice-cold drink to his crotch and waiting it
out.
Rope isn’t exactly a boner killer, but Psycho for sure is, and by the time they
get to the break before North by Northwest, Adam isn’t tempted at all to do
anything more than piss during the intermission. The crowd by concessions is
crazy, people stocking up on popcorn and soda to sustain them through another
two films, but it feels too good to stand up and move around for Adam to take
refuge in his seat again until he has to. Besides, he’s found a good vantage
point on some stairs, and it’s interesting to see who’s here, the mix of people
old enough to have seen at least some of these movies the first time around,
film-school hipsters with their stupid sunglasses and skinny jeans and scarves
even though it’s August in LA, and families and couples, and just people like
Adam who like Alfred Hitchcock movies.
Then, across the foyer, Adam sees someone short and slight with a shock of
bleached-blond hair, a mess of spiked and floppy and shaved on the sides, and
he thinks, he came. Tommy came! He’s pissed Tommy didn’t bother texting him,
and frustrated that there are so many people he’s got to fight through to get
to him, and there’s still a chance they’ll get called back in before he makes
contact, but at least he came.
Except just as Adam’s close enough to say his name, a girl in an I’m not gay
but my girlfriend is t-shirt comes up and kisses the blond on the lips, and
they turn, and it’s not Tommy at all. Her hair is almost exactly the same, and
she’s got the same boy hips and black belt that isn’t doing much to hold her
jeans up, but those are definitely boobs stretching out the Vertigo graphic on
her chest. It’s a pretty cool t-shirt, but it would probably look better on
Tommy.
He’s not really in the mood for more movies, but he’s paid for the ticket, and
his mom isn’t due to pick him up until ten, so Adam buys himself some insanely
expensive Junior Mints and heads back inside, where, on the plus side, Roger
Thornhill is having a worse day than he is. Tommy might be an asshole, but at
least no one is kidnapping Adam or trying to kill him with an airplane, and
he’s pretty sure that no matter what happens, Tommy's never going to make him
scale Mount Rushmore pursued by gunmen in ugly suits.
===============================================================================

It's 10:45 on Saturday morning and Adam's eating pancakes with his parents and
his brother when the phone rings. Neil, who has a birthday party to go to later
and is waiting to hear if he can get a ride with his best friend, Stephen, or
if Stephen is still grounded, flies to answer it.
"No," he says, and then, "Fine," and he slams the phone down on the counter and
sulks his way back to the table.
"Who was it?" Leila asks when he starts picking at his pancakes.
"It's for Adam."
Not for the first time, Adam wonders exactly what the rules are for justifiable
homicide. "You couldn't bring me the phone?"
"What, did you break your legs?"
The only person Adam might want to talk to who would call his land line is
Tommy, and Tommy clearly has no intention of ever calling him again, so it's
hard to get enthused about having to get up from his breakfast to answer, but
he's not going to compound his brother's rudeness. The display says, unknown
number, so Adam's a little wary when he says, "Hello?"
"Hey," a familiar voice says. Adam can't quite place it until, "I forgot to put
your number in my phone or something," follows, and Adam realizes it actually
is Tommy.
"That's okay," Adam says while he considers and rejects, Is that why you never
texted me back? and the only possibly less desperate-sounding, I’ll put my name
on my texts next time, and, I'm glad you called. He goes with, "What's up?"
"Wanna maybe hang out today?"
Adam wanted to hang out at the movies three weeks ago, but whatever. He's over
it. Mostly. "Sure," he says. "What'd'you wanna do?"
"Beverly Center? And then, like, I don't know," Tommy says. He doesn't really
seem like the shopping type, but there's food and a movie theater and stuff,
and Adam knows people go just to hang out. He can totally do that, he's sure.
"What time?"
"I'm leaving now, so like two hours?" He's taking the bus, then. Adam's hoping
he can get a ride from his mom or dad.
"I'll text you my number so we can find each other."
"Yeah, cool. I don't know what happened," Tommy repeats.
When Adam sits down at the table again, both his parents are looking at him
quizzically.
"I'm just gonna go to the mall with Tommy," Adam says casually. He dodged their
questions last time when they wanted to know what had prompted him and Tommy
getting together again, and he didn't tell them about Tommy standing him up or
anything. They haven't asked him if he was dating anyone since eighth grade
when he and Danielle went to the Christmas Formal together and he gave them a
lecture delivered mostly at screaming volume about how boys and girls could be
friends and everything didn't have to be about sex all the time. He doesn't
want to talk about what he is doing with boys any more than he wanted to talk
about what he wasn't doing with girls.
"I have to get something at the Apple Store if you want a ride," Eber says.
"Cool." Adam stuffs a forkful of pancakes in his mouth like he wasn't gonna ask
for a ride if no one offered. Perfect.
There ends up being drama over Neil's party, and it's more like two and a half
hours before Adam can get to the mall. He's torn between stressing about being
late and feeling a vicious stab of justification given how long he waited for
Tommy at the pizza place and the fact Tommy never showed up at all to the
ArcLight. They text back and forth the whole time Adam's in the car with his
dad and Neil, Tommy making snarky comments about the people on the bus and then
people at the mall, Adam laughing at Tommy's observations and complaining about
emo twelve year olds. When he finally texts, Here, as his dad drops him off,
Adam's surprised when the return text says, "in sephora. meet u there."
Sephora is like Danielle's favorite store, and Adam's bought some stuff there
for drama class, but he can't really picture Tommy wandering among the liners
and polishes and brushes. When he gets there, Tommy is definitely not
wandering. He's sitting on a stool, eyes rimmed with heavy kohl and thick
mascara, with a Slave-to-the-Rhythm era Grace Jones look-alike (seriously her
hair is amazing) painting his lips with something so dark it's almost black.
Adam stops and stares as she fits her little brush under Tommy's lip ring,
carefully tracing the edge of his lip and then pulling the line all the way
across to the opposite corner.
Adam wants to pin Tommy to the floor and rut up against him until neither of
them can breathe. Which is not all that conducive to his being able to breathe
normally even just standing there. It's also not his usual reaction to seeing a
guy in makeup. Adam makes an awkward and totally involuntary noise which draws
Tommy's attention from the mirror he's holding in front of his face.
Somehow―Adam wonders how much practice he's had―Tommy doesn't move his mouth at
all, but he does a sort of eye-widening thing that seems to imply hello and
I'll be done in a minute and what do you think? all at once.
"Fuck me," Adam chokes out, not at all what me meant to say, because it's far
to close to what he's actually thinking.
"I told you I was good, honey," Grace says, smiling at Tommy as she finishes
his lips with a final dab of her brush.
"You did," Tommy agrees, putting down the mirror and picking up the lipstick,
checking the bottom. "I'll take this―" he looks at Adam for a second. "And the
eye stuff."
Grace looks at Adam, too, her smile widening. "Good choice," she says over her
shoulder to Tommy as she goes off to get his things.
"Do you do this often?" Adam asks, giving up on not staring. Tommy's eyes are
crazy beautiful.
"Nah. Tried my sister's eyeliner and liked how it looked, but she threatened to
run me over with Dad's car if I used it again, so I thought I'd get my own. I
was gonna just get the cheap stuff, but then I saw this place and thought, why
not?"
Why not indeed. Except for how they're at the mall on a Saturday and there are
like eleven thousand other kids here and at least half of them probably like to
beat up guys in makeup. Adam's not sure if Tommy hasn't thought about that or
if he just doesn't care. He thinks it might be a combination of both, and his
stomach twists with jealousy. Adam can talk the talk about not caring what
other people think, but he's actually totally hung up on it. Since about the
time they moved to Santa Monica and he started junior high, actually. Only when
he's up on stage does he feel brave enough to wear whatever he wants.
"You look amazing," Adam says past the lump in his throat.
"Hell, yes, I do." Tommy jumps off the stool, hip-checking Adam's thigh as he
goes past on his way to the counter to pay.
It doesn't occur to Adam until Tommy's walking toward him again that it would
have looked less odd if he'd gone to the counter with Tommy instead of standing
next to a perfume display clutching the edge of a shelf staring at Tommy's lips
while he chatted with the sales girl. "You're a fucking creeper," he mutters to
himself, singing a snatch of the song on the PA to cover his lips moving when
he realizes it was actually aloud.
"Dude," Tommy says. "Celine Dion? Really?"
There's a comeback there about Tommy knowing who it is, but Adam can't find it.
"You wanna get something to eat?" he says instead.
"You're totally buying me fucking Chipotle." Tommy swings his Sephora bag so it
hits Adam's wrist. "This shit is expensive."
"I didn't tell you to buy it," Adam protests.
Tommy just laughs. Apparently the staring wasn't subtle in any way.
"Fine," Adam says. "But I get to borrow the eyeliner sometime."
"Maybe." Tommy skips ahead and turns to walk backwards like Adam isn't walking
fast enough. "Carnitas with black beans and the works. Biggest Coke they have."
"You get everything you want, don't you?" Adam asks.
Tommy laughs so hard at that he nearly falls on his ass.
The line at Chipotle is out the door which means they have to stand in front of
California Pizza Kitchen. Adam's hit with a flood of remembered embarrassment,
transported back to the table in Hollywood with the waiter giving him pitying
looks while he waited for Tommy. But Tommy doesn't seem to get the connection,
just leaning against the window like some kind of supermodel in his makeup and
ripped jeans and faded concert t-shirt. Adam can't help staring at him, and he
catches a few other people staring too, including a guy in jeans so tight
Adam's not sure how he can walk. Tommy meets the dude's gaze and blows him a
kiss, which the guy catches and presses to his crotch.
Adam tries not to look too horrified, while Tommy laughs and the guy winks and
carries on into the mall, but he can't help asking, "Did you know he was gonna
do that?"
Tommy snorts dismissively, shrugging up off the window so they can move forward
in the line. "Put my kiss on his dick? Nah. Figured he'd appreciate it,
though."
Wondering if the guy speculated about whether Adam was with Tommy or with-with
him, or if he'd even noticed Adam at all, Adam misses when the line moves
again, and Tommy has to grab his wrist and tug him up to the door of the
restaurant. Then he doesn't let go. They're not really holding hands, and from
most angles it probably looks like they're just standing face to face, but Adam
can feel a flush starting on his cheeks and a thousand stares prickling at the
back of his neck.
"Dude, chill," Tommy says, dropping Adam's wrist like it's hot.
"I'm not―" but he was. Somehow he manages not to look around to see who's
watching when he reaches for Tommy's hand, hooking their fingers together.
"This is better," he says.
Tommy rolls his eyes, but he doesn't let go.
They eat, Tommy finishing Adam's burrito when he can't, and then Tommy asks if
Adam wants to go to The Grove. Adam is starting to re-evaluate his assumptions
about Tommy's shopping habits.
The bus stop on Third is crowded, but Tommy doesn't have Adam's hesitancy to
push past people who've been waiting longer, so they manage to get seats right
at the back. There's no trench coat today for Tommy to grope him under, and
there are bodies pressed all around them besides, but Adam's still a little bit
disappointed. Tommy isn't even paying any attention to him, leaning over to
look out the window.
"We don't get off til Fairfax," Adam says. "It's a few more stops."
But Tommy straightens up and says, "No. Here," as the bus swings to a halt, and
stands to squeeze through the crowds toward the door. Adam trips on someone's
shopping trying to follow him, elbowing a woman in the back of the head,
leaving a string of clumsy apologies in his wake while Tommy holds the bus door
open making it beep. When he escapes the bus and looks around, they're standing
in front of a bakery.
"You can't need more food. Seriously."
"Nah, gotta see a friend about something across the street. It'll just take a
second."
Across the street there seems to be a beauty salon. "Okay," Adam says. They
wait for the light to cross, Adam patiently, Tommy twitching and staring at the
traffic like he can make it stop if he just glares hard enough. Adam's tempted
to fling Tommy's "dude, chill," back at him, but he doesn't want that glare
turned in his direction.
They don't stop at the salon, heading back up toward the Beverly Center another
block until they get to an auto shop. "Wait here," Tommy says, almost a
whisper, though they're alone on the corner of a busy intersection in LA, so
Adam's not sure who might overhear them.
Adam doesn't want to wait here, but before he can say anything, Tommy's
trotting down the side of the building toward a driveway at the back. Adam
decides he'd rather wait than follow him. He's true to his word, doesn't take
long, is back with a smile on his face in less than three minutes.
"Cool," he says when Adam looks at him quizzically. "We can walk from here;
it's just a few blocks."
When they get to the Farmer's Market, Adam figures they'll wander around, look
at things, but Tommy darts through the crowd, ignoring all the vendors, and
heads for the parking garage.
"Now where are we going?" Adam's panting a little trying to keep up.
"Nowhere," Tommy says, slowing down once they're walking through the garage
doors. Adam really hopes they aren't here to steal cars or something. Maybe
that place was a chop shop and Tommy works for them.
"What are we looking for?" Adam's seen Gone in Sixty Seconds. People steal cars
to order sometimes.
"You ask a lot of questions," Tommy says, but he says it more like he thinks
Adams amusing than like he's really pissed.
"Only two," Adam feels compelled to point out.
Tommy laughs and speeds up again, heading toward the far side of the lot. Adam
takes a deep breath and keeps up with him, so they're side-by-side when they
round a corner and end up in a three-sided dead space about six by three feet,
next to a sign that says, Employee Parking Only.
Adam doesn't see a single thing that Tommy might look triumphant about. Unless―
Maybe Tommy wants to make out again. No one could see them here. Adam would do
it. He might even let Tommy touch his dick. Before he can say anything, though,
Tommy pulls a baggie out of his pocket.
"I'll save you asking," he says. "We're gonna smoke up."
Adam's not a total square. He's been to parties, and drunk wine with dinner
sometimes on special occasions, and, unlike Bobby Preston's parents, who sent
him to boarding school when he smoked pot in his dad's Mercedes, Adam's pretty
sure his mom and dad wouldn't do much more than frown disapprovingly if they
caught him smoking weed. But he's still never done it. As far as he knows none
of his friends have done it. Except, obviously, Tommy, who he guesses counts as
his friend again.
Adam says, "We are?" and hopes that sounds less stupid to Tommy than it does to
him.
"Sit down," Tommy says.
There's nothing to sit on and the ground is filthy, so Adam sort of crouches
against the wall. Tommy sits crosslegged on the asphalt in the protected corner
where Adam had thought they might make out without being seen, and pulls a
lighter and rolling papers out of his Sephora bag.
"A little dirt's not gonna hurt you." Tommy smacks the ground next to his hip.
Adam sits before he's even decided that he's going to. Tommy rolls in silence,
and Adam can't think of anything to say, so they just listen to the chirps of
car alarms and the revving of engines headed up the ramps, Adam's eyes on
Tommy's fingers. He seems like he knows what he's doing. Not like James Franco
or whatever, but this is not his first time.
"Does your dealer work at that car place?" Adam asks while Tommy's licking the
rolling paper to seal the joint.
"He's not my dealer," Tommy says, putting air quotes around the word with the
lighter and the joint. "He's a buddy of mine. Graduated last year. He has a
medical card."
Someone who's selling the pot he gets from a dispensary sounds like a dealer to
Adam, but he doesn't say anything. Maybe he's not selling it. Maybe he just
gives it to Tommy because he likes him. Or maybe Tommy gives him something else
in return. Adam remembers the guy in the tight jeans at the mall, feels the
same twist in his gut he'd felt watching Tommy blow kisses at him. He is so
fucking pathetic. They've gotten off together once, and now he's all jealous.
Tommy lights up and takes a huge drag, then passes the joint to Adam.
Remembering the choking disaster on Tommy's thirteenth birthday, Adam takes the
tiniest inhale he can. He still coughs a little, but everyone coughs a little
when they're smoking pot. At least in the movies.
"You don't have to smoke if you don't want to," Tommy says, holding out his
hand for the joint.
He might have mentioned that before, but going back over their conversation,
Tommy hadn't actually said anything about Adam having to. He just assumed Adam
would want to, leaving it up to Adam to correct that assumption.
Adam doesn't hand the joint back, though. Instead, he takes a little bit bigger
hit, trying to pull the smoke into his mouth first and then breathe it in so he
can do it slowly.
"Or," Tommy says, smiling slyly up at Adam from under the fall of his bangs,
"you can totally cave to peer pressure."
Adam lets him take the joint, and leaves his hand in the air, middle finger
extended.
"Any time, baby boy. Any time." Tommy takes a huge hit, but looks at Adam and
ends up doubled up laughing and coughing.
"What?" Adam says when Tommy seems to be breathing again.
"Oh my fucking god your face." Tommy takes another hit and hands the joint
back. Still holding his breath, he croaks, "Classic."
Adam isn't sure he wants to know classic what, but he can guess surprise
wouldn't be too far off. He wants to say something back that will put the same
look on Tommy's face, but he can't imagine what that would be. Instead he takes
another hit, and then another slightly larger one when that one doesn't make
his chest seize up.
"How's it feel to lose your virginity?" Tommy asks while Adam's inhaling.
And fuck his chest seizing, Adam's whole body seizes up.
"This is your first time, isn't it?"
Adam's heart starts beating again with a thump that nearly knocks him on his
face.
Tommy plucks the joint from Adam's numb fingers and watches him while he
relights it and drags deep. Adam stares back, eyes on Tommy's lip ring, the way
it touches the joint as he purses his lips to inhale. He thinks about the
lipstick in Tommy's bag, and how it would stain the paper, and Adam would be
able to see if its base is red or purple or true blue-black.
"They say you don't get high your first time," Tommy says, breaking Adam's
trance. "But I got soooooo fucking high."
"I don't know if I'm feeling it," Adam answers. He isn't hungry, and nothing
seems very funny, and Tommy's voice doesn't sound weird except for how so was
really really long, but Adam's pretty sure Tommy did that, not his ears.
"You haven't smoked very much," Tommy says. "You should have some more."
"You have to give it to me," Adam says, because Tommy's still got the joint
clamped between the fingers of the hand resting on his far knee. Adam would
have to lean over him to get it.
Adam's pretty sure he shouldn't lean over him right now.
"I can give it to you," Tommy says, and giggles a little. But he doesn't hand
Adam the joint.
"Give it to me, then," Adam says after thirty seconds or so of watching Tommy's
hand and seeing it not move.
Tommy grins and hands it over, his fingers brushing Adam's deliberately. Adam
thinks about Tommy's fingers brushing his dick and wonders if that might happen
again. He hopes so, but Tommy isn't really giving him any clues and Adam hasn't
got the first idea how to ask.
"You have to put it in your mouth and suck," Tommy says, and Adam realizes he's
just staring at his fingers where Tommy touched them. Tommy's holding out the
lighter, thumb over the wheel, and Adam pulls himself together, putting the
joint to his lips and leaning into the flame when Tommy sparks it.
He doesn't choke, or even cough, somehow figured out how to smoke between the
last hit and this one, and he leans back against the wall, tipping his head up
and looking at the ceiling. Someone's sprayed an 8 on it in lime-green paint.
"Dude," Adam says, and he's going to ask Tommy why someone would do that, but
he hears heels echoing through the parking lot, click, click, click, getting
faster, getting closer. "Fuck, fuck!" he whispers, grabbing Tommy's arm.
"Someone's coming!"
Tommy doesn't panic though, he laughs, hunched up over his knees, wheezing into
his fist. There's a scrape, and a chirp, and then the heels stop, a door slams
and an engine starts.
"Fucking Bowfinger,” Tommy gasps, still laughing, clutching Adam's arm back, so
they look like they're trying to save the other one from falling off a cliff or
something. Adam has no idea what Tommy's talking about.
"Fucking dog in fucking shoes."
Adam's still lost, but Tommy's laugh is infectious, and now he's laughing too.
"Man, you are baked," Tommy says, yanking on Adam's arm and headbutting his
shoulder.
"You're the one talking about dogs in shoes," Adam points out. Totally
reasonably.
"You cannot tell me you haven't seen Bowfinger. Steve Martin and Eddie Murphy."
"Oh, yeah," Adam says. He's never even heard of it. He's totally seen LA Story,
and Beverly Hills Cop, though. And there's a video store around the corner from
Danielle's house and she totally thinks Steve is hot with his white hair, so
she'd probably let him choose it without asking any questions if he lets her
think he owes her one for something.
"Let's go," Tommy says. "It smells like fucking gas in here."
There is so much Adam could say to that, but it seems like way too much
trouble, so he just laughs again and lets Tommy haul him to his feet.
Instead of leading him back the way they came, Tommy tugs Adam by the hem of
his shirt in the other direction, and they come out across the street from the
park. "Need a fucking soda," Tommy says, and looking both ways, he darts out
into traffic.
Adam freezes―he really doesn't want to die today, and his parents would kill
him―but the cars are all going slow trying to find parking, and a woman in a
station wagon with two carseats in the back glares at Tommy's back and waves
Adam on.
"No fucking respect for people who don't have fucking cars," Tommy complains
when Adam catches up to him. "You supposed to drive from the mall to the park?"
"I think you're supposed to use the crosswalk," Adam says, but Tommy's off
again at a trot, leaving Adam to jog to catch up.
Adam's never been to Pan Pacific on a Saturday, and it's kind of crazy. All the
picnic tables seem to be full, and there's a crowd of people playing baseball
and a group of kids who seem to be playing tag, and where the fuck is Tommy
going? Adam figured they'd head for one of the buildings, maybe one of them is
a snack bar or something, but Tommy's going the other way, toward a mixed-
generation crowd, maybe some kind of family reunion, barbecuing under a tree.
Adam hangs back, unsure, not really wanting to meet people he doesn't know
while he reeks of pot. But then Tommy's gone, and Adam's left on the path,
standing in one spot and spinning, looking around like an idiot.
Until there Tommy is, on the other side of the crowd now, heading up a hill, a
can of Coke in the hand not holding his bag of makeup. Adam spots an open
cooler under the tree, none of the family paying attention to it. Tommy just
fucking stole a can of soda from a family in the park. Adam should be mad. He
is mad, but he's hella impressed, too. That fucking takes nerves of steel. He
could never do it.
By the time Adam catches up to Tommy, he's found a patch of shade away from
most of the crowd and is lying on his back, head pillowed on one elbow, Coke
can to his lips. He looks gorgeous and dangerous, makeup starting to smear
around his eyes, studded belt sticking out from under the hem of his tee, boots
scuffed and worn and too-big looking on his feet. For a moment, Adam hates him
with a frightening ferocity, hates how he can lie there without caring what
anyone thinks, without being scared, no doubts, and Adam wants to fall on him,
hold him down, arms pinned, legs trapped between Adam's thighs, explain to him
that that's not how the world works. That there are rules.
And then Tommy looks up at him and grins, wild and happy, and he's six years
old again, just found out he can go to day camp in the park with Adam in August
instead of going to a babysitter with his cousin, and it's like the whole world
is his, and Adam just wants to kiss him.
He settles on saying, "What the fuck?" and flopping down in the grass next to
Tommy's bag, figuring he's less likely to try to do something stupid like hold
his hand if there's something in the way.
"They'll never fucking miss it." Tommy holds out the Coke, dripping
condensation on Adam's chest. The drops are cold, and spread out on his shirt,
sticking the cotton to his skin and sending goosebumps pricking up the back of
his neck. He doesn't want it, but his mouth is really dry, so he takes it and
gulps some down.
"If you close your eyes and listen," Tommy says, taking the can back when Adam
holds it out to him, "you can hear all the different sounds in layers, like the
instruments in an orchestra."
Adam closes his eyes, but just hears noise.
"The traffic," Tommy says. "The people talking. The sound of the bat and the
ball slapping into the gloves. The dogs barking. Just listen."
Adam listens. And Tommy's right. It's like music if you let it be.
When Adam opens his eyes again, seven loud cheers from the baseball diamond
later, Tommy's rolled onto his stomach and is propped up on his forearms
staring at Adam's face.
"Um," Adam says, his heart pounding.
"I didn't know if you were sleeping." With his teeth,Tommy twists his lip ring
so the ball is hidden in his mouth, and then back again so it's resting against
his lip, and then repeats the motion. It's really really mesmerizing.
"Um," Adam says again. "No." He's still staring at Tommy's mouth, and Tommy's
still staring at his― He doesn't know exactly what, because he can't look away
from Tommy's lips to see quite where his eyes are.
"I'm kind of housesitting for my uncle," Tommy says. "We could go over there if
you want."
"Yeah," Adam says. "Yeah. Okay." Housesitting means no one is home. And the way
Tommy's staring at him― Adam feels a grin start in his chest, bubble up 'til it
hits his cheeks.
"Okay," Tommy echoes. "Yeah." He's smiling too as he stands and reaches out a
hand to Adam.
They have to get the bus to Van Nuys, and then walk, and by the time they get
to a low, pale stucco house, the sun is almost gone. Instead of heading for the
door, Tommy angles across the front lawn to a gate at the side of the house.
"Where are we going?" Adam asks. He was looking forward to sitting down
somewhere comfortable.
"Wanna show you something," Tommy says, fiddling with the latch, opening the
gate just wide enough for them to squeeze through.
And Adam can see why. The grass and weeds growing alongside the house are waist
high and the ground is littered with rocks ranging from fist-sized to head-
sized. The gate can only open eighteen inches or so. Picking their way to the
back in the dark is perilous. "We couldn't have gone through the house?" Adam
asks.
"Just, come on. Don't be a baby."
When they get to the back of the house it's much brighter; a security light on
the corner of the roof angles down to light up a small patio with a barbecue,
two chairs and a table, and an old Cadillac that's seen better days. Adam's not
sure what he's supposed to be looking at, but Tommy heads right for the car.
"C'mon," he says, beckoning Adam with a flap of his hand as he opens the
driver's door.
Neither of them are old enough to drive, and Adam can't see a gate big enough
for a Beetle, never mind a Cadillac, so he doesn't think they could get out of
the yard anyway, and it seems like that was an awfully long bus ride to look at
a car. He's about to ask again what they're doing out here, but Tommy reaches
around him and flips the seat forward, pushing him into the back, climbing in
after him and taking the baggie and zigzags out of his pocket.
Adam doesn't want to be stoned when he gets home, but most of his buzz has worn
off, and Tommy's really fucking hard to say no to. It's not so much that Adam
likes being friends with him again and doesn't want to piss him off―Tommy
doesn't really seem to be like that―it's more that Tommy makes everything
thrilling. Makes things prickle under Adam's skin, and he doesn't know what to
do with it except follow along.
Tommy makes quick work of rolling another joint. Giving Adam's face a quizzical
look and not seeing a no there, he places it between Adam’s lips. His fingers
brush against Adam’s cheek when he's lighting it, and despite the way Tommy was
looking at him in the park, Adam isn't sure if it's an accident or not.
Smoking for a few minutes in silence, Adam squints through the haze at Tommy,
trying to figure out what he wants, and then when Tommy arches an eyebrow at
him he shakily gestures with the spliff in Tommy’s direction. Tommy takes it
and inhales deeply before leaning into the front seat and stubbing it out in
the ashtray.
Everything feels like it's spinning, and Adam leans back, letting his eyes
drift shut, just for a minute. He doesn't even make it that long, because next
thing he knows, Tommy's got his fingers sliding along Adam's hipbone into the
waist of his jeans.
Tommy?” Adam's eyes fly open.
Tommy just grins at him, not moving his fingers. Instead he lays the flat of
his hand on Adam’s stomach, half under his t-shirt, half under his jeans,
watching Adam's face carefully, clearly pleased with himself.
Adam wants to be chill, act like he hasn't been hoping this would happen all
day, like this isn't any big deal that they're doing this again, but he can
feel his breathing quickening and his hips rising a little to meet the questing
fingers. Pot's supposed to slow you down, but Adam's brain is flying,
spinning―be cool, be cool, and oh my god, is this gonna mean we're boyfriends?
what is he doing, fuck fuck fuck―and this shouldn't be harder than the first
time, but somehow it is.
While Adam's distracted, Tommy’s other hand moves to his fly, and before Adam
can even be sure how he got there, Tommy's fingers close around his cock. The
grin Tommy gives him when he gasps is feral. And really fucking hot. Adam tries
to breathe again and it comes out all thready sounding.
Licking his lips, Tommy pushes up Adam's shirt, and it's all Adam can do not to
ask out loud if Tommy's gonna blow him, but Tommy's hand just keeps stroking
Adam's dick, and when he leans in, it's to fasten his lips around Adam's
nipple. Adam hadn't thought that sensation could get any better than it was the
first time in Tommy’s bed, but high it's like his nipple is actually part of
his fucking dick. No amount of embarrassment could stop the sound he makes when
Tommy uses his teeth.
Please…” Adam begs as Tommy pushes his shirt up higher, nips at the skin under
his collar bone, making him whimper again. “Please.”
Please what?” Tommy slows down his hand movements to a near standstill and
stops all the kissing and biting. He clearly gets off on making Adam ask for
what he wants. Adam's not sure how he feels about that.
Wanting to make Tommy feel the way he's feeling, Adam grabs his face and drags
him forward to fall against his chest. He tries to kiss him but Tommy eludes
his lips, kissing his jaw instead. Trying again to capture his mouth, Adam only
gets Tommy’s lips brushing his cheek. Horny, stoned, and getting pissed off,
Adam tightens his hold on Tommy's face. “If you don’t kiss me I’m gonna fucking
kill you.”
Tommy starts laughing and can't stop. Adam's about to push him off and just
leave―he doesn't have to put up with this shit―but Tommy's lips are all pouched
out where he's trying to hold in the giggles, and Adam has to have them. While
Tommy's distracted, Adam pulls him close and sucks his lower lip into his
mouth.
Like he flipped a switch, Tommy stops laughing and starts moaning. Both hands
on Adam’s chest, he's pushing him sideways in an effort to get him lying on the
back seat. Adam wants Tommy underneath him, but he hasn't got the balance to
resist. Then Tommy tries to get up onto his knees and falls onto the floor. Now
they're both giggling.
Fuck man, I’m totally mashed.”
Laughing loosened the knot in Adam's chest, and he says, “Get up here. I have a
cure for that,” which is a blatant lie, because all the making out has done for
him is make him feel more baked.
Tommy starts to move back up onto the seat and then stops, his face inches from
where Adam's dick pokes out of his jeans.
"Oh," Adam says.
"Oh," Tommy echoes, and suddenly two pairs of hands are shoving the jeans out
of the way and Tommy's sliding his lips over Adam’s length, pushing at Adam's
leg, though there's nowhere for it to go.
Dude. We’re in a car here. Not a lot of room,” Adam says, amazed at how steady
his voice sounds.
"Mmmpf," Tommy murmurs, opening his mouth around Adam's cock and sucking on the
head.
And yeah. Adam's not so much with the steady anymore.
With one leg folded up against the car door and the other crooked at an awkward
angle in the footwell, Adam is far from comfortable, but his dick is in a boy's
mouth―in Tommy's mouth―and no amount of fantasizing about the perfect romantic
cock-sucking interlude comes even close to what it feels like to be actually
getting his dick wet.
He has no idea what to do with his hands, since it seems rude to grab Tommy's
hair like he wants to, so Adam grips the seat and the bunched-up fabric of his
jeans and tries desperately to keep still. He can see Tommy jacking the base of
his cock, though Tommy's hair is blocking the view of where his mouth wraps
around the head. Scary and thrilling and amazing, when Tommy pulls up to lick
the tip of Adam's dick, Adam can feel his lip ring catching the ridge. He's not
sure it should feel as good as it does.
"I― You―" he says, his hand gripping Tommy's hair despite his best efforts.
Maybe it's not as rude as he thought, though, because Tommy moans and shoves
like half Adam's dick in his mouth, sucking hard and moaning again so it's all
hot and wet and kind of vibrating in this amazing way. Adam's orgasm catches
both of them by surprise.
Tommy coughs and splutters, dribbling jizz all down Adam's cock to soak into
his boxers, and Adam vows to give some kind of warning next time. Assuming
there is a next time. Maybe if you come in a guy's mouth that's a deal breaker.
"Sorry," he says, trying to sound earnest but mostly sounding dazed.
"S'okay." Tommy pats his hip. "Just took me by surprise. I'm cool with
swallowing though. It's not like you have the clap, right?"
Adam has absolutely no idea what to say to that. He's pretty sure, "You're the
first person I ever even kissed how the hell would I have the clap?" is the
wrong thing, though, so fortunately when he opens his mouth nothing more than a
gurgle comes out.
"I don't either," Tommy says. "The school nurse will test you and shit. It,
like, got in the papers because the parents had a fit, but it has private
funding or whatever. So."
Adam tries to imagine a clap clinic at his high school. No fucking way. "Okay?"
he says. Maybe the pot was stronger than he thought, and he's imagining this
whole conversation.
"You don't have to blow me, though," Tommy says. "You can just―" he makes the
universal sign for jacking off.
Kissing, Adam thinks. Kissing would make all the talking stop. He pulls Tommy
up off the floor and onto his chest.
They end up with Adam half on his back and only half on the seat and Tommy half
on top of him and half holding him up, a position which is only tenable if they
both stay still. This time it's Adam who ends up on the floor.
Ow! Fuck!” He hits his hip on the foot well divider and his right leg, tangled
in his jeans, twists under him.
Tommy laughs so hard he hits his head on the arm rest. “Shit! Ow.” But he still
can't stop laughing.
Shut up. It’s not funny.”
Tommy laughs harder.
This is ridiculous. But Tommy does seem to be laughing at the situation and not
at Adam. Which is something. “Will you help me out here?” Adam tries not to
sound like he's sulking.
Trying to look serious and failing spectacularly, Tommy manages to sit up and
tug Adam’s pants off the leg that's still half on the seat. This enables Adam
to sit up and finish the job. Tommy looks down at him where he's crumpled on
the floor of the car, fully naked now. “Damn,” he says, under his breath. He
says it like he thinks Adam's sexy.
Not sure what to do with that, Adam tugs at Tommy’s jeans, trying to pull them
all the way off while Tommy divests himself of his shirt.
When they're both naked Adam stops to wonder what the hell they're doing in the
back of Tommy's uncle's vintage Cadillac without their fucking clothes on, but
then Tommy stops laughing and leans in to kiss him again, and Adam really
couldn't care less if there are more practical places they could be.
Until, trying to get a better angle to kiss Tommy and get a hand on his dick,
he brings his kneecap down on the button fly of his discarded jeans. He almost
bites Tommy's tongue off.
Dude, what the fuck!”
Sorry. Buttons, knee, ow. It was bad.”
Let me see.”
Are you kidding? I can’t even see. It’s dark, I’m stuck in the foot well of a
car―"
At least you got to come already.” Tommy's jacking his own dick, slow and
insolent, his pierced eyebrow raised at Adam.
"It's so not my fault. You brought me out here. Doesn't your uncle have a couch
or something?"
"C'mon up here. I can sit on your lap and you can get me off."
Adam does as he's told, but only because the seat is really much more
comfortable than the floor.
He's not sure what he was picturing when Tommy said "sit on your lap", but
somehow it wasn't Tommy kneeling either side of his hips, looming over him with
his dick hard and right there against Adam's stomach. Still getting used to
that, Adam's also not prepared for Tommy to sit, and Adam has to shove his
thighs together at the last second so Tommy doesn't just sink down between
them.
"Gonna touch me?" Tommy asks, maybe―just maybe―a little bit breathless and
hopeful.
Adam's fucking hopeful anyway. He’s spent a lot of time in the last few weeks
thinking about how Tommy’s dick looked in his hand, and he wants to see it
again. "Yeah," he says. "Yeah." It still takes him a second to move, though. To
get his hands up, one on Tommy's hip and the other wrapping around his dick,
too hard, then too loose, then hopefully close to just right.
"Fucking three bears," he mutters, and god, was that out loud?
But, "What?" Tommy asks, and then, "Unngh," as Adam rubs his thumb across the
slick on Tommy's cockhead, so probably he didn't hear.
"Good?" Adam asks, now that he's pretty confident the answer is yes.
"Yes it's fucking―"
Adam jerks faster, harder, stuck staring at the shine on his thumb and Tommy's
dick reflecting the spotlight on the back porch. Not that the pizza night left
him in any doubt, but, oh, fuck yeah, Adam really fucking loves dick.
"Don't fucking stop," Tommy gasps when Adam slows down just long enough to cup
Tommy's balls with his other hand.
Tommy's high-pitched grunt when he squeezes brings Adam's eyes to his face, and
damn, that's almost better than watching his dick. His eyes are closed, head
tipped back just enough so his throat is long and tempting, glistening with
sweat, and Adam wants to bite his lip ring, give him a whole necklace of
hickeys, bury his nose in the hollow between his collar bones, but he just
stares, rapt, wondering how the fuck he got so lucky.
He's so busy watching Tommy’s face that Tommy’s orgasm comes out of nowhere.
Next time, though―god there better be a next time―he's going to know that the
twitch of Tommy's jaw, the jerk in his shoulder, means he's about to come. Adam
wonders if he looks like that when he's coming. Wonders how many other guys
know that's what Tommy looks like.
He doesn't say, You're fucking beautiful when you come, thank fuck, managing
instead to put a tease in his voice and ask, “You didn’t get any on the seat
did you?”
Tommy chuckles without opening his eyes. “You can lick it up if I did.”
Yeah, not licking upholstery, but Adam is willing to lick the patch near the
edge of Tommy’s left nipple, so he does. Then, to forestall any more comments
about his come-tasting habits, he says, “If you think I’m putting my tongue
anywhere near this seat you are so fucking high.”
"Not that high." Tommy grabs his shirt and wipes off the rest of his chest,
checking the seat either side for spills.
Adam figures he, at least, still is pretty high, because he's a little
disappointed that he didn't get to lick any more of it. Even though it's not
exactly ice-cream flavored.
"Gonna smoke the rest of this with me?" Tommy asks, arching back alarmingly to
grab the joint out of the ashtray between the front seats.
Snatching at Tommy's waist so he doesn't fall, Adam doesn't answer, but when
Tommy comes back up again he puts the roach between Adam's lips anyway. The
lighter is apparently on the back window shelf behind Adam's head, because
Tommy's hand shoots out and the next thing Adam knows there's a flame
flickering in front of his lips, Tommy's face looking wild on the other side of
it. He inhales, lighting the spliff, and promptly hacks and chokes and nearly
spits the thing at Tommy.
Tommy's hands fly to cover his crotch, making Adam acutely aware that they are
still sitting in some guy's car, completely naked. He just had sex in a car.
With a boy. His bare ass is on the seats. "How is this my life?" Adam says,
filters shot to hell by the pot, and the naked, and the sex.
"Somewhere in your youth or childhood, you must have done something good,"
Tommy says, and seriously? How the hell is he quoting The Sound of Music? Why
the hell is he quoting The Sound of Music?
"I'm pretty sure I'm still in my youth," Adam retorts, because he's ignoring
the quoting thing, in case it's Tommy making fun of the fact that he's a
theater geek.
"And you definitely did something good," Tommy says, leering, and leaning
forward to take a drag from the joint Adam's pinching loosely between his
fingers.
It feels like Tommy's inhaling his skin, all the way up his hand and his arm,
into his shoulder. "Fuck," he says. Tommy lifts that eyebrow ring again before
cupping Adam's cheeks and pulling him close enough to press their lips
together, exhaling his lungful of smoke into Adam's mouth.
The hands on his face were just enough warning that Adam manages not to choke
again, though if this is supposed to be a kiss, it's not exactly the best ever.
"Okay, now I'm high," Tommy says, mouth moving against Adam's. Then, resting
his forehead on Adam's shoulder, "We're really naked."
"In your uncle's car," Adam reminds him.
"We should get dressed."
Adam hates to agree, but he really agrees. It's sticky and sweaty and weird now
that they're not really doing anything anymore. "Yeah," he says.
Getting dressed in the back of a Cadillac is an adventure, and not one Adam
really wants to repeat. They both have comestains on various pieces of
clothing, Adam nearly gives Tommy a black eye with his elbow, and they both hit
themselves at least twice on the windows or each other. Adam's parents have
date night every other Friday, and they like Tommy―or at least they did before,
he's not sure what they'd think of his piercings and his attitude―so probably
they would be okay with Adam having him for a sleep over. He's totally going to
figure out if Tommy would think that was the lamest thing ever, and then invite
him. Because he's pretty sure they could have a lot more fun on a queen bed.
"I've gotta get home," Tommy says, once they're both dressed again.
"I thought you were housesitting for your uncle?"
Tommy busies himself getting the door open―not that easy from the back seat of
a two-door car.
"Tommy?"
As he's climbing out, Tommy mutters, "Nah, he's just at poker tonight."
It sounds like Tommy just said they broke in to his uncle's yard to have sex in
his car while he was out, and could come home at any moment. Adam wonders
briefly if he's going to be sick. Then he remembers that pot is an anti-nausea
drug, so he probably won't. Plus, they didn't get caught. But if he keeps
sitting here, they might. He gets out of the car so quickly he's not even sure
how he does it.
"Are you kidding?" he asks, because Tommy could totally be kidding.
"Didn't think you'd come otherwise," Tommy says, still not looking at him.
"You were right." Righteous anger is filling Adam's chest, but he tries to keep
a lid on it.
"And you had fun, so. And I had fun." Tommy looks at him then, a quick flick of
his eyes, and a quirk at the edge of his mouth. "Totally worth it."
Adam did have fun. But fucking hell. "C'mon," he says. "Let's get out of here."
They split up at the corner, no kiss goodbye, just an awkward bro-hug, and a
murmured "text me" from Tommy who heads east to catch his bus home, while Adam
turns south to get the bus into town where his Dad promised to pick him up if
he called before 11:30. It's only 9:15, so Adam has a chance to air out a
little. His dad for sure knows what pot smells like, but not necessarily in a
way that has him being okay with his fifteen-year-old kid smoking it. Though
Adam's pretty sure he'd be more okay about that than about his son letting a
boy suck his dick in essentially a stolen car.
Maybe he shouldn't invite Tommy over. Tommy is just the kind of trouble his
parents are always trying to keep Adam out of. He probably shouldn't see Tommy
again at all, but Adam's pretty sure it's a little bit late for that.
===============================================================================

