17

Brian dropped his backpack to the floor, and Neil took in a long breath. He had no idea what to expect, and was surprised at the tendrils of hope that spread through him at seeing Brian again. He realised that though he had tried, he'd barely been able to put him out of his mind for the last two weeks. It was ridiculous.

Dammit, he thought, he'd missed him. Actually missed him.

Brian walked over and sat next to Neil at the table, the chair scraping on the lino. His hair was even scruffier than usual and needed a cut. It was small signs like this that let Neil know that Brian had probably been stressed or upset of late, that he had been neglecting himself.

Brian rested his hands on the tabletop. He stared at them, for a few seconds, as though thinking of what to say. Alongside the tendrils of hope, Neil felt tentacles of dread too. Maybe this was Brian's formal recusal of himself from whatever friendship-relationship they had. Brian was a formal guy, he'd do something like that in person. And he did look serious enough to make a speech about how he just couldn't do it anymore. Couldn't hang out with the person who recruited him into a child molester's wet dream.

And of course, Neil thought, that sounded really fucking fair actually.

His own hands clenched, and Brian saw it and then looked up at Neil, making eye contact. Neil stared past his glasses at his eyes, wanted him to stay, wanted this not to be 'the talk.'

Months and months ago, he would have thought he was insane for even wanting to hang out with Brian, and now it occurred to him that he might go insane if Brian walked out at this point. Even though he had every reason to. Even though Neil had secretly been expecting it all along.

'All this time,' Brian said, softly, not looking away, 'I've been thinking about me. I've been thinking about what he did. What you did. How it changed my life.'

Neil watched, waited. Under the table, his fingers dug into his knees.

'Until the roadtrip, I didn't think about you much. Outside of your role, your...' he trailed off and then shook his head, 'I mean I had considered it in a way, I knew that he'd hurt you, but I'd never really p-properly considered it. At first, you were just an answer to a question I didn't want to ask. About what happened to me. And then you were another answer, to a question I'd always been curious about; about sex and feeling good and if I could.'

Brian looked down at his hands and frowned at them.

'And then you stopped being the answer, and, during that weekend in Oklahoma, I reacted badly. I'm sorry.'

Neil shook his head, unable to process the apology, the eloquence. The words moved through him, light blue and gentle, resting like a salve on some of the brittle parts of him. But this was a scary conversation, and he didn't know if he wanted to have it, if he was ready.

'I saw my mom while you were away,' Neil said, instead. 'Things aren't okay between us. I don't know if they'll ever be. It's not like you and your mom. She took it personal.'

Brian looked up at that, pained, sympathetic. His eyes squinted in that way they did when he wished things could be different. And then his expression changed and cleared, he looked determined, focused.

'How often did you see him, Neil? How many times?'

Neil – who automatically knew what he was talking about for once - opened his mouth, shook his head. A long time ago he'd said 'that summer,' but he couldn't say it again. It meant a lot more, now, to give those words to Brian. Like he would maybe finally understand what that meant.

'Seeing him again, as...as an adult, in jail, knowing he was going to be there for a long time and what he was there for...' Brian trailed off and then laughed ruefully, 'and that he didn't feel guilty. He was only sorry he got caught. He wouldn't have cared,' Brian's gaze pinned him to the chair, 'he wouldn't have cared what he took from you.'

It had been a long time since Brian had confronted him with his own perception of their reality. Such a long time since he had been pinned and exposed like this. He reminded himself that it was only two weeks, but he realised, it had been longer than that. Brian had been dealing with so much, processing so much, it felt like he hadn't really seen Neil since that day he'd shown up on his doorstep sweaty and exhausted after trying to pick up, and Brian had pulled emotions and tears and come from him, leaving him mute and exhausted.

'And,' Brian continued, 'Wendy once said to me that she thought people fell for you because you were charming. And it's funny, because you're not charming or charismatic to me. You were, before I met you. But now you're just Neil. Fucked up Neil. But that man? He was charming. You would've been wrapped around his little finger.'

Neil looked down, raised his hands above the table and rested them on the wood like Brian was doing. Within seconds, Brian scooted forward in his chair and grabbed one of Neil's hands in his own. Brian's palms were clammy, but his fingers were dry and warm. They provided a firm, anchoring pressure and Neil felt his chest hurt because of it. He didn't know why his chest was hurting, only that he was starting to feel unmoored, lost again. How did Brian do it so easily? What was his secret?

'I've been thinking about it,' Brian said, his voice gentling. 'He gave you a father, a best friend, someone who didn't talk down to you, a lover. He must've become your whole world.'

