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Mac is loath to admit it, but for once, it seems like Sweet Dee has actually managed to come up with a good idea.
Said good idea is currently struggling to hold a lime wedge between his lips – not that Mac is paying any close attention to that – and watching intently as Mac pours out three generous shots of the expensive tequila they keep hidden for rare successful nights at Paddy’s. It’s a shame to waste almost all of their good stash on Dennis alone, Mac muses, but celebrating their second consecutive night as the hottest gay bar in Philadelphia was the best excuse he was able to think of without raising too much of Dennis’s signature suspicion. Besides, if the plan worked perfectly, they wouldn’t need to worry about running out of celebratory liquor anytime soon.
“So, you did the lime first, and then the shot, right?” Mac asks breezily as he sets the blue bottle down on the counter with a soft clunk. When he looks up across the bar counter, he immediately smirks. Dennis is shakily returning his gaze through half-lidded eyes, drooping from the haziness of the two shots he’s already taken in his demonstration for Mac. God, he’s such a lightweight.
“No,” Dennis drawls, “no, no, no, no. Dude.” His eyes are completely closed now, and the empty shot glass he’s holding slips through his fingers. “You take the salt–”
“Take the salt,” Mac interjects, not wanting to break the attentive pupil character he’s got going on, a counterpart to Dennis’s inebriated instructor.
“And then you take the shot.” Dennis raises one of the newly filled shot glasses towards his lips, the amber liquid sloshing around back and forth as he casually turns his head to the side to spit up. For a split second, Mac thinks his friend is about to throw up right there on the spot, but the moment passes. “And then you suck on the lime. Okay?”
“Okay,” Mac replies nonchalantly. “Why don’t you show me again, ‘cause I’m getting a little confused.”
Dennis obliges, keeping his eyes fixed on Mac as he runs his tongue along the side of his hand to catch whatever lingering salt may have been there. Mac zeroes in on the action, following the motion with his eyes. He watches as closely as he possibly can, only because he doesn’t want Dennis to think that he’s not paying attention to this lesson. “You lick it,” Dennis says.
“Salt. Lick it.”
“And then you slam it.”
“Yeah?”
Dennis takes a deep breath, scrunching his face as if to brace himself for the stinging burn of the liquor about to make its way down his throat. He takes the shot and promptly burps.
Mac can’t help himself – he laughs. “Oh, that’s great,” he says as Dennis jams another lime wedge into his mouth. Reaching for another shot, Mac decides to push his luck further and see if he can get Dennis to take another one. “All right, so, I’m gonna do the shot first…”
“No, no, no, no. Oh, please, please, dude.” The words roll off Dennis’s tongue one by one, each more sluggish than the last. Maybe Mac wouldn’t need to give him another shot after all. “You’re not listening to me.”
This alarms Mac – he’s going to need to stare at Dennis again to make sure that he knows Mac is giving him his full attention, otherwise the jig is up. Mac immediately fixates on Dennis’s lips, which are reddened and swollen from the acidity of the lime. Under the dim lighting, they almost look bruised. If he hadn’t been painstakingly trying to get the man drunk for the past hour, Mac would have been entirely convinced that Dennis spent the evening making out with one of the shockingly numerous men who hit on him earlier. A flicker of jealousy flares up at that thought, but Mac decides not to pay it too much attention.
“Well, I’m just not getting it, bro,” Mac says with the most convincing tone he can muster, “So I think maybe if you just– ”
Neither of them will ever know how that sentence would have ended, because Dennis grabs Mac’s right hand and starts rubbing the pad of his thumb in small, feather-light circles against Mac’s wrist. It takes Mac a few seconds before he realizes that he’s being marked with grainy streaks of salt.
“If you’re not getting it,” Dennis begins, his voice teetering the edge between soothing and threatening, “then I’ll just have to show it on you.” He is raptly focused on Mac’s hand when he swiftly adds, “After all, you’ve got these great giant hands, dude. Lots of power in them.” Mac feels his face heat up – the furnace in the back must be broken again, he thinks. Clearing his throat, he makes a mental note to himself to pester Charlie about getting it fixed when he next sees him.
“Uh, Den, what are you–”
“I’m serious, Mac, your hands are so firm and so big,” – Dennis punches out that last adjective in a breathy moan that most definitely does not make Mac’s insides flutter – “They’re perfect for licking.”
Now that conjures up some interesting mental images, and Mac is starting to think that maybe Sweet Dee’s idea wasn’t so good after all.
“See, my hands are too nimble for proper licking,” Dennis rambles on, flourishing the hand that wasn’t occupied with gripping Mac’s wrist in front of his face. Mac is looking at anywhere but Dennis’s long and delicate fingers, and Dennis is unnervingly quick to notice, considering all the tequila he’s consumed. “Mac, you shit. Pay attention to me.”
