Archive of Our Own

THERE IS A PERIOD WHEN IT IS CLEAR THAT YOU HAVE GONE WRONG BUT YOU CONTINUE.
SOMETIMES THERE IS A LUXURIOUS AMOUNT OF TIME BEFORE ANYTHING BAD HAPPENS.

"Are you feeling anything yet?"

"I don't know," Graham says. There's a strange sensation in his stomach, but it might just be anxiety. "I still don't know."

"I'm feeling something," Damon says confidently. "Twenty more minutes, tops. Maybe thirty. At most."

"Okay. Okay. How will I know."

"You'll know. You'll feel it and you'll just know."

Graham shifts uncomfortably in the grimy bus seat. They're almost there. "I think I feel it," he says. There's something, not just anxiety. A giddy feeling.

Damon squeezes his thigh reassuringly. "It's good, yeah? We're almost there." Then he confidently leads them off the bus at the wrong stop. "Almost there," he keeps saying.

Thankfully the rain is light, right now. He kicks at a pebble and watches it skitter across the pavement. Damon keeps singing the same bit of Picture Book over and over again.

"Pic-ture book," he sings. There's a little spring in his step. "Pictures of your ma-ma! Taken by your papa!"

"Is that it?" Graham interrupts, pointing.

"Yeah, that's it!" Damon says. He's practically vibrating with excitement. He deflates slightly when they get inside and Graham says,

"Alex should be here already, let's go find him." The first time he'd introduced them had been tense, to say the least. Alex had seemed excited to meet Damon, and then took an immediate dislike to him. Damon, for the record, had not been excited to meet Alex. Multiple times he'd had to tell him not to be so mean to Alex—I like him, he's my friend. Damon would reply: Just having a laugh. I like him, too. Which wasn't exactly a falsehood, but still felt like a lie by omission. Damon really was beginning to like Alex; it just didn't seem to negate the fact that he couldn't stand him. A different time, when Damon had been in a more sour mood, had been a bit more enlightening.

EXT- GOLDSMITHS, DAY
GRAHAM and DAMON are standing on a patch of grass under a tree. GRAHAM is holding a pile of notebooks. DAMON has a cigarette dangling out of his mouth. It appears to be quite cold, their breath coming out in clouds.

DAMON
 Not my fault he's such a prick.

GRAHAM
I'm sure you'll be pleased to know that he thinks you're a prick, too.

DAMON
'Course he does. 

GRAHAM
Well…exactly. You're not exactly nice to him.

DAMON
Sensitive, is he? 

GRAHAM
Not as sensitive as you. 

DAMON, clutching at his chest dramatically
Really, I'm just being…cautious. Just trying to look out for you.

GRAHAM begins zipping up his jacket
You're not my mum, Damon. He shivers. Fuck, it's cold. 

DAMON
We'd be inside already if we didn't have to wait for Alex.

GRAHAM
Oh, grow up. 

DAMON 
He wants to get into your pants.

GRAHAM, surprised
Alex isn't gay. He doesn't sound very sure of himself.

DAMON
That's worse. He wants to experiment with you. (A beat.) He wants you to give him a blow job.

GRAHAM, embarrassed
Fuck off, he does not! You hardly even know him yet.

DAMON
I know his sort, though. He rubs his hands together, stamps his foot, trying to warm up.  
(Casually) He probably fantasizes about finishing all over your glasses.

GRAHAM, looking away
It sounds more like you're fantasizing about that.

DAMON, shrugging
I'm not telling you what to do, I'm just telling you what I know.

GRAHAM is visibly shivering. DAMON takes off his scarf and leans forward to wrap it around his neck. He's about to step back when he spots something over GRAHAM'S shoulder, and instead he shuffles even closer and begins toying with the scarf. 

DAMON, over GRAHAM'S shoulder
Hullo, Alex.

"Right," Damon says. "Let's go find Alex."

"Don't sound too excited."

"I am excited," Damon says flatly.

Alex is perched on a stool at the bar, and smiles when he sees them approach. Addressing Graham directly, he says, "You want a drink? I'll buy you one." He pauses, and then turns to Damon. "You, too."

A drink might settle his nerves while he waits for the pill to finish taking effect. "Yeah, I'd love one, cheers."

"You don't have a job," Damon says bluntly. "I'll buy you one, instead."

Alex blinks, surprised. "You—"

"For both of you," he clarifies. "I work, you don't, I'll buy us all drinks."

"If you insist," Alex says, looking a bit lost. It's hard to tell if Damon is genuinely trying to make peace with Alex, or if he's just trying to one-up him. Knowing him, it's probably both.

The feeling of the cold glass in his hands grounds him, palms damp with condensation. Damon sips at his own and then says, conversationally, "We can't drink too much, though. It won't be a good mix."

"Mix of what?" Alex says curiously.

"Graham didn't tell you? We just took E."

Alex leans in, interested. "Really? I haven't tried it, yet, what's it like?"

Graham shrugs. "I dunno, it's still…"

"We're coming up right now," Damon says enthusiastically. "It's really fantastic stuff. You just love the whole world. And it loves you back. You should try it."

"What, have you got any more?" Alex says.

"No, not right now, sorry, mate," Damon says, and for once he actually does sound sorry. "Maybe some other time?"

"Next time, Alex," Graham says, and Alex still looks disappointed, but he smiles at him, anyway. He finishes his drink while they chat with Alex. Alex is telling a story about a couple in one of his classes that keep getting away with doing indecent things to each other while class is in session.

"Really?" is what Damon keeps saying, with genuine interest.

"Really," Alex says. "Put her hand down his trousers and everything."

"No she didn't, you're having me on!"

"She really did," Alex says in a self-satisfied tone.

Graham sets his glass down, suddenly tuning in to his body. "I think it's happened."

"What?" says Alex, but Damon nods.

"Past five minutes, maybe, I noticed. You want to go dance?"

He stands up. He feels light, not as if he were floating but as if something tethering him to the ground has been snipped. "Yeah, let's."

Damon thrusts his glass into Alex's hands. "Do me a favor and finish this, mate, and come find us when you're done." Then he's giving Graham a light shove on the small of his back, pushing him towards the dance floor.

It feels like the most overwhelmed he's ever been, but this time it's in a good way. It's impossible to process everything at once, the lights, the music, the crowd of people, but instead of feeling uncomfortable he just takes it all in. They're absorbed by the crowd, a drop of water in an ocean, moving with the waves.

He doesn't recognize the song that's playing right now, and he doesn't care. He can taste the music, hear the lights: it isn't that he's mixing them up, it's that suddenly the boundaries between everything have blurred— and in some places vanished completely. He doesn't know when he took Damon's hand, just that now he's holding it, and he's overwhelmed suddenly by an immense fondness, and a feeling of safety, like they're two kids crossing the street together. He squeezes it tighter. They bounce and spin around, people shaking and shimmying all around, jostling them. Damon takes his other hand and then they're jumping up and down, a bubble of laughter building in his chest, a feeling of sheer exhilaration. He doesn't care when someone accidentally steps on his toes, or jostles his ribcage with their elbow, nor does he fret about whether he might accidentally step on anybody else's toes.

A few times the thought does cross his mind that he might be dancing in a way that looks incredibly stupid, but to his delight he realizes that he really doesn't care. There's only one thing bothering him—

"It's really bloody hot in here," he says, when he slows down and Damon looks at him inquiringly.

"Water," Damon responds decisively. He looks to be in a similar state, sweat beginning to soak through his t-shirt. It feels like they travel through five different clubs just trying to find the water fountain. When they get there, it barely produces a trickle, but it's cold, and that's enough.

