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"Well, I suppose it's time we headed back."
Looking down at my watch, I muttered to myself. It was just past nine-thirty. In the past, this would have been the exact moment London's nightlife finally began to stir, but not anymore. Under lockdown, the city fell dead silent like a ghost town the moment the clock struck eight. Pubs and restaurants all shut their doors, hastily putting up 'Closed Early' signs. Even the streetlights lining the main avenues looked somehow lethargic.
That was why, under the pretext of an exceptionally permitted production meeting, I was currently sitting face-to-face with David in a private room of a small restaurant.
Yet, the sounds of chatter and clinking tableware from outside our room had long since died away. The empty chairs sat in lonely silence, and not even a waiter's voice could be heard.
David was absentmindedly picking at the simple salad he had ordered at the very beginning, which still remained on his plate. Rather than bringing the leaves to his mouth, he was merely poking at them with the tip of his fork, looking entirely out of place. Bothered by his lack of response, I peered at his face.
"David?"
After a brief pause, a strangely thin voice replied,"...Yeah."
He kept twirling the fork between his fingers, acting as if he was utterly focused on the motion. The salad remained practically untouched.
"David."
"..."
"What's wrong?"
He glanced up. Our eyes met for a fraction of a second before he quickly averted his gaze.
"Mm... nothing really..."
Leaving behind a noncommittal groan that hardly matched his words, he finally set the fork down on the table.
"...Hey, Michael."
"Yeah."
"What are you... doing after this?"
Unable to grasp the intent behind his question, I instinctively frowned. I looked down at my empty glass. The wine was already gone. The waiter had taken the menu away ages ago. I would have liked another drink, but given the current climate, there was nowhere left to drop by.
"Going home. This place is closing soon anyway. Is there even anywhere else we can drink?"
"Probably not, thanks to COVID. Fucking hell."
I let out a small, shoulder-shaking chuckle at his blatantly venomous cursing, but inwardly, I realized his tedious "guess what I'm thinking" mode had begun. Utterly troublesome. But then again, I had been dealing with this side of him for years.
And above all, bringing it up at this specific timing meant he already knew exactly what he wanted to say. Yet, it was thoroughly irritating that David was trying to make *me* voice his demands right now. What would be even more irritating, however, was the inevitable future where he would sulk and call me dense if I left it alone.
I quietly let out a breath, bracing myself, and leaned forward.
"...By any chance, do you want to have sex after this?"
I tossed the whispered words out like a gamble. David snapped his head up. His eyes went wide, and he opened his mouth as if to say, *What are you talking about?*—but the corners of his lips betrayed a slackness that could only mean he was desperately fighting back a smile.
He had definitely been serious during the meeting. Or at least, I had thought so. We had meticulously gone over the schedule for our next project, the logistics for online script read-throughs, and even the staff's vaccination rates. But it seemed a part of his mind had been wandering somewhere else entirely.
"Since when have you been thinking about that?"
When I asked him point-blank, David opened and closed his mouth like a fish out of water. I immediately drove a nail in, warning him, "Don't try to play dumb, and don't lie to me." David pressed his lips tightly together, then looked up at me through his eyelashes like a guilty child.
"...Since you invited me to this meeting today."
Realizing that lies wouldn't work on me, he muttered his confession.
"Fuck..."
"I only told you because you told me to be honest!"
"Of course I'm appalled. So what, you were just pretending to have a serious meeting earlier while doing nothing but thinking about screwing me?"
"N-No, I wasn't. I just... thought about it sometimes. When you were talking seriously, I was listening properly."
"I thought your gaze felt unusually intense today. So that was it..."
Even if it was a private room, it wasn't completely soundproof. Two grown men were whispering closely, faces practically pressed together to keep our voices from leaking into the hall. Despite the absurdity of the situation, I could feel the corners of my mouth slowly rising, and I couldn't stop them.
"You're not a teenager at the peak of puberty."
"...I couldn't help but expect something."
"Expect what?"
"Well... today... it's my birthday, right?"
For a second, time seemed to stop.
"...Huh?"
A pathetic sound escaped my throat. I sincerely hoped I had misheard him, but the David sitting in front of me was glancing my way with an exaggerated, expectant look.
"...David, today is your birthday?"
I asked slowly, as if to confirm. David gave a small nod. "Yeah."
I involuntarily leaned back against my chair, my gaze drifting to the ceiling as I muttered another F-word. If I had known it was his birthday beforehand, I could have arranged a nicer restaurant, maybe even prepared a cake. Instead, I had him picking at a cold salad in a cramped private room boxed in by acrylic sneeze guards. Under the pretext of a meeting, no less.
"What the hell is that? You should have said something properly."
When I grumbled my complaint, David pouted his lips.
"If I told you, you'd just feel obligated. You're the type who rigidly tries to do all that stuff, Michael. Birthday presents, surprises."
"Obviously. It's your birthday."
"But when you do that, it just makes me tense up... Besides..."
He trailed off, averting his eyes.
"...With the times being what they are, making a big fuss out of it just felt kind of wrong."
I let out a heavy sigh. Then, without a word, I reached out across the table. Caught off guard, David's eyes widened. I wrapped my hand around his, pulling him firmly toward me, and dropped a brief kiss on his lips.
A moment of silence.
A fork clinked against a plate. Neither of us moved. David's dark brown eyes were frozen wide open. Watching the color slowly flood into his cheeks, I gently released his hand.
The lingering sensation on my lips felt terribly hot, making me self-conscious. But I believed this was a necessary action. If I didn't do at least this much, there were far too many things words simply couldn't catch up to.