Neil's eyes closed, squeezed shut. He took a deep breath, and then chased it with another. His hand shifted fretfully within the grasp of Brian's hands, and Brian responded by stroking his wrist, by grounding him.

'Neil,' Brian said, persistent and his voice full of that soul-wounding empathy that had ripped him open and exposed all his damage months ago. 'Neil, have you ever done anything with someone that he didn't do to you first? Or ask you to do first? Any of it? Was any of it new to you, when you started doing it for money?'

Neil swallowed. Thought about it.

'Rubbers,' he said. That was the only new thing. Rubbers and crabs. 'That's about it.'

Brian made a thin, desolate sound. Neil opened his eyes and Brian was still looking at him. His face twisted up, anguished, and Neil was startled to realise that all of that anguish was on his behalf. It unsettled him and he desperately sought out some inanimate object that didn't make him feel the same way. The fridge was good.

'Do you have any idea how much he twisted you up? You couldn't see it when we first met, first started hanging out. But what about now?'

Neil shook his head.

'When me and Eric were driving up to check on you, Eric told me he'd had a crush on a guy when he was younger. I almost didn't believe him. I thought it'd just been me. That...I was wrong somehow. Made wrong. That my soul was deformed, because I had crushes on older men, and when Coach noticed and did something about it...it was like I'd asked for it. I had the crushes first. I wanted him. I mean, I wanted him.'

'And now?'

Neil took a shuddering breath and returned Brian's eye contact because he needed an anchor, he needed something to make what he was about to say okay.

'I'm twisted up about it now.'

Brian made another noise in the back of his throat, a hurting noise, and then he moved even closer until their legs were touching. Neil was hungry for the contact. Two weeks in some kind of Brian purgatory had made him all the more aware of how much he wanted the contact, how much he just wanted to hang onto what was in front of him. He still couldn't forget how ruined Brian had been about seeing Coach, and now he seemed okay, functional at least.

'I missed you,' Brian said, and Neil nodded, because he agreed, because he felt the same way.

'Look,' Neil said, hoarse, 'I'll understand if after that weekend, you can't, you can't handle whatever this-'

'What?' Brian said, eyes widening, like the thought hadn't even occurred to him.

'You said that you didn't want to be touched by someone who, who was there. Who was involved.'

'Oh, no,' Brian said, forehead knitting, 'no, in that moment, I just...I didn't mean forever. Did you think I'd meant forever?'

Neil's jaw clenched and he refused to say anything, because now he felt like a fucking idiot. It wasn't that he was sure Brian had meant forever, only that it had suddenly occurred to him that if he had, Neil didn't have any ground to stand on. Not wanting to see someone because of his connection to traumatic events in Brian's childhood made complete sense to him.

'No, Neil,' Brian was saying, earnest and raw, 'I didn't mean that.'

'Whatever.'

Brian squeezed Neil's hand between his own, but the gesture only highlighted the humiliation he felt. He yanked his hand away and shoved them both back under the table. But aside from that, he couldn't think what to do next. Instead, he stared over at the fridge again, angry at himself, at the situation. It made sense, didn't it? The more time passed, the more he became sure that Brian should, at the very least, hate him.

'Neil,' Brian implored, 'you drove hours to come see me. You didn't want me to go in the first place. You put my b-blood-stained tissues in a wastepaper basket and didn't care about how disgusting it was. You left when I asked you to go. You,' Brian was shaking his head slowly, incredulous, 'you don't see any of that, do you?'

Neil said nothing, this was not a conversation he ever expected to have with anyone. Agitation crept through him on spider's legs.

'I like you,' Brian said, 'and I've, I've talked about how I felt about you being involved in all of that. In our past. In my, my past. I talked with a therapist about it before I saw you again. I talked to Eric about it. So I dealt with a lot of it a long time ago. I was in a b-bad space after seeing that man, but I didn't mean... What I'm trying to say is that I'm doing better now and I'm worried about you.'

'You shouldn't be worried about me, I didn't go on some dumb-fuck drive to see him,' Neil said automatically, too shocked to even process what Brian was saying to him. Brian raised his eyebrows, bemused, and then reached for one of Neil's hands under the table. He was so close it wasn't that hard to do.

'It's not up to you whether I worry about you, it's up to me.'

Neil's mouth slanted in a wry smile. There was that oddly formal language again, it eased him.

Brian raised one of his hands from where he'd been clutching Neil's, and took his glasses off. He folded them carefully compact, and then put them down precisely on the table. With those huge glasses off his face, he looked smooth and alert. The glasses gave him a strange, squinty look, as though he needed to still narrow his eyes to peer at the world behind all the glass. But when they were off, the simple, open guilelessness revealed itself.

