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It’s been a pretty nice fucking evening, in Party Poison’s opinion. They’d been at a party in Zone 3, because NewsAGoGo had invited them and Poison had — with only a few kisses and eyelash bats and coy little smiles, and Fun Ghoul calling them a dirty cheater with his fingers tangled in Poison’s hair — persuaded Ghoul to come. Their resulting presence at said party had been essentially worthless, given that the first and only thing Poison had done was wind their arms around Ghoul’s neck in a shadowed corner of the dance floor and stick their tongue in his mouth, where they’d stayed until Poison had grinned against Ghoul’s throat and said “hey, baby, wanna get outta here?” which, to be fair, wasn’t the most unexpected thing for Party Poison to be doing at a NewsAGoGo party. This had been, though, the first one they’d been to in a while, and the first one since kissing Ghoul for the first time in the driver’s seat of the ‘Am, and they’d been jittery the entire drive from the Diner to the shuttered warehouse Newsie had commandeered for her party. Right now, where the pair of them are curled up in the Trans Am’s back seat with Poison in Ghoul’s lap, it feels a hell of a lot like that night, except now they can just tilt their head up and kiss Ghoul whenever they want to. They feel warm and a little sleepy and stupid, and Ghoul’s mouth is fucking wonderful.
They lean away a little, enough that they can see Ghoul’s eyes twinkling at them, and the candy-pink lipstick smeared across his lips and dragging down his neck and chest in reverent open-mouth marks. Poison knows the same color is smudged down their own chin and against the corner of their mouth and they can’t help but feel a little spark of pride, a flash of delight, because they know everyone at the party saw. Mine, they think giddily, and trace their lips over one of the prints, at the curve of Ghoul’s collarbone.
“Love you,” they murmur. Their eyes drift upwards, to where Ghoul’s lips are pretty and bruised under the coat of Poison’s lipstick. “Y’know that, don’t you? I love you so much, love your mouth, fuckin’ beautiful, Ghoulie.” They raise a hand, to run their thumb against Ghoul’s lower lip, over where his mouth is curving into a smile, gathering pigment on the pad of their finger.
“I know, Pois. I love you too.”
It’s not the first time they’ve said it, but the darkness wrapping around them like a blanket, and the fact that it feels so very much like the first time they kissed, paired with Poison still riding the high from the party — the adrenaline rush of holding Ghoul’s hand and signaling to all the ‘joys present look at me, look at how lucky I managed to get — makes it feel like a pretty big deal. Poison fits their mouths together again carefully, feeling a little bit like they really are kissing Ghoul for the first time again, shaky heartbeats beating an unsteady rhythm against their ribcage. Ghoul kisses them slowly, languid and sugar-sweet, tongue and lips and gentle teeth, and Phoenix Witch, if Poison-from-a-year-ago could see them now.
“D’ you remember when I used to offer t’ share my mattress, ‘n’ I said it was ‘cause I had th’ biggest one ‘n’ you didn’t have one yet?”
Ghoul grins, eyes sparkling brighter, and Poison gets the feeling he knows the reason why without them even having to say it, but they smile a little shyly back and say it anyways.
“It was ‘cause I liked you and I didn’t wanna say it at th’ time.”
That’s not quite true, but it makes Ghoul laugh, sounding delighted, and that always makes Poison happy. The first time they’d ever gotten Ghoul to laugh, it had been during a clap with Korse and his squad of Dracs, when Poison had said something stupid about his ruffled shirt that hadn’t even been that funny — Ghoul had snorted, though, under his breath and trying to cover it up with a cough, which consequently made Poison so flustered they’d misaimed their raygun and almost taken the paint off the side of the Trans Am. In this moment, though, it doesn’t feel nearly as bad to remember (selfishly) asking Ghoul if he’d maybe like to share a bed, being breathless at the answer being “okay” even if Ghoul had looked suspicious at the offer, lying only a few feet away and watching Ghoul’s relaxed face as he slept, mouthing I love you over and over at the ceiling in a vain attempt to ease the saccharine-aching pull in their chest, thinking they would never in a million years get more than that.
Ghoul taps gently on their forehead, carding a hand through their hair. “You’ve got your thinking-too-hard face on.” His tone is teasing but his eyes are soft and concerned, and Poison brushes away the clinging cobwebs of past memories to focus on the present moment.
“Sorry,” they say, meaning it. They grin, a little crookedly. “Jus’...y’know. Remembering.”
“Okay, then don’t,” Ghoul says, teasing sparkle back, the dim lighting turning his eyes from brown to an otherworldly midnight blue. “Focus on me now.”
“Affirmative,” Poison quips back, holding back a grin when it makes Ghoul give them a deadpan stare, and leans in to bite Ghoul’s lower lip just hard enough for it to hurt a little.