There's a little platform, towards the back, with chairs and sofas. Two girls are sitting on one, poking at each other and giggling. One of them keeps glancing at him, a girl with an eyebrow piercing and a punky sort of haircut. He accidentally makes eye contact with her and quickly looks away.

Damon nudges him, and he turns back to see the girl’s friend, tall with streaks of bright purple in her hair, tied back in two ponytails, approaching Damon. Of course that’s who they’d be looking at, he chastises himself gently. Not him. Not that he cares much, right now, and he can’t bring himself to feel too embarrassed about the assumption.

Then ponytails-girl says to Damon, “My friend wants to know if you two wanna come sit with us for a while. She thinks your friend in the glasses is really fit.”

Damon smiles winningly. “We’d love to.”

Eyebrow-piercing-girl is named Clare, and as it turns out, she’s incredibly easy to talk to. She likes the same sort of music as him (“The Pixies, really? I love them!”) and she’s got a beautiful smile. Her friend is called Lori, and from what he can gather she’s not as enthused about talking to Damon as Clare is about talking to him.

***

 He cringes at the slimy sensation of Damon's tongue in his ear. "Ugh, don't!" he says, trying to squirm away.

Damon nibbles at his earlobe and then retreats. "Sorry," he says, not sorry at all.

Upon looking back up he feels suddenly lightheaded at the sight of Clare and Lori kissing, Lori's hands up the back of Clare's shirt. He glances at Damon, who's staring, slack-jawed, and then back at the scene unfolding in front of them.

When they break apart, Lori fixes Damon with a look and says, "If you enjoyed that, you're going to hell."

Damon schools his expression and scoffs. "Anyone can do that." Then he's turning to Graham and leaning in to prove it.

This is a game they've been invited to play, and he goes willingly. In here everything feels surreal, like a weird dream he's having. Things that might normally make him perplexed or even anxious simply blend in with the rest. Damon's lips on his, his fingers tangling through his hair, digging into his sides. Kissing Damon isn’t new, but doing it for an audience is, and it excites him—maybe a bit too much. He draws back.

Clare and Lori have melted away. He’s in a crowd of bodies again, dancing next to Damon. It isn’t until later that he kicks himself for not asking for Clare’s number, despite what a bizarre turn their interaction had taken; but right now everything feels a bit less…sequential. Like he could blink and it would be twenty minutes ago again.

And then once more they need to escape the crowd, away from the heat. A glass of ice-cold water. Back at the bar they end up getting drinks again.

“There you are,” Alex says. Some friends of his (people Graham has never met, that he suspects Alex just met twenty minutes ago) is about to drive over to some party, and he’s trying to get them to come with. He’s convinced pretty easily— Damon hems and haws until they realize it’s walking distance from the halls of residence, and they won’t have to worry about taking another bus back.

Alex’s two (new?) friends sit in the front, and the three of them have to crowd into the back. Graham is about to offer to take the middle seat, but Damon beats him to it, holding the door open and gesturing to Alex with exaggerated chivalry. “Ladies first.”

Alex scoffs and folds himself into the little car with as much elegance as he can muster, Damon scooting in after him. He climbs in and pulls the door shut behind him, settling in snugly next to Damon, who pats his knee absently as they try to catch up with the conversation—he can’t remember their names, Tony and something else—are having with Alex. Then Tony-or-something glances in the rearview and asks, “How did you all meet, then?”

He’s about to answer, but before he can open his mouth Damon is once again too quick. “They’re in my band,” he says, patting Graham’s knee again. He glances over to see his other hand landing on Alex’s shoulder, an odd, casual sort of possessiveness that Alex seems too drunk to really take note of. “We’re called Seymour. Remember that, ‘cos you’ll want to tell everyone about it one day.”

Alex is grinning, and he feels himself grinning, too. Their confidence is infectious. “We’d play you something right now but we don’t have our instruments.”

Graham giggles. “Or our Dave.” Tony tries to ask if he can come see them some day and he laughs again, this time with mild embarrassment.

“We need to perfect some things first,” Damon says primly. “Eventually, though. Soon.”

***

It’s densely populated, for a house party, but then again, it’s a large house. He isn’t sure whose—certainly not Alex’s new friends, who seem to have already disappeared. Alex doesn’t seem to care either way. There are familiar faces, and there are strangers. A lot of strangers, a lot of faces he recognizes but hasn’t spoken to because they’re in grades above him. Mostly art students, probably; piercings in unusual places, baggy jumpers, jackets covered in buttons, paint-stained jeans. People offering him drinks that he should decline, a girl with big hazel eyes that keeps cackling too loud at Alex’s jokes. 

Next to him Damon is going on about his latest obsession to a girl he shared a class with last term. He can’t remember her name. Her facial expressions shift minutely, as if it would take too much effort to properly emote, and her eyes look glazed over. She’s probably just stoned, but maybe she really is that bored from hearing about the theater of cruelty. Damon excuses himself to find the bathroom and he feels a brief tinge of upset, has to stop himself from following. Then wonders why he didn’t just follow—after all, they’re here together. But something about the way he’d said it had given the impression that he hadn’t wanted Graham to come along, which had sent a mild trickle of alarm down his spine. An irrational sort of worry that should be insignificant but would always manifest as a quiet apprehension which nagged and nagged at him: it was the feeling he got when he thought Damon might be upset with him.

Then he feels the cushion sink down beside him and turns to see Alex leaning against the arm of the sofa, crossing his long, spindly legs. “Where’s Damon gone?” There’s a cigarette dangling from his mouth, and the familiar sight puts him slightly more at ease.

Graham plucks the cigarette from his lips and takes a drag. “He went to find the loo. He’s probably somewhere embarrassing himself right now.”

INT- BATHROOM, NIGHT
Music can be heard, faintly, from the other room. DAMON peers into a cabinet above the sink. Whatever he’s looking for, his disappointed expression when the mirror swings shut indicates that he hasn’t found it. 
INT- HALLWAY
The bathroom door swings open as a young man approaches, colliding with DAMON on his way out. There’s an awkward jumble of apologies.

DAMON, stepping back
Oh, hello. Paul, is it?

PAUL
Oh! You’re Graham’s friend.

DAMON
Yeah. Have you got a condom?

PAUL
No. Why, hoping to get lucky tonight?

DAMON, shrugging
It’s for a friend.

PAUL, doubtful 
How thoughtful. (A beat.) By 'friend' you mean Graham? 

DAMON 
You're nosy, aren't you. Help me find a condom so he doesn't get somebody pregnant and have a crisis about it. 

PAUL 
What are you, his mum? He probably has one in his room, anyway. 

DAMON, frustrated 
He doesn't; I looked. 

Both are silent as they register what DAMON has just said.

DAMON 
I, er. I've known him a really long time. 

PAUL, tactfully ignoring the slip-up
Can I get to the bathroom now. Please.

DAMON nods and steps aside.

“It only makes sense that there would be aliens out there, somewhere,” Alex is saying, and Graham laughs, just a bit, but he nods along, anyway. “I don’t mean green buggy looking things with antennae. But at least single-celled organisms, you know, at least something.”

“You mean like bacteria on Venus.” A strand of Alex’s hair has fallen in front of his face and has been slipping around a bit as he talks. He reaches in and tucks it behind his ear for him.

Alex’s face brightens. “Mars, but yeah!”

“What if I like the green buggy ones better?” he says, and feels Alex jab him in the arm in response. “I do! I don’t want to know about bacteria…I want…a big, green, buggy alien with antennae to come down.”