"...What was that?"
David finally muttered. It wasn't an angry voice. Rather, it sounded muffled, a mix of confusion and embarrassment.
"A present," I replied curtly. If I didn't say that, I wouldn't be able to hide my own embarrassment. Sure enough, David stared at me in stunned silence, but gradually, the corners of his mouth began to twitch upwards. It was the face of someone desperately trying not to smile.
"If you were gonna do that, you should have warned me so I could mentally prepare. I wanted to have my 'receiving a present' face ready."
"Just take it as you are."
"I can't. A sudden kiss is foul play. And besides, in a place like this..."
Mumbling his protests, David gave a small shrug and looked down. He was faintly red all the way to the tips of his ears. It was obvious he was flustered, but pointing it out directly seemed tasteless. Instead, I quietly swirled my wine glass by the stem. The wine was already gone, but a faint red stain at the bottom slowly traced a vortex. Watching it, I chose my next words.
I didn't want to ruin this atmosphere. I had a feeling that if I just stayed quiet, the night would end half-baked. Eventually, the hum of the air conditioning faintly shifted—a quiet signal that closing time was approaching. I slowly took my fingers off the glass, stood up, and straightened the hem of my jacket.
"...Let's go."
My tone was surprisingly detached, even to my own ears. But every single movement as I stood up seeped with an overwhelming resolve.
David looked up. He seemed slightly surprised, the flush still lingering around his eyes, but he quickly masked it with a playful grin.
"Where to?"
At his question, I took a step forward and glanced back.
"A hotel. If we look, we'll find one that still has rooms."
I kept my tone deliberately light. But in that instant, I didn't miss how David's eyes darted away and his shoulders tensed. He immediately averted his gaze, twisting his mouth to hide his expression.
"What's with that face?"
"Eh, well, you know..."
His feigning ignorance sounded strangely high-pitched. I narrowed my eyes slightly, pressing him.
"...Don't tell me you already booked a place?"
David let out a small, defeated laugh and nodded without meeting my eyes.
"That's exactly what I'm telling you."
"...Talking like that, you were fully planning on getting fucked for your birthday, weren't you."
"When you put it like that, it makes me sound like... well, yeah, I guess. I mean, maybe. And besides,"
"Besides what?"
David started to say something, then snapped his mouth shut. When I waited in silence, he eventually dropped his shoulders and let out a breath like he was surrendering. His breathing, faintly laced with the scent of wine, reached my ears vividly.
"...A light kiss just isn't enough."
His voice was quiet, yet utterly clear. He continued, the slightly hoarse words sounding as if they were being squeezed from the back of his throat.
"Today, I wanted you to wreck me, Michael. I want you to take me in a proper hotel. And then... I want you to praise me a lot, but be rough with me, and even when I say no, I want you to make me come... over and over."
David's voice grew rougher, his last few words almost entirely inaudible, but his expression said it all. Still looking down, his cheeks were flushed deeply red. His fingertips were frozen stiff on his lap, occasionally shifting in a restless fidget.
I stood there, unable to say a word.
A heavy, hot wave surged deep within my body. My breathing hitched before my reason could catch up. Unable to suppress the faint sound rising in my throat, I quietly inhaled and forced it down deep.
*God, this is bad.*
In the quiet corner of this restaurant, I could feel my rationality violently throbbing. An urge to respond not with words, but with heat. I wanted to touch David, to pin him down, to drive my heat into that body—which was much softer than it looked—and crush him in my embrace. The desire pooled thick at the back of my tongue.
The man before me deliberately kept his eyes cast down, but his ears were burning red and he was biting his lip. That defenceless display was grating against my self-restraint. Despite all his teasing words, he wasn't actually initiating anything himself; he was waiting for my reaction. Understanding this intoxicating blend of provocation and neediness made something inside me violently creak.
Before I knew it, my feet had carried me around the table to David's side. As I stood beside his chair and silently looked down over his shoulder, he gently raised his face. His eyes, seemingly draped in the remnants of the night, stared straight into mine.
"...Did you really want me to fuck you that badly?"
The voice that slipped from my lips was lower and hoarser than I expected. It sounded like the raw heat lodged in my throat had been translated directly into words. David reacted by lowering his eyes for just a second, but then his gaze returned, and he quietly nodded.
That single nod brought me dangerously close to the breaking point. But this was still a public place. The lights might be dimmed and the other customers gone, but it wasn't a completely sealed room. Despite knowing this, my fingers moved purely on impulse. I brushed aside David's hair—grown a bit longer during lockdown—tucking it gently behind his ear, exposing the slender line of his neck. Seeing the faint flush on his skin and the slight bead of sweat resting there, my throat clicked.
"Let's go. Now."
David looked at me without saying a word.
Taking that as his answer, I firmly pulled him up by the arm. He stumbled slightly at the sudden movement, and I immediately wrapped my arm around his waist to support him. The distance between us was entirely too close. Our cheeks were close enough to feel each other's breath.
"...Michael, we're in public..."
"Just shut up and walk, please. While I still have my sanity."
When I growled the low whisper directly into his ear, David gave a sharp, thrilling shudder. It incited me unbearably.
And so, exchanging almost no words, we left the restaurant. The outside air still carried the chill of the night, but within me smoldered a heat powerful enough to burn it all away.
David squeezed my hand just a little tighter. Pulling his hand along, I started walking quietly into the night. By the time this night was over, he certainly wouldn't be able to stand. Of that, I was absolutely sure.