Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Brad had slept with Ray three times, and it would never happen again. 

The first time, in Australia, was simply a byproduct of being incredibly drunk, and incredibly horny. It had nothing to do with Brad’s long-standing affection for Ray that had started to exponentially increase by the day and reached a peak when, at 0100 in a crowded bar blasting some song Brad had never heard of, Ray spent at least fifteen minutes advocating for not only the existence of Bigfoot, but the existence of Bigfoot-related species such as Yeti and Sasquatch due to a branch of evolution extended from something called a Gigantopithecus. And also, apparently, his cousin had found one in the woods when he was camping and it attacked his truck which was why the front end was smashed (not an accident, no no. It was Bigfoot.) For some reason, in that moment, Brad had decided that he was into that. 

Yes, into that . 

It defied all explanation so Brad considered it a fluke. When they’d woken up that morning, tangled in bed sheets that smelled like sweat and sex, it took one shared look between them to understand they were on the same page. This hadn’t happened. They weren’t going to talk about it. They weren’t going to think about it and they were going to go on with their lives and friendship as normal. 

It was supposed to be the first and only time. 

It was not. 

It had happened twice more, in fact, and Brad couldn’t even blame that on being drunk or lulled into some Bigfoot-induced hypnosis. No, the second time and third time had both happened at his house, out of nowhere. One minute, Brad had been about to murder Ray and hide his body in the backyard over his opinions on box wine, and the next he’d been complaining about the flavor of gum Ray had been chewing earlier because his mouth still tasted like bubblegum and it was throwing off his make out game. 

But dammit, dammit , the third time was the last time. 

There were several very firm reasons for this. Reasons such as DADT, certainly, but more specifically there were fraternization regulations and the oh-so-charming optics of a sergeant sleeping with his RTO. It became less charming the more Brad thought about it. There were all kinds of issues that bubbled up there when he let his focus burn on it too long: power dynamics, rank pressure, all the uncomfortable thoughts he’d tossed on Ray the first time they’d slept together to make absolutely certain, absolutely certain , that their respectives ranks didn’t play into it. Worse, reasons related to the fact that Brad knew better than most what happened when you got too close to a person. He had lost his fiance and two best friends in one moment. He couldn’t lose another and if that meant he couldn’t kiss Ray’s incredibly stupid bullshit-spouting face, then so be it. 

It would never happen again. 

And so, about a week later from the last last time, the normal routine returned. Ray would escape the ‘stepford wives military edition’ tyranny of base whenever he could, normally on weekends when he hadn’t otherwise messed up his chance at a pass off. Those weekends were usually spent camped on Brad’s couch, and Brad usually welcomed the company.  

That day, Ray came over at noon and had parked in his marked spot on Brad’s couch. Normally that would have been business as usual. They’d sit and play video games, or watch reruns of South Park, and then at some point they’d have at least an hour long argument over what to order for food. It was a very comforting ritual that had become...interrupted...by the fact that not once, not twice, but three times now that ritual had not ended with Ray leaving at 4 in the morning after dozing on the couch in the middle of Ghostbusters. It had ended with him in Brad’s bed. 

Not this time! Not this time at all. Brad had kept himself very busy today. As Ray flopped around on his couch, Brad busied his hands by fixing the drip in his sink and reorganizing his pantry and at one point he sat at the table and took to polishing his own boots and dress shoes just to make sure he didn’t end up where he had the last few times. His house smelled like the sharp scent of shoepolish, and every time he looked over at the living room all he could see was Ray’s new position—sometimes a leg haphazardly thrown over the back of the couch, sometimes two legs up in the air like a sleeping dog. He could never sit normally . It was cute. Brad hated it. 

While he worked they talked idly, and Brad repeatedly refused Ray’s offers to help with any of the household chores that had suddenly been moved to the highest priority. Otherwise, it was the same as it always was. There was a level of comfort that Brad almost took for granted—the fact that Ray was such a constant as of late that it didn’t feel weird to do other things while he was around. He felt no pressure to entertain or occupy him. Ray didn’t need to ask for a drink, he knew where they were. He didn’t need permission to raid Brad’s cabinets and fish out a bag of chips because he’d been there when Brad bought them. Ray felt almost like a roommate. Until he hadn’t. 

It was folding the laundry that screwed him. Brad sat on his couch while he folded, so he could watch the movie that Ray was watching because fuckery be damned, when Fight Club was on, you watched Fight Club. The soft clothes in his hands and the gentle smell of Downy started to push back the earlier polish smell that lingered in his nose. Soon he’d stacked all his clothes on the opposite chair, crisp and lint-free. Brad’s busy hands had run out of things to do, and his brain had run out of tasks to plan, so he stayed on the couch, a mere two feet away from Ray.

“There are so many damn Starbucks references in this movie, you realize that? It’s this movie right here, this moment in time, that allowed Starbucks to take over every fuckin’ corner in the whole continental United States. If they had made this deal, with like, Joe’s Mad Coffee Club? Then we’d be sittin’ here sipping out of mad mugs and talking about how much we love the new hazelnut-bust coffee. You know what, I just made that up, but I think I have a future in, like, branding. I bet I could come up with a fucking hilarious coffee place. I could run Starbucks out of business. I could. Think about it. The morning ‘Wank Up’ special. The Flat White Ass, which we could just call that the ‘Lilley’, right?”

Brad was, fortunately, not paying attention to Ray’s commentary on Fight Club. Clearly not, because he let Ray get away with not admitting that the best candidate for ‘flat white ass’ was the whiskey tango cow tipper next to him. 

Maybe if he had paid attention, he’d be able to knock himself out of the trance he found himself in. Although trance? Perhaps not the right word. That was too magical, too soothing and fluttery. It was more like he was a sea turtle stuck in a fishing net. 

Ray sat on his couch with his legs crossed. He’d kicked off his sneakers at the door, partly because they looked like they’d somehow time traveled from an era before roads were paved and Brad could not stand to have them tracking their ancient, hillbilly mud all over his wood floors. But now he could see that Ray’s blue rubber duck sock had a hole in it, right at the big toe. Above that hole, his knee bobbed in a manifestation of what Brad could only assume was Ray’s restless body syndrome. The fabric of his basketball shorts had slid up his thigh and Brad could track right where his tan leached away into pale skin. Not that you’d be able to tell from a distance, because as small as Ray was, he had the hairiness of a sasquatch. Then Ray dragged his hand down to dust it off against his thigh, sprinkling his skin, shorts, and oh holy hell, Brad’s couch with cheeto dust. 

The goddamn nerve he had. Brad almost said something, but then he watched Ray bring his fingers up to his mouth to suck off the excess cheeto dust. Ray went in from the side, like he was gnawing on corn, palm turned to his own cheek—and then he dunked that hand right back into the bag of cheetos. 

“Ray,” Brad said, before he could really stop himself. Had he the sense, he might have let it go. Better to pretend he hadn’t been watching Ray with the kind of intensity that he watches slow motion touchdown replays with. But there were certain things that couldn’t be ignored. “I saw you lick your fingers and stick them back in the bag.” 

“So?” Ray scoffed at him and grinned, pulling his hand out so he could wiggle the offending fingers at his friend. “These are my cheetos homes, it’s part of my ecosystem now.” 

“An ecosystem headed for immediate extinction, I presume,” Brad noted, and then turned back to the movie in question. He tried to focus on that instead. He liked this movie, he and Ray knew most of the lines. Hell, he was banking on the fact that on those long slow days they’d be able to recite the movie from memory. 

The glow of the TV was bright. They’d been sitting on the couch together for long enough that the sun had set and Brad hadn’t gotten up to turn on any lights. The dark around them was occasionally blasted back by the changing colors of Fight Club scenes. He was not going to look at Ray anymore. They were friends, and they needed to stay that way. Some things were far too important to lose. 

“You know, Tyler was the first dude I had a crush on,” Ray said suddenly, and Brad blinked at the switch in conversation. The last he’d heard from Ray, he’d been going on about how he’d have kicked ass in Fight Club— a comment that Brad would normally be set on ripping apart. He was farther away tonight.

“...really?” Brad asked the question lightly, as if this were as nonconsequential as any other question. Of course, it was. At least, in a sense. He hoped Ray knew he could trust him with anything. The only difference here was that Brad had already been inside Ray, so this conversation about men they found attractive might lead to a place that he was very firmly trying to ignore. That place was, of course, back inside Ray. 

“Yeah, man. I mean, look at the guy, he’s fuckin’ hot. And the rules speech? Hot. That jacket ? Hot.” Ray pointed to the screen with his normal fanfare, almost raising up slightly with the exertion. “It wasn’t like I was going in blind or anything. I tried some early Jesus pray the gay away shit first, except like, it was less about Jesus and more about submitting myself to the church of tit and pussy with our lord and savior Pamela Anderson. I figured if anyone could smack the dick out of my brain, it wouldn’t be God, it would be Pamela Anderson. But fuck...I saw this movie and I knew, like, yeah. I’d suck a dick. Especially if it was attached to someone like that. Then it was like a fuckin’ mission that only I knew about. I’m gonna find that dick to suck.” 

There was a pregnant pause in the air. It may have been dead silent, if there wasn’t a raucous fight on the tv screen in front of them. Brad always saw through Ray. He said things so easily, but that was practiced. It was intentional. Brad knew it was a safety mechanism, so that if his words weren’t received well he could back out of them with a joke. I was only kidding, homes. No big deal. 

But it was a big deal. No matter how Ray framed it, this was a personal conversation about something that as far as Brad knew, only they knew about each other. And as the silence continued, Ray started to get nervous. One leg came out from its tucked position to stretch out against the coffee table. His fingers drummed along his bony knee. 

And then Brad frowned. “Are you…” He paused, suddenly wrapping his head around perhaps the wrong focus of that admission. “Are you saying that I was your knock off Brad Pitt?” 

It might not have been the right thing to say, but it worked. Ray’s loud barking laughter immediately released the squeeze in Brad’s chest. “Brad you’re one cocky motherfucker. Look at that guy. You think you’re close to that guy?” Ray crowed, knees tucking up to his chest as he laughed, eyes swallowed by the joy that his wide smile carved out of his face. Brad liked that laugh the most. It was the real one, the one he could say without a shadow of doubt that Ray couldn’t hold back even if he wanted to. 

“What the fuck do you mean, close to that guy?” Brad tried to maintain a level of playful annoyance, but he gave up. That’s what always happened, wasn’t it. He could try to be as distant and above it as he wanted, but Ray always found a way in. He always had. He probably always would. Like a really annoying kitchen rat that snuck in and nibbled only slightly at every single one of your apples. “I’m leagues above that guy. That’s disrespectful.” 

If Ray’s face was anything to go by, Brad was unconvincing. Ray nodded, deep and slow, mouth held in an exaggerated ‘O’ as his eyes went as wide as they could. “Oh, okay, of course. You are definitely leagues above 1995’s sexiest man alive, Brad. What the fuck was I thinking. I should have been jacking off to you all those years. The fuckin’ nerve I have.” 

The laughter died down between them like a rock finally settling on the ocean floor. Those jokes used to make Brad laugh—it was funny, right. But now there was something else behind it, because they’d fucked. Not once, no no. Not even twice. Three times. Three times, Brad hadn’t been able to control his damn self and now…

...Now the jokes weren’t so funny anymore. Now it just reminded him of what he couldn’t have, and in a very unfair event of transitive property, that reminded him of how much they’d changed between them already. He should be laughing. He would have been laughing. 

Ray wasn’t talking anymore. He’d gone quiet, and Brad could see him in his peripheral dipping his hand into the bag of cheetos with his eyes trained on the screen. The flashing of the scenes lit up his angles. Brad could tell the curve of his adam’s apple, he could see the shadow of his nose. It was crooked, Brad knew, from a fight he’d gotten into in high school. Randy Snipley, that was the guy’s name. Some big bully that Ray mouthed off to, back when he was a nerdy little band geek and couldn’t throw a punch if it was in a juice box. He’d fought him anyway. Ray was like that. Brad got the vivid memory of watching him in Oceanside, running drills long after everyone else because he just had to say something about regulation haircuts. But he didn’t complain about it. He did his assigned work and he’d been panting and smiling and sweaty when he walked past Brad. I’m serious homes. Whoever they’re letting shave heads has the precision of a blind manatee. 

Brad closed the gap between them in a second, which must have startled Ray because he let the cheetos slip from his hands and fall sideways onto the floor (a travesty that Brad would address after he’d scratched this particular itch). Ray let himself fall back, even as his head thunked uncomfortably on the couch arm that was just a hair too hard by the sound of it. Then Brad swept in, up Ray’s body like a wave, lips missing first just to the side of his lips before Ray corrected him. 

He tasted cheetos. He felt cheetos, the remnants of chewed chip and dust, which was truly disturbing, but not as disturbing as stopping felt. So Brad didn’t. He dealt with it, because underneath that was Ray—who despite not being a very practiced kisser as a former debate member and band nerd, moved lips against him so easily it felt like safety. Brad felt one socked foot slide along the outside of his calf and he shifted to make enough room for the knee Ray was trying to cock to the side. Then his hand naturally fell against the slight divot of Ray’s waist. His fingers squeezed into fabric before he decided that cotton was not the contact he wanted right now. Instead he snaked his hand underneath the shirt, right up Ray’s side until he could feel the change from smooth abdomen muscle to the ridged hardness of his ribs. It earned him a shiver, so he—

A steady palm pressed against his chest. 

“Wait,” Ray said in a gasp of air, because neither of them had remembered that perhaps it would be a good idea to breathe. That concept had always seemed stupid to Brad—who could be so enveloped in kissing a person that they’d forget to breathe? It takes two seconds to take in an airful! Yet here he was, panting, a little sweaty as he reared away from Ray and allowed the hand pressing against him to stretch out. 

Wait . 

Oh, fuck. Fuck. Fuck, fuck... fuck him. If Brad could kick his own ass, he certainly would. He’d set some damn limits for the both of them, and then one gay thought later about Ray’s crooked nose and here he was, licking second hand cheetos off of Ray’s teeth (so gross, so unfair, why). The interruption left him a little dazed, even as he stared back at Ray. 

His eyebrows managed to seem both furrowed and raised at the same time, which Brad might have thought was cute had he not been in the throes of self-flagellation. He took a few breaths in as Tyler spouted off in the background. The lights of the movie flashed around them. All he felt was Ray’s hand on his peck, the pressure in the fingertips and the hot, damp feel of it. 

“You said that was the last time,” Ray said finally, and Brad wondered if he could feel how hard his heart was beating, right under his palm. “You—you said that was what you wanted. So if that’s not what you wanted...or if it is what you want, then, you know, you should say that before we...do anything.” 

And lo and behold, it was Ray being the responsible one. How’s that for a slap in the face. Brad blinked, and through the tumble of thoughts in his head he couldn’t manage an answer. Instead he slowly backed off of Ray so that he was no longer looming over him. His hand slipped out from under his shirt and he pushed himself up until he was back where he’d been before he’d seen Ray’s nose. Back to normal. Nothing had happened. 

He half expected Ray to straighten and sweep up the cheetos. He’d eat one off the floor, and Brad would call him a barn animal, and then things would be status quo and settled. Ray always set things back to baseline. It was something Brad considered enviable about his personality. Even the most dreadful circumstance felt bearable with Ray and his off-color humor and strange observations. 

This time, Ray didn’t absorb the stillness. He stayed laid back for a second after Brad got off of him, and then...then he slowly rolled up, tilting his neck back and forth, wiping the palms of his hands against the smooth material of his shorts. Brad watched him swallow, and even in the dark and the changing glow of the TV, he knew the exact shade of pink that was flushed to Ray’s cheeks. “I’m gonna head out, if that’s cool. But I’ll see you later. Uh, you know. The thing, with the people...down at the place.” Ray shook his head after a short series of blinks, and Brad knew he was clearing his own fog. Fog that he’d caused. 

Something burned in his chest, and he could swear that his saliva glands hurt somewhere in the pocket of his jaw as he clenched it. This was what he was afraid of. Everything else, yes. God, yes, was he afraid of losing his career. But losing Ray...at this point, he knew that would hurt worse. And there was more than one way to lose him. He’d opened a new door the second he’d pressed him up against that wall in that hotel room and now, worse, he was hurting him too. 

“Okay,” Brad said, because there was nothing else to say. He turned to face the TV and caught sight of the coffee table. One side was immaculate with one beer opened on a coaster. The other side was a mess of cups of water, a half eaten sandwich, what looked like a jar of peanut butter (when the hell had he gotten into the peanut butter?), and a few stray cheetos. It was a mess, and it made the corner of Brad’s mouth quirk up. He glanced back to the couch—but Ray was gone. 

Oh, not gone. Just hovering by the doorway on one foot, trying to pull the back of his shoe around his heel with all the grace of a lumbering walrus. Brad stood up from the couch and walked to the back of it, a solid six feet away because he didn’t know the proper amount of space to afford your best friend after you’ve made out with him and then abruptly stopped making out with him because you can’t let yourself make out with him for fear of a great many different things. Six feet sounded good enough. 

“I’ll see you tomorrow?” Brad asked, and it almost didn’t sound like his voice. He cleared his throat and closed a fist rest on his side. Very casual, he was. The picture of nonchalance. “At the—the thing, with the people, down at the place, was it?” 

Ray laughed, but it was dry and hollow sounding as he finally got his shoe on properly. Brad watched his eyes dart around for his keys. Brad picked them up from the kitchen table where he remembered they’d been hiding under a chinese menu Ray had found in the mail. His mail. Brad’s mail. 

There were pieces of Ray all over his house. 

“Yeah, tomorrow. Thing, people, place,” Ray repeated, and Brad tried to smile at the half-hearted salute he got in return. As Ray opened the door into the chilly night air, Brad stepped to hold it in place. The street was quiet, but he could hear the buzzing sound that the streetlight near his house made, and down a few houses it sounded like someone was just getting home. The distant slam of a car door felt a little too on the nose, metaphorically. “Well...yeah. Bye,” Ray said, and after one last look, he turned and stepped off the porch. Brad didn’t watch him get to his car, though he had to fight against the urge to remind Ray that his shoelace was coming untied. Instead he turned away and looked at the side of his door. He ran his finger over the metal lock before he shut it with an open palm. Nothing left but to wait for the small sound of the lock sliding into place. 

Only he didn’t get to hear that latch click shut. Just before he had fully closed the door, it burst open like a blown hatch and knocked Brad straight in the nose, hard enough to send him stumbling back a few paces. He bumped against his thin entryway table tucked against the wall and had to take his hand away from his nose to steady the fern that would have tumbled to the floor. Crisis averted. He’d rather a broken nose than a broken fern.

“Ohoho fuck, oh my god, dude—I’m fuckin’ sorry, are you okay?” Ray was laughing, at least partially laughing in that way one does when someone you care about is hurt but in a funny way. “Dude I didn’t think you’d be right there, you’re so damn slow I figured you’d be back at the couch by now. Is it bleeding? I say if it’s broken we lie and say you got in a wicked bar fight for street cred. There was this dude, right, like, a real fuckin stone giant. Solid as a shit house, six foot...eh, six? Gotta be taller than you. Like a giant, dude, and he came at you outta nowhere. Or maybe not, maybe you took the hit for someone else. You know, real bogus savior-type shit.” 

“Ray,” Brad pinched the bridge of his nose, which certainly throbbed but took the back seat to a far more pressing subject. His hand dropped to the side and he stared at Ray, in a shirt that Brad definitely hated, standing in the frame of his door like it had been built for him. He opened his mouth, but no words came out. He never knew how to find the words. 

But Ray always did. “Shut up?” He questioned, and then it was him closing the gap between them. Brad might have moved like the ocean, but Ray moved like a storm, hard and fast and with an energy sparking in him that was felt before it was seen. “Way the fuck ahead of you.” 

Standing, you see, presented a slight difficulty to making out with Ray. His mouth was way down there, and Brad’s was not, but that didn’t seem to slow Ray down. Instead, Ray curled a hand in the fabric of Brad’s shirt, right at the neckline, and yanked him down. The force hurled them together, and Brad’s nose hit a little too hard against Ray’s. The flare of pain was nothing compared to the rush of right that followed. 

Over the past few months, Brad had struggled trying to place exactly what it was about Ray that was different. It certainly wasn’t the sex itself. No offense, but Brad had had better, objectively speaking. It wasn’t a knock on Ray, not in the least. Ray was inexperienced, and Brad had a habit of paying people who made a career out of knowing exactly what to do in bed and when to do it. So, sex crossed out, Brad had considered that possibly it was the secret disastrous nature of it all that made it good. But that wasn’t true. As easy an answer it would be, it just wasn’t him. So if it wasn’t the actual tactical refinement of the sex, and it wasn’t the mystery of it all...then it must have been Ray himself. Brad felt it then. It was Ray. 

That was terrifying. 

Best not to think about it. 

This angle was not working for him. He had two options: the table, or the couch. The couch was closer, and it was probably more comfortable, and eagerness aside...Brad didn’t quite have a burning desire to have sex where he ate. So he backed Ray up until he bumped against the back of the couch, and then he lifted him up onto it—not an easy task. Ray might have been slight, but he was densely packed with muscle. The deceptive weight had thrown Brad off more than a few times, but he was prepared for it now. He felt the grunt against his mouth as Ray shifted on the edge of the couch back and Brad pressed into him. The sweet spot. 

Sweet spot bliss was magical. It was the point where kissing stopped feeling like effort and started feeling as simple as floating in water. It was the optimal spot for prolonged smacking. Unfortunately...it lasted about fifteen seconds. 

“Wait,” Ray said, into Brad’s mouth, against his lips. Brad’s stomach bottomed out, but before he pulled away, Ray’s leg kicked out hard and then hooked around him. As the heel of a rubber sneaker dug into the back of his thigh, he understood. Ray didn’t want to stop, but he was falling back. Brad had leaned too far in, and he’d lost his balance on the slim, hard edge of the couch back. “Wait wait wait.”

Ray dipped back, hand gripping into Brad’s bicep so he wouldn’t completely fall back on the couch. Under that shirt, Brad knew his muscles were engaged, and it was kind of hot, really, this extended mid sit-up position. But he wasn’t here to admire, he was here to engage. So he abruptly tipped Ray back. 

Ah, too hard. Brad overcorrected, and as he pulled Ray up the couch lurched with his momentum. He tried to catch it, but Ray’s weight carried it down, and then they were both on the ground with a loud crash. 

“You fuckin’ idiot,” Ray barked, his laugh louder than the sound of the couch hitting the ground. He was angled strangely, ass on the back on the couch as his body rested on the cushions. There was a smattering of cheeto dust that he’d left behind earlier now close to his head. Brad didn’t care. He laughed too and his arm pressed against the cushion on the other side of Ray’s head while he watched his friend’s eyes squeeze shut in joy. Ray’s tongue poked out of his teeth as he tried to stop laughing. “What the hell was that?” 

“What do you mean what the hell was that. You’re so fucking short I had to lift you up onto something. I’m sorry I don’t have a children’s bathroom stool available for you, I’ll put it on my list,” Brad said, grinning all the while as he lurched back in to swallow up Ray’s laugh with his lips. On the floor, on the couch, it didn’t really matter where, at this point. 

“I’m not—” Oh, he’s trying to say something. “Short you—” It’s not anything important. “Motherfucker and you—” Ah, an and. He had more to say. “Know it—” Mhmm. Sure he did. “We can’t let the—” Wow. Impressive. “Tall people define—” He can still follow a train of thought? Brad must be losing his touch. “What is short and what—” Oh my god, he’s still talking. “Isn’t short because—Ow! What the fuck, Brad.” 

Brad had pinched Ray’s side, just a test, and the jump and indignant screech he got was certainly worth it. “I’m looking for your off switch,” Brad mumbled and changed tactics. He kissed down Ray’s neck, searching for the spot he’d found last time: the melting point.

“Nice try, but I don’t have one. I’m solar charged, homes,” Ray said, and Brad settled a bit by his throat to feel the rumble of his words as they went by. He almost successfully ignored him. Almost. His hand slipped between Ray and the couch so he could cup the back of his head and he got on one knee so he could get closer, he—

Wait, what? “Solar charged things still have off buttons. They’re not eternally on. That comparison doesn’t work.” Brad pulled away to squint at Ray, who had actually started to seem quietly sated. Brad’s lip removal was not approved if the disgruntled look Ray gave him was anything to go by. He raised an eyebrow and shrugged one shoulder as he felt Ray’s hands crawling (literally crawling, like spiders) up his chest to tug at the neckline of his shirt. “I’m just saying.” 

Ray rolled his eyes and tugged again, impatient, annoyed at this call out. That made Brad smile. Ray was a smart guy. One could say he was much too smart to be doing anything less than something extraordinary. But in Brad’s opinion, that made calling him out on his trip-ups all the more satisfying. “You know what I meant.” 

He did. But still. 

Brad was a gentleman though. He graciously continued his search for the spots that made a difference. He found one along Ray’s collarbone, and another closer up by his ear. While a part of his mind tried to commit those spots to memory, another specifically tried to forget them. That small, distant voice, like a far-away megaphone: this is not going to happen! But fuck it, it was happening now. 

Ray didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands, and it was very cute. They were everywhere. On Brad’s chest, around his back. Eventually they settled to hook around his neck, and Brad had almost forgotten. 

Almost. 

“It’s just that it’s so clear that you were confusing charging ports for activation buttons,” Brad said, pulling away again despite Ray’s squawk of disapproval and the sound of his head thunking against the soft couch cushions as he rolled his eyes. 

“Oh my god , you are such a nerd. Where is your off button, Colbert.” Brad watched Ray’s eyes widen, almost comically, as Brad tilted his head and pursed his lips. A very ‘you know where it is’ look if there ever was one. Ray gasped and thwacked Brad’s chest with the back of his hand. “I cannot be-fucking-lieve you’d dare ask me to suck your dick in the presence of Brad Pitt. That’s sacrilege. That’s unamerican. That’s scandalous .” 

Now Brad was laughing. “Oh I’m sorry I had no idea you had the sensibilities of an 80-year-old geriatric,” he said, and then lifted up so he could see the TV beyond the rise of the flipped couch. The movie was almost over. “Besides, he’s almost done. He won’t see.” 

Ray’s smile morphed into a sneaky little grin, the kind they shared when they were both laughing at the same ridiculous thing someone had said. “Well maybe now I want him to see.” Ray’s arm came back around Brad’s neck to weigh him in closer, and he didn’t fight it. 

