Chapter Text
Steve felt like a real asshole when Robin asked out of the blue one day, maybe a month after he and Billy became roommates, if the guy was paying part of his rent in labor. Shave some off if he agreed to be your housekeeper? And, at Steve’s incredulous bafflement, had clarified: Every time I’m over he’s cooking or doing laundry or—cleaning shit! To his horror, a highlight reel started up in his mind, a montage of Billy doing all those chores and more, and worse, Steve realized he’d contributed approximately nothing to the daily maintenance of their shared living space. Steve! Robin had scolded, correctly interpreting his guilty grimace.
So he’d promised to talk to Billy about it—assure him that keeping the place sparkling was in no way required or expected or—or if that was just how he preferred to live, then he’d promise to do his fair share from now on. Only, bringing it up over pizza and beer, NBA Conference Finals blaring from the TV, had produced an unexpected reaction. Billy… kinda… froze? Went bug-eyed, like Steve had caught him with his hand in the cookie jar. He looked embarrassed.
“Man, it’s fine,” Steve said, tripping over himself to explain—put him at ease. “I really don’t care either way. I just wanted to check and make sure you knew I wasn’t gonna, like—kick you out if you let up on the Cinderella routine.”
Billy flushed more, beet red, and Steve resisted smacking himself in the face. He was fucking this up so bad.
“I mean—”
“I don’t mind,” Billy mumbled, avoiding Steve’s eye as he reached for his beer. “I like it.”
“Okay,” Steve said, over the top encouraging. “Great. Well, I’ll at least pitch in more—”
“You don’t have to do that.” Billy’s throat worked, gulping, plush lips pursed on the can. Steve blinked, shook his head, tuned back in to catch the muttered aside, blue gaze locked on the Michelob commercial. “It’s all good. Nothing has to change.”
Why the hell was he being so weird about this? Did he think Steve couldn’t chip in? Pull his own weight?
“Just because I grew up with a nanny doesn’t mean I don’t know how to do stuff. Vacuum and dishes and—”
Billy grunted, annoyed, throwing his shoulders back to wedge himself into the couch, a mulish slouch. “Just drop it, will ya? I like things how they are, so what’s the fucking problem?”
“All right, jeez,” Steve cried, holding up his hands. “Touchy.”
They were quiet, both ticked, but the kind that would drain away by halftime. Except—he felt shitty just leaving it like this, having semi-acknowledged that Billy was acting like his maid.
“Is there anything I can do?” Steve asked, his tone deliberately mild, not looking away from the freethrow swishing on screen. “That you don’t like?”
No explosion—good sign. After a long, loaded pause, Billy sighed. “Take out the trash.”
“Got it,” Steve said. And let it go.
But from then on, he kept watch, determined to figure out the source of the weirdness. Almost positive it wasn’t a control freak thing or a neat freak thing—it wasn’t like the apartment was pristine. It was more that… everyday, Billy had done something obvious enough that Steve commented on it—always had. Nothing major, just Oh, hey—you got that stain out of the carpet or Holy shit, it smells so good—what is that? or How’d you unclog that drain? Wasn’t like he thanked Billy, though he probably should have been—although maybe Billy didn’t want him to make a big deal out of it?—but he’d always notice and say something admiring because Billy was good at stuff. Good at so much stuff.
He started taking out the trash, and Billy never let on that he noticed, but Steve thought he did. And he kept up the compliments whenever Billy did something nice, since that hadn’t been explicitly forbidden. But since he was paying more attention now, he—noticed some things. Only when he was pretending to look elsewhere, monitoring Billy in his periphery or in the reflection of the window or decorative mirrors his mom had foisted on him. He noticed that, those times, Billy sort of… ducked his head, hiding a grin that bordered on… bashful? And his shoulders bowed a bit, like he was—curling in on himself. Like—in delight?
Like—he secretly really liked it? When Steve noticed he’d done something nice? When Steve said something nice about it?
