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Thom is lying in bed on Zillow when Robbie texts him. A bunch of the guys went to some show tonight, some DJ who's supposed to be super good or something. Thom hadn’t bought tickets when they came out, so he’d figured he was just going to have to sit this one out, stay at home and maybe wash his sheets or something.
But apparently they aren’t actually scanning tickets at the venue, just checking to see if people have the email with the QR code, and Ozzy said he’d forward it to both of them if they want. Thom’s phone lights up with a call from Robbie while he’s still contemplating the text, questioning if he really does want to go. Like, he did want to cut his fingernails tonight, they’ve been feeling kind of long. And he hasn’t showered yet, so he hasn’t shaved either and isn’t really in going out shape.
Still, he picks up on the last ring, says “Hey, what’s up?”
“Did you see my text? Ozzy says they’re not actually scanning the tickets, so we could for sure go.”
“Yeah, I’ll go with you, just give me ten.”
“Okay, perfect,” Robbie says. He sounds like he’s vibrating. “I’ll come to you, how about that?”
Robbie lives a twenty minute walk away, in a house with four other guys on the team. Thom absolutely loves it there, but he likes being able to have his own space even more. His apartment is actually decorated too, not like Robbie’s house with the I ❤️ MILFS flag and pool table in the dining room and Kegerator tucked under a stolen street sign.
Thom wonders if Robbie’s going to walk or drive, because that directly impacts how much time he has to get ready. He decides to play it safe, assume Tristen’s going to drive and start getting ready now, even though he would bet money he’s going to walk. He doesn’t know why, but that guy absolutely loves walking everywhere.
If he’d made that bet he would have won it, because Robbie shows up twenty minutes later in a t-shirt and some kind of shiny, silvery pants.
“I like your pants,” Thom offers, even though he’s not too sure how he feels about them. They look super thin, and it’s probably like ten degrees outside. California never gets truly cold, but he still doesn’t understand how Robbie doesn’t have goosebumps covering his arms.
“They’re actually, like, long underwear.”
“What?”
“Like for skiing or hiking? I think they work kind of like those emergency blankets, you know, the shiny ones?”
“Like the really thin aluminum foil ones?” Thom asks. “I’m pretty sure those only work because the sun shines on you and it’s metal so it heats up.”
“Ok, I’m not a blanket expert,” Robbie says, shrugging. “I’ve only ever seen those blankets in, like, Criminal Minds.”
“Yeah, I have no clue how that shit works.” Thom says. “Also, do you want to call the Uber or should I?”
“Can you? I’ll get it on the way back, I promise.”
The show turns out to be in this warehouse type space with a big LED wall behind the stage, trippy flower visuals that Thom gets lost staring at for five straight minutes. The rest of the team’s been there for a while, pressed up against the barricade since the opening DJ was still performing. Thom feels momentarily bad, wonders if they’re blocking the view of the people behind them, but the Cuda are a team of short kings, so it’s probably not that bad.
The DJ, when he comes on, is good. Thom doesn’t really know anything about this stuff, but it’s an awesome experience. He can feel the music vibrate down to his bones, can feel his boys pressed up alongside his body, can feel the energy in the air. It’s fun.
He watches sweat drip down the DJ’s face, watches the way the lights flicker over Robbie’s face. God, he’s smiling so wide it has to hurt. Thom wants a beer, only had the one before he came here, but if he leaves he knows he’ll lose his spot. He checks his phone; it’s only 9:30. They’ve got a long way to go, another DJ supposed to come on after this one’s done. Thom doesn’t know if he can do it. It’s not that he’s opposed to going out or anything, but he would prefer to be somewhere a little less crowded, maybe somewhere he can sit down. He’s definitely going to stick out this set at least.
The beat drops and Robbie bumps up against Thom, stays there. He can’t tell if it’s on purpose or if Robbie’s just getting shoved, because there really are a lot of people packed in the small space. Thom likes it, he decides, likes the way other people feel against his body. Maybe that’s weird, but isn’t it, like, evolutionary? A lion couldn’t eat Thom now, not when he’s surrounded by this many people. Maybe it’s a primal instinct, that drive to celly together in a mass of every guy on the ice, to surround himself with sweaty bodies moving to the beat. Thom does feel pretty safe right now, pretty secure.