School is not exactly Adam's favorite thing ever, but he loves drama class.
Even when it runs late and he has to jog to get to World Studies and the hall
monitor, Eldon, calls, "Fly little fairy, flyyyy," at him. At least Adam knows
for sure now that he is a fairy. He's not sure why that would make it sting
less, but it does. Maybe because, yeah, assholes are still assholes, but he's
been kissed and had a hand job and a blow job, and he might get more of any of
those things, or even something else, soon. He texted Tommy two days after the
car thing―Danielle told him once, in like seventh grade, that she was never
going to look too eager because boys don't like that, and Adam thought it was
sexist and stupid at the time, but he decided why take a risk―and this time
Tommy texted him back a few hours later, and okay, he only said, "hey, sup,"
and then it was three more days before he replied to Adam's "nothing much.
homework. wanna do smthg sat?" and when he did it was only to say, "bzy. soon
tho," but he didn't ignore Adam altogether, which was an improvement on after
the first time they fooled around.
Drama class is awesome even when his teacher picks the stupidest fall musical
Adam's ever seen. It's called Young Dracula, and he thought it might be pretty
cool until he read the script. And the score. Oh my god, the score. He thinks
the writers might have been going for a Rocky Horror thing but with vampires
instead of Frankenstein, but they missed every single mark. On the plus side,
Adam got one of the leads again, even though he's only a sophomore. He gets to
play Dracula himself, which, even though he's lame and campy―not really in a
fun way―he's at least better than any of the stupid kids who turn up at
Dracula's house in the middle of their vacation.  
Also on the plus side―though this would be a plus even if they were doing a
better show―the new drama teacher's husband is a studio make-up artist, and she
announced today that he's coming in to teach them some tricks of the trade.
Adam's learned some stuff at theater camp and in the community theater shows
he's done, but more just from picking it up. No one's actually taught him
before. He can make his eyes pop and his lips shine, but he can't change the
shape of his face. He'd love to be able to change the shape of his face.
Tuesday, Mrs. Mooreland tells them her husband can't come this Thursday because
the film he's working on is doing reshoots, but he will almost definitely come
next Friday. Adam tries not to look too disappointed. It's difficult when the
next thing she does is launch into "I'm Just an Old Bat Now”, Adam's big solo
number, and the worst song ever written. Ever.
"Shut up, at least you have a solo," Danielle hisses when she sees his face.
Danielle is playing a maid and has to wear a really short skirt and fishnets
and carry a feather duster, so Adam doesn't glare at her even though he really
wants to.
 
Adam and Danielle aren’t nerdy enough that they have to eat lunch at the
loser's table, but they are relegated to the unpopular side of the quad. Adam
doesn't mind because that's the side with trees, and if he sits in the sun too
much, his freckles get even worse. On Wednesday he and Danielle are sitting on
the bench under the half-dead oak, arguing over whether Adam needs another can
of Coke before class, when his phone buzzes in his pocket.
"I thought I was the only one who texted you," Danielle says, reaching for his
phone like he might hand it to her before he even looks to see who it's from.
Not that looking helps. Unknown number, Los Angeles area code.
"Lemme seeeeee,” she wheedles.
"How bout we let me see first, since it's my phone," Adam says, disappointed
that it isn't Tommy.
Except it is. "this is tommy. borrowd fone. grounded and mom took mine. 2 wks w
good behavior. don't 4get me."
It's not that Adam doesn't get it, like, what the words mean, but it still
somehow makes no sense.
"What?" Danielle says, nearly bouncing with impatience and making little grabby
fingers in his direction.
"Nothing." Adam knows she won't buy it, and he shouldn't even say it because it
will just make her more curious and then she won't buy whatever explanation he
tries to give that isn't It's the guy I used to be friends with who I'm now
kind of having sex with, who I haven't told you about yet. He can't help it
though; it just pops out of his mouth.
"Nothing, my ass. Gimme."
"You aren't the boss of me, you know." Apparently his masturbatory habits
aren't the only way Adam's regressing lately.
"I am too and you know it. Gimme the phone." She doesn't wait for him to argue
further, just snatches it out of his hand.
"Who the fuck is Tommy?"
"I don't know?" Adam tries. "Wrong number?"
"You are such a bad liar." Danielle pokes him hard in the ribs. "Are you― Oh my
god. Oh my god, Adam, do you have a," Danielle's voice drops to a whisper,
"boyfriend?"
"No," Adam says. "No!" He's almost definitely sure he doesn't have a boyfriend.
 And why would Danielle even think that? He's never said―
"Adam Mitchel Lambert, how could you not tell me?" Danielle stares, her mouth
and eyes open so wide she looks like a freaky animation of herself.  
"He's just this guy. We were, like, best friends in elementary, and we just
started hanging out again the last few weeks." Adam waves a hand at her. "It's
nothing. Stop looking at me like that."
"I'm not going to make you talk about this here at school, but I don't care how
much homework Franklin gives you, you're coming over after, and we're going to
talk."
Adam loves Danielle. But she is really damn persistent.
He can't really avoid her after school, since she only lives four blocks away
from him and they take the same bus. It's not worth waiting for the late one;
she'll only call and bother him at home which might involve his parents. He
really doesn't want to involve his parents. Not that they aren't cool and
stuff. But he's heard stories about kids who thought their parents were cool.
Plus, if they think Tommy's his boyfriend they probably definitely won't let
him spend the night ever. Not that Tommy is exactly asking to spend the night,
but it might happen and Adam doesn't want to fuck that up.
True to her word, Danielle just talks about Spanish class and the stupid song
she has to sing in the musical until they get back to her house. Then, though,
she doesn't even wait for him to put his bag down and get a drink before she's
on him.
"Tommy," she says. "Start at the beginning. Leave nothing out."
That is so not happening. Adam would rather die than tell Danielle about
getting naked in Tommy's bed, or even worse, in Tommy's uncle's car. She's
stubborn, but when he wants to, Adam can out stubborn anyone. He puts his
backpack on the table in the foyer and pointedly walks into the kitchen, gets a
soda, and sits down at the breakfast bar before he starts with the Christmas he
turned five.
"He moved in up the street and he had a KITT car, and he let me drive it before
I even asked. Then his mom made me hot chocolate."
"A kit car? How old is he?"
"We were five. He might have been five and I might have been four. Like a
Knight Rider car. One of those Power Wheels things."
"I always wanted the Barbie one." Anyone else might sound like they could be
distracted talking about Power Wheels or Barbies, but not Danielle.
"I always wanted the Corvette," Adam tries anyway.
"So the kid let you ride his car. And now you're gay?"
Persistent and really really not subtle. Adam opens his mouth and closes it
again. Not like a fish or anything, just, what the hell is he supposed to say
to that? "Fine." He might as well tell her. "I'm gay."
"I―"
"But it has nothing to do with Tommy letting me drive his car."
"Oh my god, duh, Adam. Obviously." Danielle leans over their knees to squeeze
him in one of the choke holds she calls a hug. "What's he letting you ride now,
though?"
Blushing would be much less horrible if Adam couldn't feel it happening.
"I knew it! Every detail. You promised."
It can be hard to tell with Danielle if she believes herself when she comes out
with shit like that, but either way, Adam definitely did not promise. Not even
in some distant past conversation when any possibility of sex was completely
hypothetical. He's almost positive.
"We went for pizza. We made out a couple times. No big deal." Biggest deal in
the universe. Whatever. It's certainly a worse sin to kiss and tell than to do
a little white lying to your best friend.
"What's he look like? Is he hot?" She's doing that bouncing thing again, only
it's more worrying on her mom's spindly-legged little bar stools than on a huge
wooden bench bolted to the ground.
"He's cute. I don't know. He has a lip ring."
Danielle's mouth drops open again. "Fuuck. That is so hot."
"But he's not my boyfriend." Adam wants to make this point now before she runs
away on imagination and gossip.
"He's obviously into you, though.  Don't you like him?" She grabs his soda and
takes a sip while Adam's distracted wondering what makes her think Tommy's into
him. He's had his dick in Tommy's mouth and he can't tell if Tommy's into him.
"Why do you say that?"
"Well he totally has your number memorized if he could text you with his phone
taken away, and he was like, 'Don't forget me,' and stuff."
That Tommy must have memorized his number never even occurred to Adam. He
doesn't have Tommy's number memorized―it's just in his phone. And he's really
into Tommy, something he has started admitting to himself, if not to Danielle.
The jerking off could have just been excitement about finally getting some
action, but Adam's pretty sure the thinking about him all the time means it's
more―since it's not even usually about kissing him or his dick, but like,
wondering if he wants to get pizza again, or if he might show up next time Adam
asks him to go see a movie. Then there are the little hearts he keeps drawing
on his notebooks like he's the little sister in a Disney movie or whatever.
Adam scoffs, and then almost makes the mistake of saying, "He forgets about me
all the time,"―which would make him sound bitter and desperate, which is not
how Danielle needs to see him―but at the last second subs in, "He was just
fucking around."
"Uh huh. Exactly. So which one of you does the fucking?"
Even when Adam was waking up every morning with sticky sheets, he never popped
wood in his best friend's kitchen.
There's a first time for everything.
By dint of a political rant about gender stereotyping cribbed mostly from the
guy his dad was listening to on NPR in the car last time they went to San
Diego, Adam manages to derail Danielle and get his boner to go down, and he
escapes home to do his homework―Franklin gave them two chapters and threatened
them with a pop quiz, so it's not an empty excuse―without having to talk about
Tommy again. Danielle does whisper, "He totally likes you," in his ear as she's
hugging him goodbye, but he ignores her, since she didn't even know Tommy
existed until lunch time.
===============================================================================

Even though they have to wait like a whole extra week in the end, it's worth
it, because Mr. Moorland's make-up tutorial is even better than Adam had hoped
for. He asks for a volunteer to model for him, and Adam's hand goes up so fast
he nearly dislocates his shoulder. He gives Adam hollow cheeks and hooded
brows, then wipes it all off and talks Adam through doing it again while
everyone else takes notes. He uses Elise to model aging makeup, and does a
zombie face on Brian, who's wearing a White Zombies t-shirt. Adam already can't
wait to get home and experiment and then Mr. Moorland says, "Shall we do a
stage look for Dracula here?"
Chelsea Hawkins mutters something about that not being fair, but she complains
about everything and Adam doesn't even care what she thinks. He does try to
keep the smirk off his face when he settles back in the makeup chair, though.
To Adam's surprise, the first thing Moorland pulls out of his bag is a can of
hairspray. But then, "Black hair first," he says. Adam closes his eyes against
the spray.
Mr. Moorland pauses after spraying Adam's head to talk about how even a change
in hair color can change a person's whole look. Adam can't stop staring at
himself in the mirror. Moorland's not fucking kidding. Adam already looks a
hundred times more like Dracula, but he also looks older, less like a little
kid and more like the young man his mom keeps saying he's turning into.
Though―Adam narrows his eyes at himself in the mirror―she might have to take
off the 'nice' she usually tacks on to the beginning of the phrase.
Adam notices the hush a moment before Mr. Moorland says his name, clearly for
the second time. Everyone laughs when Adam just looks at him quizzically.
"That's exactly my point," Mr. Moorland says. "With good makeup, the actor
doesn't even recognize himself."
It takes Adam three days to decide he's going to actually dye his hair. Or to
admit that he decided he was going to dye his hair the second he opened his
eyes and saw himself in the mirror. It takes another two to buy the dye and
then he has to wait 'til Saturday to get Danielle to dye it for him. If he does
it himself he's going to end up with blue splotches on his face and ginger
streaks at the back. She argues that it will look ridiculous with his freckles
and that his mother will kill him and that he'll have to shave his head when he
decides he doesn't like it after the play is done, but he threatens to tell
Billy Squire that she's had a crush on him since freshman year if she doesn't
do it, and she seems to think the world will end if Billy finds out she likes
him―Adam personally thinks Billy will ask her out, but he's not telling her
that now―so she does it.
It's more shocking than he expected. With the spray, it was lighter along his
hair line, and had blonder bits showing through, but now it's black black.
"Shiiiit," he says, peering at himself in Danielle's bathroom mirror.
"Yeah." Danielle combs her fingers through it, lifting it off his face. "Wow.
Okay. It doesn't suck."
Ducking away from her primping, Adam grabs her hairdryer and plugs it in. She
lets him start, but after about a minute is pushing him back down in the chair
and taking over. Adam's pretty sure she's trying to rip his hair out by the
roots, but she tells him he's being oversensitive and it's the hair dye not
her, and doesn't listen. He's glad in the end when she manages to make him look
like Elvis.
"The young, hot one," she adds when he mentions it. "But don't let it go to
your head."
"Do I look like Dracula, though?" he asks.
Danielle gives him her cheekiest smile. "Hell yeah," she says.
 
In Adam's second scene on stage there's a moment when the lights flash and
swoop crazily over the set and the audience, and as one goes past the left side
of the third row he's pretty sure he sees Tommy sitting there, an older couple
on one side of him, and three girls from the Mathletes team on the other.
Before he can be sure, though, the spot is back in his face and he can't see
the audience at all. For the first time since he was eleven, Adam's certain
he's going to flub his note, but it comes out pitch perfect when he opens his
mouth to sing. It can't be Tommy anyway, because Tommy never called him again
after the text about being grounded, and Adam never mentioned he was in this
show. And a guy isn't going to travel to the other side of Los Angeles to see a
random high school musical.
He tries to look when the lights go down after his solo, but Jorge has his fat
head between Adam and the relevant seat. It isn't until the final scene that
the angle and lighting align so Adam can get another look at the guy slumped
where he thought he saw Tommy. It's a good thing he's not singing at the time,
because the guy lifts his head enough for Adam to see his eyes and his lip ring
and the little finger-wiggle wave he gives Adam, and it's all Adam can do to
keep the string of curses inside his head and focus on not letting his fangs
drop out of his mouth. Tommy is in the theater. Alone. Unless he randomly knows
three math nerds from Adam's school. The only explanation Adam can think of is
that Tommy's here to see him.
Adam wants to punch him. He wants to kiss him. He really fucking wants to not
get a boner on stage in front of half the school and their parents and
grandparents. None of his wishes come true before the curtain drops.
Dracula's cape proves useful during the curtain call, and though Adam had
practiced throwing it open with a flourish, he does the more traditional
holding it across his lower face―and thus across his crotch―as he takes a bow.
Backstage is chaos with the cast and crew jumping around and screaming about
how everything went so perfectly even though their final dress rehearsal had
been kind of a disaster. People keep leaping on Adam and hugging him, which is
not really helping with the boner situation. He finally escapes through the
maze of the group dressing room and the prop room into the costume storage
closet where the air is stuffy but he can at least be alone for a minute. He
sinks down on the low tailor's bench the seamstress uses when she needs to pin
hems, and presses his palms to his eyes, breathing slow and deep.
Feeling more like himself after a little break, but not yet in the mood for the
screaming masses again, he hangs up his cape and ridiculous black shirt with
the red ruffles―even though usually the costumes for shows in progress go in
the dressing room―and is running his fingers through his lacquered-back hair
when he hears the door open behind him. He's expecting Mrs. Moorland, or Phil,
who's in charge of props, or maybe Danielle. He's not expecting Tommy.
"Stupid play, but you can really fucking sing," Tommy says, shutting the door
and leaning on it.
After briefly weighing the pros and cons of "Hey," versus, "What the hell are
you doing here?" Adam comes out with "What the hell, hey?" adding a spazzy
hand-flap just to make it even more suave.
"You never write, you never call," Tommy says, shrugging and taking a few steps
closer. "Besides. I love Dracula."
"I'm sorry," Adam says, heartfelt. No one who loves Dracula should be forced to
sit through what Tommy just sat through.
Tommy snorts. "Yeah. Well. Seriously though, you were really good."
It seems like they're ignoring the half-a-dozen unanswered texts Adam sent
Tommy the week after he was supposed to have gotten his phone back, or the fact
that it's been over a month since Adam's heard from him at all. "Okay," Adam
says. "Thanks."
"Made me want to blow you when you were singing that one song."
Adam cannot begin to imagine what song he sang that might inspire such a
response, but Tommy's advancing on him again, and he's not sure he wants to
know anyway. Before he can stop it, his stupid, cockblocking mouth opens and
says, "You can't blow me in here."
"Sure I can," Tommy says, palming Adam's dick. "You're hard, the door's closed,
nothing's stopping me."
He's right about that. Adam's right hand is pressing Tommy's to his crotch, and
his left is grabbing at the clothes on the rack behind him. He's doing nothing
to put Tommy off.
"Do I get a kiss hello?" Tommy says, going up on his tiptoes as he speaks like
he knows the only answer is yes.
Adam kinda hates that he's not wrong, but his irritation doesn't keep his hand
from curling around the back of Tommy's neck and pulling him the last half inch
up to Adam's mouth. As soon as Adam starts to pull, Tommy pushes, one hand on
Adam's shoulder and the other still on his dick. Surprised, Adam stumbles back,
making hangers squeal in protest as he ends up ass to the wall, shoulders and
head hunched forward, stopped by the rail.
"Ow!" he says as an errant pin stabs him in the neck.
For a second, Adam's sure Tommy's going to ignore how this really isn't
working, the way he seems to ignore everything else he doesn't like, but before
Adam can protest further, Tommy grabs him by his waistband and the sleeve of
his undershirt and drags him around 90 degrees so he can push him against the
bare eighteen inches of wall between two racks.
Adam wonders if for once he should listen to his gym teacher's advice and start
working out. Yeah, Tommy has surprise on his side, but Adam must have five
inches and forty pounds on him and Tommy's still throwing him around like it's
nothing.
"Hey," Adam tries to say, but Tommy's tongue's back in his mouth and his hand
is back on Adam's dick, and all that comes out is a muffled groan.
Adam can't breathe, with the air too hot and close, Tommy's mouth sealed over
his, and Tommy's cheek crowding his nose, but there's nowhere to go with all
Tommy's weight holding him against the wall. He finally gets a grip on Tommy's
shoulders and starts to push him back, but Tommy goes down instead, and damn,
Adam has never really contemplated the literal meaning of that before.
As he stares down at Tommy's upturned face, Adam realizes that what he thought
was a not-very-skillful handjob was actually Tommy opening his pants one-
handed; they're already gaping, Adam's dick tenting the front of his briefs
obscenely.
Speaking of obscene, Tommy kneeling on the dusty floor of the costume room,
tugging at his lip ring with his teeth while he reaches for Adam's dick with
both hands― If he doesn't get it in his mouth soon, Adam's going to shoot in
his shorts. He tries to explain this, but it just comes out, "Fucking, fucking,
Tommy," a garbled, desperate whisper. And thank god, because there are thumps
and excited voices coming from the other side of the door now: Adam's
classmates putting props away ready for tomorrow's show. They really, really
should not be doing this. The door only locks with a key, and Adam doesn't have
it, and they could get caught, or locked in, and oh, fuck, Tommy's got Adam's
dick in his hands now, his mouth's open crazy wide, his tongue pointing out,
and Adam cannot think of a single word in any language except, "Oh, fuck, yes."
The blowjob itself is anti-climactic, since Adam comes less than five seconds
after Tommy closes his mouth around the head of Adam's dick, but the orgasm is
totally amazing, so Adam can't even bring himself to feel embarrassed. He
worries a little about the fact that he completely failed, again, to give Tommy
any warning before jizzing in his mouth, but Tommy must have taken the thunk of
Adam's head against the wall, or maybe the stranglehold on his hair, as a clue,
because he's wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, but there doesn't seem
to be any jizz on Dracula's shiny black pants. Thank god.
"You just blew me in my costume," Adam says.
Tommy looks up at him like that is the stupidest thing he has ever heard. "Was
the point," he says, pulling himself back to his feet with a grip on Adam's
waist. "Though I was hoping you'd still be wearing the cape."
Adam laughs weakly, wondering if his fingers are going to stop tingling soon.
"And next time you should totally wear the fangs."
The words, 'next time,' make Adam grin like an idiot, so he wraps Tommy in a
hug and snugs his leg against Tommy's erection in an effort to distract him. "I
totally get to keep them," he confides when Tommy presses his face to Adam's
neck, and Tommy bites him in answer, slow sink of teeth, a perfect counterpoint
to the dirty grind of his cock against the muscle of Adam's thigh, and it feels
so fucking good Adam can't tell if the little fireworks going off in his gut
are leftovers from the orgasm he just had or previews of the next one.
Tommy's clinging to him, humping faster now, hot exhalations stinging the
teethmarks he left on Adam's throat, and Adam gets his hands under Tommy's ass
to hold him closer, help him get more pressure, thrusting his own hips forward
to match Tommy's rhythm. He wants to suck him but there's no way he can stop
him now, no way he can stop himself. Tommy's fingers curl around  Adam's
shoulder blades, digging into the tender flesh there, and Tommy starts to
shake, his breaths coming in high-pitched gasps, and he hooks one leg around
Adam's as he shudders, coming in Adam's arms.
While Tommy goes completely limp, Adam feels charged, filled with electricity.
He needs more―to taste, touch, feel, do something besides stand here letting
the wall hold him up. They're just a few feet from the tailor's bench, and Adam
pushes, spins, pulls until they're turned around and he's sitting down, pawing
at Tommy's fly, desperate to get to his dick.
'What?" Tommy asks, and Adam would explain that he can't get dust all over the
knees of his pants―he has to wear them again tomorrow night and he doesn't want
to have to get them cleaned―but he's too busy trying to get at the fucking
enticing smell of sex and Tommy that's right in his face.
While his fingers fumble, Adam presses his nose to the crease of Tommy's groin
where the denim is damp, breathing deep, exhaling so he can do it again, deeper
this time, sticking out his tongue to taste.
There's a tiny voice in the back of his head telling him he's a freak, that he
should not want to fucking suck the jizz out of someone's jeans, but he does
want to. Wants it all, and Tommy's not pulling away, isn't asking again what
he's doing, has his fingers twisted in Adam's hair holding him close while he
makes little helpless noises above him. Finally, fucking finally Adam's fingers
figure out what to do to get Tommy's dick out, and the smell is sharper,
stronger, and Adam can taste Tommy's skin, and it's so much better.
The helpless noises turn pained as Adam nuzzles Tommy's dick up against his
belly, lapping at the base just above his balls before fastening his lips
around the head and sucking like Tommy's a straw in a Slurpee.
"Sorry," he mumbles when Tommy whimpers, except he's not, and he doesn't stop
licking―the shaft, the smear of jizz just above the elastic he's holding out of
the way against Tommy's stomach, the head again, the curls of hair trapping
beads of come.
He feels crazy, not because he wants this, but because of how much, and he's in
the fucking costume room at his schooland the door's not locked, and his
classmates are right outside, and nothing short of a gun in his face would drag
him away right now. He hasn't got the first clue how to give head, and Tommy
just came and isn't even hard, but he's staring down at Adam like Adam's maybe
kind of amazing, and it's better than the way he smells or tastes or even
feels. Adam never ever wants Tommy to stop looking at him like that.
"You can't―" Tommy gasps, trying to tug Adam off when Adam gets an arm around
his waist and tries to swallow his whole dick. And he's right: tears squirt
from Adam's eyes, he starts to choke and then drool as he tries not to bite
Tommy while he's choking, and it's all very bad. But Adam doesn't let go, just
gets Tommy's dick out of his mouth so it's safe from teeth, and rests his cheek
on Tommy's hip bone, hugging him close.
Once Adam's calmed down, Tommy's grip on his hair relaxes and he starts playing
with the strands at the back of his neck. "You really like it when I come," he
says wonderingly.
"Yeah," Adam says, uncertain, and then, "Yeah. It's― 'course I do." Because
that's what they're doing here, right? Making each other come. The dating/not-
dating, friends again/not-friends part Adam's still confused about, but he
really really likes making Tommy come and likes it when Tommy makes him come,
and Tommy keeps doing it so he must like it―
Unless.
"Don't you like it?" Adam asks, keeping his face hidden against Tommy's
stomach, though if what they're doing makes Tommy uncomfortable, having his
naked dick like two inches from Adam's mouth is maybe not ideal.
Tommy huffs a half-laugh, jostling Adam's head. "I like it. Just, you know.
It's kind of messy?"
"I guess I kind of like it messy." Adam's never, like, fantasized about
smearing come all over himself or walking around all day in his own jizz or
anything, and unlike his little brother or some of the guys in his gym class,
he's fond of showering every day, but he likes that Tommy's messy because of
Adam and what they did together. And he does like how it tastes, even though he
gets why people think it's gross.
"Okay," Tommy says, pulling Adam's head back so he's forced to look at him. "I
like that you like it."
All graceful, the way he is and the way Adam wishes he could be, Tommy
straddles Adam's thighs and kisses him, sitting down on Adam's knees and
sliding forward until their dicks are nudging each other like they were in the
car the last time.  The kissing feels good, warm and soft, sweet in a way Tommy
hasn't kissed him before. Adam wants to know if it means Tommy's gonna call him
back this time, but wanting to know and wanting to ask are two vastly different
animals, so he remains in the dark.
Instead, when Tommy stops kissing him and rests his forehead on Adam's
shoulder, Adam says, "So, my friend Danielle really wants to meet you, if,
like, that would be cool. She doesn't know you're here or anything though, so
if―"
"No," Tommy says. "I can meet her. She's not― If she's not your girlfriend or
anything."
Adam laughs, and Tommy's face goes closed.
"What?" Adam says.
Tommy just parrots the question back at him, sarcastic.
"I'm not laughing at you." Adam's confused. "Just―" he gestures to indicate
Tommy's whole look and dick and stuff. "You are clearly pretty much exactly my
type. Which makes Danielle just so. not."
Tommy's glare melts into something softer, something maybe a smile. "I'm your
type?"
It's like they're having two different conversations. Or at least two different
experiences, because Adam's pretty sure he's poking Tommy's naked junk with his
own mostly hard dick about ten minutes after shooting into Tommy's mouth. Not
that he's had a lot of opportunities to try, but he's pretty sure he doesn't do
that kind of stuff with people who aren't his type. Adam takes Tommy's hand off
his shoulder and puts it on his dick. "You're my type." Tommy squeezes him, and
Adam moans a little, thrown off his train of thought. Oh yeah. "And you were my
best friend for a really long time and I missed you." He should maybe be
looking Tommy in the face, but Adam's totally stuck looking at Tommy's hand on
his cock. "I still―fuck―still miss you." He's so going to be cleaning these
pants tomorrow.
Tommy doesn't say anything else, just speeds up his hand on Adam's dick,
drawing both their eyes to the motion until Adam has to shut his, tightening
his grip on Tommy's hips and gasping his name, finally giving him the warning
he'd failed to the last two times. When he opens them again, Tommy's wiping his
hands on Adam's undershirt, the corner of his mouth turned up in a smirk.
"You said you like messy," he says when Adam looks at him, eyebrows raised in
surprise.
Adam has to laugh at that, because he did. "Like your mess better," he says,
which is true, though he didn't know it before now.
"You're crazy." Tommy's standing, tucking himself back into his jeans, tugging
his shirt down to cover the still-damp spot, but Adam thinks he feels
different, more like he's waiting, less like he's walking away already. Could
be wishful thinking, but he's gonna pretend it isn't.
"Hope you like crazy," Adam says, nudging Tommy's shoulder as he stands and
tries to make himself look more presentable, too. Thank god his t-shirt's
white.
Tommy just looks at him and shakes his head, but the way his mouth's twisted
up, he's totally failing to hide a grin, so Adam takes that as a yes.
They can't find Danielle in the mob backstage, and before Adam can ask if Tommy
wants to come with the cast for pizza, Tommy's looking at his phone, frowning,
saying, "Shit, my mom's here. Gotta go."
Adam bites down on the "call me," that almost flies out his mouth, and says,
"Thanks for coming," instead. He doesn't catch the double entendre until he
sees the look on Tommy's face. Which, from the way Tommy laughs at him, is
obvious on his own.
"Any time," Tommy says. "For sure." He sort of kicks the side of Adam's foot,
and then turns to worm his way to the door.
"Only students and teachers are allowed backstage," Chelsea says from behind
Adam's shoulder. "That boy doesn't go here."
There are seven hundred kids at their school. Only Chelsea would think she
knows all of them. Adam doesn't bother to tell her to fuck off, just goes to
see if his parents are waiting for him.
 
When Adam wakes up the next morning, there are four texts in his inbox. At 12:
07 AM Tommy said, "do you really get to keep the fangs?" At 12:23, "r u fucking
sleeping already?" At 12:47, "like ur black hair btw," and at 12:51, "call me
asshole but not b4 11."
Adam's phone helpfully informs him it's 10:12. He wonders if the prohibition
against pre-eleven contact includes text messages, and decides if Tommy could
text him after he was asleep, he can text Tommy before he's awake.
"why should i wait til 11 to call you an asshole?" he sends, knowing it's
obnoxious, but unable to resist. He waits two minutes for a reply, but none
comes, so he types, "I really get to keep my fangs," and then, "thanx btw," and
then, "why are you still sleeping?"
He lies there for another five minutes with his phone on his chest, but he
doesn't get a text alert, and he really needs to pee, so he gets up. Neil's
lurking in the hall, waiting for him, and nearly gives him a heart attack.
"We're going to the Arboretum today, lazy," he says as soon as Adam opens his
door.
Fuck, family outing. Adam forgot. "Go away," he says, pushing Neil against the
wall―not hard, just firmly―so he can get past to the bathroom.
"I'm telling," Neil says, following him.
Not sure what he's going to tell, and caring even less, Adam shuts the door in
Neil's face. "I'm telling," Neil shouts again, smacking the door with the flat
of his hand when Adam engages the lock with a snap.
Adam's phone buzzes while he's brushing his teeth. "it's saturday. why are you
up?"
Adam spits, rinses, and uses mouthwash before replying, "had text msgs to
read."
"doin anything later?" comes back while Adam's message is still sending.
Feeling a little giddy with the fact that Tommy's not only texting him but
seems to want to see him, Adam sits on the edge of the bath before tapping out
his reply. "sposed to go to arboretum later―" Adam debates asking if Tommy
wants to come, but goes with, "can probs get out of it if you wanna hang out."
He does not expect Tommy to come back with, "wanna go bowling?" Adam hates
bowling. The shoes are disgusting, last time he went he dropped a ball on his
toe, and he's really really bad at it.
"ok," he says. "what time?"
 
