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It's not like Ronan has the wait staff rotation of Nino's memorized or anything.
...except that he totally does.
He tells himself it's because he's finicky about who comes in contact with his food. Because if he ends up with Miss Short-and-Mouthy as his waitress, he can't be entirely sure there isn't spit in his Coke. Because there's something magical about his favorite waiter's hands - how else could he explain how his soda always tasted better when delivered by the slender, standoffish local boy?
Ronan peers through the windshield of the BMW and the restaurant's large front windows. A nauseatingly WASP-y couple is walked over to a small table and quickly greeted by a short, messy-haired girl. The maggot. The Pygmy Tyrant. Blue. Whatever. Ronan takes his cue to climb out of his car. He tosses the keys into the air and catches them, whistling the murder squash song to himself.
When he steps through the threshold of Nino's and into the dim semi-chaos of a restaurant on a Friday night, he's greeted by the hostess with a coy smile.
"Back again, I see," she giggles. "Sure you don't want some company? I get a break in 5 minutes."
Ronan's stare cuts like an ice pick - fast, cold, and brutal. "I'm good," he growls out, flicking a glance around the room. His eyes flit over everyone who isn't him - they're irrelevant, so he won't waste his energy. Soon enough, they rest on the tall and slender build he'd been looking for. The other boy weaves through the tables and people with practiced ease, a tray of pizza in one hand and a pitcher of iced tea in the other. Ronan takes a second to admire the sharp line of his shoulders (swimmer's shoulders) and the smooth taper of his waist that's almost hidden by his apron.
But then the hostess is leading him to a small, two-person booth in the back corner and Ronan has to pay attention to where he's going. A shame, really. Ronan tells himself that he'll have plenty of time to ogle the waiter once he's seated.
---
Adam is punching in an order for a Hawaiian with anchovies and avocado - gross - when Blue hip checks him. Well, her hip checks the top of his thigh, really. He points at the screen and wrinkles his nose at her, eliciting a commiserating nod and judgmental huff.
"Raven Boys," she clucks her tongue. "They just like to watch the world burn." She grins up at Adam as he tries to hide his chuckle. "Speaking of... Your favorite Raven Boy has finally emerged from his car. Table 12 - he's all yours."
Adam fights the flush he can feel rising to his cheeks. Knowing Blue, she can probably see it in the dim light anyway. "I need to tell him to stop leaving such a big tip," he mutters, turning to bring the order slip to the kitchen window. "It's weird."
Blue clicks her tongue again. "I would normally say to just suck it up and not look a gift horse in the mouth, but that guy's a creep."
"He's not a creep, Blue. You just don't like him because he's not intimidated by you."
Blue's hands rest on her hips as she stands beside the kitchen counter-window. "No, he's definitely a creep. Did you know that he's friends with Boat Shoes? They're like two creep peas in a creep pod."
"Boat Shoes", as Blue so fondly calls him, is a regular at the car wash Blue works on Sundays. Though he's never made any of the crude, objectifying jokes she's used to - where's your Daisy Dukes, sweetheart?, always punished with a hose to the face - he apparently cannot help but put his foot in his mouth around Blue. The first time he'd tried to tip her generously with an offhand comment about "taking care of it" had ended with a screech of "I am not a prostitute!", from what Adam has heard. He wishes he could've seen it.
Adam hums to himself as he fills a glass with Coke, taking care to squeeze in some lime the way he knows this guy likes. He tells himself he'd do it for any regular customer, but even the more cynical parts of his brain aren't buying it.
"They don't seem like they run in the same circles," he muses. Blue huffs again.
"Like draws like. Creeps are friends with creeps. Just because one wears chinos and one looks like he walked off the set of The Fast and the Furious doesn't mean anything. I mean, you hang out with me, right? I'm sure looking in from the outside people think we're an odd pair." Blue picks up a pitcher of iced tea and whirls around. "Not that I care what people think or anything."
---
"What'll it be today, Mr. Lynch?" Ronan's startled from playing with the shaker full of crushed red pepper as a glass of Coke appears on the table before him.
He knows his smile is sharp as a knife as he answers, "Mr. Lynch was my father. You can call me Ronan..." He leans forward and peers at the small name tag clipped to his shirt, as if he doesn't know the other boy's name already. For all he knows, Ronan doesn't. "...Adam."
