A/N: Full title is I'll Tell You What I Want, What I Really, Really Want.
"Oh…oh, mmm…Len…" Barry moans when Len slips a hand between their bodies and starts running the back of his hand over Barry's denim covered crotch. "Oh God…" His voice squeaks, but Len doesn't laugh. He smiles against Barry's lips. Not a cruel smile. Not a teasing smile. Len's enjoying this, turning Barry on, getting the chance to touch him a little bit more than before.
"Is that alright?" Len whispers against the shell of Barry's ear. "Not too much?"
"No!" Barry says, jumping to answer as if Len had threatened to stop. "No…that's…that's good…just…just like that…"
Words become unnecessary, fading into kisses, and Len's hand continues to stroke, turning to cup Barry fully, fingers splaying along the sides of his erection, searching out which touches, how much pressure and where, make Barry ramble, make him moan, and which ones make his voice completely dissolve.
"Len…" Barry utters his name around a swallow when Len squeezes. "Do…do you mind if I…"
"Do it," Len replies anxiously.
Barry chuckles at Len's quick reply. "Don't you even want to know…"
"Does it involve you touching me?" Len asks.
"Yes," Barry says, "but…"
"Then no, Allen. I don't wanna know," Len says. "As long as it involves you touching me, I don't care. Just…just do it."
Len's breath had been hot against Barry's neck between kisses, but now he holds it, slowly stroking Barry through his jeans, waiting to see what Barry will do.
Barry's hand creeps down Len's side, blunt nails scratching along his skin as they reach for Len's waist, then sweep around the front, fingers grabbing hold of the button fly to his jeans.
"Oh, God, Allen," Len says in a tremulous voice. His eyes become wide as he watches Barry's face, cheeks glowing infinitely redder by the second, but with determination cemented in his expression, as he opens the buttons one, by one, by one, by…
Knock-knock-knock.
"Barry."
Knock-knock.
"Barry."
Len's jaw drops. His hands grab hold of the sheets beneath him and ball in to fists as he seethes, teeth bared, at Barry's bedroom door.
"What is it, Iris?" Barry calls out in frustration.
"Can I borrow your math book?" she asks. "I left mine at school."
"Go away," Barry pleads, hand stopped short of two final buttons and the enticing bulge lying underneath that he's yet to feel through anything thinner than Len's Levis.
"But, Barry, I need it to finish the assignment from this afternoon."
"Well, you're going to have to wait," he says, trying not to sound as desperate as he feels.
"Fine," she snaps, and stomps away.
"Oh, dear sweet God in heaven," Len sighs, pulling Barry down to his mouth with a hand to the nape of his neck. "Keep going," he begs, the sound of helpless Len making Barry instantly hot. "Please, oh God, keep going."
"Alright, alright," Barry whimpers, opening the last two buttons in a single tug. He pulls the fly of Len's jeans aside, fingers toying with the elastic waistband of his briefs, deciding whether or not he's going to slip them inside. This is a big step, a huge leap, and he doesn't want to go too far, silently make a promise he won't be able to keep. But he's dying to touch Len, and Len did say he could do what he wanted. Maybe it would be fine if he just…
Knock-knock.
"Barry?"
"What, Iris?" Barry whines.
"Dad wants to know if you're okay with pizza for dinner."
Barry stares at the door incredulously. "When am I not okay with pizza for dinner?"
"I'm just checking," Iris huffs. "Geez."
Barry takes a dozen deep breaths, then turns to the boy laughing underneath him.
"Can someone actually die from stopping and going like this?"
"No," Len chokes out, "but it sure as hell feels like it, doesn't it?"
"Yeah," Barry pants, nodding uncontrollably, forgoing the hand snaking into Len's underwear to start on the zipper to his own jeans, leaving Len in a state of utter shock. "Yeah, it does."
"Barry, what are you doing?" Len asks, not wanting Barry to do anything in haste, but praying he's about to do something in haste.
"I…I don't really know," Barry admits, but he doesn't stop. "I just…I need to feel you against me, and…" Barry manages to yank his fly open with one hand and lays over Len's body, moaning "God!" into Len's mouth as he surges forward to kiss him.
Knock knock-knock knock knock…knock knock.
"What!?" Barry barks in a voice that actually startles Len into sitting up. He looks at Barry's face, crimson and wrecked and beyond far gone, and falls back against the pillow, guffawing loudly.
"I'm not talking to you right now, Barry," Iris says with a healthy dose of indignation. "This question's for Len."
Len sucks in huge lungfuls of air to stop laughing. He coughs a few times to clear his throat, takes another calming breath, and says in a sort of singsong, overly-patient way, "What is it, Iris?"
"My dad wants to know if you and Lisa would like to stay for dinner."
Len glances at Barry, breathing hard, glaring at the door, and sees yet another opportunity too golden to miss out on.
"Why, yes, we would, Iris," Len says, making a performance of using good manners. "Thank you very much for the invitation."
