full moons & minor keys (5/7)

[behindthec]

 Title: Full Moons and Minor Keys (5/7)

Author: lolab

Pairing: William Beckett/Gabe Saporta

Rating: R. ish.

Summary: I’ve always thought William could convert an asexual, a priest, even a motorcycle dyke; and being nothing so extreme myself, I sure as fuck had no hope.

Disclaimer: The keyword in fan fiction is FICTION. Don’t own Bilvy or Gabanti; I respect them very much; just can't help seeing the world through slashy subtext-tinted glasses, and once a story starts writing itself in my head, I have to get it out.

Warnings: BOYSECKZ (warning? more like incentive), plenty of creative swearing, Gabe being all dirty and Gabe-like, flagrant abuse of the '70s handkerchief code, shameless disregard for reality (i.e. girlfriends, etc.).

Notes: Early chapter! ‘Cause I won’t have Internet access tomorrow.  (Stupid Easter festivities with in-laws and non-vegan food choices. :P) This chapter’s for ourgossip_lips, for teaching me Spanish (and just... yeah ;); my new partner in crime, saykendrawithme, for brainstorming (!! :D) and for wedding reception bathroom porn (!!!??? GREATEST SETTING EVER); for yourfirsttry, for working so hard to buy me off with NOT porn, and for iamiamamachine, for some of the best conversations I’ve had to date.

 

And for minus_four(and all of you above), for joining the super new top secret 13DF committee. :D

 

Comments = happiness. I also accept hand jobs cookies in place of feedback. <3

 

Previous Chapters:

- Chapter 1 and Chapter 1b

- Chapter 2

- Chapter 3

- Chapter 4

5.

 

We've got our souls held in this dark hotel room...

- TAI

 

 

 

The fifth time it happened, two weeks later... we’d run out of excuses.

 

It was the last night of tour, and, more relevantly, the last night I’d see William until god knows when. Between the two of us, the next few months of existence was comprised of commitments that, most annoyingly, did not involve each other – random appearances, interviews, performances, mini-tours, some studio time, some family time, some band practice time, some lock-ourselves-in-our-rooms-till-we-finish-a-song time... and finally, of course, the Sleeping With Giants tour kickoff bash at Pete’s, and then he’d be on the road again and I’d be wrapped up in the new album’s release.

 

There was, however, one slice of sunshine that had broken through two days earlier, when he’d popped into our tour bus for breakfast and spat out the words over a bowl of Honey-Nut Cheerios, nervously stirring his last remaining O around in the milk with his spoon and never taking his eyes from it:

 

“Listen, we were talking with Pete and... if you guys wanna join us on the last half of the tour, like when you’re done with the release stuff, y’know... you should. ‘Cause, like... it’d be great timing, with your new album, and plus, y’know, I think... touring with you is so much better than, like... not touring with you.”

 

William, at his most confident, possessed a genuinely poignant, passionate verbal aptitude; and at his least, tended to channel all the linguistic ability of a cucumber.

 

Still, his words couldn’t have made me happier if they’d been “Marry me, Gabe.”

 

Being the last night, and Pete being the greatest boss in the fucking universe, he booked us all rooms in the fanciest, swankiest Ritz-inspired plaza-courtyard-suites-whatever place in the entire state, and then proceeded to render this generosity utterly pointless by inviting everybody to spend the rest of the night away from the hotel, hitting every club in town and getting beautifully hammered.

 

“I think I’ll pass,” I announced unceremoniously to Pete’s room at 11:30 that evening, where I was shamelessly managing to occupy an entire king size bed by myself and still hanging my head off the edge, so I could see about twenty shocked faces upside down.

 

Pete’s head popped up in front of me as he leaned over. “Are you kidding me, man?”

 

“Dude, we could do that any time. I’m gonna like, raid the mini bar and get stuff I can’t pronounce from room service and go swimming and use the life preserver for non-intended purposes and, like... order fifty-dollar porn.”

 

“I’m in.”

 

I craned my neck to see William staring at the floor with a grin tugging at his lips.

 

“Sweet,” said Pete. “It’s gonna be awesome, Bill. First we’re going – ”

 

“No, with Gabe, I’m staying,” he amended, fast and quiet to kill any reaction potential.

 

But we were a reactionary bunch, not to mention loud as Warped Tour fangirls, and as everyone around us began to talk about fifty different things at once, occasionally yelling and/or singing their point across or forging unidentifiable foreign accents to plan the evening (words could not describe how much I loved these freaks), William became that shy, lone focal point in the blurred, chaotic photograph that was Pete’s room: his eyes lifted slowly, climbing a direct path to mine like he already knew where they were, what they were watching... what they wanted.

