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"Yance, bro, come here and meet Tendo!" Raleigh calls, and Yancy heads over with a smile on his face, because he's always down with meeting new people, especially friends of Raleigh's.
"He's our new LOCCENT tech," Raleigh's saying, and Yancy notices the tattoo snaking up a tanned wrist first, then the suspenders hugging a wiry frame and some really nice shoulders, then the bowtie expertly wrapped around a very nibble-able (is that even a word, Yancy wonders, because it should be) neck. By the time Yancy's gaze travels up to the not precisely handsome but something far more interesting face, his tongue's stuck in to the roof of his mouth and he thinks he might actually have drool running down his chin.
Huh. This is new.
When Tendo shakes his hand, the touch scorches a path all the way down to Yancy's toes and then settles right in his crotch. And that's when Tendo opens his mouth, and just forget it. "Hey, man, good to meet you, your brother's been bragging about you for, like, an hour."
Yancy grunts out something indistinct in reply. He's already wondering if it's too soon to go to his knees and propose.
This is how it starts.
Tendo Choi isn't the first man to attract Yancy's interest. That's not the problem. Yancy's an equal opportunity lover, a self-professed connoisseur of the giving and receiving of pleasure and whether his partner has a cock or tits (or, as happened on one very memorable night in Saigon, both – he still has fond, fond memories, and it doesn't hurt that those memories have scarred Raleigh for life), it doesn't matter as long as everyone gets off and everyone goes home happy.
No, the problem is Tendo himself. Tendo and his perfectly coiffed hair that's just begging for Yancy's hands to mess it up. Tendo and that perpetual smile curling his lips like he's in love with the world and the joy of it and wants to share that joy with everyone he meets. Fucking Tendo and his laidback sexy attitude and those competent hands and that cadence to his voice that sounds like music, and all Yancy wants to do is follow him around like some sort of lost puppy and sit at his feet and hell, maybe even play fetch for him. He wants to profess his adoration from the highest level of the Shatterdome and maybe write a speech or sonnet or something.
Instead, he can't seem to get out more than two words whenever he's anywhere near Tendo, and that is definitely a problem.
"Yo, Becket, slow down, man."
Yancy stops, turns. All of the words in his brain shrivel up and disappear on his tongue. Tendo's grinning wide and welcoming and Yancy might be more than just a little bit in love with the laugh lines around Tendo's mouth. Tendo's wearing a new bowtie, and those suspenders are caressing his shoulders and fuck the person who invented skinny jeans, anyway, because the way they emphasize Tendo's thighs really isn't fair.
"Hey, so, I had some ideas about a few modifications to our favorite girl, just a few tweaks, you're gonna love 'em, I promise," Tendo says, falling into step beside him, gesturing broadly with his hands and those long fingers, and the exuberance in his voice is expansive, taking up all of the room and all of the air in Yancy's lungs, "and I wanted to get your opinion on..."
It's just as well Yancy can't think of a thing to say. He's pretty sure begging for one of Tendo's bowties so he can wrap it around his hand when he beats off is probably not the best impression he could make.
"Seriously, bro, you've gotta do something about this, it's getting embarrassing."
Yancy thinks about shoving Raleigh out of his bunk bed. "Shut it, kiddo."
Raleigh's head appears, upside-down, over the edge of the railing. He looks a little like one of those tiny monkeys Yancy's seen in zoos. "Look, if you won't tell him, I –"
"You wanna shit out of a straw for the next few months?" Yancy asks. "Because I can make that happen."
"Please, no one else could drift with your surly ass if I couldn't, so you'd be grounded," Raleigh scoffs, and God, the little shit is so annoying when he's right. Yancy never should have let him live to adulthood. "And getting grounded means way more time stuck in the Shatterdome making cow eyes at your boyfriend instead of actually, oh, I dunno, talking to the dude like he's a real human being."
"So beating your ass."
"Man up, dude." Raleigh's head disappears, but Yancy can still hear him, loud and clear. "Or at least form a complete sentence around him. Something, sheesh, you're giving the Beckets a bad name."