Adam snorts and somehow it's the most charming noise Ronan's heard from him yet. He grips the edge of the table to keep himself from punching something.
"All right, Casanova. What'll you have?"
Ronan's heart skips at all the rounded vowels, the way his words roll together like one long verse of mountain music. God, he has it bad. Ronan drops his elbow on the table and rests his chin in his palm, looking up at Adam through his lashes. He wants to say your number but he knows that's cheesy and won't get him anywhere. So instead he asks, "What do you recommend?"
Adam's cool blue eyes level Ronan with a gaze that says I'm onto you, but Ronan swallows his fear and holds steady in a challenge. The corners of Adam's chapped lips quirk up and Ronan feels something burning in his lungs. He thinks he can smell gasoline and asphalt and burning rubber. It makes his fingers itch.
"How about I order for you?" Adam offers. He shifts his weight so that one hip is cocked and Ronan tries to keep his hungry eyes from following the movement. "If you like it, great. If not, it's on me."
Ronan can feel his eyes glittering in the low lamp light. Adam's beautiful fingers are drumming on the edge of the table in a sharp staccato, but otherwise he looks composed. Cool and distant, even. Ronan finds himself yearning to see that facade break.
"What's to keep me from pretending I hate it just to score a free pizza?" Ronan challenges.
Adam smirks and Ronan imagines revving the engine of the BMW at a red light. He feels coiled and ready to surge forward.
"I get the feeling that you're not very good at lying," Adam says. He raps his knuckles on the tabletop and is gone in an instant, and Ronan wonders how he's left at the starting line for the first time ever.
---
Adam tries to tell himself that the uneven flush on his face and neck are from rushing around the restaurant. Definitely not from those piercing blue eyes hidden behind thick, dark lashes. Eyes that roved over the length of his lanky body as if it was the statue of David before flicking away in practiced disinterest. It had only been a split second, but Adam had seen it all the same.
"How's your favorite stalker?" Blue chirps from beside him as he punches in Ronan's order at the POS system. He's giving Ronan what he would order if he could afford the extra toppings - Italian sausage, mushrooms, sun dried tomatoes, and artichoke hearts. It's a gamble, but Adam figures if Ronan doesn't like it, he can finish it off himself in the back after he leaves. Win-win.
"He's not a stalker, Blue," Adam mutters, but she hears him over the din anyway.
"Yeah, sure, OK. Sitting in your car until you can be seated at your crush's table is so romantic, huh? Next thing you know, he'll be following you home, Adam, and sitting in his car across the street waiting for you to come and go!" Blue throws her hands in the air. "I swear! Twilight becomes a cultural phenomenon and suddenly everyone thinks creepy stalker guys are romantic! What ever happened to common decency and communication, huh?"
Adam prints the order and passes it to the kitchen staff. "Well," he replies dryly. "If I see him camped outside my place you'll be the first to know so you can say 'Adam Parrish, I told you so!' How's that sound?"
Blue growls and gently headbutts Adam's shoulder. "You'd better. I'll rally the troops and confront him with my switchblade and psychic army."
Adam grins and ruffles her hair. "Deal."
---
The pizza that Adam places in front of him is definitely something Ronan would never order for himself. He tells him as much before he can leave. Adam laughs and Ronan chews on his leather bracelets to keep from doing something stupid, like punch the wall or smile back.
Adam slides into the seat opposite him and Ronan furrows his brow. After a quick survey of the restaurant, however, he realizes that activity is winding down.
"15 minute break," Adam clarifies, crossing his arms on the table. "Blue covers my tables and I'll do the same when it's her turn."
Ronan grunts in acknowledgment and pokes at the edge of the pizza tray between them. "What's this green shit? Looks pretty gross. I'd be worrying about that bet if I were you."
Adam just raises his eyebrows and levels Ronan with a cool stare. Ronan's insides are anything but cool right now.
"Artichoke hearts. They're really good, actually."
"Looks like weird leafy green shit to me."
Adam doesn't break his gaze. "Didn't your momma make you eat your greens as a kid?" Ronan notices how Adam winces at the way his accent comes out. He takes a second to wonder why he doesn't let it flow freely all the time, then another second to wonder if it's because Adam's comfortable or nervous that he slipped. He's not sure which answer he'd prefer.