The DJ drinks something out of one of those fancy bottles that only expensive alcohol comes in, hands it off to one of the girls surrounding him. She’s blonde, wearing a white crop top that moves when she does, and pretty. Every one of the girls surrounding the DJ is pretty, though. Thom wonders if they’re just girls who came to the show, got selected to stand on the stage by virtue of being attractive, or if they’re somehow part of the DJ’s entourage. He decides he doesn’t really care.
When the set ends it’s only 10:15, and the team’s split, half of the guys wanting to head back and half wanting to stick it out, stay for the next set. Thom wants to go to the bar down the road from where Robbie and Cardsy and all the other guys live, sit in a booth and drink a beer. When he proposes this to the group, Robbie says he’ll probably go, ask him again when they get back to the house.
So that’s what Thom does, words out of his mouth the second his feet hit the curb, before Ozzy and Ekky have even gotten out of the backseat.
“Yeah, I’ll for sure go, I just want to change my pants first,” Robbie says. Thom does a little fistpump internally.
When they walk in, Patty’s on the couch watching some guy play golf.
“I want to play that course one day,” he explains, when Thom looks at him, eyebrows raised.
Thom had heard that Patty was going to mostly be in Ohio this season, fucking around in the ECHL, but instead he’s here, coaching youth hockey and smoking too much weed.
“Fat Pat!” Ozzy crows when he walks in, dapping him up. It’s a nice, crisp sound. Thom likes it. He likes a lot of sounds, though. The schick of the lighter, the burble burble burble when Patty leans over to take a bong rip. Robbie’s footsteps upstairs, stomping around as he looks for different pants.
When Robbie comes back down his pants are an unremarkable gray, and he looks way too excited for someone who’s nighttime plans mainly consist of sitting in a too-dark, too-loud bar.
They all start talking then, something about foods with the most calories in them, the constant struggle to keep weight on. PB&Js, Patty says, and Thom thinks avocados, or maybe nuts, but he doesn’t say it, just keeps quiet and lets the noise wash over him. It reminds him of parties when he was a little kid, cold grass under his feet and fading daylight and adults talking around a firepit. It’s a good vibe.
Ekky shows up twenty minutes later. Thom has no idea where he came from, because he wasn’t with them at the set or anything.
“Zetter kicked me out to link with some girl from Tinder,” Ekky says, and oh, Thom guesses that’s why he’s here. Normal twenty year olds shouldn’t need to kick their roommate out to hook up, but Ekky and Zetter are two idiots who waited to find a rental until the last possible moment, and now they’re living in what is technically a one-bedroom with an “office” that has been converted into Zetter’s bedroom, which works great until he wants to bring a chick over and he doesn’t even have a real door, just a bookshelf “wall.”
“You wanna go to the bar with me and Robbie?” Thom asks. That would be fun, get the line back together.
“Yeah, I’m down. Right now?”
“As soon as Robbie gets his ass up.”
“Dude, fuck you. I’ve been ready,” Robbie protests, despite the fact that he’s been refusing to move from the couch for the past twenty minutes.
“Ok, let’s go then,” Thom says. He’s been getting antsy, waiting to go. Sometimes it’s like a flip just switches in him and suddenly he can’t sit still, needs to move onto the next thing as soon as possible.
So they go. It’s a little colder outside than Thom would prefer, that nighttime chill that never really penetrates but just lingers on his skin.
When they get to the bar it’s dark but not that crowded, and none of the drinks sound appealing. Thom had just wanted to go to sit there with Robbie and Ekky, not to drink. In the end he copies them, gets a matching beer. He’s not a big beer fan but he feels cool holding the glass bottle, like one of those TikTok videos that flash through aesthetic photos stolen from Pinterest.
“How’s it been playing for the Sharks?” Thom asks, once they’re all sitting down. It’s the first thing he can think of to say.
“It’s good,” Ekky says, pauses. “They don’t know the no upside-down time rule there.”