“God, fuck you,” Ghoul says, the corner of his mouth twitching upwards, and he tugs Poison back in, moving their mouths slowly against each other for a few long, precious moments. When he breaks away, it’s to shake his head in mock-disbelief around a smile, running his fingers over the soft roll of Poison’s hip. “Y’ can’t say shit like that ‘round Jet ‘n’ Kobra or they’re gonna think we’ve been replaced by ‘Crows.”
Poison drags their nose against the side of Ghoul’s neck, nuzzling into the skin there. He smells like creamy lipstick and the shitty non-alcoholic fruit punch from the party, with that underlying hint of citrus that Poison has come to identify as something intrinsically Ghoul without a pin-pointable source. “‘S the joke, baby.”
“I know that, but to everyone else we just sound fuckin’ crazy.” He pinches Poison’s side, eliciting a very undignified yelp and earning a halfhearted slap to the shoulder in response.
“You’re no fun.” Poison licks his neck and Ghoul digs his knee into their ass.
“Stop that,” he says, but he’s grinning, and when he snaps his teeth against Poison’s throat in retaliation, it unfortunately — at least when it comes to Poison’s ability to get the last word in — has the effect of making Poison’s brain jump the tracks completely and they forget all about any kind of revenge in favor of yanking Ghoul down by his shirt collar.
For a bit, it’s just warm hands against their waist and soft little breaths in their ear and Ghoul’s mouth hot and unhurried on theirs, and in a perfect world Poison would get to kiss Ghoul until either the sky came crashing down or Destroya returned and razed Battery City to the ground. This isn’t a perfect world though, and they’re interrupted — pretty rudely, from Poison’s point of view — by a rap on the window.
Poison turns to glare at the person who interrupted them, who turns out to be Hot Chimp, an only-sort-of-apologetic smirk on her face. Ghoul leans over to roll the window down, and she leans through, resting on her elbows. “Sorry to bother you guys,” she says, smile growing. “Was looking for Newsie an’ saw your car still here.”
“Haven’t seen her in a bit,” Ghoul says, like they weren’t just caught with their hands up each others’ shirts. “You checked the back room with all th’ neon lights? She was ‘n there earlier, think she had a card game started.”
“No, I haven’t. Thanks, I’ll look there.” Chimp ducks her head to back out of the car, smiling another wide cheeky grin at the pair of them. “Seeya later. I’ll let you guys get back to it.”
Ghoul blows a puff of air against Poison’s throat that’s almost definitely a suppressed laugh, and Chimp waves at them as she backs away, turning to jog towards the warehouse.
“Y’know she’s probably going to do the exact same thing with Newsie,” Ghoul says, still sounding like he’s holding back laughter for Poison’s benefit.
Poison snorts, pressing their face into Ghoul’s chest. “Yeah. Still doesn’t mean I wanted her t’ interrupt.” They glance up, grinning cheekily. “I mean, it was just getting good.”
Ghoul smacks their shoulder lightly, sitting up as properly as he can with Poison still in his lap. “Jackass.” They can hear the smile he’s hiding, and then he kisses their cheek with a soft sigh. “‘S getting late anyways, we should get back to th’ Diner ‘fore Kobes an’ Star think we got dusted.”
Poison sighs themself, much more melodramatically. “Fine. But only ‘cause you said it first.”
Ghoul brushes fingertips over their cheek, dimple reappearing in his own. “Doesn’t mean we can’t get back to it when we get back. And we actually have a bed an’ shit there.”
Poison brightens. “Oh, yeah.”
Ghoul laughs again, the way he only seems to do when Poison’s around, kissing the corner of their mouth. “C’mon, I can’t get up when you’re sitting on me.”
Poison crawls awkwardly out of his lap, getting the door open and stumbling slightly in the sand as they manage to extricate their legs from the car. On the other side, Ghoul’s door slams and they both shuffle around to the front seats. As Poison adjusts the mirror, they catch Ghoul’s eye in the reflection and smile, sees Ghoul smile back.
“Kiss for the road?” They say hopefully, delighting in the fact that it earns another contented laugh, and even more in that Ghoul leans across the center console to kiss them firmly. He pulls away slowly, like he’s also reluctant to stop, mumbling “deja vu” to himself as he does so, and Poison knows they’ve not been the only one thinking about that night this whole evening.
They wind their fingers together, squeezing briefly before letting go to turn the key in the ignition. Before they press down on the gas pedal, though, they turn to look at Ghoul’s face, backlit by the moon, his pretty features luminescent in the dark, dark curve of scar tissue splitting the pale contours of his cheek.
“I love you,” Poison says, again, a little shakily. Ghoul finds their hand again, lifting it to his mouth to press a kiss to their fingers. He meets Poison’s eyes, expression serious, but still soft.
“I love you too.” He taps the wheel gently. “Let’s motor.” He winks, lightening the mood instantly, and when Poison finally gives the ‘Am some gas, pulling out of the flat expanse of sand serving as a makeshift parking lot in front of the abandoned warehouse, Ghoul leans against their shoulder, a warm strip of contact up Poison’s arm.
It’s a long drive home, but Poison doesn’t really mind. They’ve got good company.