"See, Barry," Iris says in a superior tone. "Len knows how to be polite."
"Yeah," Barry says. "Yeah, that's great. Could you just…give us a minute?"
"Yeah…sure…whatever you want. You don't have to get so uptight…" she mutters off down the hall, walking to her room and shutting the door behind her. Barry slumps on to Len's body, and both boys groan.
"Dude," Len says, "Barry, you guys gotta talk."
"Yeah," Barry agrees. "You're right. I do."
Len shifts underneath him to find relief for his sandwiched hard-on, and Barry remembers where they left off. "B-but for right now, can't we just ignore her? I mean, eventually she'll get bored and go away."
"No, she won't, Barry," Len argues, wishing they could blast music or something to make it known that they are no longer fielding questions from Iris West. "She's doing this on purpose because she knows something's up, and I'm sorry, but my dick can't take much more of this."
"I know, I know," Barry says, grumbling with his forehead pressed into Len's shoulder, swaying back and forth, "but…you don't know…talking to Iris…sometimes it's hard."
"You wanna know what's hard, Allen?" Len grabs Barry's hand and pushes it against his crotch, bucking up unintentionally when the heat of Barry's hand seeps through the cotton. "This, Barry. This is hard. And I was kinda hopin' that…you know…you could…help me out with it."
"I want to," Barry says. "I do. I really really want to. It's just…"
"Barry Allen," they hear Iris sing to the tune of Cheer Up, Charlie as she passes Barry's door on her way to the stairs. "Barry Allen…why won't you open your door, Barry?"
Len clenches his teeth and growls. "Look, Bare, I like Iris and all, but every time we make out and I hear her voice, I lose an inch. In a minute, it's gonna disappear entirely."
"I seriously doubt that," Barry says with a weakly sly smile, but he doesn't argue past that. He sits up, straddling Len's hips, and stares at his hands, resigned.
Blood loss to Len's brain suddenly has him jumping to conclusions. "What's wrong, Allen?" he asks in a flat voice. "Don't you want to tell her?"
Barry's head snaps up at Len's accusation.
"I do!" Barry says. "I swear I do! It's just…she's been my friend forever. She's been with me through everything. She was my first real crush. I can talk to her about anything, but" – Barry shakes his head – "not about this."
Len sighs, able to feel sympathetic as his hard-on fades and everything becomes clear, not muddied by a hormonal haze.
"Barry," he says, taking one of Barry's hands and holding it in his, "freshman year, for the science fair, you gave a speech about the mating rituals of the African Anteater."
Barry flinches. "How do you even remember that?"
"How could I not?" Len laughs. "There was a dance and everything!"
"So…I don't get what you're saying," Barry says in better humor. "You think I should dance when I tell Iris?"
"No, doofus. What I'm saying is that the same guy who stood up in front of about two hundred high school students and made a fool out of himself in the name of science can tell his best friend in the world that he's got himself a boyfriend."
Barry's eyebrows shoot up.
"A…a boyfriend?"
"Well, yeah," Len says, slightly self-conscious. "That's what we are, right?"
"Yes, I guess so," Barry agrees. "It's just…you've never said the word before. I didn't know if we were using it."
Len grins wickedly. He pulls Barry's arm, hand over hand like a rope, bringing his boyfriend down to him.
"Of course, we're using it," Len says, whispering against Barry's lips, stealing kisses in between words. Barry relaxes into Len's kisses, melts into his embrace, returns to the task of lining up their bodies, chest to chest, hips to hips, legs to legs, so that Len can feel Barry, and Barry sure as hell can feel Len. With a courage garnered from Len's moans, his muttered pleas, the taste of his mouth, and Len's length growing beside his own, Barry spreads his legs, kneeling on the mattress so he can rut against him. He grabs Len's wrists and pins them beside his head. Len shuts his eyes and lets his head loll back, finally seeing relief at the end of this long tunnel of sexual tension.
"Barry…" Len moans, not struggling for any sort of dominance, willing to lie back and take what he's being given. "Fuck…"
Knock-knock-knock.
"Barry?"
"Fuuuuuuuck!" Len slams his head backward on the pillow three times with his eyes squeezed shut. "Go," Len says, giving Barry a halfhearted push. "Talk to your friend."
"Now?" Barry asks, disappointed.
"Now," Len says, his next push more forceful. "Now, now, now, right now."
Barry lets out a deep sigh. He didn't know he'd have to deal with this today. Off the cuff, on the fly, is not the way Barry normally operates. He usually sits out, plans, thinks things through, considers every possible angle, every conceivable argument, prepares for all the possible outcomes. He hadn't done any of that. If he was honest with himself, though, it wasn't that he hadn't had the time. Len was giving him all the time he needed. Barry was the one putting things off for the inevitable future. But that future is now, and he has to face the music.
Or, more to the point, a serenading Iris, marching up and down in front of Barry's door, singing Wannabe by the Spice Girls, with her complaints worked into the lyrics.