Eber is irritated and Neil is whiny when Adam asks if he can go bowling with
Tommy instead of going out with the family to look at plants, but Leila says he
should go and have fun, and even offers him a ride to Burbank on the way.
"Burbank is not on the way," Eber says, and Neil says, "Yeah. It's totally not
on the way," but Leila shoots them both quelling glares and tells Adam to eat
something healthy for breakfast, doing that thing where she looks like she
wants to pet Adam on the head, but remembers at the last minute he's fifteen,
not five.  Adam escapes to the kitchen before her maternal urges get the better
of her.
It takes an hour or so for them all to get ready, and Adam texts Tommy from the
car when they're on the move. Tommy texts back with the address of the bowling
alley, and Eber grudgingly puts it into the GPS. Adam puts his headphones in,
in the hopes of tuning out Neil's, "Why are you going bowling? You hate
bowling. Why are you friends with Tommy again? I thought you weren't friends
anymore..." blah blah blah.
"Neil," Adam eventually hears his mom say over Placebo's cover of Running up
that Hill, "can it."
Neil pouts the rest of the way to Burbank.
Tommy's leaning against the building when they pull up, thankfully not smoking,
because Adam's pretty sure his mom would change her mind about this being a
good idea if she saw that. He's got a giant paper Coke cup in one hand and his
phone in the other, which he lifts in a wave, squinting into the sunlight.
"Hey," he says when Adam gets out of the car. Adam feels himself grin like an
idiot.
Leila rolls down her window, and Adam forestalls any embarrassing mom moments
by leaning in and thanking his parents again for the ride. She gets the message
and doesn't try to kiss him, or say anything to Tommy, just tells him to have
fun, and pats Eber's hand on the gear shift. Adam sighs in relief when they
drive off.
"Nice of your parents to drive you," Tommy says, shoving his phone into his
pocket. "Can't believe my mom wouldn't let me take the driving test. I can't
wait to fucking be able to drive."
"Why'd she do that?" Tommy's birthday was while he wasn't returning Adam's
calls, and Adam figured Tommy just didn't have a car.
"When I got grounded?" Tommy says, and sucks at his Coke. "It was 'cause she
found a fifth of bourbon under my bed. So she took away my phone for two weeks
and said I couldn't take my driving test until I'm seventeen."
"Wow." Adam's not sure what else to say. He can't really imagine hiding booze
in his bedroom, so he's not sure what his mom would say if he did.
"She doesn't trust me not to drink and drive or whatever."
"Wow," Adam says again.
"So we bowling or what?" Tommy tosses his cup in the trash can at the corner of
the building and heads for the door.
It's a lot darker and a lot louder inside than Adam expected and he loses Tommy
for a second while he tries to get his bearings, so arrives at the counter just
in time to see Tommy slapping down money for two games.
"I really suck at bowling," Adam feels compelled to point out. "Like really
suck."
"First game can be for practice, then," Tommy says. "We'll save strip bowling
for round two."
The guy putting Tommy's money in the register says, "Stripper night's
Thursdays," and then laughs like a donkey. Adam wishes he'd gone ahead and
invited Tommy to the arboretum. Even Neil's constant whining would be better
than this.
Tommy ignores the braying, takes his change, and heads for the shoe counter.
"Shoes here run small," he says. "Go up half a size."
The guy spraying shoes with disinfectant has his back to them and is bobbing
his mohawked head to the metal music coming from the bowling alley's speakers.
"Yo, Frankie," Tommy calls.
When Frankie turns around, he smiles like a shark. "Tommy Joe Ratliff! Where
the hell have you been, man?"
Adam tries not to stare at the trio of spikes in his lip that seem to bristle
as he talks, or at the Virgin Mary tattoo climbing out the neck of his tank top
onto his throat.
"Ya know," Tommy says. "Y'know." He flaps a hand. "We need shoes."
Frankie looks at Adam. Adam's pretty sure he's being found lacking. "Size's yer
friend here?" Frankie says.
"Ten," Adam answers, then amends, "Ten and a half." His feet have been growing
a lot lately and most of his nine and a halves are way too small.
"You still baby size?" Frankie holds his forefinger and thumb about an inch
apart and uses them to point at Tommy.
"Quit bragging on the pathetic size of your dick," Tommy says. "Fuck you, baby
size."
Frankie laughs. "Six and a half it is."
"Six and a half around, maybe. I'm an eight, asshole."
Adam shifts back half a step, hoping to get out of the spill of light over the
shoe counter before Frankie or Tommy notices that he's flushed bright red.
They're joking about dick size like it's no big thing. Since Tommy didn’t talk
like this in elementary school and Danielle doesn’t have a dick to joke about,
Adam’s never really had a friend like that. It would also be much better if
Tommy stopped talking about his dick―his dick that Adam has had in his mouth―if
he wants to go bowling and not like, get dragged into the bathrooms. And that
thought is really not  helping. Willing his dick to stay soft, Adam takes five
deep breaths, focusing on the kinda nasty smell of overcooked hot dogs and
stale popcorn. He comes back to Tommy and Frankie staring at him.
"Um?" Adam says.
"We got your shoes." Frankie taps their heels on the counter and Adam reaches
out to take them. Tommy's got his in his hand already. "Have fun," Frankie
says.
Adam is pretty sure Frankie's definition of fun―all his definitions of fun―are
different from Adam's.
Tommy stands at the counter taking his shoes off and slipping on the clown
shoes Frankie gave him, but Adam sits on the little bench between the counter
and the lanes, because he doesn't want his socks to touch the carpet in here.
"Have you been bowling since Manny's birthday party?" Tommy asks, holding his
hand out for Adam's shoes so he can take them back to Frankie at the counter.
Adam has to think. "Didn't we go with the guy who moved here from Tennessee for
like three months in fifth?”
Tommy's nose wrinkles. It's not hot, because why would nose wrinkling be hot,
but Adam is maybe staring a little bit. "Bruce Brewster? That was Manny's party
I'm pretty sure. Either way―" he checks Adam has his shoes tied, and heads
toward the lanes― “fifth grade. What do you guys do for fun in Santa Monica?"
Most kids go to the pier, or the mall, Adam thinks, but he and Danielle usually
hang at hers or go to the movies or do theater stuff. "I don't know," Adam
says.
They get set up, get their names in the computer and choose balls, and then
Tommy asks if Adam wants a drink.
"I can get them. You paid for the game," Adam says. But Tommy gestures him back
to the seats.
"I've got it." He's looking more at Adam's shoulder than his face. "You're
cool." And with that he's shuffling off to the snack bar.
As Adam watches him go he wonders if this is maybe, like, a date. When he does
stuff with his other friends, everyone pays for themselves. Also, his other
friends don't follow him into the costume room and suck his dick. Or, like,
send him texts at midnight telling him they like his hair.
There’s that whole third date rule Adam’s heard about, and they've had sex
three times and haven't really been on a date yet, so they're kind of doing it
backwards. Though they did go out to dinner, and some people go dutch on dates,
Adam's pretty sure, and Tommy made Adam buy him lunch at the mall. Maybe this
is actually their fourth date and Adam just didn't know.
"I got you Coke," Tommy says from over Adam's shoulder. "Hope that's― Hey, are
you okay?"
"Yeah." Adam startles, puts a smile on his face. "Coke's great. Don't I look
okay?"
"You look like you're trying to figure out if the train from Philly going sixty
miles an hour or the train from Chicago doing fifty is going to hit the train
from New York first."
"No, yeah." Adam says, his smile genuine now. He's pretty sure he's on an
actual date. With Tommy. "I'm, yeah." It's possible his smile is approaching
shit-eating grin territory.
Tommy grins back, still a little bemused, and plunks their drinks down on the
table bolted between the molded plastic seats. "Let's bowl," he says.
Bowling is actually way better when he's just with Tommy. For a start, Tommy's
not as great as Adam feared. Like, he knocks down pins and stuff, but he's not
all gliding up to the line with perfect form or anything. And Adam's got a lot
more upper body strength than last time he did this, and it's a lot easier to
hold onto the ball. Plus, Tommy is fucking hilarious.
He does this little ass-wiggling dance when he gets a strike or a spare, and
cracks himself up every time he does it. After one particularly enthusiastic
time, Frankie calls down, "We need to get the pole out for you, Tommy Joe?" and
Tommy flips him off with both hands, still grinning. He has stories about some
of the kids they used to go to school with, girls who were shy that suddenly
blossomed in high school, geeks who filled out and now are jocks, the girl who
lived up the street from them who got pregnant and dropped out. Adam is
surprised when they get to the end of the first game and it's time to start the
next one. He can hear his dad saying, Time flies when you're having fun.
Adam somehow opens the second game with a strike―his first ever―and Tommy jumps
on his back, whooping. Stumbling forward, Adam grabs onto the console, trying
to keep his feet, and he almost knocks over the dregs of his Coke in the
process. Somehow he prevents the drink and Tommy and himself from hitting the
floor, though he does get a knee to the kidney in the process.
"If this is your cunning plan to want me never to get a strike again, I think
it's working," Adam groans, unhooking Tommy's arms from around his neck and
dropping him down his back.
"We're playing this game for clothes, and I want to see you naked," Tommy says,
winking, dancing backwards toward the ball return.
The man with two kids who is putting their info into the computer in the next
lane looks at them, horrified. Adam starts laughing and can't stop until he
sits down, head practically on his knees. When he looks up again, Tommy's at
the line, ball up by his chest, looking over his shoulder like he can't go
until Adam's watching.
"Good luck," Adam calls.
Tommy only knocks down one pin. He gets three more on his second bowl, but
that's not going to beat a strike by any means. Without any prompting Adam's
brain does the math and figures if Tommy has to take off an item of clothing
for every pin left standing, they can go home right now, because he's gonna be
stark naked. Not that he really thinks they're playing strip bowling. In
public. But as Tommy comes back to where Adam's sitting, he flicks a glance at
the next lane and when he sees only the dad is watching, he straddles Adam's
thigh and lifts his shirt just enough for Adam to see that he's wearing navy
blue briefs, and he has a few scratches just above his belly button like he got
in a fight with a cat.
"Fuck," Adam says, a little breathless, a little reverent, but Tommy gives up
the tease before Adam can get more than a glimpse, dropping his shirt hem and
stepping out of Adam's way so he can get up and have his turn.
"This isn't that kind of date," Tommy says, smirking, like he's not the one
practically putting his junk in Adam's mouth.
Adam stands and leans close, hands on Tommy's shoulders, lips right against his
ear. "If I forfeit can I suck your dick?"
"If you forfeit you can't suck anything at all," Tommy whispers back, and then
slaps his hip, pushing him in the direction of the ball return.
Somehow, instead of distracting him from the task at hand, the thought of
sucking Tommy turns Adam into a kick-ass bowler. Or at least one who's a lot
less crappy. When he wins―by three points, but a win's a win―Tommy whoops and
does a victory lap around him, leaping again, but this time on his chest. Adam
sees him coming and manages to grab around his waist and spin them both in a
fairly impressive dance move, or so he assumes from the girl in the next lane
saying, "Look, Daddy, it's the hot tamale train!"
Frankie gives them a slow clap from where he's wiping down his shoe counter and
winks broadly.
"Is he gay?" Adam asks, low, as he puts Tommy down. The contrast between
Frankie and the dad in the next lane is pretty marked.
"He's probably sucked someone off for blow at some point, but he's not gay I
don't think. Why?"
"He just seems―" Adam can't really articulate that his relaxed attitude about
Tommy and Adam comes as a surprise without it sounding like Adam's insulting
him or stereotyping punks, or Burbank or whatever. But it's not Frankie that
surprises him, but the way Tommy isn't trying to hide anything and doesn't seem
to think it's a big deal. And how with Frankie, and the guy who took their
money, Tommy's right. It just fucks with Adam's world view. "He doesn't care
that you're gay?"
"I don't think he knows?" Tommy says.
Adam looks at the shoe counter again, but Frankie's got his back to them. "You
don't?"
"Well, like, I never told him, or any of the guys I was, and it's not like
we've been making out or anything."
Adam can't remember the last time one of his male friends jumped on him, or
even touched him—it was probably Tommy, actually. And given everything that’s
happened in the last few months, he’s not sure that counts. "Huh," he says.
"Don't think he'd care or anything. Saw him pin a guy with a boot to the neck
for like twenty minutes once waiting for the cops when he caught the dude
beating shit out of a fag in the parking lot."
Adam flinches as the word comes out of Tommy's mouth.
"Want another soda or something?" Tommy tugs Adam's belt loop in the direction
of the snack bar. "When are your parents coming to get you?"
Adam looks at his watch. "Couple hours probably. Mom said she'd text me when
they were on the way."
"Cool. Wanna play air hockey?"
The air hockey doesn't go nearly as well as the second game of bowling, partly
because Adam hasn't played air hockey ever, but mostly because Tommy spends the
entire time biting his lip ring in concentration, and all Adam can think about
is sucking on it. And the way it feels against his dick when Tommy’s sucking
him. By the time his mom texts to say they're almost there, Adam is so hard
he's pretty sure he could hang a towel off it. And not just one of the little
towels Frankie uses to wipe the shoes. He wishes his pants were tighter to hold
it in more or looser to hide it better, but he's stuck with trying to tug his
shirt down when he no longer has the game table to hide behind.
"Glad to see you like me kicking your ass," Tommy says, getting right up in his
space and looking down pointedly.
"Shut up.” Adam totally wants to say kiss me, but they're standing in the
middle of a pretty crowded game room at a bowling alley, so he says, "Gotta
piss," instead.
"Huh, me too," Tommy says. “Imagine that.”
While his eyes scan for the restroom sign, Adam tries not to think about the
fact that he's so possibly about to get a hand job from the boy he's on a date
with. The boy who he's maybe on a first date with, who is maybe kind of also
his boyfriend, only maybe not, but who at the very least seems to want to be
actual friends again. He finds the sign for the men's room and hustles in that
direction, hem of his t-shirt gripped in both fists. He probably looks like he
just pissed himself, but whatever.
It's a single-stall, urinal, sink situation. Adam was hoping for― He isn't
actually sure, because if it were just a one-room, they'd have more privacy but
feel more rushed and it would look weird for Tommy to follow him in, but this
way feels all wrong, and―
"Dude, breathe," Tommy says, patting him on the back.
"I'm breathing." He's totally not breathing. He should do something about that.
"You gonna take care of that?" Tommy eyes his dick again, amused, and maybe a
little like he likes it.
Adam goes out on a limb. "Or you could..."
Tommy shakes his head. "Told you, it's not that kind'a date. I'm wooing you."
"You're wooing me." That is the most ridiculous thing Adam's ever heard, and it
should not be so fucking sweet.
"Totally wooing you. Whatever. I'll watch if you want, though."
For a second Adam thinks there's not going to be anything to watch except the
spread of a wet spot on the front of his jeans, but he manages to stumble into
the cubicle, holding the door open for Tommy behind him.
True to his word, Tommy doesn't reach for Adam's pants once they have the door
locked; he settles his tiny ass on the handicap grab bar, arms crossed, that
damn tempting lip ring caught in his teeth, the picture of expectant.
"You're really gonna―" Adam whispers.
"You really gonna?" Tommy's voice is pitched low and hits Adam right in the
pool of heat in his belly.
How does Tommy always make Adam want to do the craziest things? He's never even
thought about jerking off in a public bathroom, and now he's about to do it
with someone watching. "Will you at least― Can I kiss you first?"
Adam only catches a second of Tommy's grin as it's launched at his face, but he
takes it as an enthusiastic yes.
Letting Tommy's momentum push him back against the wall, Adam pulls Tommy tight
against him, cupping his ass in both hands. "Mmmpf," Tommy says into Adam's
mouth when he finds himself lifted nearly off the floor, but then he gets his
hands around Adam's shoulders and settles in. With Tommy's lip ring between his
teeth, Adam wonders how the hell he managed to stay on his side of the hockey
table for as long as he did. Gentle tugging makes Tommy squirm against him,
licking makes him try to suck on Adam's tongue, and everything about kissing
Tommy is just so much better than not kissing Tommy. Except for how it's
actually been a really fun day of just hanging out like they used to, only with
more of Adam staring at Tommy's ass. And face. And his other parts.
When Tommy lets go Adam's shoulder and moves a hand down to his hip, Adam
thinks maybe it's gonna be one of those kind of dates after all, but Tommy
pushes back instead, pleased grin on his face, returning to his perch. "Still
wanna watch," he says.
Before he can think too much about it, Adam undoes his zipper, pulls his dick
out through the fly of his boxers. Tommy's fingers twitch on the bar, but he
doesn't move to help Adam out.
"Fuck," Adam breathes when he's got his fingers wrapped around himself.
"I could tell you a gross story instead," Tommy says.
That would so not help. At this point Tommy could probably not only talk about
vomit, he could actually vomit, and Adam would still be desperate to get off.
Making out pretty much pushed him past the cold shower point. Angling so Tommy
can mostly see him, but he can still pretend a little bit that he's not jerking
off in a toilet with a boy if it gets too weird, Adam starts jacking his dick
with the quick, efficient strokes he uses if Neil's banging on the bathroom
door. It's not much of a show, but a glance at Tommy's face and Adam can see
there's not going to be any complaining.
As he comes, Adam's thinking about getting Tommy somewhere alone and doing this
again with more time and fewer clothes.
Darting in for another kiss, Tommy grabs Adam's hand as he's trying to wipe it
off, and manages to smear jizz up Adam's wrist. From the look on his face, it
wasn't an accident. They're both laughing as Adam unlocks the stall door.   
They share the sink, Tommy sliming Adam's hands up with the opalescent pink
soap, carefully cleaning between his fingers and over his knuckles like Adam
shoots motor oil. It feels really fucking good, but an old dude barges his way
in the door, glares at them and starts yelling about how they shouldn't come in
here and shoot up. Adam reaches for the paper towels, Tommy bristling beside
him.
"Shoot you up, fucker," Tommy mutters as Adam pushes him back out into the game
room.
"D'you know him?" he asks when he catches Tommy turned around flipping off the
door.
"Know enough like him," Tommy says. "Let's wait for your mom outside."
The last thing Adam wants is their date to end on a sour note, but as Adam's
eyes are adjusting to the daylight, Tommy grabs him around the waist and spins
him in a dizzying circle before darting off toward where he'd been waiting for
Adam to arrive.
Adam follows, and ends up leaning against the bricks, mostly hidden from the
parking lot by a large sandwich board someone's put up advertising Happy Hour
specials, tugging Tommy against him, back to chest. He doesn't want to get
caught making out with Tommy, but his parents probably won’t think it’s too
weird if they’re just hugging, and he wants to hold onto him while he has the
chance. He figures wooing is a good thing, but Tommy still lives on the other
side of LA, and who knows when Adam's going to see him again.
"So was it better than you expected?" Tommy asks, tipping his head back against
Adam's shoulder, grinning up at him.
For a second Adam thinks he means jerking off for him in a bathroom, but then
he figures bowling is more likely. "It was okay." When Tommy tries to pout
while he's still grinning, Adam starts tickling him.
"Fucker!" Tommy cries, but he's squirming back against Adam's body, not trying
to get away, so Adam isn't buying his complaint. He's also very aware that all
this wiggling, and gasping, and the way Tommy's grabbing his biceps and holding
onto his wrists to make him stop is making Adam hard again, which will totally
defeat the purpose of jerking off in the bathroom, except for how that was
really fucking hot, and okay, that is so not helping. Crossing his arms over
Tommy's belly, Adam squeezes him tight, breathes in the smell of his neck,
tries to settle down.
"Hate being tickled," Tommy mutters, and Adam peers over his shoulder at where
his baggy jeans look noticeably less baggy than before.
"I noticed."
"Whatever. Shut up." Tommy lifts Adam's left hand and bites the flesh at the
base of his thumb just as the Lambert's car pulls into the lot.
"I had a really great time," Adam says, wanting to kiss Tommy everywhere now
that he really can't.
Tommy steps away from him, gives him a little salute. "Yeah you did."
The car is closer now, maybe ten feet away, Neil in the back seat flipping them
both off where their parents can't see, Eber hidden in shadows, and Leila
grinning at them out the open window.
"Hi, Missus Lambert, Mister Lambert," Tommy calls, giving them a little wave.
"Thanks for giving Adam a ride."
Adam makes a run for the car before his mom can invite Tommy over for dinner,
or start giving him the third degree or something. "Call me," he says to Tommy.
Then, "I'll call you, too," in case Tommy thinks he has to wait three days or
something. Because Adam's not waiting three days.
"Cool," Tommy says, and waves again before slipping around the side of the
building in the direction of his house.
"We could have given him a ride," Leila says, twisting to look at Adam. "He
didn't have to run off."
"Nah. That's cool. He was meeting someone." Adam loves his mom, but sometimes
she's just really embarrassing.
 
Despite their schedules not meshing up for the next ten days or so, Tommy
continues his wooing campaign over text and IM, alternating between funny
bitchy commentary on the kids at school, links to YouTube or other shit on the
internet, and cheeky or downright dirty suggestions of what he and Adam could
do if only they had the place and the time. Once he gets started, Adam can hold
his own in the bitchy stakes, and he has no problem at all keeping up on the
linking, but Tommy’s the definite winner when it comes to sexting. Adam’s a lot
more comfortable with actions than words.
Wednesday Adam gets a text from Tommy while he’s waiting for the school bus and
then doesn’t hear from him again. He knows Tommy’s school has midterms this
week, so he doesn’t really think much about it, and then after school Adam has
jazz choir and then a voice lesson. When he texts Tommy between them and gets
only “ttyl” in reply, he figures Tommy’s probably busy studying for whatever
subject he’s got tomorrow, probably under his mom’s watchful eye. When he comes
upstairs after dinner, Adam’s IM window has seven messages in it, starting with
‘Hello?’ ending with ‘bbl’ and filled in with links to five Johnny Cash songs,
but Tommy doesn’t come back before Adam’s dad comes up and tells him to turn
off the lights.
Adam’s lurking in that last moment of consciousness before sleep when his phone
buzzes softly on his nightstand, lighting up his clock and the book for English
he forgot to read before bed. Even really hoping it’s Tommy, he’s so tired he’s
teetering between letting his eyes slip shut again and checking the text, but
it keeps buzzing. Fumbling it toward him, he jolts awake when he sees Tommy's
name above the little phone symbol on the display.
"Hello?" he croaks quietly, mindful of Neil sleeping on the other side of the
wall.
"Fuck," Tommy says, his voice tight. "You were sleeping."
"No, you're good." Adam peers at the time. 12:39. Late to be calling on a
school night, even for Tommy. Even when they haven’t talked all day. "What's
up?"
"Nothing. I just―" Tommy breathes like he's trying to suck all the air out of
the room. "Tell me something good, okay?"
"Hey, what happened?" Adam can't think of anything good. He can only think
about the fact that Tommy's like twenty-five miles away and he sounds like he's
gonna punch something any second.
"What are you wearing?" Tommy says.
"I― What?"
"What are you― Fuck it. That's stupid. One good thing that happened to you
today. Please."
Tommy doesn't say please. Like, ever. Scrambling for something, Adam comes up
with, "They had chocolate chip brownies in the cafeteria at lunch."
"Still hot?"
"Nah. Well, maybe a little? The chocolate chips were pretty soft." Adam
definitely prefers his chocolate chips soft. Brownies, cookies whatever.
"Hell, yeah," Tommy says, and maybe sounds a little more like himself. "Warm
brownies are the best."
Adam almost mentions that he passed his math test, but if Tommy's upset about
failing a test, maybe he doesn't want to hear that. "Neil ate dinner at a
friend's house, so he wasn't here being a little bitch."
Tommy doesn't say anything for several seconds, then softly, but without all
the tension he'd started with, says, "I wish I could have come for dinner."
"Did you―" Adam rolls to his other side so he doesn't have the phone between
his ear and the pillow. "Did you get in a fight with your parents?"
More quiet, broken by the sound of Tommy breathing. "Not really. Not with my―
Know what? Never mind dinner."
"Tommy." Adam doesn't want to be a dick, but Tommy should fucking be able to
tell him shit. They've been friends since they were five. Okay, with a break,
but whatever. "Just fucking―"
"There was just a thing at school, and it fucking sucked and they didn't
exactly take my side. Don't want to talk about it. Doesn't matter. Tell me
something else good. Tell me how if you were here right now you'd let me rub
off on your stomach, get you all messy."
"If I were there right now I'd hug you 'til you couldn't breathe." Adam would
probably let Tommy rub off on his stomach, but he's far too embarrassed to say
that on the phone.
"I can totally rub off on you while you're hugging me."
Adam can't help huffing a quiet laugh at that. "You're obsessed."
"I know how much you like it."
"Okay. I like it."
"See?"
"Why'd we have to move?" Adam asks. "What if we still lived three houses down.
Do you think you'd still―" Adam's scared to finish.
"Still what?"
"You know."
"Still wanna jump you?" Tommy doesn't sound like he's teasing anymore.
"Maybe," Adam allows.
"I don't think that's the right question."
"How come?"
"D'you remember my birthday party?"
So, so clearly. "Yeah?"
"Problem wasn't ever me not wanting to jump you."
Adam's skin prickles hot. "It wasn't― You surprised me! I was, like, twelve."
"You never called me again."
"You never called me either." Not that Adam would have had a clue what to say
to Tommy if he had.
"I'm not the one who ran away."
"I'm not the one― It was the first time anyone tried to kiss me," Adam says
helplessly.
"It was the first time I ever kissed anyone."
Adam has no idea what to say. He blurts out, "I'm wearing blue boxer shorts."
Tommy makes a choking noise. Then, before Adam can apologize, says, "Black t-
shirt, camo briefs."
"I'm sorry you had a shitty day. And I ran off the first time you tried to kiss
me."
"Woulda been doomed, anyway. I wasn't allowed to take the bus any farther than
school until freshman year."
"No cell phone, no bus pass, no laptop. You're right. It's much better we
waited." That and Adam had so not been ready to start thinking about sex with
actual other people yet. He would have been the lamest boyfriend ever.
"Can I ask you a question?" Tommy sounds serious, but not serious.
"Okay," Adam says.
"If I'd actually tried to get you off on the bus that first night, what would
you have done?"
"I―" Adam takes a deep breath, curling tighter like that will make his voice
carry less, will make this less embarrassing. "Sometimes I―" Tommy doesn't
interrupt to save him, just keeps breathing into the phone. Adam has to finish.
"Sometimes I jerk off thinking about you putting your hand in my pants, getting
me off in front of those guys, and I have to be so quiet, can't move, or
they'll come over and make fun of us. Try to hurt us, maybe. And your hand
feels so good but I can't make a sound." He's talking so fast by the time he
gets to the end it might as well all be one word.
"Wow." There's a sound like Tommy's rolling over. "That is so not what I
expected you to say."
"Me either," Adam mumbles.
"Would you have, like, that night?"
"No. Maybe. I was pretty scared." Should he tell him? Fuck it. "That was only
my second kiss."
"Shit. Seriously?" Tommy doesn't say anything else for the span of several
heartbeats, and Adam's sure he fucked up somehow. Finally, and not like it's a
bad thing, he says, "I'm the only guy you've ever kissed?"
"You're the only person I've done anything with. Except Rebecca Molnar, who
played my wife in Marriage of Figaro. We kissed on the lips."
"No tongue, though, right?"
If Adam didn't know better, he'd almost think that was jealousy. "No tongue."
"Did you― You knew you were gay, though, right? Before."
"I knew I had no interest in Rebecca's tongue, even though she was apparently
the hottest girl in eighth grade. And I thought Danielle's dad's Hustlers were
kinda gross."
"I think Hustler can be kinda gross even if you do like girls," Tommy says.
"You probably shoulda started with, like, Playboy."
"I moved on to GayTube," Adam admits. "I sorta looked at it as studying for
college, though."
"Interesting entrance essay."
"I just didn't think―" No one had ever shown much of an interest in getting
into Adam's pants before Tommy. At least not that he'd noticed. Though Danielle
has always tried to tell him that he's shockingly unobservant. And she did know
Tommy actually liked him before he did, so maybe she wasn't wrong about Jenna
and Alicia. Maybe he just hoped she was. "I guess I was pretty sure I was gay,"
he says.
"Good." Tommy chuckles lowly. "I would hate to have contributed to the
delinquency of a minor."
Adam has to bite his quilt against a guffaw. "Fuck off. That is like your
favorite thing ever."
"You sucking my dick is my favorite thing ever." Tommy's voice skirts the edge
between joking and not.
"Good thing I like―"
Adam's door opens with the clunk of its stiff latch giving way. "Adam Mitchel
Lambert it is one in the morning." The fact that his mother is whispering does
nothing to hide how angry she is. "What are you doing on the phone?"
"Nothing," Adam says, filled with contrition.
She holds out her hand, arm rigid, jaw clenched.
"Gotta go, bye," Adam hisses into the phone before thumbing the disconnect.
"Adam," Leila says, a clear warning, when he doesn't hand it to her.
"I'm off now. I'll go to sleep."
She just holds her hand out farther, the light from the hall making her
withering look ten times scarier than it usually is. Adam turns the whole thing
off, figuring she's going to take it in her room, not wanting her to be wakened
by texts from Tommy wondering where he went. Once she has it safe in her
bathrobe pocket, she says, "You can have it back after school tomorrow,
assuming you are bright-eyed at the breakfast table in the morning, ready to
meet the day.” Adam doesn't bother saying that he hasn't been bright-eyed at
the breakfast table since he was eleven, no matter how much sleep he had the
night before, so that seems a little mean.
"Okay," he says instead, following up with the most sincere sorry he can
muster. He is awfully sorry that she took his phone away, so he sounds pretty
convincing.
"And tell Danielle she can't call you after ten."
Adam manages to hold on to his sigh of relief that she doesn't suspect Tommy
until after she leaves and shuts the door.
School the next day is torture. By rushing around like a crazy person, Adam was
on time for breakfast, and he's hoping that open-eyed is close enough to
bright-eyed that he's getting his phone back. In the mean time, since family
breakfast meant he didn’t even have time to turn on his computer, he's stuck
imagining Tommy sending text after text, wondering why he's not getting an
answer.
"But he did that to you for like two months," Danielle says when she finds Adam
under their usual tree at lunch time sadfacing over his sandwich. “He’s going
to survive a day, I'm sure."
Adam isn't sure at all. “He was kind of weird last night. I don’t know. What if
he stops texting me again?"
"Then he's a fucking idiot," Danielle says, and then changes the subject to the
song she hates in the Winter Festival show. Adam doesn’t really have much of an
opinion on any of them except that they are all better than even the best of
the songs in Young Dracula, so he just lets her vent while he worries that
Tommy thinks Adam’s mad or something.
No one’s home when Adam gets there, and he looks in all his mom’s usual hiding
places for his phone, but he can’t find it, and when he uses the landline to
call her cell it goes straight to voicemail. Then, when he sees that it’s time
Tommy should have gotten home, he goes to see if he’s logged onto IM, and there
his phone is, sitting right on his laptop waiting for him. It’s still powered
off, and he hopes that’s because his mom actually respected his privacy. He’s
not totally stupid, he does delete Tommy’s dirty texts, but he doesn’t always
do it right away, and he can’t remember if there are any still on there.
It takes forever to power up again, and Adam wakes up his laptop while he’s
waiting, pouncing on the keyboard when he sees Tommy’s status dot is green. His
flow of apologies is interrupted by his phone buzzing and buzzing and buzzing
with incoming texts.
===============================================================================

They have a sub in bio the Thursday before Winter Break. Adam's pretty sure she
last taught back when his parents were in high school―she looks like an apple
doll―and she's not doing anything about the fact that no one is paying
attention to the movie about single-celled something or others she's trying to
show them. Danielle's painting Adam's nails black and silver, claiming she can
see just fine in the flickering, under-water light coming from the screen, but
Adam's pretty sure he's going to have silver blotches rather than silver lines.
"We need to dye your hair this weekend," she says, holding his left ring finger
toward the screen and examining it critically.
His roots are definitely showing, but he was hoping to have Tommy do it for
him. They went to the movies last Sunday and Tommy'd played with his hair in
the dark, and now it's kind of all he can think about. Tommy standing between
his knees, his stomach right there but out of reach because he won't want hair
dye on any of his t-shirts, his fingers combing through―
"Adam. Hair. This weekend. Or do you want to do it after school today?"
"Oooh, you girls gonna get together and braid each other's hair this weekend?"
Geoff Archer sneers from the next table.
"No. We're gonna shave my head," Danielle snaps. "Fuck off."
That gets the apple doll's attention. "Do you need to go to the office, miss?
We don't talk like that in class." Manicures and homophobia are a-okay, but no
swearing. Good to know.
That gets Adam out of telling Danielle he doesn't want her help. After all her
complaining the first time he asked her to do it, it shouldn't be that big a
deal, but Adam hasn't spent one weekend day with her since Tommy came to the
play and he senses her happy-for-him is wearing thin. (The fact that he
overheard her saying to Chrissy Rhoeman that Sandy was a total bitch for
ditching Chrissy just because she has a boyfriend now might have played a part
in the sensing, but Danielle doesn't know he heard that, so he can't say
anything.)
Boys and girls are in different gyms for PE this week and Danielle has a
yearbook meeting at lunch so he doesn't see her again until the bus stop. By
which point he's sort of come up with a game plan.
"Wanna stop at the drug store on the way home?" he asks, getting right in there
before she can say anything. "I already asked Tommy if he could dye my hair for
me, because you didn't really seem to want to last time, but we could get some
dye, and I might just buy you that Shatter glaze you've been eyeing up."
Danielle looks at him, mouth and eyebrows matching flat lines. "Are you kidding
me?" she asks. Except it doesn't really sound like a question.
"No?" Adam says. He can't figure out where he went wrong. "I'll buy you
something else if you already got the Shatter."
"You are kidding me. Jesus." Danielle shoves him. "You're trying to buy me
off?"
"Buy you― What?" Adam feels like everyone at the bus stop is staring, even
though he can see with his own eyes that most of the other kids are ignoring
them.
"Your old BFF comes back and you fucking just dump me like I don't even matter,
and then you think you can buy your way out of it with a crappy bottle of nail
polish?"
OPI isn't crappy nail polish for a start, and Adam totally wasn't trying to―
except he did pretty much hope that Danielle wouldn't be so mad at him about
another Saturday of not hanging out if he got her a present. "I'm sorry," he
says.
"Well you fucking should be," Danielle snaps. "I don't want your pity
presents." Without even letting him say he's sorry again, she pushes past him
to the other side of the crowd, just in time for the bus to pull up. By the
time he gets on there are no seats anywhere near her. She gets off the stop
before their usual, which means she has to walk five blocks instead of three to
get home. Adam's pretty sure it's not because she wants the exercise.
Friday's a short day. Danielle's not on the bus, but Adam sees her ducking into
homeroom while he's at his locker. It's hardly the first time her mom dropped
her off in the morning, but he's suspicious. She's not in bio, but everyone is
jumping around from seat to seat, sharing holiday plans and being generally
disruptive, so the apple doll doesn't notice when Lexie says, "Here," out of
the side of her mouth when she gets to Stori, Danielle on the attendance list.
It's not even like Lexie and Danni are really friends. Adam wonders what they
traded. Or if Danielle paid her. And if it was all to avoid Adam.
They don't have Drama, and they don't have lunch, and Danielle's not at the bus
stop after school either. Adam gets his phone out six or seven times to text
her, but can't think of anything to say. Instead he texts Tommy and asks when
he can come over to dye his hair.
 