“ That is scandalous,” Brad countered. “And first, I’m going to need you to say it.” 

Confusion sparked across Ray’s face as Brad laughed and pulled back. This angle was also not working for him. His knee was starting to hurt, and he was sure Ray’s back was aching. “Say what,” Ray asked as his hand fell from Brad’s shoulder. 

“You know.” Brad stood up and stretched, joints cracking as he raised his arms high above his head. That was another thing that felt different with Ray. That passion, the sharp need and pressing desire? It was all there. But something else was there too. The comfort of stopping, of knowing they could dive right back into it. It felt strange to Brad. Like he was already on third base of a relationship that was only just starting ( never going to start! That little voice called). 

As he held out a hand to help Ray up, he got the pleasure of watching the realization dawn on his face. “Oh my god, you really are a fucking nerd,” Ray said. As he came up to his feet, he rolled his eyes so heartily Brad thought it probably hurt. Then he raised one hand over his heart, and the other facing palm forward, head level. “I solemnly swear that Brad Colbert is leagues above Brad Pitt, and will always be, forever and infinitely, the more attractive Brad.” 

Oh it was so stupid.

But fuck, was it satisfying. 

In the end, Brad Pitt did not get to witness anything juicy. Brad and Ray realigned the couch, and Ray picked the cheetos off the floor, and Brad got a glass of water and then got one for Ray because he knew he’d need one. Then they went to the bedroom, a place that was wonderfully void of Brad Pitt, and spent the night doing everything Brad said he absolutely wasn’t going to do again. He had plenty of opportunities to change course. They both did. Neither of them wanted to, in the end. 

In the end, Brad had fucked Ray four times. 

He stared up at his ceiling, a good hour and a half later. He allowed himself ten minutes to revel in the rightness that he felt. Ten minutes, and then he’d tell Ray what they both knew. 

“I must be pretty fuckin’ irresistable, huh?” Ray said, barging in on Brad’s train of heavy thoughts. Brad looked to his side where Ray was laying, arm propped to hold up his head, elbow deep into one of Brad’s specially bought pillows. He was wiggling his eyebrows, and his lips were red and slightly swollen. “What was it?”

“Hm?” Brad blinked and then reached out to swipe away a small thread that had attached to Ray’s close military cut, right at his hairline. It must have been from when he pulled his shirt over his head. It certainly wasn’t from Brad’s sheets. These were good, new sheets. “What was what?”

“You know, the thing that made you go all Mr. Darcy, I must have you now. We were sitting there and then you got triggered, and I wanna know what it was,” Ray said pointedly. Damn. He was smarter than he looked, this little banjo yodeler. 

Brad considered blowing him off. He considered rolling his eyes and pulling one of the pillows from the floor to whack Ray in the face. Then he...didn’t. Maybe it was the after sex calm, maybe it was the rightness, maybe it was because he still had seven minutes to pretend...but he didn’t. “It was your nose,” he admitted, and then shook his head. “I can’t say why, it’s one ugly busted-up whiskey tango nose.” 

The insults didn’t sway Ray. They never had, because he saw through them. His grin was so big that it reminded Brad of the cat from Alice in Wonderland. “That’s...so fucking gay, dude—tch! Wait! Lemme finish, damn,” Ray held up his arms to block the incoming pillow swipe that was aimed at his head. “I was gonna say , it’s not worse than mine.” 

Ah, interesting. Brad settled the pillow down on his stomach, but didn’t drop it. He still might need to smack him with a square of soft feathers. “What was yours?”

Ray hummed and settled back on the bed, hooking both arms under his head. His elbows fanned out and one brushed against Brad’s cheek. He pushed it away—he knew how dangerous those were; sharp like the talons of a hawk. “It was your wrist.” 

Brad’s laugh bubbled up like steam trying to escape his closed mouth. “...What?” 

“Shut up! Yeah, motherfucker, it was your wrist. I don’t know. I was walking out and I looked back and you were closing the door and your wrist was just, like, there, and I knew...I’m gonna have to bite that fucking wrist.” Ray laughed through his explanation, one hand freeing to gesticulate in the air. “I don’t know why. It just happened. Had to do it.” 

“And you did,” Brad said and a puff of air escaped from his nose as he dropped the pillow to inspect his wrist. Ray had bitten it at some point. Not hard, nothing that left a mark, but Brad could remember the feeling. He remembered the thought, too. Of course Ray was a biter . Of course he was. 

“And I fuckin’ did,” Ray agreed. Then he rolled over closer to Brad and for a moment Brad held his breath, sure that Ray was going to smell like the crusty bottom of a laundry basket—but when he breathed in, it wasn’t bad. It just smelled like...Ray. And for whatever insidious reason, that smell was not offensive. He had this realization while Ray hovered over him, inspecting his nose. “Is your nose good, homes? I nailed you pretty good. It wasn’t bleeding though so I figured it was fine. It’d be a shame if your nose got all bent out of shape. How would you be the prettiest boy at the ball then?” 

Brad tried to swallow the grin that rose up under Ray’s protection, like a secret message revealed with UV light. “It’s fine. And I promise you, nose damaged or not, I am still the prettiest boy at the ball. Besides, I’m sure I did worse to you.” 

“Yeah, you sure did,” Ray said, no thought given to it. He flopped back over once he was fully satisfied that Brad’s nose didn’t seem to take any damage. “But you should be happy to hear that I think I’m finally getting used to your giant viking porn cock.” Ray said this casually as he stretched out again before he tacked on: “It was good.” 

Brad frowned. “Good?” The motherfucking nerve. He stared at Ray until he looked over, and then held the gaze even as Ray erupted into laughter. “I’m sure you’ll want to reevaluate your adjective descriptor.” 

Ray rolled his eyes, and that finally cracked Brad’s faux annoyance. “Okay, god. You’re so fuckin’ dramatic. It was fabulous. Mind-blowing. It was like the moment when Dwight Clark made The Catch for the 49ers. It was all I could do to not just blow my load instantly.” Ray glanced over at Brad, and then started laughing with him. Giggling together in bed like 12-year-olds at a sleepover was truly not Brad’s style but...well, neither was Ray. Or so he thought. So who the fuck knew anymore. 

It can’t happen again. 

That voice that Brad had tucked away was back, and suddenly very loud. The shift in mood must have been visible on his face, because he watched that same shadow reflect on Ray. 

This could not happen. They were both active military, and for fucks sake, Brad was responsible for Ray. He was his Sergeant. And Ray was his RTO. And there were reasons why this sort of thing wasn’t allowed. Those reasons were hard to think of right now with Ray right next to him and the icy ache that gripped his chest, but he knew they existed. 

“Ray—” 

“I know.” Ray cut him off, but his voice didn’t sound cold, or angry, or sad. It just sounded...like he knew. Like he knew, and understood, and maybe even felt the same way. “It’s the last time.” Brad swallowed quietly while he waited for some signal of how Ray was taking it, how he was feeling, what he was thinking. Ray was hard to read sometimes. Brad thought it was because he was so used to absorbing everyone else’s emotions and churning out jokes and lighthearted mockery to brighten the mood. Maybe all those emotions got sloshed around in there, and like an elven cloak from Lord of the Rings, it granted him invisibility (what a nerdy thought, good thing he didn't say that out loud). 

But then Ray smiled, and that claw around Brad’s heart loosened just a tiny bit. “It was a damn good last time, though. You gotta admit.” 

Brad had slept with Ray four times, and it would never happen again. 

Chapter Text

Brad had slept with Ray four times, and it would never happen again. 

They’d agreed to this like very competent adults that deal with their problems head-on. It was formally accepted this holiest of accords at brunch, almost a week and a half later. Brad had planned to dole out the deal over breakfast, but Ray had not risen to face the world until noon and still insisted on a plate of chocolate chip pancakes like a four-year-old. So, Brad sat across from him, sipping his coffee while Ray stabbed at a plate of syrup soaked, whipped cream-topped monstrosities. 

“So,” Ray said, mouth full. Brad made a face, nose scrunched in distaste. It made Ray roll his eyes and purposefully chew faster. He swallowed and spread his hands, as if asking permission to continue. “Is this better, princess?” 

Brad scoffed. “I am not the princess here. You’re the princess. If we’re going to assign frivolous royal labels to ourselves then I’m certainly not the princess.” He had almost said that if he were going to be anyone, he’d be the queen, but he stopped himself short of presenting Ray with that particular gift. He would never hear the end of it, it would be 2050 and he’d be nearly dead and Ray would say ‘hey, remember when you called yourself a queen at brunch?’

“You know what? You’re right, Brad. You’re not a princess. You’ve got duchess vibes,” Ray corrected, and Brad clocked the way he swirled his fork on the plate. Ray was nervous. “I was trying to say that I think we should go out tonight.” 

Before Brad could even react to that insane statement, Ray held up his hand and took a sip of his orange juice. Yes, orange juice and chocolate chip pancakes—the breakfast of champions, apparently. Brad ate a forkful of his omelette while he waited for the necessary explanation. 

“ Not like that. I mean we go out tonight with some of the guys and do the kind of shit we used to do. You know, get fuckin bulldozed and find some hot bar ladies to eat out in the backseat of a range rover. Because I’ve figured it out homes. We’re just stuck in a cycle. That’s all it is. So, precedence says if we break that cycle, we can be free of it.” Ray accented his point by tapping his index finger forcefully on the table. “We just gotta get laid.” 

“Ray, when has that scenario ever played out for you?” Brad was 100% positive Ray had never picked up a girl at a bar and thus engaged in cunnlingus while in the backseat of a range rover. He cut into his omelette with this side of his fork. “I guess that plan sounds as good as any.” Truth be told, he was incredibly uninterested in trying to woo anyone at a bar or any other venue. Brad preferred, as he had claimed many times before, to simply pay for a service. If it was merely another body that would break this spell, then he would prefer to not expend energy in the search. His time and effort was better spent in the act itself. 

“It’ll work. I’m very intelligent. I’ve done the research,” Ray said, despite the fact that both he and Brad knew that no research was done. He shoveled some pancake into his mouth and stretched his arms high over his head. Brad caught the edge of his shirt inching up. He knew the happy trail that was just out of his sight, hidden by the table. “So you’ll come to Macklin’s tonight?” 

Against his better judgement, and despite the fact that he thought Macklin’s was a breeding ground for plebeians not fit to search for mates among proper society, Brad agreed and paid the check. 

And that was the story of how Brad ended up at Macklin’s at midnight, surrounded by drunken idiots and disturbing musical choices. It was karaoke night at the bar, which was a goddamn nightmare. Was there anything he wanted to do less than listen to drunken commoners spit all over a dying microphone to Love Shack while a captive audience cheered them on in a perfect example of the decline of humanity? No, there wasn’t. But here he was, because Ray had a plan, and he wanted more than anything for that plan to succeed.

By now, most of their friends had left. Kocher had shown up with a date, a perfectly fine young woman who reminded Brad a little bit of Whitney Houston (a giant compliment if there ever was one). They left a little before eleven. Walt, the ever-gracious designated driver, had ended up driving home a gaggle of loud, drunk marines to Dennys so he could ‘sober up the buck’ before he brought them back to base. Brad spared a thought for the poor wait staff at Dennys as he finished the last of his second and final beer. He wasn’t interested in getting drunk tonight. He’d learned by now that Drunk Brad seemed to make very poor choices. 

“Do you think God just straight up forgot to dash him with a sense of embarrassment?” Poke asked, his last present friend for the evening. He followed Tony’s eyebrow raise to the karaoke microphone where Ray was currently revving up the crowd to I Would Do Anything for Love . His arm was around some random man—some leather jacketed biker looking fellow with a big white beard and a belly that almost bumped into the microphone stand. Together, they swayed on the small platform while the group in front of them sang along and waved lighters in the air. Brad had tried very hard to tune it all out, and yet here was Poke, refusing to let him pretend this wasn’t happening. 

“I think there were many mistakes involved in his creation,” Brad countered. He shook his head and rolled his eyes at the scene one last time before he turned back to Poke, hoping that he’d offer up some new subject about how the world works. Preferably something along the lines of the bees are dying due to the white man’s colonialism. 

No such luck in Brad’s life. “Dawg, are we ever gonna talk about how he’s got you lookin’ like sad white boy on the front center of every romance movie poster in America?” Poke, it appeared, was done playing the game of denial. Brad stayed very still, gears churning, hand clenched around the beer bottle. Truth be told—Tony being forward about it was almost...a relief. Brad didn’t mind that Poke knew that he didn’t care much about the packaging of who he was fucking. Poke was part of a circle of close people in his life that he trusted. He didn’t consider himself out , but that was due to it being no one’s fucking business (and him having a job that would truly rather not know). He had parents who loved him, who raised him to be confident with who he was— arguably too confident at times. Poke being upfront about it was new, but neither of them cared . The general state and affair of his emotions, however? That was much more embarrassing, evident by the very pointed look Tony gave him over his beer. “Can we get real about this?”

Admitting that he liked Ray? No, that wasn’t a conversation he ever wanted to have. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Brad said, and instead of looking at Poke he searched the bar for Ray, who had since disengaged from entertaining the masses. He found him leaning against the bar, face flushed as he talked to a girl with very fashion-forward boots on. “And I would vastly prefer that we do not.” Brad did not want to get real. He wished to remain unreal. 

Poke sat across from him with a very unimpressed look. “Damn, I thought for sure once you fucked each other you’d go back to normal. I thought, here we go dawg, the iceman is swinging back, he’s about to be focused as a motherfucker now. But I was wrong, this whole tortured white angst, crying into the beer shit? It ain’t cute.” 

Brad turned sharply back to his friend. That was quite the information dump, and Brad had several points to make to the contrary (he was not in the throes of tortured angst, that was pathetic, and there were absolutely zero tears to be counted, thank you). But most importantly, how in the hell had that gotten out. “What do you mean?”

Poke’s face continued to look unimpressed. In fact, if he thought it were possible, Brad would have said he was the least impressed he’d ever seen Tony. “You think I can’t tell when two people start fucking? Like that shit doesn’t get all in the air.” Poke dipped his head and pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. “What’s the damn problem? Can we talk about it so I never have to bear witness to this kind of fucked up romantic comedy scene again and you can go back to standing up straight.” Poke’s mouth quirked up, like maybe there was a joke he was about to make, but he seemed to decide against it. 

“I don’t want to talk about it. There’s nothing to talk about. It would be a conversation of empty air,” Brad countered, though he was sure his ears were red by now. He was certain he hadn’t been that transparent. He blamed it entirely on the fact that Poke seemed to know more about him than he did himself, which was Poke’s problem, and not his. “I am not in angst, or longing, or anything of the sort. I don’t want anything to happen.” 

Poke hummed a bit, but he didn’t sound too convinced. Brad’s eyes slipped back to where Ray was. The girl he was talking to was sitting down now. Her hand was on Ray’s arm. He couldn’t see her face, but her legs were crossed and her boot bobbed as she jogged her leg. She seemed to match Ray’s energy, and he was smiling. His vaguely nasal voice was higher pitched, and Brad could catch a few words here and there. He was telling some story from Australia. 

He looked a little too long. Poke followed his gaze, and had enough to look back and forth between the two twice. “Dawg.” 

“Hm?” Brad turned back, eyebrows raised as Poke shook his head in disappointment. “What.” 

“What, he asks,” Poke said, like an omniscient narrator in a novel. “This is sad. You can’t say you don’t want anything to happen and then stare at the guy like he killed your damn dog while he’s chatting someone up. You know you just did that? Cause you really just did that, and it’s embarrassing. I’m getting second-hand embarrassment.” 

Oh my god, he did just do that. Somewhere along the line he had become a pathetic, pining asshole and that was enough to make him want to shovel a bunch of rusted metal shrapnel into his throat. Disgusting. Worse even? His friends were noticing. “I—” Brad blinked and shook his head. “It’s not important.” 

Poke scoffed and picked up his beer. “Sure it ain’t. But what’s the issue? You worried about DADT? Rank shit? The embarrassment that for some reason you like a man that looks like he could play a goblin in Lord of the Rings?” Poke made himself laugh with that one, and Brad rolled his eyes so he could push down the rebuttal that almost came out. Now was not the time to accentuate the point by defending Ray’s physical appearance.

Brad thought about the question instead. It took him a moment, but he finally decided that...no. No, it wasn’t DADT, it wasn’t his job, it wasn’t his rank. Those things certainly over-complicated it all, they played a big role but...no. It wasn’t that. “I don’t want a relationship. It’s not worth it.” 

Poke’s eyes narrowed in awareness. “Oh I get it. This is about—” 

“No, it’s not,” Brad snapped, voice strained in an effort to keep it below the threshold of chatter from the bar. “It’s not about that. It’s just common sense, and now is not a good time for anyone, and it’s not what I want , so we can leave it at that.” Ray’s laugh broke above the crowd noise and Brad looked over to catch his grin. It made his stomach churn. That was no polite laugh, that was a real one. Ray was all squinted eyes and deep dimples, so Brad rolled his eyes and turned back to his friend. “This is a stupid conversation.” 

Poke seemed to inspect him for a moment. Brad met his gaze as Poke crossed his arms over his chest. Unimpressed. “Sure is dawg. But not for the reasons you think.” Brad only raised one eyebrow and rubbed his face, a silent maybe so before he looked to the opposite side of the bar, away from Ray and Poke. He still caught Poke shaking his head out of his peripheral. “You spend a long enough time worried about losing shit instead of keeping shit, then guess what? You’re gonna lose it.” 

This kind of wisdom was unwelcome in Brad’s temple of denial. He mirrored Poke, crossing his arms and sitting back on the stool. He tried to roll his eyes at that, but the words settled in his chest faster and heavier than he expected. “Better that way anyway,” Brad said, and then licked his lips. “Besides, I have to have enough angst for the sequel I’ll be dragging you through.” 

That got him a laugh and Poke reached out and punched his shoulder, hard and fast. “I’m not seeing the sequel, this first one is shit. So unless it picks up in the second half I’m gonna be asking for a mother fucking refund.” Poke checked the clock over Brad’s shoulder and downed his drink. “I gotta get going.” 

“Yeah.” Brad nodded and straightened up, waving Poke off when he tried to pull out some cash. “I got it. Consider yourself refunded.” He smiled a bit, almost apologetically, but Poke didn’t seem all too bothered. After all, he was bothered by mostly everything, so Brad figured something had to be really extraordinary to push past Poke’s threshold for bullshit. 

“I usually don’t accept charity from the white man, but in this case it is fully owed.” Poke re-pocketed his wallet as he stood. As he did, Ray walked past. He was following the girl he’d been with. Brad saw her then, as she turned to the side to slide through the maze of bar chairs. She looked like the kind of girl Ray would like. Cute, bold, a little bit of an edge to her. Ray wiggled his eyebrows at Poke as he walked by, and for a second, Brad caught his gaze. He didn’t say anything, but the smile on Ray’s face wilted for a moment before it picked back up. 

Then he was gone. 

Cycle broken. 

“You aren’t gonna be all sad and drunk in this bar now, are you,” Poke asked, one hand on his hip, car keys in the other. 

Brad laughed. No, he wasn’t. He was going to be just fine. “I’m all good. I’m heading out too,” he said. He grabbed his motorcycle helmet from the other chair. “Sorry to disappoint you, but the show is over.” He meant it, too. He was okay. He felt...okay. Ray left with someone, and he’d have a good night and he’d be happy, and that was what the whole point of this was about. Moving on. Getting over the speed bump. He was glad. 

Poke didn’t seem to buy it entirely, but he didn’t seem worried. “Alright. We’ll see.” He pointed at Brad, suddenly very serious. “I’m gonna need you to settle this by the 20th though. No later.” 

What? Brad’s brow furrowed. “What? What does that mean?”

Poke waved him off. “Gina and I have a bet as to when the white boys are gonna get their shit together and hold hands. She said you weren’t gonna do it this month, I said you’d get it done before the 20th because the Brad I know didn’t fuck around and got shit handled. But now I’m pretty sure you’re gonna need an ass kicking and I don’t want to admit I was wrong so…” Poke pointed again. “The 20th.” 

The absolute ludicrousy of that entire sentence had shaved a few years off of Brad’s ever-waning life expectancy. There was a bet pertaining to his love life? How insulting. The injury he had received on this day would not be soon forgotten, it would come back and haunt Poke sooner than later. The next time he needed—wait. “Gina knows?” Not that Brad could... really judge Poke for sharing with his wife. 

Poke snorted. “Dawg. She knew before I did. Saw you makin’ eyes at Person when y’all came over for dinner with Walt and Gabe. If you wanna get real and talk to someone with good advice, she’s got a lot of opinions on how you both should be handling things.” 

No, no. That didn’t seem like a good time. Gina was a lovely person and Brad enjoyed her company very much but getting relationship advice from anyone, especially his best friend’s girl, was giving him actual hives. “Poke, don’t take this the wrong way, but I would rather join the reservists.” 

That was a bone-cutting statement, as far as Brad was concerned. Poke reacted accordingly, with a low whistle and fist slammed to his own chest: wounded. Mortally wounded. “I’m gonna tell her you said that.” 

Then they both left. The night air was nice and cool and Brad had not had nearly enough to drink to prevent him from taking his sweet time on the ride home. Even late at night, the scenic route was beautiful. He liked looking out over the ocean in the dark. It was so expansive, so never-ending—it made him feel very small, and that was just what he needed at a time like this. His problems were real, but the world was huge, and there were billions of problems out there right now. Some were worse, some weren’t. But they’d all pass eventually, one way or another.

The silence was pressing when he walked into his house. There was nothing like walking into the stillness of your own home, encased in darkness, not even the ticking of a clock to break the heaviness of it all. It had never bothered him before. He even used to find it peaceful and calming, like an oasis in a sea of busy . But lately, he’d come home to noise. Ray blasting some god awful radio station and boiling a pot for pasta on the stove, or shouting at the TV as some twelve-year-old kicked his ass in Halo. His absence right now just reminded Brad where he most certainly was instead.

Nope! Brad dropped his keys on his entry table and flicked on the lights. He sure wasn’t going to think about Ray right now. He was going to be in his oasis, and soak in the now or whatever it was that all of those hippie liberals talked about on those meditative nature walks (or as Brad liked to call it, a damn regular hike ).

Brad sat down at his kitchen table. It was small and circular, and he hadn’t liked it at all when he bought it. But his mom had insisted he get it. It fits the space better, you’ll see , she said, and Brad remembered standing there in the Target, pissy that he was even at Target, nearly certain that he would not see, because it would not fit the space better. 

Well. It did. It opened up the kitchen area, which had always seemed a little small. It was one long space—the front door led to the living room, and right behind that was his circle table and then the kitchen. Clean, concise, clear line of sight (which was both a good and bad thing, if he thought about it). All this to say that in the beginning he had not thought he’d be hanging onto this table for more than a few months, and now he was sure he’d stubbornly bring it to every new home he inhabited until it was ultimately passed down to another family member where it would continue to circulate within the Colberts for generations. 

Oh no.

Brad frowned at the table. He was in some state if basic furniture was starting to remind him of Ray. It wasn’t just the table, either. It was Ray’s shit all over it. A jacket tossed over the back of one of the chairs, a half-eaten and carelessly rolled bag of sour patch kids, a ratty and well-read book, a very stupid car air freshener (it was boobs); these were the things Ray had abandoned on Brad’s kitchen table. 

Yeugh. 

Okay! He had a plan. He was going to get another beer, catch up on the news, and then get a good sleep so he could wake up early and catch a few waves before he had to report to base. It was a nice, simple plan. It had no room at all for thinking about Ray, or comparing him to tables, or thinking about what he was doing right now while Brad compared him to a table. 

He grabbed a cold beer from his fridge and popped the lid open on the nice wall bottle opener he’d stuck on the edge of his kitchen counter—an investment well-used. As the top clattered into the small recycling bin underneath it, he slumped back into the chair and folded open the newspaper. On page six there was a story about a dog that had found her way back home after a tornado destroyed the family home six months ago. That was the kind of cute bullshit nonsense that would distract him, right? As he flipped the pages, his eyes kept wandering over to the book Ray had left on his table. What was the book, anyway? What was Ray reading?

Brad pursed his lips and set down the newspaper. Technically...looking at a book that had been left on his own property was not thinking about Ray. Technically, it was only a slight deviation from the initial plan of reading the newspaper. Justification successful, he reached over and pressed his hand to the cover of the book. It was worn, and parts of it had even peeled away: Ray clearly cared about his books the same amount that he cared for his other personal effects.

Jazz, by Toni Morrison. Brad knew who she was of course, but he hadn’t read anything from her. Most of what he’d read growing up were the “classics” as decided by his school curriculum (though Brad never knew who made the decision as to what became a classic and what didn’t). When he got older, his tastes had strayed toward non-fiction and autobiographical works. His fingers drifted over the creased cover, a deep royal purple with the letters in a dull gold. 

The innards, Brad soon discovered, were just as torn up as the cover. Pages were ear-marked, and he couldn’t leaf through for a second without a bright, highlighted passage that stuck out sharply on the cream colored pages. He also quickly noticed that Ray had scribbled notes on the inside. Some were short, in a code that Brad certainly couldn’t decipher. Others were longer—one he followed on the margins of at least four pages. Brad sipped the beer, cold and light on his tongue, and searched for something that stuck out. 

One page had a particularly important looking note. The highlighted phrase that Ray had riffed off of was sitting there neat in blocked letters: “ Violet learned then what she had forgotten until this moment: that laughter is serious. More complicated, more serious than tears.” Ray’s scribble, much less neat with words cut off due to the tight space he was trying to fill, read: You laugh when you’re happy, you laugh when you’re sad, when you’re nervous, when you’re mad. Don’t remember where I heard this but that whole laughter is the shortest distance between two people thing is real. I don’t think you know someone until you’ve seen them laugh. I mean really laugh too not the bullshit chuckle behind the hand. Comedians aren’t sad people, they’ve just really seen too many people. You look into too many souls, sometimes you fucking collapse. Violet forgot how to see people. Motif: laughter. Life motif: laughter. Never forget how to see people. 

