Chapter Text
You are lovely. You have a lovely face and a beautiful body, long and light,
and your skin is smooth and the color of burnt gold and everyone will try to take you from me.
—Ernest Hemingway, from The Complete Works; “For Whom The Bell Tolls,”
It was all Nancy Drew’s fault—or whatever her fucking name was.
Billy was certain. He was more than certain. He was more certain than he was about the sun setting and rising every day, and the neighbour above him faking her orgasms at a pitch meant for dolphins every Friday night, eight on the dot. He was certain enough that he’d gamble his entire paycheck on it.
Nancy Whatever-the-fuck-her-name-was was to blame for this.
This being Steve Harrington, eyes hollow and mouth dry, banging on his door and asking for Adderall like every other cookie cutter, using-daddy’s-credit-card college student in Oakland.
“Dude,” Billy said, because he couldn’t think of anything else to say.
He yawned and looked over his shoulder. The clock on the microwave blinked 7:53 at him in a blue haze. It taunted him, reminding him that he should be in fucking bed, sleeping peacefully and dreaming about getting his cock sucked by Val Kilmer in the backseat of his old Camaro.
“Dude,” he said again. “The fuck are you doing here?”
Harrington had a twitchy look in his eye as he shifted from foot to foot, hands shoved deeply in his jean pockets. The hollows under his eyes looked big enough for Billy to crawl into, deep-set and bruised like he hadn’t slept in days.
He bit his lip and switched to rocking back and forth on his heels. Always moving, always shifting, like he couldn’t make himself sit still.
Jonesing could do that to a person.
“Spit it out,” Billy said, impatient, leaning his shoulder on the door frame.
Harrington cast a look up and down the empty hall and then looked to Billy, eyes wide and pleading. With the darkness collecting under his eyes, he looked like a child begging for scraps.
“Can I come in?” he asked, voice so rusty it matched the creaking pipes inside the apartment’s walls.
Billy studied him for a moment before nodding, stepping out of the way. Steve shuffled in like a ghost, edging away from Billy as he passed by.
“‘Kay,” Billy said as he closed the door, “you got ten seconds before I throw you out on your ass. What do you want?”
Harrington didn’t speak. Instead, he looked around Billy’s tiny apartment, eyes drifting from the tiny kitchen to the tiny living room, to the tiny bedroom connected to the rest of the tininess.
He narrowed his eyes. “Ten,” he said, voice hard.
Snapping to attention, Harrington withdrew his hands from his pockets, letting them fall to his sides. “I need Adderall.”
Adderall. Not speed or a bump, or an upper, or whatever-the-fuck flavour of the week all the college kids wanted from him. He’d always been good for weed and acid, and coke when his bank account was feeling flush for the month, but pills hadn’t been so important until he’d made his way back down to California, landing in Oakland when his Camaro finally sputtered out her dying breath and left him stranded.
College kids and their pills, living off their parents’ dime while they partied and drank and snorted their youth away.
Billy loved it. It paid for his last trip down to Mexico and the car parked outside, and all the things his shitty, below-minimum wage job didn’t cover.
It was how he’d met Harrington again, all the way down in Cali-fucking-fornia. It had been a shock at first, to see his face at some frat party Billy couldn’t remember the name of, and then it had been nothing but the usual when he did his weekly rounds on campus after he got off work.
“That’s good for you, princess,” he said, irritation biting at his neck. He was tired, and he’d been woken up for this? “Ask your daddy for some.”
Harrington scowled, lips peeling down and teeth baring, a flash of something other than listless nervousness. “Fuck off, Billy. I know you’ve got some.”
“Yeah? Who said that?”
“James.”
“James has a big mouth.”
“Do you or don’t you?” Harrington asked, fingers curling into his fists.
Billy sighed, heavy and dramatic, and rolled his eyes. “You’re not doing a good job of getting me in the mood. How much do you want?”
“Enough for today.”
“That’s specific.”
“What do you have?”
“Tens and twenties.”
Harrington bit his lip again and looked away. Billy wanted to reach out and touch his face, pull him close and make him look him in the eye. “Four tens.”
Billy raised an eyebrow but nodded. “Aight,” he said, smothering a yawn behind his hand as he stepped toward the kitchen. Harrington’s eyes stayed trained on him, unblinking now. It was weird. “It’s ten bucks a piece.”