'I was thinking about this before I got here,' Brian said, and Neil had no idea what he was talking about now. Was he thinking about taking off the glasses? What?

'Why do you and Eric always expect me to follow your goddamned tangents?'

Brian looked at him hard, took a deep breath, and then leaned forwards. It took Neil only a second to realise what was happening, what Brian had decided to do. Brian's hand covering his own clung fiercely, and a moment later, lips that were drier than they looked brushed against his. Once, twice, and then lingered. His breath was shaky, but not nearly as shaky as it had been during the past.

It was easy for Neil, surprisingly, to raise his other hand and curl it around the back of Brian's neck. To lick his tongue slowly across Brian's bottom lip and memorise the sharp inhale of breath. His mind cleared of cobwebs and his body cleared of agitation as he leaned forward, splaying his fingers across the back of Brian's scalp and threading through soft hair. He tilted his head, slanted his lips across Brian's, held the kiss in that moment. He kept his tongue inside his own mouth, remembering that it could be a particular trigger. But he hungered for it. He hungered to explore his mouth, to see what he tasted like.

Brian pulled back an inch, and Neil kept his hand over the back of Brian's neck, stroking back and forth, absorbing and creating warmth.

'This is probably a bad idea,' Neil quietly said.

'Uh huh,' Brian said. He pressed back up into Neil's hand just slightly, rising towards the touch, seeking it out. It was here that Neil found it easier to believe that Brian liked him, that they were more than their shared experiences in their childhoods.

'More?' Neil asked, and there was a beat, and then Brian nodded quickly.

'I want it your way,' Brian said.

'What does that mean?'

'I want you to...do it the way you'd normally do it.'

Neil took in a measured, slow breath, because he liked long, intense, drugging kisses. The kind that erased thought and time and left clients hurrying to get naked and himself dragging off clothing. The kind that involved taste and oxygen deprivation. He hadn't had too many of them in his life, but he knew what he liked.

'Are you sure?' Neil whispered, and then barely waited for the nod before leaning back in.

The hand against him spasmed hard before Neil's lips had even touched Brian's, and Neil hummed an acknowledgement of that stress, though he didn't stop. This might be the only time he ever got to do this, and he wanted it. Neil's other hand smoothed a space behind Brian's ear, and he felt the shiver where Brian's forearm touched his skin.

He started by pressing his closed mouth against Brian's, it was easiest, the least threatening. And when Brian's mouth opened against his, tentative but game, Neil opened back. It was easier than he thought. He expected Brian to pull away at any moment, at every moment, but instead there was heat and pliancy, soft hair and their sweaty fingers interlacing beneath the table.

Neil slid his tongue into Brian's mouth like he'd done it a hundred times before. He slowly ran over his bottom lip, touched the tip of Brian's tongue which had moved forward and then darted away like a shy creature. And Neil went seeking it out slowly, withdrawing every now and then to change the angle of his mouth, to shift Brian's head with his palm and fingers.

He slicked alongside Brian's tongue, swallowing down the weak, helpless sound that he made and shifting forwards on his chair. He tasted only entirely of Brian, not of toothpaste or juice or food or anything other than savoury heat and a faintly astringent aftertaste. It was easy, then, for Neil to lose himself in the sensations of it. When Brian's tongue began to move along his, gently curious, Neil let himself disappear in the dark wetness of Brian's mouth and kissed him properly, the way he'd wanted to since the thought first occurred to him.

It was a fast burn after that. Brian's hand where it clenched at Neil's rhythmically gripped and released. And Neil was happily lost, allowing Brian's slower responses, feeling his heavy exhales through his nose. When he pressed the tip of his tongue against the roof of Brian's mouth, Brian jerked and then leaned forward hard, his own tongue muscling past Neil's and finally, finally – Neil thought, moved into his mouth. It was heady and amazing and Neil thought of all the ways they could take this further, all the ways he wanted to take this further, and he sucked hard on Brian's tongue in response.

Brian jumped and pulled back, flushed, far enough that Neil let the hand that had been caressing his scalp and neck and ears and shoulders drop to his lap. Neil gazed at him hungrily, both of them breathing hard.

'It was the sucking, wasn't it?' Neil said, thickly.

Brian nodded, eyes closed tight, actively battling inner demons while Neil waited. Their sticky palms together and Brian showing no sign of wanting to let go.

'How was it otherwise?'

'Uh,' Brian said, deeper and darker than usual, that secret tone of voice that Neil suspected he had been one of the few people to ever hear. 'Uh, intense. Is that, is that how you prefer to do it?'