 

He smiled from where he sat hunched halfway under the nightstand. I smiled back and turned away, because we’d reached the point of transcending any need for verbal communication.

 

And when I got up without a word and headed for the door, I didn’t have to look back to know he’d be following.

 

I didn’t know it yet, but he’d have followed me into the depths of hell and complained only that the heat was frizzing his hair.

 

 

 

“No, no, not next week, we’ve got that Buzznet thing on Tuesday. What about the fourteenth? ...No, the fifteenth Patrick and I have a meeting with those damn studio pricks.”

 

From his perch on the edge of the bed, William giggled. I winked at him, half lost to the tiresome, static-ridden voice on the other end of my cell. I was standing in the middle of my room in a white dress shirt, black slacks, and a black and silver tie draped around my neck (felt like dressing up for our last show, what the hell), top buttons undone, running one frustrated hand through my hair as I bitched my way through an ill-timed business conversation that had started when my cell rang the second I slipped my room key into the slot.

 

When the hell had I become such a fucking adult?

 

And there was William, legs crossed on the edge of the bed, hands folded neatly in his lap, watching me with astonishing patience – and suddenly I couldn’t tear my eyes from him.

 

“Yeah, um...” I mumbled to the phone. “Listen, I’ve got to go, I’ve got a, uh...”

 

“He’s got a really impatient hooker waiting!” William yelled loud enough for the entire twenty-fourth floor to hear before ducking onto the bed and hiding behind a pillow.

 

“Uh – yeah. No, it was the TV. Okay. Bye.” I tossed my phone on a chair and lunged for the bed, war pillow in tow. “Do you know who that was?!” I shrieked, but my threats were empty, invaded by laughter as I pried the pillow off him, employing it in my assault.

 

“Jackass,” I muttered affectionately when I’d given up and we were lying on our backs sideways across the bed, heads inclined to one another.

 

He grinned, rolling on his side to face me. “Want some room service?”

 

I cocked an eyebrow. “Is that what they’re calling it these days?”

 

“Gabe!”

 

I giggled. He’d walked into it, and he knew it.

 

“No,” I finally decided. “No room service.”

 

“But I’m hungry!”

 

“I know. I’m taking you out to dinner.”

 

I’d have given my ability to sing (Little Mermaid/Sea Witch style) for a camera right then: he glowed like he was fucking pregnant or something.

 

“...Seriously?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Like... a date?” he smirked.

 

“Beckett, you can call it a date or a business meeting or a fucking luau for all I care. You coming or not?”

 

“Yeah,” he smiled.

 

Another ten minutes on the phone was spent attempting to, as subtly as possible, locate the nicest fucking restaurant within city limits that was still open and didn’t require three-month advance reservations, while William stood in front of the full-length mirror by the closet, currently shirtless and trying on various combinations of my dressier ensembles and failing painfully at fastening a necktie and Jesus fucking Christ, why was this so unbelievably hot??

 

“C’mere, douche.” I stood in front of him, having decided on a date-appropriate joint, took the ends of the tie and, with his stare on me emanating all the intensity of an apocalypse, I managed to give him a proper Windsor knot after three minutes of fumbling with the fabric and willing my libido into submission.

 

Mmm... submission... DAMN IT.

 

“Where are you taking me, dahling?” he cooed.

 

“A restaurant.”

 

“No shit. Do I look okay?”

 

I broke focus from my own tie struggles and took him in, head to toe. They say you learn something new every day, and this was my daily dose: William, I learned, wore my clothes about sixteen times better than I did – and I wore them damn well.

 

Holy fuck, he was hot.  No glamorous descriptors, no raving metaphors.  He was just. fucking. hot.

 

I managed to squeak something resembling “Uh, yeah,” and we were off.

 

Honestly, I never intended it as a date.  I never intended to get tipsy off a $200 bottle of wine, either, or for our waiter to be gay as a rainbow unicorn and spend the entire evening hitting on William.

 

"I am so not tipping him," I hissed across the table at Bill, who had been making no effort whatsoever to rebuff the advances of Chase, manwhore extraordinaire, instead giggling and smiling his way through the shameless lack of professionalism.

 

From my completely unbiased viewpoint, naturally.

 

"Why, because he told me I was cute for not being able to decide on an appetizer?"

 

"YES!"