Eyes dipping down, Harrington looked away, unmoving. He didn’t speak. Annoyed, Billy said, “Quit wasting my fucking time.”
“I don’t have any money.”
Billy froze. In the silence of his tiny, shitty apartment, he could hear his clock ticking away in his bedroom and the sounds of the world existing three stories below them from the cracked window.
“Seriously? Fuck you, Harrington,” he spat, pinning a glare on Harrington. “You woke me up for nothing?”
Harrington flinched like he’d been hit, eyes darting up to Billy and then dipping down again. A red stain spread across his cheeks.
Blushing. He was fucking blushing.
Confused, Billy frowned, eyes roving over him. Even when they’d been younger and stupider, he didn’t remember Harrington ever blushing. Even when he was head over heels for Nancy Drew, he hadn’t turned red or stuttered or turned into anything but smooth and mostly composed Steve fucking Harrington. Even when Billy had him pinned to the floor, fist smashing into his face, he hadn’t been flustered.
“I heard—” Harrington cut himself off and cleared his throat, still not looking at Billy. “I heard you...you know.”
“No, I don’t know what. What do I do?”
“...you know.”
“I don’t know how you got into college, man.”
Harrington huffed then, eyes darting up to look at Billy. His eyes landed somewhere closer to his collarbones than his face. “Jamie says sometimes you’ll…”
He cleared his throat again, shifting from foot to foot, no answer in sight.
“Jesus,” Billy groaned, pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes until they ached. His bed was beckoning him again, cozy and cool where the fan whirred directly into his face. “Would you just spit it the fuck out?”
“He says you’ll let guys suck you off for stuff.”
It came out in a rush, a blur of words that Billy had to space out and pick apart. They stuck together like gum, clogged up in Billy’s ears. Whatever he had been expecting, it hadn’t been that. Never that.
He could see it, too, so easily that it had to have been plucked from all his hormone-fueled teenage fantasies. Harrington on his knees, hand fisted in all that too-long hair, tugging his head back until his throat was bared. Eyes wide, mouth open and soft, spit and come dripping from the corners of his mouth while Billy thrust in, deep until Harrington choked and tears leaked from the corners of his eyes.
Hell, maybe he’d toss Harrington onto his bed, sprawl him out until his neck was hanging over the edge so he could watch the column of his throat as he worked his cock into his mouth, driving in deep and feeling him spasm around his dick, so tight it would almost hurt. Harrington would make choking noises, aborted whines with each shove until Billy pulled out and let him breathe—just for a second, just to watch him cough and sputter, spitting out saliva and precome, and then he’d be back in, hands cupping Harrington’s face to hold him in place as he thrust.
Mouth dry, he glanced at the ceiling and wondered if this was an omen of the Apocalypse.
“Who told you that?” he asked tightly, when he had counted back from ten and gotten a grip of his wandering thoughts and libidio.
“Just Jamie.”
“Jamie’s never sucked my cock, so how would he know?”
Harrington shrugged, cheeks flushed the softest of pinks, looking directly into Billy’s face when he looked down from the ceiling. Bravery and stupidity went hand-in-hand; Billy knew that well enough, and Harrington had both in spades.
“It’s what he told me.”
“He told you to whore yourself out for a couple pills?”
Harrington coughed into his fist, long fingers rubbing against his bottom lip. Billy tried not to stare and think about how close choking and coughing could sound to each other. “Not exactly.”
Billy rubbed both hands down his face and sucked in a sharp breath. It was too early in the morning, in the span of his fucking life, for this kind of conversation.
In California the second time around, without his Neil breathing down his neck and Susan reporting every action, he could be whatever he wanted to be, even a fag if he wanted to be, and he’d always wanted to be. Hiding it wasn’t necessary; he didn’t flaunt it, didn’t wear a nametag pinned to his shirt, but it was easier now to find what he wanted.
College boys were easy. In another life, he would have been one of them. In this one, he took advantage.
It was easy. They always made it so easy.
A handful had caught his attention, and a trade for a blowjob or two or three for a little baggie of weed or a couple drops of acid were worth it in Billy’s book.
But they weren’t Steve Harrington, from Hawkins, Indiana, hellbent on feeding whatever little addiction he’d built for himself long before Billy had walked back into his life.
“Do you?”