“What, right now?” Alex stretches and uncrosses his legs. When he settles back down his thigh is pressed flush against Graham’s; it feels pricklingly warm.

“You’d love that. They’d come down right there on the rug, and say, take me to your leader.” He shoves at Alex’s thigh with his own, as if for emphasis—though what he’s emphasizing he isn’t quite sure. “Take me to your leader. And then you’d be sat there all smug in fucking…Fucking Buckingham Palace, because you haven’t told the aliens about democracy. And they’d walk up to the queen and tell her, Alex was right…We are real.”

INT- A DIFFERENT HALLWAY, NIGHT
A curvy young woman in a little black dress freezes up when DAMON rounds the corner.

DAMON
Oh! Hello.

GIRL
Hello…do I know you?

DAMON
Don't think so. I'm Damon.

KATY
I'm Katy.

DAMON
Have you got a condom, Katy? 

KATY, grinning 
I only have one, and I'll be needing it tonight.

DAMON, disappointed but amused
You enjoy yourself, then.

KATY, stepping forward
I could use it with you.

DAMON sighs. Clearly he does find her attractive.

DAMON
No, can't, I have plans tonight…

KATY
How about a kiss?

DAMON shrugs and leans in to kiss her. She wraps her arms around him, and they kiss for a while. They break apart when her hand creeps up the back of his shirt.

KATY
You sure you don't want to use that condom with me?

DAMON
You're a lovely girl, really. 

She blows him a kiss and he smiles before turning to the door.

"It doesn't scare you at all, though?"

"What?"

"Space," Graham clarifies. "I couldn't stomach it, all that vast…nothingness."

"It isn't nothingness," Alex says. He's really warm, and it makes him want to press closer for some reason, even though it seems as if the E keeps making him overheat. "It's everything, that's what makes it—"

Graham isn't processing a word he's saying. The idea of outer space feels like it's wrapping around him and squeezing his brain a little bit. "I don't think I could get any closer to infinity, it'd make me sick…" He looks at Alex again, studying his face like he's trying to gather information; on what, he isn't sure. Alex stares back, a tipsy, dreamy smile on his face. "Anyway," he continues, "it's horrible, going to space, you know what astronauts have to do…sleep in seatbelts, shit in a bag…freeze-dried oatmeal every day for breakfast." He pauses. "Actually they don't even have breakfast because there isn't any night or day…sounds miserable."

"Oh, well," Alex says loftily. "Not everyone is willing to make sacrifices to explore the great unknown." It tickles him, Alex being so—well, so Alex—and he giggles, lightly headbutting his arm.

INT- BEDROOM
A group of about five people—actually, six, there's one lying down who sits up to look at the door when DAMON enters the room—sprawled out on the bed, the floor, a chair in the corner, passing around a joint.

DAMON, waving
Hello. 

There's a chorus of vague greetings, a few 'hello's, a few who-is-that. A young man, shirtless, long hair, paint-spattered jeans, sits up straight and holds out the joint.

ART STUDENT
Want some?

DAMON
Oh, just a bit, yeah…I'm already—but I'll have a bit. I can't stay long…
He saunters across the room and takes the joint.

 "Don't go to space," Graham says. His head seems to have landed on Alex's shoulder, and he hasn't bothered to move it.

"Why not," Alex says, ruffling his hair. Then he feels his hand slide down and settle on the back of his neck.

"I'd miss you," he says. Alex's thumb traces small circles, and he finds himself tuning into that, a couple inches of sensitive skin electrifying his whole body.

"Come live on Mars with me."

The room around them feels distant, out of focus. "I wouldn't like it. You'll have to go live with a green buggy alien instead." He likes the feeling of being close to Alex- he loves Alex, really. He hasn't felt this good in a long, long time.

Then he's shifting around, already missing the contact as Alex stands up and says, "Let's go see what they've got to drink in the kitchen." He follows. 

INT- BEDROOM
DAMON rests on paint-spattered jeans, head in the lap of the shirtless ART STUDENT. There's faint chatter happening in the background. 

DAMON
—because if you think about it, children are the most open-minded people in the world…they just want to learn about everything, you know, and they're not judgmental. Because they haven't learned how to be insecure yet.

ART STUDENT
Right.

DAMON
And so maybe as a kid you could get along with other children because none of you ever had any reason to dislike each other. And then one day…

ART STUDENT
They all learn how to be insecure.

DAMON, nodding against the ART STUDENT'S thigh
Each year everyone comes back from the summer holidays a bit less kind than the year before. 

ART STUDENT, stroking DAMON'S hair
Are you insecure, then?

DAMON, closing his eyes
Sometimes. I mean…I don't know if I ever properly learned how to be. 

The ART STUDENT accepts the joint from somebody and holds it to DAMON'S lips.

DAMON, facetiously, through a cloud of smoke
My parents stunted my growth by loving me too much.

ART STUDENT
You really think so?

DAMON
Nah, 'course not. I wouldn't want to raise my kid to feel inadequate, would you?

ART STUDENT
No, I wouldn't…

DAMON
Right now our generation is at the stage where we've learned how to be insecure and developed complexes but we haven't learned how to be adults yet. Suddenly people you know are completely different…or maybe you are. Everyone's all mixed up. People develop all kinds of complexes to deal with the, er…

ART STUDENT
The growing pains.

DAMON
The growing pains. I mean, my friend Graham—His eyes snap open. Oh, fuck! 

ART STUDENT, alarmed
What's wrong?

DAMON
Ah. Sorry. I got distracted. I really do have to be going…He sits up slowly, stretching. Has anybody got a condom?

ART STUDENT
I do, actually. He digs awkwardly in his jeans pocket and pulls out his wallet, opening it to procure a condom. Here.

DAMON pockets it. He hesitates for a moment, seeming unsure of the proper etiquette. Then he takes the ART STUDENT'S face in his hands and plants a kiss squarely on his mouth. 

DAMON, grinning
Cheers. You lot have a good night, then. 
A man on a mission, he practically bolts out the door. As he rushes down the hallway, he passes KATY again and stops to wink at her. As he approaches the stairs, he nearly collides with PAUL again, who's on his way up. 

DAMON
Hey, if you're not too busy, there's a girl back there who might like to meet you.

PAUL
What?

DAMON is already sprinting down the stairs. 

 When they reach the kitchen, they spot a bottle of rum on the counter. Alex then triumphantly procures a bottle of coke from the fridge and grins at him.

"Like the Beatles," Graham says. He swings himself up to sit on the counter and watches Alex crack open a cabinet. "Don't they have plastic cups in the other room?" He still doesn't know whose house it is.

"I want a glass," Alex says, in an isn't-that-obvious sort of tone.

“I want a glass,” Graham mimics, swinging his legs back and forth.

Alex has found a glass. He twists away from the cabinet to address him: “You want any?”

He starts to nod, then remembers, to his disappointment—“Oh, probably shouldn’t have much more, though.” Not that he really needs a drink right now, it’s just that here, in this strange house with its high ceilings and yellow lights, alone in the kitchen with Alex, it feels like maybe he should.

“Oh, yeah,” Alex says as he pours himself a drink, then passes it to Graham. “You can have some of mine, then.”

It’s cold, sweet, and fizzy, a pleasant sensation. “You don’t even know if this stuff is for the party. You might be drinking up some really nice rum these people were saving for another occasion.” He takes another sip and sets the glass down on the counter next to him.

Alex takes the glass back and drinks, wrinkling his nose exaggeratedly. “Some occasion.”