Neil smiled, though Brian's eyes were still closed.

'I think about it a lot. It's hot, with you.'

Brian laughed nervously, his eyes opened. His fingers twisted in Neil's grip and he pulled away. Neil's hand was cold where the air hit the space where Brian's hand had been.

'I wish I could do it more. It just seems to be one of those things...' Brian trailed off and looked frustrated with himself as he put his glasses back on. 'It just seems to be one of those things that has some direct link to that part of my brain. The part that freaks out about all of this.'

'It's not like I expect more from you,' Neil said and Brian smiled.

He put his glasses back on, and Neil realised he had no idea when he'd get to kiss Brian again, if he'd ever get to kiss Brian again. His tongue moved around the inside of his mouth, tasting and nostalgic for what had just occurred.

'My nightmares got bad again,' Brian said, folding his fingers on top of the table. 'After that weekend.'

'That sucks,' Neil said, though his tone was more flat than empathetic. It did suck, but he just wasn't someone to infuse his tone with sympathy in the same way that Brian and Eric and almost everyone else on the goddamned planet did.

'But I understand that I took a risk that would have consequences,' Brian said, and it sounded rehearsed even though it probably wasn't. 'I can't believe after all this time, I'm still so naïve about it. Thinking there'll be a happy ending for me. Assuming that I would be able to find closure. I was so ruined by it, by everything. And I can't stop looking for...' Brian trailed off and looked down, stilled by reality.

Neil sighed. He opened his mouth to say something, that he knew it wasn't that easy, that it was a little naïve, but that everyone had a right to make naïve decisions and mistakes, probably especially when they were dealing with something like this. But none of the words coalesced into sentences and he closed his mouth again. Brian didn't seem to be waiting for him to say anything in particular, anyway.

He found himself thinking an apology in Brian's direction, a mental acknowledgement that he wanted it to be better, that he was sorry, that he wished he could offer more. That in his role as recruiter and victim and perpetrator, he could somehow wrap the gift of closure and offer it up, even at the expense of his own wellbeing.

And, he realised suddenly, he loved Brian. It was something he had known for a while, but hadn't revealed to himself in language. It had been a messy tangle of feelings before it became words. But now, with Brian's taste still in his mouth and Brian's sweat still coating the palm of his hand, he knew it to be profoundly true. He loved Brian, the way he loved Wendy, his mom, and even the way he knew he could one day love Eric if he allowed himself.

But more than that, too. He didn't know what he wanted from Brian, he wasn't interested in exclusivity, commitment, even fucking in the classical sense. But he wanted Brian in his life, wanted him to stay, found two weeks not knowing the status of their connection to each other to be agonising.

All of these things he didn't know how to say.

Brian cleared his throat and Neil looked up as Brian leaned in and kissed him again. The kiss was open-mouthed but more chaste than before, and yet still intense. Neil opened his own mouth and opened his eyes, searched Brian's half-lidded eyes for something similar to his own feelings. Realised he couldn't read a person's mind.

Brian withdrew and offered a tentative smile.

'I suppose we should watch a movie or something before I actually freak out,' he said, hesitantly, and Neil grinned.

'Yeah, probably.'

That weekend he had Sunday off, and he went to visit Brian at home. Mrs Lackey was home, and after about half an hour of sitting next to them so that they were all awkwardly watching television together, she offered to make them lunch. Brian offered to help. And that was how Neil found himself leaning uncomfortably against the doorframe, watching the two Lackeys go about making sandwiches with a mystery meat that he couldn't even begin to identify. He remembered Brian once mentioning that they ate turtle when they could get it. It wasn't like it really bothered him anyway. He had an idea of what went into the ground chuck that made the burgers where he worked, he wasn't squeamish about food.

'Will you go hang out some washing on the line?' Mrs Lackey said to Brian, who looked at Neil quickly, like he didn't want to leave him alone. She huffed impatiently. 'There's hardly anything in the basket, for God's sake. It'll take you not more than five minutes.'

Brian left and Mrs Lackey gestured for Neil to step forwards.

'Come on, you can do some of these dishes. We pull together in this house.'

Neil stepped forward. He wanted to say things like he would have been happy to do the dishes but there didn't seem to be enough room for him when Brian and Mrs Lackey were both by the sink, but decided it wasn't worth it. He still didn't know how to read Mrs Lackey, had barely spoken to her, tried to avoid anything that resembled chatting. He didn't make conversation as he started working on the dishes, the right hand side of his body was painfully aware of his presence.

