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Really, the cops could have pulled up to the club Willie worked at for a number of reasons, all of which would have gotten his ass in trouble, including but not limited to the ID he had tucked into his phone case claiming he was 26 and had been for eight years and the fact that he had definitely punched a man in the face several minutes ago at the front door and there were at least twenty witnesses to attest to it. Not to mention the laundry list of minor offenses and arrests that were on his record, the most recent of which being the… incident a week earlier involving a squad car belonging to an officer of the law and several cans of pink spray paint.
He didn’t know, exactly, which one he was about to be apprehended for tonight (because surely, he thought, they were here for him), and he didn’t much care to find out, so when the red and blue strobes lit up the inside of the club from the three ( three! ) cop cars parked out front, Willie didn’t stick around to chat.
The moment they pulled up, Flynn materialized beside him, even though the last time he’d seen her, she’d been trying to charm her way backstage to visit the lead singer of the opening band that had played the club tonight. Her nails, sharp and fake and the color of blood, dug into his upper arm.
“Back door,” she said, her eyes trained on the cops now climbing out of their vehicles.
She wasn’t an idiot, after all; she knew Willie better than most, and had come to the (correct) conclusion that they were here for him. It wasn’t the first time she’d had to cover for him, and it wouldn’t be the last. Willie didn’t waste his time with an elaborate apology, or a grateful speech about how much he appreciated her; she already knew, and he would most likely be buying her coffee every day for the foreseeable future to make it up to her. Instead, he just nodded, short and quick, and then did his best disappearing act, ducking and weaving through the crowd of clubbers, trying to put as much distance between himself and the front door as possible.
Around him, people were starting to take note of the cops parked outside, realizing that the red and blue lights weren’t just the club strobes overhead, but that something else was going on. People were craning their necks to see what was going on, what they were here for, what drama was about to unfold, but Willie didn’t let himself get caught up in it. He narrowly avoided being smacked in the face by a girl literally shoving her friend out of the way to get a good view of the front door and then spun, just missing one of the waitstaff, laden down with a tray full of drinks. It was a complicated dance, but Willie was well used to it at this point.
The kitchen door of the restaurant side of the club had a sign warning customers in large letters that it was EMPLOYEES ONLY, but Willie ignored it, as he always did. He was employed by the club, and the club was attached to the restaurant, so technically, he was an employee of the kitchen.
Technically.
“Get out of my kitchen, boy,” one of the cooks snapped, waving a paring knife menacingly at him, and on instinct, Willie put his hands up.
“Sorry, May,” he called, skirting past her on his way to the back door. “I’ve gotta go, but I love you!”
“Boy,” she said again, clucking her tongue disdainfully, but she lowered her knife. She knew damn well what his name was; Willie had been working at this place for long enough, and she’d certainly interacted with him enough times to know it, but she remained steadfast and stubborn, simply calling him boy. “Are the cops after you again? ”
Willie, half offended, wondered why that was everyone’s go-to assumption. He wasn’t that much of a criminal, was he? Maybe it was the long hair. Or the slightly illegal things he kept doing and then getting away with.
“Sure does seem like it,” he said cheerfully, and he didn’t need to see May’s expression to feel the way she rolled her eyes at him. It was always something, with him, and May was just one of the people who got to witness the chaotic antics that followed in the aftermath.
He dodged two more cooks and one frazzled-looking waiter and finally found himself pushing open the back door into the cool night air. The kitchen door was meant to be an emergency-exit-only type deal, but Willie had used it plenty of times and had never set off any alarms before, so he figured someone was lying. It opened out into the alley behind the club, a dingy, poorly lit strip of pavement lined with dumpsters and drunk clubbers calling their rides or catching their breath. Tonight, there were only a few other people in the alley; one couple attached at the mouth against the wall, looking as though they were trying to merge into one horny, many-limbed creature from how close they were pressed together, a group of girls further down the alley, all of them on their phones, all of them talking over each other, all of their legs the same shade of tan, and a guy crouched on the ground beside one of the dumpsters, wearing a baseball cap and a hoodie and twirling a pencil between his fingers, one earbud in and the other dangling on its cord.