 

He was still glowing, whether from Chase or from sheer pleasure at my patheticness, I had no idea.  He shook his head, grinning, and leaned in toward me, our eyes hooked, golden honey on chocolate, and my heart rate hinted at a dangerous increase.

 

"Gabriel Saporta," he whispered, "you... are... one hundred and ten percent, hook line and sinker, shamelessly and completely. fucking. jealous!"

 

"I am not!"

 

"You are!"

 

"Not!"

 

"Gabe, you couldn't be more jealous if we were fifteen and Chase asked me to prom before you did."

 

I pouted before I could avoid it.  "You wouldn't go with him, would you?"

 

His jaw dropped into an open-mouthed grin and those honey eyes went moon-sized.

 

"Okay, so I'm jealous!  He has no business hitting on you, you're my date."

 

Er.

 

William raised an eyebrow, unsurprised at the truth of the admission, but clearly shocked at my willingness to fess up.

 

"Okay then," was all he said until we spotted Chase fast approaching with our second course, at which point Bill reached across the table, caught hold of my tie, and yanked me forward until our mouths met.

 

After that, all Chase brought to our table was food.

 

Conversation fell to randomness then, finding us far from the usual exchange of tour talk, music, or flirtations, and it seemed the further we got to the bottom of that $200 bottle, the further we delved into our pasts.  By the time we'd finished coffee, he was three quarters of the way through the story of his most traumatic childhood memory and I'd already detailed my first disastrous day of kindergarten.

 

I hadn't even noticed that at some point our hands had stretched across the clutter on the white linen tablecloth until our fingers met and curled together, warm and flushed from the alcohol -- or from the contact.  Fire on fire and all that.

 

Predictably, I expected the cab ride back would serve little purpose beyond a sexual tension builder until we could perch neatly in the elevator and stumble out on the twenty-fourth floor, groping and lip-locked till one of us managed to shove the room key in the slot right side up after four distracted attempts.

 

But this evening had gone anything but as planned so far, and didn't seem likely to change course now -- maybe because, honestly, there had been no real plan.

 

Or so I'd claim till the day I died.

 

Half drunk by now, we wandered around the lobby for awhile, ducking into dark, abandoned conference rooms down silent hallways because William thought it would be really cool to have a flip-chart and play pictionary at the side of the pool.

 

We never found a flip-chart, and also realized we had no swim trunks and toyed briefly with the idea of skinny-dipping until we decided Pete would probably not be cool with us getting kicked out for public indecency.  ("Pete's not the boss of me!" William slurred in a fit of giggles until I pointed out that, actually, he kind of was, which William then decided was sexy because, according to him, he had a thing for slightly older authority figures.)

 

(...Something new every day, I tell ya.)

 

Only one or two drinks still had any grip on us by the time we wandered into the hotel's bar-slash-lounge-slash-practically empty low-lit nook with a mysterious red tint to everything.  A baby grand lay untouched beside what may at times have served as a dance floor, but tonight, a random weekday at 3:15 in the morning, it was utterly ours.

 

As I slid out the bench, ears catching the muffled brush of carpet as its legs slunk across the floor, and gave one key a flirtatious poke for tone... the room (and a few distant, wandering eyes) surrendered to us.

 

"Hey, yeah, I forgot," Bill piped up, leaning against the mirrored black wood of the instrument's frame.  "You play, don't you?  Like hardcore?"

 

I grinned; Bill unfailingly had excellent word choice when even remotely intoxicated, and by excellent I mean totally redonk.  "Yeah, Beethoven is one hardcore shiznit mothafucka, man."

 

"Fuck yeah he is, play me something."

 

"How 'bout I teach you something, you lazy bastard."

 

His eyes lit up, in that way that compelled me to make a life's work out of finding anything and everything that could coax that glow from his face.

 

"Really?"

 

"Yeah, come here."

 

I stood up as he took my place, hands limp and awkward at his sides, and knelt behind him, folding his hands in mine and taking a moment to position them on the keyboard.  With my mouth hovering by his ear, I whispered instructions and then began to slowly, liquidly draw out the opening notes of Moonlight Sonata, my fingers playing through his, the success of our endeavor wholly dependent on that perfect, unbroken contact.

 

It kind of fumbled to hell after a couple measures, which was just as well anyway because my pants were starting to feel tighter than I remembered and his breath had begun to leave his body in quick, sporadic puffs, and I reasoned that any longer and we'd be well on our way to that public indecency charge (not to mention the defiling of a practically sacred musical instrument -- not that it wouldn't be worth the sacrilege).