Neil has an indoor soccer tournament all weekend, so he and their parents are
out of the house most of the day Saturday. Tommy's mom is meeting a friend in
town and agreed to drop him at the bus stop in Century City. If it weren't for
Danielle being a bitch and deciding not to speak to him, everything would be
perfect for Tommy coming over to dye Adam's hair and hang out. He texts her
while he's waiting for Tommy at the bus stop, asking if she wants to hang on
Sunday, promising not to buy her anything, but she ignores him. So he texts
Tommy to find out how far away he is.
"idk. just passed a hospital." comes back.
"almost there. next stop after park." Adam pushes himself off the low wall
where he's been waiting in the shade, and heads for the corner.
When the bus stops with a squeal of hydraulic brakes, Tommy is the first one
off. He's cut his hair since the last time Adam saw him―it's still long in his
face, but much shorter over his ears and at the back―and he's wearing the
makeup he bought at Sephora the day they went to the mall. He looks fucking
amazing, and Adam feels scruffy as hell in his baggy t-shirt and jeans with his
ginger roots showing through his unwashed hair.
"Hey," Tommy says, his face lighting up. "You're here."
"I was bored waiting at home. Figured I'd come down and take the four with
you."
"You just don't trust my amazing ability to follow directions," Tommy says,
bumping Adam's arm with his shoulder.
"Because you don't have one." Adam spies the number 4 coming, and the crosswalk
ticking down the last few seconds to get across the street to the other bus
stop. "Come on. Run."
Laughing and breathless, they make it to the stop with seconds to spare, having
only been honked at once. They head to the back and tumble into the last empty
double seat, Tommy landing half on Adam's lap. He shuffles over a little, so
he's not squishing Adam up against the window, but he keeps one leg hooked over
Adam's thigh. That gets them a sharp look from a woman about Adam's mom's age,
and an indulgent smile from the older woman sitting next to her. Adam smiles
back and rests his hand on Tommy's knee. It feels crazily like the bravest
thing he's ever done. He takes this bus all the time, and he's got his hands
all over his makeup-wearing boyfriend. The older woman winks at him, though,
and his heart feels a little less like it's going to beat its way out of his
chest.
By the time they've gone a few blocks, Tommy's taken his leg back so he can dig
through his bag without elbowing Adam in the ribs, but once he's found his
iPod, he leaves his bag so the women across the aisle can't see when he brushes
his hand over Adam's dick. "Wanna get pizza for lunch?" he asks, all innocent,
and Adam knows he's wondering what Adam would do if he undid his zipper.
"The pizza place is pretty crowded on a Saturday. Maybe we can make pizza at
home," Adam says.
Tommy gives him one of his private smiles. "You've totally gotta hear this.
This dude Lisa knows and I did it this week. He's fucking awesome with
keyboards and shit, and he asked if I would play some guitar for him."
Adam takes the proffered earbud and nods when he's got it in his right ear.
Tommy hits play. It's nothing like the metal sound Adam was expecting, has more
of a trance groove, alternating between a strong guitar line and dominating
keys. It's really good. He resists humming a melody over the top, not wanting
to impose on Tommy's music or disturb the other passengers, but he can
definitely hear vocals in his head. Tommy's got the other earbud, and is doing
his best not to look at Adam every time the guitar comes in.
Distracted by the music, Adam ends up missing their stop, but Tommy's pleased
smile that he got so into it makes up for the extra ten minutes it takes them
to get home. They spend the walk talking about recording music on a home
computer versus what it must be like to be in a real studio, about songwriting,
and about Tommy's dream of playing guitar for a living someday.
"I'm getting a lot better now that Don lets me practice in his garage. Mom and
Dad get annoyed by the noise when I do it too much at home."
"Is Don the guy on the keyboard?" Adam asks as he gets his house keys out of
his pocket.
"Nah. He's the one on drums. He's like thirty or something, works in a bank.
His garage is pretty sweet. Steve's the guy on keys. Don's his cousin."
It's weird to think of Tommy having this whole life, this whole group of people
in it, that Adam can't imagine. Like, he knows Tommy didn't go into stasis when
the Lamberts left Burbank, but he never talks about the people he goes to
school with or anything. Tommy knows a lot about Danielle, but other than the
shoe guy at the bowling alley, Adam's pretty sure he doesn't even know any of
Tommy's friends' names. Adam should totally remember to ask Tommy more about
his life, because he certainly didn't really think of Tommy getting serious
about the guitar, making friends with old banker guys and like actually
recording music. It's awesome and a little intimidating, somehow different from
how Adam's joined a theater group and started taking voice lessons and doing
his own things he didn't do when he and Tommy used to be friends.
"So," Tommy interrupts his thoughts. "Hair first?"
“Sure,” Adam says, because he suspects if they make out first he’ll forget all
about hair dying.
Adam and Neil's bathroom has a slate floor that his mother would kill over if
it got stained with hair dye, so Adam lays down one of the old beach towels
they use for mopping up leaks before setting a folding chair in the middle of
the room, and takes off his shirt before putting a second towel around his
shoulders. Tommy looks up from where he's mixing the dye with the activator and
gives him a wolfish look. Adam is tempted to kiss him, but he doesn't want to
mess up his lipstick, so he satisfies himself with sticking his tongue out
while he lowers himself gingerly into the cold metal chair.
"Promises, promises," Tommy says. "I'm gonna start at the front, okay?"
It's just like Adam's fantasy―except Tommy smells faintly of gardenias from
where Adam hipchecked him into the bush on the corner―with Tommy standing
between his spread knees, faded yellow Nirvana smiley right in front of Adam's
face, Tommy's jeans riding several inches lower than the tee's hemline making
Adam want to lean in, nose his underwear out of the way to see skin.
"You're staring," Tommy says, smiling, pulling the gloves that came with the
hair dye more firmly over his fingers.
"You're hot," Adam counters, but he lifts his eyes to Tommy's face.
"Okay. Here we go." Tommy lifts the bottle and squeezes a line of cold goop
onto Adam's part, spreading the dye along the line with a fingertip. It makes
Adam shiver.
Where Danielle used a comb, Tommy uses the nozzle of the bottle to make a new
part and then smooths the hair down with his fingers before repeating his
original action. Adam shivers every time he does it, tiny spasms in his chest
and shoulders that he tries to hide. The dye doesn't sting any more or less
than when Danielle did it, but the tingle is traveling from his scalp right
down his spine, pooling low in his belly. He does okay keeping his hands to
himself at first, until Tommy tilts his head down to do his crown, and Adam's
staring right at the bulge that seems to be all that's holding Tommy's pants
up. When Tommy combs through Adam's hair with his whole hand, pulling a section
forward, Adam makes a noise somewhere between a whimper and a sigh, and grabs
onto Tommy's waist.
"Sorry, d'that hurt?"
Adam can only shake his head slowly no, not wanting to make the dye drip or
dislodge Tommy's hand. His throat's too dry for any sound.
"No sucking my dick until we're done here," Tommy says. "You're just gonna have
to wait."
With an audible swallow, Adam pushes his thumbs under the elastic of Tommy's
jockeys. But he doesn't go farther, just leaves them there, an inch either side
of Tommy's faint happy trail, pressing gently into the soft skin like a
promise.
He's just gonna hold on for a moment, just get his bearings again, but he finds
he can't let go. Tommy doesn't stop what he's doing, sectioning out Adam's
hair, rubbing dye onto the roots, maybe tipping his hips into Adam's grasp a
little, but otherwise concentrating disturbingly well. Adam doesn't think he
should be the only one feeling breathless, so he strokes up to Tommy's ribs
then down, fingers pushing under the edge of Tommy's briefs to squeeze at his
ass.
"I'm gonna get hair dye all over your face if you make my jeans fall off,"
Tommy says, holding his hands out stiffly either side of Adam's shoulders.
"Maybe I should do the rest from back here. Smiling down at Adam, he twists out
of his grip and eels around to stand behind Adam instead.
"I liked you better up here," Adam says, putting as much pout in his voice as
he dares.
"Yeah, well, I'm almost done, and then you can put me wherever you want." He
flicks the back of Adam's neck.
"Promise?" Adam says.
Tommy just gets back to work.
Fortunately he really is almost done, because Adam is pretty sure if he doesn't
get his mouth on Tommy's dick soon he's going to―
He's just gotta get his mouth on Tommy's dick.
If he'd been thinking, Adam would have set the chair up so he could look in the
mirror, but he wasn't, and he can only see the frosted glass of the shower
doors and the towel rail under the gingham curtains at the window unless he
cranes his neck around. Which he could, but when he's done with the last little
bit along Adam's hairline, Tommy says, "Wait there," and something about Tommy
tends to make Adam do as he's told. He can hear Tommy putting things on the
counter, the plastic crinkle of his gloves coming off, and then something that
he really hopes is actually the sound of his shirt being pulled over his head,
not just a horrible tease.
When Tommy comes back into view his jeans are barely on at all, his jockeys are
sitting below his hipbones, and his t-shirt is nowhere to be seen. The need to
bite the soft stretch of skin at the edge of his stomach overwhelms Adam, and
he forgets that his hair is covered in dye.
"So, wh―AAGH!" Tommy says as Adam grabs him, trying to reel him in. But he's
too quick, gets a hand on Adam's forehead and another on his shoulder, keeping
himself tantalizingly out of mouth's reach.
"You are such a tease," Adam says, pushing against Tommy's hold.
"Twenty minutes. And I never said you couldn't touch with your hands." Tommy,
because he's cruel, squirms a little, making Adam's grip on his waist shove his
briefs down another half inch.
"I can suck you off without getting any dye on you. I know I can," Adam
promises. "Besides. You took your shirt off."
"Tell you what." Tommy gives Adam's forehead an extra little shove and steps
back out of range. "Until you're rinsed and at least a little dry, no putting
your face anywhere near my skin. But," he adds when Adam tries to protest,
"until then, I'll do anything to you that you want to do to me."
Adam's dick jumps before his brain has even parsed the words, and when he gets
it, it takes him a second to figure out how to get enough oxygen to speak. "So
I want to bite you there―" Adam points at Tommy's hip, his other hand drifting
unconsciously to rub his own where he means, "so you bite me instead?"
Tommy does his trick where he raises an eyebrow without even moving his face,
and nods. Adam scrambles out of his chair, pushing the towel off his shoulders
and kicking it aside while manhandling Tommy around to sit in his place.
Laughing, off balance, Tommy sits with a thud, says, "I'll take that as a yes,
then." He reaches out as Adam pushes his jeans lower on his hips and steps
between Tommy's knees.
It isn't until he's looking down at the blood-black oval on his abs that Adam
remembers Tommy's wearing lipstick. Or remembers what that means, anyway. His
brain flashes back to some movie or TV show where guys got points for the
number of lipstick stains they had in their shorts and a mom freaked out on
laundry day, but he's gonna be showering in about twenty minutes so no laundry,
and oh, fuck, "Tommy, jesus, do that again. On my dick."
"Bite you?" Tommy says doubtfully, and thank god, because ow, what?
"No." Adam's brain catches up. "The lipstick."
Tommy's smile is kind of amazing, but Adam doesn't get to see it long, because
Tommy bows his head and yanks Adam's jeans open, hauling his junk out through
the fly of his briefs so he can press a kiss to the top of it. It's more like
how you'd kiss an envelope to leave a lip print than anything designed to turn
Adam on, but Adam isn't actually sure he wouldn't get off on Tommy leaving lip
prints on envelopes and this is his dick, so the rough noise that comes from
his throat is totally not his fault.
"You thinking about all the cheerleaders getting up on your junk?" Tommy asks,
voice muffled as he smears lipstick down the side of Adam's cock.
"Not unless there's something 'bout your extracurriculars you're not telling
me," Adam manages, a little shaky, but clear. "Thinkin' 'bout you all messed up
from sucking my―"
He doesn't finish, because Tommy stops teasing and starts sucking, and when he
tilts his head Adam can see he has deep-purple smeared on his cheek, and who
the fuck needs words when you've got that.
 
After, legs still rubbery from coming standing up, Adam turns on the shower, so
he can rinse his hair and get his turn sucking his boyfriend. Weirdly, he’s a
little shy about taking his pants off while Tommy’s just standing there
watching him, face totally debauched like one of those ‘edgy’ photo shoots from
his dad’s old music magazines, where they made the models look like heroin
addicts who just had an orgy. Adam mostly wants to ask him if he’ll keep his
face like that but instead he says, “There’s some makeup wipes in the medicine
cabinet if you want,” because that seems like what he’s supposed to say. While
Tommy’s turned away, Adam shucks his jeans and darts behind the shower doors.
When he opens his eyes again after rinsing out the dye, Tommy’s sitting on the
abandoned chair. Between the steam and the texture of the glass, Adam can’t see
if Tommy’s looking at him or not.
Adam’s debating the merits of facial cleanser versus shampoo versus asking
Tommy to hand him the makeup remover because the bar of Ivory doesn’t prove up
to the task of getting all Tommy’s lipstick off his dick, when Tommy says, “My
family’s going to Hawaii on Monday.”
Adam’s chest lurches with excitement, translating the words for a second into
they’re going without Tommy again like that first night they had pizza, but
then, before Adam can even blink, he hears they’re all moving there and Adam’s
never going to see Tommy again. In his distress, Adam forgets the stubborn mark
he’s trying to remove is on some pretty sensitive skin and goes after it with
his fingernail. The Ow, fuck! and the What? No. What? come out all garbled
together.
“For Christmas,” Tommy clarifies. “And New Years. We’re back on the second or
whatever. Are you okay?”
Adam literally sags against the wall, something he’s only ever done on stage,
except then he had to hold himself up and only look saggy or he’d have knocked
over the set. Actual sagging is easier, even if it kind of makes him feel like
a fucking Victorian maiden or something. “I’m fine,” he snaps, cringing,
because wow, that wasn’t convincing at all.
“Uh huh,” Tommy says, and Adam can see the denim-and-black-and-pale shape of
him shifting on the other side of the pebbled glass like maybe he’s about to
get up and check for himself.
“No, seriously. Fine. Just―“ Adam pushes himself back to standing with a shaky
hand, running the other through his extra-slick hair. “I thought that was you
telling me you’re leaving.”
Tommy’s definitely looking at him now; Adam can see from the angle of the
darker pale of hair falling over his face and the smudges of his eyes. “It
was.” Tommy’s hand goes to his head in a move that echoes Adam’s, one that
Adam’s seen Tommy do hundreds of times. He’s been doing it since they were
seven and Mr. Ratliff stopped taking Tommy to his barber to get him a buzz cut.
“I would have told you more than two days before if we were moving, though. Not
that you gave me much notice when you left Burbank.”
“I told you the day my parents told me! That wasn’t my fault.” It was the next
day, actually, but it was as soon as he could. His parents broke the news after
dinner, all excited because they’d found a house, bigger and nicer and closer
to his dad’s work, and then were mystified when Adam wouldn’t stop crying and
shouting that he hated them. They wouldn’t let Adam leave the house while he
was that mad. “They didn’t want to bother me and Neil with the details until
they had them ironed out.”
“I like your parents and everything, but they’re fucking idiots,” Tommy
grumbles.
“Yeah.” Adam can’t really disagree with that. He still hasn’t totally forgiven
them. “But we’re―“ he’s not exactly sure what word to use, but decides on,
“friends again now, right?”
“You're definitely my friend. The kind who owes me a blowjob. Are you almost
done in there?”
Adam turns off the water. “Hand me my towel?”
===============================================================================

One thing that sucks about living in LA and being only fifteen is that there is
a ton of amazing live music you can't see because you're not twenty-one. But
also, pretty much every rock tour ever has an LA date, and if your parents are
cool you can go see them. Adam's parents are maybe a little bit too cool,
because a lot of the shows he wants to go to his dad wants to go to, too, but
that does mean Adam doesn’t have to worry about getting a ride, and since he
turned fourteen, if he wants to go with friends, his dad is usually okay about
not sitting with them, so it could be way worse. Plus, Danielle's parents are
only moderately cool, and they will only let her go to shows if Eber is going
to chaperon.
Before Danielle stopped speaking to him, Adam got them tickets to go see My
Chem at the Hollywood Bowl two days before Christmas. They're her favorite band
ever, and she goes back and forth on an almost daily basis torn between which
one of them she wants to marry. Adam has pointed out that they’re all married
already, but she doesn't see why that should make any difference. And since
Adam can totally see how a person might want to sleep with Gerard Way, and
Frank Iero reminds him of Tommy in ways that make Adam glad he's probably never
going to get a chance to meet him in person because it could get awkward, he
doesn't feel as inclined to argue as he might. The trouble is, he's not sure
how he's going to tell her about the tickets now that she’s not speaking to
him.
After about ten unanswered texts and as many ignored phone calls, Adam recruits
his dad to help. He does have to explain that Danielle is mad at him, but Eber
buys that it's about Adam hanging out with Tommy again without Adam having to
explain about the whole thing where Tommy’s his boyfriend.
"Just call her dad and check with him if it's okay if she comes. And get him to
tell her about it."
He rolls his eyes, but Eber talks to Mr. Stori, who apparently doesn't know
Danielle's pissed at Adam, and takes it at face value that Eber assumed he’d
want the opportunity to talk to the man who'll be chaperoning his daughter in
the crowd before Danielle got her hopes up. Less than ten minutes after his dad
gets off the phone, Adam's cell beeps with a text.
"don't think this is getting you off the hook asshole. but you must hav got the
tx months ago, so I'll come."
He texts her: "miss you. we'll pick you up at 530." He doesn't hear back.
The three days waiting for the concert are the longest Adam can remember, since
Tommy's away, Neil has a bad cold so can't go play with his friends, it's
raining, and Danielle still won't return any of his efforts at communication.
On the plus side, Tommy’s text plan works in Hawaii, but on the minus side, he
seems to be spending a lot of time out, doing family stuff or swimming or
riding around on mopeds, which he tells Adam about at night in little flurries
of messages, but which keep him off his phone for most of the day. And sharing
a bedroom with his sister and three cousins seems to put him off texting Adam
anything dirty. By lunch time on day two, Adam is about to pull his own skin
off in frustration.
He doesn’t see why it’s such a big deal, but he can’t exactly argue with his
mom’s math when she bangs on his door and complains that he’s been listening to
"Personal Jesus" on repeat for more than two hours. She should be happy it’s
Depeche Mode and not Marilyn Manson, but happy is not at all how he would
describe her tone. “We’re going to the movies,” she says once he’s turned the
stereo off. “I cannot stand you moping around this house for one more second!”
“I’m not moping,” Adam calls through the door, which apparently in mom-speak
means, do please come in and glare at me with your arms crossed.
“I’m not,” he tries again when she adds raised eyebrows and pursed lips to her
tableau of doubt.
“Superheroes or tear-jerker,” she says. “Those seem to be the choices in
December.”
The last thing Adam’s in the mood for is watching some dude cry into his
cornflakes because his wife has cancer and is cheating on him with his brother,
or whatever the Oscar contender for this year is, so he mutters, “Superhero.”
“That’s what I thought. Now hurry up, or there won’t be time to buy popcorn.”
It’s just the two of them, since Eber is staying home with Neil who’s still
coughing up disgusting sludge every five minutes, and though he’s not going to
admit it to his mom, Adam actually has a pretty good time. They end up in the
new Sherlock Holmes movie, which isn’t exactly superheroes, but is close
enough. Jude Law is hot, but not so hot that Adam has to bundle his sweatshirt
in his lap to avoid embarrassing himself, and his mom only talks a little bit
about Robert Downey Jr. and how long she’s had a crush on him, not pressing
Adam to state an opinion on the subject. Bonus, there’s enough going on
onscreen to distract him from his woes for a couple of hours.
When he manages a smile when his mom asks how he liked it, she says, “So where
do you want to go to dinner?”
They end up in a little neighborhood Italian place with high-backed booths and
red-glass candleholders at the tables. Adam’s mouth is full with his second
piece of garlic bread when Leila says, “It’s nice that you’re seeing more of
Tommy Joe.”
Adam’s pretty sure that she doesn’t mean ‘more’ in the way where he gets to see
Tommy without his clothes, but that doesn’t stop a lump of bread going down the
wrong way, leaving him gasping into a napkin while his mom pats his arm and
holds out his glass of water.
“Sorry, honey,” she says once he can breathe again and his eyes have stopped
tearing. “I didn’t mean to― you haven’t broken― been fighting or anything have
you?”
If his mother just started to ask if he and Tommy broke up, Adam doesn’t want
to know. His mother absolutely does not need any information about him liking
boys, or that he and Tommy are anything but friends again. “No,” he assures
her. “Just me and Danielle. Tommy and I are fine.”
“You never told me what happened with Danielle,” she says gently.
“She doesn’t think it’s nice I’m friends with Tommy. She’s being a jealous b―
brat.”
Leila’s lip quirks when Adam catches his language, but she doesn’t laugh at
him. “You’re pretty amazing, kiddo. Surely you can see how she misses having
you around.” And it’s his mom’s job to think he’s amazing, but it still feels
pretty good to hear it. “Wanna tell me what happened?”
Adam’s surprised to find he does.
His mom is a really good listener, and while she agrees that Adam shouldn’t
have tried to buy Danielle off with nail polish, she also thinks Dani’s been
taking the not-speaking-to-him thing too far, and he can’t really ask for
fairer than that. “Can I make a suggestion?” she asks once she’s heard him out.
Adam shrugs, suspicious that he already knows what she’s going to say.
“Maybe don’t mention Tommy every five minutes tomorrow night.” He was totally
right. “You bought those tickets for you and her for a reason. Make sure you
show her you remember that.”
Adam’s absolutely going to do that. Because his mom is smart, and also, as much
as he could spend every second of every day with Tommy forever, he really does
miss Danielle.
 
When Eber pulls up in front of the Storis’ house at 5:27 the night of the
concert, Danielle is already on the porch. She’s got her hair in tight braids
either side of her head, way more makeup on than she usually bothers with, and
is wearing an Art is the Weapon tee Adam’s never seen before, though he knows
she’s been wanting one. Her favorite black hoodie is scrunched in one fist, and
she’s clutching her phone in her other hand. Turning to shout something through
the screen door, she bounces off the steps and is halfway down the walk before
Adam’s dad can even put the car in park.
“Think she’s excited?” Eber says wryly, having been to more than one concert
with Danielle in the last few years. Adam spies her combat boots laced tight to
her ankles then loose over her skinny jeans. She’s ready to dance. You can
always tell what Dani expects from a gig by looking at her shoes.
“I think she’s excited,” Adam agrees, his heart lifting a little as he
scrambles to undo his seatbelt so he can offer her shotgun.
Even better than the grin on her face and the boots on her feet is the way she
throws herself at Adam when he gets out of the car to greet her. “I’m still
mad,” she says into his neck as she clings to him, “but I love you so much
right now I could pee.”
Adam bursts out laughing at that. “Please don’t,” he says pushing her away and
grinning at her. “But I’m glad you’re happy. It’s been killing me keeping this
a secret.”
“My Chemical Romance. Live. Did I mention I love you?”
“If you have a summer wedding, we’d be happy to host it in the backyard,” Eber
says through the open door, making Adam freeze and his face go hot. “Let’s get
going, or we’ll miss the openers.”
Danielle doesn’t react to the wedding crack, thankfully, just shoves Adam out
of the way so she can climb in front. “Hi, Mister Lambert. Thanks for driving.”
Over the sound of the closing doors, Adam can’t hear what his dad replies, but
it makes Danielle laugh and say, “I don’t think anyone loves Gerard Way more
than I do.”
Then, in celebrated pre-concert tradition, Eber cranks Danger Days on the
stereo, and they’re off.
Adam has never been sure what his dad did in another life to deserve the
parking karma he has, but someone’s pulling out of Eber’s preferred secret
space in easy walking distance of the Bowl just as he slows to pass it. It’s
hard not to take it as a sign. Especially when Danielle links fingers with Adam
and starts to pull him toward the venue as soon as Eber’s finished admonishing
them both to leave their phones on, and to head back for the car as soon as the
show is over.
Since neither of them have a bag to search, the first ticket check goes
quickly. Then it feels like everyone who’s worked there ever has to look at
their tickets before they finally get to go to their seats. Where, of course,
Danielle says, “Wait. I wanted merch.” Adam’s grateful it’s not general
admission or he might have had to kill her. After a million years in line, she
ends up with a hoodie and two tees, and a third she makes Adam buy because
they’re out of smalls and if she can’t have it, she’s determined that she gets
to see it on him. Fortunately it’s black, and also pretty cool, with just the
spider graphic from the album on it, and not, like, something he’s going to
have to explain to any assholes in the locker room. While Danielle would be
quite happy to say, “To my foot in your ass,” if anyone asks her what the
aftermath is secondary to, Adam knows he’d mean to say something short and
cutting but would start trying to explain the vision of Danger Days or
whatever, and school is easier when he doesn’t do shit like that.
With the sun going down it’s getting cold, so Adam puts his shirt on when they
get back to their seats, though he pretty much feels like a tool wearing merch
actually at a concert. Better that than peeling off the shirt he was wearing
and showing everyone around him his chest while he puts the spider one on
underneath, though. Dani doesn’t put her own shirts on, but she does pull her
new CHEM hoodie over her plain old black one. “Let’s rock,” she declares once
she’s got everything where she wants it.
Adam enjoys the openers more because Danielle keeps looking at him with a huge
grin on her face than because the music is anything particularly amazing, but
he’s pretty sure he’d feel that way no matter what. Tommy is the best thing
that’s ever happened to Adam, even when he’s kind of confusing, but Danielle’s
Danielle, and sometimes it’s nice to hang out with someone without wanting to
get in their pants.
In the setup between the second opener and My Chem, Danielle starts digging
under all her hoodies and pulls a small envelope out of her pocket. “This isn’t
me handwaving the fact you were a jerk,” she says, giving Adam a hard stare.
“But it was childish of me to just stop speaking to you for so long instead of
giving you a chance to apologize.”
“I really am sorry,” Adam says. He wants to take the envelope from her, see
what it is, but he waits for her to hand it over.
“Your present,” she says as she does. “For you to use with me.”
It’s a hand-made gift card, good for a mani-pedi and a movie for two. Adam
dives at her and gives her the biggest hug he can, grinning into her hair as
she clings back. The night only gets better from there.
===============================================================================