It was almost uncomfortably deep. It was not the Ray that everyone else knew: the loud, foul-mouthed tiny devil that ran around chattering about conspiracy theories and new business endeavors. This was a Ray that Brad was sure only a few people knew. He was one of them. He’d met this Ray before. He’d met him late at night when conversations turned from playful mockery to real issues, like Brad’s break-up, or Ray’s childhood. It was the Ray that he saw when they slept together. Both versions were Ray, and one couldn’t exist without the other, but this Ray was...exclusive. 

Brad knew Ray was smart, he knew that before he joined the military he’d been considering going to college for philosophy (a waste of damn time, in Brad’s opinion). But reading this, Brad felt like he’d been reading a diary: something that wasn’t meant for anyone else’s eyes. It felt private, personal, and special all at once and it twisted something in his gut. The feeling was familiar and the name of it grazed his fingertips but he closed his hand and pushed it away. The feeling was not welcome at his table. The feeling was not part of his plan. 

Brad flipped the pages, skimming with his thumb until he stopped on another chunk of highlighted text. He didn’t even know what this book was about, or what drew Ray to read it as many times as he did. He was hoping somewhere in these passages he’d find the answer. 

“Anything that happens after this party breaks up is nothing. Everything is now. It's like war. Everyone is handsome, shining, just thinking about other people's blood. As though the red was flying from veins not theirs is facial makeup patented for its glow. Inspiriting. Glamorous. Afterward there will be some chatter and recapitulation of what went on; nothing though like the action itself and the beat that pumps the heart. In war or at a party everyone is wily, intriguing; goals are set and altered, alliances rearranged. Partners and rivals devastated; new pairings triumphant. The knockout possibilities knock Dorcas out because here— with grown-ups and as in war— people play for keeps.” 

Hmm. Brad scanned for Ray’s comment. Never been to a party like that, seems like a fuckin’ stressful event. Pretty sure this is the kind of beefed-up talk that gets river-cleaning highway-adopting liberals thinking they know what it’s like to be in a war. Brad grinned. Yeah, he could hear Ray saying that. He could hear the lisp in his voice, where he’d probably place his emphasis, even the kind of gestures he might make. Brad was so engaged in the thought that he almost missed an addition to the note, in different colored ink, closer to the bottom. I take it back. War is all about the now. For the winners. For the losers, all that matters is the after. But it’s still not glamorous. Plenty of handsome shining assholes though. I’ll give her that. 

He still had no damn idea what this book was about. Who was Dorcas and why was she comparing a party to war? Brad flipped the book over briefly, but there wasn’t much of a plot summary to give him any indication of what the issue was. He’d probably have to read it himself, which he wouldn’t actually ever get done. Besides, this was just a minor distraction. Soon he’d have to nicely stack all of Ray’s things, and clean the dishes in his sink, and then he’d go to bed and everything would be nice and normal. 

He reopened the book, this time to the first page because dammit he was going to get some understanding of this story if it killed him. He was halfway through the first page when his front door burst open with a bang and Brad froze, eyes lighting first on the trembling fern on the entry table that he now knew was much too close to the door, and then on Ray. 

“You motherfucker, you cockblocking motherfucker, you know what, you have some nerve. I was going to have a good night, you know, I was moving on because you said it was the last time, and I got to this girl’s house, her name was Nadine, and she was really fuckin’ cool by the way, she’s a really nice person, but I got all the way to her house and I walked in and everything felt fucking bad , and then all I could think about was your stupid pouty face at the bar, and I left , and for what! For what, Brad, for why did I leave Nadine, who was really fucking cool? Who the fuck knows? I don’t! There’s no fucking good reason for passing up optimal, prime pussy attached to an optimal prime human that was actually into me, and—are you reading my book?” 

Brad had not moved a muscle since Ray had exploded into his home. It was partly due to the shock of it happening at all (it was, after all, not in the plan). The other half of it was being caught snooping, sitting there at his table with a beer in one hand and Ray’s book in the other. “Uh…” His eyebrows rose, and for a beat neither of them moved. Then Brad closed the book. “No.” 

Ray looked about as confused as Brad felt, which was rich considering he was the one who had apparently driven all the way over here with the intent to, presumably, yell at Brad about how he hadn’t been able to seal the deal. “...You literally were Brad you can’t say No and close the book and act like you weren’t that’s—I mean it doesn’t even fuckin’ matter, homes. Actually, you should read it. I’ve got a lot of things to say about it and I don’t have anyone to talk to who has read it and I’m like...this close to just standing at a freeway exit and shouting it at cars that pass by—I have something to say.” 

Brad nodded silently, eyes just a little wider than normal. Clearly, Ray had something to say. He was talking in sweeping blocks with thoughts that seemed a little tangled. Brad had barely parsed through the first speech and couldn’t afford to bank to the second yet. “Yeah, I can see that you do. I’ve got a question for you though...in the swampland trailer park you grew up in, was it normal to just barge into other people’s homes unannounced at any hour of the night? Were you raised by Saint Nicholas’ elves? Do you have no concept of property ownership and trespassing?”

Ray took a deep breath and then let it out through a slightly closed mouth so his lips trilled together like a horse. Brad watched him think as the door remained open behind him. Ray’s truck was parked on the street. He’d have to move it before 0600 when the sweepers came around. “Yes, it was totally normal because we were so poor and swampy that we didn’t even have doors, Brad. Just open frames, and we’d have to make the knocking sounds with our mouths. As a child I grew up hearing the myth of doors. Knobs were a fuckin’ unicorn— No , Brad, obviously this is not a normal fucking occurance. And you were reading my book so obviously you have no concept of property ownership—wait, tch.” Ray pinched his nose and sunk his weight to one side. “You’re fucking distracting me. Stop distracting me.” 

“I’m distracting you?” Brad scoffed and rolled his eyes as he turned to face Ray. The chair creaked underneath him as he crossed his left knee over his leg. “How am I distracting you, you came here out of nowhere and have since said 94 percent of the words so I fail to see how I am the one being distracting at this moment.” Why had he left his door unlocked? Brad never left his door unlocked out of habit. It was an ingrained movement to close the door and lock it behind him. Why hadn’t he done that tonight? “You’re a little too comfortable in my space.” 

Ray threw his hands in the air with a sharp Ha! He even did a full turn, as if there were some crowd behind him he were gesturing too. Brad clamped down on his laugh but it still came out as a snort. “Ohoho, you think so, okay, we will get to that statement in a second because I have a point to make and you are gonna listen to it.” Ray pointed at him, nodding emphatically, and his eyes looked a little wild with his eyebrows hiked as high as they were. Brad couldn’t decipher this energy that was pouring out of him. It wasn’t anything clean—not anger, not sadness, not joy...nothing he could define. It was messy. Ray was messy. Brad settled back in his chair, hand outstretched with a regal roll of his wrist: a very well, go ahead if there had ever been one. 

“Okay, I came out tonight with the purpose of being fucked. That was the entire point. I even sang the sexiest song known to mankind so I could pick up some hottie with a nose ring and probably an anchor tattoo on her ankle. That’s a fuckin’ pipe dream for me, most nights, you know. But today whatever fuckin’ God decided to put a girl in that bar that was nice, and cool, and fuckin’ hot, and into me . And we hit it the fuck off. You know what, I could have fucked her, and I could have fucked her again, and we could have you know... maybe been happy, possibly, assholery permitting. I’m saying I had an out , Brad. I had a fuckin’ out. And I...didn’t take it. I didn’t take it! And that….is your problem. Yup. You owe me a good fuck.” Ray finished on a quieter note, but he sounded very sure as he put his hands on his hips and nodded his head. He chewed on his lip for a moment, contemplative, before he turned back to Brad. “Yeah you owe me some sex.” 

Brad was still trying to process everything that had happened in the last five minutes. The reality of what Ray was saying...that was something he didn’t want to touch with a ten foot pole. The implications that simmered right under the surface of Ray’s outburst were best left right where they were. He was so busy trying to shove away the fact that Ray had left someone else’s place to come to him that he almost missed the last part. “...What?” Brad almost laughed again, if only in disbelief. “I owe you sex?”

“Yes,” Ray said, and then paused and slumped his shoulders with a quick eye roll. “Well, no, you don’t owe me sex because that’s fucked up, right...but also, you owe me sex.” Then he smiled, and the knot in Brad’s stomach flipped. “I would have been rolling around in pretty smelling lady sheets if it weren’t for your dopey sad ass.” 

Oh, no. No one ever called Bradley Colbert dopey , that was a cardinal sin. Brad must have had a visceral and physical reaction to those words, because Ray chuckled and his nose scrunched up. “First of all, call me dopey again and I’ll be happy to introduce you to a mirror so you can learn the true definition of the word. Secondly—I fail to see how anything I did had any bearing on you failing to make it to home base. That sounds like a personal problem, Ray. And I am not a therapist.” As Brad spoke, he loosened. The tension that floated in through the open door seemed to dissipate. That always seemed to happen. The longer he talked to Ray the less... everything everything felt. 

“It just is.” Ray finally closed the door behind him. He locked it and Brad watched his hand linger on the doorknob for a few moments before he turned back. He kicked off his shoes by stepping on the heels and then shuffled his way into the kitchen where his eyes lit on the jacket he’d left behind. “Don’t ask questions. You took away my sex, you should henceforth provide some sex. I don’t make the rules.” 

Brad reached out to swipe the jacket off the chair and hand it to Ray, who took it and immediately started to string his arms through the holes. “I don’t think it works that way, and I did not take away your sex. You failed to follow through. It seems like you just maybe don’t want to get your dick wet tonight because she was clearly very into you. A vestigial growth could have sealed the deal.” Brad shrugged a shoulder and took a noncommittal sip of his beer because Ray’s lack of fucking was not his concern. It definitely shouldn’t have made him smile into the neck of his bottle, and it definitely shouldn’t have churned another knot over in his stomach. They were definitely knots. Brad did not get butterflies because he was not some prepubescent teen drawing hearts in a notebook during class.

Ray finished slugging his jacket on and huffed. “No, dumbass, obviously I want to fuck, alright. Since when do I not want to fuck. I just didn’t want to fuck her I wanted to fuck—” Ray sucked in a deep breathe to cut himself off and his hands came to grip around the back of the kitchen chair. There, arms locked, he arched his back and bared his throat to the ceiling like he was expecting a higher being to come down and smite him. Brad almost wished something would . They’d been very careful up until now about avoiding direct statements like that. It was important to the very beautiful world of denial Brad was crafting. 

No one seemed to be breathing in Brad’s house. He was sure even his friendly little fern had stopped photosynthesizing. He could hear the rush of blood in his ears (they must be very red) as he watched Ray lick his lips and hunch his shoulders, every muscle in his body tight until he finally let out his exhale. His elbows unlocked and he crashed down, bopping his head on the chairback. “—Why did you let me say that, I can’t fucking believe you.” 

The indignancy of that question bounced Brad back into reality. He blinked once, twice, and then pulled his chin back toward his neck so deeply it almost hurt. “Oh, I didn’t realize I had the ability to stop you from saying things. Had I known that there are several things I would have muted out of existence.” Brad meant it as a joke, an unconscious lightening to the heaviness that settled in just as it was starting to leave. That was a tactic he’d learned from Ray, but he didn’t seem interested in practicing what he preached. Instead, Ray pulled the chair out. It groaned against the hardwood and he slumped into it, tired and defeated. 

“This is a fucking mess,” Ray said, lips pressed into a thin line as he stared at the middle of the table. His arms came to rest over Brad’s discarded newspaper and Brad watched as Ray picked at his nails without looking at them. “...I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking.” 

Brad looked at him for a moment, silent. There had been so many things that would have driven him crazy tonight, if it had been any other person. Someone barging into his home? Anyone else might have gotten a swift elbow to the face. But he knew it was Ray before he even knew it was Ray, like the idea of anyone else intruding on this space at this house was impossible. So...he knew what Ray was thinking. He’d been thinking it too. Some big, jealous, unsilenceable part of him had hoped that Ray would come back to him, despite everything to the contrary. Despite the fact that he’d said, again and again, that nothing was happening here and whatever had happened would need to stop. 

But right then, he felt guilty. He felt...like a big storm that tore up everything in its path and now Ray was caught in the whirlwinds he made. Brad knew, at the heart of it, that it took two of them to make these decisions. He couldn’t claim all of this mess as much as he wanted to pull it off of Ray’s shoulders. This isn’t your fault. It’s me, I’m the one who can’t stay in line. 

Words like that were too big, they didn’t fit in his throat. He reached out and rested his hand on Ray’s arm. The jacket sleeves were thick, but he could feel the fabric give until he met the solid of Ray’s wrist underneath it all. He thought that said more, maybe, then he could with words. Or at least...he hoped it did. 

Ray’s neck rolled, almost comically, until his head was tilted down and he was staring at Brad’s hand on his arm. Together, they stared at the point of contact. “Your hand is on my arm,” Ray said, very factual. Out of the corner of Brad’s eye (he was still staring at his own hand) he saw the corners of Ray’s lips turn up. More importantly, the dimple dipped in. Brad appreciated the topography of Ray’s face, but the highlight was certainly that little dimple. 

“...So it is.” Brad nodded, still staring at his hand. He couldn’t help but smile himself. It all suddenly seemed so dramatic, like a scene in the movie where a husband has to comfort a wife who has just heard that her father has passed. The phone would be off the hook, cord dangling between them. A dial tone would ring through the air.  

The laughter was infectious. Brad couldn’t say who started it first, but soon they were both chuckling. “That’s dangerous, Brad,” Ray said, a lilt in his voice that hadn’t been there earlier. It was accompanied by a brightness in his eyes that inflated Brad’s lungs. “Especially since you know how I feel about your wrists.” 

That made Brad really laugh; the deep, belly kind of laugh that you have to turn away from. He ducked his head and almost pulled away his hand, but Ray’s hand clamped on top of it. “Too late to back out now, motherfucker,” he teased, but he was also laughing. And laughing, as Brad recently learned, was a very serious thing. 

That popped the bubble. Each time they met like this, the resistance felt like trying to match up two kitchen magnets at the center. The pushing, that was impossible. But there was a moment there when the magnetic poles created an arc between them, and the magnets could glide there, around each other, like orbits. That’s what this felt like. They couldn’t... be , you know, magnetic . But they could be like this. And Brad would take Ray’s orbit over nothing any day of the week. “So, what happened then? With Nadine?” 

Ray scoffed and shook his head, finally releasing Brad’s hand so he could rub the back of his neck. “Yeah, I feel shitty about that. She was just trying to get some dick and I fucked up her night but uh...no, she was cool. Like I said.” 

“What did you tell her?” Brad asked, knowing full well that he shouldn’t. He shouldn’t be asking those questions but he wanted to know. Not as a product of how he felt, but because Ray was his best friend, and best friends...they talked about that kind of stuff. Fucking or not, Brad cared about those things. “Shouldn’t feel shitty about that. There are a lot of things you should feel shitty for, Ray. Your fashion choices are one of many.” Brad gestured to the jacket. It was ill-fitting and looked like it was ten years old. Comfortable, Brad thought. But comfort did not a stylish outfit make. “But this shouldn’t be one of them.” 

In a quick swipe, Ray had nabbed Brad’s beer. He wiggled his eyebrows at Brad as he took a sip, and then frowned and held the bottle away to look at the label. “Fuck you, homes. This is something to feel shitty about. This is terrible. Why can’t you just stick to the basic American beers that this country was built on.” Ray waved a hand in the air, like he was wafting away distracting thoughts. “I uh…” He paused, and then glanced back to Brad. This look was different; a little more curious. Brad could almost see him debating himself, trying to decide which answer he was going to go with. He knew before he said it that it would be the truth. “I told her that I was trying to get over someone and I just wasn’t ready yet. I thought I was but I wasn’t. And then she said she was too, and we talked about it a little.” Ray held up his palm before Brad had a chance to respond. “Don’t worry, I know you’d rather take an electric eel to the dick before you let anyone talk about your business without your written permission . So I called you Blake. Your name is Blake, and you bake.”

“I cannot be responsible for your terrible palate, that is between you and the woman who had the misfortune to birth you.” Brad snatched his beer back, a little insulted at the implication that it was him with bad taste, and not Ray with literally no ability to discern a good beer if it sucked his dick. But his face softened as Ray continued. “...Blake sounds like a pussy,” he concluded.

Ray snorted and shook his head. “Yeah, well, he’s modeled after one, so.” The cheeky grin he ended that statement on almost made up for the wounding insult. Brad grabbed Ray’s packed of sour patch kids and launched it at his face. Ray squawked— but then he realized they were sour patch kids and unrolled the bag. As Brad watched him fish around for the red ones, he thought a little more. Underneath everything Ray said there was something very sad. Brad was someone he needed to get over. Brad knew what it felt like, to have to get over someone. It wasn’t the same scenario, clearly...but he knew that ache. 

“—I’m sorry,” Brad said. It felt like all he could say. Sorry to Ray, yes. But also sorry to himself. Sorry that he had met Ray when he did, and that their circumstances made everything so difficult. Mostly, he was sorry that Ray liked him . Maybe he had never fallen into Ray’s trap at all. Maybe Ray had fallen into his trap that he had unwittingly set. It was unfair. Because Brad knew, just like he knew that his beer was the best available, that even if they weren’t in the military, and even if rank wasn’t an issue, and DADT wasn’t an issue— he was still damaged goods. They would still be right here. Brad wasn’t a person who could do relationships. He didn’t want to do relationships. At least he hadn’t, for a long while. Maybe all the things everyone talked about were finally coming to pass: all that bullshit about time healing wounds, and distance raising him up, and the right person coming along to fill that hole...

“It’s okay,” Ray said, and he sounded like he meant it. He sounded...relieved, actually. Maybe saying that felt good. Imagine that concept: saying how you felt could feel good? Blasphemy. It didn’t work that way for Brad. He couldn’t just pop out and say hey, I like you a frightening amount and I’d like to do something about it but I can’t because there’s nothing to be done. He couldn’t say that, because that would lead to the door he didn’t want to open. 

He didn’t want a relationship. He didn’t want that high, because there was always, always a low. And fuck, yes, the highs with Ray would be sky scraping. But the lows...those would devastate him. And Brad couldn’t survive another rupture. He couldn’t do a relationship—but he could glide in this orbit. Maybe that was enough for the both of them. And God, that wasn’t fair to Ray. It wasn’t. He knew it. But Brad wasn’t strong enough to let him go. 

“You know,” Brad crossed his arms over his chest and extended his legs just enough so that his chair tipped back. “I’ve been thinking that owing you sex is a little different than organic fucking.”

Ray folded his hands underneath his chin and blinked at Brad, a move that was awfully endearing this late at night. “Well that’s a weird as fuck thing to say,” Ray said, eyebrows raised. “Please e-la-bo-rate.” Each syllable was accented and exaggerated.

Brad planned to. “They just seem to be two separate concepts, is all. So, technically speaking, the last time would still be...the last time, and this would be adjacent to that. Due to the fact that it is what you’re owed.” Brad grinned a bit, unable to keep a straight face through his own bullshit. Look, he tried. He tried, tonight, to follow his rules. He hadn’t broken them, so to speak. He merely added a few caveats. 

Ray’s nose scrunched up and his voice was tied up in laughter. “Oh, now you want to fuck. You couldn’t have wanted to fuck earlier when I was all fired up?” Ray shook his head and leaned back in the chair. His head rolled to the left and he raised an eyebrow at Brad. “Well, motherfucker, the mood was officially zapped so you’re gonna have to seduce me.” 

Well. That wasn’t happening. “I am not seducing you, Ray.” Quite frankly, Brad thought his mere presence should have been seductive enough. 

“You’re gonna have to.” Ray’s eyebrows wiggled and his smile grew like the phases of a moon. “Come on, you know how to do it. A little flattery? Tell me I’m the most handsomest man you ever did see? Pick some flowers from your backyard for me? Grill me a midnight steak? Do a little dance in the living room?”

Everything on that list was giving Brad a verifiable allergic reaction. “No. Absolutely not.” He shook his head and started to stack the things on his kitchen table. It wasn’t until he was halfway through that he realized he should separate his things from Ray’s things. 

Ray slumped, and Brad didn’t need to look at him to know the exact kind of pout that he was doing. “Tch, fine then.” There was a brief pause. “I guess I’ll just have to seduce you.” 

Brad stood up from the table. He was not going to validate this conversation any further with that ridiculous statement up for grabs. “Ray, I say this truthfully, from the heart—that is simply not possible.” Oh, it was very possible. Apparently, Ray didn’t need to do a damn thing to seduce Brad. Half the time Ray could be doing something so repulsive that it could be considered anti-seduction, and Brad would still be interested. 

But Ray sure as shit didn’t need to know that. 

“Are you sure about that,” Ray said from behind Brad as he dumped the last bit of beer from his bottle into the sink before he dropped it in the recycling bin. When he turned around, he was faced with Ray draping himself over the kitchen counter, eyelashes fluttering as his hand made a sweeping motion right under his... oh for fucks sake. 

“Your nose does not turn me on, Ray,” Brad said, despite the fact that it...sure did the last time. And even now, when it had no discernable reason to interest him, he felt his cheeks warm. It wasn’t the damn nose, it was the ridiculousness of it all. He would not let Ray get away with thinking his nose had the power to summon erections from the deep. That was something he’d never be able to live down. 

Ray waggled a finger at him. “That wasn’t what I heard last time, Bradley. Don’t be ashamed, this face has brought even the strongest of people to their knees. I’m like Helen of Troy.”

Brad did not dignify that with a response either. He merely eyed Ray over his shoulder as he started to rinse the few dishes that were left in his sink. Brad normally cleaned them right away, but schedule not permitting, he would always clean them before he went to sleep. Usually it was a meditative experience. Tonight it was a turnstile that he had to get past. “Helen of Troy was the most beautiful woman in the world.” Tch, he wasn’t planning on commenting. Alas. “Your nose is the exact thing that disqualifies you.” 

He heard Ray moan and knew exactly what he was doing: hand to his chest, knees buckling under him as if he’d been shot by an arrow in the heart. “You wound me. Don’t know how I’ll recover. You know who would never say those things to me?” Ray came around Brad’s side and opened the dishwasher. That was the extent of his assistance, it seemed. “Blake would never do this to me.” 

“Why don’t you go see him then?” Brad grinned as he bent down to place a bowl in the dishwasher. “Since you seem to be missing him so much. I would hate to stand in the way of star-crossed lovers.” 

Ray leaned against his counter. Brad caught the sheen of his bony knuckles as he gripped it from behind. “I should go see him. He’d probably greet me with some brownies and a candle-lit bake spread. It was his dream to open up Blake’s Bakery, after all.”

The snort that came out of Brad’s nose was a little too loud. He finished loading the dishwasher and hooked it up with his foot until he could grab it with his hand and click it shut. He jabbed the on button with his finger. “It’s surprising you would use baking in this imaginary scenario, seeing as you couldn’t follow a recipe if your life depended on it.” 

“That’s because I don’t need a recipe, Brad. I've evolved past the need. It’s all in the eye, homes. But don’t worry, I know that not everyone has reached this advanced stage in their baking career. You shouldn’t feel ashamed that you still have to follow the recipe.” Ray said this with an air of trickery to him. He knew exactly what he was doing, and Brad knew what he was doing. His knowledge did nothing to stop his reaction. 

“Ray, baking is an exact science. You cannot eye the measurements. That is why the measurements are measured. Because the cohesion of the baked good requires very specific parameters. You can’t just grab a handful of flour and toss it in the bowl and call it baking. That is incorrect chaos, and I won’t be tolerating it in my kitchen.” Brad crossed his arms over his chest as Ray laughed hard enough that he had to bend over to catch his breath. It made Brad want to simultaneously kick his tiny ass out of his house and toss that same ass onto his bed. 

Especially since that ass was now rummaging through his cabinets. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m looking for the ingredients I’m gonna need to make you muffins and prove you extremely fuckin’ wrong, that’s what I’m doing.” Ray lifted up to his toes to look into a higher cabinet, which would have distracted Brad entirely had he not been so perturbed by that statement. 

The bridge of his nose would certainly have lasting imprints from being pinched as frequently as it had been in the last few months. “Get into the bedroom and out of my cabinets before I call animal control.” Muffins. The insanity of it all. “You will not be making muffins in my kitchen unless you plan to follow the recipe .” 

“Oh, we’ll see,” Ray said. He pulled away from the cabinets anyway, and Brad tried to read the expression on his face. If his own experience was anything to go by, he’d say that at some point in the last five minutes, Ray had been properly seduced. The skin around his eyes had a tightness to it and his tongue kept sliding out to glide over his lips like a snake testing the air. “I still haven’t gotten my grand seduction gesture.” 

But they both knew that somehow, he had. Brad couldn’t begin to place what it was. Maybe it was the insults that Ray had always understood meant the exact opposite. Maybe it was the recipe rant. Maybe it had even been the dishwashing; after all, Brad had found himself entranced by Ray completing many mundane tasks. 

Whatever it may have been didn’t matter soon enough, because whatever it was had them both heading to the bedroom with a bit of urgency. Somewhere in that short walk from point A to point B, Brad thought about how easily that urgency came up—but also of how easily he could have made the choice to disengage. 

Fuck that. He was going to fuck that .    

Brad stared up at the ceiling a while later. He was tired now. It was late, and he had expended a lot of energy in the past hour. It was almost three thirty now and he would have been getting up in just an hour or two to surf. His entire plan had been stripped from the book, crumpled up, and tossed overhand into the trash bin. 

It didn’t bother him as much as he thought it would. 

“You should really read that book,” Ray said. He was laying pretty close and he had bunched up the pillow under his head for more lift. Brad wondered if maybe he should get an extra pillow, and then remembered that Ray would certainly not be in here again so it would not be an issue. “One of my favorites, you know? And no one has read it. It’s a fuckin’ travesty.” 

“Why do you like it?” Brad asked. He took in a deep breath and closed his eyes. The idle conversation was nice, but he could feel himself drifting. He focused in despite his sleepiness, genuinely interested in the answer. 

Ray didn’t answer right away. He could feel him fumbling around, trying to get comfortable, yanking the covers a little more to his side. Brad thought about getting up and grabbing him another blanket but he was tired , and Ray knew where they were. “It’s a complicated book, you know? Different from a lot of the shit I read in school. Shit like The Great Gatsby or Grapes of Wrath or like...The Scarlet Letter. Those books are good too but— I don’t know it’s just the same kind of perspective over and over again. Like I’ve read enough about the white man’s struggle, as Poke would say. The way this book deals with violence, and the repercussions of generations of violence, and displacement and motherhood and community and, you know, jazz . It’s just so fucking good. It’s different. It makes me think. I like shit that makes me think about something that I would never have to think about. That’s the only way we get change in the world, right? Perspective. Books are a hell of a way to do that. Nothing helps you see where someone is coming from like a book.” 