“So you’ve got unlimited upside down time?” Robbie asks. JMac banned upside down time for the Cuda, which he defines as whenever someone’s head is upside down. That means no more cartwheels, no more handstands, and no other fun little tricks at the arena or in the hotel. Thom hates it.
“Yeah, I can just cartwheel through the halls at the SAP Center,” Ekky says. Thom can’t tell if he’s being serious or not. “So hyped to regain upside-down privileges without you fuckers there to ruin it for me. Only downside to the show is I keep being late in the morning without the sound of gagging to wake me up.”
“What?” Thom’s confused, doesn’t really get what Ekky’s talking about. While they’ve been yapping Robbie’s hand has moved to his thigh.
“Dude, did I never tell you this? Last year when I was living with Robbie and Ozzy I didn’t even need an alarm, I would just wake up to the sound of them gagging brushing their teeth.”
“Most people gag when shit’s on their tongue,” Robbie protests. When he speaks the hand on Thom’s thigh shifts, a little tacky. “And it was mostly Ozzy, like he would literally gag when the toothbrush touched his teeth.”
“That’s got to be, like, psychological. No one physically gags from shit touching their teeth. You don’t even have nerves in your teeth.” Thom’s got a really hard to trigger gag reflex, and he loves where this conversation is going, always jumps at a chance to brag about how hard it is to make him gag. It’s flirting the Thomas Bordeleau way.
“Your teeth have feeling in them, though.” Ekky says. “And Thom, we all know you don’t have a gag reflex.”
Perfect. Robbie’s been reminded of the no-gag-reflex thing and Thom didn’t even have to bring it up, which is like a double win. Maybe he’s imagining it, but it seems like Robbie’s hand gets tighter on his thigh. They’re sitting side by side in the sticky booth, Ekky across the table from them.
This might be as far as it goes, Thom thinks, a little groping in a dark bar, but he hopes not. Robbie’s so hard to read. It’s impossible to tell whether or not he’s into Thom for real, or is just being nice.
Either way it’s good. Thom’s liking just sitting here and chatting, listening to whatever thoughts Ekky has about showering and how often he needs to wash his towels.
“I can’t remember the last time I washed my towel. I’m thinking that big washer and dryer just make shit up about how often you have to wash them.”
“You’re so right, because why would a towel get dirty when it’s only touching me after all the dirt’s washed away?” Robby says.
“Yeah, I guess people get sketched out by, like, the fibers of your skin sticking to the towel.” Thom doesn’t know the actual word for it, but those little pieces of skin that come off, the tiny little parts he learned about in bio class.
“You can’t see them, though.”
“Yeah, I don’t get scared of things I can’t see,” Robbie says. His thumb is tracing little circles through the finer hair on Thom’s upper thigh.
No one says anything for a second, and then Robbie shifts, opens his mouth. “It’s lowkey really late, like we should probably head back.”
When they get back to the house, Cardsy has made it back, is lying on the couch way too drunk. Some kind of nature documentary is on the TV.
“You guys haven’t— you guys haven’t ever seen me like this.” Cardsy’s forehead is shiny with sweat, hair sticking. “Please don’t remember this tomorrow.”
Patty cackles, stretched out on the other couch.
Thom nudges him with his foot. “Sit up, dude.”
Patty sits up, and Thom plops down right there, in the middle of the couch. It’s a big couch, he probably didn’t even need to get Patty to sit up, but whatever. There’s plenty of space but Robbie still sits right next to Thom, thigh pressed up against him.
“Is this Obama?”
“Yeah, I think this is the episode he narrated,” Patty says.
“Dude, imagine being the actual president and deciding to spend your time narrating a nature documentary.”
Onscreen, these little monkeys jump between rock spikes. It’s a long way down if they fall, Thom thinks, and those rocks look like they could impale a person. He wouldn’t want to be one of those monkeys, in danger like that all the time. They don’t look like they mind, though.
“I think Obama was the last president that no one, like, really really hated,” Robbie is saying when he tunes back in.
“People hated Obama,” Cardsy says.