Willie came to a stop just outside the food and peered down the alley, past the group of arguing girls. The buildings across the street were illuminated red, blue, red, blue, which meant the cops were still parked out front. His fingers itched for his skateboard, but he’d left it in the employee break room. Stupid. So much for a quick getaway.
He’d have to run, then, either all the way home or to a sufficient hiding place until the cops gave up. He’d run from the police before, and knew he was capable of doing it, but he’d been on his feet for most of the night already, and his legs ached at the thought of driving them into a full sprint right now.
Someday, he thought, hearing May’s disdainful tone in his head, his luck was going to run out, and he was going to get in serious trouble, but he planned on evading that day as long as possible. Or dying first.
Maybe if he got enough of a head start, he wouldn’t have to run. He ran a hand through his hair, disrupting the bun it had been half-knotted into, and got his hand hopelessly tangled before he wrestled it out. He took a single step down the alley, towards the arguing girls, before changing his mind. Not towards the cops, dipshit.
“Dude,” and Willie jumped at the sudden noise. God, he needed to stop committing crimes; it was making him paranoid, and his nerves were already shot. He turned to find the guy in the hoodie standing from his crouch, pulling his earbud out of his ear. His face was equal parts interest and concern as he approached, like Willie was something he was worried about, but couldn’t wait to study. “Are you alright?”
That was… an excellent question. Willie’s eyes darted down to the end of the alley, looking for any sign that one of the cops had come around the side of the building. He wondered how effective Flynn’s stalling would be, how much time she was giving him. His mind raced.
“There are cops inside,” he finally said. “Looking for me.”
Hoodie’s eyebrows shot up. “What’d you do?”
Willie hesitated. He scanned the alley again, feeling jumpy, feeling paranoid, feeling like he was wired too tight. He should be running. They would be here soon; all the cops he’d ever met were short a few marbles, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that if he wasn’t inside, he’d probably try to go out the back door. He should be running. Why wasn’t he running?
“A few days ago,” he said, and then paused, wondering how much he should say. He sized the guy in front of him up, trying to figure out if he was the type to snitch on him. Oversized hoodie, backwards baseball cap, earnest expression on his face, but not shocked, like this was something he was used to.
Earnest expression on his very attractive face, something distracted and traitorous pointed out, deep in Willie’s brain. He shook his head, tried to remind himself how little it mattered if the guy was hot when Willie was about to confess crimes to him.
He lowered his voice, just in case the couple against the wall or the pack of girls was eavesdropping, although he doubted it. “An officer said something shitty to my friend so I, uh, looked up which cruiser was registered to his name and spray painted something dirty on it.”
Hoodie laughed. “Seriously?”
Willie nodded, confidence boosted by the fact that Hoodie seemed to find this funny, rather than criminal. “And then tonight, a guy got too rowdy at the front door, shoved a girl into the wall, so I punched him. In the face. That’s probably…” Willie ran a hand through his hair, catching several more snarls as he did so and wincing. “They’re probably here for one of those, honestly.”
“Respect,” Hoodie said with a nod, his eyes still bright with humor. He gave the pencil in his hand another twirl. “And they’re inside, right now. Do they know you came out the back door?”
“They know I’m here at the club,” Willie said. At least, he assumed they did. “They didn’t see me sneak out, but it’s only a matter of time before they-”
“Okay, focus,” Hoodie said, his tone suddenly firm, and Willie blinked at the sudden shift. “What do you need? Are you running from them, or do you need someplace to hide?”
Willie’s attention caught on the change in the guy’s voice; where before, he had sounded unsure, now he sounded like he was commanding a battalion.