'I think you're going to hurt my son,' she said after a couple of minutes. Neil's hand slipped and he just managed to catch the plate that would have clattered back into the sink. He looked at her, and she was staring at him, hawk-eyed, vigilant.

'He's a smart kid. He can take care of himself,' Neil said, quietly. She looked at him, assessing, and then frowned.

'Never thought you'd amount to much, and now you're the manager of a store, aren't you?'

'Supervisor,' Neil corrected. He was a long way from being manager material, he was sure.

'That's pretty close to management. You should get them to send you on a course.'

He smiled absently, he hadn't ever really considered it. He had found it so hard to start delegating to staff, he couldn't imagine managing an entire store, being in charge of hiring and firing. Would he look at a dumb shit like himself and hire him? Probably not.

'You and your mom doing okay?' she said, her voice curious and concerned now, even though it still had just as many hard edges as ever. It was the way the tone of her voice dropped into the lower registers, he decided. She expressed a lot through octave, the same way that Brian could.

He didn't reply because he didn't know what to say. He and his mom were not going okay, but it looked like they were on the surface. He knew his mom felt alienated around him, and he knew that he felt as alienated around her as ever, and the façade he had maintained was no longer comforting. He knew things would never be the same again. He couldn't begin to wrap his head around it.

She sighed. It was a simple sound, but it made his heart hurt. He turned to her to say something, but couldn't think of anything to say.

'I never thanked you for going out to see Brian like that, to help him. I would've gone myself, but, well, he's never liked me smothering him.'

Neil watched her warily, and her expression softened.

'You know you could just say 'you're welcome.'

'You're welcome,' Neil managed faintly, feeling stupid and out of place. He startled when she clapped a hand friendlily on the shoulder. A moment later she handed him a plate of sandwiches, and Brian walked in as though he could somehow sense when the awkward conversation was over and the food was ready.

'Thanks, Mom!' he said, and practically herded Neil back into the lounge. They sat down and Brian raised his eyebrows inquiringly at Neil. Neil simply shrugged. The conversation, all in all, hadn't been that bad. As for hurting Brian, well, they did that to each other all the time didn't they? They'd learned how to manage as best as they possibly could.

Later, she went off to work for an afternoon and evening shift. They had both ended up napping on the couch, finding it easy to simply rest in each other's presence. And after that, they went up to Brian's room.

Brian talked about how obsessed he used to be with UFO's and aliens, how they were all over his walls, how he was pretty good at constellations and elements of astronomy as a result.

'I even considered, you know, doing it at a college level. I thought maybe I'd spend my life as some kind of UFO hunter. I'll never not believe in them. I just think the role of aliens in my life is, you know, not what it used to be.'

They were both lying down on the bed. A notepad filled with Brian's sketches lay next to Neil, who had thumbed through them marvelling at his skill and intelligence and feeling a little envious that he had never put a single creative thing into the world.

'So what do you want to do now? We could go down to the park. Watch a movie?'

'We could make out?' Neil said, just as conversationally.

Brian laughed through his nose, surprised. And then he turned to Neil and pursed his lips, he was seriously thinking about it. A moment later, he nodded, expression sobering, though a twinkle still remained in his eyes.

'You should check the top drawer,' Brian said, shy.

He twisted over and pulled open the drawer, and his eyes widened when he saw a tube of lubricant.

'How?' Neil said, as he dropped it on top of the chest of drawers, 'how did you grow the balls to get that?'

'You've complained about it in the past, not having any on hand here.'

'You tried it? On yourself?' Neil said, feeling that heavy weight in his gut shoot straight to his dick, thinking about Brian wrapping slick fingers around himself, taking himself in hand. Brian, however, shook his head.

'N-not yet.'

Neil ignored it for the time being and pushed Brian back on the bed, splayed fingers under his shirt and listened to the now-familiar hitches and exhales. Brian's torso was hot under his palms, and he looked down at him hungrily as he mapped the skin. He'd never considered that he would be capable of sensuality in the past, but he also would never have considered himself capable of a typical job, or that he would survive his mom finding out what happened to him.

He pulled up at Brian's shirt and Brian's eyes widened when he realised what Neil wanted. He moved sideways a little and took his own shirt off, and bit his bottom lip nervously when Neil scratched his fingertips through a small smattering of chest hair. A moment later, he shucked his own shirt and threw it to the ground.

'W-we haven't done this before. Taking everything off properly.'

Neil paused for a moment and wondered if Brian was trying to say that they should stop. But Brian was the kind of person who would normally just say so, and maybe he was just observing something that made him uncomfortable. That wasn't often a signal for 'no' from Brian, and he'd learned to trust in Brian's ability to call it quits when necessary.