What Mac really needs to do is to steer the conversation away from the dangerous trajectory it was currently heading. He desperately tries to pull his arm away from Dennis’s viper-like grip. “Dude, your hands aren’t that bad. I’ve watched them do lots of things, I would know–” The rest of that thought instantaneously withers away as his brain short-circuits.
Dennis has his lips wrapped around the side of Mac’s wrist, and his tongue is hypnotically laving away the salt, up and down, sending jolting spikes of heat down Mac’s stomach. Before Mac can even react, Dennis mercifully releases his hand, downs another shot, and brings a fresh lime wedge to his mouth. His eyes, blazing impossibly blue, never once leave Mac’s, daring the other man to break eye contact first.
Mac is more than happy to look away. His face has got to be flaming red; he can feel the heat of his blush radiating off his cheeks. He balls his saliva-slicked hand into a fist and prays to God that Dennis can’t hear the manic tempo of his heartbeat. He’s seen this version of drunk Dennis many times before, pliant and fluid like the drinks he’d consumed, but there’s something unfamiliar and predatory in the lazy smile currently playing across his lips that has Mac on the edge of his barstool.
Blackout drunk, Sweet Dee had said. Mac figures that one more shot is all that it’ll take. Part of him wants to call it a day and just go home, but imagining Dee’s inevitable shrilly squawking upon hearing the bad news keeps him rooted to the spot. He’s going to have to see this all the way through.
“Oh,” Dennis sighs, softly dragging Mac’s attention back to him. “I think that one tasted way better than the other three.” He leans against the countertop, leveling his face with Mac’s. “You’ve got delicious musk, bro.”
Mac’s at a loss for words, but he can feel his body hungrily reacting to the strange praise. His blush has unwillingly crept down the back of his neck, and his black sleeveless tee is starting to feel uncomfortably scratchy and hot against his skin. If there’s blood rushing downward to other parts of his body, Mac really doesn’t want to think about it.
“So you start with the lime,” he says weakly, and Dennis rolls his eyes.
“Wow, asshole, you’re really not getting this.” Dennis starts shuffling things around the countertop, pushing aside the scattered empty shot glasses and squeezed slices of limes to clear out a sizable empty space. Suddenly, he hoists himself onto the counter and grabs two fistfuls of Mac’s shirt.
Mac is so caught off guard that the strangled noise he makes can only be described as a squeak. “Bro, what the hell are you doing?” he chokes out, pretending that the stretched collar of his shirt digging into the nape of his neck isn’t sending a thrill down his spine. Offhandedly, he also notes that Dennis must have been working on his arms at the gym lately; they’re looking more defined than usual.
“Trying a more hands-on approach. Take this off,” Dennis says, tugging at Mac’s shirt.
“What? No!” Mac looks around the bar furtively. They haven’t officially closed for the night, so there are still patrons scattered here and there. There’s no way in hell that he’s just going to take off his shirt for Dennis, not without good reason, because that would be – “Gay,” he says brilliantly.
Dennis ignores this. “I’m not leaving until you learn how to do a tequila shot, so I’m gonna show you a proper body shot. Everyone knows that’s the best way to do it.” It’s the most lucid thing he’s said all night, and Mac briefly wonders if Dennis has suddenly sobered up (that would be a disaster). With a pause, Dennis edges his face closer to Mac’s and promptly says, “Take off your shirt before I do it myself.”
Paying no attention to the hammering in his chest, Mac gives this some careful consideration. Aside from feeling slightly miffed that Dennis was under the impression that Mac was unfamiliar with body shots (which was true, but that’s beside the point), Mac feels better knowing that it would definitely be less gay if he lets Dennis take off his shirt instead of doing it himself. After all, he wouldn’t be the one initiating the action in question.
“Fine. You do it,” he says, raising his arms over his head. He observes as Dennis releases his grip on the front of the shirt and hooks his fingers underneath the bottom hem. As the fabric rides up Mac’s torso, the whisper of Dennis’s knuckles faintly brushing against his chest leaves behind a trail of warmth – or maybe it’s that broken furnace again.
Dennis throws the shirt aside, perhaps with more force than necessary, and he pushes himself off the counter, stumbling a little before finding his footing. Feeling exposed, Mac looks around the bar again, hoping that there aren’t any prying eyes watching them too closely. Someone sitting in a booth whistles at him appreciatively, and Mac quickly turns back to face Dennis, embarrassed at the attention.
A mistake, he quickly realizes, because Dennis is shamelessly eyeing Mac, focusing on the other man’s chest with a heated fascination. “I’ve never seen such strong, rugged pecs like yours, dude. They’re just begging to be licked,” he breathes, and just as quickly as those words slide out of his mouth, his gaze wanders back to Mac’s face, almost as if to catalogue the effect of his praise.
Mac grips the edge of the countertop and bites the inside of his cheek, holding back yet another undignified squeak that would’ve given Dennis too much unwarranted self-satisfaction. Using the only weapon he has left – his obstinacy – he says, “So, the order is lime, salt, shot, right?”