"My mom couldn't make us do shit. Our house was a fucking zoo. Me and my brothers were the fucking monkey exhibit."
Adam snorts with laughter again, but there's something dark and a little wistful in his eyes. Ronan tucks that look away for later.
"Your poor mother. Stuck with a barrel of monkeys when she just wanted children."
Ronan snaps his leather bands and shrugs. "Eh, she liked it. Said it was exciting."
A small silence falls between them and Ronan finds that he's bracing himself - for the inevitable question: what about your dad?
But it never comes. Instead, Adam nudges the pizza tray towards him. "Just try it. You might like it. It's getting cold."
Ronan scoffs but picks up a piece anyway. "Maybe that was my strategy to get a free meal. Wait until it's cold so it tastes like shit either way."
"That's cheating," Adam counters, tapping a finger on the table in a sharp, warning rap.
Ronan grins his knife-grin as he prepares to take a bite. "Ah-ah-ah, you never specified any rules for this bet, Adam. You can't just add them in after the fact. We aren't 7-year-olds in a sandbox arguing over whose force field is more invincible."
Adam rolls his eyes and Ronan drinks in the sight before he can be caught. He's gotten good at stealing appreciative glances - in and out, in a split second, like a motherfucking thief.
He ignores Adam's scrutinizing stare as he takes his first bite. And damn it all - he should've known that Adam can see through his shell. Ronan knows he looks like a liar, and most people take that at face value. And yet, and yet.
Adam's eyes are already shining with triumph from behind his pale lashes. Despite Ronan's efforts to school his face into casual disgust or even stony neutrality, Adam must have seen the exact moment that Ronan thought shit, this is pretty good.
"So? How is it?" A part of Ronan, a deep, ugly pocket of self-loathing and sabotage, wants to sneer and lie and push this beautiful creature away. You're too good for me. I don't want to ruin you. But Ronan can't pull those brambles out of his lungs and throw them at Adam, and he definitely can't lie. So he feigns indifference and shrugs. "It's OK, I guess. For weird leafy green shit."
Adam's grin is way too dazzling and way too smug and Ronan can't stop drinking in his straight teeth, the curl of his lips, the smattering of freckles on his nose. God damnit.
Ronan's so focused on eating the damn good pizza that he almost doesn't see Adam get up to refill his drink. Ronan glances up at him when he returns and suddenly feels winded - Adam's framed in the soft lamp light, his dusty hair curled over the tips of his ears. His cheekbones cast soft shadows over his ruddy cheeks, wind-worn and tanned from the sun. The long line of his neck makes Ronan's mouth water when he leans in to place a new Coke on the table by Ronan's elbow.
"I get off at 10," Adam murmurs. And oh, Ronan is so weak to the way he draws the number out into two syllables. He's so preoccupied with it, actually, that he doesn't even register the meaning of the words until Adam is long gone.
But when he does, he's paralyzed with - everything, really. Fear. Adrenaline. Confusion. Anticipation. Hope.
He leaves a messy stack of bills on the table when he finishes his pizza and stalks out the door with gasoline in his veins.
---
"You'll never guess who's outside," Blue says, elbowing Adam in the side as he counts his tips for the night. He spares a quick glance at the front window, where a charcoal gray BMW idles in the parking lot. Even through the drizzle, Adam can just make out the shape of Ronan's shaved head and the sharp slice of cheekbone in the hazy red light from the neon sign out front. He's reminded of Harrison Ford in Blade Runner and the image sends a thrill down to the base of his spine. He hums in acknowledgment but doesn't answer Blue out of fear of what he might say.
"Adam Parrish," she warns, tapping a finger to his wrist. "What did I say about stalkers just two hours ago?"
Adam shrugs her off and pockets his tips. With the $20 Ronan had left him, he'd brought in about $60 total. Not bad, but not great either. He wonders how to tactfully tell Ronan that the excessive tips make him uncomfortable. Blue's line (I'm not a prostitute!) comes to mind, and he has to stifle a giggle.
"So, um... About that," Adam replies as he unties his apron. "I may have told him that I get off at 10. As in... I, uh. Indirectly invited him to be here. So he's not stalking me."