So… he decided to test it. Nothing too overbearing or obvious, just—instead of merely noticing, he was sure to compliment. Because why not, if Billy liked it and still wouldn’t let Steve lift a finger except on garbage day?
Good became his go-to. This tastes so good. That looks so good. Good, good, good.
Which is when it clicked for him—that Billy didn’t do chores and stuff because he liked the chores. But because… he liked Steve’s reaction?
And—that would explain his weirdness. Why he didn’t want to talk about it. Like maybe he was worried Steve would think Billy liked being his bitch or something—Steve winced, anticipating the whack from the Robin who lived in his head—not that Steve thought of him that way.
…Though if he didn’t mind Steve thinking of him that way—or even liked it, then…
Well, Steve didn’t—dislike that. Like the general concept. Held a certain—
Anyway, in the interest of further—ah, testing, Steve mentioned, casually, on his way to work one morning, “I’ve been craving that pasta salad you made.”
Billy cut him a glance over his coffee where he was hunched at the kitchen table. Grunted, and Steve quirked a grin, tossed him a salute goodbye. It wasn’t even a lie—the pasta thing—he’d been salivating at the memory. This version with Italian dressing instead of mayo, with olives and stuff.
Lo, late that afternoon, when he got back, there was a big Tupperware of it in the fridge. Billy wandered in halfway through his second helping. They paused, wide-eyed at the sudden charge buzzing in the air, and Steve’s stomach clenched.
“It’s—good,” he managed, hands suddenly clammy around his fork and bowl. Billy was staring at Steve’s hands, held awkwardly aloft where he leaned on the counter. The stare was strangely heavy—hooded lids. Steve cleared his throat. “You—did good.”
Billy’s cheeks were as flushed as that day on the couch, watching basketball, insisting he liked—
Abruptly aware his boner was starting to tent his shorts, Steve turned to face the counter, ducking to shovel more pasta in his idiot mouth. Heard Billy go to the cabinet, fetch a glass. Fill it. Walk back out.
Heaving an unwinding breath, Steve set down the bowl, let his elbows bear the weight of this latest sexual awakening.
So that was a thing, apparently—and for Billy, too, potentially. Probably. Because, without quite meaning to, they fell into this little routine where, before Steve left for work, he’d pause, and Billy would look up from his coffee, and Steve would mention something—a rental movie he wanted to see, or a sale at the liquor store, or if Billy would mind throwing Steve’s whites in with his so he’d have a shirt to wear to this meeting later in the week…
And the VHS would be waiting on the counter. And a six-pack would be waiting in the fridge. And his shirt would be washed and ironed and waiting in his closet. And everytime Billy would be lingering nearby, not quite meeting his eyes, and Steve’s pulse would pound even though technically there was nothing sexy about an ironed shirt, and Steve would say Good. You did good.
Billy would sometimes clench his fist, when Steve said it. Or squirm in his seat a bit. Or swallow, throat bobbing. Color rising. And the sight hit Steve like a load of bricks. A load of bricks to the head.
It was the weirdest game of gay chicken—scrambling to find mundane tasks for Billy to complete for the prize of a pat on the back, when all Steve wanted, and he bet Billy felt similarly, was to order Billy to his knees.
He thought about it whenever they were on the couch watching TV, whenever they were eating in the kitchen or drinking on the balcony or passing each other outside the bathroom in the morning.
So he tested further. Came home and went to see if Billy had done it—and there he was, standing by Steve’s bed. The neatly made bed.
Steve’s heart was rabbiting out of his chest, too on the fritz to form words, and his feet weren’t much better, charting a crooked, clumsy course until they were toe to toe, Billy’s gaze downcast, his lips parted, breaths shallow.
He didn’t know whether it’d sound stupid if he said it out loud, what he’d been wanting to say for days—whether Billy wanted to hear, or would consider it a step too far.
They’d come this far, though. Steve wet his lips, took a calming breath, and Billy seemed to brace for it. “Good,” Steve said, and it came out breathy. “Good boy.”