Billy dropped his hands and looked at Harrington, eyes narrowed. The flush was still there, pretty and pink, wholly unexpected. Tempting him. Heat and want snaked through his belly. How many men got to live their high school fantasy? How many had their high school fantasy’s offer themselves up on a silver platter, packaged prettily in desperation?
“Sometimes,” Billy admitted. He watched Harrington’s back straighten, that shifty look in his returning. Billy’s stomach clenched in lust and want and something as twisted as regret.
When Harrington moved before him, Billy turned away, holding one finger up. “Stay put.”
It was stupid to let an addict know where he kept his stash, but his apartment was small and shit, and there were only so many places to hide it. He could feel Harrington’s eyes on him as he dug in his old duffle bag, stashed away in his closet, for an unlabeled bottle. He counted out four pills into his palm, hesitating for only a moment before he tucked the bottle back into the bag.
In the sad excuse for his living room, he grabbed Harrington’s hand and spread out his fingers, dumping the pills into his palm. Harrington stared at him, wide-eyed and dumb, eyes darting between him and the pills.
“Do you want me to—?”
“Jesus, no.” Billy closed Harrington’s fingers into a fist and pushed his hand against his chest, giving him a little shove toward the door. “I’m coming to collect in three days. Got it?”
Harrington licked his lips. Billy’s eyes got stuck on the wetness there, shiny and pink and begging to be sucked red. He nodded slowly, swallowing hard enough that Billy could see the clear outline of his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat.
He wanted to sink his teeth into it, leave red marks and teeth bruises to be seen for days after.
“Thanks,” Harrington said, voice scratchy. He didn’t look back as he darted out the door, closing it with a gentle click behind him.
He made it his entire shift before he caved.
Keyed up on adrenaline, three cups of espresso and a whopping hundred dollar tip from some ritzy newlyweds, Billy slid into his car, jammed a piece of gum between his teeth and took off toward the university.
He found Steve's frat house easily, and even at six in the morning they let him in just as easily.
Everyone knew Billy. He made a point to be welcome.
Not bothering with knocking, he opened the door and stepped inside.
A bleary-eyed Steve looked up at him where he sat cross legged on the bed, books and papers and pens scattered around him. The hollows under his eyes looked like graveyards, sucking the life from him.
Billy wondered if he slept at all.
He closed the door behind him. Steve stared at him, lips parted and damp, as he crossed the room, giving a cursory glance to Jamie's empty bed, and shoved the pile on Steve's bed to make room to sit.
Steve swallowed so hard Billy could hear it. "It hasn't been three days.”
Billy raised an eyebrow and looked at the nearest paper. Scratched into the top was Steve's name, the date and a whole bunch of upside down information on high interest saving accounts.
What a fucking riot.
"I know," Billy said, turning his attention to Steve. He leaned back, resting his weight on the heels of his palms behind him. "I changed my mind."
Steve licked his lips. Billy's eyes dipped down, caught on the pink of tongue and white of teeth.
"About what?" he asked, like his tongue wasn't wagging and his lips weren't wet.
Thinking about his cock in Steve Harrington's mouth had gotten him through a hard shift. In the lull of tables, he'd imagined Steve on his knees, eyes open and mouth wet—so fucking much like it was now, and, Jesus, didn't that say something for his own imagination—and white come on his face. While he'd chewed gum angrily and ignored the tickle of cigarette smoke in his nose on his break, he'd imagined taking all his nicotine-deprived frustrations on Steve, pulling on his hair until he whined and holding him down on his cock until he gagged.
He thought about licking his mouth after, tasting slick saliva and salt-bitter spunk, kissing it into Steve's mouth and sliding a hand down to jerk him off, slow and sweet, until his hips twitched and he begged for it.
The Steve Harrington Billy had known in Indiana had been softer. Younger. There had been a roundness to everything he'd done, no matter how smooth he managed to make his actions. The Steve Harrington in front of him was all angles, jaw sharper, dark stubble that would probably feel like sin on the insides of his thighs scuffing his cheeks and chin.
The hollows were there but Billy could ignore them. He could ignore Jamie's socks on the floor and tax season. He could ignore the exhaustion.
"You did offer." He leaned back further, cocking his head to the side.
Steve swallowed again. His Adam's Apple bob. His eyes flicked down to Billy's lap and back to his face, opening his mouth to speak and then snapping it before a word slipped out.
