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It should have been so much harder.
He shouldn’t have fallen for Tommy so easily, and Tommy definitely should have never fallen in love with Nikki. Tommy was too good for him, Nikki believed that with every fiber of himself, but he wasn’t about to let this bit of true happiness slip by him. Not when he found himself truly smiling for the first time in a long time, to the point his cheeks hurt and his heart felt full to the point of bursting.
He was sitting on the ratty, stained couch of his run down apartment, Tommy passed out on top of him drooling onto his T-shirt. The party was dying down around them, but Nikki couldn’t bring himself to even pay attention to the other party goers around him. He was too busy watching Tommy’s face, his pink lips parted as he breathed softly and his eyes twitched behind his eyelids. He looked so peaceful, his sleep was deep due to the effects of too much Jack Daniels and a few unidentified pills that some of Vince’s guests had been passing around.
Nikki could hear Vince teasing him somewhere in the background but he didn’t even look up, or acknowledge that the singer had even spoke. Right now, in his alcohol and drug induced bliss, he was happy, and the only thing that would make him happier was getting the drummer to bed so they could be alone without Vince’s smartass remarks, the occasional girl attempting to flirt with him, and the sound of some random guy Nikki didn't know puking into the corner of his Iiving room.
Nikki gently tried to shake Tommy awake, he was far too drunk to carry Tommy into their shared bedroom, he would drop Tommy on his head and he knew it. Tommy groaned and tried to bury himself farther into Nikki’s chest, but a few whispered promises about curling up in bed together away from the prying eyes of the others had Tommy dragging himself up off of the couch and trudging through the door and flopping down on his and Nikki’s bed.
Nikki smiled as Tommy’s tired, reddened eyes searched for him through his bangs, and the sight of the lopsided smile on Tommy’s face had his heart skipping a beat.
Tommy was fucking beautiful, he was fucking perfect.
Maybe not perfect in the traditional sense. Maybe he was loud, crazy, emotional, a little hot tempered. But he was Nikki’s kind of crazy, and the way he held him tucked every broken part of Nikki back into place, and fused the pieces back together in such a perfect way that unless you had seen them before, you never would have known they had even been broken in the first place.
And then Nikki was shutting the light off, bathing the room in the light of the moon shining through the curtainless windows, and grabbing the ratty blanket off of the end of the bed to wrap around himself and Tommy.
And then Tommy was right where he was before, his face pushing into Nikki’s chest, placing a peck right above Nikki’s heart, and mumbling an ‘I love you’ before he was out cold, his even breathing becoming deeper as the drummer faded off into sleep once again.
Sleep wasn’t going to find Nikki so easily. If he was being honest, Nikki didn’t even want to sleep, he wanted to be conscious to enjoy this moment, with his arms wrapped around this man that he was so lucky to call his. His mind flashed back to the day this friendship had turned into more.
Vince had been out with his girlfriend at the time, and Tommy and Nikki were stumbling around the apartment, drunk out of their minds, stomach muscles aching from the laughing they had been doing all night. It was late on a Saturday night, and the strip was alive, and Tommy wanted to go stand outside on the balcony and watch the other kids stumbling around down the street while they continued their work on their second bottle of Jack.
They were laughing at the kids falling over in the streets, puking behind trash cans, realizing that they were just as obliterated as the people they were laughing at, but not really caring. Music was faint in the background from whoever was playing at the Whisky that night, and the breeze felt amazing to both men as they tried to catch their breath from the belly laughs that had overtaken them. At some point Nikki had slung his arm around Tommy and placed a sloppy kiss on his cheek before resting his head on the younger man’s shoulder.
“Tommy, I’m so fucking glad you’re my best friend, man.” Nikki could hear how slurred his own voice was, and he knew his affection was getting a little too friendly, but the alcohol had lowered his inhibitions. He was expecting a kind laugh back, arms wrapping around him, something. But what he got was Tommy stiffening up, and when he pulled back to look at Tommy he was met with wet brown eyes.
Nikki’s heart had broken then, because Tommy’s eyes were his favorite part about the drummer, and seeing them lined with tears felt so wrong. Nikki remembered placing a hand on Tommy’s cheek, asking him what’s wrong, and he will never forget Tommy’s slurred confession to him in that moment.
“I think I love you, and I’m terrified.”