“No, people disliked Obama,” Robbie argues. “No one ever hated him like people hate Trump or Biden.”
“Where even is this?” Ekky asks out of nowhere, staring at the screen.
“Arizona.” Thom knows it’s not actually Arizona, but it’s funny to say.
“I don’t think that’s Arizona.”
“How would you know? You’re from Sweden,” Patty interjects.
“We played the Coyotes like three weeks ago, and it looked nothing like that.”
It’s an uncomfortable reminder, that Ekky’s left them, that their line’s all split up. Cardsy’s stolen Thom’s spot, or maybe Thom just didn’t work hard enough, because Robbie’s on the top line and Ekky’s playing in the show and Thom, well, Thom just got off IR and he hasn’t played an NHL game since the start of the season and he’s still fucking around in the AHL. It’s not that he doesn’t like the Cuda, because he does, loves the guys and the trainers and his coaches, but he wants to- wants to be more, he guesses.
It’s weird, because hard work got Thom to the NTDP and it got him to Michigan and it got him through a tryout with the Sharks, but now it just seems to be failing him. He’s not getting better and he doesn’t know how he can try harder, doesn’t know where he’s not giving it his all, but there’s got to be somewhere. Once, when he was younger, maybe at Michigan or maybe in the NTDP or maybe even before that, his team had absolutely killed these other kids, like a 12-0 blowout. After, in the locker room, Thom had mentioned to his teammate that he almost felt bad, beating the other team like that.
I don’t feel bad his teammate had said, some guy with a face made blurry by Thom’s faulty memory. We work way harder than them. Maybe they think they’re working hard, maybe they spend just as much time on the ice as we do, but they aren’t actually putting in the same amount of work, not like we are. It was a conversation that kind of changed Thom’s view of practice, that just being on the ice wasn’t enough, that he needed to be putting max effort in too. It’s gotten him this far, but now he feels almost stalled.
“Do you want some blanket?” Robbie asks. While Thom’s been thinking he’s found one somewhere, has draped himself in it. When Thom nods, Robbie throws a corner of it over Thom’s lap, over where his shorts are riding up so high a stripe of untanned skin is showing.
The nature documentary ends, and Cardsy grabs the remote, says “I want to watch the numbers episode.”
Thom looks up again, and on the TV Cardsy is flipping through episodes of Rick and Morty. Thom’s never watched it before, but he knows that stupid song, the one that’s all over TikTok.
It opens with some ice cube shaped like a ‘T’ bouncing around, fighting off these attacking numbers. What the actual fuck is this TV show, Thom wonders. Under the blanket Robbie’s hand has found its way back to his thigh. It makes Thom realize how close together they’re sitting. He wonders, brief and fleeting, how it looks from the outside, but the thought slips away as onscreen Ice-T’s dad gifts him some special necklace.
Halfway through the episode, Ekky gets up, comes back with a bag of microwave popcorn and plops down on the couch right next to Thom. When he opens the bag Thom can smell it, is reminded that he’s a little hungry. He’s always a little hungry, though, comes with the territory of playing a professional sport.
“Is this popcorn sweet?” Ekky asks, mouth full and a confused expression on his face.
“It might be kettle corn, yeah,” Patty says.
“Kettle corn?” Ekky repeats, eyebrows wrinkling.
“Yeah, it’s like, uh, popcorn with a sugar coating.”
“I like the salted one better.” Ekky loves salt, so that comes as no shock.
Thom shifts over to grab a handful of popcorn, is reminded of Robbie’s hand on his thigh. He tries to make his movements a little smaller, not disturb the warm weight of Tristen’s fingers on the inside of his leg.
The popcorn is good, not coated in hard sugar like Thom would expect from kettle corn, but sweet nonetheless. Thom didn’t realize quite how hungry he was until he started eating, polishes off the bag as onscreen a number and letter fuck in front of a crowd as Ice-T raps. This is— Thom guesses this is the ending, a parody of the ‘love saves all’ trope. It’s not funny, not exactly, but it’s entertaining enough.