“No, you dumb dick.” The sudden glare that Dennis throws in Mac’s direction is so venomous it’s almost comical. “You know what, I’m gonna show you a shot so good, you’ll never forget the damn order again.”
“We’ll see about that,” Mac fires back, pushing himself on top of the counter and lying flat on his back against the wood before Dennis could even try bossing him around any further. He can feel the stickiness of spilled tequila and lime juice on his skin, and he hopes Dennis will get on with his lesson quickly so this could be over soon.
“You look so good like this, Mac,” Dennis mumbles, splaying his hands across Mac’s bare shoulders. “Laid out and ready just for me.”
Mac inhales sharply, and he has to scrunch his eyes shut. This is such a bad idea, the worst one Dee has ever come up with, and he’s going to end it now before things get any –
A warm wetness slides across his chest, making a straight line between his pecs, and Mac nearly rolls off the countertop in shock. Dennis is firmly holding him in place though, and when Mac’s eyes fly open, he sees the other man liberally sprinkle salt along the line he’s just licked.
“Dude!” Mac yelps. “A little warning would’ve been nice.” Dennis wordlessly shrugs, choosing to place the last remaining tequila shot right below Mac’s belly button. Thankfully, he doesn’t comment on the slight bulge beginning to form in Mac’s jeans. Maybe he didn’t notice, but Mac sure has, and he’s doing everything he can to keep it in check – mainly picturing Dee.
“You can’t move, ‘kay?” Dennis says gently, running his thumb along Mac’s bottom lip for the tiniest of moments before pushing a lime wedge into his mouth. “And watch me. Closely.”
Mac doesn’t need to be told twice.
“Salt is always first,” Dennis says, bringing his tongue to Mac’s chest for the second time that night, eliciting a whimper from Mac when he lightly scrapes his teeth against soft, flushed skin to get all of the salt.
“Then the shot,” – and holy shit, Dennis doesn’t use his hands to pick up the shot glass, instead lowering his face towards Mac’s crotch (Mac has to bite down on the lime to hold back all of the undignified noises threatening to escape him) and catching the rim of the glass with his lips. He tilts his head back to let the liquor pour down his throat and releases the glass with a pop, sending it rolling on the floor.
“And you finish with the lime.”
That’s when Mac realizes that the only available lime is the wedge currently nestled between his lips. Shit. Shit, shit, shit –
Dennis’s hands forcefully find their way on either side of Mac’s face, and before Mac can do anything to stop it, Dennis dives in for the lime, his eyes firmly trained on Mac’s. Mac can pinpoint the exact moment when Dennis’s mouth finds the fruit; he feels it loosening out of his own grip. This is good, Mac thinks. He’ll just push the lime wedge into Dennis’s mouth, let the bastard have it for himself, and he’ll get the hell out of the bar, Sweet Dee’s plan be damned.
Using the tip of his tongue, Mac releases the lime from his hold and nudges it into the other man’s mouth. Unfortunately, Dennis chooses this exact moment to finish sucking, and the lime wedge plops spectacularly onto the counter, removing the barrier between his lips and Mac’s.
Neither man moves. Mac feels Dennis’s warm breath hit his cheeks in soft puffs, while his own falters and sputters to a halt. An infuriatingly smug grin begins to form on Dennis’s face, as if to say gotcha. Every inch of Mac’s skin feels like it’s been doused with gasoline, and Dennis is looming above ominously, ready with a lit match.
“You’ve got some lime juice on that sweet mouth,” Dennis murmurs.
“Oh?” Mac brings the back of one of his hands to his face, ready to wipe it clean, but Dennis is faster.
His mouth captures Mac’s bottom lip unforgivingly, and he sucks on it as if it were just another lime wedge instead of a sensitive body part connected to Mac. His tongue swipes across Mac’s lip at an achingly slow pace, sending pleasant shocks directly to Mac’s groin, and instinctively, Mac goes to tangle his fingers in Dennis’s hair.
But it’s over as quickly as it began, and Mac’s fingers are grasping at nothing but air. Dennis has pushed himself away, looking down at Mac with unmasked amusement.
“If you wanted to get me drunk,” he begins slowly, tracing light circles on Mac’s bare chest with his fingertips, “all you had to do was ask me first, baby boy.” With a wink, he turns around and heads for the back office.
Mac is stunned, mortified, and above all, painfully – and confusingly – aroused. Oh, he’s going to kill Dee the next time he sees her, because there’s no going back from this. There’s no way he can ever look at a tequila shot again without popping a boner, and death would be preferable to facing Dennis tomorrow morning. He’s already planning the details of his move from Philly when he hears Dennis shouting at him from the back office.
“Hey, asshole! You coming or what?”
Or maybe moving away wouldn’t be necessary.