Blue's jaw drops and Adam bites back a smug grin. It's not often he gets to shock Blue like this. "You smooth bastard," she whispers, and he delights in the rare curse spilling from her lips. "Do I need to give him the 'you-break-his-heart-I-break-your-face talk?"
Adam hangs his apron up and waves his hands at her. "God no! Please don't. I just... I just wanna hang out with him a little."
Blue quirks an eyebrow and levels him with a flat stare. "Uh-huh. 'Hang out'. Just bros being dudes, huh? Just driving around town alone together doing 'guy stuff', I'm guessing? Just making heart eyes at each other in the car-"
"Oh my God, Blue. Enough with the scare quotes."
She breaks into a grin and punches him lightly on the shoulder. "I'm just bustin' your chops. Call me when you get home so I know he didn't dump your body in a ditch somewhere off 64 halfway to Charlottesville."
Adam turns to leave and waves her off. "Yes, Mom. I'll call you."
Once she's out of his immediate reach, Blue cups her hands over her mouth and whoops, "Go get 'em, tiger!"
Adam groans and lets it go, fighting the heat that flows from his toes to the tips of his ears.
---
After spending the past hour speeding through the streets of Henrietta blasting his EDM at a volume that would effectively drown out his thoughts, Ronan finds himself sitting in the parking lot of Nino's again.
He'd left the windshield wipers on, so every few seconds the haze of drizzle is swept away and the warm light of the restaurant comes into sharp focus. Swish. Adam at the till, counting money. Swish. Adam chatting with the maggot. Swish. Adam untying his apron. Swish. Adam walking towards the front door.
Ronan drops his wrist from his mouth, where he'd been chewing on his wrist bands, to drum his fingers against the steering wheel. This isn't creepy, right? Adam had told him when he'd get off work. That means he wants to see Ronan after work... Right?
Ronan's tempted to call Noah. His wispy friend can be infuriating sometimes, but in his roundabout way he gives solid advice. It isn't always what Ronan wants to hear, per se - Dude, just grab his face and make out with him! Trust me, it works every time! - but Ronan can use some of Noah's blunt affirmations to boost his confidence right about now.
There's a tapping at his window. Ronan gulps and rolls the window down until he's face-to-face with Adam, hair damp and curling at his temples from the rain and looking ethereal in the red neon lights.
"Funny seeing you here," Adam jokes, and Ronan tries his damnedest not to follow a raindrop as it slides down his elegant neck.
"Yeah, well," Ronan replies, voice gruff with the effort of trying to sound casual. "You said you'd be here, so..." He frowns and taps the steering wheel with a bony finger, his sharp eyes not missing the way Adam's gaze follows the movement. It somehow bolsters his resolve. "Wanna ride? It's raining."
Adam grins and wipes the rain water from his brow. "Yeah, OK. Sure. Can I put my bike in the back, though?"
Ronan nods and gets out to help Adam wrestle his bike into the back seat of the BMW. Ronan tampers down Noah's voice in his head - There goes your make-out spot. Amateur move - with words of his own. "What a shitty bike."
To his surprise, Adam laughs at this and Ronan kicks the front wheel of the car to direct his nervous energy somewhere. "Yeah, it is. But it gets the job done, so I can't complain."
Ronan grunts in reply and climbs back in the driver's seat, turning his music down so he'll be able to hear Adam. As soon as Adam climbs in, Ronan throws the car into gear and backs out of the lot. "Where to?"
He feels Adam's heavy gaze on him and wonders if the breathless way Adam speaks is just wishful thinking. "You tell me."
---
Adam isn't sure what came over him. "You tell me"? Blue would lecture him about how that's a surefire invitation to death on the highway, but Adam can't find it in himself to care. Something about sitting in that sleek car next to Ronan makes him feel reckless. He's both wild with envy and utterly captivated by the danger of it all. Like it's a glimpse of a parallel universe where Adam Parrish can have these things for himself - expensive and dustless and safe like armor for his soul. I can still have this, he reminds himself. I can still earn this if I work hard enough.
The music drifting through the speakers is dark and fast and electric, and it all feels so very Ronan but not at all at the same time. Adam watches Ronan drive from his peripheral vision, drinking in the sharp and hungry gazes he throws Adam's way when he thinks Adam's not looking.