“See, there you go again,” he says, kicking his legs at Alex even though he’s too far to be kicked. “You’re drinking their rum, out of their nice glasses—”

Alex leaps back dramatically, pretending to be kicked. “It isn’t that nice of a glass, though, is it. It’s plain.”

“—out of their nice glasses,” he continues stubbornly, “because you’re too good for a plastic cup, aren’t you!”

Alex makes a sort of casual shrugging motion, flipping his hair. “I am too good for a plastic cup, actually.” Of course he isn’t. He’s lost count, at this point, of how many times they’ve gotten drunk together straight from the bottle.

It’s fun, though, to keep on needling him, even if it’s not even particularly funny or clever. “So ungrateful,” he says. “You think you can just do whatever you want.” He aims another kick at Alex, who has drifted forward again, and his foot briefly connects with his thigh. “Oops,” he says, looking up at Alex with a laugh hovering in his chest.

Alex somehow looks lost and confident at the same time. “I suppose I do think that,” he says, and steps forward, between his legs, right up against the counter. The way he kisses makes Graham feel a bit strange and girlish, but he’s been in motion and he can’t stop. Nothing could throw him off right now; nothing could make him do anything other than what feels most natural. Alex probably is kissing him the way he kisses girls: he’s seen it, and it feels exactly how it looks.

All of his senses feel heightened. The song changes, and he thinks, vaguely, that he remembers Damon liking this one. Alex's hands, no longer cupping his face, are beginning to wander. He's slipped them under the hem of Graham's shirt, and is tracing patterns on his lower back. It feels really nice, and he sighs into his mouth. Then Alex's fingertips are running lightly up his spine, and he squirms at the sickly, ticklish feeling that mixes with his growing arousal. Alex just slides his hands back down to his waist and kisses him harder. He's surprised, but only mildly. Mildly surprised that Alex is kissing him; slightly more surprised at how suddenly it had made sense. Damon's words come back to him, unbidden—He probably fantasizes about finishing all over your glasses. At the time he'd been annoyed, even somewhat disgusted. Now—Alex isn't quite squeezing him, but his hands are a firm, strong pressure on his waist—the idea has a scandalous sort of appeal. He realizes, scooting closer and wrapping a leg around Alex's waist, that Damon might've been hoping he'd feel like this when he’d said it.

His stomach does an odd little flip. Alex hooks an arm around his leg, palm on the underside of his thigh, and begins to kiss his jaw, and then his neck, and then suddenly he feels teeth and tongue worrying at the fragile skin there, his mouth hot and wet and bruising. Almost instinctively he sinks his fingers into Alex's hair and tugs lightly. There's barely any reaction, just a bit firmer of a pressure on his waist, a little squeeze on his thigh. He realizes that he probably only did it because Damon would've reacted to having his hair pulled—would've moaned, or bitten him, or something like that. The little twinge of misplaced guilt seems, strangely, to turn him on even more, but still, he pushes gently at Alex's chest. Damon will be back soon, he thinks, heart beating fast.

Alex looks at him, a question in his face. "Damon will be back soon," he says apologetically, as if that explains everything. It sort of does.

"Detected him with your psychic beam, have you?" Alex says playfully. Then he picks up his glass and drains the drink in a couple gulps, slams it back down on the counter, and pours himself another.

The pleasant, excited feeling rolling through him has bent into something slightly anxious, but it doesn't dampen his mood too badly. Alex reaches for his hand and he takes it, hopping down from the countertop.

***

Time and space are moving strangely. Or, he corrects himself, he’s moving strangely through them. Connective tissue dissolves fast. It seems like in the time spent in doorways and hallways and in crowds he finds himself dissolving and reforming at various points. Alex is no longer holding his hand, vanished. Now he feels himself pouring back into his own body, and he’s watching Damon rush down the stairs, and his body feels electrified, burning hot everywhere Alex had touched him. Damon’s scanning the room, not frantic but determined, until he spots Graham and his face splits into a grin as he crosses the room, half-dancing as he winds around the people dancing and milling about.

The song changes, an odd electronic sound effect—We’ll be together again—and Damon jumps to attention. “I like this one!”

He’s heard it on the radio before, a few times. He lets Damon take his hands and swing them back and forth. In some ways it’s even more fun dancing here than it had been at the club. There’s fewer people, for one thing, so it isn’t as hot. It’s dim enough, here—somebody’s decorated the place with weird, artsy little lampshades—but not too dark, and no flashing lights to distract or overwhelm. A better view of Damon, dancing. He’s certainly not a skilled dancer, by any means, but he’s still captivating, so comfortable in his own body, so determined to have a good time at all costs. And, Graham thinks, Damon is always so happy to see him, in a way that’s so obvious it sometimes leaves him feeling odd and off-kilter, like he’s standing next to a different version of himself and Damon is looking at that version, instead of straight at him. Not now, though. Perhaps because the other version is in him, right now, rather than beside him.

Damon has been spinning circles around him when suddenly he’s pressed against his back, speaking quietly next to his ear. “Listen to this bit, right here—hear that? It’s And Then He Kissed Me. Fucking brilliant.” Before Graham can respond, he feels Damon suddenly freeze behind him and sort of clutch, gently but insistently, at his neck. Graham freezes too. He hasn't seen it in a mirror, yet, but he's remembered it's there and sure enough, Damon's noticed. “Hello, where’d this come from?”

He should lie, probably, but it feels especially wrong right now, like he’d make it worse by lying about it.

“Don't be shy, who was it?"

"Erm," he says somewhat desperately. It seems like he can't come up with a lie even if he wanted to. "It was…I don't know." Damon starts leading him across the room, still sort of dancing, as he flounders for something to say.

"Someone swooped out of nowhere, gave you a love bite, turned into a bat and flew off?"

He'd laugh if his heart wasn't beating so fast. "Sort of, yeah," he mumbles.

They round the corner, Damon pulling him into the hallway, then glancing at him, an odd expression on his face. "Have you seen Alex lately?"

“Erm- Alex and I- he just went to the kitchen to get another drink. And then he—I mean—"

Damon's eyebrows leap up into his bangs, eyes comically wide. "Oh, Alex did this?" He reaches out to touch the spot and it throbs tenderly. Hand still on his neck: "He’s a clever young man, isn’t he? Very opportunistic."

"You saw how drunk he is. I was…there."

"How nice of you," Damon says, voice  low. He's clearly trying to sound seductive on purpose, which in other circumstances might amuse him. Not this time, though. "To be there for him." He digs his thumb into the bruise.

"Ow, you prick!"

Damon keeps pressing, looking him straight in the eyes, and he fails to suppress a whimper. Letting his arm drop back to his side, he says,"You like it, really," and nudges him in the shoulder. When he doesn't respond, Damon crowds closer. "I know you do." Then his mouth is on the same spot that Alex's had been, biting hard. Suction, an intense pressure.

"Fucking hell," he says, and his voice comes out all distorted, high-pitched and breathy. Damon's got him up against the wall, one hand gripping his hips and the other splayed possessively over his lower abdomen, pressing down just above his trousers.

Baggy jeans don't do much to hide an erection when it's pressed against someone's leg. Damon rolls his hips, grinding his thigh against him hard and slow. "Is this because of me?" Damon loves winding people up; he's practically purring. "Or was Alex kind enough to get you warmed up for me?"

"'Scuse me," someone says, and they spring apart, stepping aside to let someone wobble past them. Thankfully it isn't anyone he knows.

"Let's go find Alex," Damon says, for the third time that night. 