Adam's fifteenth birthday was celebrated with his parents, Neil, Danielle, and
five kids from his theater group. They ate lasagna and cake and played Karaoke
Revolution. It was fun, but it's not what he wants for his sixteenth.
"What do you want to do?" Leila asks when Adam nixes her party plans.
It isn't a good idea to tell his mother that he wants to get his license,
borrow her car, and drive up into the hills so he can blow his boyfriend in the
back seat with the lights of LA spread out below him. He knows this. He has no
desire whatsoever for his mother to have any of this information, except maybe
the license part. It's still really hard to not say it, since he's been
thinking about it in increasingly graphic detail for days.
"I don't know," he says instead. "Maybe we can have a family party after my
test appointment Monday afternoon, and then I can go out with my friends in the
evening?"
The look his mom gives him would play great on stage. "You know you can't take
your friends out in the car unless your dad or I come with you, right?"
"We don't need the car," Adam says. He wants the car. A lot. But he knows he
can't have it.
"Okay," Leila says. "Eleven o'clock, though. It's a school night."
"You're the best," Adam says, and kisses her on the forehead. It makes her
happy, and he likes to make her happy.
The twenty-ninth dawns sunny and not too cold, thank god, because Adam really
doesn't want to take his driver's test in the rain. He has a text from Tommy
wishing him happy birthday and saying he'll see him later, and one from
Danielle telling him not to bother bringing lunch to school, and his mom got up
early and made french toast. There's a card from his parents with tickets for
Wicked inside, and Adam has to get up and hug them both, and Neil says, "You
better not expect me to go," but then he has a card, too, and he made Adam a
mix CD with some pretty cool music on it, and he says, "happy birthday," and
mostly sounds like he means it, so Adam totally forgives him for being snotty
about Wicked.
Breakfast takes extra time so Leila drives him to school, and she promises to
be back at 2:40 to pick him up and take him to the DMV. Adam's not sure how
he's going to wait 'til then. He's still gonna have to take the bus mostly,
because he knows his parents aren't getting him a car, but sometimes he's gonna
get to drive and it's going to be amazing.
Adam feels like he's going to fly out of his skin by second period, and it's
only having seen Ms. Miller's zero-tolerance phone policy result in six of his
classmates, including Danielle, getting their phones confiscated that keeps his
in his backpack during third period biology where they're talking about the
production of ejaculatory fluid. Tommy's school is less strict about phone
usage, and Tommy sometimes sends him dirty texts during class. Adam's never
been more tempted to return the favor.
When he checks his phone as he's rushing to fourth, though, the text he has
from Tommy isn't dirty. He doesn't think. "Meet you at Muma on Melrose at 5:
30." Adam's pretty sure Muma is a restaurant, and not like― He's not actually
sure what it might be that was dirty that he and Tommy could get into without
fake IDs. But Tommy's kind of weirdly sneaky about things like that, even if
he's still never going to get served beer in Pizza Express.
"Can't wait :D" Adam texts quickly before slipping through the door, shoving
his phone in his bag again.
Lunch is deli sandwiches and homemade cupcakes courtesy of Danielle. "I'm not
mad you're celebrating without me," she says, holding his sandwich back over
her shoulder so he can't reach it.
"You met him, Danni. And he wants to take me out. I was gonna say no?"
"You're a lucky bastard," Danielle says. She hands over his food. "I'm not
really mad."
They’d spent the first half of New Year’s Eve drinking the booze Danielle’s
cousin Marisa bought them, and the second half crying into each other’s necks
about how they never wanted to fight again, and most of New Year’s day nursing
hangovers and the remnants of hurt feelings, and things have been much better
since. But Adam has been trying his hardest not to shove Tommy in her face,
though the three of them had lunch when Tommy got back from Hawaii so she could
get to know him a little.
"I'm really not, Adam." She nudges his knee with hers. "Honestly? I'd probably
dump your ass in a heartbeat if I got a boyfriend, even if I didn't mean to.
And we still hang out at school all the time, and you came over twice last
week, and I do have other friends, you know."
"He's just kind of amazing." Adam can feel the sappy grin that always creeps
onto his face when he thinks too much about his boyfriend, and Danielle eyes it
with a wry smile of her own.
"Besides which," she says, "I am totally not going to be sticking my hand in
your pants, and I'd hate to deny you a happy ending to your birthday."
"I better be getting one of those happy endings to my lunch, though," Adam says
gesturing at the box of cupcakes just out of reach.
"You can even have two. And, hey! No refractory period."
Adam decides not to tell her that when you're fifteen and your boyfriend is as
hot as Tommy, the refractory period isn't as big a deal as Ms. Miller made it
out to be. He hopes this is also true about being sixteen, remembers that it
seems to be true in Tommy's case, and takes a bite of his sandwich so Danielle
doesn't ask why he's grinning inanely to himself again.
The second half of the school day is worse than the first half, but finally
Adam's climbing behind the wheel of his mom's mini-SUV and on the way to the
DMV. The test goes okay―he never goes over the speed limit, stays in his lane,
stops for pedestrians, and is really careful to avoid California stops. He
loses a few points, but he passes, and that's what important. There's cake at
home to celebrate, and his mom invited Danielle, so he gets to celebrate with
her after all. She even comes when his mom drops him off in Hollywood. Leila
lets him drive, but she's not letting him keep the car.
Adam walks into Muma at 5:29, and Tommy's waiting at a table. He has on his Dr
Pepper t-shirt and the dark blue jeans that Adam loves. He looks really
amazing. Adam would much rather eat him than dinner, but probably that's
frowned on by the owner of this place. They don't kiss hello, but the look
Tommy gives Adam makes his chest tight, and when Adam sits down Tommy gropes
his knees under the table. Eber isn't picking Adam up for six hours. They can
kiss later.
"Lemme see your picture," Tommy says when he's done feeling up Adam's thighs.
Adam hates his picture. But he pulls his shiny new license out of his wallet
and hands it over.
"Lip freckles!" Tommy says, like that's the best thing ever.
"Freckles everywhere," Adam complains.
"I like them," Tommy says, and looks at the license again before handing it
back. "You look good."
As part of one of Danielle’s assignments for psychology class, Adam's working
on accepting compliments, so he doesn't argue. Bonus, that makes Tommy smile.
"So, your present," Tommy says. "You don't have to have it, I can get you
something else. But if you want it, it's across the street."
There are too many people between them and the window, and Adam didn't bother
paying attention to what was across the street when he came in, so he's no
wiser. "Okay," he says. "What is it?"
Tommy just nudges Adam's foot with his toes and gives him a mysterious smile.
"It's a surprise."
Dinner is also a surprise―way healthier looking than Tommy's usual fast-food
fare―but it's good, and Adam eats his whole salad, nuts and seeds and beets and
all, and all the fries Tommy doesn't steal, even though he had cake like an
hour ago. "Do I get my present now?" Adam asks when Tommy's chewing the last
french fry.
"Only if you want it," Tommy says, and Adam wants to shake him and tell him to
stop being so mysterious. And possibly kiss him while he's there, arms in
Adam's hands already.
"Oh, you know I want it," Adam says instead, kicking Tommy's ankle, making him
laugh.
When they get outside the first thing Adam sees across the street is a
GoldExchange, but then he looks to the left and spies a neon sign that says
BODY PIERCING/TATTOO, and that seems a more likely candidate for Tommy's
patronage. Adam's stomach does a roller-coaster swoop. "Are we―" he says,
envisioning a thousand things at once: needles pricking his skin leaving him
covered in ink and bristling with metal, and his parents' faces, and Tommy
holding his hand while Adam gets his name tattooed on his ass―
"Dude, breathe." Tommy hooks a finger around Adam's pinkie. "You're always
touching my earrings, and, like, looking at them, and I thought maybe you'd
want to get one. You don't have to though. We can―"
Adam's racing thoughts crystallize on a ring like Tommy's that Adam could reach
up and touch any time he wanted to. "Hell yes I want to," he says.
It seems to take forever for the light to change, and Adam can't tear his eyes
away from the neon sign, but he's holding Tommy's hand, and tracing the shape
of Tommy's knuckles with his thumb, and that keeps him from wanting to just run
across the street anyway, saying fuck LA drivers and the fact that they would
never stop.
Just before the light turns green, Tommy squeezes his fingers, and when Adam
turns to look, Tommy's gazing up at him, fond smile on his face. "You weren't
just saying yes because you thought I wanted you to, were you," he says, not
even a question. "What are you gonna get done?"
Oh, god. Choices. But before Adam can answer, they're running across the
street, still holding hands, darting around a clump of girls in high heels and
short skirts to get to the sidewalk on the other side. "Faggots!" one of them
yells, and Tommy spins back to shout, "Jealous!" back at her, and Adam really
can't believe this is his life.
"She just wishes her boyfriend gave as good of head as you," Tommy says, making
the heat prickling Adam's face even worse. Tommy doesn't notice, though, too
busy dragging Adam up the stairs to the piercing studio.
Despite the seedy looking entrance, the place itself is really clean, and the
pierced and tattooed guy behind the counter smiles when he sees them, greets
Tommy by name. "This is Adam," Tommy says. "He wants you to put some holes in
him."
"My ear," Adam says, because this is the kind of place that puts holes anywhere
you want, and Adam doesn't want to end up with an accidental cheek piercing or
something.
"We can do ears," the guy says. His own earlobes have holes the size of Coke
bottles in them. Adam turns his gaze back to the rings in Tommy's earlobes,
thinking about that instead. "I'm James," the guy goes on. "You thinking one in
each lobe?"
Tommy has three in his left and two in his right. But he's been talking about
maybe getting his cartilage pierced, and Adam wonders what that might look
like. "I'm not sure," he says.
"Whatever you want, so long as you don't want more than three," Tommy says.
"That winning lottery ticket got sent to the wrong address."
Tommy always seems to have walking around money, and Adam's never asked where
it comes from. He always figured allowance, like Adam gets. Now doesn't seem
the right time to ask, so he just says, "I was thinking one hole to start
with."
James gets out a book of pictures, and the three of them talk about the various
places one can have his ear pierced. Even after James explains that lobes heal
a lot faster and hurt a lot less, Adam decides to get the cartilage done. It
looks cool, and the assholes at school are probably less likely to pick on him
for it. Besides, when Adam suggests it, Tommy goes all shiny-eyed glow and
says, "Awesome," reaching up to finger the curve of Adam's ear.
Decision made, Adam's left to fill out some paperwork while James gets the
equipment ready. "You're going to come with me, right?" Adam says to Tommy when
he gets to the part about 'normal' yellowish discharge.
"Hell, yes," Tommy says. Eagerly. Like he cannot wait to see someone sticking
needles into his boyfriend.
"You're a little bit crazy," Adam says. Tommy just rolls his eyes.
Once they're sitting down, though, Adam on the bench, Tommy on a chair to his
right so James can get to his left ear, Adam thinks Tommy's not so crazy after
all. The smell of the cleaner James is using is sharp in his nostrils, and
Tommy's hands are heavy on Adam's knee where they're knotted with his, and it
feels like everyone is focused on Adam's ear. It's disconcerting and thrilling,
and maybe kind of a turn on.
"Right?" Tommy says, like he can see what Adam's thinking.
"We're doing the left one, aren't we?" James asks, pausing in his cleaning
efforts.
"Yeah," Adam and Tommy both say, looking at each other with a smile.
"Okay, about ready here." When James lets go of Adam's ear completely, it's
cold, and Adam suppresses the shiver threatening his spine. Tommy squeezes his
hand tighter.
"Okay," Adam says, not sure if he's reassuring Tommy or talking to James. With
a mirror, they check again that it's going where Adam wants it, and then James
gets his needle out. Or so Adam assumes by the way Tommy's eyes go big.
There's a pinch, James holding his ear steady, and then he says, "Okay, Adam,
breathe for me."
Adam's surprised to realize that he needs to be told. He stares at Tommy and
takes a deep breath in, trying not to tense up as he prepares for pain on his
exhale. He's so focused on Tommy's face, and the feel of Tommy's hands on his,
that it seems like Tommy's the one piercing him. The tension he's trying to
avoid in his shoulders coils warm in his guts.
"Now," James says softly, and ow! that fucking hurts, brings tears springing to
Adam's eyes, but like when you pull a hair out by the root, not when you fall
down and skin your knees. Tommy's breath catches, and he almost crushes Adam's
fingers, and Adam never wants to do that again and he wants to do it a hundred
more times right the fuck now.
"Dude," Tommy drawls. "Fuck."
Adam just sits as still as he can, hyper-aware that he's got a needle near his
skull.
"Just going to put the jewelry in now."
Adam's whole ear is a hot throbbing ache, so he can't really tell what James is
doing over there, but quicker than he expected, James is patting him on the
shoulder, saying, "All done."
"Thanks," Adam says, brain looping on the porn stereotype of the whipped bottom
saying, Please, sir, may I have another. He doesn't notice Tommy standing to
plant a kiss on his lips until he's done it and jumped back again.
"No hanky-panky in my studio," James says, but he's smiling when he says it.
"Dude," Tommy says again. He puts his hands on Adam's shoulders and leans close
to peer at his ear. "That is fucking hot."
Leaning back, hands still on Adam's shoulders, Tommy looks at James. "Can you―"
he says, and then looks at Adam, "Do you mind if―" He fingers his own ear where
Adam's is pierced. "Can we do me, too?"
All the good work Adam's been doing getting oxygen to his lungs is undone, and
his heart and his dick lurch in tandem. Tommy reads the oh my fucking god yes
on Adam's face and turns back to James, says, "Do you have time?"
"I'm your man," James says, "but you gotta sign the forms again."
Adam seriously doesn't trust his legs to hold him, so he takes a second to wrap
his arms around Tommy's waist and pull him between his knees for a hug before
he tries getting off the bench and onto the chair. "You gonna do your left one,
too?" he asks, whispering against Tommy's neck.
"That okay if we're matching?" Tommy pulls away to look Adam in the face.
"Definitely okay." Adam doesn't say that it's pretty much the best birthday
present he's ever had.
Tommy lets Adam pull him back into a hug, rest their cheeks together, while
James is getting Tommy's paperwork. "Thanks," Adam says. "This is much better
than like, a CD or something."
"Like I was gonna get you a CD for your birthday." Tommy nips Adam's jaw,
stepping back as James walks through the door. "This gonna hurt more or less
than my lip?" he asks.
"Kissing'll be a whole lot less painful," James says, eyes on their linked
hands. "Not too different, otherwise. It’ll hurt for longer."
Adam notes that he'll have to ask how long Tommy's lip hurt, because his ear is
seriously throbbing. His legs feel steadier though, so he moves to the chair
and lets Tommy take his place. It's weird watching James clean Tommy's ear, the
smell just as sharp in Adam's nose, but only heat where he knows Tommy's
feeling cold. Tommy's knee is pressed to Adam's chest, Adam holding it there
with one hand while the other squeezes Tommy's fingers. When James gets the
needle out, Adam isn't sure he can watch, but he can't look away. He finds
himself breathing with Tommy, deep in and slow out, breath catching as the
needle punches through, and he doesn't know if it's the breathing, or the way
Tommy bites his lip, or watching Tommy get a ring in his ear that does it, but
by the time James is putting the ball in place, Adam is beyond turned on into
seriously horny.
Tommy recovers a lot more quickly than Adam did, and before Adam's done
thinking about how looking at Tommy's ear now feels like looking in a mirror,
Tommy's paying, and they're headed out into the street. "What'd'you want to do
now?" Tommy asks once they're back on the sidewalk.
It's about 7:15, and that gives them ages until Eber is picking Adam up. "I
want to make out with you for the next four hours. Starting now." Not that the
middle of Melrose is the best place to make out.
"Hell yes," Tommy says. "Can you wait about ten minutes?"
Again with the cryptic, but that's worked out pretty well so far for Adam
tonight, so he doesn't press further, just follows along as Tommy heads up the
street.
Not quite ten minutes later, Tommy rings the bell on a pink stucco apartment
building with big glass doors. "Another uncle?" Adam asks, Though he so would
not care at this point if Tommy broke into a total stranger's house as long as
there was a door to close and maybe a sofa. Or a floor. Carpet optional even.
"Sister's best friend. She's got a hot date tonight with her boyfriend at some
house party in the hills, and she owes me for a favor. I had to promise not to
drink any of her booze and no getting jizz on her couch, though."
"It's a little creepy you were talking to your sister's BFF about your jizz,"
Adam points out.
"Not as creepy as―"
The intercom crackles and a girl's voice says, "Tommy?"
"Sorry we're late," Tommy says, and the door buzzes, letting them in.
"As―" Adam prompts.
"As talking to my actual sister about jizz. Tara's cool. Her brother's gay,
too. Older than her, though. Their parents don't speak to him anymore. She gets
it."
It shouldn't come as a surprise to Adam to hear Tommy say he's gay, given
everything they've done together, but somehow it does. Adam's only said the
words out loud to Danielle, and that was scary as hell. Tommy says it so
casually, like it's no big deal.
"Does your family know about me?" Adam asks while they wait for the elevator.
"Mom and Dad know we're hanging out again but not, like, what we do or
whatever. I told Lisa last time she was home, though."
Adam cannot begin to imagine telling Neil, but Neil's thirteen, not in college.
"Do your parents know?" Tommy asks, letting Adam step into the elevator first,
hitting the button for the seventh floor.
"Mom suspects," Adam says. "Or Danielle told her and she knows. It's hard to
tell."
"She's not mad?"
"Not the kind of thing she'd be mad about. Still don't really want to talk
about it with her." He's had all the sex talks with his parents that he can
face.
"She still likes me though, right?" Tommy leans against the back of the
elevator, so Adam has to turn his head to see him. He can't imagine why Tommy
cares if Adam's parents like him, but he's pretty sure Tommy doesn't have to
worry.
"She totally likes you. You kept me from falling off the stage and breaking my
head at camp that time. Even if she finds out about the pot I don't think
she'll forget you saving my life."
That gets a smile. "You weren't going to die, but like, you did go a little
overboard with the cartwheels."
Adam gets right up in Tommy's space, pressing him against the wall with his
hips. "The scarecrow gets excited, okay?"
"The scarecrow, eh?" Tommy gropes Adam's definitely excited dick and pushes him
off when the elevator dings, depositing them at their floor. "Keep your straw
in your pants 'til Tara leaves."
Adam laughs despite himself. "Fuck you, straw."
Tommy sticks his tongue out, and knocks on a door. A tiny woman with jet-black
hair cut in a bob, and thick liquid eyeliner accentuating the cat slant of her
eyes opens it. Adam doesn't know much about shoe designers, but he wouldn't be
surprised if her heels cost a few hundred dollars. He feels like an oaf
standing in her doorway, like Tommy is man-sized and he's something else
entirely.
"Adam, oh my god!" she says. "I think I babysat you and your brother when you
were, like, nine or something. You're all grown up!" She hits Tommy in the
shoulder. "Nice catch, squirt."
"I'm like six inches taller than you."
"You're also late. Remember the rules. There's Coke in the fridge. Oh, and
happy birthday, Adam!"
"Thanks," Adam says, but he has to call it after her as she trots down the hall
in a whirlwind of perfume.
Adam's still looking around bemused when Tommy launches himself at Adam's
chest, knocking him against the door. There's a minute where Adam thinks
they're both gonna go down, but he gets his feet planted and his arms around
Tommy's back, and they're kissing, finally, Tommy sucking on Adam's tongue,
whimpering, grinding against Adam's thigh, and Adam doesn't care where they
are, there's a closed door and Tommy's here.
"God I fucking―" Tommy grabs Adam by the front of his shirt and drags him into
the room, toward a grouping of furniture in front of a TV. "Fucking wanted to
suck your cock so bad while James was putting that hole in you. What the fuck."
"I―"
"I didn't even know that was gonna happen."
"Me too," Adam says, tripping on the edge of the rug, grabbing onto Tommy's
shoulders to catch himself. "It was―"
"Fuck. I want to get your clothes off. No jizz on the sofa, no jizz on the
carpet." Tommy looks around wildly.
"I don't think we can fool around in Tara's bed," Adam says, though he would if
Tommy nixed everywhere else.
"I don't wanna just rub you off in your jeans. And I still fucking suck at
swallowing sometimes."
"Shower?" Adam asks before he really thinks about it. Showering seems like a
big step. He still hasn't really seen Tommy naked, not in good lighting.
Definitely not all wet, slippery― "Shower," Adam says.
"Fuck. Yeah." Tommy starts pulling off his shirt as he heads for an archway
that Adam presumes leads to the bathroom.
Walking while trying to take off your shoes and jeans at the same time turns
out to be dangerous, and Adam nearly takes a whole row of pictures off the wall
when he stumbles―he'll have to remember to straighten them up later―so he goes
for his shirt instead, and by the time he gets to the bathroom he's in his
socks and boxers with his jeans half-way down his thighs.
Tommy, on the other hand, has managed to undress completely. He's facing mostly
away from the door, reaching for the shower, but is angled toward the giant
old-hollywood mirror, lightbulbs blazing all around his reflection. Adam stops
dead, breath freezing in his lungs, mouth going dry. Tommy is fucking amazing.
He's all narrow angles; he'd probably say skinny, but all Adam can think about
is how his hands would fit around him.
With the water adjusted to his satisfaction, Tommy turns around, and Adam
hasn't moved. Side on to the mirror, Tommy's dick casts a shadow over his
hipbone, and Adam needs to be touching him right the hell now, so he crowds
forward, backing Tommy right up to the edge of the shower stall.
"Are you gonna―" Tommy says, trying not to trip on the lip or bang his elbow on
the glass.
"Suck you," Adam answers.
"Get naked," Tommy finishes. "Your dad'll wonder why the wet clothes." He
laughs when Adam starts shoving at his boxers, stepping on the toes of his
socks to get them off.
"You could help," Adam says, though he's really not sure how.
"I'm providing incentive," Tommy says, squeezing his dick before stepping under
the shower's spray. With a final twist, Adam kicks off the rest of his clothes
and joins him.
The downside of blowing someone in the shower is that tile is really not
comfortable on your knees. And there's a high risk of water running down into
your nose, which makes it really hard to breathe when your mouth is full. Adam
lasts about fifteen seconds and then he's up again, sucking Tommy's tongue
instead, crowding him against the wall, palming his junk.
"Nggh!" Tommy says when his back hits the tile―it must be cold, because Adam
seriously didn't put him there that hard.
"Sorry," Adam mumbles against his mouth, but he doesn't let him up. He's got
Tommy's dick in his hand now, jacking it right up near the head like Tommy
likes, and he doesn't want to stop.
"Hogging the hot water," Tommy mumbles between nipping at Adam's lips, and it's
true, he is. With pretty impressive coordination, if he does say so himself,
Adam gets them turned around so Tommy's got his back in the spray and Adam's up
against the wall, legs spread wide so he can get Tommy's dick level with his
and rub them together. The groan of pleasure Tommy lets out makes Adam groan
right back.
Tommy gets his hand in there too, and it's all a tangle of fingers and palms
and hips and cocks for a minute and then Tommy says, "Fuck it," and pulls out
of Adam's grip, sinks to his knees.
"That's―" Adam starts to warn him, but the spray's still on Tommy's back so
nothing is running into his face, and he doesn't seem to mind the hard tile if
the enthusiasm with which he's going at Adam's dick is any indication, and this
mouth feels really fucking good, so Adam gives up on words.
And, like, rational thought.
When he comes, he hits his head on the wall, and it jars his ear which really
fucking hurts, and he yelps which makes Tommy jump back and get a shot of jizz
in the face. Adam tries really hard not to laugh, and fails completely.
"Mother fucker!" Tommy says, pulling himself up with fingers digging into
Adam's hips. "How do you make swallowing look so easy?"
He's not sure he does, though he's never coughed jizz on Tommy's lap or caught
a shot in the eye, which is something. "You usually warn me before you come?"
he says, and he's manhandling Tommy back against the wall again, thinking that
if he's not drowning he can probably put up with sore knees.
Not that it takes Tommy long. Because he can, Adam pulls off when Tommy starts
coming, and jerks him so he comes down Adam's neck and chest. When Tommy opens
his eyes, they go comically wide, and Adam starts laughing again, laughing even
harder when he makes Tommy squeak by pulling him close and smearing the mess
between them.
"You're crazy!" Tommy says, batting at Adam's shoulders, but he's wiggling his
hips to help and starting to laugh too, so Adam ignores him.
The smearing and wriggling becomes a slow, sticky grinding, and their laughter
peters out into heavy breathing, Tommy clinging to Adam's neck, Adam trailing
kisses down Tommy's cheekbones and nuzzling under his chin, lapping at the
beads of water and sweat he finds.
"This is the best birthday ever," he murmurs when even their grinding has
slowed to a stop.
"I don't know," Tommy says, teasing drawl. "That one at Disneyland when you
turned ten was pretty awesome."
It hits Adam that it's weird, in a really fantastic way, that Tommy was there
to see him cry when his brother puked on him on the teacups, and still wants to
be here with him now, naked, and stuck to him with spunk. "I did get a pair of
Mickey Mouse sweats," Adam says. Then, feeling a little reckless, "I'd rather
have you, though." That gets him a bite to his collar bone, and Tommy's grin
pressed to his chest.
===============================================================================

Adam figures because Tommy gave him such an amazing birthday, he'd better do
something awesome for Valentine's Day. Then he figures that Valentine's Day is
maybe too cheesy, and Tommy will think he's stupid if he makes a big deal out
of it.
"Oh my god," Danielle says, when he explains his dilemma while they’re trying
to do their homework on a half day early in February. "Just ask him what he
wants to do."
"That ruins the surprise, though," Adam complains.
“So instead you both plan some Valentine date and one of you has to be
disappointed because you can’t do both things?”
Adam is about ninety percent sure that Tommy is not planning on anything for
Valentine's day. It’s just not his scene. But he should maybe listen to
Danielle just in case. He lets Danielle get back to her psych essay and ignores
his history book in favor of the internet.
The trouble is that Valentine's Day doesn’t seem to be geared towards pairs of
teenage boys. (Not that most of the girls he knows would be interested in the
things the ads and the websites are suggesting, but they definitely aren’t for
Tommy.) Adam’s not buying diamonds or roses, and Tommy’s not really that into
chocolate. Adam would be cool with about a hundred more matching piercings, but
he doesn’t want to steal Tommy’s birthday idea. They’re not old enough to get
tattoos. Which kind of leaves dinner. And maybe a necklace or a bracelet or
something. Adam wonders if he remembers how to make friendship bracelets still.
But he hasn’t seen Tommy wearing anything on his wrists since junior high, so
probably a necklace would be better.
“What do you think of this?” he asks, angling his laptop screen toward Dani.
He’s found a silver pendant with an eye on it, hanging from a black cord.
“It makes you look like a stalker. Why don’t you get him these?” Danielle tips
her own screen his direction to show him something called Bedroom Dice. There’s
a woman wearing underwear and high heels on the package.
“I don’t even want to know what those are,” Adam says. “I’m not getting him sex
toys. That’s creepy.”
“Creepier than an eye to hang around his neck?”
Much creepier, but Adam doesn’t feel like arguing. It’s not like he was super
attached to the idea of that particular pendant. He clicks past a wolf’s head
and a pentagram. Danielle says, “Don’t get him something that looks like it
came from Hot Topic.” And that’s an idea. The place Tommy likes to buy old band
shirts had some pretty cool jewelry.
“You’re a genius,” he says. “Wanna go to Silver Lake?”
With Danielle, shopping trumps homework every single time. She ditches her
essay and calls her cousin Marisa to see if she’ll take them shopping. She’s
got a client meeting―she’s a wardrobe consultant, which as far as Adam can tell
means she gets paid to go to people’s houses and tell them their clothes are
ugly―but the client lives in Los Feliz, so Marisa will drop them off on her way
and pick them up when she gets done. Adam even has time to finish his history
chapter before she gets there to pick them up. It’s, like, perfect.
The first store they go in has about twenty pairs of platform shoes that
Danielle can’t keep away from, but the jewelry selection sucks. Adam has to
literally pry a pair of lucite disco shoes with rainbow stacked heels out of
Danielle’s hands. Even though they’re over a hundred dollars, he might have let
her get them, except that they’re two full sizes too small and her toes hang
off the ends. “Marisa would kill you. And then me,” he says, putting them back
on the shelf and bodily standing between her and the shoes. “Come on. I’ll buy
you some coffee.”
A chai latte mollifies her enough that she doesn’t complain when he walks her
past the store with the shoes again to get to the shop where Tommy found his
vintage Hendrix poster. She loses herself in a rack of coats, and Adam heads
for the display counters at the back. The case of pipes catches his eye, but
Danielle would have questions he doesn’t want to answer, and if Tommy’s parents
found drug paraphernalia in his room he’d probably be in even more trouble than
he got for the booze, so he moves past that, and the case of ashtrays and
letter openers, to the ones with rings and necklaces.
“Looking for something for your girlfriend?” the woman behind the counter asks
when she spots him. She’s probably Marisa’s age―28 or so―and dressed to kill.
She looks like she has lots of opinions on what girls like their boyfriends to
buy for them.
“No,” Adam answers, glancing over at Danielle, trying not to turn pink. He
feels weird telling the woman he’s shopping for his boyfriend, and it doesn’t
occur to him to say he’s looking for something for himself.
But then an older guy in black jeans and a tight black t-shirt interrupts them.
“I’ll help him, Sandy. That woman you were showing the poodle skirts to needs
something.” When she walks away toward the dressing rooms, the man gives Adam a
broad smile. “You look like you’re after something more rock-and-roll than
Audrey Hepburn.”
Adam isn’t sure if it’s his black hair or his Queen tee, but he’s grateful.
He’s pretty sure no one has ever thought he was rock-and-roll before. Except
then the man winks and adds, “Have you got a boyfriend already, or are you
hoping to catch someone with your choice?” and Adam realizes the guy thinks
he’s gay.
Or, knows he’s gay. Because it’s not like he’s wrong.
“Dani?” Adam calls, hoping his voice doesn’t sound as panicked as he feels.
It’s not a big deal. The guy doesn’t sound like an asshole, or really like a
creep, and it’s not like he’s pressing Adam’s blown kisses to his dick or
anything. He just wants to help Adam get the present that he wants. Nothing to
freak out about.
“D’you find something?” Danielle asks from over his left shoulder, and Adam
relaxes a fraction. “I can’t even tell you the junk he was looking at on line.”
Danielle gives the shop guy her teacher’s pet smile. “I bet you can find him
something perfect.”
“I hope so,” the guy replies, but he’s smiling at Adam when he says it.
Okay. Really not a big deal. “Already have a boyfriend,” Adam almost whispers,
ignoring the funny look Danielle’s giving him. It’s not quite her are you
kidding me look, but it’s close.
“Lucky guy,” the man says, and starts getting trays out of the case.
It doesn’t take them long to find a medium length necklace of small black beads
with three slightly larger hematite beads opposite the clasp. It’s actually
less expensive than the pendants Adam had been looking at, and he likes it a
lot better. Danielle gives two thumbs up of approval, and store guy not only
has a plain black box made specially for necklaces, but is willing to wrap it
in silver paper for no extra charge. Adam feels sillier and sillier for having
been scared of him.
“What the hell was your deal in there?” Danielle demands as soon as they get
outside and the door shuts behind them.
“Nothing,” Adam tries, even though he knows it’s futile.
“Was he like a creeper or something before I got there? Do I need to kick his
ass? Because I will totally kick his ass if he was hitting on you in a sleezy
way or anything.”
“No!” Adam says. “No. He wasn’t― He just, like, assumed I was gay. And I―“ Adam
doesn’t know how to explain.
“And you totally are, so that’s a problem because…” Danielle shoves him. “Even
if you weren’t, what’s wrong with being gay? Are you a secret homophobe?”
“What?” Adam shoves her back, but it’s pretty half-hearted because he’s
distracted by the whole why would she even think that thing. People get beat up
for being gay. They get killed. And excuse him if he doesn’t want to be one of
those people.
“Why do you care if some old gay dude knows you swing from his side of the
plate?”
“I swing from― Have you been watching that weird 90s gay softball movie you
tried to show me again?”
“Timothy Olyphant. And Dean Cain. And Zach Braff. Don’t try to tell me you
don’t watch Scrubs marathons when they’re on. How many times do I have to tell
you it’s not about you, it’s about all the hot dudes?”
“How was I supposed to know he was gay? He might have been a gay basher or
something.”
Danielle gives him the full-on are you kidding me look not tempered for
company. “Adam, honey, we’re at a vintage store in Silver Lake. And you did
look at him, right?” She checks the traffic before pulling him out into the
street by the wrist, heading back toward the coffee shop where they’re meeting
Marisa. “Maybe you’re the one who should be watching more gay movies. He was
practically out of central casting.”
“Whatever. Why do I need movies? I’d rather be having gay sex with my gay
boyfriend.”
One day Danielle’s going to hurt something rolling her eyes like that.
 
Adam’s mom lets him take her car to Burbank on Saturday if he promises to be
home by ten. He wants to take Tommy his necklace right away, but he managed to
get a reservation at an Argentine restaurant Yelp assures him is romantic for
Tuesday night, so he’s going to wait for actual Valentine's day like an adult.
He can’t stop thinking about seeing Tommy with a necklace Adam gave him around
his neck, though. He really hopes Tommy likes it.
“I mean it, Adam. Home by ten. I don’t want you driving through LA on a
Saturday night when people are moving from the bars to the clubs.”
“Okay, Mom. Okay.” Adam kisses his mother’s cheek as he takes the keys she’s
dangling off one finger. “I promise.” Tommy’s parents are gonna be home anyway,
so it’s not that likely he’ll get too distracted to leave on time.
The advantage of Tommy’s parents having no idea Tommy and Adam are dating is
that they don’t forbid them to shut Tommy’s bedroom door. But his mom is doing
laundry so she keeps coming in without knocking to pick up dirty clothes or
drop off clean ones, and then to ask what they want for lunch, do they want a
drink, or a snack. And then Tommy’s dad starts in, calling up to see if they
want to come downstairs and watch Animal Planet, it’s about big cats― and Tommy
rolls his eyes, but Adam says, “Might as well,” because, seriously, it’s got to
be easier to not grab his boyfriend and shove his tongue in his mouth if there
isn’t even any pretense that they’re alone. Besides. Tigers are awesome.
“Sorry,” Tommy says, putting down the guitar he’s been clutching since the last
time his mom came in unannounced bearing a bowl of popcorn and a pressed dress
shirt Adam can’t imagine Tommy wearing. “I was hoping they’d at least run some
errands or something.”
“It’s cool,” Adam says. “I like just hanging out with you.”
“‘Cause I’m just that awesome,” Tommy says like he means the opposite, but he’s
smiling like Adam handed him the keys to his own car, and it makes Adam’s heart
lurch.
They make it downstairs just in time to catch a female lion dragging a―maybe
gazelle―carcass back to her family, and Tommy’s dad saying, “You missed the
kill,” like he’s certain they’re going to be crushed with disappointment.
“They’ll show another one, I’m sure,” Tommy says, nudging his Dad’s knee with
his own as he walks past to take his spot on the ottoman, leaving the armchair
for Adam like they’re ten years old again.
It’s hard to keep his hands to himself with Tommy right there, shoulder nudging
Adam’s knee where it’s tucked up against the overstuffed arm Tommy’s using as a
backrest, but he has a good view of not only the TV but Tommy’s parents, and
between the commentary about lions killing all the cubs when they take over a
pride and Tommy’s dad looking all dad-like out of the corner of his eye, Adam
manages to resist his inappropriate urges.
“Are you staying for dinner, sweetie?” Mrs. Ratliff says once they’ve all
learned everything there is to know about the mating habits of the African
lion―and jeeze that wasn’t embarrassing at all.
“Yes,” Tommy answers for him. “We’re just going to go to the park for a little
bit first. Back in time to set the table, promise.”
“Um, yes. Thank you,” Adam adds as Tommy drags him toward the front door, death
grip on his elbow.
“Have fun, boys,” Mrs. Ratliff calls as they grab their coats and run out the
front door.
“The fuck?” Adam asks.
“I was not going to sit there listening to my dad dissect the finer points of
lion fucking while mom cooked dinner. We’re gonna make out behind Mrs.
Ferrigut’s box hedge.”
“We are?”
Tommy’s still dragging him along, man with a serious mission. “We are. It
hasn’t rained in days; there won’t be any mud.”
It rained like Wednesday, but that might have just been out by the ocean.
Besides. Making out. And if there’s mud in the bushes, there’s probably mud at
the park, and they can say they were wrestling. Or maybe playing tag. That
might sound less suspicious.
Tommy shoves Adam through the gap between the hedge and the high fence around
Mrs. Ferrigut’s yard, following behind him. When Adam still lived here, Mrs.
Ferrigut’s son parked his motorcycle in the space and kept the hedge neatly
trimmed so there was room. But he’s gotta be like thirty-five now, probably has
his own house to keep his bike at, or maybe he has a car and kids or something.
Overgrown, the gap’s a pretty good hiding space. They obviously aren’t the only
ones who think so, because there’re even a couple flattened cardboard boxes to
sit on, cigarette butts ground into the dirt around their edges.
“Maybe we shouldn’t be here,” Adam says, trying to back out again when he sees
this is obviously someone’s spot.
“It’s cool,” Tommy says, not halting his forward motion. “Those’r mine.”
Adam’s going to ask why Tommy’s hanging out in his neighbor’s bushes when he
has a perfectly good house just up the street, but Tommy pushes him down and
climbs on top of him, his dick―his really hard dick―pressing into Adam’s
stomach, and questions seem totally beside the point.
They’ve for sure made out more comfortable places than a couple of boxes under
some bushes, but they’ve made out less comfortable places, too, and Adam
doesn’t really care. His sweater and jacket mostly isolate him from the cold
seeping through the cardboard, and Tommy’s warm on top of him if he ignores the
cold fingers creeping under his shirt, and when Tommy gets like this, so
desperate for Adam’s kisses, it warms something up inside of him that nothing
else touches.
“D’you want?” Adam runs his hands down Tommy’s side, angling his fingers in as
he reaches his hip, trying to squeeze between them, get at Tommy’s fly.
“S’okay. Just―“ Tommy moves Adam’s hand to his ass, slows his frantic humping
to a dirty grind, and starts going at Adam’s lips with teasing brushes of his
tongue instead of the sucking bites from a minute ago.
They make out to the sound of the wind rustling in the leaves and the odd car
driving past, the sky above them going pink, Adam getting hotter and Tommy
cooling down until they meet somewhere in the middle.
“What brought that on?” Adam says when Tommy stops kissing him to nuzzle under
his jaw.
Instead of answering, Tommy pulls Adam’s collar down so he can get to skin
that’s okay to mark, and starts sucking gently. Adam lets him, liking how it
feels, liking knowing that Tommy wants to do it, but he still prods, “Tommy?”
“Like―“ He straightens Adam’s collar, patting it into place, and pillows his
head on Adam’s neck. “You were just sitting on my bed all day, like, sitting
there, and I couldn’t even kiss you or my mom would have caught us, and then we
were watching those lions fucking and your knee was so hot, and if I’d just
turned I could have curled up between your legs and sucked your dick, but I
couldn’t even hold your fucking hand, because if my mom― She―“ Tommy bites him,
a sharp nip that makes Adam jump and his hands grip too tight around Tommy’s
waist. “Sorry,” Tommy says, soothing it with his tongue.
When he doesn’t go on, Adam kisses the top of his head, squeezes him again,
more gently this time, whispers, “She wouldn’t like me anymore?”
“She wouldn’t understand. Neither of them. Love the sinner, hate the sin.”
There’s nothing Adam can say to that. He doesn’t think that much about church,
but he remembers one of the last times he saw Tommy before that weird first
kiss at his thirteenth birthday party. It was the summer they were eleven, and
between Adam’s mom getting more party jobs and Tommy’s mom sending him to
church camp instead of Camp Crescendo where they’d been going together since
they were seven, they hadn’t seen each other in months. Adam had been in the
front yard for almost an hour―banished from the living room where he was
driving his mother crazy―when Mrs. Ratliff’s car finally pulled up, and he
nearly tackled Tommy against the side of the car he was so happy to see him.
“Woah,” Tommy had said. “Hey.” He didn’t really hug Adam back, which was weird.
Mrs. Ratliff didn’t get out of the car, which was also weird, just said goodbye
through the window before she drove off.
A little warily, Adam said, “Mom made cookies. Snickerdoodles. How was camp?”
“Camp was stupid.” Tommy told him, looking down at the tangle of friendship
bracelets on his wrist, picking at a red and black one Adam hadn’t remembered
seeing before. “How was music camp?”
Instead of telling Tommy about how he got to sing four songs in the final
showcase, Adam said, “Are you okay?”
“Yeah.” Finally, Tommy gave Adam a half smile. “Do you have any Fritos? Fritos
go awesome with snickerdoodles.”
They'd headed for the kitchen where Adam’s mom unearthed a bag of cool ranch
Doritos left over from their fourth of July party and gave it to them with a
baggie of cookies and a couple Capri Suns before shooing them back outside. “We
can hang in the treehouse,” Adam said when Tommy looked kind of longingly at
the sliding glass door to the air conditioned living room with its stereo and
the Playstation. “It’s usually pretty cool up there.” He shoved the Capri Suns
in his pockets, gripped the chips and cookies in his left hand, and let Tommy
climb the ladder first, following awkwardly behind, trying not to drop
anything.
Technically, the treehouse was Neil’s. He was the one who begged for it as soon
as he saw the big old cherry tree in the backyard, was the one who held pieces
of wood and passed tools up to their dad and the guy next door while they built
it. But he was at his friend’s house that day, and besides, Adam was tired of
having to share everything with his little brother, thought Neil should have to
share too. When Adam poked his head through the ladder hole, Tommy had been
kneeling on the floor looking at Neil’s hand-lettered sign―which he’d run
through their dad’s laminator without even asking―that said, “NO SINGING
ALOUED!!” He was still learning his letters when he made it, and Adam was never
sure if he forgot the second hump of the W or got confused between aloud and
allowed, but he made a point of flouting the sign’s directive at every
opportunity back in those days, and had started singing, “Ground control to
Major Tom, commencing count―“
Before he could finish the line, Tommy laughed, saying, “Neil’s handiwork?”
Delighted Tommy was acting more like himself, Adam dropped the chips and
cookies near Tommy’s knees and hoisted himself the rest of the way up.
They’d picnicked on the rug made from carpet scraps glued onto a tarp, and Adam
answered all Tommy’s questions about who was at camp and what shows they did,
while Tommy ignored all Adam’s attempts to get any similar information out of
him. When the food was gone, Adam lay back on the beanbag chair and tugged
Tommy down next to him by the wrist, keeping hold of it so he could point to
his various bracelets and ask who made them.
As he'd picked through them, Adam was pleased to see Tommy was still wearing
the black-and-gray one Adam made him at camp the previous year, and the shades-
of-blue one Adam gave him when he moved, and even the crappy, red-white-and-
blue one that was Adam’s first ever attempt at bracelet making. The rainbow one
was from Angela who played Dorothy when they did Wizard of Oz the summer
before, and Adam’s pretty sure Tommy made the all-black one himself. But there
was a green, white, and yellow one he’d never seen before, and the red-and-
black Tommy was picking at, and one in different shades of purple in the same
pattern as the blue one from Adam.
“Camp or school?” Adam asked, hooking a finger under the green bracelet which
was the oldest looking of the new ones.
“School,” Tommy said, and when he didn’t elaborate, Adam shook his arm by his
grip on the string. “Fine,” Tommy said, elbowing Adam in the side a little.
“Josie. Sat behind me in math. Saw the Mario Kart sticker on my folder, decided
we were soul mates or something, and made it for me.”
“Mario Kart rocks. What about this one?” Adam touched the purple bracelet.
“The craft counselor did that. He was showing one of the other guys how to do
the herringbone pattern cause he liked the one you made.”
It had taken Adam almost a week to make it, and he was pretty proud of how it
came out. Now he couldn’t help smiling that it caught someone else’s attention.
“How bout this?” Adam wrapped his fingers around Tommy’s arm and rubbed the
black-and-red knots with his thumb.
Tommy didn’t say anything for ages, lying stiffly next to Adam on the beanbag,
their shoulders barely touching and Adam’s hand on his wrist their only other
point of contact. Adam felt weird, and wasn’t sure if he should let go or not.
When they were little, he and Tommy had pushed and shoved for the best spot on
the couch and sat half on top of each other to watch cartoons and stuff, and it
was never a big deal, but maybe they were grown up now and not supposed to do
that? Only Adam didn’t want Tommy to think he was mad or anything, either. Adam
was still trying to decide what to do when Tommy moved his hand away, but sort
of snuggled closer with his shoulder.
“Remember how Zach had that Batman comic at camp last summer?” he said, quiet.
“Yeah?” Zach had been in Tommy’s cabin, had the top bunk above him, and the
three of them had hung out a lot that year. The year Tommy went to church camp
Zach had started learning drums, and Adam hadn’t seen him as much.
From his vantage point on the beanbag, Adam could see Tommy was playing with
his bracelets again. “You know how when your cabin counselor came to find us to
tell us free time was over and we had to go to afternoon activities, and we
were all lying on Zach’s bed so we could see the pages, and you kind of had
your head on his arm and I kind of had mine on your chest, and Ed laughed and
said that was one of his favorite issues, but it would still be there after
dinner and it was time to go?”
Adam had no idea where Tommy’d been going with that, but he nodded, and said,
“Mmm hmm,” when he realized that Tommy wasn’t even looking at him.
“That’s not how it was at this camp.”
Suddenly picturing like, Friday the Thirteenth or something, Adam asked, “No
comics allowed?”
“Comics were okay, just they were weird about, like―“ Taking a deep, shuddery
breath Tommy flicked a glance at Adam then went back to looking at his hands.
“My bunkmate, Jon, brought, like, I don’t know. This awesome comic book, like a
real hardback book, and we were on his bed just looking at it, and he was
telling me about the characters and stuff, because it wasn’t normal like Batman
or X-Men or anything, there were like these kids at a school and a ghost, and
our counselor came in and he was really mad.”
“Because of the ghost?” Adam knew even less then than he knows now about being
Catholic, but he knew the Holy Ghost is this big deal, and figured they didn’t
like you to read about other kinds of ghosts.
“Because we were on Jon’s bed.”
Adam didn’t get it. He’d only been to music camp, but in his experience, at
camp your choices of places to hang out during free time were pretty much the
bed or the steps outside your cabin. And the steps weren’t very comfortable.
“Why?” he’d asked.
“Boys aren’t supposed to share beds.” The way Tommy said it reminded Adam of
how his mom would tell Neil that he was never ever ever to go out in the street
without holding someone’s hand when Neil was little.
“But you were just reading?”
“Every day from then ’til the end of camp, we had to go to the deacon’s office
during free time and kneel on the floor and ask forgiveness and say prayers and
stuff and then listen to lectures about being real men and serving the church
by getting married and giving our wives the gift of children. It fucking
sucked.”
Adam hadn’t gotten it then, that the counselor and the deacon thought Tommy and
Jon were doing something dirty, not just being kids. He’d thought they were
eating in their bunks or something. Now he can’t really imagine having Tommy in
bed next to him and not wanting to touch him.
“I made reservations for Tuesday night,” he says, wanting to give Tommy (and
himself, if he’s honest) something happier to think about than his parents’
religious enthusiasms. “Valentine's Day. I know it’s cheesy or whatever, but it
was really nice what you did for my birthday, and I missed your birthday, so.”
Tommy’s head shifts and then his chin digs in just under Adam’s collar bone.
“Only if you want,” Adam adds. He should have said that part first. Tommy’s a
little too close to focus on clearly, but Adam tries.
“Really? You want to take me out to dinner?”
Lifting his head, Adam pecks the tip of Tommy’s nose. “It’s not too fancy, like
you don’t have to wear a tie, but it’s a little nice. Is that okay?”
“Mom just ironed my nice shirt,” Tommy says, prodding Adam’s chin with his.
Adam still can’t really see him in a dress shirt, but maybe he’d like to.
“Yeah. Okay. You could wear that. But still jeans if you want. I like those
black ones.” They’d look good with the necklace.
“Sneaky,” Tommy says, and he looks happy again; the worried frown gone from his
forehead. “You got reservations. On Valentine's day.”
“It’s getting dark, speaking of dinner.”
“Shit.” Tommy wiggles until he can get his knees underneath him and stand up,
then pulls Adam to his feet. “I wish it wasn’t a school night. Then maybe we
could get a motel room, say I’m spending the night at yours and you’re spending
the night at mine, and we could…”
“A motel?” There’s enough wind Adam can blame the shiver that jolts his spine
on that, but it’s the thought of spending a whole night with Tommy. They
haven’t done that since that first night with the pizza, and that wasn’t
exactly—well—planned, or comfortable, or filled with the kind of amazing sex
they’d probably have now if they got a whole night to themselves. “Do you think
we’d get away with that?”
“Definitely not on a Tuesday in the middle of February,” Tommy says, tiptoeing
up for a last peck to Adam’s lips before heading back to the sidewalk and home.
“But if we save up, maybe we can do it soon.
 