Ronan's voice breaks the relative quiet, but it's so soft Adam can't decipher what he'd said. He faces Ronan directly for the first time since getting in the car and says, "Sorry, what was that? I can't hear anything on my left side."
Ronan's eyebrows shoot up and Adam braces himself for one of the two reactions he always gets when he reveals his partial deafness - a question about how it happened or blatant pity disguised by embarrassment. Ronan gives him neither. Instead, he simply repeats what he'd said before.
"I said, you sure you don't have anything better to do on a Friday night?"
Adam feels his lips pull into a rueful smile. "I dunno, man. This is the most excitement I've seen in a while. I'm usually working or sleeping or doing homework."
Ronan's feral grin tugs at the pit of Adam's stomach. "Oh, I'll show you excitement," he growls, revving the engine. Adam watches the red hand of the speedometer climb higher and higher as they race down 64 in the cool rain. Adam wants to feel the wind on his face, suddenly, but he doesn't want to ruin the leather seats. When he voices this, Ronan just shrugs and rolls the windows down and Adam is free, he's flying, he's untethered for once and it rushes over him like a wave crashing on the shore. He wants to keep driving with Ronan like this forever.
They take an exit labeled Singer's Falls and the roads become narrow and winding. Adam's never been to this wild, untamed edge of Henrietta, but it immediately reminds him of Ronan. They drive in silence for a while, Ronan's bony knuckles curled protectively around the gear shift. Adam watches its smooth movements out of the corner of his eye and wonders if Ronan would agree to teach him to drive a stick someday. For all his understanding of how cars work, Adam has a frustrating inability to communicate with them. Ronan doesn't seem to have that problem.
They finally pull off at one of those "scenic overlook" spots that dot Virginia's mountain roads. From inside the car, Adam can make out the pinpricks of light in the valley below. Henrietta, old and dusty but still alive in the dark somehow. Adam's never seen the town from this angle. Never thought of it as anything but a prison before. But up here, on a mountain next to Ronan, Adam thinks that maybe it's not such an awful place all the time.
---
Ronan's not entirely sure what possessed him to drive out by his childhood home. He was tempted to turn down the narrow dirt driveway hidden by overgrown honeysuckle and raspberry bushes as they passed, but it felt like too much so Ronan settles for winding up the mountain to the scenic overlook instead. He wonders if Adam is suspicious of him - everything about it screams "Make-Out Point" - but he's just looking out the windshield at the town below, his elegant features softened with contentment.
Ronan settles into himself at the sight, not ready to break whatever this is. They sit for a few minutes, the pulse of the electronica humming softly between them and the raindrops pattering softly against the windows.
"So," Adam breaks the silence. Ronan chances a glance to his right and immediately regrets it. Adam is too beautiful in the semi-dark, too unearthly and unreachable for Ronan to bear.
He swallows. "So."
Adam's lips curl into a smile and Ronan is overcome with the need to feel them against his own.
"So you sure eat a lot of pizza," Adam ventures, tapping the car door lightly.
Ronan smirks. "What can I say, I'm a growing boy." He pats his stomach for emphasis and Adam chuckles. God, he wants to hear it again.
"Blue said your friend is as much a fan of Sunday car washes as you are of Friday night pizza."
Ronan snorts and slides his hands idly over the steering wheel. "Yeah, well, Gansey's just obsessed with getting the maggot to forgive him for insinuating she's a 'working lady', if you catch my drift."
Adam laughs again. "Oh yeah, I heard all about that. Also about his 'eyesore' of a car."
Ronan pushes a finger to Adam's chest, light enough that he can bat it away if he wants. He doesn't. "Hey man, the Pig is a work of art. That baby can carry me faster than this fucker any day." He thumps the gear shift to punctuate his statement. "Don't take the maggot's word for it. See it for yourself before you pass judgment."
Adam glances down at Ronan's finger on his chest before meeting his gaze coolly. "Is that an invitation?"
The air between them is suddenly charged and crackling like a live wire. Even with the windows open, Ronan feels that heat pushing at him from all sides. His voice is raspy and dry when he replies, "Maybe."
