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Oliver's phone buzzed one drowsy afternoon as he lay sprawled on his bed, reading a novel.
Or trying to read a novel, while really he was thinking about Felix, and where Felix was, and what he could be doing. This was around that time of day when Felix, lazing about somewhere, would get tired of sloppily sexting Annabel or India or his new girl of the week, hand disinterestedly grinding down on his erection and not really interested in doing anything about it. Felix would cut his conversation with the girl rudely short and decide he would rather be going out tonight and avoiding his latest assignment. And then he would message Oliver.
Oliver flipped over the phone that had been laying facedown on the covers to avoid the taunting reflection of his own face in the dark screen.
Felix might have been given a private school and Oxford education, but that did not mean he was particularly gifted with writing, or reading, or really anything to do with English.
hr7 ilrre, the message read.
hey ollie, Oliver translated.
you want 2 go out in a bit
bored as fuck and burning up in these rooms m8
Felix always texted when he didn't feel like dealing with Oliver in person but was too bored to waste away with nothing to entertain him. Oliver didn't mind it, really. At night when he couldn't sleep, he would scroll through their week's backlog of chats, rereading particular favorites until he woke up with a dead battery and his phone resting on his chin.
Sure, where?
idk.
The rare punctuation from Felix meant he didn't want to be further pushed on his absolute lack of plans for the night. Most likely they'd stumble through the evening until they wound up in King's Arms or some other dingy pub. But that meant stumbling back to their dorms with Felix's drunken weight draped over Oliver's body, glowing warm at the point where they touched.
A silence burned across the screen as Oliver stared unblinking at his phone, trying to conjure up something interesting to say. He could imagine Felix's lengthy form stretched on his bed, or the floor, staring up at the ceiling, rubbing at his nose and glancing about his knickknack filled room. Maybe shirtless, window a little open to keep out the heat. Cigarette in hand.
Did you know, Oliver wrote. You can record your own heartbeat through your phone?
(Oliver tried to use some sort of grammar when texting, which would make Felix laugh at him. Serious Ollie, he'd say, grabbing him by the back of the neck, ruffling his hair. Serious Ollie, so uptight.)
A long pause. Oliver waited patiently. It wasn't unusual for Felix to take a while to respond, inevitably distracted by something in his room or a text from Annabel or Farleigh or remembering something urgent he had forgotten to do and never replying at all. sry m8, the next night, got cot up with smthing.
Five minutes passed.
no didnt know that
You just have to press your phone to your chest, Oliver added helpfully. and then hold it for a minute. its really easy.
thats funny
howd you even find that out
Oliver blinked, imagining Felix's bored yawning. Jaw opening like a lion’s, shining canine teeth and pink tongue.
accidentally recorded a video while i was sleeping, He lied. watched it back and realized i could hear my heartbeat
Another long pause.
Floundering, Oliver thought of something he could say. This was usually when Felix went anyway, and steered the topic to whatever it was he wanted to talk about.
Lost for options, Oliver opened his files and sent the audio recording of his heartbeat he'd taken last night. Immediately he wished he hadn't, imagining Felix's perplexed reaction, sitting up to squint at his phone in bemusement.
It made him feel too squeamish, Felix listening to it. A dissected lab frog, wet intestines glistening under harsh fluorescents. Worse was the idea of Felix wrinkling his nose at the wet thudding of Oliver's literal heart.
There was no response.
my hearts slower than most people, He hurried to admit. because of my parents.
what do u mean, Felix's reply came faster. Dog's ears perking up.
well, they did all sorts of stuff. and my mom didn't care she was pregnant with me
she just kept drinking. did cocaine too. and other things.
don't tell anyone this.
ofc not ollie, came the insant reply. Boiling in sincerity.
but like, babies whose mums do that kind of thing get secondhand issues and stuff. you've heard of it, right. crack baby was what they'd call me at school. you've heard of it?
yeah, ofc. He hadn't.
the babies brains are supposed to come out fucked up and like. people who do cocaine and all have slower hearts becausse their system is all fucked and it goes down to their kids.
jesus.
i don't think my brains wack or anything
but ive always gotten sick easy and had a really slow heartbeat my whole life
fucking hell, Felix helpfully piped in.