In a just world, Adam would be able to borrow a car and go pick Tommy up for
their date, but instead he lives in a world with probationary license laws and
parents who are apparently evil, so he has to take the bus. He’s been trying
not to make his parents too suspicious that Tuesday is any more special than
any other night, but Monday he makes the mistake of saying one too many times
in front of them that he thinks it’s stupid he can’t drive after eleven, which
makes his dad get out his phone at the dinner table and start reading aloud
from a website of statistics about teenage car deaths.
“I know all this,” Adam tries to interrupt him. “I did take drivers’ ed.”
Neil starts reciting a list of states and capitals aloud in alphabetical order,
which is his new trick whenever Eber tries to lecture them. Mostly they all
ignore him, but tonight Adam’s grateful for the help.
“Never mind!” Adam says when Eber raises his voice to be heard over Neil’s
drone when he gets to the part about deaths due to texting and driving. “I
never want to drive again!”
“Perfect,” Eber says, sharing a smile with his wife.
“I hate you both,” Adam reminds them, but they don’t seem to care. The incident
definitely puts the kibosh on Adam coming up with a last-minute reason he needs
to borrow one of the cars though.
On the plus side, one of Neil’s friends is having a Valentine's Day card party
(which Adam at first thought meant they were going to sit around and exchange
valentines cards like they used to do in elementary school, but which turned
out to be where they are gonna play, like, gin rummy or hearts or whatever),
and Eber and Leila have a date of their own which they’re going to straight
from dropping Neil off, so Adam has the house to himself while he gets ready,
and no one is there to ask why he’s dressing up to just go to a movie with a
friend, which is his not very inspired cover story.
The reservation is for seven, and Adam meets Tommy outside the restaurant just
before that. He looks amazing in his dress shirt with the collar open, skinny
black jeans and a pair of black, suedey shoes Adam hasn’t seen before. He’s got
just a hint of makeup on, no lipstick or anything, just enough so his eyes pop
even with his hair falling softly over his face. Adam wants to grab all the
couples walking past in the street, say, “He’s mine, look at him, and he wants
to be here with me.” Instead he hugs him, tells him he looks great, and asks if
he’s hungry. It’s not exactly Adam’s smoothest moment, but he has all night to
do better.
It hadn’t really occurred to Adam that going to a nice restaurant in downtown
LA on Valentine's Day would mean that not only would he and Tommy be the only
teenagers there, but the only guys there without female dates. He maybe should
have picked something in West Hollywood, or something a little more casual.
With a haughty sneer, the hostess leads them right to the back, past cozy
tables with candles and roses and people lost in each other’s eyes. Except the
ones who stare at the boys with their dyed hair and eyeliner who dared impose.
Adam can see Tommy bristling at the attention in the way he goes all languid-
slinky swagger to compensate. Adam’s own walk stiffens and his shoulders tense,
and he envies the way Tommy has of looking like he doesn’t care, even while a
part of him likes that they’ve spent enough time together for Adam to see that
actually he does.
They end up right by the door to the kitchen, the single straggly potted palm
at Adam’s back a totally ineffective screen from the noise and the bustle, but
Adam’s determined to make the best of it, and he smiles brightly at the hostess
as she hands them their menus. “Sorry,” he says to Tommy once she leaves, “you
picked a much better place for my birthday.”
“It’s cool,” Tommy says. “Not your fault these losers think you have to be
engaged or whatever to have some dinner on February fourteenth.” He makes a
show of looking at the menu. “And the food looks good.”
The food does look good. Although the website hadn’t mentioned that there was
some kind of love tax happening on Valentine's night. Adam’s glad he hasn’t
actually spent any of his birthday money yet so his bank account is flush
enough to handle it.
Their waitress is a lot less aloof than the hostess had been―complimenting them
both on their outfits, saying they look sharp as she takes their orders,
offering them virgin cocktails without sounding condescending―and it makes
Tommy less slouchy and Adam less ramrod straight. While they’re waiting for
their appetizer, unable to wait anymore, Adam gets out the necklace he’d
brought in his jacket pocket wrapped in its silver paper. He doesn’t expect it
to be greeted with a look of alarm.
“You didn’t say we were doing presents,” Tommy says.
“Because it’s not so much an exchange. But I missed your birthday, and you were
away at Christmas, and I love my earring a lot, so I wanted― It’s just
something I wanted to get for you.”
Still looking skeptical, but not quite so much like Adam’s trying to trick him,
Tommy reaches for the present. “You don’t, like, owe me or anything.”
Which, Adam knows that. It’s not about owing. It’s about― “Just open it. If you
don’t like it, you don’t have to keep it.”
Adam can see from Tommy’s face that he likes it, though. It’s not quite the
look that he gets when he looks at his favorite guitar in the music shop on
Sunset, but it equals the one he has when he beats Adam at Mario Kart. “It’s
awesome,” he says, turning it in the light of the candle before fumbling with
the catch so he can put it on. “Goes with the whole look I’ve got going here.”
It falls just where Adam hoped it would, all three hematite beads underlining
the notch in his throat and the shape of his collar bones. It’s really hard not
to go around the table and lick his neck, feel the cool of the glass against
the warm of his skin. But Adam just returns Tommy’s smile.
“I was out shopping and I saw it and I thought you’d like it.” Adam figures
that sounds better than the whole I really wanted to see you with my jewelry
around your neck thing. Casual is more Tommy’s speed. And Adam is still a
little worried about what Danielle said about the eye pendant seeming stalkery.
Their food comes then, and their waitress, seeing the wrapping, asks to see
what was in it. “This,” Tommy says, lifting the necklace a little so she can
look. “It’s like a really late birthday present.”
“Sort of,” Adam says, because that’s not really what he meant, but she’s
saying, “happy birthday,” and putting down their plates, clearing away the
wrapping, and the moment’s over.
The food is even more delicious than it looked on the menu, and Tommy tells
Adam about the new song he’s writing, and they make plans for Tommy to come to
Adam’s spring concert, and after a rocky start have a really good time. Over
strong South American coffee―which Tommy seems to like, but Adam wishes were a
little less bitter―Adam says, “I’m glad you asked me out for pizza last
summer.”
That gets Tommy’s coy, lip-ring tug, glance-through-his-eyelashes routine, and
then a wink. “Me too,” he says.
And yeah, Adam is glad about all the sex and making out, but he really likes
having Tommy’s friendship back, too. “Why then? Why not the year before, or
next year?”
“I saw that flier for when you did The Music Man.”
The photo shoot for that had taken forever, and Adam still hated the way it
came out. Of all the things to make Tommy want to call him again.
“You had your arm around that other boy, and I don’t know, the way you were
looking at him.” Tommy nudges Adam’s foot with his toe under the table. “It
reminded me of how you are. How it was when we were friends. And I don’t know―
Maybe you ran away when I kissed you or whatever, but it wasn’t like you hit me
or called me names.”
“Of course not. I wouldn’t ever hit you.”
“See?”
“I hated that kid in the poster with me, though. He used to pinch me when no
one was looking. During the shoot, at rehearsal, god. He was such a dick.”
Tommy gives him a what-the-fuck look. “You’re a good actor, then. It totally
looked like you guys were friends. Mom still had your number in her address
book, so I thought I’d call.”
“And here we are, six months later,” Adam says, raising his glass for a toast.
Not that it’s exactly their six-month anniversary or anything, with all the
time Tommy didn’t call him and stuff, but six months ago Adam never would have
said they’d be here, so he’s going to celebrate what he can.
“And here we are,” Tommy agrees, letting his glass clink off Adam’s.
===============================================================================

Adam cannot imagine why anyone would hold a tech conference in Chicago, in
March, but they are, and his dad is going and taking his mom, and Neil is
spending the week with Stephen, but Adam gets to stay alone. He is not allowed
to use the car, and he's not allowed to have any parties, and he has to call
them every evening, but they don't say anything about having one friend at a
time over to spend the night. Possibly because he hasn't asked if he could
since he was Neil's age.
They're going to be gone the whole weekend after the conference ends because
it's too far to go and not play tourist apparently, which means there are two
potential nights Mr. and Mrs. Ratliff might let Tommy stay over. They never got
around to getting a motel, but this will be even better. No one to tell them
they’re too young to get a room, no having to lie to anyone, and best of all,
it won’t cost them anything. Adam texts Tommy with the news and an invitation
from the bus to school while Danielle is distracted with Alexis' new hair cut.
He's pretty sure his mom asked Danielle to keep an eye on him while they're
gone, and it would totally be like Danielle to start early. Not that she's a
snitch, but she will take any excuse she can get to be justified in her
nosiness.
Fuck yes. I’ll lie if I have to," Tommy sends back two seconds later.
"no getting grounded again." It's been almost two months since the last time,
but Adam hates it when Tommy's grounded. He's gotten used to getting regular
text messages, even when they can't actually see each other.
THE WHOLE WEEKEND. FUCK."
Adam sucks a breath in through his teeth at that, because he'd only really
thought about Tommy spending the night, not about the fact that they would have
the whole house to themselves all Saturday and Sunday, too. Adam wonders if
they can get away with never putting clothes on.
"What are you doing?" Danielle asks, peering over the seat at Adam's phone.
Adam covers the screen with his hand but before he can even deny anything, she
adds, "I won't tell your mom if you have Tommy Joe over, but only if you tell
me everything."
"If you tell her I am never speaking to you again, and I'm telling Billy you're
in love with him, and I'm telling Vanessa that you're the one who stole her
diamond necklace," Adam hisses under the general hubbub of the bus.
"But I didn't!"
"Your word against mine, and Vanessa loves me and thinks you're a bitch because
you told her her sweater was ugly that time in seventh grade."
"You're such an asshole," Danielle complains, but Adam knows he's won.
His phone buzzes again, and, glaring at Danielle, holding the screen so she
can't see, he thumbs open the text.
"I've got my hand in my pants thinking about it."
Adam tries to keep his face composed, but he can tell it's a total failure.
"You were a lot nicer before you got a boyfriend." Danielle mouths the last
three words, because even when she's pissed, she's not a total bitch, and Joey
Carrera and Phil Litton are sitting almost right across the aisle, and they
have a history of punching kids they don't like the looks of, and also of
calling Adam faggot and fudge packer. They don't need actual proof he's gay.
But Adam couldn't care less about Danielle or a couple of assholes he goes to
school with. "Aren't you on the bus?" he texts back.
"no1 next to me. have my jacket in my lap."
If anyone else told Adam they were jerking it on the bus, he wouldn't believe
them for a moment. But Tommy just might do it. "u gonna come?" Adam asks. He
can feel the heat flushing his face, and knows this is a bad idea, but he has
to know.
"u want me 2? walk around all day with jizz in my shorts from thnkn bout suking
u all nite?"
Adam is seriously worried he is going to crush his phone. Or maybe pass out,
because he's not sure he can remember how to, like, breathe. "fuck," he sends
back.
"i'd ttly let you fuck me."
They are rounding the corner in front of the school, and Adam is hard, and
trapped in his jeans, and trying not to bite his tongue off holding back the
whimpers because he's having fucking text sex with his boyfriend and he has to
stand up. He hates his life.
"why aren't u here rn?" he says. Then, "at school. don't stop tho. 15 mins til
bell."
"leaking. if u were here i'd let u suck the taste off my thumb."
Adam is so completely fucked.
The brakes squeal and he's thrown forward enough to pinch his dick in a fold of
denim and bash his wrist on the seat in front protecting his phone. There's
enough chaos with the students shoving for the doors that Adam hides the noise
he makes and manages to stand and get his bag in front of himself. There's a
boys room right inside the school doors and there's bound to be enough of a
crowd at the urinals no one will think twice about him going in a stall.
By the time he gets the flimsy door locked behind him, there are three more
texts.
"tasted it for you"
"wish it was ur hand on me"
"fucking school sucks"
Adam could not be in more agreement with the last one. "fukin killin me," he
manages to text one handed while he gets his jeans open with the other. He
wasn't going to actually jerk off, just get some privacy to get things under
control, but the thought of Tommy fucking tasting himself on the bus is too
much.
"u touchin urself yet?"
"yes. fuck. so hard. jerkin in the boys room."
"bein quiet or gonna let em hear u?"
"qiet" Adam's texting with his left hand and jerking himself fast and hard with
his right which leaves no hand to gag himself. It's gonna have to be willpower,
not that he's exactly a shining example of that right now.
"let me hear u this wknd tho right?"
Adam will do whatever Tommy wants. He's too close to coming to tell him that,
though, so he just sends back, "y".
When his phone buzzes in his hand again, Adam shoots before he even reads what
Tommy said.
This, Adam thinks as he's wiping his hand on a fistful of toilet paper, is how
people get themselves in serious trouble. He's got his dick out and his phone
in his hand, and it's so fucking tempting to take a picture and send it to
Tommy. Fortunately he remembers the article his dad read them (Yes, at the
dinner table, thank you so much. The man totally has a thing.) about a girl who
got expelled for sending pictures of her boobs to her boyfriend. And the boy
almost got arrested but the girl's nipples weren't showing or something.
Whatever, Adam really doesn't want Tommy getting arrested. That would be way
worse than grounded.
Instead of hitting the camera button, Adam opens the text.
"im gonna make you scream"
"u cn try," Adam texts back. And fuck. That's the first bell.  
"came on the bus," Tommy says. "gonna be all wet and sticky the rest of the
day"
"wanna lick you. fuck final bell ttyl. <3" Adam isn't sure about the heart, but
he hits send before he can erase it.
 
Adam’s parents leave while he’s at school on Monday, so he comes home to an
empty house with a very full refrigerator. He suspects his mom wants to make
sure he doesn’t have “I needed to get some groceries” as an excuse for having
used the car after all. He has a snack, and does his math homework, then goes
to his voice lesson and comes home to an empty house again. He makes a meatloaf
sandwich for dinner and eats it in front of the TV with his phone in his hand.
Breaking the dinner time rules isn’t as exciting as it might be. At least not
until Tommy finally answers his texts, and starts telling him about how he’s
going to suck Adam’s dick in every room of his parents’ house come Friday.
It’s a very long week.
Danielle comes over most days, but she has to be home for dinner, and Tommy’s
parents are on some kind of extra homework kick or something in exchange for
letting him spend the whole weekend over at Adam’s, so he’s not on chat as
often as usual, and there are long pauses between text messages.
School on Friday is even longer than school on his birthday when he had his
appointment at the DMV. Then, he’s got to wait for Tommy to get all the way
across town on the bus. Why did Tommy’s stupid mom have to tell him he couldn’t
get his license?
Except somehow, Tommy is sitting on his front porch when Adam gets home after
school, ear buds in his ears, hair flopping over his eyes, legs tucked up to
his chest and fingers twitching on his shins like he’s playing guitar along
with whatever he’s listening to. Adam stutters to a halt on the sidewalk,
stunned all over again that this is Tommy. His best friend, his boyfriend, his―
his.
“Hey,” he calls, once he’s gotten his legs started up again. Tommy looks up and
his moue of concentration smooths out into a smile.
“I couldn’t wait anymore,” he says, tugging his earbuds out and forestalling
Adam’s questions about what he’s doing here so early. “Forged a note about a
dentist appointment and cut out at lunch.”
“You should have told me; I’d have skipped last period.”
“I would have, but the buses took for-fucking-ever. I only got here like ten
minutes ago.” Now that Adam’s close enough, Tommy wraps his arms around his
waist, burrowing under his jacket, wriggling his fingers until they find skin
at the small of Adam’s back.
“Hi,” Adam says, hugging back, burying his nose in the hair behind Tommy’s ear,
breathing in the smell of him, LA county bus scent and all.
They cling to each other on the porch for a while, until Adam realizes that
half his neighbors and anyone passing could be watching them, and they have a
whole house to cling in, and with considerably less clothing if they want to.
He wants to.
“Hi,” he says again, pushing Tommy gently away. “We can go inside. And, like,
get naked. Or, I could be a good host and offer you a drink or something.”
“I can drink naked,” Tommy says, stepping aside so Adam can get his key in the
door.
But even with his parents two-thousand miles away, Adam feels a little crass
flinging off his clothes in the foyer, and Tommy seems to feel the same,
because the only things they lose between the porch and the kitchen are Adam’s
jacket and Tommy’s bag. Adam gets them cokes cold from the fridge, and even
remembers to replace them with warm ones from the pantry so they’ll have more
to drink later if they want.
Neither of them say anything while they pop the cans, or while Adam gets out
some pizza rolls and puts them on a plate and puts the plate in the microwave.
“I’m usually, after school, are you hungry?” Adam says when the microwave
dings. This is ridiculous. He let Tommy blow him back stage at school. He’s
sucked Tommy’s cock upstairs in the bathroom he shares with his brother. This
isn’t exactly a blind date or anything. There’s no reason for this to be
awkward.
“I’m always hungry,” Tommy says, sounding more relieved than annoyed that
Adam’s being kind of a freak. Food and drinks in hand they head for the living
room, where they sit just close enough on the couch to share a plate, and watch
TV for a while.
When the pizza rolls are gone and Adam’s watching Tommy tip the last of his
soda into his mouth, he blurts, “I don’t know why I’m suddenly nervous.”
Tommy chokes a little on his coke, and Adam thinks he’s laughing at him, but
once he gets his breath back, he says, “Me too, a little. We could go up to
your room.”
 
It turns out blow jobs in his own bed when there’s no danger of anyone
interrupting them is just as awesome as the idea of getting head in every room
had been. They spend the rest of the afternoon cuddling and making out and
dozing and rutting together until they’re too sticky and sore to come anymore,
and then Adam washes the sheets while they eat an entire tortilla casserole,
because it seems like the first time you have your boyfriend spend the night he
should probably have clean sheets to sleep on, even if he’s half the reason
they’re covered with jizz to begin with.
“You don’t snore, do you?” Tommy asks while they’re watching a movie after
dinner, wrapped together in a blanket.
“You’re the only person I’ve ever shared a bed with,” Adam says. “You tell me.”
Tommy doesn’t answer, just pulls Adam’s arms tighter around his chest and
snuggles closer, smiling a little in the flickering light of the TV screen.
When Adam wakes up the DVD menu is playing on an endless loop, and Tommy’s
shaking his shoulder gently, smelling like shower gel, wearing pj pants and a
long-sleeve t-shirt. “You want to take a shower while I make the bed?” he asks
when he sees Adam’s eyes are open.
“Mrump?” Adam says, stretching, rubbing a fist over his face. Then, “How long
was I asleep?”
“Long enough to drool all over my neck and for me to take a shower.” Tommy rubs
his thumb teasingly under Adam’s lips but it’s just for show. Adam can’t feel
any wet there. “I hope that was okay. The showering.”
“Oh no. Hot boys getting naked in my―“ Adam realizes he missed the hot naked
boy. “You could have woken me up first. I would have watched.”
Tommy huffs a laugh. “Don’t be a creeper. Go wash the jizz off your dick and
come get in bed. We have the whole weekend for you to see me naked.”
Adam’s stomach flips over at the thought.
Since there’s no point in jerking off when he’s got Tommy here, Adam’s shower
is quick, but he still expects Tommy to be done by the time he’s dried off and
in his sleep pants. But instead of his boyfriend warm and sleepy under the
covers, Adam finds Tommy prickly and frustrated, jerking at the spare blanket
Adam keeps on the bed in case his feet ever get cold. (His feet never get cold,
but his mother’s do, so he and Neil both have blankets left over from the days
she made their beds for them.)
“You okay?”
“Ugh. Queen beds are so much harder to put sheets on than twins. Also, this
blanket is too small. How are you supposed to fit it on here?”
Adam takes the blanket out of his hands, folds it in half length ways then in
half again before really looking at it. “Yeah. I have never used this blanket.”
He drops it on the floor. Infusing his voice with sweeping drama like they’re
lost in a snow cave and Tommy’s life might depend on Adam’s body heat, he says
“We don’t need the blanket. I will keep you warm.” He likes the idea. Kind of a
lot. Not the snow part, or the cave part, but Tommy depending on him? Yeah.
Tommy’s still looking at the blanket on the floor when Adam crowds him onto the
bed, half lifting, half shoving him so Adam can crawl right on top of him, show
him what a great blanket Adam makes. “Ooof,” Tommy says, but he’s pushing a lot
harder with his hips than with his hands, and when Adam pushes back he lets out
a little whimpering moan, so Adam just says, “See?” delightedly, lining up
their palms and arms and legs, covering Tommy completely. “With me here you can
totally sleep without blankets.”
“With you here,” Tommy says, voice low and not at all matching the bright tone
Adam’s using, “I’m not that interested in sleeping at all.”
Which works out perfectly, since Adam would much rather hold Tommy down and see
if they can both get off like this, no hands.
 
They sleep late, tangled around each other under Adam’s quilt, which is
actually important in the end, because they’ve lost their pants, and their
shirts, and Tommy can’t actually breathe with Adam’s dead weight on top of him,
but it’s toasty and warm and body heat is really pretty awesome. Because Adam
is the best boyfriend, he brings Tommy bagels for breakfast in bed―though it’s
past lunch time and they eat them on the blanket on the floor like they’re on a
picnic and not in bed at all. The house phone rings while they’re arguing over
whether raisin bagels are better with butter or cream cheese, and when Adam
doesn’t answer it, his phone starts up with his mom’s ring tone. When he
answers it, frowning, Tommy stands, and, patting him on the shoulder with a
smirk, heads for the bathroom.
Adam listens to his mom tell him all about the science museum, and the
aquarium, and the pizza they had last night, and he wonders if she’s ever going
to stop talking, and he wonders where Tommy went, and he wishes he’d never
answered his phone. He doesn’t really care what his parents are doing in
Illinois, and he’s sure he’s going to have to hear it all again when they get
home, anyway. He’s about to try to find some excuse to get off the phone when
Tommy finally comes back.
He’s not wearing any clothes, and Adam won’t need an excuse to get off the
phone because he is going to swallow his own tongue and die.
“Danielle’s here,” Tommy says, loud enough for Leila to hear. “We need to get
the next bus or we’ll miss the movie.”
“That’s nice that the three of you are going out,” Leila says. And fuck. Adam
hadn’t told her Tommy was coming over. He looks at his clock. It’s almost three
in the afternoon, though, so there’s no reason for her to think Tommy’s still
here from last night.
“Yeah,” Adam squeaks. It would be nice. Will be nice. He’s totally going to
arrange for that to happen. At some point. Some point when Tommy isn’t naked,
his dick less than a foot from Adam’s mouth.
“I’ll let you go then, sweetie.” Adam’s trying to get enough air to say ‘bye’
when she adds, “I know it’s tempting with us gone, but no using the car to take
Tommy home tonight. Your dad wrote down the mileage, remember.”
Adam remembers. Eber told him about it before he did it, again while he stuck
the paper he wrote it on to the refrigerator with a magnet, and a third time
when he put the numbers in the notebook on his phone. His parents must have
been really naughty as teenagers, because Adam never thinks of doing half the
stuff they worry he’s going to.
He’s not sure what it says that they don’t seem to be worried he’s going to
spend the weekend having sex with his boyfriend.
“I won’t drive him home, mom. Don’t worry.” Adam prays she doesn’t hear the
because he’s not going home he leaves unspoken.
Finally, she says, “Have fun, sweetie. Bye!” and he can hang up.
“How’s your mom?” Tommy says.
“There is a rule.” Adam grabs Tommy by the hips and pulls him down on his lap.
He can’t think with Tommy’s dick bobbing in his face like that. “You are not
allowed to talk about my mom while you’re naked. Or while I’m naked. No talking
about my mom while there is any nakedness happening.”
“Sure,” Tommy agrees far too easily. “I think you should fuck me today.”
Adam probably didn’t hear that correctly. “I. You. What?”
“Fucking. We should do it. Today.” Which sounds pretty much the same as the
first time he said it.
It’s not like Adam hasn’t thought about it. It’s not even like they haven’t
talked about it. But Adam never really took the things Tommy said down the
phone when they both had their hands in their pants seriously. “For real?” he
asks.
“We don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Tommy says, struggling to extricate
himself from Adam’s lap.
“No.” Adam says, holding tighter. “I want to. I really really want to. Just
trying not to get my hopes up here.”
“Okay.” Tommy’s eyes are narrowed, and he reaches down to palm Adam’s dick,
like he imagines it’s going to be anything but hard. “Okay,” he says again once
he has a handful of ready-to-go. “You should take your clothes off.”
Shifting Tommy onto the floor so he can stand, Adam gets on that.
As soon as Adam’s shirt is off, Tommy leans in to kiss him, which makes it a
little harder to slip out of his pants, but calms Adam’s nerves, too, and
that’s a good thing. Because it’s pretty hard to give a bad hand job, and as
long as you don’t bite, pretty much all blow jobs are pretty awesome too, in
his experience. But if you’re bad at fucking you can, like, traumatize someone
forever. Adam has heard the stories. He doesn’t want to be bad at fucking. And
Tommy has more experience than Adam does, at least with blow jobs and stuff, so
he might have done this before. So even if Adam’s not horrible, he might be
laughable. Adam doesn’t want Tommy laughing at him.
“I don’t have any condoms,” Adam remembers aloud as Tommy pulls him down on the
bed.
"You can't tell me your dad didn't give you condoms with the sex talk. He's so
the dad who gives you condoms."
He is. It's true. And he did. "Neil stole them and turned them into water
balloons." Adam hadn't really cared at the time, because the sex talk had
mostly been about not getting girls pregnant, and Adam hadn't been able to
imagine a scenario where that might be a problem. But he pays attention in sex
ed, and he doesn't want any diseases, either.
"I'm clean," Tommy says. "We can do it anyway."
Adam really wants to. His dick practically leaps across the sliver of bed
between them at the suggestion. But he remembers Tommy’s talk in his uncle’s
car about being tested for the clap. He must have been worried about it if he
got tested. "Does the school nurse test for everything?" Adam asks.
Tommy's staring very hard at Adam's nipples, or maybe the mattress where he's
tracing an invisible wrinkle with his fingertip.
"Tommy?" Adam wants to touch him, but he's practically vibrating with tension
and Adam's a little bit afraid he's going to break.
"Never mind," Tommy says. "I'll blow you and we can go get condoms later."
Adam never thought he'd see the day he would turn down a blow job, but
something weird is going on here, and he thinks they need to talk about it.
“Yes she tested you or no she didn’t,” Adam says. “I’ll trust you if you just
tell me.” Tommy might lie to his parents, or about whether he’s actually going
to call, but he wouldn’t lie about something that could make Adam sick.
“She never tested me,” Tommy mutters.
“Jesus,” Adam says. “Like at all? I could have mouth clap right now?” That’s
not what you call it, but he definitely remembers whichever disease people call
the clap is one of the ones you could get by giving head. “Why did you tell me
you got tested? What the fuck?”
Tommy doesn’t say anything, and Adam shoves his shoulder, goes to get out of
bed and put his clothes back on. This is so not okay.
Before he can do more than start to roll over, Tommy grabs his wrist. “I’m a
fucking virgin, okay?" he says, voice overloud with panic. He’s still avoiding
Adam’s eyes. Adam doesn’t say anything, but he stops trying to pull away. More
quietly, but voice still strained to breaking, Tommy says, "I got my hand on
Matt Lombardi's dick through his jeans once and he gave me a black eye. Unless
you can get an STD from getting punched in the face and called a filthy faggot,
I'm clean."
It takes everything Adam has to turn the laughter that bubbles up in his chest
into a wheezing, gasping bid for air. He doesn't think it's even a little bit
funny―he's just so fucking relieved―but Tommy won't get that, Adam knows. He'll
think Adam's making fun of him. "Fuck," Adam says, once the laughter's under
control.
Adam's plotting Matt Lombardi's painful demise and trying to figure out how the
hell to respond when the implication of what Tommy just said slaps him. Tommy’s
been lying to him since the night they first hooked up.
"Why didn't you just tell me?" he says, rising up on his elbow to look Tommy in
the face, heat and hurt in his voice.
Instead of answering, Tommy fists a hand in his bangs, effectively cutting off
Adam's view of his eyes.
"Seriously," Adam says, prodding him in the shoulder again, though more gently
this time. "Am I that much of an asshole?"
"I'll just go," Tommy mutters, rolling over and starting to slide out from
under the covers.
Before he can catch a breath, Adam's irritation flips to anger, and he grabs
Tommy's arm. "You will not just go, jesus."
He's grabbing too hard, holding too tight, and he forces his fingers to relax
so they're a bracelet not a cuff on Tommy's wrist. Tommy doesn't turn to face
him, but he stops moving away, and he doesn't try to take his hand back.
"Look at me," Adam says, and when Tommy doesn't, softer, "Come on. Look at me."
Tommy glances back over his shoulder, blink-and-you'd-miss-it quick, and then
curls in a ball, his back to Adam. Adam lets his arm go so he can cuddle him to
his chest.
This is so fucked up.
"Why would I care that you're a virgin?"
"Why are you pissed at me then?" Tommy's voice barely makes it past the hunch
of his shoulders.
"I was a little surprised you've been lying to me for like seven months," Adam
says, trying to keep his voice calm but doing a pretty shitty job of it.
All Tommy has to say is, "Yeah, well."
Adam needs a break or he's gonna push Tommy too far. "I'm gonna go get a drink
or something. Don't― Just don't leave, okay?"
Tommy nods, curling even tighter, tugging the quilt higher over his shoulders.
"Want some hot chocolate?" Adam asks, desperate for Tommy to unwind a little.
Tommy nods again, and Adam figures that's all he's going to get right now. He
pulls on his boxers and heads for the kitchen.
It takes a few minutes to put a pan of milk on the stove for hot chocolate and
get out mugs, but then he's just waiting. And thinking.
And feeling like an idiot for all the times he worried Tommy thought he was
lame and stupid and inexperienced, when Tommy didn't know any more than he did.
Even though the heated floors and afternoon sun have made the kitchen summer
hot, he starts shivering, and the note his dad left on the refrigerator that he
can't stop staring at goes blurry.
"Fuck you," he chokes out. His fist is clenched and cocked. Something stops him
seconds before he throws a punch at the steel fridge, and he stumbles blindly
into the sunroom off the kitchen where he can lay into the overstuffed cushions
of his mom's reading chair instead. It hurts just enough, the impact jarring
his shoulder and the rough tweed fabric scraping his knuckles, but he's not
going to break any bones.
Pissed off as he is, he doesn't want Tommy to hear him, because he knows,
fucking knows, if Tommy sees how upset he is he's going to take off. At the
same time, he's not sure he doesn't wish the stupid chair was Tommy's face.
Just thinking that drops him to his knees, fury drained out of him like it was
never there. He buries his face in his arms on the seat cushion, even his tears
replaced by numb shock.
Several minutes later, the smell of hot milk pushes him to his feet, and once
he's standing again, he feels like the biggest drama queen in the world. It
fucking sucks that Tommy lied to him, but a lot of the shit Tommy's done since
they became friends again has sucked. Things have been good for months now,
though. Except he thought part of what was good was that Tommy seemed to trust
him.
Adam hits the kitchen just as the milk starts boiling over the edge of the pan.
He's not in time to save the stovetop, but he does get to it before it burns.
At least it's one of those convection stoves with a glass surface, and it won't
be too hard to clean. Shoulders relaxed, breathing calm, Adam pours milk into
the mugs of chocolate powder, whisking with the little whisk until all the
cocoa is dissolved.
Grabbing the mugs, Adam checks his face in the mirrored back of the china
cabinet, and he doesn't look too blotchy, so he heads back to Tommy.
He expects to find a little lump curled up under the quilt still, but Tommy's
sitting up against the pillows, Adam's spare blanket around his shoulders and
the sheet barely covering his lap. He's so fucking gorgeous and he's in Adam's
bed, and Adam honestly doesn't have a fucking clue what to do with that
information.
"I'm sorry," Tommy says as soon as Adam crosses the threshold. "You're not the
asshole. I am."
"No you're not," Adam says, mouth on autopilot.
Tommy looks at him, are you fucking kidding me? face as clear as Danielle’s
ever is.
"Okay. Maybe a little."
"I got this reputation, and I don't know. I played up to it, and you seemed to
like me. I wanted you to keep liking me. And then honestly, after a while, I
forgot I’d kind of implied I was a slut.”
The thought of you sucking a lot of dick isn’t what made me like you.” It hits
Adam that his was the first dick Tommy ever sucked. That night in his uncle's
car was Tommy's first time, too. "I probably would have liked it more if I knew
I was your first."
"I'm sorry," Tommy says again, hugging his knees up to his chest, but not
hiding his face this time.
Wanting to be closer, Adam comes the rest of the way into the room and lurks
half way to the bed. "It's okay," he says, and it is, mostly. "Now I know, and
that's kind of hot."
"When you came in my mouth that first time I had no fucking clue what I was
doing." Tommy snorts a little self-deprecating laugh. "I was scared you might
figure it out then, actually."
"I figured spitting jizz everywhere was pretty standard when you had no
warning." Adam holds a mug of cocoa out to Tommy, putting the other one on his
bedside table. If he was going to figure it out, that might have been the time,
except, really, how was he supposed to know?
Adam still doesn’t get why Tommy thought he couldn’t tell him, except shit was
weird for the first few months anyway―Tommy was weird―and then they never
really talked about it after that. Adam just kept assuming. Whatever. Tommy’s
here for the whole weekend. And Adam’s his first everything. “We’re going to
have so much sex,” Adam says.
“You still want to?” Tommy asks, smile a little wobbly.
“We can finish our cocoa first,” Adam says. But he takes Tommy’s mug out of his
hand so he can kiss him, and their drinks end up forgotten.
 
