Part the Seventh

Thom crawled out of bed in the morning with the worst hangover he thought he had ever experienced. It felt as though tiny pneumatic drills were eating away at the inside of his skull and even the slightest movement sent bolts of pain arcing down his spine and fireworks exploding behind his tightly closed eyelids. He felt only a little more human after swallowing some aspirin and vomiting it back up and swallowing some more because he would probably regret it if he didn't. As he scrubbed himself vigorously under a shower running as hot as it would go, he wondered just how much he'd had to drink last night. Enough that everything up until waking up drenched in sweat and tasting puke in his mouth was only a vague blur.

He made himself dry toast and a large glass of orange juice, unable to face the time nor the effort of preparing something more complicated. It was only just after noon, which surprised him – usually if he was in this state he'd be lucky to be up before dinner. There was another message on the answering machine; he almost fell through the floor when Jonny's voice started speaking. “Colin wants me to let you know that there's a rehearsal this evening. And... that you'll be there even if you have to crawl in. I don't know what he means. I think we probably need to talk.”

Thom's fist shot out and hit 'rewind' to listen to the message again. A surge of warmth welled up inside him – Jonny didn't hate him! Or at least, he was still willing to talk to him... and wanted to talk to him, even. He replayed it... Colin wants me... you have to crawl in... and a cascade of icy coldness quickly doused the sudden optimism he had felt. Rehearsal meant he would have to face both Greenwoods in the same room at the same time. Both Greenwoods with their hair and hands and lips and eyes... he moaned aloud and scrubbed his hands through his hair in frustration as his cock twitched at the mere thought of them. Since when had any idea involving Colin and Jonny automatically sent an impulse to his groin that he simply could not control?

Abstractly, he wondered if the arrangement he had with Colin would be called off. Whether he could still claim his soul back even after he had bared it so shamelessly.

The shrill of the doorbell nearly had him jumping out of his skin. It would be easy enough to pretend that he wasn't it, but there was a chance that it could be Jonny, come to 'talk' to him... or even Colin, to determine where they should go from here. He wasn't sure which scenario he would prefer. Glancing down, he adjusted his dressing gown so that it fully concealed the bulge in his trousers, and went to answer the door.

Whoever he had been expecting to see, Wesley had been fairly low down his list of candidates.

“Jesus Chr- what the fuck are you doing here?” Thom hissed, glancing up and down the street as though people would see Wesley on his doorstep and automatically assume the worst. The younger man was dressed in jodhpurs and those expensive riding boots of his, heels and toes spattered with mud, and Thom couldn't quite ignore the flattering way the tight material clung to those sculpted, muscular thighs... and other parts, too. His hair was damp and combed back from his forehead, and if he was feeling the ill effects of the previous evening's indulgences, he was clearly more used to dealing with them than Thom was.

“Nice to see you too, Thom,” Wesley said with a broad smile, stepping into the hall as Thom stood aside for him. “You look awful,” he said after a moment, piercing eyes sweeping over Thom from head to toe.

“How did you get my address?” Thom asked, closing the door behind him and turning round to stand with his back against it.

“Colin,” Wesley said airily, moving through into the sitting room where the curtains were still drawn and flopping down onto the sofa. “I phoned him and said you'd seemed a little out of it last night, put on the old 'concerned friend' routine, offered to drop by and check up on you, and here I am. Incidentally, I presume that since he can still stand to mention your name and apparently cares for your welfare, the two of you haven't suddenly decided to absent yourself from the other's life. Even if he doesn't drop everything and run to your aid at the notion of you being a little under the weather.”

Thom perched on the arm of the sofa, twisting his hands together in his lap. “I haven't talked to Colin about it. I still don't know why I'm talking to you.”

“Because you need an objective observer.”

“OK, then, objective observer -” Thom unknotted the tie on his dressing gown and pushed the two sides apart “- why does an answerphone message from Jonny do that to me?”

Wesley blinked at the tent in his shorts for a few moments, and then smiled. “Put that away, you'll have someone's eye out.”

“I'm serious here. That isn't normal, is it?”

Wesley looked up at him. Even in the half-light, his eyes were very, very blue, and it unnerved Thom; he shifted uncomfortably where he sat, his gaze sliding away from Wesley's every time it met, like two identical poles of a magnet. “I'm a lawyer, Thom,” he said quietly. “Not a sex therapist.”

Thom chewed on his lip to keep from crying with frustration. “I know that. I just... well... it's not really the sort of thing you bring up in polite conversation. It's not as though I could talk to Ed or Phil about it, is it, and there's no way I'm going to tell Colin or Jonny that I sprout wood just at the sound of their voices.” He caught himself. “Jonny's voice, I mean.”

Wesley's expression was calculating. “This answerphone message... was it obscene in nature?”

At that, Thom managed a genuine laugh. “Like hell it was. Jonny can't even say the word 'sex' without blushing, he's hardly rushing around sending people dirty phone calls.” It was a bad idea to have thought that, he realised instantly, because suddenly his head was filled with filthy things Jonny might say to him, in his quiet, measured, well-spoken way. He crossed his legs in an effort to tamp down his desire.

“Well, that's a good thing, then,” Wesley said, clapping his hands together. “It means you're just human like the rest of us hot-blooded males.”

“I... sorry, what?”