Brad had opened his eyes at some point during that talk, just so he could watch Ray while he spoke. Ray wasn’t looking at him. He was staring up at the ceiling with one hand resting on his stomach. He gestured lazily from its resting place there, accentuating his words. He looked very peaceful. Brad didn’t know if that was from the fucking or the conversation. Maybe both. 

“I mean, I know books aren’t gonna change the world, I’m not a fucking moron. I just think, you know, the ability to look outside yourself and shit like that? Readers are good at that. Because they do it all the damn time.” Ray paused, and Brad watched the corner of his mouth twist up in a smile. “Eh, mostly. There are definitely racist, sexist, all other kinds of -ist readers out there. But it still helps, if you ask me.” His eyes slid over to Brad, smile still in place. “So fuckin’ read it, homes.” 

Brad flipped the covers off of him and got out of bed. “Well, now I have to,” he said, because he sure did after that speech. Besides, if it made Ray happy, and it had the benefit of being a good book, then what was the harm in that? He stepped half-way out into the hallway to open his linen closet and wrap his hands around the fluffy blue blanket he usually saved for winter. “You have a part you liked the best?”

Ray watched him bring the blanket back with a curious little smirk. Brad threw the blanket at his face to get rid of it. By the time he got back under his covers, Ray had unfolded the blanket and covered himself up all the way to his neck. “You’ll have to find out.” 

Of course. Brad rolled his eyes, but the little challenge that lingered in those words did excite him. Really, the idea of travelling through the sea of Ray’s notes to locate his favorite passage was kind of enticing. “Fine.” Brad rolled over on his side and suddenly felt a pang of anxiety at how normal that felt. The first time he’d slept with Ray, they’d shared the bed out of sheer drunkenness. The second time, they hadn’t. Ray had left after a while, unwilling to cross that line. The third time, though...he stayed. And he’d stayed the last time too. And now, after just three times, Brad found himself bothered by his own unbotheredness. This should bother him. Why didn’t it? 

How bothersome. 

“May I do the honors this time?” Ray seemed to sense Brad’s discomfort, or so Brad discerned based on the tone of his voice. He was facing away by now, and had no urge to turn back. 

“What honors?” Brad checked the clock on the nightstand. With one hand he deftly changed the alarm from five to seven. 

Ray shuffled again, and Brad waited for his answer. He could picture his position, tight in a ball. He knew by now that it wouldn’t last. Ray slept like he was possessed by a demon. The closest reference Brad had for it was like a spreading starfish over the sea floor. It didn’t matter where you went to get away from a limb. Eventually, that limb would crawl its way into your personal space. “This is the last time,” Ray finally said. 

Brad almost smiled. Almost. Because dammit, it was the truth. It wasn’t even the last time, really, as this had been an adjacent event. It was the last time, adjacent to the previous last time. But it was nice. It was an ending. Closure, as some people call it. 

That’s what Brad told himself as he finally started to drift to sleep. He’d blame the tiredness on the lack of sensical arguments re:closure. Closure? This was far from closing anything, and he knew it. His walls of denial were made of wood. Stronger than straw, but the harder that wolf blew, the more they started to shake. 

But it was still standing. 

Brad had slept with Ray five times. 

It would be the last time.

Chapter Text

Brad had slept with Ray five times, and it would never happen again. 

If he were to be technical (and a technical man he was), then it was really only four times because the fifth time had been tangential. There were several reasons for discrediting ‘fuck five’ and they were so clear and obvious that Brad didn’t even take the time to sort through them. It was four times...and maybe a half. Four and a half.

That half had changed things regardless. Brad couldn’t really put his thumb down on what it was. It reminded him of those old, ridiculous toys that children used to play with. The tubes filled with some kind of gel that would slip and flop out of your hand when you squeezed it—he couldn’t grapple with all the unspoken elements of their purposefully undefined not-relationship anymore. The only thing he knew for sure was that it was getting harder and harder to tell himself that this was just sex. The further they got away from that benchmark the more entrenched Brad felt in the hole they were digging. Soon it would be too high for him to climb out. 

But still...only four and a half.

Brad thought about how four and a half was definitely better than five as they passed through the hills that some people called mountains on their way up north to Brad’s childhood home. Ray was driving, overlapping the cars he deemed glacial slow with a heavy foot to the gas pedal. His truck, old but still standing, groaned with the effort. It sounded like a monster yawning after sleeping in the earth’s crust for a millennium. Every time there was a slight incline, Brad worried that the truck would wheeze and hack and they’d end up walking to his parents’ house on foot—only Ray would never leave the damn thing behind so they’d have to lug it along with them like a whale carcass. Not that Brad could judge him for that. He never left a vehicle behind himself. 

A sweaty truck-pull through California might actually be preferable to the weekend he was about to spend with extended family. Look, Brad loved them. He did! They were great people, and he loved them as much as you could love someone while still being endlessly irritated by their presence. That’s family, right? If it were just his parents and his sisters, that would be welcomed. But the extended cavalry of cousins and aunts and uncles? He’d been dreading it for nearly two weeks and he had not been subtle about it. Over the past two weeks, Brad found ways to inject every conversation with a mandatory complaint about the upcoming trip in the hopes that Ray might take a heavy hint and spare him from asking out loud. 

So he was not surprised when Ray popped up last night, keys twirling on his finger like he was showing up in a glistening suit of armor with a fabled lost sword instead of his shitty truck with a stash of old oreos under the passenger seat. Brad could faux-complain all he wanted (and he did), but Ray coming with him was exactly what he wanted. After all, you never send a man in alone, right? Now he had backup. It was 70% the fact that he needed a buffer— Ray would be the perfect sponge to suck up his cousins’ attention— and 30% the fact that he liked Ray’s company. Ray was his best friend, and he was allowed to enjoy his company, four and a half fucks aside. 

But right now that best friend was trying his fucking patience. He had given Ray a three-song leeway, meaning Brad would allow exactly three songs to play that he hated, for Ray’s sake, and none thereafter. His limit was reached. He already had to sit through Friends in Low Places while Ray butchered the chorus, and that was hard enough. When the tell-tale vocals of Kiss from a Rose started to pump through the speakers, Brad automatically reached forward to change the station. 

“Don’t you motherfucking dare change this station.” The ferocity in Ray’s voice made Brad pause, finger barely brushing against the knob of the radio. Before he had the chance to reevaluate, Ray was smacking his hand away like he was trying to bat a fly out of the air. “I’m driving, my rules, my songs. This song is mythical Bradley, you uncultured bastard.” The side-eye Ray treated Brad with was strong enough to cook an egg. 

Fine. Brad leaned back in the seat, set to pout by staring gloomily out the window in a show of protest against this level of radio dictatorship. Unfortunately, it was very hard to resist the song once it started. 

Or maybe it was the fact that Ray was singing along to it so dramatically. Brad couldn’t quite swallow the grin as his faithful driver hit the high note on ‘you became’. Ray tossed his head back and bared his throat to the road ahead of them, eyes squeezed shut in wild passion for...Seal, apparently. Not to mention a reckless abandonment of his main function right now, driving the car . Brad almost said something about that, but then Ray was looking at him with that ridiculous love ballad, boy band angst. He sang at him loud and silly and full of purpose— But did you know that when it snows my eyes become large and the light that you shine can be seen.

Dammit. Well, now he had to join the chorus, didn’t he? It was a car passenger rule. Besides, he’d rather sing along than just stare at Ray singing, grinning like some hapless moron being wooed by the song from fucking Batman.

So he joined in, even if he knew he couldn’t carry a tune to save his life. Brad could do a great many things, but remaining on pitch was simply not one of them. He usually kept his humming to himself but Ray had a habit of bringing out the unabashed and unashamed in everyone he came across. It didn’t matter that Brad couldn’t sing, Ray never seemed to care. It wasn’t about that. “Baby, I compare you to a kiss from a rose on the gray—” 

Full stop. 

Brad nearly fully turned to Ray, body twisting in the car seat. “Did you just say gray?”

Ray frowned, clearly disappointed that his belting had been cut short. Both his hands drummed lightly on the steering wheel as he shot Brad a distracted look, head still lightly bobbing to the sway of the song. “What? Yeah. That’s the lyric.” 

The absolute absurdity. It was surely not. Brad’s lips twisted into another smile and he turned away so that it would not be mistaken for any kind of fond affection. It wasn’t that at all. Clearly,  it was plain and normal friendly mockery for getting something very wrong. “It’s definitely not. It’s on the grave , Ray.” Brad reached out to turn the volume knob down a notch so he could hear Ray’s response over all the rose kissing happening. 

He really didn’t need to, in hindsight. Ray’s indignant scoff was loud enough that the people in the car behind them probably heard it. “Bull shit , on the grave. It’s the gray.” Ray smacked his palm against the steering wheel when the chorus came around again and then excitedly pointed at the radio in the truck, as if he possessed some kind of futuristic lyric translating system that would prove him right. “See? There’s no V. Show me the ‘vvvv’ in grave. You can’t.” Ray leaned back, smug and triumphant with his argument. Brad didn’t even need to look over to read the cheeky little tilt of his right eyebrow and the purse of his lips. 

That stupid eyebrow was wrong , though. When Brad listened, he could hear it. It was subtle, swallowed by the music as it trailed off at the end of the word, but he could hear it. Besides, even if he couldn’t, even if it wasn’t there— in what world did gray make more sense than grave? That point alone brought a furrow to Brad’s brow. “What the fuck is gray ? Gray isn’t anything, why would it be gray?” He shifted in the seat. Ray’s truck was actually fairly roomly compared to other accommodations, but his legs still got a bit restless after a few hours. There was likely some psychological reasoning for being able to remain still and perfectly calm for hours during a mission in a tight humvee but not being able to replicate the same behavior on a peaceful drive through California. It existed, sure. Brad was not interested in it. 

Ray rolled his eyes slowly and shook his head like a tired preschool teacher trying to explain why the sun disappears at night. “It’s a metaphor , Sugartits. It’s like, you know...depression. Sadness. Loneliness. And then the person is the rose that changes all of that. The point of color and growth in all that gray space .” 

Brad blinked. “...No.” It was a general statement meant to cover two things at once: Ray’s metaphor defense, and the nickname Sugartits . He would accept neither of those things, thank you very much. 

Ray scoffed, insulted that his argument hadn’t been accepted. “Yes!” Brad could hear the simmering frustration in his voice. By now, he could tell the subtle differences in annoyance levels and when it was appropriate to back off, lest he suffer a truly radioactive glare and a petty silence for the rest of the drive. This wasn’t anywhere near close to that. If anything, Brad knew Ray liked this kind of playful, useless arguing. “You can’t just say no and not offer a counter argument, that’s stupid. I’m right. You just don’t want to admit it.” 

Ah, there’s a truth. If Ray were right, Brad would not want to admit it. But that wasn’t what was happening here. Ray wasn’t right—Brad just lacked the ability to firmly prove his point. “No, it’s grave. It is not my fault your ears are too broken from years of shitty country music and that terrible band you were in to hear the words correctly. All the proof I need is in the song.” Brad pulled his water bottle from the cupholder and took a long sip. The water wasn’t very cold anymore, but the condensation still made his hand wet. Wet enough that when he set the bottle back into place he reached over to wipe his hand on Ray’s arm. His fingers swiped the edge of Ray’s cotton t-shirt.

It got the desired response. Ray’s indignant shout made him laugh and Brad dipped back toward the window to avoid the hand that came out to whack him. “I will pull this car over. First you assault me with your flagrant disregard for Seal and his lyrical genius and then you use me like a dish towel.” Even as he ranted, Ray couldn’t keep a straight face. The crooked grin emerged halfway through his snappy words and Brad had to resist a very real urge to reach out and dig his knuckle into the dimple there.

He wondered very briefly if Ray also had things he had to resist doing. He must have, logically, but there was still that waffling part of Brad that couldn’t be certain. It was a train of thought he couldn’t follow at the moment, trapped in the truck with Ray, so he didn’t even allow the train to leave the station. Instead he shrugged one shoulder, very nonchalant, and looked regally out the window like a king surveying his land. “You can go ahead and pull over. It’ll still be grave.” 

In a picture perfect moment of the straw that broke the camel’s back, Ray tossed his head back against the seat and let out a strange sound of deep, guttural frustration. It only made Brad smile to know that he could also poke at Ray’s so-called ‘pissy points’. Sure, Brad’s might be easier to find, but Ray’s were much more satisfying. “Why would it be grave! Why. Why, Brad, out of all the hills to fucking die on, you’ve chosen this one? It’s not grave! And we missed the song. I’m resetting your three song limit.”

He sure was not . Brad didn’t care if Ray pulled over and tried to fist fight him on the freeway, he was not resetting his three song limit. He had suffered enough. But Brad knew by now that the best way to get Ray to not do something was to disengage with that thing. So he didn’t deny him. Instead, he focused on the meaning of grave in the context of the song. He understood Ray’s earlier metaphor, but he thought grave made more sense . “I don’t know. Death, loss, grief, renewal?” Brad shifted in his seat again and drummed long fingers against his knee. “Like beauty coming out of tragedy. You’re the one that was all wrapped up in the metaphor of it all. This metaphor makes more sense.” 

That seemed to make Ray think. Brad watched him mull over that thought like a donkey chewing hay. Even his jaw seemed to move around as he wrestled with the inevitability that Brad was entirely right. His lips pursed and made a loud sucking sound. “I don’t like it.” Well. That was as close to an admission as Brad would ever get from Ray. He’d take it. “I like gray. It connects back to the first lyric. Evidentiary support to my claim...where’s your evidentiary support, Bradley.” 

Evidentiary support. What a nerd. He must have been really annoying to debate with. Brad was starting to think that maybe all his teammates didn’t think he was on drugs, they just thought he was goddamn annoying—a thought which, at first, Brad found funny. Then it pissed him off a little. Ray was annoying, yeah, but fuck anyone who thought it. People who didn’t embrace all of him were missing out on something really great. 

However, more important things were at stake in this moment. Ray’s honor was not one of them. “Well it doesn’t matter what you like,” Brad said haughtily, eyes scanning for the road signs ahead. They were nearing their stop for the night. “It matters what Seal likes.” 

“Homes, Seal doesn’t even know what Seal likes,” Ray countered, snorting as he blindly reached for his own water bottle. He grabbed Brad’s instead, but that didn’t matter. Brad let his guzzle down the rest of the bottle like a drain. He had to wipe his mouth with the back of his hand to catch the dribble before he could finish his thought. “He’s spent his entire career avoiding this song, hasn’t he?” 

Yeah, maybe so. Maybe so. But Brad didn’t care. He was right. “It’s grave.” 

Ray slowly turned to look at him, taking his eyes off the road to hit Brad with the hard, dead-eyed stare of a man close to the edge. “Brad. I’m going to put you in the grave.” 

“Great, I welcome your attempt. It’ll be like a little scruffy rat trying to kill a mountain lion.” Brad was the mountain lion, in case that needed clarification. But then the exit Brad was looking for breached his view in the distance and he tapped Ray’s shoulder and took the empty water bottle from his outstretched hand.  “Pull off here, we’re stopping in Pismo.” 

“What?” Ray squinted ahead at the exit Brad was pointing too and furrowed his brow. “Why? I’m not tired. We can make it to your parents’ in one go, it’s not that long of a drive.” But Brad heard the click of his turn signal anyway as he started to check his blindspots and merge into the next lane. 

As the exit came closer, Brad felt a slight spike of anxiety in his chest. He’d been so sure about it before, but now he almost wanted to drive right past it and keep going. Like Ray said, it was a very doable drive. Through a collection of sheer stubbornness and gluttony for his own punishment, he held steady. “I know. It’s tradition.” Brad cast his eyes downward and attempted to ignore the feeling of Ray’s eyes on him. “I like the waves here.” 

It was a good out because it wasn’t a lie in the slightest. Brad did like the waves here. It was part of the reason he had always stopped here on the drives over. It was a nice little beach town, and even if he’d never admit it...he liked a little bit of the kitchy, homegrown and beachy vibes the place gave off. 

Ray seemed to buy that part, at least. “Oh, this is a surf thing,” He said, nodding his head slightly as he pulled off the exit. 

Brad’s mouth pulled down into a tight frown as they left the freeway. Ray continued talking, but his voice had gotten just a little softer. It usually had a bit of a nasally quality to it, but he reacted to Brad’s sudden clamming up by sanding down his own edges. “Okay,” Ray said. “But I’m not sleeping in the truck so you’re getting a hotel room. And it better be a fucking nice one. I want a spa tub.” 

Brad busied himself by picking up the trash from the fast food and making sure it was all tucked away in the big bag for an easy clean-up. It was mostly already collected. He should have had the forethought to leave a mess so it would be ready to distract him when he needed it. “I already have one,” Brad muttered, straightening back up on his seat. He’d made his reservation ahead of time because he was a very prepared individual by nature—and doing so would ensure that he wouldn’t get cold feet at the last moment.  

“—you okay?” Ray brought the car to a slow stop at the light and reached out to push against Brad’s bicep. “Are you upset that I was right? It’s alright, it’s okay to be wrong sometimes. That’s how you grow as an individual.” Ray’s smug grin only partly covered the round concern of his eyes. Brad met them for a moment, deep and warm like the hollowed opening of a volcano. 

The last time Brad was here, he’d been in the driver’s seat. He remembered she’d been sleeping, forehead up against the window and long hair braided over her shoulder. He remembered stepping on the brake carefully so she wouldn’t jolt or hit her head on the side—

He shook it off. The feelings were only remnant. Memories, that’s all. Like the wisps of smoke that stay after you put out a candle. It was silly, really, how much it still hurt. The ache was made worse by his own thoughts pressing in on him: his own disdain for the fact that anyone was able to hurt him like that in the first place. He used to scoff and laugh at dramatic romance movies, all the tears and longing and heartbreak. Brad thought he was above it, for some reason. Like because of who he was as a person, because he was strong and smart and rational above all else...it wouldn’t happen to him. 

But it did. And a year later he was still trying to untangle the parts of him from their life together. Brad rubbed his nose and pointed to the left ahead to make sure Ray took the correct street. “Yeah. I’m fine. I’m tired of being in the car.” 

“Okay,” Ray said, and despite the word Brad knew right away that he didn’t believe him and wouldn’t be letting it go. Sometimes, Brad got lucky. Sometimes, Ray picked up on a mood and decided to let Brad simmer in it. Other times he became intent on digging Brad out of the funk like a stubborn pimple. “I might believe that if we hadn’t spent way longer in an enclosed vehicle before. And this one has AC and a kick ass radio so…” Ray looked over at him again, ignoring how Brad pointed back to the windshield in a wordless watch the road . “What’s up?”

Well, he might as well get it over with. “We used to stop here,” Brad said, voice straining to sound as unbothered as possible. Unfortunately, as stone-like as Brad liked to think he was, the material that formed his emotional complex was much, much softer. Instead of frowning, he grimaced in a tight, uncomfortable smile. “When we’d drive up back home. We would come this way to catch the waves in the morning before we went on.” 

He tried to look at Ray then, to make sure Ray saw that he was super okay with this all. You know, it was no big deal. Just a little dramatic heartbreak with the person he was set to spend his life with. His smile strategy did not have the intended effect. Ray looked worried. “Oh,” he said, fingers squeezing the steering wheel. The line of his lips read like pity, but Brad tried not to take that to heart. He had—he used to. But he’d been trying to translate that differently in his head. Ray didn’t pity him, he just cared. There was a difference there. Or...there had to be, because otherwise Brad would go insane. 

Then he watched the worry shift into confusion as Ray scrunched up his nose. It was still a really cute nose. Brad had another urge he had to resist— the desire to reach out and run his finger down it, from the brow to the tip. Ray continued, unaware of the urge Brad stomped on. “Then why the fuck are we stopping?” 

Brad shrugged, as if he hadn’t asked himself that very question several times. “I did it before her,” he said. “So I’m doing it after her.” He refused to change his own life because of this. He’d liked this place, and he would like it with or without her. It was important to him that he didn’t lose anything else. Brad liked his routines. He wanted to keep them. 

His agitation with his own stubbornness spilled out a little. He couldn’t quite contain it and finally Ray’s stare felt too analyzing. “What?” Brad licked his lips, trying to cover up some of the venom that had slipped out in that single word. He didn’t mean to be harsh. Especially not with Ray, who had driven all this way with him, who had done more to pull Brad out of the hole than he could ever realize. 

Luckily, Ray didn’t seem to take offense. It was truly lucky, because Brad had certainly offended Ray before on much simpler calls than this. Instead, Ray just flicked up a hand, palm facing the windshield. “Nothing, nothing. Chill, it makes sense.” Brad watched Ray’s tongue glide over his own lips. He didn’t look at Brad, just drummed his hands rhythmically on the steering wheel, popping to sit up straighter as they started to drive into town. “Okay where am I going? You gotta direct me.”

Disengagement. Brad let out a small sigh of relief and felt the tension leave his shoulders. “Take the left at the light. It’s right on the beach.” It was a nice enough hotel. Not the most expensive one, but nothing minimal either. It had a bit of a sea cottage vibe and Brad didn’t love it...but he also didn’t hate it. He liked their starfish soap and he had a feeling Ray would get a kick out of it. He was sure the morning would end with Ray requesting six hotel soaps from the front desk to load into his duffle bag. For the next six months Brad would find starfish soap hidden around his house in various places—a thought that Brad quickly shut down. He couldn’t start allowing himself to think that far into the future in regards to Ray. They weren’t supposed to have a future like that.

“On the beach, huh? Sexy.” Ray drew out the ‘s’ sound, slipping over the word like a snake with a little wiggle of his shoulders. Brad rolled his eyes, but the smile on his face was no longer a grimace. “Are you gonna wear one of those little beach dress things and go collecting seashells on the shore?” 

“A sarong?” Brad rolled his eyes and pointed ahead to the sign of the hotel down the street. “No, Ray. I am not going to wear a sarong and collect seashells.” It wasn’t even funny, really. It was stupid. But Ray thought he was funny, and his pleased chuckle made Brad smile. His unfortunate reality was that at this point Ray could make the worst jokes, on par with airline food and uninspired knock-knock jokes, and Brad still might laugh at them. It was like a curse, really. Infatuation was a curse. 

As soon as Ray pulled up to the front, Brad opened the door and stretched his legs outside. “I’ll go get the room, wait here,” he said, and Ray hummed his agreement as Brad swept up the bag of trash by his feet to throw out on his way into reception. Ray’s truck was cleaner now than it was when he’d picked Brad up, a fact that Brad would surely be pointing out on his return. 

The small hotel lobby was relatively peaceful and quiet. There were a few people milling around, but Brad didn’t encounter any kind of wait at the counter. The young woman there was friendly and beaming—a talent Brad respected. How one remained as positive and upbeat in the face of what was surely a parade of absolute morons (excluding him) every day was beyond him. Customer service was not really in his skillset. He could be formal and respectful, but he lacked the unique charm required for the position and he knew it. 

The woman handed him his room key and gave him a brief rundown of the services they had, including the continental breakfast hours. She also handed him a brochure containing the nearby features that he might enjoy, but Brad returned it. He didn’t need it, he was only here to do one thing and then leave. Or, if he wanted to be technical about it, as he previously claimed to be, he was here to do two things: prove to himself that he still liked this place, and to surf. 

When he walked back out Ray was out of the truck. His arms were stretched high above his head as he faced out toward the water. Brad could see the small of his back and he immediately clocked the small birthmark near his right hip. Ray always claimed it was just a large freckle, but Brad argued that for something to be called a freckle it had to fit into a certain size constraint. Ray had returned that there were no official size constraints and therefore the subjectivity allowed for multiple definitions of what a freckle was and could be. At some point Brad had realized that they’d spend about a half hour talking about a birthmark on Ray’s lower back. That was just too much time devoted to such an asinine subject. 

Still, he wanted to press his thumb on it. 

Somewhere along the line he’d gotten particularly pathetic with his suppressed urges. He remembered when they used to be specifically themed toward fucking. But there was nothing sexual in his desire to poke Ray’s dimples or brush his thumb along a birthmark. That was just pathetic. The Brad of the Past would be horrified at this turn of events. Hell, Current Brad was a bit horrified by this turn of events. For whatever reason, the urge to throw Ray onto a bed was much more palatable than the urge to pick a piece of lint from his shoulder. It reminded him that they were moving further and further into slippery territory. 

He didn’t say anything to Ray. Instead he opened the car door and got back inside to wait until Ray finished stretching and standing and taking in the sea air. He briefly considered shouting out to him that he’d have all the time in the world to pull out the kinks in his joints when they rounded the corner to the parking lot by their room. He had too many other thoughts in his head to usher Ray along. The setting sun pierced sharply through the windshield so Brad knocked down the small sunblocker from the top of the truck and took a slow breath. The uncomfortable volley left him feeling exposed and frustrated: he could either think about Ray, or he could think about her. Both of these options were unpleasant at the moment, though for very different reasons. 

Then Ray got back into the car and the stillness in there felt more alive. A realization clicked into place: as stuck as Brad felt with Ray sometimes, he was an undeniable breath in his chest. He might not like thinking about the implications, and the realities, and the future—but the now? The moment Ray entered his space his mouth didn’t feel so dry and the truck didn’t feel so small. He felt better. 

“You know what? We should have stayed at the Madonna Inn. You know that weird fuckin’ hotel in like...Obispo, I think. San Luis Obispo. It’s fuckin’ weird, homes. They got rooms that would make you want to drown yourself in a lobster tank. You know, that fuckin’ oddball garish shit? We should have stayed there. We’re not that far, I don’t think. You could still drive down to surf here in the morning.” Ray turned the truck back on and it coughed and sputtered like a fifty-year-old chain smoker. Brad looked at Ray’s crooked teeth as he grinned. “That would be real different for you, homes. Make a new tradition.” 

Brad wasn’t sure what the hell about him made Ray think he was the kind of man who would enjoy the unique and absolutely unacceptable attractions that the Madonna Inn had to offer, but it would need to be rectified immediately. “I know you were born without a functioning sense of taste, but I sincerely want you to know that if you ever bring me to such an establishment, I will be calling the authorities and charging you with assault.” 