And he hadn’t even considered hiding until this guy had brought it up; he’d been pretty set on running, but with the time ticking away…
“I can help you,” Hoodie said, sounding impatient. He twirled the pencil again, and Willie’s attention was momentarily caught by the way his fingers twisted around- no, not a pencil. A drumstick. “Just say the word.”
“You-” Willie blinked again. “What? You want to help me?”
Hoodie rolled his eyes, gave the drumstick another flick of his fingers. “I’ve done this before, man. I’m in a rock band that got our start playing shitty clubs in the seediest parts of town. None of us are legal to drink, our crew is mostly runaways and delinquents who needed a job and are probably lying about their qualifications, and our guitarist has a problem with mouthing off to authority figures. I’ve run from cops before. Are you fleeing, or hiding?”
Willie opened his mouth, then closed it again. Something in his brain was struggling to connect the fact that this guy was in a rock band with the drumstick in his hand, and if he really wracked his brain, he could vaguely recall that the drummer of the band playing the club tonight had been wearing a pink hoodie. He shook his head; it wasn’t relevant.
“They’re going to be here soon,” he said, somewhat helplessly. As if on cue, his phone chimed in his back pocket, and he pulled it out to see Flynn’s name on his screen: they’re coming your way. stalled as long as i could.
He opened his mouth, although what he’d been planning on saying was anyone’s guess, but he never got the chance. To his utter horror, he heard the backdoor opening behind him, the one he’d just come through. The one that was supposed to be emergency-exit-only, a qualification that the police apparently didn’t respect, either.
He’d waited too long. They were here, and Willie really didn’t want to get arrested. Not tonight.
Well. Not ever, but especially not tonight.
Later, Willie would blame it on panic, or the fear of getting caught and stuffed in the back of one of those cruisers, or maybe just sheer adrenaline, but in the moment, all he could think was move hide get out of the way- and his body responded. He reached up and yanked off Hoodie’s baseball cap, crushing it backwards over his own head in an attempt to hide his hair. Then he grabbed the front of the pink hoodie with both hands and pushed his new drummer friend towards the opposite wall. He wasn’t pushing terribly hard, but Hoodie wasn’t resisting, going along with him willingly, and it was a miracle and nothing else that neither of them tripped.
Hoodie only had time to yelp, “What-” before Willie was spinning them both in place, pressing his own back against the wall so that rather than pushing Hoodie up against the wall, Willie was the one being pushed. It all happened in a matter of seconds, and Willie’s heart rate skyrocketed, both at the urgency of the situation and the sudden proximity to Hoodie, whose expression was bordering on shell-shocked. It was a good look on him, Willie thought, slightly hysterically, and under different circumstances-
“I guess I’m hiding,” he said, his voice coming out breathless, half a laugh, and he watched the corner of Hoodie’s mouth quirk upwards. God, but he was hot. “Come on, make it convincing.” Willie gave one of his hoodie strings a tug, going for playful, trying not to let on how badly his hands were shaking.
“Make it convincing?” Hoodie demanded, but he brought up one arm to rest on the brick wall beside Hoodie’s head, drumstick still in hand, both blocking Willie’s face from view and bringing them, if possible, even closer. Willie could feel the drummer’s breath coming out short and hot against his mouth, and it was doing horrible things deep in his stomach.
Focus. Cops.
Willie took a shaky breath and looked right into Hoodie’s eyes, which had slight bags under them and were a light, indeterminable color in the dim light of the alley. They were so close. Willie had no doubt that anyone who passed by would assume they were… well. Their mouths certainly looked close enough to be touching. Hopefully any cop who spotted them would assume they were just another couple who’d stumbled out of the club to make out.
Couple. The word twisted unpleasantly behind Willie’s ribcage, and he made a valiant effort not to look at Hoodie’s mouth. He hadn’t even asked first, for crying out loud. He supposed the drummer would have shoved him away or caused more of a scene if he hadn’t been alright with any of this, but still. Willie should have at least checked.