Ozzy and Cardsy peel off to bed once the numbers episode is over. Ekky is still there, but he’s got practice tomorrow, keeps making noises about how he needs to go home soon. On the TV the next episode has autoplayed, and Rick is getting smashed into little red splotches by Bigfoot. Thom does not get this TV show.
“I’m going to walk back now,” Ekky says, after Rick and Morty have been killed by Bigfoot for the fifth time. “Thom, do you wanna come too?”
“I wanna watch this episode,” Thom says. He wants to— he wants to stay pressed up against Robbie like this, he guesses. He hopes Ekky doesn’t push it, hopes he doesn’t try to wait out Thom just to have a companion for the first half of the walk. Hopes he doesn’t assume anything either, hopes he just leaves without a second thought. That’s not usually how Ekky works, though.
“Ok, see you tomorrow.” Maybe Ekky is tired, maybe the couple beers he had at the bar are slowing down his brain, because he leaves easy, slips out the front door without another word.
Robbie shifts. His hand is on Thom’s dick now, where it’s trapped hard beneath his shorts. It’s weird, because Thom didn’t really realize he was getting hard, but he suddenly is. Robbie’s hand is moving, just a little, soft over Thom’s dick. He can feel every movement through the fabric of his shorts, hypersensitive in the best way.
Thom stares straight ahead, watches the screen. They’re on to the next episode now, something about a Denny’s. Robbie’s hand on his dick means he can’t keep his head straight. He pretends to watch the episode anyway, quiet and still. It doesn’t feel like he could come from this but he also doesn’t want Robbie to stop.
He doesn’t know how to let Robbie know he likes this without saying anything, without making some kind of noise. He settles for letting his hips hitch up, just a little, pressing his dick a little more firmly into Robbie’s hand.
The TV is still going, but it’s impossible to focus on. Robbie’s hand feels- not like sex or jerking off or anything, but something on the good side of overwhelming, like the first moment of jumping in a hot tub, a shock to the system in the best way possible.
He’s on the edge of something, it feels like, but it’s not coming. It’s whatever, it feels good. Thom hopes Robbie knows this feels good.
Robbie lets his hand slip back to Thom’s inner thigh. Thom’s eyes are open, but he’s still not really looking at anything, has no idea what’s going on onscreen.
“Are you good?” Robbie asks.
“Yeah, I just, like, zoned out for a second.” That’s probably a good thing for Thom to say, makes it sound like Robbie did a good enough job that Thom couldn’t even focus on Rick and Morty. Robbie did do a good job. Thom’s struggling to understand what’s going on in this episode, confused by the fact that he missed the first half and now Rick has an alcoholic girlfriend, who he maybe raised from the dead or something.
He can feel precum sticky-damp on his boxers, on the thin scattering of hair on his stomach. He forces himself to refocus on the TV show.
Robbie’s hand moves back onto his dick, presses down in a way that sends a jolt of arousal all the way to his toes. The pressure, the simple way Robbie is rocking his hand over Thom’s boxers, is melting through him, slow syrupy waves that make him feel all over shivery. His leg is vibrating on the sofa and the world is sliding out of focus again.
It feels good, is the thing, and Thom loses track of time again, just lets it happen to him. Robbie’s hand eventually slips back to his thigh, and then they're just watching the TV in silence, Thom desperately hoping Robbie moves his hand back. He can’t ask for it though, feels like that might be going too far.
They watch the rest of the episode like that, still and quiet. It turns out Morty was never in the fear hole, just Rick. Thom thinks that probably would have more meaning for him if he cared at all about any of the characters; as it is he couldn’t give less of a shit.
This episode must be the last one in the season, because after the credits roll the TV switches back to the search bar. Thom’s not too sure where to go from here, doesn’t know what the protocol is. Like, should he go home? But he can feel the arousal in his teeth, and Robbie’s leaning in like he just might kiss him, and Thom really doesn’t want to leave.
He turns towards Robbie, and his face is so close. One of them just needs to lean in six inches and they’ll be kissing, but it’s not going to be Thom who leans in. It’s weird that Robbie won’t make a move, even when he’s been flirting all night. Thom desperately wants him to make a move.