Ray laughed and smacked the heel of his hand against the steering wheel again. “Oh sure, like you’d ever let the authorities deal with your problems for you. You think you’re some rogue element of society, unburdened by social contracts and traffic laws. Dork.” As Ray drove around the corner, Brad stared at him with a deep, deep level of betrayal. A dork? Really. Him? Brad Colbert was not a dork , thank you. 

“I am not a dork,” Brad said pointedly as they got out of the car again, less than a minute later. Ray parked his trusty old truck right in front of their room. The parking lot had more cars than Brad expected, but the location and price point of this hotel did make it the optimal choice. It was why he’d picked it in the first place. “Rectify your insult.” 

Ray grinned at him over the truck. “Fuck no, sugartits. You’re a dork. It’s a fuckin’ shame that you’ve somehow gone this long in life without knowing it. It’s not a bad thing, by the way. It’s real endearing. A very cute look.” 

Brad knew Ray was intentionally adding on words that would make Brad cringe, and though he was not trying to reward such behavior by giving Ray what he wanted, he couldn’t quite hold it back on cute look . Ray snickered as he pulled out his duffle bag. “Dork.” 

He didn’t have to stand for this. Brad decided he simply wouldn’t dignify that comment with a reaction. He got his own backpack out from the small space behind the seats. If you needed more than a backpack when travelling home, you were packing too many things. Brad only needed a few changes of clothing and a toiletry pack. That could easily fit in one hiking brand backpack. He tossed the strap over his shoulder and went to open the door with the electronic keycard.   

The room was just the same as it always was. This hotel was nice but not too fancy. The walls were a gentle off-white, the bedding was blue and there were light wood accents with the furniture and wall paneling. Two beds with a shared nightstand sat small and unassuming, fluffy white pillows and soft quilting betraying the absolute debauchery that Brad was sure had taken place here. That’s what hotel rooms were, after all. He tried not to think about what he’d find with a black light as he set his bag down and rolled his neck. 

Behind him, Ray pushed past him and tossed his bag on the nearest bed. He stood with his hands on his hips, shaking his head slightly like he was coming back from a great disappointment. “Damn. Here I thought you were going to try and seduce me with one bed.” Brad gave a long-suffering sigh at Ray’s follow-up cackle that ended in a light snort. “I’m kidding! It’s a joke. Unclench.”

He had specifically gotten two beds, in fact, for that very reason. It had less to do with Ray than it did him. More often than not, Brad was the one to make the first move, and he simply didn’t trust himself to not end up adding to whatever Jackson Pollock-esque jizz artwork that was surely lining the walls in this place. He was going to stick to his word—that last time was the last time —if it killed him. And at this point, it may very well might. Brad stood, watching Ray flip through a small TV guide that had been left on the nightstand. His other hand casually picked at something in his teeth, or maybe he was biting his nail. Brad couldn’t tell, but he knew that he shouldn’t be filling up with fondness over such a basic level of existing. Ray wasn’t even doing anything for fucks sake.  

“I’m going to take a shower,” Brad announced suddenly. He dropped his backpack on the ground and knelt down to unzip it and fish inside for his toiletry pack. A shower would be nice and refreshing. It would reset his mind and rinse off hours of driving. It might even rinse off Friends in Low Places , if such a thing were possible. 

Ray flopped on top of the bed, the one closest to the door, and Brad made a mental note to be sure he claimed the bed tonight before Ray decided it was his. Brad preferred the bed closest to the door. He wasn’t sure why—it preceded adulthood. Even as a kid, he preferred that side when his family would take the occasional vacation. Ray was still flipping through the TV guide, but he looked up with such sudden concern that Brad was sure whatever followed was going to be dipped in sarcasm. “Brad, how are you going to shower? They won’t have your fancy mango sunshine shampoo.” 

Tch. Plebeian. It wasn’t Brad’s fault that shampoo companies named their products after ridiculous things. And the women’s products were simply better in terms of hair care. That was a factual reality, and because Brad cared about how he looked (he looked great , and when you looked great , you were proud of it) that meant he had to browse the shampoos that had more fanciful names. “It’s mango sunrise,” Brad said. His light, trying tone was accented by the way he held up his toiletries, shaking the non-descript black bag in his hand. “I brought some with me.” 

Ray’s face glowed in something that Brad would assume was affection, and his logical brain struggled to shut down the warm feeling that gave him, like he’d just taken a shot. Brad felt a lot like he was straddling a fence right now. Occasionally, he tipped more toward the open field. Then he’d slide back to his home base, safely fenced in. Right now, he let himself have that feeling. It was short and non-consequential. No harm done, right?

“Fuck yeah you did,” Ray said, chuckling a bit as he grabbed the remote that was also resting on the nightstand. “Thank fuckin’ God, I was really worried about that. What the fuck would happen if you didn’t have it? I’m pretty sure we’d all just evaporate in a huge cataclysmic fireball. That’s the kind of rapture shit they talk about in Sunday School. I’m pretty sure Brad without his mango sunrise is, like, the fifth horseman.”  

What a brat. Brad raised his eyebrows as Ray clicked through the channels, trying to reach the guide that would scroll lazily through all the options despite the fact that Ray had just spent a good five minutes browsing through the magazine with the exact same information. “Forgive me,” Brad said. He stood back on his feet and moved his backpack to rest against the wall, safely out of the way. “I apparently never learned that the proper way to wash myself was by taping a squirrel to a stick and rubbing it over my body.” 

“Yeah, we call that a squirrel and shine,” Ray said, not a single beat missed. He didn’t even look up from the guide channel, but he was smiling. The sun was setting fast now, and they hadn’t turned on any lights. The glow of the TV set a calming shadow over the room, but Brad reached out and flicked the light on anyway. Ray kept talking, unbothered. “Really makes the skin soft, right? But damn, is it a bitch and a half to catch those squirrels. You know what? I’ll start a squirrel farm and I’ll sell squirrels with a bottle of complementary squirrel wash. But you gotta find your own stick to tie it to, I’m not gonna do all the goddamn work.” He looked over, eyes bright and wide like they always were after he went on a tangent about something. “Oh, save me the little bottle of hotel shampoo. I love that shit.” 

Brad grinned and raised one eyebrow. “Is it because it makes you feel big?”

An easy shot, but Ray had given him the opening. He could hardly be blamed for hitting a target that large, just hanging out in the open, begging to be smashed. Ray rolled his eyes and went back to looking at the TV. Brad could see the dimple deepen on his cheek. “Haha. So funny. Go get in the fucking shower.” 

Brad did. It was a nice enough shower, the water pressure left a bit to be desired but that’s because Brad apparently enjoyed a “power wash”, as Ray would say. He took a little longer than he usually did for no particular reason. By the time he got out, the bathroom was hot and steamy and he had to wipe the mirror away to check if he needed to shave. He could probably use one for the sake of staving off any embarrassing commentary from his mother, but he’d do that after the surf in the morning. 

When he left the bathroom, Ray was gone. Brad clocked the little notepad on top of his backpack fast. There, in Ray’s quick, choppy handwriting, was a note: Be right back, don’t go to sleep xoxo :). Brad made a face at the hugs and kisses followed by the innocuous smiley face, but safely alone he dropped the towel he’d tucked around his waist and pulled on the cargo shorts and t-shirt he’d been wearing before he showered. If there was any evidence that the shower had served more as a cleanse of the mind, that was it. 

He didn’t know where Ray had gone. He must have gone on foot because his car was still parked out front, and Brad didn’t know when he’d be back—a fact that had him a little more antsy than it should have. Ray was an adult and was free to roam about the streets of Pismo Beach if he should so please. But his absence was felt. The silence in this room felt heavy and lonesome, so after a few minutes of sitting in patient quiet, Brad stepped outside into the breezy night. 

There was a nice sitting area up on a deck that overlooked the ocean. A few other hotel guests sat there, around the fire pit with beers and some takeout burgers. Brad’s stomach began to turn over immediately at the smell. He hoped Ray would get back from wherever the fuck he went soon, or Brad would go out and find food himself. 

He sat there on a lounge chair for a minute. The salty air helped him settle down, but being here suddenly felt harder than he expected. They sat around that fire pit once—they’d stayed out late, far later than anyone else. She was telling him something about college, but he couldn’t remember what now. All he remembered was that her hair was soft under his cheek and there had been a ship out there in the distance, twinkling nights in the never-ending dark of the water. 

He hated that the silence here felt consuming. Brad normally liked the peace and quiet. He had never been uncomfortable alone. Oftentimes, he vastly preferred it. But this place had too many memories for him; the steady ocean waves were slowly chipping at his wall of stubbornness. Maybe this hadn’t been the best of ideas. 

But the air was fresh and he could hear the water rolling steadily ashore, so it was preferred to the quiet stillness of the room. He stayed out there for a good fifteen minutes, ample time for Ray to have returned. But when he finally walked back and keyed into the room, Ray wasn’t there. 

“Hey, hold the door!” Just before Brad closed it, he heard Ray’s voice call out from down the sidewalk. He was holding two bags—one big brown one that he held in both arms, and two plastic bags that hung so heavily from his arms that Brad knew Ray would have angry red rings in his skin. He stepped aside so Ray could enter. He smelled the food right away.

“What did you get?” Brad asked, immediately grabbing at the paper bag so Ray could relieve himself of the plastic chains holding him down. Thank god he bought food. Brad was about a good ten minutes away from a truly dangerous blood sugar throwdown—and the gesture made him smile. It was nice. Ray was probably also hungry, so Brad had to remind himself this probably wasn’t for him so to speak. It was more likely Ray just got restless while Brad was in the shower. 

Not that he wanted it to be for him. The strange thought felt like an infiltrator, one that didn’t belong to him. In what world had he become some sort of dutiful and wandering moron waiting for their friend (friend) to bring them dinner? Probably the same world where he’d become some kind of angsty heartbroken sad sap sucker . Unfortunately, that was this world.

“Man, this fuckin’ place was packed, homes. I mean like wall to wall people stuffing their fucking faces and it took all of my strength to not say fuck you and just eat while I was there but I didn’t, so you know, you’re welcome.” Ray set the plastic bags on the bed and rubbed at his arms. As suspected, there were red lashes where the plastic cut in. They’d go away in about two minutes, but Brad figured it probably didn’t feel all too great. 

As he set the bag he’d taken from Ray on the small table by the window, Ray slid up next to him and started digging inside of it. “I didn’t know what to get because I didn’t know what you were in the mood for, so I got three things we can split. I was gonna get this appetizer oyster thing but fuck me dude, it was expensive, and I don’t have the kind of green a motherfucker needs to buy oysters so you’re just gonna have to make it work—oh, right but I did go to the grocery store and I got some ice cream and I also got some beer and I also got Sorry because it’s the superior boardgame next to Candy Land, which is obviously the best one.” 

Brad looked at the takeout containers Ray pulled out of the bag with raised eyebrows. This food looked expensive, he could tell by the care they put into the branded packaging. It was definitely not something he expected from Ray. He knew the man usually preferred food like Taco Bell or Jack in the Box or some other fine dining establishment that would cause retaliatory stomach cramping two hours after eating it. He also knew Ray hated oysters, but he must have gathered at some point in their friendship that they were Brad’s favorite (if the restaurant knew how to prepare them correctly). “...Why?” Brad asked, unable to stop himself from grabbing one of the boxes and opening it up. The food smelled excellent, and Brad had what he believed to be a refined palette. Distinguished. Quite possibly a bit picky, but that was neither here nor there.  

Ray shrugged and pulled out two rolled sets of silverware from his back pocket—what the hell? Where did he get those? Brad assumed he had asked the front desk at the hotel for some silverware and didn’t actually abscond from the restaurant a thief. “Why the fuck not. I was hungry. I figured you were to,” Ray said. He handed Brad one of the silverware rolls and opened some of the containers on the small table. They just barely fit, and there was no room for plates so they’d have to just pick from the boxes. Undignified as it was, Brad felt the twitch of a smile on his mouth. “Here it’s uh—well I don’t remember the titles because they were fuckin’ bougie but that’s some kind of steak and that’s some kind of chicken and that’s some kind of shrimp.” 

Brad had several questions. He didn’t know which one to ask first. Ray was still setting up—he tossed a beer to Brad and then stuffed the rest of them and a carton of ice cream in the small refrigerator. It wouldn’t keep the ice cream from melting, but Brad figured it would at least prolong the death. As Ray sat down across from him and picked apart the paper ring around the silverware roll, Brad settled on a question. “Why the board game?” It was a good question. Was it not an undeniably odd thing for one to retrieve during a one nighter at a hotel room with two grown ass, hard as hell marines? 

Ray snickered and whipped out his silverware from the napkin. They went clattering on the table and his knife fell into the chicken dish. Brad watched him with mild disdain as he licked the grip end of it. Brad’s own napkin came apart neatly. “I was cruising through the channels and there wasn’t really shit on so I figured to satisfy my craving for carnage I’d just thoroughly destroy your ass in a dumb-as-shit game,” Ray said, flashing him a bright and cheeky grin. “I almost got Risk but I thought we might actually end up in a fight.” Brad rolled his eyes as Ray gave him quite the look as he sliced up the steak. “You take Risk really fucking seriously dude.” 

“It’s a serious strategy game,” Brad said calmly. He took the lead from Ray and started to cut up the chicken. It looked good. Nothing was worse, in Brad’s extremely correct opinion, than dry chicken. He took the last piece he cut on his fork and ate it. 

Goddamn, that was good. “Where did you go?” Brad took another piece of the chicken. He could probably pack away all this food on his own. He knew Ray could too. He’d be conscious of their sharing. But this chicken was very good. He wasn’t even a huge chicken person.

“This place, uh...fuck if I remember, some kind of grill. The name is probably on the receipt. It was down the street. The lady at the front desk recommended it.” Ray picked up the tail of a shrimp with his fingers and ate it in one bite. He tossed the tail back into the box. Brad almost said something about it, but Ray did relegate the tail to one corner. He supposed he could forgive him. As Brad ate another piece of chicken Ray reached out and swiped at his fork with his own. “Don’t eat all that I wanna try.” 

Brad rolled his eyes but dutifully reached out for the shrimp instead. That was also very good. He wondered how much it all cost. It wasn’t like he hadn’t also splurged on meals before, but this was a new one for Ray. He usually liked to get the most bang for his buck in the tried and true tradition of ‘it doesn’t matter what it tastes like if you can get five of them for two dollars’. “So, did you relieve the restaurant of their cutlery?” Brad asked, and when Ray’s fork stabbed a piece of chicken Brad reached out and swiped it off with his fork for a fast steal. Ray’s loud, offended gasp made him laugh. 

“You motherfucker! Don’t fucking start with me, I’ll stab your whole hand with this,” Ray warned, waggling his fork in a threat before he went back for his stolen piece of chicken. Then he ate it, and proceeded to talk with his mouth full of chicken like a five-year-old. “Nah, I asked at the front desk. The restaurant had plastic forks but you can’t eat steak with a plastic fork and knife, that’s some deeply depressing shit.” 

Brad laughed again and tried the steak. It was all good food. As they ate, and laughed, and joked about inane and stupid things, Brad pointedly ignored the voice in his head that tried to pull him away from all of this. It felt a little intimate, really, sharing food that most people would classify as date food over a small table and beers with nothing but each other’s company. 

But fuck that. For the first time since he saw the road sign to pull off, Brad felt good . So for one second, he wanted to shut that part of his mind off and just be normal . What did it all mean? Who cares. Right now, all it really had to mean was two friends having dinner. Maybe it meant more. Maybe it didn’t. Brad was going to pointedly not think about it. 

He was doing a surprisingly good job at it, considering that for the past few months those thoughts had invaded nearly his every moment. For the next nearly two hours, he didn’t think about the future or the past. They scraped those take out boxes clean and opened up the ridiculous board game that Ray bought—a game that Brad became more invested in by the minute. He had two little guys safe home, but the last two proved a monstrous effort. Ray had three in, so Brad had devoted the rest of his strategy to prolonging his inevitable defeat. Between them, on the edge of the table, the open carton of butterscotch caramel ice cream sat dripping with condensation and the two spoons jabbed into it were slowly sinking into the melted remains. 

As Brad bumped Ray’s last red guy back to start again, Ray sucked his teeth and sipped at the now lukewarm beer he was still nursing. Brad had finished his earlier—the flavor profiles of the beer and ice cream clashed, and he’d rather eat the ice cream. He wasn’t a sweets guy, but Ray had brought back his favorite. Besides, ice cream didn’t really fit into that category, right? Brad took another soft spoonful from the container as Ray made a face. 

“God, you know, I fuckin’ hate this stupid bougie craft beer you like. You’re welcome. I coulda gotten Pabst like a real American but we’re stuck with your pussy hippie jizz juice,” Ray said, even as he downed the rest of the can and let out an impressive burp. Brad watched him tip back in the chair, balancing on the back two legs, and he had to stop himself from hooking his foot out to bring the chair back down like his damn mother.  

Look. It was not Brad’s fault that Ray didn’t know good beer from bad beer. Or bad food from good food. Or anything good from anything bad. He’d seen the man sniff expired food, shrug, and eat it. “I’ll revisit my earlier commentary on taste,” Brad said simply, and dutifully moved one of his pegs five spaces ahead. He ignored Ray’s quick dork name-call in response, and instead watched Ray pick up another card. Sorry was a strange choice for a board game. It reminded him of the games you specifically get for children—Operation, Trouble, Candy Land. “Why this game?”

Ray laughed and shrugged his shoulders. He’d let his chair back down on all fours and brought his leg up high. With his knee bent so close to his chest he could rest his chin on the boney cap. “I don’t know, it’s fun. I thought you’d like it. I figure it would take your mind off things if you could brutally kick my ass back to start.” Brad grinned as Ray’s eyebrows bounced up and down at him, eyes bright. “Did it work?”

Fuck if Brad wanted to admit that all it took to distract him was a bit of good food and a stupid children’s game, but...yes. It did work. And suddenly he needed Ray to know that. “Yeah,” Brad said, but then decided that the single syllable word didn’t quite sell how much better he felt. It was a feeling that extended far beyond the past few hours. He hadn’t really paid a whole lot of mind to it, because it was hard to see how far you’d come when you were still in the thick of it. But God, he felt better. He was better. A year ago he’d had this unimaginable, unending sadness that turned into a hardened, salted exterior. He didn’t feel like that anymore. He felt flexible. Brad knew why.  

“Good.” Ray hummed his approval with a small grin. Brad watched how his fingers drifted along the edge of the card deck. “Plus, I don’t know, you said you had little cousins that’ll be there. We can give the game to them. Unless I spill beer on it and it ends up smelling like a nasty frat house filled with rich little pissants that drink—” Ray twirled the empty can around to try and find the name. 

He didn’t have the time to find the name because in that moment Brad leaned over and kissed him.

There were two problems with this. One was the same problem Brad had experienced for a long as fuck time. The other was a newer twist on the old problem—it was just a kiss. No steamy makeout that would lead to them rolling over each other or shoving the boardgame to the floor in a flurry of passion, no nipping or heat or even tongue. It was just a fucking kiss. A soft, affectionate, hey thanks for everything tonight kiss. 

It seemed to surprise them both. Brad froze, still hovering half-way across the table, directly above their very serious game of Sorry. His head pounded hard in his chest and he could feel the tips of his ears flush red—there was just something embarrassingly intimate about how simple that kiss had been. It was so brief and gentle and he had a near-violent flashback to when he’d been in highschool having his first awkward, unsure kiss. The difference there was that the mouth had been unfamiliar to him. Ray’s mouth wasn’t. It didn’t feel awkward until he pulled away and his brain caught up to the muscle movement his body had decided to do without verifying in advance. 

He opened his mouth, but the words didn’t find their way out. It appeared as though there’d been a five-word pile up somewhere in his throat and now all the rest of the words were backed up deep into the churning pit of his stomach. 

Then Ray grinned and snorted like a horse. “I fuckin’ knew it. It’s always food.” 

Brad blinked and slowly settled down back into his chair across from Ray. You know, there was likely a world where he handled this kind of interaction with some grace. If he believed in the multiverse, then there existed a Brad that had gotten his shit together long ago and had the ability to move through this like an adult. But he wasn’t that Brad, and Ray’s smooth transition, though very welcome, did not make sense to him. “What?”

Ray seamlessly went back to what they’d been doing. He grabbed the ice cream container and scraped at the side to spoon the rest of the soupy mess into his mouth. Brad squinted at the dribbles of ice cream that escaped over his lips—lips he’d just kissed. Ray didn’t notice. He just swiped his mouth with the back of his hand and gestured with the now empty spoon. “Food? You know that old lady shit where they’re always like oh, key to the heart, it’s in the food. Well it’s fuckin’ true. It’s food.”

The absurdity penetrated Brad’s temple of disbelief—the key to his heart? What was Ray implying here? That Brad had a key to his heart, like it was a little child’s locket or a jewelry box with one of those pop up spinning ballerinas and the twinkling music.“There’s no key to my heart ,” Brad said assuredly, and he took the lead from Ray to continue the game, even though his mind was starting to wander elsewhere. “That’s exceptionally gay.” 

“Oh yeah?” Ray’s eyes lit up at the playful challenge like the widening pupils of a cat that’s spotted its prey. Brad felt the space between them close as Ray leaned forward this time, close enough that if Brad wanted to meet his lips again, he could. He wanted to. He...would, even. But first he had to fix this whole key business. Ray couldn’t go around thinking he’d found the key to Brad’s anything . “Well then you must be exceptionally fuckin’ gay, big gay Brad, because I got the key to your heart,” Ray said, and Brad let out a huff of air and leaned back. He fucking knew it. This little rat bastard thought he had the key to his heart. The nerve. The literal, outrageous nerve. How did such a small package contain so much damn nerve.  

“Shut the fuck up,” Brad clipped. He tried to sound serious, but he couldn’t stop his smile or keep the bouncing sound of a restrained laugh out of his voice.“There’s no such key and it’s impossible to have something that doesn’t exist,” he said, arms crossing over his chest. Then Brad tilted his head. See, the key itself was ludicrous, but the idea that Ray could swoop in and steal it was even more ridiculous. He had to make sure Ray knew that, despite the real possibility of it. He couldn’t let him know that, God, think of the sheer size Ray’s head would grow to. “Besides, if there were a key, you nor anyone else would ever know where I hid it. If by some infinitesimally small chance you found said location, you’d never be able to access it. It would be in a place nearly impossible for anyone to access.” 

Ray rolled his eyes in the way that Brad loved, like his very existence had sent Ray’s eyeballs rattling in their sockets. “Oh okay , Brad. I’m a recon marine too you know. I could get your fuckin’ key. I did get your key.” Brad watched Ray dig around in his pocket and fully pantomime pulling out a key ring, going through the key ring to find the right heart key, and then reaching forward to stick it into Brad’s chest.  

Brad smacked his hand away with a loud laugh, the kind of laugh he really only had around people who he felt safe and comfortable around. “You have not. Trust me. I think I’d know.” This conversation was not bothering him as much as he thought it would. He might have been way more defensive, had he not just been softened by ice cream and steak. But he wasn’t in the mood to keep denying Ray something he had a feeling was...fairly accurate at this point. They might be fucking around, but Brad knew. 

If he had a key (which he did not, that was a gay ass concept that would not be explored), it was with Ray. 

“I have too, you big bitch.” Ray was back to tipping in his chair, this time with a smug, smarmy look on his face. “I snuck in under nightfall and yanked that shit right outta your fuckin’ chest with my nose.”

Oh for fuck’s sake. Brad really shouldn’t have told Ray about the nose thing. That was shaping up to be one of his major life regrets, at this point. When would his humiliation over this one single (if you don’t count the many other times) moment of weakness end? Besides, all tomfoolery aside, the fact remained that Brad was a refined recon marine, as finely tuned as a jet engine. Ray was a brilliant mind and a fantastic recon marine, and Brad knew it. But he also knew that he was better. “You could not sneak in under any kind of fall , Ray,” Brad said, head tilted as he watched Ray rock back and forth in the chair. “I would catch you.” 

Ray squinted and lifted up his chin. His lips pursed in disbelief as he hummed a high note of disbelief at Brad’s confidence. “But you didn’t, did ya?” He said, and Brad didn’t have any comeback to that. He sure hadn’t. At this point, it was a lack of ability. He was pretty sure he could no more stop Ray from breaching his walls than he could stop a hurricane from making landfall. He wasn’t sure he wanted to anymore. The logic of trying to do so was seeming farther and farther away. 

Or it had been, but then Ray pulled a Sorry card and grinned as he reached out with his little peg to knock Brad’s clean off the board. It tumbled onto the carpeted floor and rolled toward the end of the bed. “Tch, sorry, rough break.” 

What the fuck. How was it statistically possible that Ray was getting this many Sorry cards. Was he cheating? How was he cheating? Brad was certain the little shit was fucking with him somehow. Maybe he had some cards under the table, in his hands. There was no way lady luck was favoring him this heavily, that fickle bitch. “I’m going to end you,” Brad said, dragging a hand over his face before he leaned over to grab his poor discarded peg.  

“You’d miss me,” Ray said. For a minute, Brad thought he was going to add something else. The cadence of his words felt incomplete, but when Brad looked back at him he was sitting with his mouth closed and his eyes cast downward on the board game.  

He looked so pensive for a moment that Brad reached forward, possessed by the spirit of glazed chicken and craft beer, to flick the tip of Ray’s nose. “I would,” he agreed, plain and simple. He would miss Ray if he was gone, in nearly any sense of the word. 

Sometimes, Ray was incredibly hard for him to read. Brad had never claimed to be gifted in the art of analyzing the deeper emotion behind a spare look here and there, but he knew Ray better than he knew anyone else at this point. Parts of him remained elusive yet. Maybe it was because the looks he got were ever evolving in the changing topography of their relationship. Ray looked happy, but something else lingered there that he couldn’t quite place. Before he could get too far in his head about it, Ray was standing up and rolling out his neck. “Fuck, alright, I’m gonna shower real quick,” he said.  

But as he spoke, Brad reached out and circled his fingers around Ray’s wrist. The space between Brad’s desire and his fear eclipsed behind Ray's smile. Fuck it, right? What happens in Pismo stays in Pismo? “You could shower in the morning.” 