They were tucked in a small space behind one of the dumpsters, partially hidden from view of the back kitchen door, and it certainly didn’t smell great, but Willie couldn’t find it in himself to focus on the stench when every one of his senses was overwhelmed by the guy in the hoodie towering over him. He smelled faintly of sweat and something sharper, like mint – his deodorant, maybe– and he had a good few inches on him, forcing Willie to look up in order to meet his eyes. He had a jawline that looked as though it had been crafted by the heavens themselves, and there was something amused about his expression, even now, even in this compromised position, like he knew something Willie didn’t.
There was a single strand of blond hair hanging in his face that Willie desperately wanted to reach out and tuck behind his ear, which struck him as both unbearably soft and also slightly pathetic. He needed to get a hold of himself. He was hiding from the police, to avoid being arrested. Hoodie was just assisting.
At the end of the alley, a man’s voice called out, loud and authoritative, and Willie froze, the blood in his veins turning to ice. Hoodie must have seen his face change, or felt him go still against him, because he leaned in closer and breathed, “They’re questioning the girls down there.”
“You can hear that?” Willie demanded. He could hear low murmurs from the end of the alley, nothing else, but Hoodie seemed to be able to hear exactly what they were saying.
Hoodie shrugged. “I’m good at picking up small noises, man. I’m a drummer. Someone’s got to be able to find the beat in the middle of a song. One of the girls has hair like yours. They’re asking if any of them saw you run past.”
“ Did they see me?” Willie hissed.
The drummer cocked his head, listening, then gave a small shake of his head. “They don’t have a clue what he’s talking about. They’re all very drunk,” he said, his lips curving into a subtle grin. “They’re all talking over each other, and arguing. The cops aren’t going to get shit out of them. I think you’re safe, so long as they don’t-”
He suddenly tensed up, and Willie strained his ears to hear it, too: footsteps. Heavy, most likely wearing boots, and coming towards them.
“I’ll check further down, ” a man was calling, and the footsteps drew nearer.
For at least the third time that night, Willie felt his pulse skip a beat, and when he met Hoodie’s eyes again, he was sure he was doing a shit job of masking his terror.
“I’m really sorry about this, man,” the drummer said, and when Willie opened his mouth to ask what the hell he meant, he leaned forward, pinning Willie the rest of the way against the wall and further hiding him from view. Then he pressed his lips to Willie’s, effectively cutting off whatever pointless question Willie had been about to ask.
For five entire seconds, Willie just stood there, frozen, with the drummer’s mouth moving hot against his, slow and methodical, with just a hint of teeth. His other hand, the one that wasn’t clutching the drumstick by Willie’s head, came up to rest on Willie’s hip, burning even through Willie’s shirt, and Willie gasped slightly at the sudden contact. Hoodie used his shock to gain further access into his mouth, all slick tongue and insistent lips and oh, those were definitely teeth on Willie’s bottom lip. Willie thought he might pass out. His knees suddenly felt very weak.
Then the five seconds passed, and Willie got a hold of himself. This had been his idea, after all. He’d made the first move, pulling Hoodie over here, committing to the act.
Make it convincing.
He uncurled one of his hands from the drummer’s hoodie and ran it through his hair, fingernails scratching against Hoodie’s scalp gently. He cradled Hoodie’s head where his neck met the base of his skull and used his new leverage to pull the drummer impossibly closer to him. The brick wall dug into Willie’s back through his thin shirt, and from the parts of Hoodie that were flush against him (which was… most of him ), Willie could feel that he was toned as hell under that baggy pink sweatshirt.
A tiny voice in Willie’s head tried to make a joke, slightly delirious from loss of oxygen or blood flow or common sense, about being caught between a rock and a- and then the drummer did something complicated with his tongue that effectively erased all thought, ration or not, from Willie’s mind.
