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Stay calm. Stay calm.
This was Josh. It wasn't some stranger - it was the boy he'd been in love with for months now, his beautiful drummer who'd saved his life just from being in it, who'd made him realize that his music might take him somewhere after all. Tyler shouldn't be freaking out right now - he'd been waiting for this moment ever since he had first kissed Josh in a moment of exhilaration following their show last week.
But now that they were standing in Josh's bedroom, and Josh was teasing questioningly at the hem of Tyler's shirt while brushing his lips against his jaw, all Tyler could think was no, no, no, abort, abort... He was pretty sure that as soon as his shirt came off, it was all going to be over. And he wasn't ready for this to be over yet - he couldn't lose Josh, not when they had just begun, as a band, and as - whatever this was. He'd been here before, with girls, and he knew how it worked. The shirt came off, and that was the end of everything. He'd been walked out on too many times to let it happen again.
So when Josh began to tug up ever so gently on his hem, Tyler squirmed and clamped his arms meekly to his sides, all the while looking down at the floor between his and Josh's shoes. Josh retracted his hands immediately, moving them to Tyler's shoulders and attempting to look him in the eye.
"Ty?"
He could hear the slight concern in Josh's voice, and it just made him duck his head farther, shrinking in on himself in an attempt to conceal the redness appearing on his cheeks.
"Ty, hey, it's okay," said Josh, guiding his face up gently by pressing his hand to Tyler's cheek. Tyler dared to flick his eyes up briefly to meet Josh's, and found them warm and full of love and questions. But instead of asking any of them, Josh just pressed in to Tyler, holding him cheek to cheek so that he could whisper in his ear. "I'm sorry. We don't have to do anything you're not ready for. We can stop, or we can just... kiss, if you want. I'm fine with whatever."
Tyler felt his a twisting feeling beginning in his gut. Josh was being far too nice, too perfect, like he always was; but Tyler couldn't justify prolonging it. He couldn't just let this carry on, with soft touches over clothes and kisses and loving looks, knowing that it would have to end eventually. Josh didn't deserve that. He managed to tear himself away from Josh's embrace, turning his gaze to the floor again.
"I - Josh..." he began, "I - I don't want to stop. I want to do...everything - with you." His breath stuttered as he squirmed uncomfortably, knowing full well that he was about to screw up everything. "But ... I can't."
Josh just kept stroking his shoulder, though his movements seemed a little more reserved now, as if he thought Tyler might recoil again at any moment.
"It's not that I don't..." Tyler began again. "It's just... God..." He was on the verge of tears, and Josh could clearly tell, because he threaded both of his arms under Tyler's shoulders, pressing both his hands firmly to his back to hold him steady.
"Ty... I don't want to push you, that's the last thing I want to do... But I just want to make sure you know that you can tell me anything. I'm not going to judge you or be upset. You can trust me."
The sheer kindness in Josh's voice was enough to make the tears that had been welling up in Tyler's eyes spill over.
"Josh, I can't. You're going to hate me."
That just made Josh grip him tighter.
"Not possible," he whispered. He began again, a little more hesitant. "Tyler... is it - are you asexual or something?" Josh said hurriedly. "Because that's not a problem. That's fine if you don't -"
"No!" Tyler interrupted, eyes wide. He hadn't even considered that Josh might come to that conclusion, but Tyler realized that of course, his body language probably made him seem like he didn't want to be intimate. And that was far from the truth - especially considering all the nights over the last few months that he had spent palming himself through his boxers as he lay in bed, imagining that it was Josh's hand instead...
"No, I'm definitely... I'm... sexual," said Tyler. Josh couldn't contain a little giggle at that, but he cut it short when he saw Tyler starting to duck his head and cry again.
Tyler held his breath. This was it. He was about to lose Josh. That expression of love and concern was about to turn to one of disgust and judgment, maybe even amusement. He only hoped that Josh might still want to stay in the band. They could still make music even if Josh thought he was pathetic, right?
His arms shook as he pulled his shirt over his head.
He might have missed Josh's gasp if he hadn't also seen his eyes widen and his mouth fall slightly open as he drew in breath. Tyler waited for laughter. But it never came.
Instead, Josh silently started to cry, his face contorting slightly as he tried to keep his composure. Tyler had never seen Josh cry before, ever. But now tears were pooling at the corners of his eyes, his lips pulling down into a shaky frown.
Tyler started to panic, fumbling with his shirt as he struggled to cover himself up. This was a mistake. He needed to back-pedal, and quickly. But before he could even find the opening of his t-shirt, Josh was grabbing his wrists - firmly, but not painfully - and looking him in the eye. He gently took the shirt from Tyler's hands and let it fall to the ground.
Tyler had never felt so exposed.
Slowly, so slowly, Josh reached out his hand, ghosting his fingers over the dozens upon dozens of bumpy white scars that covered Tyler's stomach and hips. Neither of them seemed to be breathing, and both were still blinking away tears. Tyler watched anxiously as Josh traced from his ribs to his hip bones with his thumbs. No one had ever touched his scars before - not even his doctors or his mother. He felt like he should be uncomfortable, or scared - and to some degree, he was - but something about the way that Josh was touching them... wait... was he... kissing them?