 

"I always wanted to have sex on a piano."

 

...And then he had to go and say things like that, right into my ear, like a dirty secret (which it probably was, and at this point probably should have stayed one).

 

I kind of froze up, but he gave me a nervous laugh and stretched out his fingers.

 

I needed another drink.

 

"I need another drink."

 

"Yeah?  I could go for one."

 

"Wait here."

 

I headed over to the bar, grateful for a gust of fresh, neutral air that didn't possess the siren-like effect of his cologne, and ignored the heat rising in my face from more than a few stares of the last remaining patrons.  I downed a shot of god knows what before I returned with two proper glasses, as William was attempting to pluck out "Heart and Soul" with one finger.

 

Ten minutes and two drinks later, I'd taught him the easy part and he was delighted.

 

"Dude!" I announced, loosened again from the alcohol.  "Know what we should do?  We should write a song."

 

"Yeah?  Okay.  Start here."  He poked at C and followed it with E flat.

 

God, you're cute, I didn't say.

 

What I did say was, "C minor is gay, I like A flat – A flat is the SHIT!" because I was just drunk enough.

 

We probably sat there for an hour, during which time I learned that William liked minor keys (C or otherwise) maybe more than life itself, and a brief, half-drunk existential wondering made me think for a second that that had to mean something – something dark and philosophical and emo, no doubt.

 

But we actually fucking wrote half a verse and a chorus (in A flat, no less); the true masterpiece, however, was the title: "Your Dick May Be Bigger But My Wiener Is Cleaner (Beckett's Shower Anthem)" -- mine, clearly.  Which earned me several sordid and unflattering nicknames (which in turn earned the undivided attention of the bartender and the few stragglers), but it didn't stop him from holding my hand all the way up the elevator.

 

That was the only evidence that we had any notion of each other's presence, though, because we were sober enough by now to know this was one of those moments where, if we looked at each other, something unstoppable would start.

 

We chanced it, finally, when we got to my door.  His was three down the hall, but mine was closest to the elevator, so, you know, it was all practical.

 

"Um, do you, uh... wanna come in?"

 

Because "oh my god please come in so I can ravish you to death a thousand times over" would've been a little forward.

 

He smiled.  It was answer enough.

 

We kicked off shoes, tossed our respective ties, unbuttoned our respective top buttons, but otherwise kept our distance, and our clothes.  We eventually wound up in the same spots we'd occupied at the beginning of the night, sideways across the bed on our backs, faces turned in toward one another with one weak bedside lamp glowing lazily behind us.

 

He was as beautiful as he'd been then, maybe more.  Definitely more.  William only ever got more beautiful.

 

"I saw a different side of you tonight," he said quietly.

 

"Mm... which side would that be, the jackass businessman or the geeky pianist?"

 

He smiled.  "You play beautifully."

 

"Thanks."  I stared at his chin, because staring at his mouth meant business and staring into his eyes, well.  That was just too much right now.

 

I don't know why I was so cautious, so scared, so reluctant.  Except I did know; I knew every moment I spent with him I fell a little harder, and every moment got me closer to saying something I'd regret.  Something I wasn't ready to say -- and honestly I didn't know if I'd ever be ready.

 

"Gabe?"

 

Shit.

 

"Yeah?"

 

Long, life-threatening pause; thanks, Becks.

 

"Is there anything you want to tell me?"

 

SHIT.

 

"Uh... what?"

 

Fantastic, I'm quoting "Hollaback Boy" now, and did I mention SHIT?

 

"I -- I just -- you seem.  Like.  When we're alone, you just... it always seems like there's something you want to say, but you don't."

 

I think shit pretty much covers it.

 

"Um.  Like what?"

 

Stalling is cool.

 

He swallowed.  If I didn't know better I'd say he looked almost as nervous as I felt.

 

"Um.  I don't know.  Something you're afraid to say."

 

And this, ladies and gents, is what we call a window of opportunity.

 

But it was cold and blustery out and I wasn't ready for the window to be open because all kinds of shit might come flying in and... and I was taking this metaphor far beyond its capacity.

 

So I did the only thing I could bring myself to do: lie through my fucking teeth.

 

"No.  It's nothing.  There -- there's nothing."

 

And because he was William and intuitive and painfully trusting, he said "Okay."

 

We were silent again, but somehow I'd gotten trapped in his eyes.

 

"Gabe?"  Only this time, scarcely a whisper.

 

"Yeah?"

 

"Can I kiss you?"

 

And because it was the first time either of us had asked, I thought it deserved an answer.