The look Ray got then? Brad knew that look. The sneaky grin was impressed into the folds of his brain matter by now. One could even call it sultry, if one were as attracted to Ray as Brad was. As Ray turned more Brad, he pulled on his wrist to reel him in. “I could…” Ray said, in the lilting tone of consideration even as he allowed Brad to pull him. 

“You could.” Brad pulled Ray in until he could put his hands on his hips and yank him the rest of the way in, nearly on his lap. Ray laughed in a snort and smacked both of his hands to Brad’s chest. He pushed away in an arch that reminded Brad of the Little Mermaid, a thought he was about to share before Ray spoke again. 

“We’re gonna fuck this chair up,” Ray said, eyebrows raised at the admittedly small chair they were both crowding over right now. Brad glanced down to his side—the chair was small, but it was built sturdy enough. Besides, it wasn’t like he was going to fuck Ray on the chair. 

He was going to fuck him on the bed, like a gentleman.  

Just a few hours ago he’d been determined not to do that very thing. Brad would never admit to being wooed , but it would appear to the unbiased eye that he had been. “What, with your added two pounds,” Brad teased. His hands squeezed around Ray’s hips, searching for the specific nerve Brad knew was ticklish. He grinned when Ray jerked and cursed at him.  

“Fuck you.” Ray dropped down on Brad’s lap, legs straddled around him tightly to maintain balance. Brad’s arms automatically locked around his back to make sure Ray wouldn’t fall off his legs onto the floor. The man wasn’t as light as he looked, Brad knew that. Ray also seemed to know that as he rested his full weight down on him. “Not so happy now, are you?” 

He wondered if Ray knew how wrong he was. Brad was the happiest he’d been in a long time. 

Brad stared up at the ceiling a while later. His attention had been drawn by a small stain above the bed. It didn’t look like a water stain, which was confusing and unsettling. What was it? How did it get there? Why did he have to notice it? It would be bothering him for the rest of the night. 

The bed was small. Ray was still wedged next to him and Brad felt the sweaty heat from his skin settle in the small pockets between them. Maybe it was because the bed was so small, but this time they’d ended up tucked closer together. Ray’s head rested on his shoulder, near his collarbone, and he felt the hot weight of his thigh tossed over his own legs. Brad’s arm was pinned under Ray, so it was by mere circumstance that his fingers skimmed around the curve of Ray’s side. Simply circumstantial, that’s all. The bed, the positioning, that’s all it was.

But it wasn’t. Brad would have liked to pretend it was the size of the bed, but he knew better. This time had been different. It wasn’t hard or fast or stumbling like the past four and half times. Brad had made a habit of fucking Ray like he knew he was going to lose him—like it was the last time . In his defense, it was supposed to be that way every time. 

He must have forgotten that this time. They were slower and softer and Brad could remember very specific moments of tenderness that gave him a very conflicted anxiety; the feeling of Ray’s chest expanding with breath under his own and the feeling of his lips pressed to the shell of Ray’s ear. All these feelings curled in his chest like dying leaves under the light of his introspection. Tonight had lacked that fiery urge to plunge into the deep, to clutch Ray’s hips and extinguish some permeating need that settled in them both. Tonight, he thought about Ray sneaking out to get him a very nice dinner and a stupid board game to make him smile. Brad was gentle, and thorough, and focused on finding and giving Ray the things he knew he liked by now. 

Usually they laughed and messed around, and Ray would wind Brad up with snappy comments about his form and they’d have to take breaks because Ray’s leg cramped up or Brad needed a glass of water. Brad loved that. It was casual and close and part of the reason being with Ray was always so, so easy. But tonight, they were almost silent—not in an awkward or distant way, but in the kind of way Brad hadn’t experienced in a long, long time. He felt too connected and too intent on the act to crack a joke, and clearly Ray had too. Brad loved their routine, though he’d never allow himself to call it such. It was fun and exciting and vibrant. This had been soft and tender and vulnerable and very, very good.

Good, but terrible for Brad’s ability to keep his Rays in separate boxes. Brad had not fucked Ray tonight. No, he did something much goddamn worse. He made love to Ray tonight.

The ease that he felt earlier had started to evaporate, replaced by the same repetitive fear and disconnect that he couldn’t seem to shake off, no matter how hard he tried. This time, the fear was flavored with a hefty dose of guilt. How long was he going to yank Ray around like this? He’d been so busy trying to protect himself that he continued to ignore the real damage he was doing to someone he cared about.

“You need to go back to your own bed,” Brad said, a little harsher than he meant. He didn’t bother correcting himself because he was too busy searching for the dumb stain again and ignoring how Ray shifted against him. He felt Ray’s head lifting up to stare at him, but Brad found the stain and wasn’t interested in looking at Ray at all. He knew those stupid big bug eyes were trying to suss out his mood. Good luck, Brad’s mood was behind five feet of thick, led-lined concrete. 

Ray was quiet for a moment, but soon the sound of his soft chuckle burst the bubble of tension like he took a needle to it. “Jackass. What the fuck do you mean?” The back of Ray’s hand thwapped against Brad’s bare chest and Ray rolled over in the small bed, as if he were going to just ball up and go to sleep. “This is my bed. I claimed it when we walked in. You go back to your own bed.” 

Brad blinked at the stain on the ceiling and narrowed his eyes. “No, you didn’t.” Actually, now that he mentioned it he did recall Ray tossing his duffle on the bed. Brad unearthed his arm from under Ray’s shoulders to poke at his back. If he even tried to fall asleep, Brad wouldn’t hesitate to roll his tiny ass right off the mattress. At least he liked to think that he wouldn’t. A little voice mocked him from the back of his head: you would never. “I always sleep in the bed closest to the door.” 

That got a snort from Ray and he turned back over, twisting the sheets around them into a wrapped mess. Brad was uniquely familiar with how dangerous Ray was to a tucked sheet by now. “You always do? Can’t wait to hear this fucked up reason. Is it about murder? The fastest escape?” Ray rested his chin on Brad’s shoulder and Brad felt the tickle of the air from his words in his ear. Brad slid his eyes over to catch a big cheesy grin, certainly there for his benefit. 

It almost made him smile. Then he remembered the feeling of Ray’s head cradled in the palm of his hand as his thumb drifted along the edge of his narrow jaw. It almost hurt. He’d let this go on for far too long, and now it hurt. “Just get up,” Brad said, though his voice had softened. He bumped Ray’s chin gently with his shoulder to get him moving.  

Ray didn’t seem to share his growing anxiety. “Don’t make me get up,” he whined, lifting up only to flop over on Brad’s chest like Elizabeth Swan fainting from her tight corset. “I gave you the gift of ass and now that ass needs to recover or I’ll die .” 

“That’s dramatic,” Brad said lightly, because as one of the most dramatic men in the universe, he’d know. But he didn’t push Ray any further. He pulled his arm up again, this time so Ray could sink in closer, and Ray automatically lifted his head so Brad could slide his arm underneath. Brad would go to the other bed in a minute. Just a minute. 60 seconds, that was hardly enough time for either one of them to get too comfortable, right?

It went on for far longer than sixty seconds. Actually, the longer they laid together, the better Brad felt. Ray’s breathing was steady and calm, his skin was warm on Brad’s chest. Slowly, like peeling wallpaper, Brad’s fear started to slip away. What was wrong with this? What was the point of fighting against something he knew he wanted so badly? Who was he protecting, what was he doing ? Questions that he always thought he had the answers to felt open-ended and blank now. His lips brushed against the crown of Ray’s head and his eyes started to drift shut. 

So it was a bit of a shock when Ray suddenly pulled away. The place where Ray’s body had been resting, heavy and warm, suddenly felt cold and unbalanced—why did he get up? Brad frowned and blinked a few times to re-settle back into his awareness. His elbow pressed into the mattress as he levered himself up to watch Ray stand and swipe the tissues they’d used to clean up from the nightstand. He dropped them in the small trash can as he walked by. “D’you know where my pants went?” 

Ray had a nice ass. It wasn’t the kind of ass that might inspire someone to write a hit single, but it was a nice ass. Brad had teased him many times about being as flat as Florida (the flattest state, as Brad had to point out to assure his playful insult had landed). But it wasn’t. Not really. That ass had served Brad very well up to this point—he figured he should start treating it with some respect. Brad was too busy admiring Ray’s ass to care to look for his pants. He’d prefer Ray not find them anyway. “Somewhere around here,” Brad offered, because that was factually correct. The pants would indeed be somewhere around there.  

Ray snorted and threw a balled up sock at Brad’s head. It was very quickly batted away. God only knew when those socks had last been cleaned. “Yeah, no shit. They didn’t walk off—fuck it. I’ll find them in the morning.” Brad heard zipping and he snapped away from admiring Ray’s profile to see him digging around in his duffle bag. It took him a moment to realize that Ray was making room for a wine bottle. Where had it even come from? 

“What’s that?” Brad sat up a little higher and slid backwards to rest his back against the headboard. He tried to focus on the bottle instead of Ray. It wasn’t even the man’s casual nudity, or his ass, or his nose . It wasn’t in an effort to keep himself cooled off at all, so to speak. It was in an effort to stop that little swell in Brad’s chest when he looked at Ray now. Brad knew for sure that the Grinch must have been able to feel his heart grow three sizes. He could feel his own heart pulsing right now like it was some ridiculous cartoon set to pump right out of his chest and skip on over to Ray with a little present bow on it.  “That’s a little classy for you. I was expecting a bottle of jaeger.”  

Ray stuck a tongue out at him, ever gracious, and held up the bottle of wine in his hands to showcase it. It looked like a nice bottle, something a person might get for a special occasion or a holiday. It was a deep red, and the label had fanciful silver swirls of vines on it. “Wine. For your parents?” 

Oh. Brad raised his eyebrows, and Ray seemed to take offense at it. He flipped Brad off and tucked the bottle into his duffle, probably safely between his boxers and his jeans. Charming. “My mama didn’t raise an asshole that showed up to people’s houses without a fuckin’ bottle of wine, or like...a plant,” Ray said. Then he hesitated and twisted his hands into the fabric of his bag. “It’s kosher.” 

“It is?” Brad tried to keep the surprise out his voice. He was surprised—not by the measure of thoughtfulness (he knew Ray to be a very thoughtful person, despite his external first impression), but by the thoughtfulness Ray was extending to his parents. When Brad had hinted that he wanted him to come along, he hadn’t expected Ray to take any extra measures beyond keeping him company and singing his ear off with bad country music on the way there. In hindsight, he realized he should have. After all, if the situations were switched...Brad would want to leave nothing but the best impression for Ray’s mother. 

Suddenly, Brad was able to tune out of his own turmoil and focus on Ray’s. He was nervous. Ray might be tricky to read on occasion, but he had his tells. His fingers tapped anxiously on his duffle bag and his eyes looked like they belonged to a sad old basset hound. “Yeah...uh, that’s good, right? I mean I wasn’t sure, so I googled it and apparently wine is one of the things that has to be...are your parents kosher or did I just assume.” 

His nerves were understandable. He could imagine the layers of stress vibrating under Ray’s skin right now: that he’d overstepped, or over-assumed his own importance. Brad almost wished he was. He wished he could tell Ray that it didn’t matter, that he was just a friend and there was no need to leave some lasting impression on his parents. They didn’t talk about it, but they both knew anyway. And Brad had only realized, just now, right in this moment, that this weekend might be as stressful for Ray as it was for him. That maybe all this time Brad had been subconsciously aware of this strange faux-meeting and Ray had been keenly aware of it. And he’d bought a bottle of wine for his parents. That was…

It was very sweet. 

“No, it’s uh—that’s really nice. They’ll like that.” They would like that. Ray had met Brad’s parents once before, but it was in passing; a quick greeting before Brad left base and took them out for lunch. Now Ray would be coming to his parents’ home, his childhood home, to properly meet them, and that was an anxiety that Brad would deal with tomorrow. How was he going to introduce Ray? Surely Ray wasn’t expecting anything other than the normal new friend greeting, but Brad suddenly felt like that was insulting. Ray might not take offense to it, but something in his chest tugged sour at the idea of giving Ray that narrow of a label. He’d have to wrestle with that tomorrow—maybe he’d break their Fight Club rules and ask Ray about it. What a mature, upstanding thing to do! Brad was 99% sure he wouldn’t be doing it. But it was nice to pretend for a moment that he could potentially function like a normal adult. He pushed the thoughts out of his mind and turned back to the conversation at hand. “But for future reference they don’t practice so close to the guidelines.” 

“Ah, so like my mom,” Ray said as he zipped up his bag and placed it back on the floor, with a lot more care than he normally would if the duffle hadn’t contained precious cargo. “On Sunday morning we’re God-fearin’ but on Sunday night we’re drinking at Albert Mosely’s and threatening to stick a rusty blade where the sun don’t shine if Francine Bouling doesn’t stop talkin’ shit about our cobbler recipe.”

Brad snorted and started to settle back into the bed. He briefly wondered if Ray was going to come back. He consciously left space for him to return to his spot if he wanted to. Brad didn’t ask, and he didn’t offer...he couldn’t quite bring himself to that level of indulgence yet. Instead, he wondered what it would be like to grow up in the place where Ray had grown up; a place where everyone knew each other by first and last name and secrets were practically an accepted form of currency. God, he’d hate it. Brad didn’t want to know his neighbors, and he preferred no one being aware of his existence until he wanted them to know. Small town America was not a friend to privacy. “Sure. We’ll call it that,” Brad agreed. Close enough. Either way, he knew his mom would greatly appreciate the wine and the care. “They’ll like that.” 

“Good.” Ray was stalking around the room, searching for his pants by the dim lighting of the bedside lamp. “For reference, when you come support me at a mandatory family weekend, my mom prefers whiskey—ah! Found the fucker.” 

Brad hummed in disappointed acknowledgement as Ray pulled his pants out from where they’d been kicked under the bed. “Noted,” he said, and he didn’t care to stop the small smile as he watched Ray hop on one leg as he re-pantsed himself. What would his night have been like without Ray? Miserable. Brad knew that, truth be told, most of his past nights and days would have been just as miserable without Ray. “Thank you for coming.” 

“Oh you don’t have to thank me for that, Brad,” Ray said, and as he crawled into the other bed from the bottom he wiggled his eyebrows at Brad in such an obnoxious fashion that Brad was impressed he even had the facial muscles to arch his brows that high and that fast. “I thoroughly enjoyed coming.” 

Dumbass. Brad tried to swallow down the disappointment that Ray hadn’t come back to his bed. Maybe he would have, had Brad offered. But now Brad couldn’t ask—he didn’t want the possibility of that rejection hanging over him for the rest of the night. He’d rather assume that Ray had merely been respecting Brad’s initial wishes. That was probably all it was. “You know what I meant, you rejected state fair hog.” 

There was a flurry of comforters and sheets as Ray burrowed his way into the other bed. Brad thought he must have been some kind of underground scampering creature in a past life, like a mole or a groundhog. “Yeah, I do,” Ray said, still chuckling lightly as he settled down into bed. Brad followed suit, moving closer to the center of the bed to erase the opening he’d left for Ray. Best to act like he’d never left it in the first place.  

“You want to come with me in the morning?” Brad asked. He lifted up his wrist to program his watch alarm—he never really took it off. It was the perfect watch, after all; waterproof, flawless timekeeping, and plenty of extra applications including a stopwatch and timer. He set the alarm for daybreak, 5:30 in the morning. 

Ray took a moment to reply, though Brad was sure the answer would be no. Ray had never seemed particularly interested in joining him in the early hours, though he’d gone out in the water with him at later times. “Ask me in the morning. I’ll measure my rage with you waking me up against the desire to see you get your ass handed to you by mother nature,” Ray said, and Brad scoffed in disagreement. As if he ever got his ass handed to him in any fashion, past game of Sorry aside. “Besides, I don’t trust the ocean.”

“What?” Brad’s scoff turned into a light laugh as he lifted his head up to look at Ray in the other bed. He was turned on his side, facing Brad, like they were two preteens whispering to each other from the bunk beds at camp. “Why?”

“Too many jellyfish,” Ray said simply, as if he were commenting on the weather instead of professing some strange fear of ocean invertebrates. “Saw this National Geographic special, and there were so many fucking jellyfish, I was like that’s just too many fuckin’ jellyfish homes. It’s not necessary. Also, they look like the fungi of the sea, you know? Like...like if you eat the wrong jellyfish, you’ll full on fuckin’ die. But if you eat the right jellyfish, you might get real high and see the future. But that’s the gamble of jellyfish, right, like, who knows what you’re gonna get. Besides, I feel like they should be classified as a weird plant. They got no brains or eyes or hearts like what the fuck is going on in there?” 

As he usually did after one of Ray’s rants, Brad had nothing but questions. He settled back down to stare at that dumb stain on the ceiling as he tried to parse through all that information. “...Do you go around eating jellyfish from the ocean in the hopes that one of them will give you a psychedelic revelation?” 

Ray must have been rolling his eyes. Brad didn’t need to look—he could feel the familiar energy of the pause Ray left before speaking. “No. Because I don’t trust the ocean. Keep up, Brad.” 

Fuck it, Brad didn’t know what the fuck he was talking about. He had never heard about this whole jellyfish thing before, and he had no idea what possessed Ray to question their drug content or lack-thereof. “You’re not making sense,” Brad said. Then he reached over to turn off the side table lamp. The room went dark in an instant, but the glow of the street outside snuck in from under the heavy curtains they’d shut.  

“I’m making perfect sense, fuck you. You just can’t put it together because I fucked you so good,” Ray said, sounding smug. Brad heard him shifting around in the covers and tried to imagine how he was sleeping without looking over at him. Ray usually started up balled tight, and ended up stretched to every single corner of the bed. 

Hm. Did he want to expend the energy to argue with Ray about the idea that he could possibly be rendered mentally inept by the sheer exceptionalism of a good fuck? He did want to make that point, but he was tired enough that he could settle for a dissatisfied tone. “Goodnight Ray.”  

“Sweet dreams sugartits,” Ray said, and then the room was still and quiet.

Brad really had to find a way to nip that nickname in the ass before it ended up sticking around—which it certainly might. Besides, Brad was...well, he felt better than he did most nights after they fucked around. Almost well enough to admit to himself that this was likely not the last time and that any given nicknames were likely to continue. After all, he’d been proven wrong again and again. Maybe it was time to let go of that forced conclusion. 

Brad had slept with Ray six (five and a half) times.

It probably wouldn’t be the last time. 

“Hey Brad?” Ray’s call made Brad open his eyes again. He was on his side, facing away from Ray and toward the door. 

“Yes?” If this was more jellyfish discourse, Brad was going to make Ray sleep in the tub.

After a beat of silence, Ray spoke again with a smile in his voice. “It was gray.” 

Brad blinked. 

It would definitely be the last time.

Chapter Text

Brad had slept with Ray six times, and it might happen again. 

It was high time he started admitting to himself that, given the sheer statistical data, it was probably going to happen again. In fact, the time between said fucks seemed to be shortening at an exponential rate. It was just last week that he and Ray drove to his parents house up north and Brad couldn’t even contain himself for one night in a hotel with two beds. He didn’t even have an excuse . 

His mom and dad made an excellent buffer between the two of them, mostly because his mom seemed to love Ray more than she loved Brad and co-opted him the entire visit. She even hit Brad with a very knowing stare as they were leaving. I like him a lot, she’d said, as Brad hugged her goodbye with an aluminum-covered pie tin in his hand. 

How dare she. Ray was not likable. 

Take now for instance. Brad received a text at approximately 1600 from Ray that only contained an address and a single word demand: COME.  

You see? Highly unlikeable, thinking he had the ability to just summon Brad whenever he wanted like an obedient sheep dog. As if he didn’t have things to do today. Brad had plans, you know. He had tasks that needed to be completed. He was going to work on the throttle for his bike today. He was going to try and recreate his aunt’s brussels sprout casserole. He was going to work out and prepare for tomorrow, back on base. 

He slammed the door to his vehicle as he stepped out into the bright, sunny parking lot of the Fairmont Grand Del Mar. Why in the fucking world Ray wanted him to come here was beyond him. This was probably the nicest hotel in San Diego, and Ray was more of a Motel Six kind of man. Brad could only assume he’d been caught digging through the dumpsters in the back with his scrappy raccoon hands and now he was being held under hotel arrest, awaiting pick up. 

Everyone and their brother seemed to be at the hotel today. As Brad walked up to the entrance, valets ran back and forth like busy bees in their uniforms, driving cars away and loading luggage. Brad had to sidestep a particularly stacked luggage cart before it rammed into him. Of all the ways to end up in the emergency room, plowed down by the elite’s Louis Vuitton suitcases was among his least favorite. 

The hotel was beautiful, but it didn’t really suit Brad’s taste. It was traditionally grandiose, with darker marble pillars and deep oak accented with patterned golds and browns. Brad preferred a cleaner, more modern aesthetic, but he could appreciate the design for what it was meant for. There was a brief time in his life when he’d considered being an architect, so he liked to assume he had a good eye for that sort of thing. 

Of course, Brad assumed he had a good eye for most things, because he was simply better than most people in most areas. Design was one of those many, many areas. 

But he didn’t have more than four seconds to inspect the elements of the lobby before he was accosted by his summoner. 

“Brad!” Ray called his name loudly enough that several people glanced up from their passive lobby tasks. One man, likely also named Brad, looked up with some alarm from where he was reading a newspaper in a plush, leather armchair. Brad only spared him a brief glance before his focus was drawn back to Ray, sauntering over like a bouncing deer in a meadow.

“What the fuck is this?” Brad asked before Ray even made it to him. Several things set off red flags in his head. Number one– Ray had his shirt tucked in, and it was buttoned and ironed . He was even wearing a damn tie. He must be under some sort of duress. Number two, Ray was walking freely in this very nice lobby, certainly not arrested. Was a tucked-in shirt all it took to trick the masses into believing he was an upstanding member of society? “Can you keep yourself from yodeling across the lobby?”

“No.” Ray grinned, and Brad clocked his brushed hair and, dear god, he’d shaved . Was this even Ray? Was this some sort of mind-fuck? Robotics were getting advanced, he couldn’t put it entirely out of the question. Not that he’d admit that to anyone, but he would put money down on humanity ushering in their own extinction, Terminator style. “I had to tuck in my shirt homes, so if I don’t yodel then all the energy trapped in by my shirttails will cause me to explode hot, oozing flesh all over San Diego’s finest. Is that what you want?” 

Oh, no. It was Ray. Crisis averted. “It’s not what I want at the moment, but ask me again in five minutes when I understand why you brought me down here.” Brad could still not identify any logical reason for their presence here. There was no sign advertising a goat auction in the lobby, and there didn’t seem to be any sort of loud, raucous band music ricocheting around the space. So why the hell were they here, and why was Ray cleaned up ?

It was incredibly rude of him, really. Ray knew damn well what a nicely tucked and buttoned shirt could do to Brad, and he couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen Ray in something so…well-fitted. Hm.   

Ray didn’t answer right away. Instead he lifted a hand and curled his finger at Brad with one eyebrow raised. “Come hither, Big Gay Brad, and I’ll show you.” And then he turned and walked to the far end of the lobby, disappearing down the corridor. 

Brad did not like surprises. He considered turning away. He almost did. He could easily walk back to his vehicle and head home and finish all the tasks he had lined up for the day. 

But his house didn’t have Ray in a button-up shirt and a shaved face at the moment, so…fuck. It wasn’t really an option now, was it? This motherfucker and his conniving, dastardly tactics. Devious. Downright maniacal. 

Brad followed him. His pride had already been compromised several times over. He might as well chase the thread that he was insistent on pulling. 

“Feast your eyes!” Ray stood at the front of two large, open double doors, spreading his arm like a butler presenting the new princess to the royal court. Beyond him was the hotel’s banquet hall, brimming with people and music and decoration in a tasteful rustic lavender palette. It took Brad mere moments to put together the live band, the long bar, and the large easel next to them that held up a very elegantly crafted wooden slab with the names Esther and Ethan along with the date. 

“Ray, have you brought me to a wedding?” Because if Brad just drove across San Diego during rush hour to attend some unimportant milquetoast’s nuptials he would be very cross.  

“Ooo fuck, you got a sharp eye Colbert,” Ray teased, and smacked him hard enough on the shoulder that Brad almost took a step forward. Almost. He’d rather die than admit Ray had the strength to move him without his permission. As it was, all he could do was stare at Ray over the sounds of clinking champagne glasses and distant bubbly laughter and wonder if it would be inappropriate to throw him (gently) into the wedding cake. 

“Why did you bring me here?” Brad asked, quick eyes darting from person to person, trying to find someone he recognized. He thought he knew everyone Ray knew around here. That was the benefit to existing in the same circles, and there were no weddings on his radar this month. 

As he gazed over the tenth person, he had a sudden realization. “I’m not dressed for a wedding, Ray. Why didn’t you tell me this was a wedding?”

For fucks sake, the least Ray could have done was tell him he would need to dress nicely. He was only in his weekend polo and khakis. He was wearing flip flops, for fucks sake. He would never decry the versatility of a flip flop, but he knew that a wedding was no time for anyone’s toes to be out unless they were in a strappy heel. That was a bit of an unfair standard, wasn’t it? At any rate, he was not in the appropriate dress for this event. 

“Because it’s a wedding, and like, a rich guy wedding at that,” Ray said, as if this fully explained any questions Brad could possibly have. Then Ray took a step back and gave Brad a very obvious once-over with a critical eye. “You know what? You’re right Brad. You’re not dressed appropriately for this event. But you’re close enough that no one is gonna notice. You see that guy? He’s got like...the exact same outfit as you.” 

Ray waved his finger over to a guy leaning against the bar who was...well. He was wearing something similar. But that hardly proved anything. It simply meant that man didn’t know how to dress for an event properly. “Besides, you always look like you’re one degree of separation away from playing golf with a CEO.” 

Brad’s whole face crumpled at the insult. “...I do not look like that. I’m wearing a polo, it’s a very practical piece of clothing and it’s not my fault that it happens to be suitable for many different outings, golf included…” Ray had started to walk into the hall, confident and casual as he ignored Brad’s defense. 

Brad’s eyes widened slightly as he fell into step behind him. Suddenly, he felt like he was eleven again and following his mother around the grocery store. “Ray, do you know these people?” 