Billy curled—did that thing where he ducked, hunching around something invisible—and the sound punched out of him, this pained gasp. Steve’s hands moved on their own, reaching to cradle Billy’s head, step close to whisper in his ear, his brow at Steve’s shoulder: “Good? Is this good?” Felt more than saw him nodding. “You want to be good for me?”
“Fuck,” Billy whispered—bit wheezing. Wet. “Fuck.”
“What do you want?” Steve asked, fumbling at his heated neck. “What do you—?”
“Be good.” It was mumbled, cringing. “Wanna be good.” A shaky inhale. “Make you feel good.”
Steve’s blood was roaring everywhere but his brain—would’ve fallen over if he weren’t clutching Billy. “Want that, too.”
He heard a thready laugh, and Billy straightened, leaning back into his hold, face tipped, lidded gaze on Steve’s chin. “So?”
So what’ll it be?
Buying himself time to gather his wits, some composure lest he combust, Steve tilted his head, assessing. Adjusting his hold, ran a thumb across Billy’s lower lip, firm enough to pull at the skin. “Want this.” Another swipe, exposing teeth, his curving tongue. “Make me feel good with this.”
A tug at his belt, and Billy was nodding, making short work of the button and zip—movements quick and precise. He sank, kneeling at Steve’s feet, tugging the pants to hang at midthigh, and finally looked up.
Steve swept blond curls off his forehead. “Like you like this.”
Billy stared, eyes gleaming. Seemed to be—waiting.
“So good like this,” Steve corrected. “Now show me how good.”
Swaying, Billy buried his face in Steve’s briefs, nosing him through straining cotton, and huffed hot air at the crown. Steve compulsively gripped fistfuls of hair, still using Billy’s ears as handlebars, and resolved not to let go—to let Billy show him.
And, boy, did he. Laved at his dick until the fabric was soaked, the white gone translucent—white gone flushed pink, twitching under kitten licks—and Steve was on the verge of begging when a pull at his waistband freed his cock, bobbing only a sec before swallowed in Billy’s grip, fed into his greedy mouth.
Steve’s entire vocabulary had been reduced to one word, babbled at the ceiling behind closed lids: good, good, good, only sometimes it came out guh, guh, guh. One hand cupped the back of Billy’s head, and it was when his hips were on a steady grinding roll that he realized he’d caged Billy against him, locked the gulping heat around his cock as he plugged toward the peak.
Billy wasn’t struggling, though—his fingers biting into the meat of Steve’s ass, moaning so deep in his chest that Steve felt it more than heard it.
Steve grappled for a new word—close, close—but Billy didn’t stop, didn’t let up a second, and when Steve grunted his release, the throat worked around him still.
The moment Billy pulled off, lungs heaving, face ruby red and shining, Steve flopped to his knees, blindly reached for Billy, draping loose arms around his neck, his ribs, waiting for his own breaths to slow.
“Was it,” Billy asked, tight. “Was it—?”
“Good,” Steve said, huffing a laugh, coasting hands across the bellows of his back. “So good—you’re so good. Always so good for me.”
Billy burrowed his face into Steve’s throat, his collarbone, looping him in an uncertain hug. He was hard, pressed against where Steve’s clothes gaped open. Working a hand between them, Steve rubbed his palm along rigid heat.
“What do you want?” he asked, nuzzling the nest of blond. “Since you been so good?”
A shudder ran up the sloping spine. Steve smoothed his free hand down to Billy’s waist and back up, waiting.
“I—cleaned the shower,” Billy said, halting. “I could—show you, and—?”
Steve kissed his temple, quick, so helplessly fond. Overwhelmed.
“Good boy wants a wash?” Steve suggested, and tightened his arms when Billy tried to do his pillbug thing. “Be my good boy,” he said, hushed, nosing Billy’s flushed ear. “You want to?”
And Billy curled again, only this time around him. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah.”