It doesn’t look like he’s going to, though. This might be it.
“I still think it’s wild that Obama would narrate a nature documentary,” Thom says, just to break the silence.
“That wasn’t really Arizona, was it? With the monkeys.” Robbie’s face is so close to Thom’s, and he’s speaking so softly that Thom has to break the eye contact, glance at the Tv.
“No, that was like, Madagascar. The monkeys were cool, though. I don’t know why they decided to jump across those stone spikes, that seemed a little stupid on their part.”
“One of their monkey friends probably dared them to do it.”
“They can’t really talk to each other, though.”
“What?” Robbie says, somehow quiet despite how indigent he sounds. His face is so close to Thom’s where they’re sitting side-by-side on the sofa, twisted to face each other. He just needs to lean forward a little more. “They definitely can communicate— didn’t those scientists teach chimps sign language or something?”
“That’s debated. Like, there was this chimp they named Nim Chimpsky to make fun of this guy who said that only humans have language, because they thought they could teach him to sign, but then it turns out they couldn’t really teach him language. Like, he knew some signs, but that’s like a dog barking to be let out. He couldn’t use, like, syntax.”
“Wait, what’s syntax?” Robbie's breath is hot on Thom’s face, and if he just moved an inch closer they would be kissing. Thom really wants to be kissing.
“It’s, like, the structure of a sentence. Like, how words are put together,” Thom says. “If you said Jack kicked Sally or you said Sally kicked Jack, those would mean different things, even though you’re using the same three words. Nim couldn’t do that. Like, humans can do sentence structure. We can put words together in different orders to say things that have never been said before, and no one else can do that.”
“But the monkeys can say stuff, yeah?” Robbie sounds so curious, so genuinely interested. God, Thom likes him so much.
“Um, so, like, Vervet monkeys, they’ve got alarm sounds to warn about different dangers, but they’ve only got three different sounds for snakes, eagles, or leopards. So they’ve got some parts of language, like they’ve got semanticity, which is a fixed association between a sound and a meaning, and arbitrariness, which means the sounds don’t have any reason to correspond to what they mean,” Thom says. “But they can’t refer to the past or future, only the present, and they don’t have productivity, which means they can’t say new things.”
“I feel like it would be super lonely to be a monkey,” Robbie says. He’s so close to Thom he’s barely even whispering, voice just a breath. “Even when you’re around all your monkey buddies you can’t share your thoughts or anything.”
“Yeah, that’s kinda sad. Like, they’re basically alone all the time.” Thom’s face is so close to Robbie, but he’s not moving any closer, still hanging suspended, lips not quite touching. Thom can’t make a move here, but he desperately wants Robbie to.
He glances down at Robbie’s lips, feels like it’s almost too bold, flicks his eyes away towards the Tv. When he looks back Robbie’s leaning in, and then finally, finally, they’re kissing.
Robbie doesn’t really open his mouth, though, doesn’t deepen the kiss even as they keep going. His lips are parted, sure, but only just a little, and, like. Thom’s used to sloppy makeouts, and this isn’t that. Their tongues are still in their mouths and they’re sitting side-by-side on the couch. The angle’s all wrong and Thom shifts, wonders if he should swing his leg over Robbie, sit over his hips. It would make the angle better, sure, but it seems a little too forward, and Thom hates taking the initiative like that.
He decides to go for it, briefly loses Robbie’s mouth on his as they shift, but then he’s on top and the angle’s so much better. His shoes bang into the coffee table and the kiss is still weirdly shallow, Robbie’s mouth soft and slack, but it’s good.
It shouldn’t feel this good, kissing not quite deep enough to be called making out, fumbling because it’s past three a.m. now and they both have a few drinks in them, but it is. It makes Thom’s stomach go swoopy, even without any pressure on his dick.
Thom shifts, uncomfortable with how his dick’s sitting but not willing to risk sneaking a hand down for a rearrangement. Robbie underneath him isn’t really moving, and Thom wonders briefly if he’s actually into this. It’s not like he can feel Robbie’s dick or anything, not even sitting directly on top of where he should be hard. Maybe he is hard? Thom can’t really tell.
