Chapter Text
“Oh, fuck, there it is, you’re so fucking responsive. I am not going to last, Otes, you’re so tight!”
“Don’t then, fucker, come already, get on with it! I’m fucking close.”
I pull out, holding onto the condom to keep it in place and half smile as he whimpers at the loss of me inside him.
“Flip over, arse up for me,” I instruct him, and smile wider as he immediately repositions himself. We both sigh as I tuck myself back into his tight heat, rolling my chest down until it’s resting fully along his back and we’re once again touching everywhere that matters.
I stay still for a few blissful seconds until his hips push back against me and I haul in a breath before withdrawing and pushing back inside Otis’s gorgeous hole.
The sounds of our bodies colliding and the intoxicating scents of our skin and sweat commingle to create an atmosphere that has me gasping for breath as I hold back and resist the almost overwhelming urge to kiss him. I’m saved from the chance by his face being buried in the pillow below him.
I reposition us one more time, pulling him up so that we’re both upright, my weight on my ankles as he sits in my lap, and I focus on the way his body is clamping around me, the way his weight feel on my legs and the grunts of pleasure he’s releasing into the heated air around us.
We’re sweating and breathing hard and I’m aching. My balls are tightening as I get ready to unload into the condom, wrapping my hand around his cock, bringing him along with me and toppling us both over the edge.
He’s painted his pretty brown skin with his release and his chest is heaving as he fights to catch his breath. I reluctantly pull back, laying him down on his back so he’s not lying in the mess and sitting back up on my knees as I tie off the condom ready to discard it, watching his beautiful face in the aftermath of an orgasm that only I can give him.
I tear my eyes away from him and take myself into the bathroom where I grab a flannel to clean up. I avoid looking at myself in the mirror, I’ll deal with that later. I take a clean flannel into his room and he startles from where he’s almost drifting off to sleep as the warm cloth touches his skin and I reluctantly clear up the signs of his pleasure from where it’s tangled in his dark curly chest hair.
“You always take such good care of me, Christian,” he mumbles as I finish cleaning him up and he drifts off more completely.
“Of course I do,” I whisper to his sleeping form as I tuck his blankets around him, pull on my discarded clothes, and head for the door.
I turn around as I reach the handle, looking back at the sleeping form of my best friend. His face is relaxed, showing none of the strain and hurt that had marred his features when I’d arrived earlier that day. I take a mental photograph, something to hold onto, as I let myself out of his flat and head for the bus.
🥀🥀🥀
I reach my own front door ten minutes after the bus drops me off and I’ve got the door open and my clothes in the washing basket before I can think too hard about it. The shower is punishingly hot and I let the pressure of the stream pummel warmth back into my core.
I want to believe that this will be the time that he sees me, the time when he’ll look at me as a possibility instead of an antidote to the hurt of another failed relationship. I only have myself to blame for the way that I’m feeling now, though. He’s never led me on, never given me any indication he wants anything more than a palette cleanser, a way to medicate his mind. I’m safe, familiar, and he knows that he can come to me when he’s hurt or sad or angry and I will make him whole again.
I have to make him whole again because he’s my Otis, my other half, my best friend.
It’s become a habit, this pattern of ours. Otis heads full force into relationships, diving in with his heart and I love that about him. He commits himself to the effort, to planning elaborate dates and being whatever they want. He is sweet and thoughtful and in so many ways these are all admirable qualities. They would be at least, if any of the guys he picks were worth the dear, sweet, man that he is.
They break his heart and he calls me when he’s broken, when his heart is bruised and unable to be receptive to anything more because it all just hurts too much. I hold him close and we play Mario Kart, and I feed him and we restore our connection. Sometimes we have sex, sometimes he just falls asleep in my arms.
The sex today had been next level, going on for hours as we seemed to have found unending stamina, fitting in round after round. As if he needed the additional release this time, to ground himself back into himself.
I’m not complaining. I get to be there to make him feel like himself again, to bring him pleasure. As the water rolls over me and I wash myself thoroughly, though, I do have to acknowledge that I wish I wasn’t always the guy after the guy.
I shut off the shower and dry off quickly, throwing on some comfy sweats and a t-shirt of his that I probably borrowed a decade ago and will never return. It’s a faded uni thing that’s been washed so many times it’s practically see through in places and so soft that it soothes the fizz under my skin created by the heat of the water mixed with the emotions that boil around as I work to settle them.
The TV’s on for background noise and I pick up my phone for the first time. The group chat is popping off as Nick and Charlie seem to be trying to figure out a good weekend to visit. It’ll be good to see them. Otis hasn’t chimed in, still passed out maybe, we worked hard today, the sleep will do him good.
We’ll go back to being us when I see him next, because we always do. Video games and crap TV and banter over who gets to choose the take away because neither of us can be fucked with cooking. I close my eyes and let myself think about Nick’s brownies for a second because the idea of comfort food is what I need right now.
Hey guys, I’m absolutely in. Can do either of those weekends, so give us a shout when it’s fixed. Looking forward to seeing you!
That’s enough, I say to myself as I lie down on the sofa.
Zephyr appears and hops up onto my chest as I reach for the remote to turn on the TV, eager for the flat not to be so quiet. She purrs and I bury my fingers in her fur.
Now it’s just us, as it may always be.
My phone rings, the silent vibrations adding to Zeph’s purrs on my chest. I check the screen and see it’s him, contemplate not answering and giving myself some more time. But I can’t do it. I answer.
“You left,” he says softly.
“I do that,” I say in return. It’s our pattern, this part, navigating our way back.
“D’you see the messages from Nick and Charlie?”
He knows I did, will have seen my response if he’s been in the chain at all and caught up with it. “Sure, it’ll be good to see them,” I say, surprised I’m keeping my voice as neutral as it is.
“It will,” he says.
“You good, Otes?” I ask, reluctantly, not really wanting to hear but unable to stop myself.
“Sure am now, you were possessed back there, fucked the memories right out of me.”
This is interesting. We don’t usually talk about it, and definitely not over the phone. “Seemed like you needed it, didn’t hear you protesting either.”
“I sure as fuck was not,” he laughs, and he’s sounding more like himself with every word. “You never fucking disappoint, Chris, always take such good care of me.”
“Always,” I say, softly.
We talk for a little while longer, about nothing in particular, and we’re us by the time we confirm that he’ll pick me up when we head to meet the gang the following weekend. The TV is still on, an old episode of Midsummer Murders playing across the screen. I scratch Zephyr’s ears again as I put my phone face down on the coffee table, locked and hopefully silent for the rest of the night.
“Oh, Zeph,” I say to her. She looks balefully at me. “I know, you don’t have to tell me!”