“Jonny fucking Greenwood, that's what.” Thom stared at him, his mouth falling slightly open. “Thom, if you didn't think filthy things about him every time he spoke to you, I would think there was something wrong with you. I don't know how you stand being around him so much.”

In the next moment, Wesley had snagged Thom by the collar of his t-shirt, yanked him off the arm of the sofa to sprawl on the cushioned seat, and hooked one leg over his waist, straddling his thighs. Thom struggled, briefly; then their mouths crashed together, Wesley's insistent tongue running over his lips before pushing them apart, teeth clicking and breath coming in spurts like inexperienced teenagers, and Thom forgot any protest he might have had.

Wesley was a lot bigger than Thom. That didn't necessarily make him a large man by any means, but for all Thom's helplessness he could have been the same size as Ed, and in his unfamiliarity he seemed even larger; and, pinned under him as he was, with no leverage at all, Thom realised that this was what he'd been looking for. Wesley pushed himself up, pinning Thom by his shoulders, and stared down at him, golden hair like a halo around his tanned, chiselled face, and Thom wondered what on earth this Greek god could possibly want from the scrawny, flame-haired, wonky-eyed misfit beneath him.

Then one of Wesley's hands left his shoulders, slipping down his front, broad fingers curling around the waistband of his shorts and yanking them down in one smooth, fluid motion. Thom squeaked as a hot, callused palm closed around his cock, clenched his teeth and thought of as many unsexy things as he could to stop himself from coming right there and then. When he'd brought himself under control – well, a passable impression of it – he lowered his hands and with some effort managed to get the jodhpurs to Wesley's thighs. Wesley's gaze was hot as he lifted his hand, spat in his palm and reached between them, the head of his cock pressing up against the underside of Thom's, and began to stroke them together.

“Let's start from the top,” Wesley hissed, his mouth hovering a few inches above Thom's, lips redder than usual, swollen and damp. “I'm going to tell you what you need to hear. I'm going to keep doing this -” his hand sped up, and Thom gasped and keened under the frantic yet skilled touch “- and you are going to come harder than you've ever done in your whole life. Right?”

Thom nodded, bucking his hips desperately, seeking something, anything for relief from this delicious torment. Wesley pressed a sharp knee into the tender flesh of his inner thigh and grinned. “No, Thom. When I say so. And I want to do this a while longer.” He slowed his hand, the motions becoming lighter, more gentle, and Thom whined with need. “Now... Jonny. Jonathan. You've been having some rather impure thoughts about your best friend's baby brother. And you're feeling very guilty about that, aren't you, Thom?”

“Y-yes,” Thom whispered, sucking in a shuddering breath.

“I've had him, you know.” Wesley's smile was shark-like, his words coming in hot sharp pants across Thom's cheek. “God, and you think Colin is a slut. You should have been at school with Jonny in sixth form.”

Thom moaned and wriggled, trying to get enough purchase with his hips to exert some control over the situation, but it was useless. Sweating and flushed, he allowed himself to go limp below Wesley's body, surrendering to that treacherous hand and the terrible words that he didn't want to listen to but couldn't help from hearing. “That's... bollocks,” he groaned, as Wesley's thumb skated over the head of his erection and he jumped. “He's not like that. He isn't.”

Wesley dipped his head and licked at the sweat that was beading on Thom's upper lip. “That's what you want to keep thinking,” he murmured into the corner of Thom's mouth. Thom could feel him smiling. “You want to think he's somehow better than us? Purer? Maybe if you knew him you wouldn't have to feel so guilty about jerking off to the thought of his pretty face.”

“Shut up.”

“He wasn't even sixteen. Term had just started, I remember it like it was yesterday. He grew out his hair over the summer. I sat through our piano lesson with him giving me those little sideways glances from under his fringe – you know what I mean, don't you? Hiding behind his fucking hair. So I shoved him forward over the piano and fucked him like that.”

“Stop it.”

“Anyone could have walked in. He was making enough noise that they could probably hear at the other end of the building. I remember his fingers...” Jonny's fingers scrabbling for purchase on the smooth, shiny wood. His high, frantic gasps, pained at first and then filled with pleasure, as Wesley drove into him again and again, his cock rubbing along the edge of the keys, every now and then a discord as a hand or limb slipped and landed on the ivory. One of Wesley's hands fisting in that too-long hair, yanking hard enough to bring tears to the long-lashed brown-green eyes, exposing that elegant neck, pulse fluttering wildly like a trapped bird under the pale skin. And then the loss of rhythm, the tangle of awkward teenage bodies, the final shattering cries as, one after the other, they tipped over the brink.

“... and that sexy fucking lisp when he thanked me for it. So... fucking... polite.” Wesley's voice was higher now, his breathing coming faster. “He couldn't say no. Probably bent over for half the school.”

That did it, and Thom came, and Wesley was right; it was harder than he had ever done in his entire life. He was still trying to climb down from it, his heartbeat pounding in his ears, when Wesley stiffened, shuddered and swore, and Thom felt a rush of wet warmth spill between their stomachs. The younger man pressed his forehead to Thom's neck, shivering, and Thom could have sworn he heard a stifled sob. Realisation washed over him in a startling wave.

“None of that really happened, did it?” he asked, putting a hand under Wesley's chin and tilting his face up to look into those damp blue eyes.

“Of course it didn't,” Wesley said with acid bitterness, yanking his jodhpurs up over his hips. “I just told you what you needed to hear.”