INT- LIVING ROOM, NIGHT
ALEX is on the sofa, legs crossed. A drunk girl is plastered to his side, playing with the hem of his jumper.
ALEX, laying his palm on her head
La tête.

GIRL
La tête.

ALEX, touching her knee
Le genou. His hand drifts up her thigh. La cuisse. He leans in to whisper something in her ear.

GIRL, giggling
What's that, then?

ALEX
Guess.

DAMON and GRAHAM enter the frame. DAMON'S arm is slung casually across GRAHAM'S back and around his shoulder.

ALEX, raising an eyebrow
Hi, Graham. Damon.

DAMON, with casual affection, squeezes again at the bruise on GRAHAM'S neck.
Alright, Alex?

GRAHAM, weakly
…Hi, Alex.

ALEX, extremely drunk
What're you up to, then.

DAMON
I dunno yet…the night is still young…

GRAHAM
It's past two in the morning, actually.

DAMON
We might like to stick around here a bit longer…His hand drifts down GRAHAM's back, reaching into his back pocket to grope him.

GRAHAM, mumbling
No, I'm…I'm tired…

"Or we could just go to bed," Damon says cheerfully. "G'night, Alex!"

"Right, bye," Alex says with an air of drunken confusion.

As they turn to leave, Graham feels Damon's hand give one last squeeze before he removes it from his pocket, and he's certain Alex notices. "Bye, Alex," he says helplessly.

As soon as they're outside, Damon says, "I was right about him. If I hadn't been here you'd be on your knees for him at this very moment."

"I would not! Now he thinks we're about to go—"

"About to go what."

"...Have sex, or something."

"Aren't we?"

"Well," he says, suddenly feeling shy. It's not something he's ever really said before, about what he and Damon get up to. He's actually still not sure if he would describe it ('it' in question generally being making out, grinding against each other, coming in their pants, sometimes getting their hands on each other and pulling each other off if things got particularly heated) as 'having sex', but he supposes it might as well be.

Damon laughs and takes his hand. "Pic-ture book…" he sings, for the millionth time that night. "A picture of you! In your birthday suit!" He swings their hands back and forth. He can't tell if it's his own hand that's sweating, or Damon's. It isn't the first time he's stopped and considered the fine line between 'having sex' and 'messing around'. 

INT- GRAHAM'S BEDROOM, DAY
GRAHAM is pulling various articles of clothing out of drawers and folding them sloppily into a suitcase. DAMON is picking things up, poking around, presumably there to help him pack.
DAMON, holding up a shirt
You'll want to take this one. If you want to get attention from girls, I mean.

GRAHAM
It's too small on me.

DAMON
I know. That's why.

GRAHAM
Come on. It doesn't look good on me, I just haven't gotten rid of it yet.

DAMON
Try it on, then, let's see. 

GRAHAM shrugs and begins to take his shirt off. He reaches for the shirt, but DAMON doesn't pass it to him.

DAMON, quietly
I wish you weren't leaving. He steps forward, letting the shirt drop to the floor. You'll be—people there will really like you. I'm excited for you. He moves even closer, standing right in front of GRAHAM. I'm going to miss you, though. I can already feel it.

GRAHAM
I won't be far. 

DAMON wraps his arms around GRAHAM, tight, and squeezes. GRAHAM responds in turn, and they share a long hug. 

DAMON
You won't be here, either. It's alright, though. It's alright.

They're still embracing. DAMON'S fingers dig into the bare skin of GRAHAM'S torso. Then he relaxes, pulls back slightly to look at his face, and gives him a sweet little kiss on the lips.

DAMON
Don't forget about me, while you're away.

GRAHAM, laughing but still serious
'Course I won't. Nobody could.

DAMON
Before you go— He closes his mouth mid-sentence, tries to start over. Before you go.
DAMON sinks to his knees. Then he wraps his arms around him again, hugging his midsection, pressing his face against his bare stomach. 

GRAHAM, hesitantly
Before I go?

DAMON
Let me do this. He begins to unbutton his jeans. Let me do this. Please.

And he had. Damon hadn't expected, or even wanted, him to reciprocate. It had been different from their teenage fumblings, more serious. He'd taken him in hand, soft, murmuring little encouragements as he'd coaxed him to erection. Then his mouth had been on him; inexperienced, careful, blue eyes wide and unblinking, staring up at him. He hadn't known how to respond, what to do, what to say, but he'd rested his hand on Damon's head and sort of pet him, watching his eyes flutter shut and then snap open again, as if determined to see Graham's face.

He'd tried to warn him, when he was getting close, and Damon had wrapped his arms around his midsection tighter, taken him deeper, swallowed. Looking up at him, drool on his chin, all he had said was I'll miss you. Everything felt still, the room falling into an almost reverent hush. The moment hovered, stretched, and snapped. He'd watched Damon's tongue dart out of his mouth to lick at a drop of cum that had landed just below his mouth. He'd wrinkled his nose and said I always wondered what it tasted like. Not bad. But not that good, either.

He'd made a weak attempt at a joke, even though a joke wasn't what felt appropriate. But perhaps making Damon laugh was the only appropriate way he could've reciprocated right then. All that just to see what spunk tastes like? Damon had laughed, just barely. Soft and beautiful. Yeah, well, I didn't want to try my own. And as he'd risen to his feet Graham had suddenly felt terribly, inconsolably sad, and he'd hugged Damon again: at first because he thought he might cry and didn't want him to see, and then because he couldn't let go.

The memory hovered around the outskirts of his mind, out of sight but always within reach. He knew it meant something, but it frightened him to try to work out the significance, and he tried not to dwell on it. It was hard not to, though. Occasionally he allowed himself to replay it in his mind while masturbating, the image of Damon on his knees, sincere and vulnerable, lips on him. It was incredibly effective, and he would be coming before he knew it, an incredible high, a unique satisfaction that the memory was real and not just something his mind had conjured. Then the feeling was always quickly replaced with a sort of fuzzy, melancholy confusion.

When they get back to his room, Damon kneels down to take own his shoes off, then unties Graham's as well, and he feels another swell of fondness so profound that it aches. He kicks off his shoes as Damon rises to his feet, smiling at him. The kiss isn't frenzied like earlier; it's slow, thoughtful, almost innocent. He feels Damon's hands resting flat on his chest and a memory scampers past, of an ex-girlfriend who used to do the same. It's almost romantic, he thinks, which would frighten him if everything didn't feel so romantic right now. His lungs are in love with the air that he breathes—Damon is peppering little kisses all over his face—the soles of his feet are in love with the rug beneath them—Damon's lips press briefly at the paper-thin skin just below his eye. He lets the train of thought exit the station. "The curtains are probably in love with the windowsill, too," he muses quietly.

Damon giggles and pulls back to look at him. "What?"

"Don't you think they could be?"

"I don't know what I'd do without you," Damon says. "And all your funny little ideas." They stand face-to-face for a moment in comfortable silence. He thinks again of that moment, Damon on his knees saying Let me do this, and the pieces fall into place. 

GRAHAM drops to his knees.

DAMON
Wait—

GRAHAM doesn't hear. He begins to unbutton DAMON'S cargo pants. DAMON seems to give up on speaking and lets him, stroking at his hair affectionately.

GRAHAM, yanking the pants down impatiently 
I want to—
He freezes and looks up at DAMON.

DAMON, shrugging apologetically
Sorry.

GRAHAM
You're not… 
He cups him through his boxers.

DAMON, shuddering at the contact
No. It's, er—

GRAHAM, still fondling him
It's okay. We've got time.

DAMON
It's not—it's just the. I mean being on E. And the drink, too. It's alright, though. 