It’s not really his problem, Thom decides. Robbbie’s been the instigator all night, he probably wants this. And if he doesn’t, well, that’s on him. He’s the one driving all this, could have bowed out at any time.
He kisses Robbie again, his not quite open enough lips, his tongue just barely peeking out. It’s a little weird, because they’ve been kissing long enough that this should have turned into proper making out, deep and wet, but whatever. Thom likes this too. He’d like it more if Robbie’s hand was back on his dick, but maybe later.
He’s not sure what makes him realize someone’s coming, maybe the slam of a door or footsteps, but his body reacts before his mind does, scrambling off Robbie. He lands, panting, three feet away on the sofa, sitting bolt upright staring at the blank roku screen. Next to him is Robbie, dead silent as well as Ozzy appears.
Ozzy definitely knows something is up, Thom thinks. He’s not sure how much he saw, if he caught a glimpse of them kissing or just walked in on the aftermath, but either way it’s suspicious. Thom’s phone is sitting three feet away from him on the coffee table, and it’s kind of obvious they’re not watching Tv or talking or anything.
Ozzy doesn’t say anything though, just walks out the side door with his pack of Marlboro Reds.
Thom glances at Robbie, who doesn’t say anything, just stares back wide-eyed. Neither of them move. Thom wonders if Ozzy knows. He has to, right? Like, he’s dumb, but he’s not that dumb.
If he knows, maybe he’s not going to come back in. He’s been outside a long time, it seems like. Maybe he’s driven away or something, but Thom hasn’t seen the lights of his truck or heard it start up.
Robbie’s still sitting stock-still a few feet away from Thom. It’s got to have been five minutes since Ozzy walked by, or at least three. Thom doesn’t have his phone to check the time. He could lean forward and grab it, desperately wants to, antsy and getting bored, but it seems dangerous to move at all.
When Ozzy walks back in they’re still in the exact same positions, frozen and quiet. Thom has no idea how long it’s been. In the kitchen, the refrigerator clicks on. Ozzy still doesn’t say anything, just walks past them again, back down the hallway. A door shuts and Thom turns to Robbie, not sure what he’s supposed to say.
“He definitely knows,” Robbie says.
“Maybe he doesn’t.” Thom doesn’t know if he does or doesn’t, because it’s always hard to read Ozzy.
“Stupid to do that here, anyway.”
“Yeah,” Thom says, barely breathes the word out. He’s not really sure where they're supposed to go from here.
“Should we, like, go up to my room or something?”
“Yeah, we probably should.”
“Be quiet, though,” Robbie says, and so Thom slips off his shoes, carries them up the stairs thumb tucked in the heel. When they get to Robbie’s room he shuts the door so quiet it doesn’t even click, walks the two steps towards his bed and sits down heavily. Thom is left standing in the middle of the room, kind of awkward before he can get it together enough to settle on the bed next to Robbie.
Robbie reaches for him after a little pause, and then they’re kissing again, still the not quite deep enough kissing from downstairs. Thom wishes Robbie would, like, open his lips more. Or maybe just snake his hand back down to grab Thom’s dick. That would be nice too.
Robbie shifts, and Thom shifts with him, off balance a little, lagging behind whatever Robbie’s telegraphing with the way he moves his hands and twists his torso. He knows Robbie’s body language on the ice pretty well, can anticipate what he’s going to do before he even does it, but in bed like this it’s a completely different game. Thom feels like he’s fumbling along, not quite getting where Robbie’s going with anything.
Somehow they end up laying on the bed side by side. The kissing had stopped while they moved, but now Robbie’s lips are back on Thom’s and his hand is back on Thom’s dick and it all feels so nice. Even Robbie’s bed feels nice on Thom’s back and sides where he’s sinking into the comforter, soft and cozy like somewhere he never wants to leave. Thom’s bed at home never feels like this.