They stayed like that, silent, eyes heavy on each other. Dark lust, the twisted kind that made Billy think he was a little more fucked in the head than Neil claimed, rolled down his spine, spreading through his belly. His cock twitched, thickening in his pants.
Steve's thigh flexed and twitched, his fingers spreading and curling. He didn't speak.
Guilt picked alongside the want. Billy shifted, pushing to sit up. Maybe he'd misstepped. Hell, maybe he'd slammed his foot into a crack he wouldn't be able to drag himself out of.
Steve had been desperate a day ago. He wasn't now, all cozy-warm in his own bed and hopped up on uppers. He didn't need to offer up how ass—or mouth—in exchange for what he already had.
"Steve—"
He got up, long legs unfolding slowly as he shuffled papers off his lap. Billy watched him cross the room to the door, hand lingering on the doorknob, back to Billy.
"Steve," Billy said again, a touch softer, frown bracketing his mouth.
Steve locked the door and turned. His eyes were unreadable. Billy felt pinned down by them.
"Take off your pants."
Never a man to be told twice, the remains of guilt disappeared into a flash of heat as Billy undid his belt and slacks, shoving them off his hips and down his thighs while Steve settled himself on his knees before him.
Steve’s hands landed on Billy’s thighs, palms so soft, and he felt them tremble, the tiniest shake running along his wrists. He was staring at Billy’s cock, half hard and the tip blushing blood, peeking from the hood of foreskin, resting against his thigh.
Billy shifted, uncomfortable, fingers twitching into a semi-fist until he couldn’t take it anymore. He touched his fingertips, worn and calloused, against Steve’s knuckles. “Steve,” he said. Steve didn’t look up. He said it again.
He was biting his lip, white teeth rigging into red and slick skin. Billy wanted to lean down and lick into his mouth, suck and nip and bite at the skin until it was red and sensitive from stubble.
His eyes were half-lidded, gaze dipping down to Billy’s dick again. His mouth opened to say something—anything that wasn’t silence and a heavy stare—when Steve cleared his throat and said, “I’m going to be really bad at this.”
Billy choked on a laugh Unlikely. Steve’s head jerked up, eyes narrowing, and the easy fury of being mocked flashed red-hot. “Nah,” he said, “It’s not that hard.”
Steve glared, eyes sharp, the tips of his nails biting into Billy’s thighs. He scowled. “Don’t be a dick and let me just—”
“Suck my dick?”
Eyes closing, Steve breathed deeply through his nose. Red flushed up his neck, fingers digging into Billy’s thighs hard enough to hurt. Billy grinned. “I’m going to punch you.”
“You make a lot of promises.”
“You never shut the hell up.”
“Want me to stop?”
Steve’s jaw clicked. “You could make this easy on me.”
“Have I ever?”
His lips twitched, pressing into a stubborn line when he opened his eyes to look up at Billy. His hands flattened on his thighs, sliding to curve his palm against Billy’s knees, liquid heat working its way across the trail of his skin. Billy curled his toes, a silent shiver snaking up his spine.
“No,” Steve said, finally, lips peeling open from the blunt line, tongue darting out to touch his bottom lip. He swallowed, eyes dipping down to Billy’s crotch. “Just tell me what to do.”
Rucked sheets sliding under him as he let his weight drop to his elbows, Billy sized him up. Steve, on his knees, in front of him, inches away from his cock. He’d seen it a thousand times before, projected in his head when he was jacking off in the shower—or, embarrassingly, the few times his body betrayed him entirely and he woke in the midst of orgasm, flushed and panting and moaning through the sudden crash of wakefulness and mind-numbing pleasure. Mortifying in the way nothing else was. Horrifying. Fucking telling.
On his knees, head dipped, lips shiny and pink and parting, he looked like something out of one of those wet dreams, stripped down to the bare bones.
“You could stop being so freaked out,” Billy said mildly.
Steve’s head rose, shooting him another glare. “I’m not freaked out.”
“Yeah, you are. You’re making my dick soft.”
The click was audible. Steve’s jaw clenched so tight Billy thought he might break his teeth, and Billy said, “Chill out.” And then, on a whim, “C’mere.”
Steve frowned, face softening a fraction, and he hunted Billy’s face for something. Impatient, Billy wrapped a hand around Steve’s wrist and tugged. Steve opened his mouth, shiny and wet and fuckable still, to say something. Billy pulled again, eyebrows raised, expectant.