Fuck, but he was a good kisser. Willie tried not to get distracted from his mission, attempting to focus on the footsteps coming ever closer, the smell from the club dumpsters, the sounds of the other couple making out several yards away, his impending and ultimate doom if this charade didn’t work and he was caught anyways and then the drummer was also hauled in for assisting a criminal.
Tried being the operative word, as it was… remarkably hard to think about anything that wasn’t Hoodie’s lips or his hands or his tongue or his teeth. Willie felt like he was on fire, burning from the inside out. The hand still fisted in the drummer’s pink hoodie tightened as he held on for dear life, feeling like he might fall or drown or collapse if he let go.
The heavy footsteps grew closer; it only sounded like one pair of boots, but Willie had the sudden and vivid realization that if they saw his face now, it was all for nothing, and he wasn’t about to let the best kisser he’d ever had the pleasure of knowing in his short life get arrested for helping him. That would be the true crime.
He pulled away from Hoodie, regretting it as soon as he’d done it, since he wanted to do nothing else except kiss this boy for the rest of his life, and used his grip on the pink sweatshirt to yank on it, exposing more of the drummer’s neck.
“What-” Hoodie began, sounding thoroughly wrecked, and a tiny thrill shot through Willie at the sound of his voice, confused and slightly hoarse, paired by the image of his hooded eyes and his lips, kissed bright pink and slightly swollen.
He had done that to him. Willie.
“Shh,” Willie said. “Roll with it. Make it convincing,” and that was all the warning he gave before he ducked his head and latched his mouth onto the pale stretch of skin where the drummer’s shoulder met his neck and bit down, hard.
He wanted to record the sound Hoodie made in response, somewhere between a sharp gasp and a helpless, involuntary whimper. He wanted to burn it onto a CD or a vinyl or put it in his phone so he could keep listening to it over and over again for the rest of his fucking life. He dipped his head lower, concealing it from view of the officer rapidly approaching them, and sucked gently on the spot he’d just bitten. Then, moving his head slightly, he did the same thing again, further down the drummer’s collarbone, eliciting that same beautiful sound as before.
To say that Willie suddenly felt very unsteady would be an understatement. He had the barest thought that without Hoodie’s weight pressing him into the wall, he would have toppled over, completely boneless, by now. He was in way over his head, and he had to keep repeating, this is a ruse, this is a ruse, this is a ruse, over and over in his head like a mantra. A reminder. The truth.
Willie barely noticed when the footsteps passed them by, the officer making a noise of disgust in the back of his throat at the public display of… something happening in front of him.
There was a rush of victory, then, sure and triumphant, as the sound of the cop moved further down the alley, away from them, and the next mark on Hoodie’s neck was perhaps a tad too enthusiastic, if the small noise he made and the way he gripped Willie’s hip tighter were any indication.
Willie detached his mouth from the drummer’s collarbone, releasing his sweatshirt as he did so. “Sorry, sorry,” he whispered, and then took a shaky breath, resting his forehead against Hoodie’s shoulder for a moment, trying to calm his racing heart. He could feel the drummer’s chest heaving against him, and when he pulled away to look up at him, the drummer’s eyes were squeezed shut.
“God,” Hoodie said softly, opening his eyes and meeting Willie’s. His pupils were blown wide, and he didn’t seem able to get his breathing under control, not that Willie could blame him. “I just… God. ” He leaned his head back, craning his neck to make sure the cop was gone and exposing the three new marks, two of which were already darkening into solid and obvious hickeys. Willie had done that. Without thinking, he reached up to press his thumb to one, and Hoodie shuddered.
Willie felt euphoric and slightly giddy, and he couldn’t help himself; he let out a quiet laugh. “I can’t believe that worked,” he breathed, and Hoodie leaned back in. At first, Willie thought he was going to kiss him again, but Hoodie just pressed their foreheads together.