The internet is amazing, and Adam loves it, especially since he figured out how
to clear the browser history so he doesn't have to live in constant fear that
his family will figure out what he's been looking at, but it failed completely
to actually prepare him for what it's like to have actual sex with an actual
boy. Not that Adam's really complaining, but he could maybe be a little
smoother about it all. For one thing, they never really show the lube in gay
porn. Or, like, the prep. And Adam's read that lube's important, and he's been
using it when he whacks off, so he knows how much works for that and stuff, but
he's not really sure how much is enough for fucking.
More than he thought, is the answer.
"Ow," Tommy says against Adam's mouth, and Adam freezes. "I think―" Tommy
reaches down and wraps his fingers around Adam's wrist. "More stroking and less
pushing?"
Adam tries that. He can't move very much because of how Tommy's holding on, and
how Tommy doesn't have his legs very wide apart―maybe because Adam's sort of
lying half on top of him so they can kiss―so it's more a wiggle with his
fingertip than the stroking that Tommy means. "Hang on," he says, sitting up.
Watching him a little warily, Tommy lets go of Adam's wrist. "This isn't you
stopping, is it?" he says.
"Improving," Adam reassures him. "I hope." Something about knowing Tommy's
never done this before, never done anything before that Adam hasn't done with
him, makes him feel about a million times more awkward and a million times more
confident at the same time, which should cancel each other out, but doesn't.
But he's going to not think about that, because he's got Tommy on his bed,
naked, and he's got lube, and Tommy was begging and now he's looking at Adam
expectantly, and, ohmygod sex.
Sex with a boy. Jesus. Hottest thing ever.
"Adam?" Tommy asks, fairly pointedly.
Right. Actual sex. Not just fantasy sex. "Sorry," Adam says.
Going to his knees, Adam strokes Tommy's thighs, pushing them apart so he can
crawl between them. He can't stop staring at the shadowy cleft of Tommy's ass,
though he can feel Tommy's eyes on him, and he wants to look at Tommy's face,
make sure this is okay. "God you're hot," he says, tearing his gaze away from
Tommy's ass just in time to catch the flush staining his cheeks.
Tommy's propped on two pillows, but Adam has four on his bed, and he grabs one
of the spares, hoisting Tommy up by the small of his back and trying to shove
it under his hips. He's not very successful until Tommy catches on and helps,
planting his feet to lift up.
"This is you improving?" Now Tommy's got his knees in the air and his feet up
by the pillow under his ass, and Adam can actually see. It's definitely an
improvement.
"Totally," Adam says, reaching for the lube.
It's even better when Tommy shifts down a little, opening up even more, letting
his knees drop wider. "Gonna get you all wet this time," Adam says, and god
that sounds cheesy out loud, but Tommy's practically pulling his lip ring out
with his teeth, which is what he does when he really likes what Adam's doing,
so Adam doesn't apologize, just squeezes extra lube onto his fingers and rubs
at Tommy's hole.
"Cold," Tommy says, but he's pushing against Adam's fingers, so Adam doesn't
think it's really a complaint.
Adam slicks up and down Tommy's crack, gently gently, and it takes everything
he has not to try to push in when he gets to Tommy's hole. He wishes he'd tried
this on himself at least once so he'd know what it feels like. "How much
stroking?" he asks, because seriously. He's not sure how long he can keep
control.
"You don't have to―" Tommy reaches down again, but this time fits his fingers
to Adam's. "Not teasing. Just not shoving everything at once."
Their fingers slip together, and go skidding up behind Tommy's balls, making
both of them jump, but then as Adam watches, Tommy slides down and rocks the
pad of his middle finger against his hole, and Adam thinks he gets it. He
stares for a minute, captured by the motion, and watching is hot, but Adam
needs to try it, too.
"Can I?" he says, voice cracking a little, and Tommy nods.
Adam gets his finger under Tommy's, pressing gently, remembering that these are
muscles and he's trying to get Tommy to relax. "Like a massage," he mutters,
and that wasn't really supposed to be aloud, but Tommy huffs a laugh, says,
"Yes," and nudges Adam's fingers a little more firmly against him.
It starts making sense in his fingertips as well as his brain, and Tommy's
rocking his hips just a little, letting him know when he's doing it right, and
his finger's starting to slip inside, just the tip, because he's not pushing.
He's not pushing. At all. Except Tommy's pushing, and his finger is
disappearing, and it's so fucking hot, in like every possible definition of
that word, and Adam wants to go further, but he also wants to pull away,
because he wants his whole hand, his arm, god his everything inside that heat,
and he's not sure he can keep from trying.
"Tommy?" he says, voice fucking quivering, and he isn't moving, is just staring
at Tommy's hips lifting off the pillow, at his body opening up, and he's almost
down to Adam's bottom knuckle now, and Adam is never going to get to fuck him,
ever, because he is going to die.
"Oh," Tommy says, and, "Fuck. That's―" He clenches, grinds his ass down into
the pillow, taking Adam's hand with him, and Adam pushes, can't help it, gets a
fraction deeper, and Tommy drags in air like it's molasses.
"I'm gonna come," Adam says, and he is. He so is.
But, "Don't you fucking dare," Tommy hisses. He's wiggling, and Adam pulls out
a little bit, pushes back in, and Tommy starts nodding frantically. "Like that.
Do it like that." So Adam does.
It's easier not to think about his own dick when he's moving, feeling how slick
Tommy is inside, how soft, and the fucking heat. He pushes up and in and Tommy
rocks down and fucking moans, this deep ragged sound that forces a whimper out
of Adam's chest. This is way more intense than having Tommy's dick in his
mouth, or licking come off Tommy's neck, or staring at him while he sleeps,
thinking, I love you I love you I love you, and wishing he could say it out
loud. It's more intense than anything ever. And Adam doesn't even have his dick
inside him yet.
"More," Tommy breathes, "more more more," and he's scrabbling at Adam's
fingers, trying to push them into his ass.
Adam doesn't bend that way, and one of them is going to hurt something, so he
pulls Tommy's hand away with his free hand, and pulls out far enough to push
back in with two fingers. Tommy's ass is resistant at first, but he does that
rocking thing again, and Adam twists a little bit, and sinks inside.
His fingers are being crushed against each other, his knuckles grinding
together, and then something shifts, and they're just enveloped in snug, slick,
heat. "Moooooooooove," Tommy moans, but he's moving enough for both of them,
whole body rocking, his hands braced above his head, heels digging into the
mattress, and Adam has to grab his own wrist to steady his arm, keep Tommy from
fucking himself off Adam's hand completely. His head's arched so far back Adam
can't see much more than his chin and the tip of his nose, and he's making
these sounds like he's crying, except really really not, and Tommy's so fucking
gorgeous, so fucking wanton, that Adam has no warning whatsoever before his
orgasm hits despite his best intentions.
He hardly notices at first, so turned on that it's just a matter of intensity,
but then he sees the jizz on his thighs and Tommy's shin, and his own arm, and
fuck that is so not helpful. Tommy doesn't notice at all, is still fucking
himself on Adam's hand, hitching breaths between groans and whimpers, and Adam
has never hated his dick before―not even when he got hard giving a report on
cell division in front of Ms. Miller’s bio class―as much as he does right now.
He really really wants to be fucking Tommy, but he needs a hard dick to do it.
Though actually, his dick hasn't really gone soft.
Adam's staring at where his fingers are buried inside his boyfriend, and
imagining what that's gonna look like around his dick, and his dick, despite
being spattered with jizz, is very fucking interested in that image, and Adam's
pretty sure with a few tugs he'll be fully hard again. The apologies and
explanations he was ready to give to Tommy turn to entreaties on his tongue,
"God, Tommy, so hot, want you, fuck, can I, will you, please, more," and sounds
that don't even mean anything. He's palming his dick with his free hand, and
yeah, he's definitely going to be ready soon.
"Yes," Tommy says, and, "do it," and, "more," and Adam concentrates again on
what his fingers are doing, how they're sliding easily now, like maybe Tommy's
open, or relaxed, or whatever it is he's supposed to be, but Adam should
probably do three fingers just to make sure.
"Slow down," he says, petting Tommy's hip, but what he means is Stop fucking my
hand for a second, and Tommy doesn't get that at all.
"Dun wanna slow," he mumbles, adding a filthy-hot twist to the way he's rocking
his ass. His dick is so hard, flat on his abs, the head slipping back and forth
in a slick of precome as he moves.
Yeah. Slow is a stupid idea.
Adam figures out how to time his thrust with Tommy's and get a third finger
inside. It makes Tommy whimper, and twist again as he bucks up hard. "Gotta be
now," he says. “Or―aaah”
Adam has no intention of finding out what the consequences of it not being now
might be.
He smears the lube from his fingers onto his dick while he's pouring more
straight out of the bottle. It's all over his thighs, mixing with the come
that'd started to dry, making his leg hair glisten darkly, but he's not going
to hurt Tommy. He's not. Lube is key. Everyone says so.
"Are you gonna," Tommy says, and he's reaching for Adam's hand, vague and
uncoordinated, his other palm still pressed hard against the wall above Adam's
bed, putting an arch in his spine that Adam can't quite tear his eyes away
from. But then Tommy's question sinks in. He's asking to be fucked. Asking Adam
to fuck him.
"Yeah," Adam says, voice little more than a broken exhalation as he surges
forward, the hand not on his dick planting next to Tommy's shoulder so he can
kiss him, hard and fast and no more coordinated than Tommy's grasping had been.
His dick bumps Tommy's nuts, and he's so glad he came already, or that probably
would have done him in, and getting so close and then being denied would have
actually killed him. One of Tommy's feet comes up to hook around the back of
Adam's thigh and Adam realizes this is so much harder than they make it look in
movies. He's going to have to do this by feel―preferably without falling on
Tommy, crushing him or breaking something―but maybe the secret is to stop
fucking thinking so much, because while he's been freaking out, his hand has
slid to the end of his dick and is holding it steady, ring finger and thumb,
while his forefinger slides up Tommy's crack, and there―
Hole doesn't seem like quite the right word as Adam tries to push inside and
his dick shoots on a slick of lube right down Tommy's ass and ends up wedged
between the pillow and the small of Tommy's back. "Sorry," Adam says, "Sorry."
Tommy says something that sounds like, "Mmrrm mrvv shrm shrm," which makes no
sense at all, obviously, and then he's hauling on Adam's shoulders to sit up,
then pushing him away, and Adam goes, even though he doesn't want to.
Over,” Tommy says as he twists around, turning his back on Adam, and oh that
looks so much easier.
Tommy's hip is right there, something to hold on to, and Adam can watch as his
fingers slide back into Tommy's body, guide the way for his dick. Tommy
whimpers when they go in, again when Adam pulls them out, but he's pressing
back into Adam's hand, knees skidding a little wider when Adam slides the head
of his cock between his cheeks.
In, in, in," Tommy says, reaching back to clutch at Adam's wrist where it rests
against his flank. "In."
Adam lines up, fingers still guiding, and leans. Nothing happens. "I don't
think―" he says, but then Tommy pushes his chest down and his ass up, and Adam
starts to slip inside.
It's nothing like trying to get his fingers in, not even all three of them at
once; his dick is much harder to control, and enough bigger that this looks
impossible. But Tommy's saying, "Adam, Adam, Adam," over and over, and pulling
on his wrist like somehow that's going to get Adam deeper, and even if he
weren't desperate to fucking do this, that would be incentive enough to keep
going. Pressure, pressure, pressure and then there's a popping sensation that
makes Tommy gasp and Adam groan, and then it's slipping in and in and Tommy's
nails are going to break right through the skin on Adam's arm, and holy fuck
they're fucking.
"Tommy," Adam says, awed, the hand he no longer needs on his dick gripping
tight to Tommy's ass, leaving lube-smeared fingerprints until skin catches on
skin.
The sound Tommy makes is strangled, muffled in the pillow, and it's the hottest
thing Adam's ever heard. Adam needs to hear it again, so he pulls back, though
he's only half-way inside yet, and then shoves forward, getting deeper this
time, forcing another desperate sound from Tommy's throat. It spurs Adam
deeper, hips twitching as he tries to process everything at once.
"Fuck," Tommy moans. "Oh fuck, Adam."
"Do you need―" God, Adam is going to die if Tommy needs him to stop.
Move,” Tommy says, head twisting on the pillow so he’s looking back over his
shoulder. His thighs are shaking, his fingers are clenching and unclenching on
Adam's wrist and in the pillow up by his face.
Adam doesn't have a fucking clue how he's going to move the way Tommy wants him
to, and then his hips are rolling of their own accord. He comes out too far,
nearly slips out completely, but he's watching and his thumb's right there to
nudge his dick back inside. He rolls again, and again, and again, mindless
motion, pure sensation, and after a while Tommy releases the death grip he's
got on Adam's wrist to clutch the sheet up near his head instead, which reminds
Adam to reach around for Tommy's dick.
That fucks up his coordination, but Tommy's moaning low, biting the fucking
pillow, rocking his hips back like he was doing on Adam's fingers, and fuck
coordination, Adam's just trying to hold on, make this last long enough to make
Tommy come on his dick. He squeezes his eyes shut, blocking out the image of
his cock disappearing into Tommy's body, into all that willing heat, because
that's one sense too many; who gives a fuck that he came ten minutes ago.
All the half-formed plans Adam had had about this moment―getting the right
angle, making it good for Tommy, not going too fast or too hard or too slow or
whatever―fly right out the window, because all that exists is slick heat and
clutching fingers and gasping breath, his and Tommy’s heat and fingers and need
to move air in and out, and this is them doing this, and if the way they make
this look easy in porn is to practice, Adam really wants to learn to make it
look easy, because, god, he could do this forever, but in the mean time, fuck,
he’d better concentrate, because he’s probably giving Tommy the worst handjob
of his life here. All Adam can do is try to keep his grip, not get distracted
and squeeze too hard or let go completely as he gets lost in the friction on
his cock.
Taking Adam by surprise, Tommy comes on a string of sounds unlike anything
Adam's ever heard, and nearly pulls Adam's dick off with the way he twists his
ass. Adam tumbles forward and ends up riding Tommy down onto the bed, their
legs splaying, Adam grinding deeper, coming as he tries to catch his breath
from the fall.
"Fuck, are you okay?" he finally gets enough air to ask, though he's not sure
how Tommy's gonna answer with Adam crushing his lungs.
"Mmmh," Tommy says, sliding his hand across the sheet just far enough to hook
two fingers around Adam's thumb and hold on.
Adam takes that as a yes. He knows he needs to pull out, figures he should
probably go up not sideways to do it, but he's not sure he can get a knee
underneath himself to get the leverage. Somehow he manages to shift his hips
and his dick slips out wetly, without him doing much of anything. They both
whimper when it does.
"You okay?" Adam asks again.
Tommy squeezes Adam's fingers tighter for a second, but Adam's still crushing
him, so he tries to roll off.
Mm mm,” Tommy says as soon as Adam's weight shifts.
"I'm too heavy," Adam says, but before he can move farther, Tommy whimpers,
stopping him.
Mm mm,” Tommy says again, shifting one shoulder and settling his head deeper
into the pillow.
Adam doesn't have anyplace to put his head except Tommy's skull, which doesn't
seem that comfortable. He pulls his arm closer, dragging Tommy's with it, and
tucks them around Tommy's head, resting his on their crooked elbows. It's still
not ideal, but it makes Tommy hum happily, so Adam stays. Eventually, though,
his neck starts to hurt, and the slick of jizz between his dick and Tommy's ass
is starting to go sticky, and he really needs some water, and he has to move.
"Sorry," he says. "I'll be right back."
This time Tommy doesn't protest, just hums again when Adam kisses his shoulder
blade as he goes.
He hasn't moved when Adam comes back with a warm wash cloth and a glass of
water, but he's awake, staring wide-eyed at the door, so Adam gives him a
smile. Tommy’s eyes flutter closed, and his hand slides farther into the space
Adam left next to him. “Gonna clean you up now,” Adam says, picking up Tommy’s
hand and kissing it. Tommy must have had the biggest orgasm ever, because
there’s no witty retort; he just spreads his legs a little and squeezes Adam’s
thumb.
Shuffling closer, Adam starts wiping at the lube on Tommy’s skin with the
washcloth, making him shiver a little when the edges that went cold while Adam
was walking back come in contact with his balls, and Adam thinks next time
he'll have to fold it smaller, keep the heat in with his hands. Then he thinks
about assuming there's going to be a next time and what his dad always says
about people who assume things.
"That was really good," he says. "I mean, I liked it." He wipes up the inside
of Tommy's near thigh and then the far one. "Sorry I wasn't better."
That gets a flat-eyed look from Tommy, and, "Better?"
Tommy came, which is good. A lot of guys don't when they're being fucked Adam's
read, and even fewer their first time. But Tommy was almost coming from Adam's
fingers. He probably didn't get off from the clumsy way Adam was fucking him.
"Like more― I don't know," Adam says.
"Uh huh," Tommy says under his breath, and then, "Am I clean yet?"
He is, mostly, and Adam folds the cloth clean side out and makes one more pass
over the crack of his ass before kissing it. "Clean," he declares.
C’m’ere? Need a pillow.” While Adam's dropping the cloth onto one of the empty
plates that have gathered in his room over the course of the weekend, Tommy
rolls on his side, leaving room for him.
Tommy wasn't kidding about using Adam for a pillow. He forgoes curling up under
Adam's arm, head on his shoulder, and climbs right on top of him, pushing
Adam's legs together with his toes when his foot falls between them.
"Hi," Adam says, bemused, and kind of crazily in love.
"Hi," Tommy answers, lifting Adam's left arm and putting his hand on Tommy's
ass.
"You comfortable?"
Mm mm.”
Adam moves his chin where Tommy nudges it with his forehead, giving room for
Tommy to tuck in underneath it.
"Now'm comfortable," Tommy says.
Adam isn't, not really, but he just lost his fucking virginity, had two
orgasms, and his boyfriend wants to cuddle. You couldn't pay him to move.
 
Adam can't tell at first what woke him up, and then the barking penetrates. The
neighbor's fucking Dalmatian. He really hates that dog. The room is night-dark,
and Adam rolls over to peer at the clock. 2:36 AM. And jesus, the damn dog is
freaking out. Adam pulls a pillow over his head, and only then realizes that
Tommy was in bed with him when he fell asleep, and now he's gone. Gone, gone.
There're no sounds coming from the bathroom, no hushed footsteps in the hall.
"Tommy?" Adam says softly, just in case he's like, sitting in the corner or
something weird, but there's no answer. Adam thought they were done with the
disappearing acts.
Pulling on a pair of sweats and poking around with his toes for his flip-flops,
Adam scans the room in the meagre glow from his bedside lamp, looking for
Tommy's stuff. His shoes and jacket and jeans are gone, but the t-shirt draped
over Adam's stereo is definitely Tommy's. He could have gone home in one of
Adam's though; it wouldn't be the first time, though the last time they were
only eight.
"Fuck," Adam mutters under his breath, and then when the dog starts up again,
"Fuck!" loud enough that Tommy will hear him if he's anywhere in the house.
Still no answer.
It hits Adam that maybe it's totally normal to fluctuate between wanting to
smother your boyfriend with kisses and wanting to smother him with a pillow.
Maybe Tommy finds him completely frustrating, too. Maybe that's why he keeps
fucking leaving.
Or maybe Tommy's just a freak.
"I love you but you drive me fucking nuts," Adam says to his empty room,
because he knows he's not going to say it to Tommy. With luck, it's Tommy that
set Brutus (and seriously that is the stupidest name for a Dalmatian ever.
Inappropriate, but not inappropriate enough to be ironic. Stupid.) off, and he
hasn't made it any farther than the bus stop. But when Adam goes out front, he
can't see anyone on the street at all. And Brutus' barks are coming from the
back. Adam heads for the french doors off the kitchen.
There's a cherry glowing through the window of the treehouse in the cherry tree
that has nothing to do with fruit. About eight layers of Adam's irritation
slough off―Tommy didn't run away, he just found someplace to be alone and
think. Adam thought he'd given up smoking, though, so he still sounds gruff
when he stands at the bottom of the ladder and whisper-calls through the trap
door, "I'm coming up."
There's a scrabbling sound in answer, like someone grinding out a cigarette
against a wooden floor, and Adam says, "Don't bother, I can smell the smoke."
Tommy snorts, says, low, "You're so fucking sneaky." He's curled up in the
beanbag in the corner, jacket crossed tight over his chest, hands tucked in his
armpits, making Adam aware of the goosebumps on his own bare shoulders.
"Scoot," Adam says, climbing into the compact room. "Cold."
When Tommy sits up, his jacket lifts and Adam sees he has nothing on under it.
Not that he wouldn't still be huddling if he were wearing a henley and a
flannel with it. Settling into the warm hollow Tommy left, Adam pulls him down
on top. Tommy tries to stay all hunched up, but Adam pets and strokes and pulls
at him until he's lying on Adam's chest, cradled between his thighs, jacket
open so they're skin to skin, not skin to harsh metal zipper. The scents of
weathered wood, musty beanbag, sun-dried cherry pulp tease Adam's nostrils, and
then Tommy relaxes, butting his head up under Adam's chin, tucking his hands
under Adam's shoulders, and Adam's nose is filled with cigarette smoke, his
mom's CostCo Pantene, and the heady stench of the two blow jobs and the actual
omg sex they've had since they showered and Tommy borrowed shampoo.
"God, I want you all the time," Adam whispers, the words out of his mouth
before they've even fully formed in his brain. And fuck, that was so not
supposed to be out loud. A sheet of flame starts under Tommy's chin and floods
Adam's face, and he'd give anything for the nightmare lullaby to come true, for
the bough to break and the treehouse to fall, and okay, maybe not kill them
both, but at least cause a diversion.
He expects Tommy to laugh, or push away, or tell him to fuck off, but his
fingers curl tight under Adam's shoulder blades, and he turns his face right
into Adam's chest, nearly drilling through his sternum with his forehead and
nose. Adam doesn't breathe, or move, just keeps his arms looped around Tommy's
back. Tommy's shaking, breath coming in ragged puffs against Adam's skin, and
if Adam didn't know better, he'd think Tommy were crying.
Adam wants to apologize, wants to go all out and say, "I love you," wants to
just say Tommy's name, but he doesn't want to make anything worse, and he still
can't get enough oxygen.
Then Tommy heaves air in through his nose, chilling Adam's chest, and says, "Me
too," so quiet Adam almost doesn't hear.  
The relief is like water spilling across Adam's bones and he clings to Tommy,
arms and legs nearly crushing him. Tommy's clinging back, fingertips embedded
either side of Adam's spine, elbows finding home under Adam's ribs, hard and
sharp and painful, and Adam still wishes he could hold on tighter.
For long minutes there's nothing but the sounds of the night―leaves rustling;
Brutus barking again, but from inside this time; a car going past in the
street―then Tommy turns his head, presses his cheek to Adam's chest, pulling in
a shaky breath. Adam lets his arms relax, starts rubbing Tommy's back in slow
stroking circles over his kidneys, his other hand resting heavy between Tommy's
shoulders.
"I hate doing what I'm told," Tommy says, voice rough.
This isn't exactly news, but Adam has no context for it right now, so he just
murmurs, "mmm hmm," and keeps stroking.
"I hate it," Tommy says again. He pulls his right hand out from under Adam's
back and wipes his face with it before resting his palm on Adam's chest. Then,
so quietly Adam has to strain to hear: "But I'd do anything you wanted me to.
You could say anything. Do anything and I'd say yes."
Adam's skin is on fire, his guts dipped in ice, and then they swap places,
goosebumps covering his arms and his chest filling with heat. He literally
cannot breathe with how much he wants Tommy to feel that, though five seconds
ago it never would have occurred to him to imagine it. But he wants Tommy to
want it, too. He doesn't want him to sound so scared.
"We don't have to do that again," Adam says, words like glass in his throat. He
was right. He shouldn't have assumed. "I'm sorry."
"No!" Tommy says. "No." He pushes up looking at Adam. "It was― That's not what
I'm saying. Fuck. I'm not doing this right at all."
Adam's so confused. "I don't―" he says.
"Having you do that, be inside me like that― It was―" He buries his face in
Adam's neck again. "But if you'd pulled a knife out, I would have let you slit
my throat."
"I wouldn't― Tommy, what the fuck?" Why the hell would he want to slit Tommy's
throat?
"I can't explain," Tommy mutters. He starts wiggling like he's trying to get
out of Adam's hold.
"No," Adam says. "Tommy."
Tommy stills.
And shit. Jesus. Tommy doesn't do that. That's Adam's role. That's― From the
moment Adam didn't walk out when Tommy was forty-five minutes late at the pizza
place, Adam's felt vulnerable to Tommy's whims. And, sure, lately he's been
certain Tommy liked him back, but this is different.
"You think I don't get it?" Adam asks into the hair falling across Tommy's
forehead.
"It's different for you."
"Because I've been stupid for you since you kissed me under that tree in the
park?" Adam hadn't really thought of it that way, but he let Tommy grope him on
a bus for fuck's sake. Adam just doesn't do shit like that.
"Not stupid like this."
Adam is pretty sure the only difference is that he doesn't watch as many horror
movies or play video games where the whole point seems to be to chop people's
heads off with increasingly ridiculous weapons, so it's never occurred to him
that Tommy would want to, like, kill him or anything.
"I will never want to slit your throat." Adam traces a line from the point of
Tommy's jaw under his ear to the back of his neck. "I promise." He doesn't add
that he also promises not to ever smother him with a pillow even if he does
have the urge.
"You'll fuck me again, though, right?" Tommy asks.
"Only if you want me to." He might cry if Tommy doesn't want him to, because it
was fucking amazing, but he'd survive.
"I want you to." Tommy nuzzles closer and tucks his hand under Adam's back
again. "I need you to." The words are almost lost in Adam's chest.
"If I hurt you, we can―"
"No," Tommy spits harshly, fingers digging in with the word. "No. You don't get
it."
"I need you, too." Adam smooths a hand down Tommy's back.
Tommy bucks against him, grinds his hips into Adam's, the bones peeking over
the top of his jeans digging painfully into Adam's groin.
Adam tries to soothe him again with his hands, and when Tommy shakes him off,
Adam says, "I love you." It's more because he can't keep it in anymore than
because the thinks it's the right time, and he wants to kick himself for not
waiting.
Tommy growls, jabs Adam again with his hips and then starts to roll off him.
"Hey," Adam protests, wishing he'd kept his mouth shut, wishing Tommy would
fucking talk to him.
But Tommy's not leaving, he's taking Adam with him, so they end up on the rough
wood of the floor, Tommy on his back, Adam weighing him down.
"I need you," Tommy says again. "I need you." He pushes at Adam's sweats, and
when Adam instinctively lifts to help, he scrabbles at his own fly, opening his
jeans, twisting and kicking to get them off. Adam thinks to stop him―they're
six inches from an eighteen-inch square hole in the floor, the rug’s indoors
for winter and the planks aren't sanded, and they're up a fucking cherry tree
when Adam has a bed just inside―but his body's on autopilot and he gives Tommy
room to get his pants off, doesn't protest when Tommy grabs him by the arms and
pulls him down again.
Adam's sweats are bunched around his thighs and Tommy still has his jacket on,
open, but they're otherwise naked. They're farther from the window here, out of
the shine of the security light next door, and Tommy's just a glint of eyes,
teeth, piercings, and the soft glow of pale skin against the dark of his jacket
and the weathered boards. Adam's holding himself up on his hands, trying to see
something in Tommy's face, make some sense out of what they're doing on the
floor.
"You don't fucking get it," Tommy says again, hands on Adam's ass pulling him
down as he bucks up into him.
He's right. Adam doesn't. Tommy's so mad. And, wow. Hard. Adam's marveling at
that―he didn't notice anything when Tommy was lying on top of him a second
ago―so he isn't paying attention to what Tommy's doing, snaps back in focus to
Tommy pressing Adam's hand to his throat. And, sure, Adam likes framing Tommy's
jaw with his forefinger and thumb when they're kissing, but this isn't that.
Tommy's squeezing, like he's trying to get Adam to choke him.
"What?" Adam says. "Tommy what the hell?"
Tommy just stares at him, squeezes harder, worms his other hand between them to
grope at Adam's dick. Which if it had started going hard when he'd felt Tommy's
is decidedly not now.
"Tommy!" Adam snaps, pulling and then finally wrenching his hand out of Tommy's
grip, listening in horror as Tommy gasps brokenly like Adam was cutting off all
his air.
"I'd fucking let you. I fucking want you to. Want you to choke me. Cover my
nose and mouth with your palm and watch me ’til I pass out and you let me
breathe again. Want you to carve your fucking name into my ass, fuck me til my
blood is running down both our thighs." He's still jerking Adam's dick, and
fucking christ, Adam's getting hard. He's sixteen years old and the hottest guy
he knows is touching his dick, but what the actual fuck is Tommy even saying.
"When you fucked me, I loved it. I fucking loved it, but I wanted it to hurt
more. Everyone said how much it hurt, and you had your fingers inside me, and
it felt so fucking good, and I wanted your dick so bad because I knew then it
would hurt. Like it was supposed to. And it did, jesus, I mean― But it didn't
hurt like I was still gonna be feeling it three days from now."
While Adam's trying to make what Tommy's saying make sense, Tommy stops jerking
him and starts pushing his dick down toward Tommy's ass.
"Tommy," Adam says again, because what the fuck is he supposed to say, but
Tommy hooks his legs up around Adam's waist and gets Adam's dick lined up.
"You make me crazy. Like actually fucking crazy. I go insane with everything I
want, everything I fucking need when I'm with you. I just― You can't, Adam.
Please. Just, please."
Tommy's still a little open and slick from before―not nearly as much, probably
not enough for this to be a good idea, but maybe enough for it to be
possible―and everything in Adam's head is telling him he's got to stop, talk
Tommy down from whatever ledge he's out on, but clearly his brain is not in
charge, because he's letting Tommy drag him in with heels and fingers, letting
him make Adam do this.
And god, he's so fucking tight Adam feels like his dick's being strangled the
way he was strangling Tommy a minute ago, and Tommy's gasping, his legs are
shaking at Adam's hips, but he's saying, "Yes― oh, fuck― shit― Adam," and Adam
doesn't want to make him crazy but he wants so fucking much to make him happy.
"Legs―" Adam gasps. "Up." Ignoring Tommy's protest, Adam sits back on his knees
and hooks his arms under Tommy's thighs. As soon as Tommy gets what he's doing,
he helps, and then Adam's lining up again, pushing back inside.
It's still tight, but better; he just wishes he leaked as much as Tommy so
there wasn't so much friction. He licks his fingers, smears spit on the
underside of his dick where the drag is worst, and gets another inch or two
inside. Tommy's hissing through his teeth, has a death grip on Adam's forearms
propped next to his waist, and Adam wants to ask if this is good, if this is
enough, but he's scared of the answer.
Adam can move a little, but it's not really fucking; the drag is still too
much. Shifting his weight to his left arm, he feels for Tommy's dick with his
right hand, hoping to make this better for him, maybe checking if he's still
hard. His fingers find the slick on Tommy's belly, more on the head of his
cock, and maybe―
Tommy always gets wetter when Adam plays with his balls, so Adam tries it, rubs
the base of his cock, and is rewarded with a helpless-sounding moan from Tommy,
and enough precome to rub around Tommy's hole and Adam's dick. It's not great,
but it's much better than spit.
"Fucking hell, Adam. What―" Tommy's question is cut off by Adam fucking forward
with a sharp jab of his hips.
He still can't get all the way in, but it's enough to make the air hitch in
Tommy's throat, another bubble of precome spill onto his stomach. Adam drags
his fingers through it, smears it around the base of his dick, and grinds
forward until Tommy's folded right in half, Adam's hips resting on his ass.
"Fuck," Tommy says, a tight crushed sound, and Adam snaps his hips again,
driving Tommy upward, skidding on his shoulders toward the wall. Adam has to
inch his hobbled knees forward to get the leverage to pull out and slam in
again without just falling on Tommy and crushing him, and he's struck again
with how fucking ridiculous this is to be doing this here, but Tommy whimpers,
digs blunt nails into Adam's arms, and it's just so fucking desperate.
Adam keeps feeling like he's falling, can't keep his knees under him, and then
Tommy cries out as his head hits the wall, the nylon of his jacket too slippery
on the floor. Adam stops, tries to apologize, but Tommy lets go Adam's arm with
his right hand, puts it up to cushion his head, and says, "Don't you― Don't―
dare stop."
His dick, his hips, his fucking heartbeat are all in complete agreement, and it
honestly doesn't matter at all that Adam's brain thinks this is a fucking
stupid idea, that they should be talking about this or something.
"Tommy, Tommy, Tommy, Tommy," Adam's saying, letting Tommy's legs go as he
drops to his elbows, grinding deeper now instead of fucking in and out, and he
can hear his voice breaking, realizes he's crying, and nothing in his sex ed
classes told him sex could feel like this.
Sliding his hands between Tommy's back and his jacket, Adam grips his
shoulders, pulls him away from the wall, needing him to be closer, a vague idea
in his head that there must be a way to get Tommy up off the floor, but before
he can do more than hold on, Tommy comes slick between their bellies in a hot
rush that takes Adam completely by surprise. It leaves Tommy limp and Adam
shaking, and he cannot do this anymore.
With a low, raw sound he almost swallows, Adam pulls out of Tommy's ass and
bodily drags him back to the beanbag where he holds onto him so tight he's
honestly not sure Tommy can breathe. He tries to relax his arms but can't,
tries again, and only succeeds when Tommy bites his chest.
"Sorry," Adam says. "Sorry. Sorry."
"Stop apologiz― what―" Tommy shoves at him, tries to get a hand down between
them, but Adam catches his wrists.
"I'm okay," he says. He's so not okay. But he doesn't need to get off, and
that's what he means.
"But you―"
"I'm okay," Adam says again, and presses Tommy's face to his chest, hoping
he'll stop talking, hoping he won't notice that Adam's cheeks are wet.
Several minutes pass before Adam lets go of Tommy enough to pull his sweats
back up. Tommy's jeans are still tangled on the floor by their feet, but he
makes no move to get them, so Adam puts his arms around him again.
"Did I hurt you?" Tommy asks once Adam's tucked him back into the curl of his
body.
Adam shakes his head, realizes Tommy can't see it the way his face is pressed
into Adam's neck, and says, "No," trying not to let his voice hitch on the
word.
"Do you―" Tommy's voice is so small. "You still like me, right?"
Adam's chest does a weird lurching sob that turns into a laugh―this is so out
of control―and he touches Tommy's chin, tries to look him in the face. "You
fucking scared me. I don't― God, Tommy you scared me."
The shivering starts in Tommy's elbows and moves up his arms and down his
chest. "It's okay, it's okay," Adam says. "I scared me. You wanted me to hurt
you and I did it. I liked it. What if I―"
"Just please don't leave me. Please, Adam. You don't ever have to do that
again, but don't tell me we can't be friends anymore." He hauls in a breath so
deep Adam worries his lungs will pop, but he doesn't stop shaking. "And don't―
if you get a boyfriend or something, can you not tell me?"
Gripping tight to Tommy's arms, Adam shoves him far enough away to look him in
the eye. "What the fuck, Tommy," he demands. “I’m not going to― I don't know
what I'm supposed to do here.”
Tommy struggles in his hold, trying to duck his head, hide from Adam's stare.
"I can't―" Tommy twists viciously out of Adam's grasp, so Adam grabs him with
both arms, letting him hide his face, but not get away. "I can't believe you
think I would just leave you. Fucking stupidest thing I've ever heard. Jesus."
"'m not stupid," Tommy says.
Christ. "Stupidest thing. Not you're stupid."
"But I scared you." Tommy's struggling to get away again.
The shocked-hollow fear Adam felt when he realized he'd made Tommy come by
fucking him into a wall turns to crushed-lungs racing-heart panic. He can't
imagine how he's going to fix this. Worse than Tommy hating him is Tommy
thinking Adam hates him. And nothing Adam imagines saying sounds like it will
make things any better. He's still trying to form words when Tommy pushes hard
against his chest.
"Can you let me go?" Tommy sounds worried Adam's gonna say no. Which isn't
totally surprising, because Adam hasn't exactly been responding to his
struggles, still wants to say no, even though he knows that will make things
worse. "I'm cold," Tommy adds.
"Okay." Reluctantly―even though he's cold too and figures a change of scene
would do them both good―Adam opens his arms and lets Tommy sit up.
While Adam's watching Tommy pull on his jeans, he blurts, "Take a bath with
me." He didn't mean to say it, is pretty sure it's a line from a book he got
off his grandmother's shelf when he was stuck inside on a rainy day one summer.
Some romance with a brooding hero who swept in to rescue a hard-done-by woman
from a fate worse than death or something and then seduced her in a bubble
bath. It was stupid even in the context of the stupid book. It's even stupider
now.
Unsurprisingly, Tommy looks at him like he's crazy.
"Sorry. Never mind," Adam says, but Tommy interrupts: "Maybe that would― I'm
really cold."
Adam wants to carry Tommy down the ladder, but a) Tommy would probably punch
him if he tried, and b) Adam would likely fall and kill them both. He does go
first though, so he can catch Tommy if he shivers himself right off the rungs.
They don't talk as they go inside and up to his parents' bathroom. They don't
talk while Adam turns on the taps, adjusts the temperature, looks through his
mom's things to find some bubbles that don't smell like flowers. Adam leaves
Tommy sitting silently on the toilet lid while he goes to get their towels out
of the bathroom he shares with Neil. When he comes back, Tommy's sitting in
water up to his waist, hunched near the taps, leaving two thirds of the tub for
Adam to get in behind him. Adam decides to take that as a good sign, ignoring
the fact that it looks like Tommy's trying to crawl inside his own skin.
Watching Tommy rub a thumb back and forth on his knee, Adam strips and climbs
into the bath. "Is this okay?" he says, touching Tommy's shoulders. Tommy
doesn't lean back, but he does unwind his arms from around his legs, so Adam
fits his calves either side of Tommy's hips and tugs gently. Bubbles bob around
his knees as the curl of Tommy's spine gives a little.
"C'mere," Adam says softly, tugging a little harder until Tommy's nestled
between his thighs, leaning back against his chest. When the bath fills (so
much more quickly with two people in it, and this is way more fun than the
displacement experiments they did in physics class, even though Adam's freaking
and Tommy's being all creepy and silent), Adam turns it off with his toes, and
the quiet presses on his ears.
"Is this weird?" he asks.
Tommy tilts his head back, shooting him a cryptic look.
"It's weird." Adam says.
Looking away again, Tommy wiggles so his shoulder blades dig pointedly into
Adam's ribs. "Shut up?" Adam asks.
And he finally gets an answer, though it's only a nod and Tommy threading his
fingers through Adam's, pulling Adam's arms around his chest. The quiet turns
peaceful, and Adam's lungs start to thaw.
For a minute or so Adam thinks he's going to have to wait forever for Tommy to
say something first, but then Tommy squeezes his fingers and speaks. "I know
you won't really hurt me."
Adam wants to ask how he knows. Adam doesn't even know that.
"Even when you―" he waves his hand, leaving Adam's pressed wetly to his
stomach. "When that, it wasn't, you know."
"I don't know," Adam admits.
"It hurt like getting your ears pierced. Not like... Not like getting punched
or whatever."
Neil’s the only person who’s ever seriously punched Adam, and even though
Adam’s cheekbone was bruised for days, it actually didn't hurt nearly as much
as getting his ear pierced. But it also didn't make him even a little bit hard,
and he totally gets what Tommy's saying. "You're okay then?"
Tommy nods, his hair scratchy on Adam's damp chest.
They stay in the bath until the water gets cold, and then Adam stands Tommy
under the shower’s spray, rinsing the bubbles off and warming him up again. “Do
you―“ Adam starts when they get back to his room, wondering if Tommy wants to
put pajamas on or anything, but Tommy murmurs, “Talk in the morning. Sleep
now,” crawling under the covers, so Adam joins him.
 
