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The power was out again. Something to do with the generator popping a gasket or… whatever the undergrad at the front desk had yelled up to the motel room windows. Jet and Mads already had the window open, hoping to tempt some kind of early evening breeze, so the words had floated in but neither of them got up to clarify anything.
The power would come back eventually.
In the meantime, Jet was reading aloud, angled so that the last rays of sunlight shone over their page, and Mads’ head pillowed on their shoulder. Every now and then he would interrupt with some commentary on the characters, or to point out a particularly nice line, or to tease Jet for stumbling over a word that neither of them recognized and so neither of them knew how to pronounce it.
But Mads was, “Pretty sure that a U-E doesn’t sound like that, babe.”
“No, it totally does,” insisted Jet. “Because remember when we had to ask Doc how dialogue was pronounced? This’s the same as that, so the word just ends.”
Mads pushed up on an elbow to get a better look at his partner. “You’re full of shit, Star. ‘Value’ ends with a U-E and it doesn’t just end!”
“That’s different!” Jet pounded one hand against the covers of the bed.
“Call Cherri, then. He’s a poet, he knows words.”
“Cariño, everyone knows he can’t spell for shit. Plus, him ‘n Kobes ‘n Ghoul are out tonight.”
“Hmph.” Mads ducked down again, resting his head under Jet’s collarbone and tripping his fingers down the buttons of their shirt. “Why didn’t we go out, again?”
“Have you ever been on a date night with those three?”
“Nope.”
“Try an’ keep it that way. Kids’re fucking nightmares to keep a handle on. Plus,” Jet shifted, wrapping their arm around Mads’ waist. “Nothing wrong with a bit of peace and quiet, for once.”
Internally, Mads agreed. He’d just gotten off of a full moon’s worth of concerts, fairs, and nonstop parties with the Missile Kid. This was the first conversation in what felt like forever that Mads wasn’t straining to shout over a wall of speakers or squinting through a haze of smoke and lights. He traced his fingers back up Jet’s torso, feeling them shiver under the light touch.
“You got a point there,” he admitted.
Jet inhaled, about to say something in return, but cut themself off when Mads popped the first button on their shirt.
“What’re ya doing?”
Mads undid the next button. “Figured you were gettin’ hot.”
He loosed another, then lifted himself up and pulled the now-open collar of Jet’s shirt to the side. Jet’s pulse jumped in their throat, but Mads paid more attention to their collarbone. He traced the warm skin with his lips, drawing a gentle gasp from Jet when he bit down lightly. Kiss after kiss landed on the line of their clavicle, ending where their shirt wouldn’t move anymore, right at the edge of the pitted scar burned into their shoulder.
“Mads—”
Jet’s voice was strained, soft, on the edge of breaking. One more kiss found a home just above Jet’s heart, then Mads’ laid his head there and picked up Jet’s book.
“Okay, so let’s pretend that ‘segue’s pronounced like that,” he prompted. “What’s Ivanovich 'segging' to?”
Jet cleared their throat, pressed a kiss to Mads’ scalp, then took the book from him and picked up where they’d left off.