As he unfolded from the floor, stiff as he stood, using Billy’s knee for leverage, Billy tugged him forward, hooking the toe of his shoe on his heel, kicking off his sneakers. Steve clambered awkwardly on top of him, elbows and knees everywhere, spine stiff as he settled on Billy’s lap.
Billy took the opportunity to slip his hands around him and grab his ass.
He jerked, hips rocking down in an unpleasant slide of friction and denim that had Billy’s cock giving an interested twitch and scowled again. Billy tipped his head back and smiled, sunny, and cupped his hands, giving a squeeze.
“You’re a dick,” Steve muttered, shifting his weight from knee to knee, rocking the line of his fly against Billy’s cock. It rode the edge of pain but he chased it, kneading his fingers until Steve’s hips twitched, bare toes flexing against Billy’s knees.
His hands hovered over Billy’s shoulders, hesitant in that way teenage virgins were, all damp palms and reeking of uncertainty. It turned him on, like the ridge of Steve’s fly, like the twisted desperation that had taken up residence in his eyes the day before. Once, Billy had been accused of being a twisted bastard by the most twisted little twink he’d fucked since he’d landed back in California, and he’d been right. Playing coy was a one-way ticket to disinterest, but the thought of being the one—the first—to get his hands on Steve’s skin and mark him up, inside and out, was enough to leave his chest aching with undiluted want.
It was a fantasy at best, but Billy would bet his entire stash and the five hundred wrapped in rubber bands Steve had never had anything inside him. No fingers, no cock, no tongue.
It was close enough.
“Come on,” Billy said, letting his head fall back against the bed. Steve eyed him, dubious. “What makes a good blowjob?”
“What?”
“A. Good. Blowjob,” Billy said, over-enunciating each word, letting out a bark of laughter as Steve’s expression soured. “Just think about it.”
“Enthusiasm?”
“Yeah, enthusiasm, desire, whatever. You gotta want it so bad you think you’ll die if you don’t get your mouth on their cock. You know what I’m saying? You gotta need it like you can’t breathe without him in your throat. You’ll gag on it if it means he’ll come in your mouth.”
Billy’s fingertips crept up, playing under the hem of his shirt, brushing along the heated skin just above the band of his jeans. He felt the shiver down Steve’s back, the subtle shift of his hips from uncomfortable weight to rocking into a grind.
His hands settled on Billy’s chest. “How?”
Billy pressed his splayed palm to his back, basking in the twitch of his muscles beneath his skin. Stroking his thumb along the dip of his spine, he murmured, “That blonde bitch used to brag about your mouth, y’know. Told me you could make a chick come with your tongue. That still true?”
“Which blonde?”
He shoved an arm underneath himself, weight propped up on his elbow. “I don’t fucking know, man. Blonde. Dumb.”
“You think everyone is dumb.”
“You didn’t answer the question.”
“Do you want me to kiss you?”
“I didn’t say that.”
Steve’s breath skimmed his lips and chin, inching closer with each word exchanged. Billy stilled. The swell behind the uncomfortable press of metal and denim was telling. His heart was dead weight in his chest.
“Kiss me,” he murmured finally, when the silence had stretched to discomfort and his heavy heart had heaved, swelling in his chest.
Steve didn’t taste like defeat. He tasted like Billy's spat-out mint gum and saliva, like mercy and something underneath that Billy had only tasted in the air once, when he’d been seventeen and so headstrong he’d thought about breaking Steve apart with his bare hands just to get him out from under his skin.
He kissed with finesse, all charismatic lips and tongue, like Billy was a girl in desperate need of a delicate touch. Billy let him, head tilting, mouths fitting together like jigsaw pieces, and when Steve reached up to touch his cheek, holding him like a prayer cradled in his palms, he hesitated, and Billy grinned against his mouth, hooking an arm around his waist and rolling them onto the bed.
Steve grunted, smothered against Billy’s mouth, and Billy kissed him harder, fine china breaking apart under his hands as he gripped the hem of Steve’s shirt and yanked up, hands branding across Steve’s skin, fingers stretched from hip to ribs and creeping higher.
Underneath him, Steve squirmed, hips shifting and legs moving, hands groping his shoulders. He kissed like he was trapped, caught somewhere in No Man’s Land and lost. Billy kissed along his chin, down his jaw and to his ear.
Voice rough with kisses and want, he asked, “You good?”