Yo, I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want
So tell me what you want, what you really, really want
I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want
So tell me what you want, what you really, really want
I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna,
I wanna really, really, really want Barry to open his door…
Barry climbs off the bed, puts on his shirt, and walks, defeated, towards the door, while Len follows, slipping his shirt back on, and taking deep breaths in an attempt to kill his erection.
Though Iris's singing is doing a bang up job with that.
Barry unlocks his door, the clicking of the tumblers silencing her singing. He opens it while her footsteps shuffle his way, so by the time it swings to a stop, she's there in the doorway, ready to invite herself in for a chat. But Barry stands solidly, unmoving, with no idea where to start, how to begin, his fear of speaking and saying the wrong thing keeping him from saying anything at all, even hello.
"Barry," she says, staring into the face of this boy she's known most of her life, whom she's trusted with every last secret, and who looks like he's about to upchuck on her shoes, "can we talk?" Her gaze flicks past his shoulder to Len inside his room. "Privately?"
"Uh…yeah," Barry says. "Sure…we can talk, but I…"
"Hey, Iris," Len says, walking up behind his boyfriend. "Barry…" He grabs Barry by the waist. He twirls Barry around, leans him over his arm, and kisses him tenderly on the lips.
Len had originally wanted to sit and watch Barry and Iris have at it right there at the door, his first instinct to sit quietly and see Barry twist a little in the wind. But now that they're together, boyfriends, made more official by acknowledgment of the word, it became too painful.
Len had been wrong. Things weren't the same as they had been before. They were a world of more complicated.
Len positions Barry back upright and breaks their kiss, looking him in the eyes before he backs away.
"I'm gonna go get Lisa and be back in a few," he says, smacking Barry on the ass as he leaves the room. "I think you two might want to sit down and talk some things over."
"Uh, yeah," Iris says, mouth hanging open as Len, with a rather telling outline visible through the front of his jeans, saunters down the hallway towards the stairs.
Both Barry and Iris listen as he walks down the stairs and out the front door.
"So," Iris says, turning her gaping-mouth grin towards Barry, "I take it you two are…"
"Dating," Barry says. "Yeah. B-but, please, don't tell your dad!"
"Barry…"
"I'm gonna tell him," Barry vows. "I swear. I just…I want to find the right time. You know, Len and I didn't start off on the best foot when we first met, and even though we became friends, I don't think Joe ever really forgave him."
Iris nods. Barry is speculating, but Iris knows it's the truth.
"Well, tonight over dinner might be the right time," Iris suggests. "Unless…does Lisa not know?"
"Yeah, she knows. Ow!" Barry yelps when Iris slugs him in the arm. "What was that for?"
"Len told Lisa before you told me?"
"It's complicated," Barry says, rubbing his sore arm and leaning away when Iris looks like she's gearing up for a second punch. "But…promise you won't tell your dad?"
"I'm not going to tell my dad," Iris says with a dismissive wave of her hand, as if the very thought of her tattling was ridiculous from the start, "if…" A mischievous smile blooms on her face to rival any of Len's.
"If what?" Barry asks warily.
"If…" She clasps her hands excitedly beneath her chin, "you tell me what it's like kissing Leonard Snart!"
"No!" Barry gasps. "I am not having this conversation with you."
"Come on, Barry!" Iris presses, bouncing on the balls of her feet. "He looks like he'd be an amazing kisser."
"Iris!" Barry exclaims, appalled, not admitting that he himself used to think the same thing.
And Len definitely lives up to the assumption.
Iris giggles, but Barry sighs, and she tones down her teasing.
"What's wrong?" she asks at his drastic switch in mood.
Barry leans against his door frame and crosses his arm over his chest, more for comfort than nonchalance.
"Do you think…it's going to bother Joe? Finding out that I'm…"
"Gay?"
"Well, bisexual," Barry clarifies. "Len's the only guy I've ever considered being with."
"I think…" Iris reaches out to put a hand on Barry's arm, "that my dad wants you to be happy, Barry. Whatever makes you happy will make him happy. He'd just like to be let in on it when it happens." Barry nods. He had that feeling, he just needed to hear that someone else did, too. "And, hey," she continues, giving his arm a reassuring squeeze, "if something goes weird and he gets angry or whatever, which he won't, I'll be there to back you up."
Barry's eyes travel from her hand on his arm to her warm, smiling eyes, and he can't help smiling in return. Those eyes, that face, the touch of her hand, have always been a huge comfort to him. Iris was always more than a friend, more than a sister. She'd always hold a special place in his life and in his heart.
"Thanks," he says.
Iris nods, but her smile starts to curl up at the corners, and her eyes become dark. "So, about the kissing…"
"No, Iris!"
"Come on!"
"No! I'm not saying a thing!" Barry declares, heading towards the stairs.
"I'll just keep bothering you when he comes over till you do," she promises, going after him.
"Iris…"
"And I still know how to unlock your door."
"No!"
"Tell me!"