my parents never really bothered taking me to a hospital or for checkups o r anything though so who knows if im fucked up in other ways
idk how they could b so slefish, Felix wrote. i mean 2 do that to ur own kid..
fkced up
i only found out about my heart when i broke my whole leg and my parents were forced to take me to the doctor then.
ur whole leg?
yeah every bone
christ
thats awful man im sorry
hope nothing happens to u when ur older
Warmth bloomed over Oliver's jaw like a blush. His cheeks hurt from the grin that split his face at Felix's concern. Just when he was typing and retyping some sort of thank you, Felix sent another message.
It was an audio recording. 30 seconds long. Oliver froze mid-typing. Didn't press play.
holy shit ur right mine is way faster wtf
So it was what he thought it was. Oliver swallowed the saliva that had suddenly flooded his mouth. His fingers skittered over the audio message, caressing the pixels.
He put his phone up to the highest volume and held it to his ear. Hit play.
Immediately, he flinched as Felix's loud breathing was blasted into his ear canal, bringing the volume down. He was uncomfortably aware of his own heart pounding away in chest, his whole body flushed. A cold drop of sweat ran down Oliver's side.
A few brief seconds of rustling as Felix got into position, his huffing that Oliver was intimately familiar with. He could almost see Felix, shirtless, glowing from the sun, hair a rumpled mess. Struggling with his sweat-soaked phone to find the right place on his skin to press the phone to, the screen kissing his chest.
And then it came through, dull, a little muffled by the poor audio quality of the phone. Lub-dub. Lub-dub. Lub-dub.
Oliver almost vomited from excitement. Or at least, it felt like it, like something was desperately crawling up his throat to meet the sound, unable to be kept down. Lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub, strong, much faster than Oliver's sedate pace, thrumming quickly like a hummingbird shoved into the body of a human god-boy. The chambers of his heart opening and closing, the thudding, almost wet. Here it was, the heartbeat that pounded so strongly that sometimes Oliver could see it, fluttering in his neck. Pressed to his ear, each peak in the mic screeching uncomfortably, Oliver was cradled by the noise, the steady marching beat of it, atria and ventricles contracting. Oliver's heart squeezed in sympathy.
It ended abruptly, and Oliver swallowed down a whine along with whatever had been trying to crawl out of his throat. Pulled his phone down to play it again, and instead saw a flurry of new messages.
ollie we need to get u to a doctor or smth m8
u need that looked at
Oliver's whole body felt aglow, his heartbeat pounding as if trying to match Felix's. A giddy smile was stuck across his face and his body jerked forward as he leaned closer to type a response.
i should probably get it checked, yeah. but ive only been to a doctor twice it was a fucking awful experience.
aw, man. sounds horrible. how abot next time ill take you
not really an idea of a good time, is it?
oh fuck off. im worried 4 u, srsly.
thanks but you don't need to worry about me felix. ive always been able to take care of myself
im serious
shit gotta go see u in a bit ollie
see you.
Oliver sighed, burying his face in his pillow, smiling. He rubbed a hand over his face. Looked at the messages again, Felix's see u , until his eyes burned.
Then he scrolled up and pressed play and held the phone up to his ear once or twice or three times more, listening blissfully to Felix's rustling dissolving into the steady pounding of his heart.
Lub-dub. Lub-dub. Lub-dub.
Oliver need to hear it again, forever, in a thousand different variations. How would it sound when Felix was calm, when he'd just been out biking, when dancing, when he was panting after sex? During sex? Oliver's fingers and teeth and nails ached, to put his ear to Felix's chest and hear it there. Skin on skin, the sound of his heart pounding at his ribcage like a battering ram. Desperate to be free, a little caged hummingbird. Oliver's hands pulling it free, scalpel in hand, until it rested safely where it belonged. Held gently in Oliver's palm, shivering and beating away, protected from the world's greedy eyes and longing hands.
–
hey farls
yeah
did u know u can record ur heartbeat on ur fone
what
yeah man its rlly cool ollie showed me
hes got a fucked up heart bc hes a cocaine baby
fuck off
wgat