GRAHAM has begun mouthing at him through the fabric in a futile attempt to get him hard.

DAMON, pushing him off gently
It's alright.

He watches Damon's hand slip into his cargo pocket and pull out a tube of KY. Then he extends his other hand, an offer to help him up. He takes it. Pulling himself to his feet, he keeps staring at the little tube. "Did you—where did." He stops and thinks for a moment. "Is that why you were gone for so long, earlier?"

Damon shakes his head, rocks forward onto his toes, back onto his heels. "When I disappeared at the party I was looking for this, actually," he says, fishing a condom out of his other pocket. "Just in case you wanted it."

"Wait," he says, looking up from the lube to meet Damon's gaze. "You've had that in your pocket all night?"

He grins, somewhat sheepishly, setting the lube and the condom aside on the nightstand. "Bit presumptive of me, maybe. I just thought if we did want it. I mean it doesn't hurt to be prepared."

He nods silently. It doesn't feel real. He looks at the lube again. "And you. You want to…"

Damon ducks his head. His trousers are pooled at the ground around his feet. "If—only if you really want to. We don't have to." It's rare to see him so bashful, and it gives him a funny little feeling of accomplishment, that he's the one who elicited that response from Damon, normally so confident.

"I want to," he says. It surprises him how easy it is to say it.

Damon pulls down his boxers, stepping out of his pants and sinking down to sit on the bed. "I want to be close to you. You inside me, reckon that's about as close as we can get."

Sometimes Damon says things like this. Rarely like this, but things about them, about closeness, about their connection, and when he thinks too hard about it he begins to feel a bit sick. Right now, it makes him feel like he's being born and dying all at once. All he says, though, is, “Okay. Okay,” and watches Damon pull his shirt off and roll onto the bed. He pulls off his own shirt, just to make things a little more even, and then, still in his jeans, joins him on the bed. On his hands and knees, now, he hovers over him, leans down to kiss him. Damon begins to stroke at his chest, toying with his nipple, breath quickening as Graham begins to kiss his neck, sucking marks into his skin, all over his collarbone. Then, suddenly, he feels overwhelmed with the responsibility of what they’ve agreed to do, and he sits up. “Show me,” he  half-pleads. “Show me what to do.”

“I—” Damon says, reaching for the little tube on the nightstand and screwing off the cap. “I can—y’know. Get myself ready.”

Graham shakes his head. “No. Just. Tell me.”

Damon takes his hand and squeezes some lube onto his fingers. “Just—” He’s flushed, not making eye contact. He’s not as confident as usual; for once it doesn’t seem like he’s two steps ahead. Perhaps just one step, this time. He lets out a quiet little huff of breath when Graham presses the first finger in. He breathes in, out. Then he says, “Add another. I don’t like just one, it feels all funny and poky.”

He adds another. It’s strange—he suddenly thinks about the first time he had sex with a girl, how she’d talked to him, patiently guided him through it. How much of a relief it had been to not have to guess at it all himself. “Is that—”

“That’s better,” Damon says. “Now just…I dunno. Pretend I’m a girl. Well—don’t do that. But you know.”

It actually isn’t bad advice. He begins to move his fingers, slowly, bending them ever so slightly. It’s an odd sensation, but, he thinks, not that unlike fingering a girl. “It doesn’t feel—weird?”

“It feels really weird. Not as much anymore, though. You get used to it.”

“You,” Graham starts, heart in his throat. His fingers slow to a halt, though not on purpose.“You’ve—”

“Not with anybody else,” Damon says quickly. “Just—after I dropped out, I had a lot of time on my hands.” He shifts his hips. “C’mon, don’t stop.” He starts again, and Damon continues, “I suppose I was just curious, one day. And I liked it.”

“Is it—does—Am I.” There isn’t anything to say that doesn’t feel a bit embarrassing, although right now it’s a comfortable sort of embarrassment. He feels too good to be truly embarrassed, too in tune with everything around him to be stuck in his head. “You like it.”

He nods. “Just keep going.”

He does. It doesn’t take very long for him to crook his fingers up in a particular way that makes Damon let out a low moan. “I think I feel it,” he says, surprised.

“Yeah, that’s it, now just—” Whatever instruction Damon had been about to give is forgotten, replaced by another moan, a bit more high-pitched and gasping this time. He begins to choke his words out like it’s the last chance he’ll ever have to say them: “You—I thought about this.”

If this wasn’t so new and tender, if they weren’t both on E still, if he didn’t feel like he might cry at any moment, he might’ve made a sarcastic remark. Obviously you did if you brought lube. Instead he just repeats him: “You thought about it.”

“It just. Happened.” He gasps and whines when Graham presses his fingers and strokes in a particular way, but he’s clearly determined to keep talking. “It just happened…I missed you. A lot, you know. I missed you all the time. No matter where I was—oh, fuck—no matter. I couldn’t stop missing you. Even if I’d seen you just that last weekend.” One of his hands is fisted in the sheets, gripping the fabric for dear life. The other just sort of flexes open and shut, grasping at nothing, and he takes it with his free hand, holding it tight. Damon continues: “I couldn’t turn it off. Can’t, I mean. When- I mean it just would swim through my mind whenever. And so—I mean it wasn’t the first time. I mean maybe it was—”

“What was,” Graham says. The idea of Damon lying in bed pressing his fingers into himself.  (Let me do this, please—) is beginning to drive him crazy. He’s suddenly aware of how hard he is, straining against his jeans, but he doesn’t do anything about it.

“The first time I imagined it was you, instead,” Damon says, his voice faltering, desperate. “I thought- that’s it, keep going, keep doing that—I just, I thought about how I missed you. And I was already—y’know.” Damon is gripping his hand so hard it feels like his fingers are going numb. “And so I, I dunno, I got all mixed-up. Because I wanted you there, and suddenly all I could think about was your fingers in me, instead of my own—you. In me.”

He doesn’t even think about it, the fact that he’s suddenly compelled to lean down and kiss Damon’s limp cock, lying there useless and up until then completely untouched- he just does. Damon lets out a strangled sort of whimper, and he wants to hear it again, so he repeats the action, intentionally drooling a little bit, pressing a wet kiss to the tip. Damon whines, a sound that he’s never really heard him make before, not at all like the muffled sort of gasping moans he’d heard during their past fumbling encounters.

“Wait,” Damon says, and it sounds like he’s taking every last bit of strength to remain coherent. “Wait—look at me—Graham, look, please, look at me, I need to see your face—”

Graham straightens back up and looks, takes in the full picture, of Damon, completely naked, flat on his back, a thin sheen of sweat coating his neck, his face, eyes wide and staring. The sound of him, little hitching cries that seem to force themselves out of his lungs. His fingers inside of him, his chest rising and falling, and then, suddenly, the milky-white fluid dripping from his still-soft cock. Damon doesn’t make a single sound, just throws his head back, trembling. He almost seems to be holding his breath, and then he exhales, melting into the mattress. Graham slows the movement of his fingers, gradually, almost reassuringly, a gentle caress. As he slides them out he feels like he’s just witnessed a miracle.

He takes a moment to enjoy the view. Damon opens his eyes. “C’mere.” The way that he kisses this time is almost shy. The way he unbuttons his jeans and gets a hand around him is decidedly not. He can’t help it, the way his hips jerk forward, chasing the feeling, and he begins to kiss Damon’s neck again, vaguely aware of how ridiculously bruised he’ll look tomorrow but not caring. Then his jeans and underwear are being pulled off, and he makes an involuntary, embarrassing, needy noise at the loss of contact, and he finds himself rubbing against Damon’s hip, until—

“Wait,” Damon says, unscrewing the cap of the lube for the second time. “Slow down, don’t, don’t, hold on. Get inside me.” He isn’t hesitant, anymore. It’s a command.