Yancy really hates his brother.
"So, I was, uh..."
Tendo glances up. Yancy's gaze narrows in on the bit of ink peeking from beneath Tendo's shirt cuff. He wonders if Tendo has ink all over his body and how long it would take to trace all of the tattoos with his tongue and he is so, so fucked.
Tendo waits a beat. Two. "You were...?"
"Uh, we should...that is, I want to...I mean, would you...we could..."
Raleigh rolls his eyes as he walks by the conn, and gives Yancy his best 'you're lucky I love you and I'm bailing your ass out' look. "My stuttering idiot of a brother would like to take you out on a date. Although, man, that is going to be one boring dinner conversation."
Tendo swivels his chair to stare at Raleigh's back as he saunters away, mission accomplished, you're fucking welcome, then turns to face Yancy. Yancy really hopes he doesn't faint from nerves, because that would definitely make him look bad.
Also, Raleigh is a fucking dead man.
"Is he...?" Tendo jerks a thumb in Raleigh's direction. "Did I hear that right?"
"Uh, yeah?"
The thumb waggles between Yancy and Tendo. "Me and you?"
Any minute now, the power of speech will come back Yancy's way, like a boomerang ricocheting back home. He can't be this tongue-tied forever, right? Right? "Yeah."
"Huh."
"You're kinda like the hottest guy I've ever met."
Aaaaand, it really just figures his first actual sentence would be that one. Because this is his life.
"Me?" Tendo's eyes widen and, oh man, not even fair, he's sort of blushing, and Yancy wonders how far down it goes and that's it, man, stick a fork in him, call him done. He is officially throwing in the towel and giving up.
Which, of course means he pulls Tendo out of his seat, and presses their lips together until Tendo melts against him and starts to return the kiss. And those are definitely fireworks going off somewhere, because damn. Tendo may be wiry, but he's got moves, man, and whatever it is he's doing with his tongue should be taught in schools somewhere. Yancy's pretty sure he's making some seriously embarrassing noises, and he doesn't even give a crap, because Tendo's mouth, man, who knew a mere mortal could kiss like that?
"Please say yes," he murmurs against Tendo's lips, certain he'll cry if Tendo turns him down. Maybe throw himself off Gipsy's shoulder or something. And Raleigh will never ever ever let him live it down if he kills himself over a broken heart.
Tendo just grins and hooks his fingers in Yancy's belt loops. "How about you actually ask me and I will."
Something's not adding up (Yancy's still befuddled, sue him, anyone would be after a kiss like that), but Yancy's pretty sure he's still in the game. "Wait, is that a yes?"
Tendo tugs him closer, and oh yeah, Tendo is not at all disinterested, and wow, those skinny jeans don't hide a lot. "Ask me."
Right, he can totally ask because, unlike his brother, who thinks a wink and an eyebrow waggle counts as foreplay, Yancy is an actual adult. He can be adult about this. "Can we just skip dinner and go straight to bed?"
Yep, and this is why Tendo's the problem. Because Yancy never says shit like that, he never loses it, he never...gets kissed again like he and his partner are going for a world record in awesome. (He and Tendo would be taking home the gold, by the way, in case anyone's wondering. And probably the silver and bronze, too.)
"Yes," Tendo says, when he lets Yancy up for air, and okay, blood may be roaring in his ears, but Yancy knows the 'you're about to get so lucky' tone when he hears it.
"Your place," he manages. It's probably (definitely) true that he'll be traumatizing the hell out of his brother later in the Drift with images of him and Tendo having sex as payback for being a fucking dick, but that doesn't mean he's giving Raleigh a free preview.
"Absolutely," Tendo grins, before taking Yancy's hand to lead him away from the conn, and it's a damn good thing that Yancy's already got practice in following Tendo around like a puppy, because he is gone daddy gone.
Thankfully, Tendo doesn't actually expect Yancy to be coherent the rest of the night.
***