'Take 'em off,' Neil said, indicating Brian's pants, and Brian's eyes widened. 'We're not going to fuck, it's just better this way.'

'We should maybe do this on the sheets. Dirty sheets are easier to clean than a messy-'

'So do it,' Neil said, teasing. Brian shot Neil a curious look as he slid off the bed and pulled the quilt and blankets back, and Neil ignored him as he kicked off his jeans, his briefs. He was comfortable with his own nakedness. He wasn't ashamed of his nudity and he wasn't about to start now. He turned back to Brian and then lay down on the bed, his back on the sheets, head resting on the pillows.

Brian was much slower about taking his pants off, and pulled off his boxers with his back facing Neil.

'We can pull the blankets back over us, but it'll get hot,' Neil said, matter-of-fact, trying to offer an olive branch.

Brian turned back, hands fisted at his side, looking like he was determined not to hide himself. He was still soft, but that didn't bother Neil at all. They had plenty of time ahead of them, and this was new for Brian. It still surprised Neil that Brian didn't say 'no' all the time.

'What do I do?' Brian said, innocent, and Neil took some pity on him.

'Straddle me. Here,' Neil said, pointing at his upper thighs. 'And then pull the blankets over us.'

Brian did not have the same easy eloquence with his body that Neil did, but that didn't mean it wasn't hot being straddled by him, or feeling his body heat in close proximity. Skin against skin, the blankets being tugged over them and Neil reaching up to help them settle, Neil was struck again with a shot of affection. It left him breathless. He was almost certain bullets had less impact.

'Relax,' Neil added, and felt the muscles in Brian's thighs give and settle as he leaned over Neil, braced himself, looked down at Neil's face.

'This is new,' he said.

'Yep.'

'It's not bad,' he added. 'I do like the part where I'm on top.'

Neil snorted with laughter, because this was becoming an increasingly unsurprising fact about Brian; he liked to be on top. With more confidence behind him and a better understanding of his own body and Neil's, he took charge more often, and initiated more frequently. It had been strange, at first, because he'd stereotyped Brian into a completely different category. But then as he learned more about the guy's steel backbone and his stubbornness and his willingness to face a lot of issues head on, he figured it wasn't that weird after all.

Brian ran his hands over Neil's torso, up over his collarbone and shoulders, down his upper arms. Neil shivered a little bit, started getting hard again, smoothed his own palms over Brian's thighs. Turned his head and kissed a section of Brian's forearm that came within reach, and then licked when Brian paused and let him.

'No clothes at all,' Brian said, 'it's weird.'

'Has its perks.' Neil arched upwards and pulled Brian down by a shoulder and licked a stripe across his chest as their hips shifted against each other. Brian made a shocked sound when their dicks touched. Neil opened his mouth to explain, to suggest something, but Brian's hand had already shot out towards the lube. Neil watched him as he squeezed some of the clear gel onto his fingers. He shifted and leaned more heavily on his left shoulder as he reached between them, and when he felt Brian's fingers and coldish lube slick over him, he bit off a groan. Brian's hands were artist's hands, they were dexterous and knowing, even without much experience.

'Fuck,' Neil breathed, and Brian nodded, but didn't reply.

It took a while to get the angle right, but Brian was fully hard by the time he anchored both their dicks together with his hand and thrust, exhaling hard. And then he paused, nuzzled at Neil's neck.

'I didn't expect you to let me take the lead,' he said, honest and voice thick with want.

Neil shifted his hips and groaned as the small movement teased at him, warmed him.

'This used to be easy, this shit. But it's not so easy now, so it's, someone else having the lead can be okay. And it's something I like doing with you. Also, my track record with this stuff is freaking out. I'm fucked up, I guess. I have no idea what I'm saying.'

Brian laughed breathily into Neil's neck, which tickled. He was becoming more free with his laughter now, sharing it as often with Neil as he did with Eric.

'I don't know about you, but I have a good record with dealing with freak outs. I'm usually the one dealing them out to others. And I like this,' he thrust forward again, and then again, and Neil's eyes squeezed shut and focused on breathing, because he didn't think he'd take long. 'I like us. I-uh, I don't know if it'll last. Sometimes I don't know how it could. But right now, like this,' Brian lifted his face and pressed his cheek against Neil's, let his breath move over Neil's ear, something that he wouldn't stop doing now that he knew how much Neil liked it. 'Like this, it's more than I ever thought I'd have.'