Tyler opened his eyes, and sure enough, Josh had lowered himself to the ground so that he was at eye level with Tyler's midsection, and was placing chaste, barely-there kisses to each of his scars, starting at his left hip and working his way to the right, and then beginning a new row slightly above - following the same careful lines that Tyler had once made, locked in his parents' bathroom with a blade, so many years ago. In another context, having a guy - having Josh - mouthing this close to his waistband would have been undeniably sexual, but this was different. Somehow, it was so much more intimate.
Josh had nearly made it to Tyler's navel when he stopped, turning his head to the side and resting it softly on Tyler's stomach as he drew his arms around Tyler's hips, holding him. It was so protective a gesture that Tyler couldn't help but sink to the ground, meeting Josh's eyes as they knelt in front of each other.
"I thought you would hate them," mumbled Tyler. "I thought - everyone who has ever seen them has hated them. And I didn't want you to think I was pathetic or attention seeking, or -"
"Tyler." Josh cupped his hands on either side of his head. He looked like he was struggling to say something, but Tyler couldn't tell what. Josh just shifted back so he was sitting on the ground, and pulled Tyler so that his bent legs draped over Josh's, their chests facing each other, heads close enough that Josh barely had to whisper to be heard.
"Ty," he began again. "Nothing about you is pathetic. You make my world turn around, you know that, right? Making music with you, and... being with you, it's made me believe in life again. I would never give that up because of something like this. I could never." He swiped Tyler's tears away with both thumbs, before leaning in and pressing kisses to the hollows under each of his eyes. "You are so beautiful, Ty. You're perfect. I don't care how many scars you have."
And then Tyler couldn't help it - he was kissing Josh, slower and deeper than he ever had before. This was so much more than their over-excited first kiss backstage, all tongue and heavy breathing and questions; it was more than the tentative, closed-mouth kisses that they had been sharing ever since then. This was the way that Tyler had wanted to kiss Josh since just days after meeting him, since the day he first watched him drum and realized that he'd found the piece of his life that he'd been missing for twenty-two years. He relished the feeling of Josh's soft lips moving rhythmically against his own, and moved one of his hands up to tangle gently in Josh's dark brown hair. He vaguely registered the discomfort in his pants, but had no trouble pushing the feeling to the back of his head - there would be time for that, and for everything else. He was actually starting to believe that; every swipe of Josh's tongue against his lips, and every circle that he rubbed into his back made Tyler believe a little bit more in a future that he could look forward to.
He whimpered softly when Josh pulled away, keeping his eyes closed in the hopes that he would never have to leave this moment, no matter what the future might hold. But then Josh was saying his name.
"Ty... I'm not sure... I don't want to make this about me," Josh said cautiously. "But I feel like I should... can I... show you something?"
Tyler didn't know where this was going, but he trusted Josh. If there was anything he had learned in the last few minutes, it was that. He nodded.
Before Tyler could register what was happening, let alone its possible implications, Josh was raising himself off the ground slightly to pull down his jeans. Tyler half expected him to pull them off all the way, but Josh stopped when they were midway down his thigh, and suddenly Tyler could see why. Josh didn't have as many scars as he did, and they were thinner and flatter and older looking - but they covered the top of his right thigh, criss-crossing in disorderly patterns. If what Tyler was feeling from looking at these scars was anything like what Josh had felt when looking at his, then he understood why Josh had cried.
Josh reached for his hand and guided it to his scarred thigh, covering Tyler's hand with his own.
"There," Josh said, smiling weakly. "Now you don't have to be embarrassed. We're even, or whatever." His eyes widened. "Not that I'm trying to compare my experience to yours, or claim that I understand what you've been through," he explained hurriedly. "I know that's not fair. I know - Kitchen Sink, right? The new song? 'Nobody thinks what you think...'"
Tyler was so in love.
Josh continued. "I just wanted you to know that... that we have this in common. But it's in the past. And now we have music. And each other. Right?"
Tyler's heart beat a little faster at that, and he started to get nervous again. "Josh..." he began tentatively, feeling that he was pushing his luck at this point, "I still - sometimes..." He tried to breathe deeply. "I promise that I've mostly stopped but it's just - sometimes things are bad, and mostly it's just really shallow stuff and I'm being safe, and I'm sorry, I don't want to burden you or anything or make you... I don't know, feel responsible or something..." he trailed off.
Josh just responded by drawing Tyler's head down to his shoulder and gripping his remaining arm around his back. Tyler took the opportunity to nuzzle his face into the crook of Josh's neck. He smelled like clean laundry and aftershave and something distinctive that Tyler couldn't name, but that he associated purely with Josh.
"Iloveyou," mumbled Tyler, barely audibly, into Josh's skin. He could feel the muscles of Josh's face pull back into a smile before he leaned down to kiss Tyler's temple.
"God, I love you too, Tyler."
For minutes they just stayed like that, Josh rocking Tyler back and forth almost imperceptibly, until finally he broke the silence.
"Ty?" he said softly.
"Yeah?"
"We're gonna make it."
And Tyler believed him.