He’d never cared before. He’d never had a reason to. Guys willing to suck his cock were a dime a dozen, whether they were idiots in college with addictions to feed or guys he picked up after work, when he went to a bar or club and wanted to blow off more than steam. Names, faces and tastes blurred together, until they were wet heat and a gentle buzz in the back of his head that he forgot faster than algebra.
He never kissed them either. They never deserved it.
But it was Steve Harrington, in the flesh, under him, hands still shaking as they knitted in his hair, eyes a little hazy as he nodded and licked his lips and said, gravel-rough, “I’m good.”
Fingers circling lazy patterns on his ribs, Billy hummed, catching Steve’s earlobe between his teeth, tugging. He moved down to the slim column of his neck, over the sharp bump of his Adam’s apple, teeth scraping and nipping and sucking until Steve made a downright delicious noise on his throat. He hooked an ankle over Billy’s bare leg, scrabbling down the back of his neck to fist in the collar of his shirt.
Billy dropped a kiss to the hollow of his throat, pushing up his shirt to his armpits, and then ducked down, hand splayed on Steve’s ribs as he caught his nipple in his mouth. It hardened between his teeth, between the licks and sucks, the roll of his tongue, and Steve made an aborted noise, tiny and choked, back arching off the bed when Billy bit down.
His teeth clacked and he hissed, hands wound so tight in Billy’s hair it almost hurt, and gritted out, “Fuck, Billy.”
It was his name, heavy on Steve’s tongue, thick enough that Billy could feel it in the dip of his spine as he hunched over Steve. Nipple caught between his teeth, he glanced up, feeling the tug and strain of Steve’s skin, and caught Steve’s eyes.
Dark, watchful, drinking in the movement as Billy let his nipple go, lips parted around a sharp gasp as he switched the other, trailing wet kisses across Steve’s sternum. He watched Steve’s eyes flutter shut, the tremble in his jaw as he let out a wanting noise, deep from his throat, head falling back against the bed.
Each noise Steve made was like honey on his tongue, thick and luscious, dripping down the back of his throat, and Billy thought about his cock, the hard press beneath Steve’s fly, brushing against his ribs as he bent lower. Turned on, filled up with it, hard for Billy. It went straight to his head, narrowing the entire world down to where their bodies touched.
He tugged open Steve’s fly with deft fingers, worrying Steve’s nipple with his teeth until Steve moaned, real and throbbing.
Billy knew lust. He knew want and devotion to desire, the desire to fuck and be fucked. He knew what it meant when a man threw back his head and moaned. He knew what it meant when Steve lifted his hips as Billy tugged his jeans and briefs down his thighs.
Billy set a kiss to Steve’s nipple and sat on his knees, dragging Steve’s jeans off his body, tossing them to the floor. When he looked back, Steve was pushed up on his elbows, damp-slick at the hairline, eyes bright and chest heaving.
Wiping the saliva off his mouth, Billy grinned. “Still good?”
“Yeah,” Steve said, nodding. He cracked a smile, wobbly, and closed his eyes. “Still good.”
Billy settled between Steve’s legs, hands on his thighs, leaning over Steve’s body to kiss his throat. “Take off your shirt.”
Steve did and Billy slid down Steve’s body, resting between his thighs on the bed. He kissed the spot above his belly button, through the trail of dark hair bisecting his stomach down to his groin. Below, the hair thickened, thinning over the bridge of his hips and thickening against at his groin. Billy’s lips trailed over the path, nipping the skin stretched across his hipbones, nose dipping into the crease of his thigh.
The scent was thicker, muskier, with a hint of salt that Billy licked off. Steve’s muscle jumped beneath his touch. Billy turned his head, lips skimming over the base of his cock. His tongue darted out, flat against the side of Steve’s dick, licking from root to tip, and Steve swore, hips jerking up and hands settling on the back of Billy’s head.
His cock was thick, flushed a ruddy pink that darkened at the tip, foreskin a few shades lighter than the skin of his shoulders. Billy let his lips run over the head, gentle, soft, splaying a hand on Steve’s hip, tucking the vee of his thumb and pointer against the base. He nudged back foreskin with his lips, fitting his mouth over the exposed glans, and sucked.
Steve moaned, a shudder wracking through his body that Billy felt on his tongue. His hands stroked over Billy’s hair, hips twitching up as Billy swallowed down, until the head rested against the back of his tongue, threatening to slip into his throat.