Neil opened his mouth to say something about how that sounded like romantic bullshit, for all that he liked hearing it. But in that moment, Brian's hand around them both tightened, and he began moving in earnest. He also lifted up a little, so he could look at Neil's face as he moved, eyes searching him, wide with some emotion that Neil couldn't pin.

One of Neil's hands found its way to hook over Brian's shoulder, and the other stroked his back firmly, over and over again. But it was the eye contact that felt the most intimate, since Neil found that he couldn't look away, and Brian wasn't either. That almost horrible weight of care spread through his chest like some disease, heavy and as thrilling as the knowledge he was going to come soon.

Brian's eyes were searching his, and then suddenly widened. He inhaled so sharply that Neil thought he was going to come, but instead he inhaled again, and again, sounding more like he was close to panicking.

'What is it?' Neil said.

'N-nothing,' Brian said, his rhythm still fast and measured, Neil still rising to meet him.

'Christ, are you sure?'

'Honest,' Brian breathed, returning his eyes to Neil's and offering a hesitant smile.

About thirty seconds before he was about to come, Neil realised with a shock that this was probably the most mature, consensual sexual encounter he'd ever had. It filled him with a rush of wonder, like lukewarm water tickling him underneath his skin, and it raised goosebumps all over his body. So it turned out there were still new things to experience, things that Coach hadn't done and he hadn't discovered for himself in his line of work.

And it was that realisation that sent him hurtling over the edge.

'Fuck,' he choked, as he slammed into orgasm far harder and sooner than he'd expected. At that point he had to squeeze his eyes shut, he arched hard, and Brian's forehead dropped heavily onto Neil's shoulder as he moved his hand faster and came shortly afterwards, breath hissing out of him, hips jerking.

He shuddered in Neil's arms for a minute, and then moved over and lay on his back next to Neil, reaching blindly for the tissues with the ease of someone who had probably needed to know where the tissue box was at all times, due to the frequency of nightmare-induced blood noses. He handed a wad of tissues to Neil, and then cleaned himself up. Neil shifted over so that Brian had more room alongside him, and kicked one of his legs out from underneath the blankets and quilt so that he could start to cool down.

'Why do you have so many things on your bed, anyway?' Neil said, voice still hoarse, throat scraped.

'I like it that way,' Brian said, simply.

'What was that, earlier? Your freak-out? Are you okay?'

Brian turned and looked at Neil searchingly.

'Are you freaking out?'

Neil stared at the ceiling as he thought about it. Aside from a vagueness pressing at his awareness, and a sense of weight now anchoring him to Brian, he felt okay. But he'd reached a point where feeling okay after coming felt weird, so he didn't know what he truly felt, or what was actually going on. In the end he just shrugged.

Brian nodded like it was a meaningful response, and then curled on his side and yawned deeply. Without intending to, they both fell asleep easily and quickly.

Weeks passed and things grew and changed and settled and expanded. They were friends and sometimes lovers and sometimes antagonists in their own mutual storyline. One Thursday night they were at Neil's, and Eric was in some kind of sleep coma on the couch. Brian was getting ready to head home, putting his journal into his backpack and taking his time about it. It was on an impulse that Neil suddenly opened his bottom drawer, took the cassette out and handed it to him, breathing already turning shaky.

'Take it. Don't...throw it away yet. Just, take it.' He ignored the rattling ache in his stomach as Brian took the tape and folded his fingers carefully around it. His stared at it like it was poison, and then looked at Neil confused.

'Are you sure?'

'No. So don't throw it away.'

An easy day suddenly zinged with tension. Neil stared at the cassette and wanted to snatch it back. And Brian was now cradling it in both hands, as though it was both radioactive and precious, something that should not be dropped or accepted.

'Uh, sure, sure, okay,' Brian finally managed, and then gently put it in the front pocket of his backpack.

Neil folded his arms, feeling belligerent, accountable, awful.

'A part of me is always gonna feel something for him,' he said, accusing. Brian stood and offered acceptance, practically radiated it. Neil had no idea how he did it, it didn't look like he was standing any different, and his expression was the same as almost always, but somehow there was just something there which made it okay. Made his ability to create fraught situations okay.

'I'd never felt special like that before. I'd never been able to make someone that happy,' he added, feeling like he owed Brian more of an explanation.

Brian didn't say anything, and Neil searched in himself for words that were once elusive, and now appeared easily, as though they had been there all along.

'I realise it wasn't, you know, me. He just loved kids our age and I was his favourite because I was so fucking available. Or whatever.'

He swallowed around a rawness in his throat. Brian looked down at his backpack, as though he could see the cassette through it.

'Maybe a part of him really did like you, Neil,' he said to the backpack.