“Okay,” he says, and shudders at the slick feeling when Damon reaches down to touch him again. Then he remembers—“Did you—” It’s hard to get the question out when he can’t get a moment to think. “You, er, you spent all that time looking for a condom.”

Damon slides his hand up and down, tortuously slow. “If you want. We can use it if you want.”

“Do you. What, er. What do you want,” he says stupidly.

“We’re not exactly strangers, are we? I just wanted you to be comfortable.” He can’t figure out how to respond to that, so he gives up on talking for a moment. For a moment the only sound is his own ragged breathing, and then Damon says, “Don’t think too much. Just do it.” He lets Damon guide him into position. “Go slow.”

He pushes in slowly. It isn’t even really the sensation that’s overwhelming, it’s the combination of being inside Damon and the events of the whole night leading up to it so far that makes him feel like everything is dissolving around him, and he feels himself trembling as he lowers himself down, their chests pressed together, skin sticky with sweat. He feels arms wrap around his back, holding him tight, fingertips tracing soothing, repetitive motions on his back, and says, so quietly he’s practically whispering, “Is that good.”

“That’s good,” Damon murmurs into his ear, and he can feel his nails scratching lightly at his scalp, then his hand curling around the back of his neck. “Go on.”

He lifts his hips, carefully, slowly, and lowers them again. "I feel," he says. That's its own statement, really, because there's too many feelings at once to put into words. He closes his eyes. "Good. And I don't just mean—I mean—"

"I know," Damon says. "I know, because I feel it…I feel it. What you feel. Can you—"

"I can," he says. Or at least he thinks he can, can feel, in some abstract way, what Damon is feeling, like they’re one person in two bodies. He’s felt it before, but he’s normally a bit more unsettled by it.

For a moment it’s just the sound of them quietly panting, and the torturous feeling of moving just a bit too slowly to be satisfied, careful, maybe too careful, not to hurt him. Then Damon wraps a leg around him and says: “You can—I know you won’t hurt me. You can…”

He does, speeding up, his thrusts becoming more desperate and erratic. He can hear Damon’s quiet, moaning sighs below him, and, more distantly, can hear himself; strange, desperate little noises that seem to punch their way out of his chest against his will. Soon—too soon—he feels it. “I’m,” he starts, and then Damon’s nails dig into his back, scratching, stinging, and he has to collect himself and try again. “I’m, I’m almost—I’m gonna—”

His weak attempt to pull out is stopped by Damon, who clamps his leg down tighter and grabs at his bottom, pushing him back in. “Don’t, don’t worry, it’s alright, just do it, just keep going—"

His vision goes dark for a moment when he comes, and the whole time he can hear Damon’s stream of near-incomprehensible assurances, over and over, I love you, it’s alright, go on, it’s alright, I love you, feels so good, come on, come on—He slows to a shuddering halt, and lays there panting for a moment before he slowly, carefully pulls out.

“Ooh,” Damon says, in a tone of mild disgust and fascination. “That feels weird.”

“Sorry,” he says automatically, rolling over onto his side.

“I asked you to…” He props himself up, eyes darting back and forth across his floor. “You haven’t got any sort of…clean washcloth, or anything. Don’t answer that, actually.” He picks up his own discarded t-shirt and uses it to clean himself off, and then he’s curling up and tucking his face into Graham’s shoulder. Then, barely audible: “Thank you.” He doesn’t respond. You’re welcome seems ridiculous and inappropriate. Damon’s arms wrap around his waist. This isn’t the first time he's done it, but in the past he’s just hugged him back and then scooted away, vaguely uncomfortable with the idea of anybody holding him in his sleep. This time he lets him stay. It feels like he owes him that much.

He doesn’t think he could fall asleep, not yet, but eventually he does just that, listening to the slow, measured sound of Damon’s breathing.

***

 He wakes up and immediately wishes he hadn't. It very well might be the worst hangover he's had to date, he thinks. Head-wise, at least. It's also irritatingly hot—it shouldn’t be, but the sun is coming through the window and burning them like ants under a magnifying glass, and it isn't helped by the fact that Damon, still asleep, is clinging to his side, body heat trapped under the covers with him. He slowly peels the covers away, then shifts, trying to extricate himself from Damon's arms, who of course doesn't budge. "Damon."

No response.

"Damon." He tries to shake his shoulder and it sends a wave of pain reverberating through his body, throbbing in his head. He feels like a bell ringing itself.

Damon stirs but doesn't let go. "Hrm."

"Scoot over."

"Go back to sleep," Damon mumbles, nuzzling at his chest and burrowing deeper into the blankets.

"I'm sweating. You've got to get off me."

"Oh, yeah?" he says, still sounding half-asleep, and makes a sluggish, halfhearted attempt to roll over. As soon as he begins to move he gives up. "Fucking hell."

"I know," Graham agrees. "It's bad."

"Let's not ever do that again."

"You don't mean that."

"I don't. Oh God, we've got to get up," Damon says, pained and miserable. He makes no effort to get up.

"We don't have to get up. You've just got to get off me."

Damon rolls over and groans. "No, we've got to. Or at least someone does. We need to take aspirin or something before we fall back asleep or we'll wake up again just as bad."

He's right. He looks so miserable at the prospect of getting out of bed that Graham feels compelled to offer—"I'll go get some."

"You don't have any in here?"

"No, I kept meaning to get more…"

"Fuck," Damon says, and begins to slowly slide off the bed. "I'll go sniff some out."  He slowly rises to his feet with another pained groan and finds his boxers on the floor, pulling them on.

"At least put a shirt on," Graham says as Damon reaches for the doorknob. There's a sort of necklace of mottled bruises all over his neck, the base of his throat, a few more faint on his chest.

"Mine’s got spunk all over it,” he says. Graham doesn’t bother pointing out that he could just borrow a different one; if Damon wants to go be an exhibitionist, so be it.

He closes his eyes and sinks back into the mattress, drifting fitfully in and out of consciousness. Clouds pass over the sun, and his sweat begins to cool. He rolls across the bed to root around the detritus on the floor and manages to struggle back into his t-shirt and boxers, half-crawling his way back, eyes closed before he even settles down again. Bits and pieces of the night before surface in his mind and join a swirling pool of fragmented thoughts and memories. It must be the hangover. He’s being overtaken by a lazy sort of paranoia, a little spark of panic smothered beneath a blanket of apathy. He thinks about it, him and Damon, forever: a promise, but also a threat. It feels almost like instead of sex something else had happened in his room last night, some kind of a ritual. Images of Damon underneath him, chest heaving. The memory of being inside him. They’ve crossed a line, he thinks, that can’t be uncrossed. It would have been crossed eventually, and the knowledge that the inevitable has finally occurred sends waves of relief through him. It’s soured slightly by the fact that he has no idea what the next inevitable could be, just that there is one, and so the waves of relief have an undercurrent of dread.

It feels like Damon is gone for hours. When he gets back, he's got a glass of water, a handful of pills, a joint, and a banana.

Graham forces his eyes open. "Who gave you all that?"

He sets the glass of water down carefully and then dumps everything else onto the nightstand. "Asked around."

He pictures Damon wandering around the halls of the student residences in just his boxers, covered in love bites, approaching whoever he sees. "What did you say?"

"The truth. That we took E and we also drank too much and we really need it." He passes him two tablets and a glass of water.