And- fuck- Nikki was terrified too. Looking into his drummers eyes he could see all of his own emotions reflected back to him, and he hadn’t planned on this. It was painful swallowing his emotions and his love for Tommy every day, but it was something he had grown accustomed to, something he thought he would do for the rest of his life.
This was uncharted territory, because Nikki Sixx didn’t fall in love- certainly not with his best friend.
Tommy had stumbled backwards then, reaching for the handle of the glass balcony door, trying to mumble out an excuse for his escape. He was in flight mode, mistaking Nikki’s silence for rejection, and the thought of Tommy walking out the door had Nikki’s heart dropping into the pit of his stomach.
Nikki’s hand was suddenly grabbing Tommy’s, pulling it away from the door handle, and when their reddened eyes met, Nikki still couldn’t get the words that danced on the tip of his tongue out past his lips. He didn’t let go of Tommy’s hand, and raised the other one to touch the drummer’s cheek, it was the only way to see if this was really happening. In his dreams he would always wake up before he was able to touch Tommy’s face. When his fingers made contact with the soft skin of Tommy’s cheek his body lurched forward on its own accord.
Tommy was frozen for a few seconds before he responded to Nikki’s lips pressing against his own in the most gentle way Tommy had ever experienced. It was beyond perfect, and even more surprising to the drummer because nothing about Nikki was gentle, but the way the bassist’s lips caressed his own, and the gentle hands pushing him back to lean against the glass door of the balcony had Tommy shuddering in Nikkis arms.
Even as Nikki pulled away, resting his forehead on the drummer’s to look intoTommy’s eyes he still couldn’t speak. He was trying, honestly. His hands seemed to know what to do as they pushed themselves up the back of Tommy’s T-shirt, stroking the soft skin of his lower back, but his vocal cords just hadn’t caught up yet.
They were still paralyzed as Nikki took Tommy’s hand and led him inside, sat him on the edge of the bed and straddled the drummer with a confidence he didn’t know he had.
Lips brushed against creamy white skin, clothes thrown to the side in a forgotten heap.
When he pushed into Tommy for the first time, looking down into those beautiful brown eyes that were just so full of wonder and trust, Nikki could have broken into tears in that moment.
The assault of sensations was completely overwhelming. The tight heat of this intimate moment buried inside of the only person he had ever trusted with his heart, to know that this man under him had the power to absolutely destroy him. The feeling of Tommys gentle fingers buried in his hair, gently stroking Nikki’s scalp almost as if he was reassuring Nikki that yes, this really is okay. He wants this too.
Fuck.
Nikki was pretty sure he had felt more emotions in that hour than he had the first 22 years of his life.
That night had been only the beginning. Every day, Tommy showed Nikki a new way to love, a new way to feel. Nikki used to hate emotions, and would have been happier never feeling anything, but Tommy had shown him that positive feelings did actually exist.
That was still a wild thought to the bassist.
They were completely broke. They had no money, they lived in a shithole apartment that was covered in puke stains and cockroaches, but Nikki could live there forever with this man.
He was loved.
He was happy.
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The light shining in from the curtainless windows had Tommy groaning and attempting to cover his eyes with the blanket, sighing in frustration when he realized that the piece of shit was too thin to really help block any kind of light.
He slowly tried to blink his eyes open, a pounding pulse in his temples and a familiar weight over his chest.
The pounding headache was most likely from the endless amounts of Jack he barely remembered drinking, the weight on his chest he knew was from some part of his boyfriend’s body. Squinting down he realized it was Nikki’s head on his chest, a thin line of drool darkening a spot on Tommy’s T-shirt, and the parallel to the night before wasn’t lost on Tommy. The last thing he remembered from last night was falling asleep on top of Nikki, in a very similar way to how the bassist was currently laying on him, and it made his heart clench a little.
They didn’t have much, but they took care of each other like no one else ever could. Tommy was known for being quick to fall in love, but this one was real. He was staying in love, and that was new.
Nikki was his best friend before he was anything else, and maybe that was the difference.
Tommy could have laid there forever, but his bladder was yelling at him to get the hell up, so he did his best to untangle his limbs from Nikki’s without waking him up.
That didn’t work, it never did, as soon as Tommy moved a muscle Nikki was blinking up with him with reddened eyes. Even through the bleary hangover Tommy could still make out the gleam in Nikki’s eyes that he only ever got when he looked at him.
“I think I’m dying, T-bone.” Nikki’s rough voice cut through Tommy’s inner thoughts, earning a chuckle from the drummer.