“What?” Ray glanced back at him over his shoulder, profile beaming, and Brad couldn’t stop the small smile. What a sneaky little bastard. Like a fox, but with less inherent sultriness. A weasel? Yeah. That worked. Brad reached out to pull Ray to the side so a woman making a beeline to the champagne tower wouldn’t bump his shoulder.  “No. Obviously I don’t know anyone. Who would I know that would have such a lame wedding?” 

Brad was the first to say that weddings were a waste of time and money, but he thought as far as weddings went, this one wasn’t bad. The food smelled good, there was plenty of booze, and there were tasteful decorations in a mellow color scheme. 

But he knew Ray. Ray would want some loud obnoxious band at his wedding. He’d want tater tots and chicken nuggets and easy mac, and probably a petting zoo or something in case his partner got cold feet and he needed a stand-in. 

“You brought me here to crash a wedding,” Brad said, finally gathering what was happening here. They were wedding crashers. Uninvited plebeians to a privileged affair. At the other end of the hall, he spied the bride and groom. They looked like a nice couple, if not incredibly moronic for tying their happiness to another person. He wanted to pull them aside and give them a hefty dose of reality before it was too late. Statistically, it will end in both of them alone and miserable.  

Ray looked offended, as if the possibility of him crashing anything was ridiculous. In Brad’s defense, if he were to pick a party crasher from a line-up of random people, he’d pick Ray. The man just looked perpetually uninvited. “Not to crash it. No one is crashing.” Ray shrugged his shoulders and pursed his lips into a fish mouth. His hand reached out to waffle between them in the ‘so-so’ motion before he changed visual tactics and brought both hands together in a criss-cross prayer fashion. “We’re like...merging.” 

Brad closed his eyes and let out a long sigh. “Never say that again,” he said, doing his best to wipe the image of Ray’s hands sweeping together from his memory. But he couldn’t. Ray’s hands were imprinted on his mind now. He knew the feel of them. Their usual temperature. How sweaty they got when he was nervous. How nimble they were, how good they were at getting into tight spaces. He knew Ray’s hands, and no amount of ridiculous gesturing could clear them from his brain. “I’m leaving.” 

He went to turn, but Ray scooped in front of him and pushed his hands into Brad’s chest. “No no no wait!” He said, and Brad waited, because apparently this was who he was now, at the beck and call of the world’s most prominent bratty wedding crasher. “Trust me, this is fun. I’ve done this tons of times. The food is always good, and they got an open bar, and there’s a chocolate fountain. Brad, look at that chocolate fountain. They got a whole table dedicated to shit you can dip in the fountain. But I’m gonna go to every table, and dip weird shit into it to find the ultimate unexpected delight.” 

Did Ray put on cologne? He smelled like he put on cologne. He smelled...very good. But it wasn’t as strong as he’d expect. Was it aftershave? Did Ray know how to use aftershave? Oh no. That would be just...a terrible additional perk as Brad tried to distract himself from getting turned on by the feeling on Ray’s palms against his pecs. He thought he was past this stage. 

“Unexpected delight sounds like the title of a 70s porno,” Brad said, now fully ignoring everything he could about Ray’s state this evening. Brad had been distracted by the location, and then the wedding, but now all he had left was Ray with his slightly-out-of-regulation cut waved back and his crisp white dress shirt. His tie had—Jesus Christ. What he had assumed were red polka dots earlier were now clearly in shape. His tie had crabs on it. Little tiny crabs. 

“I’m leaving,” Brad said abruptly, because he would never be able to live with himself if he got hard because of Ray in his crab tie . 

“Why!” Ray whined like a child and tugged on Brad’s polo collar. His thumb nail lightly nicked Brad’s neck. “Stay with me.” When Brad looked down at him, he was treated to a cartoonish pout, with big puffy lips and sad droopy dog eyes. If they weren’t in public Brad would have grabbed that lower lip and given it a pinch. But Ray couldn’t hold the pout long enough before his grin won out and his eyes crinkled at the corners. 

Social events like this gave Brad a bit of anxiety. He didn’t like having to mingle with people. Small talk was grating, and he really didn’t care about anyone’s life updates. The people he liked, he kept in the know about. But…he supposed the benefit to crashing a wedding was that technically, no one would be bothering him. No one would recognize him, right? And Ray had once said he gave off ‘an 80s serial killer’ vibe. Brad had no idea what that meant, specifically, but he figured it meant that he didn’t look approachable. “We’re going to get caught,” Brad said stiffly, stepping slightly to the side so the waiters with the trays could pass by with more ease.  

“So what if we do?” Ray shrugged one shoulder, mouth twisted to the side. “They’ll just kick us out. Besides, that is not Recon Marine mentality sugartits.” Brad couldn’t help but tilt his head slightly at that– the insinuation that he was not exhibiting the highest level of competency in his chosen field was absolutely noted, the little shit.

Ray seemed to clock the spark that ignited in Brad and wiggled his shoulders in some sort of contained victory dance. “Fuck yeah. See? Besides, I found you a limited-social quota daytime function with a chocolate fountain and an open bar. Brad this opportunity may never come again and I’ll stab your left asscheck with a corkscrew if you make me miss it.” 

Damn. It was more fun to think of this as a recon opportunity. He could turn this into a very entertaining evening if he approached this in the people-watching mindset. How long would it take him to figure out who belonged to the bride’s side vs the groom’s? He looked over the hall again, at all the people who were not paying attention to them in the slightest. Maybe Ray was onto something. Open bar, recon mission, and…sure, chocolate fountain. 

But he couldn’t let Ray know that. Imagine the smug grin he’d get? Oh, wait. No. Don’t imagine that. Brad was mission oriented now, he didn’t need the lingering image of Ray’s smile hanging over his vision like a half moon. “I’m not dancing,” Brad said. “Nor will I be speaking with any trussed-up civilian to pretend I belong.”  

Ray rolled his eyes, as though Brad was the exhausting one here and not him. “You don’t have to,” he said, and his eyes were already wandering toward the tiered chocolate fountain, bubbling with brown glaze. “We can just, you know, be two best pals. Like the movie. Wedding Crashers 2, even Crashier.” 

Christ. What a moron. Brad waved a dismissive hand toward Ray and turned to make his way to the open bar. “Go dip stupid shit in chocolate.” 

“Yessir, Big Gay Brad,” Ray said to his retreating back. Brad didn’t bother turning around, he knew Ray would have made it to that table already. The marines should put a chocolate fountain at the end of the courses. Ray would break global records.  

Brad sat on one of the bar stools, off to the side and far enough from the other various couples crowding the open bar. One of them was an older gentleman, and he wondered if he was someone’s drunken uncle that would cause some chaotic scene later on. That would probably entertain Ray, at least. And then Brad would be able to point out that he’d likely have the opportunity to be the drunken, wedding-ruining family member sometime in the future. It was likely on the man’s bucket list, anyway. 

He ordered a scotch neat and tried to focus on different people. There was certainly enough going on. One couple seemed to be moments away from someone having a drink splashed in their face, with a hushed argument growing louder by the second. There was some poor man trying and failing to woo one of the bridesmaids, who was looking for help from a friend who seemed to be enjoying how painfully awkward the entire situation was. There was plenty to study, but his eyes kept skipping back to Ray like a stone over water. 

He really did seem keen on trying every edible thing with chocolate. He had an absurd amount of sticks in his hand, each with a different food item stabbed at the end of it. From here, Brad could see what looked like some sort of egg roll appetizer, and a leafy green. Some other people seemed to be staring at him too, but Ray clearly didn’t care. He was going to do what he wanted to do. Brad smiled as he watched him very carefully and fully coat each item in the chocolate, and then he grimaced in disgust as he watched Ray accidentally drop something in the fountain and attempt to stab it out with two fresh sticks like a weird ice-fishing reenactment. 

“Hey.” 

Brad nearly startled (Startled! Him! The fucking indiginity) when a voice came from his left. He turned, drink in hand, to one of the most beautiful women he’d seen in real life. She looked like she belonged to a catalog cover, with long blonde hair and deep, moss green eyes.

“Hey,” Brad volleyed back, because he was still trying to right his brain after the whiplash caused by going from Ray stabbing at pieces of eggroll in a chocolate fountain to the Vogue model that was suddenly beside him. 

She didn’t miss a beat, likely used to the impact her presence had. “So whose side are you with?” She asked, light and easy as she leaned on the bar and sipped at her own flute of champagne. 

Son of a bitch. You see, Ray, this was the problem. Brad hadn’t been able to do proper recon, and therefore was unable to come up with a solid backstory that wouldn’t be questioned or picked apart. 

Now, Brad wasn’t the best liar, but he was still able to think on his feet. He cleared his throat and took a sip of his drink to cover the pause. “Uh—Brides.” 

“Oh really?” The woman smiled and licked her lips, platinum hair like a shining, smooth waterfall as she flipped it over her shoulder.  “Me too. What are you, a coworker or a friend or…” 

“Yeah.” Brad said automatically, and then realized that she’d given two options and ‘yeah’ would not be a viable answer. Dammit. He took another sip of his drink and tilted his head. Well, most people have many coworkers. That would be the safest option, would it not? And a clarification would certainly be needed. “Coworker.” 

The woman’s smile grew, and there was something of a spark in her eyes. It reminded him of Ray’s eyes when he knew he was about to win an argument, or when he’d tripped Brad up in a conversation. God, what would it take for him to not see Ray everywhere. Would J-Lo have to descend from the Heavens herself? “Yeah?” The woman continued. “Oh cool. So you’re also in adult films?”

Brad was lucky he wasn’t taking a sip of his drink, or he would have choked on it. What in the fuck? How had he gotten this so wrong? Perhaps he had some incorrect assumptions about what an adult film star’s wedding would look like. Regardless, he’d made his bed. And now, aptly so, he’d have to lie in it. “Yes.” 

The woman nodded, accepting that answer as if it made complete sense. “Oh so like, what do you do, are you like one of the actors or a fluffer or a cameraman?”

Brad looked out over the crowd and prayed the drunk uncle would do something disastrous to distract from this moment. Unfortunately, no such event seemed to be taking place. What were his options here? An actor? In adult films? No, Brad’s pride wouldn’t allow that. Not that there was anything wrong with it. Far be it from him to disparage sex workers, but if Brad was going into acting, in any field, he would be at the top of the food chain. He would be replacing Brad Pitt. And a fluffer? What the fuck was that? After a moment, Brad answered with the first thing that came to mind. “I do lighting.” 

“Really?” The woman seemed impressed, and Brad couldn’t tell if it was because she was really into pornography lighting or if she had assumed he was one of the actors. He couldn’t tell if that was a compliment or not, but now he desperately wanted this conversation to be over. This is what happens without proper recon. Failure. Embarrassment. Devastation. “Cool. Cool,” she said, and her manicured nail tapped on the champagne flute. The color matched her dress, a striking blue. “And how long have you been doing that?”

“Not long,” Brad said automatically, because he always thought two steps ahead. If he said he’d been doing it long, she may ask him questions about the bride he supposedly knew. Best to play it safe and pretend he was new to the scene, and she’d invited him simply because she’d invited everyone else and she didn’t want to leave him out. See? Backstory coming together, despite a rocky start. “I uh, I used to do commercials.” 

The woman’s eyes widened as she nodded and he watched as she tried to hide a growing amusement from her face. He wasn’t sure what was so funny about this. Lighting was a very serious job, on any film set. It made the difference between amatuer pornography and the big leagues, if you asked him. If he were to work on a set, that’s the job he’d want to be doing. “And you thought you’d rather step into the low-paid high-stakes game of lighting adult films?”

Ah, well..he supposed that was a good point. But who was she to assume he didn’t enjoy high stakes. Perhaps he was a trust fund kid, or he had money invested and therefore didn’t have the need for a particularly high paying career– he didn’t have to rationalize this to anyone. It was his pretend life, dammit. Brad simply raised his eyebrows and took an unbothered sip of his drink. “Yes, I enjoy the challenge.” 

The woman laughed, a real laugh, and turned to face the bar so she could set her empty flute down. The bartender gestured to it in a wordless ask, but she shook her head and turned back to Brad. “I’m really impressed with how far you’re willing to keep this going.” 

What? Oh come on. Brad had been plenty convincing. He’d even convinced himself of the importance and dignity behind a career in adult film lighting. He turned back to the bar with her, placing his own glass, still half full, on the bar top. “I’m sorry?”

“Yeah, the bride isn’t a film star. She’s a biophysicist,” She said, and Brad froze slightly as she tucked a strand of blonde behind her ear as she raised her eyebrows at him, light and playful. “Your friend was really loud.” 

Dammit, Ray. Brad had been so flabbergasted by the act of surprise wedding crashing that he hadn’t been able to monitor Ray’s voice. It was nasally and high-pitched and often carried through a room like the screech of a hawk over a valley, only far less majestic. “Yeah. Yeah he is,” Brad said, and when she laughed, he couldn’t help but laugh a bit as well. At least she didn’t seem angry. And, for what it was with, she did have him on the hook for a while. He should have noticed she was messing with him sooner. “I apologize, I didn’t mean to intrude on this. He just saw the chocolate fountain and he has a tiny rat brain that lights up at certain sights.” 

The woman gave him a slightly appraising look, but her smile remained, so Brad took that as a sign he wasn’t about to be thrown out of a formal function like a peasant. “It’s okay,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. The glossy material of her dress sloped down in cute cold-shoulders. He was actually very interested in this dress. It managed to be both very sexy and very charming at the same time. Quite the find, if you asked him. “I’ve done it too. Besides, I’m gonna be honest you are definitely the best looking guy here and if I have any chance at making it through this night I’m gonna need a good distraction...if that’s something you’re up for. I’m Eliza, by the way,” she said, holding out her hand. 

Oh. 

That’s right. This was a wedding. And they were both… apparently single people, sitting alone at a bar. The realization hit Brad pretty hard, like a donkey kick to the gut. He hadn’t even considered having sex with this woman. She was undeniably beautiful, and he’d noticed that right away, but his mind hadn’t gone where it should have. A few months ago, it would have been his first and only thought. He wouldn’t have wasted time with this backstory game. He would have been upfront, as he was with most of his one-night stands, and that would have been the end of the conversation and the beginning of a very fun time. 

This was new. Or at least, it was new to Brad. It wasn’t even a moment he had analyzed and made a decision on. It wasn’t like he’d been talking to himself, discussing options in his head. He simply hadn’t been interested in sleeping with her, because he– 

Well, he didn’t need to go that far. No sense in naming the thing that could not be named. He didn’t have to think about it. He felt it. He knew it. He didn’t want to sleep with anyone…else. 

It was weirdly comforting, that realization. Comforting in the moment, and terrifying at its depths. He would have to travel to the deep ends of that eventually, but for now, Brad was happy to stay drifting on the surface. He knew his routine by now. The stress and panic about his situation would come later, in the quiet spaces of the late night when he could lay in bed and be reminded of how he was edging closer and closer to a point of no return. 

“Brad. And I—” As Brad reached out to shake her hand, he was interrupted by some oddly shaped, chocolate-dripping item shoved into his face. 

It was Ray. He’d popped up on his side, apparently hidden from Brad’s peripheral. Ray did have meerkat tendencies, but that didn’t mean he should be able to escape Brad’s awareness. What was happening in this hotel? Was this some alternate dimension where Brad’s heightened skills were reduced to simply above-average as opposed to extraordinary?

“Hey Brad, try this.” Ray said, shaking the stick towards Brad’s mouth. He had a strange energy to him, like when he had one too many stimulants in Afghanistan and was one iota of caffeine away from becoming a human vibrator. Brad could sense that energy in him now. Was it the chocolate? How much sugar had he consumed? 

Unfortunately, Brad couldn’t focus on that right now because there was still a dripping monstrosity dangling in front of his face. He stepped back from the bar to make sure the chocolate wouldn’t drip onto his khakis or god forbid his polo. “What the fuck is that ?” 

“It’s a watercress sandwich that I dipped in chocolate,” Ray said, very simply, as if it were as American as pie and as normal as a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. He gave up on trying to get Brad to eat it and jammed the small triangle into his mouth. Chocolate oozed from the corners of his lips and he quickly wiped it clear with the back of his hand that he then waved toward Eliza. “Hey, I’m Ray.” 

“Hey,” Eliza said, and Brad finally turned back to her now that 100% of his attention hadn’t been consumed by a bonafide food hellspawn. She was still smiling with the same amusement she had while Brad was elaborating on his career in adult film. Interesting, really, that Ray’s sudden appearance and messy appetizer promotion hadn’t scared her off. “If you’re looking for weird food combos, the salmon is surprisingly good in the fountain.” 

Brad laughed a little at the suggestion but then thought about it. Depending on the quality and texture of the chocolate it’s possible that it could pair quite nicely. “That doesn’t sound as horrific as it should,” Brad said with a slight smile as he glanced over to Ray. He half expected him to scamper off in search of a piece of salmon he could dunk into chocolate, but he didn’t. 

Instead, Ray’s eyes widened just a fraction too large, and the tightness of the skin around them meant that Brad was actually a little impressed that Ray’s eyes hadn’t twitched yet. Brad suddenly felt like he was watching a pressure cooker. Ray’s mouth would open with a powerful blast of hot steam. 

“Oh, nice,” Ray said, voice tight enough that Brad noticed but not enough so that anyone unfamiliar with his dulcet tones would. “I will try that. Love salmon, love the migration, love the effort a salmon will put forth just to blow its load. I mean, fuck, the energy it’s gotta take to swim upstream like that, horny as shit, ducking away from big ass bears and shit and scraping your junk all raw on the rocks just to get to some special fucking grounds,” Ray stopped abruptly and held up his finger. “—Uh, speaking of loads, yeah, Brad, I need to talk to you.” 

Brad blinked.

What in the fuck was that? 

Brad could roast and poke at Ray all he wanted, and he certainly did. But for what it was worth, Ray was usually more socially competent than he let on. He was definitely better than Brad at meeting new people, or having small, casual conversations. This particular brand of Ray-ness typically didn’t emerge until the third date , so to speak. It wasn’t only what he was saying, but how he was saying it. It wasn’t normal, confident and boisterous Ray. He seemed halting and nervous. So what the fuck was going on? Brad couldn’t even spare a second to take in Eliza’s reaction. He was too busy staring at Ray and trying to decipher what had launched him into a combat zone. “... What?”

“Yeah, uh…” Ray slowed slightly, and for a second they locked eyes. Brad’s confusion was met with something he could only identify as ‘apologetic determination’, and he braced himself for whatever Ray was about to say. “He’s a doctor. Well, like, my friend, who is a doctor, so I just had some questions for him about…crabs. I have them. Yeah. And uh, it’s not pretty.” 

Was this happening? Brad almost wanted to look around him to try and find the hidden cameraman from whatever prank show he was clearly on. That was the only justifiable reason he could think of as to why Ray had announced he wanted to talk about crabs, which, based on his previous declaration of Brad being a doctor, could only be the kind of crabs that one simply didn’t discuss in public, no less at a wedding in front of a stranger. 

It was clear that Eliza thought the same, though she seemed to be handling it with a bit more grace than Brad would have, had he been the one responding to that insane statement. “Oh,” she said, voice high and light as she gave Ray a polite nod with her tilted head. How she managed to make that not seem like the most outrageous thing she’d heard all day was beyond him. “Well that seems like a private conversation, maybe I should just…” She gestured off to the side, on the other end of the bar where Brad clocked the sad groomsman who had clearly failed in his attempts at wooing the bridesmaid. Well, wouldn’t his day just turn right the fuck around. 

But then, as if they were all traveling on the same crab-induced wavelength, all three sets of eyes settled on Ray’s actual crab tie that he was physically wearing. 

Brad ducked his head and reached out to grab his half-finished drink, desperate to drown the chuckle that threatened to spill out with the sharp sting of alcohol.

Ray cleared his throat and picked up his tie, holding it out from his body as he stared at it. Brad may have just left that one alone, but Ray clearly felt the need to explain it. “Yeah, yeah I uh, I wear this tie when I have crabs…as a warning,” he said, and Brad stared at the wall and wondered if Ray understood that he had accidentally confirmed he not only had crabs multiple times but had them so many times that he required clothing to signify when he was crab-ridden. 

Based on the way Ray’s nose scrunched at his own words, Brad guessed that he did indeed understand this. “It’s like a scarlet letter. But a crab tie.” Ray cleared his throat a second time and dropped the tie back down. “Just to be clear I’m talking about the STD and not the aquatic crustacean as depicted in the tie but they don’t sell ties with pubic lice on them so I had to make do.”

Brad nodded slowly because it seemed to be all his brain was capable of doing at the moment. All other brain function was dedicated to understanding what the fuck had just happened here and trying to determine whether it was hilarious or embarrassing. His scales were tipping toward hilarious, and that was likely because he was not the one with the pubic lice in this situation. 

Eliza’s mouth fought a valiant war against a smile and ultimately won as she stepped to the side, planning her escape route. “Right, no I definitely understood the connection there it’s…super clever.” 

Brad turned toward her to give her a slight wave goodbye. As far as social interactions go, she wasn’t so terrible. He liked her wit. Alas, she was simply another tragedy of Ray’s storm. “Well, it was nice to meet you…both?” She smiled at Brad, and even at Ray as she turned to walk away. She caught Brad’s eyes as she looked over her shoulder. “I’ll see you around maybe, Doctor.” 

Brad gave her a polite smile as she left, as graceful as she arrived. He watched her move into the crowd, seamlessly blending in with a group of people to the front of them. On the other side of the room, the band had started to play a Supremes cover. You can’t hurry love, no you just have to wait…

“What was fuck was that?” Brad asked, incredulous, but unable to stop the strange bubble of laughter that cropped up at how ridiculous that entire exchange had been. He didn’t even have the capacity to be upset about it. After all, he wasn’t the one who made a fool of himself. 

Ray seemed frazzled, suddenly fidgeting with his shirt, making sure it was still properly tucked (it hadn’t been) and smoothing his hands over the buttons. “I—I don’t know, Brad,” he said sharply, in a tone of voice Brad didn’t often hear from Ray. “Whatever. Fuck off.” 

Brad had the unique privilege of knowing Ray very well. He’d seen him angry, cussing and frothing like a dog. He’d seen him frustrated as he banged a wrench against the wheel of a car. But this was a new kind of emotion. As he watched Ray try to gather himself, Brad tried to pinpoint it. It was almost like he’d balled up a bunch of anxiety and painted it over with a thick coat of aimless frustration.

“You’re jealous,” Brad said, without thinking of the ramifications for voicing such a truth in the open air, as if words meant nothing. 

Ray took umbrage with a twitch of his eye. “Oh okay, Brad. Sure,” he said, and Brad assumed he was aiming for casual and unbothered with a hefty dose of sarcasm, but he was sorely missing that mark. Ray seemed to notice that too, and he let out a pent-up huff and bit his lip. With a gesture that was half-hearted and wild at the same time, he waved his hand toward the chocolate tower. “Shut the fuck up and go dip something in chocolate, like you’re supposed to.” 

But Brad couldn’t go dip things in chocolate because this was much more fascinating. That wasn’t the best word, perhaps, but it was the one Brad would be hooking into so he could ignore how much this was really doing it for him. Way more than Ray’s nose had, which was saying something, because his nose really put Brad through the wringer. 

Brad leaned in a little closer to Ray, swept up into the autopilot that took over when he reached a certain well-traveled (at this point) road. He knew exactly what was at the end of this road, and right now that was all good. He was safe in the shallow end, the ground was still under him. “Are you mad?” Brad asked, as Ray stiffly ignored Brad’s crowding. Brad watched one of Ray’s fingers tap rapidly at the bar top.

“No,” Ray answered, quickly spitting out the syllable like it had deeply offended him. Brad grinned, and leaned back again, nursing his drink as he stared at Ray over the rim. He kept his eyes on him until Ray couldn’t take the weight of his gaze anymore and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand as he licked over his lips. Brad wanted to bite them. “Maybe,” Ray amended, nose scrunched up in that same frustration-flavored anxiety.  

Jealousy was all fun and games, but Ray didn’t seem to be bouncing back as quickly as Brad expected. The more Brad looked at him, the more he picked up on Ray’s discomfort. The constant fidgeting, the way he scratched at his nail beds. So despite the fact that there was nothing going on, and he didn’t owe Ray any sort of explanation , he was compelled to set him at ease. “I didn’t say yes,” Brad said, humored gaze softening. He wanted to drift his fingers along Ray’s jawline and swipe his thumb to his cheek. 

Instead he reached out and pinched Ray’s cheek, hard. 

Ray dipped back and batted at Brad’s hand with both of his, like a furious kitten with a ball of twine. He gave Brad a wide eyed look that Brad interpreted as ‘try me motherfucker’. So Brad just smiled, reveling in his chance to be the smarmy one for once as he nonchalantly sipped at his whiskey and acted like he’d done nothing wrong at all. 

Next to him, Ray huffed and rubbed his cheek. It was a little red where Brad had pinched him. “I know that,” he said, despite having no way of knowing that, unless he’d been watching the conversation from the very beginning. It was possible, Brad supposed. Maybe as much as his eyes kept skipping back to Ray, Ray’s eyes kept doing the same. 

“You could say yes, you know, if you want to,” Ray continued, still fussing with his shirt. Brad watched him stick his thumbs into his pants to readjust them, even though they were tight enough that Brad was positive they hadn’t moved. “It’s okay, I mean. That’s okay. She’s hot. A little out of your league but I know you like a challenge.” 

Out of his league ? Oh really. Brad scoffed and shook his head. This was the most ridiculous thing he’d heard all day. More ridiculous than Ray’s crabs. He turned to say so, but Ray’s expression stopped him. 

He looked upset. The kind of public upset where Brad could see how hard he was trying to hide it. He remembered, a few weeks ago, when Ray had left with that girl at the bar. He remembered how that felt. It was a punch to the gut, and he didn’t want Ray to feel that way. Not when he really had no reason to. Brad didn’t want to sleep with her. He didn’t want to sleep with anyone else. 

But he couldn’t tell Ray that. That would be crossing a line. 

And there was chocolate on Ray’s chin. 

“You have chocolate on your face,” Brad said. His voice came out so fond that even a version Brad of two weeks ago would have gagged at him. But it was the closest he could come to giving Ray a bit of comfort. 