He closed his eyes and bobbed his head, slow, wet suction, spit slipping past the ring of his lips. It was sloppy and messy, because Billy didn’t care to be neat and tidy about it, about the weight of Steve’s dick on his tongue and the startled whine-whimper when Billy swallowed against the head, Billy’s fingers curling around the base to hold him still, tight when he jerked and pressed too deep.
The stutter-stutter-inhale of Steve’s breathing kept Billy in check, eyes closed, blissed out on the weight and taste of Steve in his mouth. When he gasped and twitched, fingers coiling around Billy’s hair, he pulled off with an obscene and wet noise, nuzzling his way down to Steve’s balls, soft skin and wiry hair dampening with the saliva slicking his chin, moving back to his cock when Steve’s thighs stopped trembling.
The third time he did it, Steve grunted, kicking at Billy’s shoulder with his heel. Billy laughed, choking on the sound as he pulled away to glance up the length of Steve’s body, the shadows of ribs and sharp hips, the thick curl of hair across his chest—the baleful glare he shot him.
Billy kissed the crown of his cock, fingers wrapped loose as he jacked him, sliding the foreskin back and forth where his lips didn’t touch. “Yes?”
Steve kicked him again, shifting restlessly. He tugged Billy’s hair, sharp, soothing fingers stroking his scalp. “Don’t tease.”
“That’s the point.”
“To drive me insane?” A pretty red flush had spread across his cheeks and chest
“Is it working?”
Steve didn’t reply. His head fell back again, rocking his hips up, expectant. Billy laughed again, joy on his tongue, and tucked the head into his mouth, teeth artfully hidden away, working over the slit and pressing in, tightening his grip on Steve’s cock, stroking with purpose.
His muscles twitched to the sound of his breath, rolling beneath his skin like waves, tiny gasps that left Billy aching, grinding down against the sheets and leaving a wet patch where his cockhead rubbed against the sheets.
His cock leaked over Billy’s tongue, adding to the mess, balls drawing up tight, swollen where Billy rolled them in his palm, thumb rocking against the spot just below. Steve jerked, a battle-torn noise breaking from his throat like he was trying to keep it down, spunk flooding into Billy’s mouth, bitter salt and body-hot.
Holding him down, he worked Steve through his orgasm, spunk pooling on his tongue until Steve whined, pushing at his shoulders, gasping out a garbled, “Too much.”
Billy pushed himself up to kneel, spitting in his left palm, spunk and spit and the taste of Steve wrapping around his own cock, achingly hard. He groaned, eyes half shut, head falling forward as her jerked himself off in quick, brutal strokes, orgasm hot on his heels.
It ripped through him. He bit back the noise, hard enough to taste iron in his mouth, a dull roar of white noise ringing in his ears as he spilled across Steve’s hips and stomach, below his navel. A drop landed on his softening cock. Billy fixated on it, staring, dumb, until the trembling in his thighs stopped.
Falling to the side and rolling onto his back, he lay on Steve’s bed, shoulder crammed against Steve’s warm thigh. His hand curled loose around his own cock, the weight softening on his palm. The world tilted, blurring, and he sucked in a sharp breath and held it until his lungs burned and his brain tilted back on its axis.
They stayed there, quiet except for their shared breathing. Blissed out, he listened to Steve breath in and out, until the sharp inhale-inhale-stutter evened out, until he shifted beside him, startling Billy from the post-fuck daze he’d fallen in.
“So. Uh.” Steve swallowed, loud, like his lips were on Billy’s ear. Billy cracked an eye and craned his head up. Steve wasn’t looking at him, eyes fixed on the off-white ceiling.
“So?”
“I don’t owe you now, right? Debt’s paid?”
Oh. Right.
The debt.
The drugs and the deal, the idea Jamie had put in Steve’s stupid fucking skull, the one he had actually followed through on.
That debt.
Billy scoffed and rolled away, sitting up and swinging his legs over the edge of the bed. His whole body felt loose, warm and dreamy, ready to bed down after an eight hour hell-shift and a stupidly intense orgasm with a boy he’d used to think about too much.
“Yeah,” he said, getting up from the bed and picking his shirt up. He wiped his mouth and chin off on the back of it and pulled it on. He didn’t look at Steve. “We’re square.”