 

I couldn't hold in the smile to save my life.  "Shut up, Bill."

 

It started akin to a first kiss, like a first ever kiss – not in skill level, but in sensation, in emotion. It was slow not because we were scared, but because it could be slow. For the first time since whatever the fuck this was had started, we had two of the world’s most prized luxuries: time, and privacy.

 

But slow motion eventually dissolved to just motion, and that’s where we lingered – just motion, constantly, tongues, hands, hips, legs, working to fuse into one – and it was so addicting, so irreversible, that I didn’t even notice he’d crawled on top of me until he brought it to my attention.

 

“Quitate tu ropa,” he whispered.

 

My eyes literally shot open. He’d just told me to take off my clothes. He’d just told me to take off my clothes in Spanish.

 

He smirked at what I guessed was a pretty priceless face on my part. “Rosetta Stone is the shit.”

 

“Rosetta Stone taught you that?!”

 

“Er, no, actually Sisky’s brother taught me that one in high school.”

 

“Dude,” I choked. “What – when did you –?!”

 

“I just told you to take off your clothes and you want to know the timeline of my Spanish education?!”

 

Fuck, could he possibly get any sexier.

 

“Shut up then,” I said simply, and kissed him.

 

It wasn’t long before he broke the connection of our mouths, started trailing kisses across my face, and smiled against my skin.

 

“Someone once told me,” he breathed into my ear, “that I couldn’t top if the future of my dick depended on it.”

 

I smiled. He fucking remembered, how hot was that?

 

“So, if that person doesn’t mind,” he went on, voice descending to a low, teasing drawl, “I’d like to prove him wrong.”

 

Then, and only then, did he meet my eyes, willing the unspoken question to shine through them.

 

Seeing as all the blood meant for my brain had now rushed down between my legs, all I could do was nod – and barely, at that.

 

Proving me wrong seemed about as effortless to him as breathing, but I didn’t have room in my head for any solid thoughts right now, let alone wonderings about how he was so damn good it seemed like he’d been doing this for years. God knows I hadn’t known (other than in theory) what the hell I was doing our first time – not that he’d complained in the least.

 

And right now, complaining would have been a veritable impossibility. Passing out; death by overwhelmingly good sex – now those were possibilities.

 

So typical of him that he was nothing like I’d expected, which was even more of a turn-on – not cautious, not uncertain or shy, and, though still gentle, displaying a calm, subtly overwhelming power I’d never have associated with him before.

 

He waited for us to settle into a rhythm before treating me to a mind-blowing dose of my own dirty-talk medicine – things no one had ever said to me before, things that only ever echoed in my fantasies – and nothing I’d ever imagined would slip from the lips of this reserved, soft-spoken musician I’d been in love with as long as I could remember – because sometimes it seemed like nothing before life with William was worth remembering.

 

It was this thought that coaxed me to slip a hand behind his neck and pull his mouth down to mine. He fixed an absolutely radiant smile on me when our lips separated.

 

“You’re so beautiful, angel,” he whispered, lacing the fingers of our free hands together.

 

I kissed him again. “You make me beautiful, sweetheart.”

 

He studied me for a long moment after that, and I swear his eyes started glistening with something beyond that ethereal glow I’m always on about. Something tangible, concrete. Something wet.

 

Oh, shit.

 

He leaned in, burying his face against my neck before those few drops could betray whatever it was he wanted to keep hidden.

 

And then something strange happened: He breathed two words into my neck, so soft and so close to the rhythm of our bodies that it took me a minute to realize what he kept repeating:

 

“Don’t go.”

 

I had no fucking idea what he meant – we were in the middle of having sex for fuck’s sake (though at the risk of sounding like a chick, at this point I dared to think it was closer to making love), not to mention we were in my room – where the hell was I going to go?

 

But I said "I won't," over and over to match his pleas.  "I'm not going anywhere.  Promise."

 

It seemed to work, but naturally, leave it to me to fuck everything up to hell -- and that's when it slipped out, uncalled for and unallowed -- but unfortunately, not unspoken:

 

"Te amo."

 

...Oh fuck.

 

Attention non-native speakers: te quiero would have been disaster enough; it's what lovers say, it's what you say when you're dating, to your girlfriend or boyfriend or even when you're in love – literally translated “I want you,” it's like an informal, watered-down "I love you," and it had no place whatsoever in our relationship at this point, because honestly there was no relationship, not that kind, and whatever we were, "couple" didn't qualify.