Adam hums and tilts his head. His eyelids are heavy, his cracked lips parted, and Ronan is very good at talking himself out of taking what he wants but this. This is testing his limits.
Adam's soft voice cuts through the charged quiet. "I think I'd like that."
His hollowed out vowels are what snaps the taut wire inside Ronan at last, and he can feel the electricity skittering down his limbs to his fingertips. It feels like a summer storm waging inside his ribcage when he slides his fingers from Adam's chest up, up, up to cradle his neck and pull him in close. Their lips meet over the center console and Ronan is consumed with want. It's a flame that fills his lungs, pours from his mouth, spills from his fingertips.
Adam's lips are dry and cracked and they part so easily beneath Ronan's tongue. Ronan breathes him in and pulls them closer, closer, until the gear shift is digging into his gut. But he can't bring himself to care about anything except for Adam, Adam, Adam.
---
Adam's never felt this burning longing inside him, never wanted to reach over and crawl into someone's skin like he does when Ronan kisses him. His wandering hand finds purchase on Ronan's waist, and the light touch elicits a hungry groan that Adam swallows with a small noise of his own.
Their lips meet again and again, bodies pulling closer and closer, as if Ronan's afraid this will be his one and only chance to kiss Adam senseless. Which is ridiculous, really, because now that Adam's had a taste of this electric boy, he's not sure that he can go back to living without.
Ronan's strong hand grips Adam's neck, but instead of feeling restrictive it's grounding. Each of Ronan's kisses communicate something new - I'm here. I want you. Don't let me go. I don't want to let you go.
Adam answers each in kind - I'm not going anywhere. I want you, too. I can't let you go. Please don't let me go.
They break for air and Ronan's lips find their way down the column of his throat, nipping softly to elicit quiet sighs from Adam's lips. His hand slides down over Adam's shoulder, thumb rubbing gentle circles at his collarbone. Ronan's name escapes his lips in a breathy sigh and Ronan pulls the stretched collar of Adam's T-shirt to bite down where his collarbone meets his shoulder.
Adam can't help the sharp gasp he lets out at the feel of Ronan's teeth on his skin. He can feel Ronan's smile as he presses tender kisses to the bite, smoothing his tongue over the reddening spot. Adam uses his grip at the base of Ronan's skull to pull him back up. "Ronan," he breathes, sure that his face is flush and pupils wide with want. "C'mere."
And they're kissing again and Adam is drowning, drowning -
A godawful racket pierces the quiet and Adam pulls back in surprise. Ronan chases his lips but growls at the obnoxious voice that crows, "Squash one, squash two-"
Adam can't help it - he laughs. And laughs and laughs and laughs as Ronan snatches his cell phone from the cup holder and snaps, "What?" Into the receiver.
His hand is still curved around Adam's neck, keeping him close enough that he can feel the irritated huff of Ronan's breath when he snarls, "I'm busy. Fuck off."
Adam's still laughing when Ronan chucks the phone back into the cup holder and leans in for another kiss. Adam responds in kind, loosely wrapping his fingers around Ronan's wrist at his neck. But just when Ronan moves to deepen the kiss again, the terrible ringtone kills the mood a second time.
Adam shakes with laughter and lets his fingers stroke Ronan's wrist as he answers the phone again.
"Jesus fucking Christ, Gansey! I told you, I'm busy, you fucking shit-for-brains. No, I'm not racing, and no it's none of your fucking business what I am doing so please, for the love of God, fuck off for five minutes."
Ronan's pinched expression sends a wave of fondness through Adam. He leans into Ronan's touch at his neck, and this earns him a gentle stroke to his pulse point. Suddenly seized with daring, Adam leans forward to nip lightly at Ronan's neck. He can faintly hear what sounds like a lecture coming from the other end of the line, and it makes him grin when Ronan's breath hitches at his ministrations. It feels good, oddly enough, for Adam to be able to demand attention this way. Each press of his lips says look at me, each scrape of teeth insists don't ignore me.
Ronan lets out a strangled noise from deep in his throat and grips Adam's neck tighter. Adam pulls back to look up at his face and is not disappointed. Ronan's pupils are blown wide, a red flush staining his cheeks and neck. Adam can't help it - he tilts forward to land a soft kiss on Ronan's lips. Ronan flushes deeper and pulls Adam back in.