Ray huffed and plopped down on a bar seat next to Brad. He hunched over, face locked in a distinctive pout that Brad knew for a fact Ray didn’t even know he was doing. “I’m sure I do,” Ray said stiffly, and made no move to wipe anything off his face.  

Brad turned toward him, still standing and leaning against the bar. “So come here,” he said, fully prepared to wipe the chocolate off of Ray’s chin because he was romantic like that. Or he was in this moment. Brad knew he wasn’t really batting home runs in the romance department but that was because he was too busy using the bat to actively beat romance back.  

“No,” Ray said, still pouting, chocolate still on his chin. When Ray swiped his drink and took a sip, Brad didn’t stop him. 

“Tch.” Brad smirked and shook his head at Ray in faux disappointment. “We’re at a wedding you know.” 

Something in Brad’s tone must have penetrated Ray’s funk, because he finally looked up at Brad. It was a powerful feeling, watching Ray try to analyze his expression. For once, he felt like he was the one tripping Ray up. For all his supposed lack of experience, Ray always seemed pretty sure of himself. Right now, Brad was the sure one. 

“I know that,” Ray said, curiosity slicing through some of his still present frustration. He rubbed a hand across his face but missed his chin, where the chocolate in question remained. 

Brad rolled his eyes but the smirk remained. He almost felt a little giddy. Turned on, a little horny, but…there was something else there. Something deeper that resonated deep in his core. “Well then act like you’ve been in public before,” he chided, in as chipper and mocking of a tone he could muster. 

Ray reacted to the tone instantly, just as Brad knew he would. Their unique banter always felt like a light calling him home. There was safety in their constant bickering. Right now, it brought Ray back to shore. When he answered, it was with a squinted gaze and puffed up shoulders. “I’ve been in public before, motherfucker. I am not some inept social disaster that's wandered into a public affair after years of living in the Alaskan wilderness.” 

Huh. What a turn of phrase that was. Brad grinned. Ray’s wit never ceased to make him smile, even if it was a very strange brand. “Oddly specific.” 

Ray waved him off and then wiped at his face again, missing the chocolate for the second time. He took another sip of Brad’s scotch and then passed it back. “I read the book the other day about the guy who gave everything up and went to rough it in Alaska.” 

Ah, what a commendable choice that was. No offense to that man, who had not survived, but if (or when) Brad decided to abandon society and flee to the calm serenity of the Alaskan wilderness, he’d be thriving. Because, as previously mentioned, he was better than most people at most things. 

But Ray still had chocolate on his face. “Ray, you still have chocolate on your face.” 

In a huff, Ray grabbed a napkin off the table and wiped his whole lower face, finally getting the chin chocolate. It was almost sad. Brad really wanted to wipe it off himself. Then he would have been able to smear it back on Ray’s nose. “Just tell me where it is, oh my god,” Ray said, turning on the stool to face Brad.  

The chocolate was already gone, but this was too good an opportunity to pass up. Ray was still a little frazzled, and now that he seemed to be less burdened about it, Brad couldn’t help but take the moment to his advantage. “Little to the left,” Brad said, pointing with his figure to guide Ray around the various parts of his face. “Oh you just missed it— too high. Little lower.” 

“Fucks sake, Brad.” Ray stood up abruptly from the stool and hit him with a pent-up stare. “I’ll go get it myself.” 

“Yeah, no, go ahead,” Brad said casually, voice high and lofty as he shrugged one shoulder. But when Ray finally located the sign pointing to the bathroom and took off, Brad followed him. He had to see the end results of his fuckery, didn’t he? 

He was close behind Ray as he pushed open the doors to the bathrooms in the hallway. One man was washing his hands at the sink, but quickly dried his hands and left as Ray leaned over the counter to get as close to the mirror as possible. 

“You motherfucker,” he said, finding no chocolate readily visible on his face. He whirled around on Brad, eyes bright and daring as Brad held up his hands in a truce.  

“I take the opportunity when it presents itself,” he said. He felt the air snap around them, he could feel the shifting winds of Ray’s storm. Heat crept up him like a rising tide. If Brad knew what was good for him, he wouldn’t have followed Ray into this bathroom.

Ray stared at him, right in the eyes, connected and charged in a way that felt familiar but very new at the same time. “So do I.” 

There was nothing quite like getting jumped by an amped up, jealousy-fueled, post-prank Ray. He was powerful and quick and he had Brad backed up into the wall of the bathroom, head knocking against the corner of a heavy wooden picture frame, in mere seconds. Ray’s mouth tasted like chocolate and despite Brad’s height advantage, he was the one in charge. 

At least he was for the first five seconds. It didn’t take long for Brad to push back. His hands locked around Ray’s waist, settling where they’d been dying to be since he saw Ray in his tucked-in shirt. He swiveled the smaller man around, backing him into a stall. Ray automatically reached out behind Brad to bat at the door until his fingers found the handle and it clanged shut behind him. Brad heard the lock slide into place. 

For a moment, Brad thought about nothing but Ray. He existed in the peaceful, calm serenity of a badly needed make-out. One hand stayed on Ray’s hip, and the other cupped behind his head so Ray would have some cushion against the hard wall. Brad was steady, intent, focused. Ray kissed with hunger, always moving closer, hands touching every part of Brad available.

And in the floating free zone of that bathroom stall, Brad thought he might love– 

Ray’s hands were trying to unbutton Brad’s khakis, and Brad was slammed back into the reality of where they were. 

In a bathroom stall. 

In a public bathroom stall. 

Suddenly Brad’s senses extended beyond Ray. They were in a bathroom. There was a toilet right next to him. A toilet that someone had no doubt recently shit in. People were still coming in and out of here, he could hear the faucets turning on and the door opening and closing. 

Now, Brad loved sex. Brad was a sex fiend. He was sex motherfucking positive. But he was also neat, and clean, and would not be having sex in a public bathroom with piss droplets on the toilet seat and some neighboring man taking a dump two feet away. 

“We can’t.” Brad abruptly pulled away from Ray and grabbed his wrist away from his khakis. The little weasel had just undone the button, which Brad quickly redid. Dammit. Now he was hard as shit and horny as hell and in a bathroom stall . Boy, he did not think this one through, did he?

Ray looked dazed, but he frowned when Brad pulled away. His hands reached back out and latched onto Brad’s arms. “Why not? I promise I don’t really have crabs. I mean, unless you have crabs. Then it’s fine because I would have gotten them from you. We’d just be swapping mutual crabs and that’s okay.” 

…Well. A lot to unpack there. Did Ray think there was any scenario in which Brad would have crabs and would not immediately remedy that situation? Regardless, he had to focus on the matter at hand. He couldn’t be distracted by Ray and his fictional pubic lice and the concept of swapping them. “It’s a public restroom, Ray,” Brad said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.  

Apparently it wasn’t, not to Ray. He rolled his eyes and slumped back against the wall, pout returning. “It’s a super clean bathroom, dude! This place is expensive as fuck the bathrooms are like plate clean.” 

Plate clean? Oh, gross. Fucking disgusting. Now Brad was imagining having to eat off of this bathroom floor, which was truly the stuff of nightmares. On the plus side, it was doing wonders for his boner control. “No. No.” Brad shook his head and closed his eyes to scrub his mind of that thought. “No. Absolutely not.” 

Ray reached up and grabbed him by the polo collar. “Okay maybe I haven’t been clear enough about my needs, that’s my bad,” he said, releasing one hand so he could press it to his own chest in a sincere apology. “But Brad, I am going to need you to fuck me within the next thirty seconds or I might die.” 

Dramatic. Well, mostly. If Brad were honest, he’d felt that way himself just a minute earlier, before he was reminded of the fact that they were in a bathroom. It smelled in here. Ray’s aftershave was already wearing off and only partially covered it up as he pulled Brad back to him, lips crashing together, waves on rocks. 

Brad let him, because kissing Ray was slightly addictive and calming and it felt good and it was just enough to distract him from the sound of two men talking about how the salmon was a little dry from the urinals. 

He could get Ray to the car, but Brad learned early on that he was really too tall to comfortably fuck in a car, and he preferred to give Ray the attention he deserved. They could go home, but Ray was right about one thing– this needed to be remedied in the immediate future. And that was when Brad realized where they were. 

In a hotel. 

But Brad’s thoughts had distracted him from his current action, and Ray picked up on his less-than-focused attention.

“Are you thinking about something else?” Ray said suddenly, breaking away from their kiss. He stared at Brad, mouth open in a dramatized gasp. “You are unbelievable. I’m gonna jam a chopstick up your nose.” 

“Well sure, if you could reach,” Brad fired back, so automatic that he didn’t even have to think about it. That insult barely made sense, because it wasn’t like Ray needed to be at his height to jam a chopstick up his nose, but it got the desired reaction from Ray who thumped Brad’s chest with the back of his hand. As he did, Brad reached up and grabbed his hand, keeping it trapped in his. “We’re in a hotel.” 

Ray squinted at him, as close as he could be without jumping on Brad and wrapping his legs around him. “Yeah, so?”

So, he says. Brad rolled his eyes and gestured around them with head. Did he have to drag Ray all the way to this clear solution by hand? “So there are rooms all around us.” 

Brad watched the realization dawn on Ray. He pulled away, back bumping against the wall. Brad released Ray’s hand and instinctively reached out to shield the back of his head again, but it didn’t hit. “You are not going to put down 300 dollars just to fuck on a bed, Brad.” 

Oh god. That’s right. They were in a fancy hotel. Fuck him sideways. 

You know what? Yeah. Fuck him sideways. “Maybe I am,” Brad said haughtily, raising his eyebrows in suggested indifference. Yes, that was a lot of money to put down on a technically unnecessary hotel room, but Ray was right. Thirty seconds.  

Ray didn’t seem as sure about the prospect. Instead, he threw his hands up in exasperation. “Oh my god, what about a supply closet or something? It’s gotta be clean in there, that's where they keep all the cleaning shit.” 

Brad gave Ray a look akin to the kind of look he might give someone if they’d grown a second head. “No, are you joking? Those closests never get cleaned.” Obviously those closets would be the dirtiest place in the whole building. Who cleaned their cleaning supply closet, right? Well, Brad would have. But not many people were as fastidious about cleanliness as he was.

“Jesus Christ,” Ray said, rubbing his hand over his face in frustration. The move reminded Brad of his repeated attempts to remove the chocolate from his face, and something stirred in his gut and he needed to find a secure, clean place right now.  

“Come on.” Brad reached over and undid the lock to the stall. He had waited until the last man that entered left, so he and Ray could both leave without making a spectacle of themselves, flushed and tousled as they were. Brad wasted no time exiting the bathroom in long, sure strides. He was going to get them a room, dammit. 

“Brad!” Ray chirped after him, clipping at his heels like a chihuahua. “This is a waste of money! What about the car! What about–” Ray got distracted by a waiter passing him with a serving tray of little pigs in a blanket. Brad didn’t even have to look to know he was grabbing as many as he could fit into his little raccoon hands. “Oh, shit, yeah, thanks…Brad!” 

But Brad was already in the lobby, steps away from the front desk. He met the man at reception with calm determination as Ray hovered a few feet behind him, watching intently, mouth full of pigs in blankets. “Hi, I don’t have a reservation. Do you have rooms available?”

The man smiled a smile only ever witnessed in the line of customer service and tapped away at the keyboard in front of him. “Certainly, just give me one moment.” 

It had better be a fast moment, Brad thought. For some reason, the fact that Ray had sucked a pig out of the wrapping and had now put that wrapping on his pinkie finger did not turn Brad off. No, his resolve only grew stronger as Ray grinned and wiggled his pig finger at him. 

He was going to fuck that idiot in thirty damn seconds. 

Except he didn’t. Turns out, it took more than thirty seconds to pay for the room and get his hotel key. Then when they got to the elevator, some family with two children joined them and they both had to keep their hands to themselves until they could get off on the third floor. Then it took an additional twenty seconds to find the damn room. 

But as soon as they were in and Brad closed the door behind him, he swept Ray up and knocked him down to the bed. Ray laughed, a sound that squeezed at Brad’s heart, and he was 300 dollars poorer but a priceless amount richer. 

A while later, Brad was laying in the large, queen-sized bed and thumbing through the tourism magazine that was left on the nightstand. It was always interesting to see what features were deemed tourist-worthy. How many of them had he done? Which ones were worth doing and which ones were truly for the easily-amused traveling masses? 

Ray came out of the bathroom, still naked and seemingly indifferent about it. Brad wasn’t sure when they passed over the line to casual nudity. It wasn’t something he really cared about, but there was a definite comfort level associated with it. It was different than locker room nudity, or pre-fuck nudity. That tipped another signal in his brain. They were getting closer to the zone that Brad simultaneously wanted and did not want. 

“You should see the tub they have in there, homes. It’s so fucking big.” Ray flopped back onto the bed and reached for the remote. He flipped on the TV and clicked through the channels until he found the scrolling guide.

“I’m not fucking you in a tub,” Brad said, without looking up. It would have to be a big tub, and he was sure it wasn’t big enough. Showers? That was something he could work with. But fucking in a tub? Not to mention how immediately disgusting the aftermath would be. No, showers were the way to go when it came to (private) bathroom fucking, and that was a hill he was willing to die on. 

So to speak, anyway. Brad didn’t die on hills. He won his battles on hills.  

Ray scoffed next to him and Brad looked up from the magazine to catch his exaggerated eye roll. “Excuse me, you big presumptuous motherfucker. Not everything I want in life revolves around getting some from your colossal dick. Maybe I just wanted to soak.” 

“Soak?” Brad laughed a little and set the magazine down. “What are you, some young Victorian lady nearing the age of entering society?” Baths were outdated and only useful if you were in need of a good icing or had some type of plebian chicken-pox disease that you needed relief from. 

Ray grinned as he watched the channels go by, thumb hovering over the remote as if he’d need to make the decision before the show scrolled out of view. “I’ve got to look my best,” he said. His eyes darted to the side and when he caught Brad’s gaze he wiggled his eyebrows. “How the fuck else am I supposed to attract your attention among the many young lads and ladies vying for it?” 

Now it was Brad’s turn to roll his eyes, even if he couldn’t stop his wide smile. He loved when Ray continued a bit. He was good with sharp repartee, and no one had better follow-ups than him. “Stupid,” Brad said, and he frowned slightly at the continued fondness that penetrated his voice. He’d been hoping it would go away after they blew off the pent up energy. Apparently it did not. 

Ray chuckled and kept watching the channels scroll by, so Brad leaned back and propped up the pillow at the correct angle behind his head so he could watch whatever stupid shit Ray put on. He was more than pleased when he put on a football game. There was a moment there when Spongebob Squarepants rolled by and Brad thought he was going to have to wrestle him for remote rights.  

For a while they watched the game in a comfortable silence, making passing comments about the plays or a particularly good tackle. Then Ray seemed to sit up a little straighter. Brad was already paying attention to him before he spoke. “Hey.” 

“Hm?” The tone was interesting. It was the serious kind. Ray wasn’t often serious unless he had something important to say, and given their current status and moment in time, Brad felt the pilot light of his anxiety click on. 

But Ray didn’t ask a question about what they were doing, or where they were going, or any of the things Brad was worried about him voicing. Instead, he apologized. “I’m sorry,” Ray said, head turning to him. Brad could see the sincerity of it in his eyes and the slight downturn of his lips.  

What the fuck did Ray have to be sorry for? Beyond, of course, dragging him to this wedding affair. He did jam his elbow into Brad’s ribs at one point as they’d been rolling around in bed, but he’d already apologized for that. “You’re going to have to be more specific,” Brad said, voice light. As far as he knew, Ray didn’t have anything to actually be sorry for.  

Ray was back to absent-mindedly picking at the skin around his nails as his eyes turned to the game. “I don’t know why I couldn’t let it go,” he said, sounding distant. “If you wanted to sleep with her, you could have.” 

Oh. That’s right. While Brad had already come to terms with who he wanted to sleep with in his mind, Ray didn’t know. Brad had assumed, given that he’d put down his good American credit card for a hotel room just so they could fuck, Ray would know that it was obviously not an issue. But clearly that hadn’t fully translated over. Brad hooked an arm behind his head and stayed staring at Ray. “I know I could have. I can do whatever I want.” 

One of the teams made a touchdown and the crowd cheered, and Ray didn’t move a muscle. For a moment he was very still, and then Brad watched him intentionally relax, forcing his shoulders to loosen as he let out a long breath. “You can,” Ray agreed, and finally peeked back at Brad. 

He looked young. Brad didn’t think about Ray’s age much, because he never seemed like he was 21 to Brad. Or maybe Brad was the one who acted younger than he should have. Or maybe, at the end of the day, 21 and 26 were not as far away as they seemed. After all, their experiences shaped their behavior. Ray had seen war. They’d shared that together. That’s what mattered. 

But he looked young now. Unsure, nervous, big eyed, and honest. Young, yes, but it was another sign to Brad that Ray was more mature than he was. Ray might spent 90% of his time talking about stupid shit and pretending he was some wild, reckless youth, but Ray was able to be really, truly open. Brad knew he was looking at Ray right now, and not the persona everyone put on for the general public. He was being vulnerable, and that took maturity and trust. And he deserved the same from Brad. 

He deserved that. But Brad couldn’t. Not in the way that was needed here. The guilt clawed at his chest with ice and Brad tried to shake it off. He could at least…try to meet him halfway.  

“And I did,” Brad said curtly, hoping that would be enough . He did what he wanted to do. He had options tonight, and he did what he wanted to do, despite Ray doing his hardest to be unfuckable, what with his pubic lice and his weird chocolate fountain combinations. Neither of those things had deterred Brad. An actual, gorgeous person who was actively interested in him hadn’t deterred Brad. Both of those realizations made him feel like he was being tugged closer to that deep end, so he chewed on the side of his cheek and returned to their shore in the main way he knew how. “Use that sorry for the other things you have to apologize for, like assuming that I would ever want to fuck you in a public bathroom.” 

It worked, because it always did. Brad’s change back to a light, flippant tone made Ray smile. They were safe here. “Oh like you’ve never done it,” Ray quipped, readjusting his position so his head was back on his pillow, closer to Brad. Clearly Brad had said the right thing, or at least close enough to put Ray at ease. 

Ray’s closeness made Brad want to drift his hand over the curve of Ray’s shoulder and the smattering of light freckles there. Ray had what Brad liked to call recon freckles. They weren’t really present until his skin had seen some sun, and then they’d rise to the surface like stars appearing after dark. There weren’t many, and they weren’t densely populated, but they were there. He could see them if he looked close enough. And as of late, he was often looking very closely at Ray.  

Focus, Brad. There’s a conversation happening. “Why do you act like you have?” Brad asked suddenly, eyes flicking up from Ray’s shoulder to his eyes. He smirked a little, knowing full well Ray had never fucked in a public restroom because Ray’s little black book of sex consisted of Brad and maybe one or two other names. Maybe . He was pretty sure it might just be him entirely, and he for damn sure hadn’t fucked Ray in a public bathroom before.

Ray reached out to whack his chest again, right where he’d been sucking like a vacuum earlier. “Shut up. We’re talking about you , Colbert. This is whataboutism, and I won’t stand for it in my arguments.”  

This fucking nerd. Ray thought Brad was a nerd? What about him, always using his basic high-school debate terminology to reject the arguments he knew he couldn’t beat fair and square. The brat. Brad grinned and tucked his second arm behind his head, totally at ease. “Not gonna happen.” 

There was a flash of something in Ray’s eyes. “We’ll see,” he said, and Brad was suddenly very concerned that Ray was about to make public bathroom sex a personal mission. Brad had his standards, but he wasn’t so sure they’d hold up forever if the moment was right. God, how could he live with himself if Ray managed to supersede his iron-clad public bathroom sex clause? This dishonor that would bring to his warrior spirit was immeasurable. 

But that was a problem for future Brad, wasn’t it? And it was possible that future Brad would have more resolve than him. Not probable, because as evidence was trending he was only getting weaker and weaker to Ray’s whims, but it was still possible. 

Right now, he wanted to eat. He hadn’t been able to grab any wedding appetizers and he’d spent the good part of an hour expending energy. He needed to gain some of that back because he had spent 300 dollars here, and that meant they were going to make good use of this nice, big bed. 

When he reached over and pulled the menu out of the nightstand drawer, Ray peered over his shoulder. “Are you ordering room service?”

“Yeah.” Brad rolled back into place and opened up the menu, immediately scanning to the seafood section. All the salmon and crab talk earlier had clearly left an impression on him. “You’re hungry?” Brad asked, looking over at Ray. 

Now, Ray could pack it up no doubt about it. But Brad was pretty sure he’d eaten half of the wedding already, not to mention all the chocolate mixed in with it. He was actually surprised that Ray wasn’t locked in the bathroom shitting his brains out from the unsavory combinations he was putting his intestines through. After all, he’d made Brad pause mid-fuck because he said he was nauseous. “Maybe you shouldn’t” 

Ray squawked and yanked the menu away from Brad, fueled by indignant passion. “Fuck you, I’m gonna eat what I want to eat,” he said, shouldering dramatically away from Brad so he couldn’t read the menu with him. “I’m not gonna sit here and eat a salad while you get a steak and fries just so you can have a squeaky clean fuck. Shit happens Brad. You’re gonna have to deal with it.” 

Oh for fucks sake. Was that the conversation Ray thought they were having? Brad rolled his eyes to the ceiling. “I didn’t mean that,” he said, with great forced patience for his annoying bedside partner. “You have a stomach full of chocolate and god knows what else. Maybe you should take it easy, you were the one who said you were nauseous.” 

Ray gave him a suspicious, appraising look before he laid back to share the menu with Brad, using one hand to wave off his concern. “It was the position and the tempo,” Ray said decidedly, and then seemed to think about it for a moment. “...And maybe the chocolate. But I’m fine now, and I want nachos.”

“Alright, fine, but if you throw up anywhere near my general vicinity I’m going to murder you,” Brad said. There was nothing that made his nose curl faster than that distinctive smell. But Ray seemed unbothered, so they both read the menu until Brad settled on a shrimp cocktail and Ray decided they should split both the shrimp cocktail and the nachos. Brad said no, because he wanted all his damn shrimp, but he knew he would already have to spare at least one for Ray.

“Hey Brad, guess what,” Ray said suddenly after Brad finished ordering, sinking down to lay more comfortably on the bed. His head was dangerously close to Brad’s shoulder. Close enough that Brad thought it would be less annoying to just push his head down onto it, but he didn’t. That would be cuddling. That would be illegal cuddling punishable by the court of Brad. 

Ray didn’t seem to notice or care. Instead, he looked up at Brad with a smug little grin and wide eyes. “I’m a 300 dollar lay.” 

That bastard. “Shut the fuck up.” 

Ray didn’t shut up. He chattered away, judging the football players despite the fact that Brad knew he wasn’t a very good one himself. Brad still listened to everything he said. At some point in the past two years, Ray’s voice had gone from incessant and irritating to comforting and interesting. Buried in all that bullshit, Brad could usually find some very well-formulated thoughts and opinions. 

So he listened to Ray talk, and he hummed along his agreement. Then they ate, and they fucked, and they watched more TV, and they took a shower where Brad proved again that it was the superior fucking location (see, he could and would fuck in a bathroom, just not the specific public restroom ). Then Brad ordered even more food, splurging on a nicer steak dinner and dessert combo, and eventually Ray fell asleep during Mission Impossible 2. 

He was curled on his side, snoring lightly as he always did. And just as Brad always did, his mind started to settle back into reality. The floor wasn’t under him anymore. He was drifting in the depths of their current situation, forced to tread the water alone. 

Problem number one: he only wanted to sleep with Ray. That meant exclusivity. And the term exclusivity automatically implied some kind of relationship , which is exactly what he couldn’t and wouldn’t have, no matter what. Relationships end. And he didn’t want whatever he had with Ray to end.

That felt new. Just a few weeks ago he’d been desperate for it to end. And now that he was here, drifting in the space between never wanting it to end and knowing that reality meant it would eventually, felt miserable. How long could they stay in this undefined spot? Brad could stay there for a long time. He could possibly stay there indefinitely. But could Ray? 

He couldn’t even ask that. He couldn’t ask Ray what he wanted, because that would be starting a conversation about the thing they weren’t supposed to have conversations about. 

It was a multi-faceted problem, problem number one. It was a big ol’ bitch of a problem. 

Which brought him to problem number two: he was going to hurt Ray. 

How could he watch the man sleeping right next to him and know that he was going to hurt him? Brad knew where this was going, even if Ray didn’t. Ray seemed to trust him, or at least trust that they’d figure it out. But Brad knew that eventually there wasn’t going to be anything to figure out. He’d leave Ray with scars similar to the ones he had. 

What the fuck was he doing? He was fucking this up. He was fucking Ray up, wasn’t he? This was Ray’s first… not -relationship, Brad knew that much. And this was a pretty messed up first not-relationship to have. Because Brad was broken. And you couldn’t fix broken people. There were too many pieces, and when they broke, some of them were inevitably lost forever. How could he be whole for Ray when he had missing pieces?

So Brad knew what he had to do. He had to stop this now. Not because he wanted to, but because if he didn’t it would spiral out of control. 

But he didn’t fucking want to. 

Because he lov-

Brad got up. As quietly as he could, which was very quietly, he pulled on his khakis and his polo. He had to leave, because all he wanted to do was roll over and drop an arm over Ray and close his eyes and go to sleep, but he couldn’t do that. Not to himself, not to Ray. He couldn’t. 

There was a small pad of paper and a pen on the small desk. Brad didn’t just want to leave , like some shitty person in a romantic comedy who was afraid of commitment. He didn’t want Ray to feel bad, waking up in an empty hotel room in the middle of the night. 

God, what the fuck was he doing. Was he really doing this? Fuck. He angrily scribbled his note on the pad, endlessly disappointed in himself. 

Ray. Have to get up early, so heading home. Didn’t want to wake you. Hotel is ours until 10:00 am, stay if you want. Talk to you tomorrow. BC

It wasn’t a good note, but he hoped it would provide a different context to his quick departure. He tried to tell himself that this wouldn’t hurt Ray. He hoped Ray would just read the note and assume Brad was being his normal work-focused self. Maybe he’d order more food or take the bath he seemed to have wanted. 

But as Brad shut the hotel door behind him with a soft click, he knew it would hurt. 

Brad had slept with Ray seven times, and it would happen again.

But there would still inevitably be a last time.