 

But what I actually said... you don't just fucking say.  It's reserved for your closest family members, and for that end-of-the-world, can't-live-without-you kind of love, and there it was just spilling out of my mouth and judging by the look set across his flushed, angular features... he had at least some concept of the words' weight.

 

"What?" he squeaked.

 

"Nothing," I replied, fast, automatic, terrified.

 

His body froze for half a breath and, frantic to erase the past ten seconds, I just kissed him, hard and frantic like I was trying to suck the words back into my mouth.

 

It's not that I didn't mean them.  And that's what scared me.

 

But he responded, intensifying each time our mouths connected until one hard thrust of my hips sent him over the edge and he moaned right into my mouth as I came in his hand, only dazedly mesmerized at how I'd never been with anyone where we could trigger each other's climax.

 

Surely that must've meant something -- and couldn't mean anything, I reminded myself.

 

And I was sure I blacked out for a few breaths, those forbidden words still pulsing in my head, begging for release over and over and I wanted to, so hard, because it was the fucking truth...

 

William, I'm in love with you.  So easy.  Six words.  One and a half seconds.

 

I opened my eyes to avoid any more darkness-induced mishaps; his now limp frame lay draped across mine, skin on skin at every inch, from our clammy foreheads down to the tangled mess of our legs.

 

It wasn't All The Other Times, when we could just zip up, wipe our hands on our sleeves and saunter away with a smirk and a wink.

 

Like we'd even want to, now.

 

And by some uncanny miracle, everything managed to not be awkward.

 

He squirmed a bit till he was nestled against me in the universal post-orgasmic cuddle pose, head on my shoulder and arm snaked across my chest.  The motionless haze didn't last long, though; he tilted his head back to look up at me and we were kissing again, just kissing, sliding tongue over tongue and hands over skin, not grabbing, not frantic, just sweet and lazy, reverent.  Really incredibly gay, to be honest -- like the way I’d heard that women touched each other -- worshipping more than taking; more than wanting, even.

 

I didn't care.  It was heaven.

 

"Mm," he mumbled some half hour later, when our kisses had slowed and our eyelids were requiring colossal effort to keep open.  "What time's your flight home?"

 

"Noon.  Ish.  You?"

 

"Nine-thirty."

 

I forced an eye open, one finger drawing languid circles on his back.  "Dude, that's like... five hours from now."

 

He smiled sleepily.  "Yeah.  We can doze for like... an hour.  Wow."

 

"Doesn't matter."  I traced his bottom lip with my thumb.  "As long as you're here when I wake up."

 

It was a boundary-fucking request I was willing to risk.

 

"I'm not going anywhere," he stated, echoing my earlier words, almost forgotten now, having been swallowed by the heat of the moment.  "I promise."

 

And he didn't.  For an hour and eight minutes, he was mine.

 

 

 

Four hours later I was inching through the mile-long Delta security line, drunk on exhaustion and aching to take his hand, but wary of paparazzi and too tired to risk the results.

 

Bill was fucking adorable -- couldn't get his contacts back in at the hotel so he was wearing his glasses, thick red frames reducing him to the image of a nerdy fourteen-year-old dyke.

 

Not being able to kiss him was murder.

 

And in other news, I'd been putting it off so hardcore that by the time his flight was boarding, it just shot out of my mouth without permission:

 

"Um, hey.  That -- that week before you start touring again.  You said you weren't, y'know, doing anything, so I just figured, y'know, neither am I, really, so, uh... if you wanted to come hang out with me in New York, y'know... that'd be cool."

 

He'd started smiling only a few words into it, but kept quiet to let me finish making a fool of myself.

 

"I'd like that."

 

Wow.  Seriously?  Yes?  Was that a yes?

 

"Really?"

 

He chuckled.  "Yeah.  Really."

 

"Okay.  Cool.  Yeah, um -- oh fuck, they're like, closing the gate."

 

"Yeah.  Okay."  His eyes darted to the gate and back.

 

"So.  Yeah.  I -- "

 

He was in my arms, holding me to him, not an inch of space between us.  I just lost myself in the warm length of his body, smelling his hair like the dweeb that I was.

 

"I'll see you soon," he whispered, and then a rush of stale airport air struck me as he pulled away and started for the gate, shooting me one last smile and his shy little wave.

 

And I, predictably, felt pathetically deflated.  Like I'd lost an arm, or my band, or the ability to breathe.

 

But I did breathe, kept forcing myself to until I joined up with the rest of the Cobras at our gate, and decided August could not possibly come soon enough.

 

 

/ch. 5