Adam swims to consciousness in semi-darkness, with no alarm going off and no
square of hall light indicating a parent has been in to wake him, then
remembers that it's the weekend and his parents are out of town. Tommy's here.
But before he can reach for his boyfriend in the bed next to him, there's a
voice near his shoulder.
"My uncle got in an accident and my mom wants me home." Tommy's dressed
already, standing by the bed, words spilling out in a deluge. "He's okay and
everything but he needs to rest and―"
"Sure," Adam interrupts, mouth sleep-sticky, before Tommy can talk himself into
a frenzy. "Of course. Do you need―" Accident. Uncle. Home. The words line up in
Adam's still-dozy brain. Tommy's leaving. Before sunup. Before they can have
the conversation Tommy promised they'd have once he'd slept. "I can give you a
ride?” Adam blinks Tommy into clearer focus, but he’s still dressed and ready
to go. “I mean, I'm not supposed to, but I think if it's an emergency―"
"No," Tommy says. "No― No." He's backing away, hand stretched toward his jacket
still hanging off the corner of an open dresser drawer where Adam dumped it
after their bath last night. "Lisa's gonna― no."
Trying to dig his way out of the blankets, Adam thrashes around, thinking he
should walk Tommy downstairs, make him coffee, at least offer him a coke. Make
sure he's okay. But Tommy flaps his hands, says, "no," again, mutters, "I'll
call you," and then the bedroom door is shut behind him and Adam's left in
silence, any noise Tommy's retreat makes smothered by the carpet in the hall.
"Fuck," Adam says at the empty room. "Fucking fuck."
He tosses and turns and tosses and turns, but despite being exhausted, Adam
can’t get comfortable again. Tommy’d promised that he was okay, that he still
wanted Adam, and once they were out of the bath and dry, he’d folded himself
into Adam’s arms to fall asleep. But the last time he’d said, “I’ll call you,”
Adam hadn’t heard from him for three weeks. And that time he’d actually sounded
like he meant it. This time was totally a brushoff.
His phone isn’t on the bedside table, so Adam untangles his legs from the
sheets and gets up. When he discovers it plugged in to the spare charger in the
kitchen, there are three missed calls, and Adam’s never been so delighted to be
wrong in his life, except they aren’t from Tommy. Two are from his mom and
one’s from Danielle. None of them are from this morning. Deciding calling now
just makes him look like a loser, Adam texts Tommy instead: “Hope your uncles
ok. Tell lisa I said hi.” He considers adding “love you,” but hits send before
he can. Tommy pretty much flipped out when Adam said it last night; he’s not
making that mistake again when he’s not there to see how Tommy takes it.
There’s no immediate return reply, and since his boxers are lacking in pockets
and there are a lot of dishes that need to be washed before his parents get
back that night, Adam turns his alert onto loud and sets to work.
By half past seven the kitchen is sparkling, Adam’s bedroom and the living room
are devoid of plates and glasses, and the dishwasher is humming quietly. Adam’s
phone is also quiet, and he’s slid it open about four-hundred and seventy-three
times just to check it hasn’t accidentally turned itself off. He’ll give it
until ten. Just text something casual: hope you’re okay or see you soon or
something. In the mean time, Danielle’s a freakishly early riser. Maybe she
wants to go get breakfast.
Dani is over the moon about the idea of breakfast; her parents want her to help
them babysit her visiting cousin, but also they like Adam and know she hasn’t
been hanging out with him as much lately, so they’re willing to give her a
break. She wants to go to Rae’s, but Adam doesn’t feel like waiting in line, so
he makes her go to IHoP instead.
“How come you’re not making your boy breakfast in bed?” Danielle asks once
they’re digging into their pancakes.
Adam wants to tell Danielle that he’s scared Tommy’s freaking out and is going
to disappear on him, but there’s no way he’s telling her about what happened in
the treehouse, and even the fucking in his bed feels too raw and personal, so
he just tells her that Tommy’s mom needed him home for family stuff.
“Fucking family stuff,” Danielle agrees fervently. Then, “Oh, speaking of, did
you see Modern Family this week?”
Adam is mostly relieved by the change in subject.
By ordering extra toast and a side of bacon when their waitress tries to give
them the check, they manage to eke out the free coffee refills for almost two
hours, even on a Sunday morning, and Adam’s feeling much better by the time
they finally tumble back out into the winter sunshine.
“Fuck,” Danielle says, checking her phone. “If I don’t get home now and
entertain the tiny terror, apparently I’m not leaving the house until my
eighteenth birthday.”
Adam should get home anyway, vacuum, wash sheets and towels, generally make the
house look less like he spent half the weekend having sex with his boyfriend in
it. And his parents’ plane is due to land at half past four, so it would
probably be nice if he got one of his moms’ casseroles out to defrost, too. But
first, he’ll just send Tommy one more text.
 
Stephen’s mom calls at noon to ask if she can bring Neil back early. Adam would
prefer it if she didn’t bring Neil back at all, but that obviously isn’t an
option. “Mister Hanson will drop him off,” she says, voice tight. “I’ll be
taking Stephen to the hospital.”
“Okaaaaay.” Adam’s thrown by the hospital thing. He’d figured Mrs. Hanson was
just tired of having Neil around after a week. “What ha―“ he starts, but Mrs.
Hanson has hung up.
Siblings are seriously overrated. When Neil comes through the front door
pulling his suitcase and dragging his backpack by one strap, Adam’s folding
towels hot from the dryer. “Was there a flood?” Neil asks sullenly.
So there are maybe kind of a lot of towels for one boy for a week, but it’s not
like he used all of them or anything. It seems rude to make a guest use a towel
that’s all damp still because maybe you were too busy kissing after the last
shower to remember to hang it up. Adam’s just polite, is all.
Neil, not so much. “Did you jerk off the whole time Mom and Dad were gone or
something?”
“Go put your stuff away or something.” To Adam’s surprise, Neil doesn’t argue,
just trudges toward the stairs.
“Hey,” Adam calls after him. “Is Stephen okay? His mom said she was taking him
to the hospital.”
“It’s not my fault!” Neil shouts, and his bedroom door slams.
That hadn’t even occurred to Adam. He just figured asthma attack or something.
What the hell has Neil been doing? And why aren’t their parents home to deal
with it?
When he’s made his bed and put all the towels and his clothes away and Neil
still hasn’t emerged from his room, Adam goes and knocks on the door. “I didn’t
think it was your fault,” he says. “What did he do?”
“Go away.” Neil sounds like he’s crying. Adam’s not really in the mood for
crying, but his mom would not be happy if she found out he just let his brother
sob his heart out and didn’t do anything. Plus, Neil’s not really a crier.
Something bad must have happened.
“I’m coming in,” Adam says, waiting another few seconds before opening the
door. It’s so annoying when his parents don’t give him any warning, and he
doesn’t want to do that. When he doesn’t get told not to, Adam cracks the door.
Neil’s lying on his bed, face buried in his pillow, back shaking with jagged
breaths, and Adam really really wants to know where Tommy is right now and if
he’s okay, but instead he goes and sits on his brother’s bed and lays a hand
between his shoulders.
Adam rubs until Neil stops crying and turns his head to the side so he can
breathe more easily. “Want to tell me what happened?” Adam asks softly.
“Stephen’s mom’s a crazy bitch,” Neil mutters.
“Okaaay.”
When Adam doesn’t call him on his language or bother telling him not to let
either of their parents hear him talking like that, Neil continues. “We were
playing basketball. On the driveway. Not anything big, just shooting hoops.”
When his shoulders tighten up, Adam starts rubbing again. “He thought it would
be awesome if we could do dunk shots. But we’re too short, obviously, so he
went and got his dad’s stepladder.”
Adam is pretty sure he can see where this is going, and he really does hope
Stephen’s okay. Although probably Mrs. Hanson would have sounded more terrified
than pissed off if Stephen was like unconscious or anything.
“I didn’t even want to do it, but he made fun of me, and she was looking out
the window right then, and then he climbed up and jumped too hard and
everything came crashing down and his arm made this horrible snapping noise.”
“It’s just a broken arm though?”
“His pitching arm.” Neil flops over on his side so he can look at Adam. “She
came flying out of the house screaming, and he was crying, and suddenly she
turned on me and started saying all this stuff about how I’ve always been
jealous that he has a chance to play for the major leagues someday and now I’m
trying to kill him.”
It does sound pretty much like she’s crazy, because the idea that Neil wants to
play major league baseball is ridiculous. “But it’s not like you got the ladder
out.”
“Tell that to her!”
“She was probably just scared seeing her baby with his mangled arm and
everything. I’m sure she’ll get over it.”
“It wasn’t mangled. Ew.” Neil pushes at Adam’s leg, and Adam stands.
“Washer’s free if you need to do any laundry,” he says, nudging Neil’s suitcase
with his toe.
“Mom can do it tomorrow when she’s washing their stuff from their trip,” Neil
says, pulling his DS out of his backpack and rolling onto his back.
“Yeah,” Adam says. “I’ll let you suggest that to her.”
Neil flips him off without even looking at him, so Adam figures he’s feeling
better enough to be left alone.
In an effort to not send Tommy texts every three minutes until Tommy replies,
Adam tries playing video games, reading his book for English, reading the first
Hunger Games book again, calling Danielle (she can’t talk, because she’s still
on cousin duty), watching TV, practicing the music for the Spring Thing
concert, and reviewing the latest chapters for both history and biology. He
doesn’t get very far with any of them, but he does manage to keep his text
count to five in just over five hours, which he’s hoping leaves him on the
attentive side of the attentive/obsessed-stalker line.
His mom calls when their plane lands to ask him if he’d mind starting dinner,
and he’s pleased to be able to say he’s defrosted something already, and even
has some vegetables to cook. If she notices that he keeps her on the phone a
lot longer than usual, she doesn’t say anything.
Neil, of course, makes dinner all about him, and how the world is ending
because Stephen’s mom hates him now, or whatever. Eber grumbles about parents
living vicariously through their children, and Leila tries to calm Neil down
and promises to talk to Mrs. Hanson. No one asks how Adam’s week was. Not that
he wants to tell them anyway.
 
By Wednesday, when Adam still hasn’t heard from Tommy, he considers telling
Dani everything. But how do you tell your best friend your boyfriend kind of
wants you to kill him, except he obviously doesn’t because now he won’t even
talk to you? It doesn’t make any sense. Instead, he just lets Dani make fun of
him for getting a D on their pop quiz in Bio, doesn’t correct her when she
speculates that he was chatting all night with his boyfriend instead of doing
his homework. He was actually playing Tetris ’til his eyes bled.
After dinner, during which Adam failed to contribute the the conversation at
all, Eber and Neil head for the living room to watch the news, and Leila
corners Adam in the kitchen. “I know it’s hard for you to believe,” she says
softly. “But I have some pretty good advice sometimes. If that’s something you
feel like you might need.”
If Adam would rather have his teeth pulled than tell Danielle what happened,
he’d rather be boiled in oil and flung off a cliff than tell his mother. But
she does have some pretty good advice.
“If someone won’t talk to you and you said you’re sorry, what are you supposed
to do?” he tries, looking at his mom’s shoes instead of her face.
“Is Danielle mad again?”
“No,” Adam says. This was a bad idea. He starts putting dishes in the
dishwasher.
Apparently talking is more important than chores, though, because his mom tugs
his wrist until he puts the plate down and goes with her to the kitchen table.
“Are you and Tommy fighting?” She makes him sit, but she doesn’t try to make
him look at her.
“He’s probably just busy,” Adam says. “His uncle got in an accident, and he’s
okay? At least Tommy said he was okay, but, like, he won’t answer my texts.”
And what the fuck why does he suddenly feel like he might start to cry?
“Did you try calling him at home?”
Adam did, three or four times, but he hung up before the phone rang, so that
doesn’t really count. “No,” he says. “I think it’s― we kind of had a
disagreement before the accident thing, so it might be that, too.”
Covering his hands with hers, Leila says, “It’s hard to find a balance between
giving someone space when you’re arguing, and letting them know that even if
you don’t agree on everything you still care about them.”
“I don’t want to bug him.” Adam’s phone’s in his pocket, and it’s hard not to
pull his hands out from under his mom’s and check it, even though he knows it
would have chimed if Tommy’d texted him back.
“Maybe texts aren’t the best way to get him right now,” Leila says.
“I tried emailing. He’s not replying to those either.”
“I don’t need the car tomorrow. You can take it to school, then drive out to
Burbank in the afternoon if you want. Maybe it would be best to talk to him in
person.”
It’s really hard for Adam not to throw himself on his mom, but he’s pretty sure
knocking her onto the tile floor and giving her a concussion isn’t the best way
to say thank you, so he settles for pulling her into a hug instead.
“Drive carefully, sweetie,” she says into his neck. “And if he still needs a
little more time and you’re upset, call me, and I’ll figure out a way to come
and get you. I don’t want you driving if you’re unhappy.”
Adam’s pretty sure he has the most awesome mom in the whole world. “You’re the
best mom ever,” he says, still half strangling her in a hug.
“And don’t you forget it.” Extricating herself from his hold, she pats him on
the back. “I’ll help you finish the dishes, and then I think your dad would
probably appreciate it if we went and got him some ice cream. Any flavor you
like.”
“Seriously. The best.”
 
To Adam’s credit, he makes it all the way to fourth period before he can’t
stand it anymore and has to go see Tommy. Though he’s not sure it totally
counts as credit if he was really only waiting until the parking lot gates got
unlocked for people with first lunch. Either way, though, he’s only cutting a
third of his classes. At the last minute he gets Gina, who sits next to him in
fourth and is good at forging, to write him a note. Otherwise his mom will
never trust him to take the car again, and while seeing Tommy sooner would be
worth it if it just meant he had to wait until he turned eighteen to drive ever
again, he doesn’t want to disappoint her when she’s being so nice.
It takes forever to get across town, but Adam still gets to Tommy’s school
before final bell. And realizes that he doesn’t actually have any kind of plan.
He’s not sure where Tommy gets the bus, or if he usually comes out the front or
if there are other exits. There’s a rent-a-cop near the parking lot, but even
with his dyed-black hair, Adam’s still pretty sure he looks enough like a high
school student that the guy would be asking a lot more questions than he’d
answer. Maybe he should just go to Tommy’s house and meet him there. Except he
might not be going right home after school. Adam wonders if Tommy might
actually answer a text if Adam told him he was outside waiting. But if he
really doesn’t want to talk, that will only make him sneak out for sure. Plan.
Plan, plan. Plan. He needs one.
Movement in the corner of his vision catches him, and Adam looks around to see
a gaggle of kids in gym uniforms jogging desultorily up the street. Near the
edge of the group, chatting to a girl with long red hair, is a girl Adam
remembers from elementary school. She was mostly pretty nice, except when he
blanked and couldn’t spell maybe in a class spelling bee in fifth grade and she
called him useless. He’s pretty sure her name is Jamie. Another thirty feet or
so, she’ll be running right past his window. He turns the key half way so he
has the power to roll it down.
“Jaime,” he calls when she’s a few feet away. She stops and looks around,
before realizing where the sound came from. Warily, she backs up a few steps
and peers in at him. “Adam,” he adds. “You were in my class in fifth grade?”
“No talking to perverts during gym class,” the redhead says, elbowing Jamie out
of the way so she can see into the car. Then, “Oh. Aren’t you a little young to
be a pervert?”
“I don’t think he’s a pervert,” Jamie tells her. “I think he’s a nerd.”
“No talking to nerds ever,” Jamie’s friend says. Adam hates her. A lot. But
Jamie’s still his best hope of finding Tommy.
“I just need to ask you a question,” Adam says quickly, before Jamie can turn
away. “Do you still know Tommy Ratliff?”
“The faggot?” the redhead says. “Yeah, we know that fucking loser. Why? You a
pervert after all?”
Adam feels the blood rush out of his face then back in again, superheated. He
can’t see; he can’t breathe. He barely hears Jaime say, “I’ll catch up with
you, Crystal,” the words muffled by the pounding in his ears. “You okay?” she
asks, but Adam doesn’t answer until she reaches through the window and pokes
his arm.
“Never mind,” he says, fumbling for the ignition to turn the engine over and
get out of here. Tommy has to come home eventually.
“No, I know him. You guys were, like, best friends, right?”
Adam manages a nod.
“Don’t worry about what Crystal said. She's kind of— Anyway. He’s probably not
even gay or anything. Kids just rag on him because of the makeup and stuff. You
know.”
Adam didn’t know. He had no idea. He nods again because what the fuck else is
he supposed to do.
“So was that it? Because I gotta get back before coach misses me.”
Meaning to dismiss her, Adam says, “No,” instead. “Do you know where he catches
his bus?”
“Oh, yeah. The bus stop’s around the corner. There’s a gate right by it.” She
points at the far end of the block.
“Thanks,” Adam says weakly. She waggles her fingers at him and jogs off.
What the fuck is Tommy thinking wearing makeup to school if people are calling
him fag because of it. If people are maybe― Is that fucking dick he gave a
handjob to not the only one who's punched him over this?
Still shaking, even several minutes after the last gym-class straggler has
disappeared inside the school, Adam takes the keys out of the ignition and
opens the door. He’s going to walk to the bus stop and wait for Tommy, and
they’re going to go somewhere and talk, and Tommy’s going to forgive him for
everything that happened in the treehouse, and no one’s been punching him, and
everything’s going to be okay.
Everything is going to be okay.
The bus stop’s easy to spot, with the sign-topped pole, and the painted NO
PARKING box in the street, and when Adam fully rounds the corner he can see the
wide gate in the fence, closed now, but with a second rent-a-cop walking
towards it as the bell rings inside the school. Perfect timing. Now Adam just
has to wait.
It doesn’t take as long as he expected. A clot of kids who look like freshman
shove out the doors and down the stairs, followed by a girl digging in her bag,
then there’s no one for a second or two, and when the door opens again, Tommy
squeezes through. He’s got his combat boots on today, and his headphone wires
are stark against his black hoodie, disappearing into the shadows the hood
throws around his face. His shoulders are hunched and his hands are buried deep
in the front pocket. The only speck of skin Adam can see is a strip above both
knees where there are holes―new since Adam last saw those jeans. He looks like
any other high school kid, but Adam would recognize him anywhere.
Not wanting to tangle with the security guard, Adam doesn’t approach Tommy
until he’s passing through the gates. “Hey,” he says, and Tommy jumps.
“What are you doing here?” Tommy asks, not pushing his hood back, glaring up at
Adam from underneath it.
Not exactly the greeting Adam was hoping for, but he’ll work with it. “We need
to talk.”
“I’m gonna miss the bus.” He sounds like a sulky two-and-a-half year old.
Though that’s probably redundant.
“No shit,” Adam says. “There’ll be another one. Come on. You’re the one who―“
They’re not getting into this on the street with half Tommy’s school spilling
down the steps. “Just come on.”
Like it doesn’t really matter one way or the other, Tommy shrugs and falls in
step when Adam turns back toward the car.
“I’m the one who what?” Tommy mutters as he settles in the passenger seat.
“You― I just thought you were all worried about me avoiding you after― after
what happened, and now you won’t even talk to me.”
“Here I am. Talking.”
Kids are coming out the front gate, eyeing them through the windows. Adam jams
the key in the ignition and puts his seatbelt on. “Fuck no passengers under
twenty. Belt up.”
“Where are we going?” He’s fumbling the belt around his hips, so Adam ignores
his belligerent tone.
“Somewhere not here.”
“My mom’s home.”
“Not your house, then.” Now Adam’s got Tommy next to him, he’s more pissed off
than scared. This shit was one thing back in August, when they hardly knew each
other anymore, but Tommy’s his best friend. Adam’s fucking in love with him,
and everything Tommy was saying about needing Adam, wanting Adam to slit his
fucking throat or whatever― he’s gotta feel the same way. But apparently being
a virgin wasn’t the only thing Tommy’s been keeping from him.
“We can―“ When Tommy pauses, Adam looks over to find him chewing on his lip
ring. “Go straight here, then right at the light.”
Adam turns right where instructed, glad to see Tommy’s leading them toward the
hills where there are more likely to be places to park out of the way of cops
looking to ticket teenage drivers. His mom is going to kill him if he gets a
ticket. Tommy keeps giving directions, leading Adam finally to a vista point
half blocked from the road by scrubby trees. It doesn’t seem to be near a
trailhead or anything, so it’s unlikely to get much traffic at three o’clock on
a weekday.
“Okay,” Adam says, turning off the car, unbuckling his seatbelt and turning so
he’s facing Tommy in the seat. He doesn’t want anyone under the illusion that
they’re going anywhere until they’ve actually talked. “Here you are. Talk.”
Tommy doesn’t turn, or take off his belt. He pokes his backpack with his toe
and glowers at his knees.
“Tommy, seriously.”
Tommy just glowers harder.
“Fine. I’ll start. Why didn’t you tell me people at school were giving you
shit?”
Tommy’s head shoots up at that. “Who?” he demands. “What?”
“People are calling you faggot. And I’m guessing from the way she said it that
it’s not just behind your back.”
“So?” Now Tommy’s glower is turned on Adam. “I am a fag. So what?”
Now that he’s actually looking, Adam can see that Tommy’s offhandedness isn’t
bravery, and it isn’t not giving a shit. He’s got that hunted look like he got
in the treehouse when Adam told him he loved him.
“Is it just the name-calling?” Adam asks, even though he’s scared of the
answer.
“What does it matter?" He says it in a way that says no clear as anything.
"It’s not a big deal.” He chews his lip again, won’t look Adam in the eye.
And jesus fucking christ. Adam wants to shake him until he stops being such an
idiot. “I’m pretty sure my boyfriend getting gay bashed and I don’t even know
about it is a big fucking deal!”
Tommy glances in Adam’s direction, so quick Adam almost misses it. “Your what?”
“My boyfriend. At least―“ Adam grabs Tommy’s chin, maybe a little harder than
he means to, and makes Tommy look at him. “I’m assuming you will at least tell
me if you’re dumping me.”
While he doesn’t try to pull his face out of Adam’s grip, Tommy manages
nonetheless to look very hard at Adam’s neck. “We’re, like, actual boyfriends?”
Adam cannot have heard that right. The last five months, his birthday,
Valentine’s day, all the sex―Adam told Tommy he loves him―and Tommy doesn’t
think they’re boyfriends? “What the hell do you think we’ve been doing?”
“I thought― You never, like, said or anything.” Tommy lets his head sag in
Adam’s grip, and Adam slides his hand back, gets ahold of the hair at Tommy’s
nape.
“When I told you I loved you, did you think I was just trying to make you feel
better?”
“You told me― You said you loved me?” Tommy sounds genuinely confused, not like
he’s fishing to hear it again, and Adam can’t stand it. There’s too much space
between them in the front seat.
“Come in the back with me,” Adam says, pushing the release on Tommy’s seat
belt, opening his own door. “Please.”
Adam goes around, but Tommy crawls over the center console, and they’re a
tangle of knees and elbows for a minute until they resolve themselves, Tommy
tugged down with his legs over Adam’s lap, Adam’s arms around him. “In the
treehouse,” he says quietly once Tommy’s stopped wiggling, is resting his head
on Adam’s shoulder. “I said, ‘I love you,’ and you kind of growled and pulled
me onto the floor.”
“I didn’t― I’m still not sure what was even happening there, but I couldn’t
really concentrate on what you were saying. I’m sorry.” Tommy’s gone stiff
again, like he was that night, scared Adam’s going to push him away.
Instead, Adam hauls him even closer, presses his cheek to the top of Tommy’s
head. “I love you,” he says, soft but firm. “I love you, I love you, I love
you. No apologizing.”
“Love you too,” Tommy says around a mouth full of marbles, and Adam realizes
that he’s not only crushing Tommy’s ribs, but squishing his whole face into
Adam's chest.
“I better let you breathe then.”
Keeping his hands on Adam’s arms, but getting far enough away so he can look
Adam in the eye, Tommy says, “I am sorry about scaring you, though. And saying
all that stuff about you killing me. I don’t even know― It was like I was
somewhere else in my head, and no matter what I did I couldn’t get back.”
“Did I do that? Like―“ Adam is pretty sure Tommy didn’t take any drugs or
anything, and he doesn’t know what else can make that happen.
“I don’t know,” Tommy says, honest, not like he’s saying what he thinks Adam
wants to hear. “I think we both did? Like, do you ever get―when you do that
thing where you won’t stop sniffing and licking all around my, after I come, my
dick and stuff, and even when I say it tickles you can’t stop until I pull your
hair?”
Adam nods. Even with the hairpulling sometimes it’s hard to stop. He doesn’t
want to do things Tommy doesn’t like, but he just tastes so good that Adam has
trouble getting his tongue to catch up with his brain. It makes him want to
hold Tommy down and lick him forever though, not bare his throat for slitting.
“Does it feel like all you are is your mouth and the rest of you doesn’t
matter?”
That’s not exactly how Adam would describe it, but he thinks he gets what
Tommy’s driving at, so he says, “Yeah? Kinda.”
“When we were, you know, that first time, it was like that. Like, when I’m
sucking you and I’m good at it―“ Adam keeps his scoff that Tommy thinks
there’re times he’s not good at it inside― “but, like, instead of zoning out on
it or whatever, I don’t know.”
More confused than he was before Tommy started, Adam runs his fingers through
Tommy’s hair. “I won’t think you’re weird or anything. As long as you don’t
actually, like, actually want me to kill you.”
Nudging into Adam’s hand as though he wants him to keep petting, Tommy closes
his eyes, but he says, “Not like I didn’t matter, but like I didn’t exist. Or
more like I was everything and everything was you inside me? I really can’t
explain it now.” Opening his eyes, he nudges again because Adam’s stopped,
caught up trying to imagine what Tommy’s talking about.
“It was so amazing, it sounds weird now, I know, but it was the most― It was―
and then you were gone, and I wanted you to come back― and you were, with the
washcloth and everything, and I had no idea how to go back to being me.”
“I don’t want to make you not be you.”
“No,” Tommy says. “That part was good. I can’t explain it, but it was good.”
“But you said I make you a crazy person. And like, the choking and the blood
and stuff.” Adam keeps his hand carding through Tommy’s hair, needing the
comfort of it just as much as Tommy seems to, if not more.
“I’ve been thinking about that a lot.” Tommy slides his hand up Adam’s arm and
starts kneading at the back of his neck. “I can’t stop thinking about it. How
I― What it felt like, why I couldn’t― Just, going from that much intensity to,
like, sleeping, like there was nothing― nothing to say it ever happened. I
needed proof, or, not even that, but I was trying to get back there and figure
out a way to make it not go away. But I did it wrong.”
That’s a total understatement, but Adam knows it’s a bad idea to say it. “Maybe
we can figure out how to do it right,” he says instead. Not that he isn’t
terrified to do that to Tommy again, but the good parts really were good, and
he can’t pretend he doesn’t want to keep fucking Tommy. “If you can’t, I get
it, but if you want to I really― It’s amazing, doing that with you.”
“I didn’t think you’d want to,” Tommy admits. “That’s why― I figured― I
couldn’t face you telling me we couldn’t do that anymore, so I had to go.”
“You didn’t have to run off. I told you I wasn’t leaving you.”
“And I told you I was fine. I didn’t know you weren’t lying too.”
Adam isn’t even really mad anymore about Tommy’s lies, is mostly sad Tommy
feels like he has to do it. “You don’t have to lie to me. About what you’ve
done or what’s happening or whatever. I’m not gonna― You don’t have to lie to
me, Tommy.” Leaning in, he rests his forehead against Tommy’s for a moment.
“Was your uncle even in an accident?”
Looking sheepish, Tommy nods, then shakes his head. “Yeah,” he says, “but like
two weeks ago. He’s fine now; he just jammed his shoulder, had a little
whiplash.”
“Did Lisa come and pick you up?”
“I walked. And took the bus.”
“Are those cuts and bruises you sometimes have from kids at school?”
Like this is somehow harder to talk about than the treehouse stuff, Tommy goes
back to leaning his head on Adam’s shoulder. “Yeah," he says, voice almost too
quiet to hear. Then, "Well. Not all of them.”
Alarmed, Adam asks, “Are― Your parents aren’t?”
“No!” Tommy lifts his head to look at Adam, genuinely confused, then snuggles
in again. “No. They aren’t exactly shining examples of support when I do get in
trouble at school, but they’d never. Jesus. That'd be all I need. Just
sometimes I fall asleep in Mrs. Ferrigut’s hedge and wake up with scratches or
whatever.”
“So mostly they’re from people picking on you.”
Tommy shrugs.
Adam still doesn’t get why Tommy didn’t tell him, but then again, he never
asked. “Does the principal know you’re getting bullied?”
“The principal said I was causing a disturbance wearing eyeliner to class and
if I didn’t stop making people feel uncomfortable he would have to suspend me.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Adam stiffens, nearly pushing Tommy off his lap
with the need to go ask the principal where he gets off.
“He didn’t.” Tommy pats Adam’s chest. “I wore it again and he didn’t. But Mom’s
not like your mom. She got mad at me, not him.”
Adam wants to punch Tommy’s principal. And his mother. He wants to scrub
Tommy’s face and tell him never to wear makeup again, and he wants to paint his
face like a geisha and walk into Tommy’s school and dare people to start shit,
even though the thought of doing that for himself scares the hell out of him.
“I love you,” he says again, kissing Tommy’s forehead, his temple, his cheek,
his lips.
Tommy kisses back, and they make out for a while, more tentatively than they
ever have before―not lazily like when they’ve both just come, or slowly and
deliberately like Adam guides Tommy into when he wants things to last―like
maybe they’re both trying to be careful, make sure the other one’s on the same
page. Adam’s dick seems to be unclear about the whole serious conversation
thing and is on page hello, you’ve been ignoring me for four days, but Adam
continues to do just that in favor of trying to show Tommy that he’s here and
not planning on going anywhere. Also, Adam’s had sex in the back of a car, and
while there’s more room in his mom’s SUV than the back of Tommy’s uncle’s
caddy, he’s not that eager to repeat the experience.
“I love you, too,” Tommy murmurs when their kisses have mostly devolved into
nuzzles and hands stroking each other’s necks and faces.
“You better,” Adam says, cuddling him. “Because you’re stuck with me.” He feels
like his smile is going to break his face.
 
The sun is setting when Tommy starts to shift in Adam’s lap like maybe Adam’s
not the only one getting a little stiff sitting in one place for so long. “If
I’m not going to be home before dark, I have to call,” he says, arching back in
a stretch. “Your mom does know you have her car, right?”
Adam huffs a laugh. “Yeah. I was desperate to see you, but I’m not insane. She
was― I talked to her. Didn’t really tell her anything, but she― She was worried
that you weren’t answering my texts. She knows I― how I feel, I think.”
Tommy half stands, leaning between the front seats, presumably to get to his
phone, and his ass is right there and Adam really wants to bite it, but he just
touches it instead, the side up near Tommy’s hip, and says, “How are you so
hot?”
“Pfft,” Tommy says, and then grunts a little as he pulls himself back up, phone
in hand. “You just like that I’m easy.”
Which makes Adam crack up. Not that Adam doesn’t know what he means―it hasn’t
ever been hard to get Tommy’s dick out, sure―but very little else about Tommy
is even remotely easy. Not since they were little kids.
“Oh, fuck you,” Tommy says, but he’s grinning, and poking Adam’s leg with his
knee as he sits down and opens up his phone to call his mother, tell her he's
safe and he'll be home later.
~fin~
End Notes
     It is said that writing is a solitary pursuit. I have never really
     found this to be true for me, even less so with this story. I owe a
     debt of gratitude to many people.
     This story literally would not exist if it weren't for bluesoaring
     (autoshediastic). I wrote the original little scene a hundred years
     ago because she was having a crappy day, and it was her love for this
     Adam and Tommy that prompted me to keep going. And going and going
     and going. I spent almost a year writing this, and she never stopped
     cheerleading, being a sounding board, and figuring out what Tommy was
     thinking when he was eluding me. When I was sure this story wouldn't
     have an ending, she found it. So this story is truly hers from start
     to finish (and she might kill me if I don't make sure you all know
     that ;P)
     She also made me an amazing soundtrack.
     soundtrack by bluesoaring here
     1. Grace Kelly - The Motion Sick
     2. Mercy Kiss - Abandoned Pools
     3. Revival - Orgy
     4. Anone Can Play Guitar - Radio Head
     5. Ramalama [Bang Bang] - Roisin Murphy
     6. Modern Romance - Yeah Yeah Yeahs
     7. The Hand That Feeds - Nine Inch Nails
     8. I'll Believen In Anything - Wolf Parade
     9. Mistaken for Strangers - The National
     10. Last Love Song For Now - Okkervil River
     11. Sad, Sad Song - M. Ward
     12. Everyone's a Junkie - Our Lady Peace
     13. In a Minute - Ours
     14. Don Quixote - Pencey Prep
     15. The Kids From Yesterday - My Chemical Romance
     This story also would not be what it is without miss_begonia. She
     took an insanely long and ridiculously rough draft--it barely had a
     single finished scene in it--and gave me detailed notes on it like I
     hadn't seen since giving things to my thesis advisors in grad school.
     She uttered the now-imortal words, "use the treehouse". And not only
     that, she listened to me babble about Adam and Tommy and high school
     and teenagers and so much sex for HOURS AND HOURS over the last year.
     Plus, she too made me a fantastic mix. (how lucky am I? TWO MIXES :
     D :D :D \O/)
     soundtrack by miss_begonia here
     1. Goodbye, Bear/Love Me Dead - Ludo
     2. I'm Not Okay (I Promise) - My Chemical Romance
     3. Grand Theft Autumn (Where Is Your Boy) - Fall Out Boy
     4. Bum Like You - Robyn
     5. The Night Starts Here - Stars
     6. I Would Do Anything For You - Foster the People
     7. The First Taste - Fiona Apple
     8. Games People Play - Lissie
     9. You Are Not Alone - Mavis Staples
     10. Rootless Tree - Damien Rice
     11. Take Care - Drake (feat. Rihanna)
     12. Waves and the Both of Us - Charlotte Sometimes
     13. Slow Ride - Bonnie Raitt
     14. Everybody Here Wants You - Patrick Stump
     15. Skinny Love - Bon Iver
     I also could not have done this without my beta, isweedan, and my
     team of pre-readers, many of whom only got to see a scene or two, but
     all of whom provided immeasurable help in a time of need:
     littlemousling, geeklite, and aislinntlc.
     And thanks, of course, to i_bleed_magenta for all her organizational
     work running lambliffbigbang and to my artist, rude_bunny for all my
     boy!kisses which can be found here <3
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