“I can’t, either,” Hoodie replied. He made no move, Willie noticed, to back up or remove his hand from Willie’s hip, and. Well. Willie certainly wasn’t going to be the one to point it out.
“Are they gone?” he breathed. Their mouths were close enough to touch again, and he could feel Hoodie’s breath on his lips, still coming out quickly even as they both calmed down. Willie hoped his own breath wasn’t terrible; it wasn’t the sort of thing he’d considered in the heat of the moment, but now he couldn’t stop thinking about it.
“They’re gone,” Hoodie confirmed, the words ghosting against Willie’s mouth. “Turned the corner at the end of the alley. I’m guessing they didn’t find what they were looking for.” Willie couldn’t see his mouth; they were too close, but he could hear the grin in his voice, the humor lacing his tone.
For a long moment, they just stood there, unmoving, Hoodie’s entire weight still pinning Willie to the wall. Willie could feel the grin on his own face spreading, something like exhilaration filling him as he replayed what had just happened. It had been bold, and stupid, and slightly dangerous, but he couldn’t think of a single thing he would have done differently. Not when he had this: a gorgeous stranger pressing him against the wall, lips kissed red and breath stolen from his lungs, at least three new spots of evidence on the drummer’s skin.
If hiding from the cops was always like this, Willie might start making more of a habit out of it.
“Thank you,” he said, and Hoodie drew back enough for Willie to see the puzzled look on his face. He wanted to kick himself for speaking and shattering the moment. “For doing this, I mean. Thank you for being so… cool about it.”
Cool about it? Willie wanted to snatch the words out of the air as soon as he’d spoken them. Willie was certainly not acting cool about it. Willie was having a whole entire crisis, right here in the alley, and now he couldn’t even form sentences.
To his relief, Hoodie let out an easy laugh. “No problem. I’d do it again in a heartbeat, dude.”
Before Willie could parse out what, exactly, that was supposed to mean, he heard the back kitchen door open once more, and he barely had time to react before the cross, no-nonsense voice of his favorite cook was cutting through the relative quiet of the alley. “ Boy! ”
He huffed out a laugh. “Here, May!”
Hoodie backed up a few steps, allowing him to peel himself away from the wall. His legs were a tad shakier than he would’ve liked to admit, but he counted it as a small miracle that he was still standing at all.
“You left your board in the staff room, boy,” May called, as Willie approached the back door. His tattered old skateboard was tucked under one of her arms, and his even more tattered helmet hung by its strap from her wrist. “Your pretty friend delivered it to me when she came to check if you were hiding in the kitchen.”
“I was not,” Willie said, realizing it was unnecessary as soon as it was out of his mouth.
May narrowed her eyes at him, making him feel infinitely more dumb. “Obviously.” She reached out, extending his helmet to him. “Won’t get far without these.”
“Aw, I would’ve figured something out,” Willie said, trying for an easygoing tone. “Are they all gone?”
May huffed. “One of them came back here to find you. Very rude. Scared one of my dishwashers. I am assuming he did not find you?”
“He did not,” Hoodie confirmed. Willie hadn’t even heard him come over, but he was standing right behind Willie, hands tucked into the front pocket of his pink sweatshirt. May turned her fiery gaze on him, then nodded, apparently satisfied.
“They’re gone now,” she said, and Willie felt his shoulders slump in relief, all the tension leaving him at once. “Trouble follows you, boy.”
“Sure does,” he agreed. He took his helmet from her outstretched hand, then his skateboard. “Tell Flynn I went home and I’ll see her later tonight, okay?”
“That helmet is shit,” May said, instead of answering him. “Cracked to hell. You need a new one, boy.”
Willie examined his helmer, offended on its behalf. Aside from a crack in the side, it had held up remarkably well, considering how many years he’d been using it. It wasn’t pretty, but it was a trusty old thing, and it got the job done. “It’s alright,” he said.
“It’s shit,” she snapped. “Do not get arrested on your way home. Or hit by a bus.”