His mouth is dry, and it takes him a moment to realize it’s from the way he’s open-mouth panting, breathing through it loud and desprate. It feels like he’s going to come but it also feels like an orgasm is impossible. He hopes he comes, thinks Robbie would like that. Thinks that he himself would like that. He tries to, like, focus in on Robbie’s hand on his dick, on the feeling low in his stomach, tingling in his palms. It hurts, a little, because there’s nothing really slicking the way, and even though Robbie isn’t really sliding his hand so much as providing pressure the friction is still almost too much.
He wants to come, is the thing, but his orgasm still feels so far away, despite the way pleasure is spiking through his body in a way that usually only happens when he’s on the brink of coming. He tries to focus harder on the feeling in his dick, but that doesn’t really help any.
He wants to come, though. That would be fun. He wonders if Robbie’s getting bored of this, if he wants to, like, do something more. Maybe he should offer to suck his dick or something.
“Do you want me to, like, suck your dick?” Thom asks.
“Do you want to suck my dick?” Robbie counters.
Thom’s stumped. As an answer that makes no sense, because, like. Shouldn’t Robbie know if he wants Thom to suck his dick? Why is this up to him?
“No, like, do you want me to?”
“Thom, it’s, like— it’s about what you want to do too, you know?” Robbie says, cruel, pressing.
Thom gets what Robbie’s saying, but it’s not. You suck a guy's dick because he wants it, because you should make other people feel good, because Thom’s never been an instigator when it comes to this stuff and he’ll go wherever the other person wants to lead him. He rolls over onto his side, fetal position facing the wall. He doesn’t want Robbie to see his face right now, not like this. He might still be drunk, but it’s been long enough where even his buzz is starting to feel normal. That’s a good excuse, though, that he’s drunk. He might have to use that one.
“Yeah, I know that. It’s just, like— I feel like I usually do what other people want. Like, I’m not the leader here.”
“Thom, that’s not good. Like, you know consent, right?”
“Yeah, I know consent,” Thom scoffs. When he was at Michigan, athletics used to make them go to Title IX stuff all the time, split them up so the girls could be told to carry their rape whistles and the guys knew to ask for consent. He even got a few shitty cups out of it, plastic ones with the Title IX printed big in maize and blue, used them for two years before they got lost in the move to California.
Thom rolls back over, faces Robbie and says, “I think I’m just, like, a follower. And also kinda drunk, don’t listen to whatever I’m saying right now.”
“No, you’re good,” Robbie says. “I always forget you’re such a lightweight.”
Thom actually doesn’t feel that drunk, but he’ll take the out for what it is, rolls to face the wall and then back towards Robbie.
“I lowkey might go to bed soon though,” Robbie says. “It’s like four in the morning.”
“Yeah, me too.”
“You’re not, like— you can’t sleep here,” Robbie says, tripping over his own words despite how slowly he’s speaking.
“Oh God, no,” Thom says. He hadn’t even considered that that would be on the table, with how little they had done in the way of actual hooking up, desperately wants to reassure Robbie that he never expected to be allowed to sleep over. “No, that would be so stupid, like—”
He trails off as he rolls off the bed, grabs his shoes. He doesn’t put them on though, needs to stay quiet for the quick walk back downstairs. He glances around one more time, just to make sure he’s not forgetting something that could make this turn awkward tomorrow, and when he turns back Robbie is peaking out the door like a Navy SEAL checking that the hallway is clear.
“You’re good,” Robbie says, ushering Thom out, and oh, he guesses Robbie is going to walk him to the door. It’s weirdly thoughtful of him.
He stands guard as Thom carefully puts his shoes back on in the darkened kitchen, opens the door for him like he’s trying to be a gentleman or something. Thom has the fleeting thought that he should kiss him goodnight, ends up deciding against it, just awkwardly says his goodbyes and slips out the door.
Walking back home he’s weirdly amped, dick still hard. He could go jerk off about it, but he almost doesn’t want to, feels like it’ll ruin the sanctity of the experience.
He wishes he journaled or something, wishes he could write down everything that happened to him in excruciating detail. This shouldn’t be life-changing at all, no one even came, but it still feels weirdly important, and Thom’s not sure how he can express the importance of this experience. Maybe he can’t. Maybe it’ll just live inside him forever, and maybe that’s better.