Ronan has the phone tilted away from their mouths as they exchange a few more chaste kisses. But soon the voice on the phone grows loud and indignant.
"Ronan Lynch! You'd better not be doing what I think you're doing!"
Ronan bares his teeth in an unrepentant grin. Adam wants to taste it. So he does. He pulls Ronan's bottom lip between his teeth, letting go with a swipe of his tongue. "And what is it," Ronan counters, a little breathless, "that you think I'm doing, Dick?"
Adam laughs into the inch of space between them as the voice carries over the phone's speaker. He can catch snippets - gotta be kidding me and offending my delicate sensibilities being the clearest. Ronan presses one more soft, lingering kiss to Adam's lips before replying. "You done? I told you I was busy. Now fuck off."
Ronan turns the phone off (like he should've done to begin with) and steals a few more heated kisses from Adam. Adam breaks away to say, "I think that's a sign that we should head back."
Ronan groans and kisses Adam a few more times before whispering, "Don't ever wanna stop," against his good ear. Something not quite fear but not quite relief floods into Adam's throat, and he pulls Ronan in with a growl and deepens their kiss again to chase that feeling.
Ronan's hands are traveling over his shoulders, down his arms; his fingers link with Adam's and he squeezes them before letting them dance under the hem of his shirt. It's too much and it's not enough and all Adam can think is more, more, more.
Adam's own fingers skate over Ronan's abdomen beneath his shirt, his touch light and shaking. Ronan's voice breaks against Adam's lips in a soft moan of, "Adam, fuck, Adam," and Adam's pants suddenly feel too tight.
With great difficulty, Adam moves his hands to Ronan's shoulders and pulls back a fraction. "Ronan," he breathes. "We should... Can we slow down a little?"
"Yeah," Ronan nods and pulls away. "We should... Yeah, that's- that's probably a good idea."
Adam tampers down the instinct to lean over and devour him whole. "You think you could, uh... Drive me home, maybe?"
Ronan nods, but before he lets Adam go completely, he traces his bottom lip with his thumb. Adam wants to draw it into his mouth, but he refrains and accepts one last soft kiss there instead. God, what Ronan could do to him.
---
They're halfway back to Henrietta proper when Adam's hand settles over Ronan's on the gear shift. The car surges forward with the touch and Adam looks way too smug.
Ronan can't believe that all these months he's pined after Adam, he'd been right under his nose the whole time. Or, well, over. He lives over Ronan's church and though it should be weird, it pleases Ronan.
"So," Adam starts as they sit in the church parking lot. "That was nice."
Ronan feels his cheeks heat at the memory of Adam's lips on his. "Yeah, uh. It was... Nice. More than nice." Fucking amazing, more like. But Ronan isn't ready to lay those cards out on the table just yet. He needs to keep some of his dignity intact.
Adam hums and turns Ronan's palm over in his so they can slot their fingers together over the gear shift. "I'm off Sunday. If you wanna... I dunno. You can come up and we can hang out and stuff."
Ronan breaks into a predatory grin. "And stuff?" He's leaning forward, but Adam meets him halfway with a smile.
"Yeah, stuff." Ronan can feel Adam's soft chuckle against his lips and he leans in for more.
"It's a date, then."
---
Bonus:
"It's not funny, Noah."
Noah is grinning as he lines up a pool shot, trying to use a stance he saw on TV once. He taps the cue ball and sends everything scattering around the table - everywhere except into a pocket. Damn.
"No, Gansey, it really is. You totally deserve it for ruining Ronan's make out session."
Gansey huffs from where he sits on the floor on mini Main Street, gluing a piece of roof to the cardboard hardware store. "How was I supposed to know he was on a date! I thought he was racing or something. I didn't even think he'd pick up!" Gansey pauses to stare up at Noah through his wire-rimmed glasses. "Wait, why did he answer if he was... Otherwise engaged at the moment? Just to traumatize me?"
Noah lines up another shot and sticks his tongue out in concentration. He sends the balls skittering everywhere except a pocket. Again. "Think about it. Could you make out to the murder squash song? He was trying to get the phone to shut up."
Gansey just shakes his head and focuses on his models again, muttering to himself about being too old for this as Noah starts to hum said murder squash song.