Behind him, Hoodie let out a weak cough that sounded suspiciously like it was covering a laugh.
“I won’t, I promise,” Willie said, knowing damn well he couldn’t promise either. He took off the baseball cap he’d forgotten he was still wearing and jammed his helmet over his head in its place, offering the hat back to the drummer. “Here, man. Thanks again.” He wasn’t just talking about the hat.
Hoodie took it, replaced it on his own head. “No problem.” He wasn’t just talking about the hat, either.
“Chop, chop,” said May, apparently bored of their drawn out goodbyes. “You need to get home, boy. You. Other boy.”
Hoodie blinked. “Me?”
“Only other boy out here. Yes,” she said impatiently. “Are you coming in, or staying out?”
“Oh. I mean, uh,” and gone was the suave, quick-thinking boy who’d pushed Willie against a wall with a grin and said shit like I’ve done this before and I’d do it again in a heartbeat. Somewhere, a switch had been flipped; now the drummer looked awkward and uncomfortable, shrinking in on himself and hunching his shoulders as if it made him appear any less tall. He looked slightly terrified, but that might have just been May, who was slightly terrifying.
And yet somewhere, underneath the oversized sweatshirt and nervous expression, Willie could still see the other side of him, just under the surface. His bottom lip burned with the memory of the drummer’s teeth against it. He shivered.
“In or out, boy,” May snapped, and then apparently grew tired of waiting. She let out a tremendous sigh, gave Willie a pointed look he couldn’t begin to decipher, and then marched back into the kitchen.
“ In, ” Hoodie yelped, diving to catch the door before it closed and locked behind her, and Willie couldn’t help himself; he laughed. When Hoodie turned back to look at him, there was an embarrassed smile on his face.
“My band,” he said, as if he was explaining, or possibly apologizing. “They’ll be waiting on me. I told them I was just ducking out for a second. Glad I could… help you?”
“Hey man, it’s all good,” Willie said, buckling his helmet. “Nothing personal. And yes, you were a huge help. The horrid little goblin who lived in his brain provided him with several choice memories about just how helpful Hoodie had been, as well as the color of his thoroughly kissed lips, his wide eyes, the sly grin on his face when he said I’d do it again in a heartbeat.
He shook his head as if that would shake the images away. “I- um. I should go. Shouldn’t push my luck, I mean. The cops might come back, and I don’t want to be here when they do.”
Hoodie reached out, then, with the hand not holding the door open, and Willie wasn’t sure whether he was going to cup Willie’s face or clap a friendly hand on his shoulder or something else entirely. He didn’t get the chance to worry about it, however, as Hoodie apparently thought better of it and dropped his hand.
“Right!” he said brightly, in a voice that didn’t match his unreadable expression. “Well. See you around.”
Willie smiled. “See you around,” he said, and then Hoodie was retreating into the kitchen, the heavy door slamming shut behind him, and Willie was alone in the alley with his board and a pulse that still hadn’t calmed down yet. He allowed himself ten seconds to just stand there in silence, attempting to process what the hell had just happened. He’d asked for help hiding from the cops and he’d received so much more, holy shit.
He wanted to chase after the drummer. He wanted to track him down, kiss him again, get his phone number or his band’s touring schedule or when he would be at the club next but a bigger part of him that sounded suspiciously like the voice of logic said, You’re pushing your luck. You need to go.
God, he didn’t even know the drummer’s name. Granted, there had been more pressing things at hand, but still. Willie could have at least made introductions before locking lips with a total stranger.
He supposed it hardly mattered; it wasn’t as if he was ever going to see Hoodie again.
Willie allowed himself one more moment of standing there, during which he touched his bottom lip gently, only for a second, before casting one look at the door Hoodie had gone through. Then he shook his head, put his board on the ground, and started for home, his lips still tingling.
He’d promised May he wouldn’t get arrested, after all, and she scared him far worse than any officer of the law did.
~