He tries to tilt his head at an awkward angle and drink the water without sitting up and manages to spill some of it down his front. The second time he wakes up, he's relieved to find his headache mostly gone. From where the sun is in the sky it seems like late afternoon. He's lying on his side, and Damon is once again curled up with him, face pressed between his shoulder blades, breath hot on his back, arm around his waist. As he comes to his senses he can tell that Damon is hard against the back of his thigh. He sits up and cracks the window open. Damon stirs but doesn't open his eyes, and he leans across him to grab the joint on the nightstand.

When he lights it, Damon stirs again and rubs his eyes. "Are you smoking that without me?"

He blows a cloud of smoke out the window, a pleasant mix of weed and tobacco. "Yes."

"Give it here," he says, but he doesn't sit up. Graham places it carefully in his mouth, and he exhales a massive cloud of smoke.

"At least try to aim for the window."

"Sorry," he says, passing it back.

He takes another hit and coughs. Then he gestures at Damon's erection, though it seems so obvious that the gesture feels unnecessary. "Looks like it works, after all."

"Oh, yeah," he says, dropping his hand casually to palm himself through his boxers and reaching out lazily for the joint with his other. "That's a relief." He takes a long drag, accidentally blowing smoke in Graham's face when he aims for the window. He wrinkles his nose, and Damon notices and says, "Sorry. Come on, I'll make it up to you.

"S'alright, it's just a bit of smoke," he says. It takes him a moment to notice Damon's expression, until he makes a beckoning gesture. He's already a little stoned. The dread he’d felt while Damon was gone had melted away when he’d returned. "Sorry, I'm not wearing my glasses. Didn't notice you…" He giggles. "Making eyes at me."

"C'mon," Damon says, taking another long drag. He leans down. Damon blows smoke into his mouth, just centimeters away, and he breathes in. Exhales. Then closes the gap and kisses him, and for a few moments they kiss lazily, until Damon makes a quiet little noise of alarm. They break apart, and he says, “I got ash on your duvet, sorry.” He props himself up awkwardly and ashes into—well, more onto—an empty beer can on his nightstand. “Let’s finish this first, and then we can…Let’s finish this."

They could abandon the joint for now, but he can feel the worst parts of his hangover dissipating, and decides it’ll probably do them good to finish it. He’s impatient, though, and clearly Damon is, too. It’s almost immediately so absurd that he begins to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” Damon says, pulling smoke into his lungs with a hurried desperation and then passing it over to him.

“Nothing,” Graham says, but then he chokes on smoke and lets out a wheezing, scratchy, giggly sort of cough.

“What is it?”

“You, puffing away like a bloody maniac. Sat there with your hard-on acting like you’re smoking the last spliff on the planet.”

“Come on,” Damon protests, but then he starts laughing, and keeps laughing, shoulders shaking.

He’s laughing, too, and wipes at his face when he feels a tear trickle from his eye. “It’s not that funny.” The paper suddenly feels burning hot on his lips: they’ve finished it.

“No,” Damon agrees, “it’s not.” Then he laughs again.

Graham leans across him to deposit the remains into the beer can. On his way back, he kisses Damon mid-laugh, who makes an exclamation of surprise and then kisses back. They’ve drifted back into familiar territory, for the time being, and it puts his mind at ease. Damon is lowering himself back down onto the mattress, and he’s pulling Graham with him, and really, he hadn’t exactly been—excited, before. Just relieved to finally be rid of his hangover, along with that heavy, awful dread that had been tangled up in it. Most of it’s gone, anyway, and it’s a relief knowing that he won’t have to spend the rest of his day feeling it. Perhaps the rest of his life, to some degree, but that’s not what matters right now. There’s a fuzzy, pleasant, sluggishness to it, something soothing about how familiar it is when Damon’s tongue invades his mouth, and white noise swarming around the edges of it all, blotting out everything but the weight of their bodies, the odd, wet little noises people make when they kiss. It isn’t until he feels Damon’s leg hook over his—the bend of his knee fitting right over the back of his thigh—that he starts getting hard. They’re in (more or less) the same position they’d been in the night before, and it feels like Damon’s body is reminding his own of what they’d done.

When he grinds down, Damon makes a sound, not quite a moan, not quite a hum, but a quiet, close-mouthed sound of pleasant surprise. His mind is in a relaxed fuzz, adrift and floating with the motion of his hips, a loose, steady rocking movement, grinding against where Damon's thigh becomes his hip. He should slow down, he thinks, vaguely, without much urgency. He'd like it if Damon finished first, for once, and based on the way he's writhing beneath him, he figures they're on the same page about that. It's almost amusing how hard Damon is, given his complete inability to sustain an erection the night before. "You're so hard," he says, without meaning to.

Damon's breath hitches. "I know," he whispers. Then he says, "It does happen to me sometimes," and laughs. Not his usual laugh; a breathy sound of delight, rippling through his body and shaking against him in a way that feels almost overwhelmingly good.

His movements get more frantic—he can't help it—but he thinks, perhaps over-optimistically, that he might be able to last anyway. He pinches Damon's nipple (not too hard, just enough to sting a little), listens to him whine, kisses him, thinks maybe if he pulls his hair and gets a hand around him he'll be able to make him come first without having to stop chasing his own release.

As if reading his mind, Damon is suddenly pleading with him—touch me, touch me, please, please, c'mon—and he's coming before he can even get a hand on him, collapsing and flattening him with his entire body weight. He fights the urge to go completely slack and boneless, tightens his trembling hand around Damon's leaking cock.

That's about as useful as he can be right now, but Damon doesn't seem to mind. He's clearly struggling to move his hips while pinned, and Graham rolls over—only slightly, still clinging to his side—to watch him, fucking up into his hand in agitated, slick little thrusts. He's too lightheaded to understand a word of Damon's barely-coherent rambling, but it doesn't matter what he's saying, anyway, just what he sounds like. It all amounts to the same thing. He's coming to his senses, heart rate slowing down, and can focus more clearly on Damon's plight as he struggles to get off. He's panting heavily, and his breath keeps catching in wounded little gasps. Having failed at his mission to get Damon off first, he's briefly gripped by the curious, almost sadistic urge to make him wait just a little longer, just to watch him, to see if he'll beg again.

Instead he spits in his palm (Damon clutches at him, protesting at the loss of contact) and touches him with more intention, twisting his wrist just so, stroking at the tip with his thumb, and Damon is holding him so tightly it's getting difficult to breathe, and then he's spilling, sticky-wet-hot into his hand. He watches him go slack, arms falling to his sides, and they lie there in silence for a moment, breathing deep. Then he pulls his hand out of Damon’s boxers and wipes it unceremoniously on his abdomen, rolling over to reach for Damon’s t-shirt from the night before and doing his best to clean them both up with it.

“That’s my shirt,” Damon complains.

“You’re the one who used it last night,” he says, tossing the shirt back down to the floor. He's in desperate need of a shower (they both are) but the task of getting out of bed still seems far too laborious and unpleasant to undertake just yet. He's tempted to spend the rest of the day in bed, but doing so always makes him feel off-kilter, uneasy, and besides, he'll have to get up and piss eventually.

Damon is propped up lazily on his elbows, surveying the clutter and rubbish strewn about the floor. "Will you finally let me clean your room?" 

Then again, when Damon is here, sleeping too long feels less like the miserable failure it usually is and more like an indulgent, leisurely sort of thing. "Maybe," he says, feeling himself drifting off again. He's not too worried. Damon won't let him waste the day in bed.