“Me fucking too, dude. But give it a few hours. By tonight we’ll be up for round 2.” The drummer replied with a smirk.
“We drank all our shit last night, there’s no more.” Nikki mumbled. He was nuzzling into Tommy, rubbing his head against him like a cat begging for attention and fuck if that wasn’t the cutest thing. Tommy didn't think he’d ever get used to that sight. Nikki allowed himself be so affectionate and vulnerable with him, and many people were shocked at how his demeanor changed when Nikki was around Tommy, particularly his band mates. Vince never failed to make jokes about wedding bells, and finding Nikki the perfect wedding dress, but one look from Nikki, and the threat to fuck his boyfriend on everything that the singer owned, was usually enough to shut him up.
Tommy patted Nikki’s head, signaling to him that he was about to get up and felt arms tighten around him. “Don’t go.” “Babe, I really have to pee.” Tommy felt Nikki’s lips attaching themselves to his neck, sucking a gentle love bite onto the pale flesh, and Tommy couldn’t hold back the moan that escaped his lips. “That’s not fair. Quit that, I can’t pee with a boner, asshole.”
Nikki was chuckling then, smiling against the bruise he had just marked on his lover’s skin. “That’s the point.”
Tommy rolled his eyes, but couldn’t help the smile that was taking over what he was trying to make an angry face.
“I’ll be back as soon as I’m done baby, then we can have all the fun you want.”
Tommy felt Nikki finally release him, and gave him a quick peck on the cheek before standing up and heading to the bathroom.
Upon exiting the bathroom, Tommy made his way to the kitchen, opening the fridge hoping to find a stray water bottle. He frowned when he noticed their food supply was basically non existent at the moment, he made a mental note to see if he could find any money laying around later and go get some food.
They were used to this- they tried to spend what little money they had on rent so that they weren’t living on the streets, as well as the shitty landline phone service to use for band related business, and to keep the electricity on. Some months they had enough for food and booze, some months they had to resort to begging Tommy’s parents for money, and when that didn’t work they usually had to resort to shoplifting.
Tommy wasn’t particularly proud of that fact, but it beat starving to death and Nikki would always force Tommy to eat before he ate anything himself, and he couldn’t stomach food knowing that Nikki was going hungry for him.
It was a nice thought and all, but it still made him physically ill.
Tommy selected a (somewhat) clean glass from the kitchen counter and filled it up with water from the sink, desperate to get rid of the stale, dry taste in his mouth that came with too much beer and whisky.
Glass in hand, he padded back over to the bed, intending to make good on his promise to have some fun in bed with Nikki before sorting out their food and alcohol situation. His heart clenched up when he saw that Nikki had fallen back asleep. Tommy knew he probably fell asleep the second he left the room, and he looked so peaceful, Tommy couldn’t disturb him.
Stepping forward, Tommy pulled the thin blanket over the bassist where it had fallen off, and gently brushed a stray lock of hair out of Nikki’s eyes. The romantic part of him was screaming to get into bed with Nikki and plant kisses on every square inch of his body, but Tommy knew he had to be exhausted. Sometimes Nikki got to thinking at night- sometimes good things and sometimes bad things- regardless, Tommy knew the bassist usually stayed awake for a while after they stumble their way into bed together, and just watched him sleep.
As a result, Tommy always let Nikki sleep as long as he could, and today was no exception.
A smile smile pulled on his lips as he started to back towards the door, giving Nikki one last glance as he shut the door as quietly as he could. He has a new mission now: operation find some fucking money.
Kitchen drawers: money no, cockroaches yes. Fuckers are lucky I don't have my lighter.
Vinnie's wallet: no (just making sure you weren't holding out on us, Vin).
Couch cushions: you just looked there 5 days ago dumbass, definitely no.
Tommy groaned to himself. He had to take care of this before Nikki woke up. Tommy could roll with the punches day in and day out, but Nikki was a worrier. Even worse, he held all that worry inside of him, letting it stew and fester to the point of rotting.
Guess the plan was back to square one. Tommy grabbed a jacket from the coat rack, already annoyed because it was 70 degrees outside already, but he couldn't very well hide hot dogs and a vodka bottle in a tank top.
Slipping on his boots, Tommy headed out the door, making sure to shut the door quietly behind him, not wanting to disturb his sleeping boyfriend.