Steve didn’t look at him as he pulled on his pants, creased from the floor, and Billy only knew that because he kept peeking over his shoulder, something decidedly cold and distant spreading every time he turned and Steve was still staring at the ceiling.
Something sour flooded his mouth, metallic and off, like chewing on tinfoil.
His chest felt heavy like lead and bricks of cocaine.
He cast a look over his shoulder. Steve still wasn’t looking at him. He swallowed the taste down and muttered, “I’ll see you later.”
He took the stairs two at a time, mind blank until he reached the bottom, hand on the banister as he swung toward the front door.
It was stupid. He was stupid. Fucking stupid to think—that he had a right—that it was anything but—
Dirty blond hair, olive skin, dark eyes. Grey school athletics t-shirt and hideous purple sweatpants he swore were for good luck.
“Jamie!” he called, smile plastered on his face as he veered left instead of right.
Jamie and two others that Billy had never bothered to learn the names of stood around the pool table, beers in hand. They turned as Billy stepped into the rec room. Jamie grinned, leaning his hip against the pool table and setting his beer to balance precariously on the ledge.
“Hey, man. What’cha doing here?”
Billy stopped next to him, giving the other two a quick once over, dismissing them immediately. “Oh, you know,” he said, turning his attention back to Jamie, “just the usual. I was just hanging around, so I thought I’d come visit my old buddy Harrington.”
Jamie’s smile turned Cheshire-sharp. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” he said, nodding, setting a gentle hand on Jamie’s shoulder. He squeezed, the corner of his mouth curling up. “I just wanted to thank you, man.”
Jamie laughed and shifted on his heels. “No need to thank me. You got what you wanted. He did, too.”
“No, man, I really need to thank you,” Billy said again, leaning his head down, close to Jamie’s ear. His lips parted around words that didn’t come.
He grabbed Jamie’s neck, fingers iron bands around his nape, kicking hard at his kneecap until he buckled. He went chest down on the pool table, balls rolling, stick dropping from his hand. Billy grabbed the bottle by the neck, smashing it against the ledge. It broke with a shatter, sticky beer sliding over his wrist and down his arm, splattering across his shirt. Glass fell to the floor, quiet on the carpet.
He ignored it, crowding his hips up against Jamie, shoving his cheek against the felt, smile wiped from his face. Beside him, the two others made noises, angry and outraged, closing in on where he held Jamie against the pool table.
He tilted the broken bottle between the two of them. “Shut the fuck up,” he said to them, eyes drilling holes into Jamie’s skull.
Jamie grunted. “Billy! What the fuck!”
“We’re gonna call the cops,” one of the others said.
“What did I just say?” Billy asked tightly, throwing them a quick glance. They’d backed up two steps, one clutching the pool stick like a weapon, the other holding his in defense. “Shut the fuck up,” he said again, jamming his knee against the back of Jamie’s thigh when he squirmed.
“And you,” he said, bringing the sharp glass to Jamie’s neck. Jamie stopped squirming, sucking in a breath. A twitch ran down his spine. Billy pressed the edge of the glass against his skin, until it gave way and blood swelled.
“Billy, come on,” Jamie pleaded, another tremor wracking his body. “I don’t know why you’re doing this—”
“Let me enlighten you,” he said and leaned down, bent over the prone curve of Jamie’s body, lips a hairsbreadth from his ear. “If I ever fucking find out you told Harrington to do something this fucking stupid again, I’ll kill you. You tell him to go somewhere else, to suck some fuckhead off, I’ll make you wish you’d never crawled out of that sorry cunt between your mother’s legs. Got it?”
Jamie nodded stiffly. Billy pressed harder on his neck, until the skin stained a brighter red, and he squeaked, “I got it! I’m sorry! I got it!”
“Good boy,” Billy said, and then smiled, letting go of Jamie’s neck to pat his cheek. He stepped away, glancing at the bottle in his hand, at the blood flecking the vee of his thumb and forefinger, at the beer dripping onto the floor.
Billy dropped the bottle and smiled cheerily. Jamie scrambled away from him, tripping over his bare feet, scurrying away from him, staring with wide, frightened eyes.
“Nice seeing you, boys,” he said, and patted the nearest one on the shoulder. He flinched away from Billy’s touch.
Billy laughed, hyena-loud and joyful, and when he climbed into his car and jammed another piece of gum into his mouth, he felt a little less fragile.