Neil sat down on the edge of his bed and laced his fingers together. He had been feeling increasingly like he was just tired of guilt; guilt for not being caring or compassionate enough, guilt for what he'd done to his mom and what he'd done to Brian. Guilt was his constant companion, moreso than anyone else had ever been, and invisible enough that he'd hardly noticed it was there for the longest time. It stole his words and his sentences, it burned him out from the inside, it turned him into a black hole, a vortex. He was so empty from it, he would have spent the rest of his life using people, himself, drugs, alcohol, sex, anything to hide from it.

'I wouldn't have gotten the job I did, or moved out, or any of that shit, if it weren't for you,' Neil said, looking down at his hands, the long, slender fingers, the myriad of tiny scars from years of not looking after himself. 'I mean, eventually, maybe. But I dunno. When I came back to Hutchinson, I wasn't, I wasn't expecting to live for very long. I didn't have anything planned. It's not like I planned to do it. I just also never expected to live long. Maybe the virus. An overdose. Murder. Something.'

He didn't look up when Brian's breathing hitched at his words, at the shuddery exhale. He didn't look up when Brian sat on the bed next to him, close by, and then closer as he made the inches between them disappear so that they were touching.

'And it's not like I'm pathetically grateful, or anything, because you kind of made my life, make my life hell sometimes. You don't give up. Ever. You're pushy and stubborn and kind of bossy like your mom and people think you're meek and it makes me fuckin' laugh. I mean, Eric thinks you're cute.'

Brian pushed his shoulder into Neil's, rocking him.

'You don't think I'm cute?'

'Not cute like some goddamn baby bird that needs protecting, I don't.'

'Oh,' Brian said, pushing into Neil again, sweetly.

'But, I am kinda grateful. I can't decide if my life is better now, or just as fucked up before, just maybe now in a different way. But sometimes it feels better, with you.'

He wasn't ready yet, he wasn't ready to say 'I love you.' And if Brian couldn't tell that he did by now, then maybe he would never be ready. If he couldn't tell from Neil's offering up the cassette to him, in giving that to him and asking him to take it and trusting him with that part of himself, then maybe Brian wouldn't understand Neil's love, what it looked like and felt like. Neil hardly understood it himself.

'I'm grateful too,' Brian said softly.

'Yeah?'

'I-I don't know what the future will bring, for me, or for...us. But yeah, it's funny, I am grateful. I'm,' Brian laughed a little, 'I'm still having nightmares and everything from here to the horizon looks, I think, broken. So how did you become one of the least broken parts of it? I hardly know. And I've stopped trying to figure it out. You let me be myself, and that's, I know that's hard, because I don't know who or what I am. I was, closed, for so long. I am bossy and stubborn and kind of a shit, and you let me learn that about myself, and let it be okay. And you, with your stubbornness, taught me that it could be a kind of strength to be stubborn.'

Neil hid a smile, as Brian rested his head against his shoulder.

'And you gave me the tape. I think I know what that means.'

'Yeah?' Neil said, sceptical, and Brian nodded against his shoulder.

'Yeah, I think I do. And, this is pretty sappy for us. Isn't it?'

'I fucking hate it,' Neil said, on a laugh.

'Well, we can change the subject then. Do you have work tomorrow? Will we catch up again soon?'

'Tuesday? Might be a bit late, I wanted to stay back and talk to the boss about maybe doing some management. Your mom suggested it, and I thought...'

'I can see it,' Brian said, dreamily, 'I can see you being a manager. I hope it goes well, anyway. Tuesday is good for me.'

Good, Neil thought, resting his own head against Brian's, finding one of his hands with his own and warming it.

Like Brian, when he looked into the future, everything on the horizon looked broken. He could not reconcile who he was on the inside, what had happened, with any kind of positive outlook. He couldn't promise Brian that he'd always be there for him and he couldn't even promise himself that he'd try and live a decent life. Every now and then darker pathways whispered, and he yearned for drugs and picking up the worst kind of clients so that his internal vortex could finally just suck him up whole, and he'd never be conscious, or alive, again.

But with Brian's fluffy hair pressed up against his ear, and both of them breathing side by side, he didn't need the promise of an unbroken future. He squeezed Brian's hand in his own and Brian squeezed back. The present would have to be enough.

Author's Note: We are finished! Thanks so much for reading, favouriting, tracking, reviewing, all of these things. I'd really love to read anything you'd have to say in reviews. Thanks again, and a special thanks to unshassive, who - without their prompting and passionate reviews - would have seen this story linger in the 'uncompleted' ether forever, I think!