Chapter Text
I surrender all control
To the desire that consumes me whole
And leads me by the hand to infinity
That lies in wait at the heart of me
Moved, lifted higher
Moved, my soul's on fire
Moved, by a higher love. *(c)
They do manage to escape from the club avoiding any possible unwanted adventures, after all. There is nobody in the darkness that fills the stairwell leading towards the back door, nor is there anyone hanging out outside, smoking, drinking, shagging, or otherwise.
The night air is pleasantly cool on Richard's skin, and only now does he finally realise just how flushed his face is. No, judging by how it feels, it's not merely flushed – for all the good it does him, his cheeks must be virtually flaming red. He follows Paul hurriedly, being grateful that it's dark and that even if they pass by street lamps, the meagre electric light won't be enough to reveal the true colour his face has acquired, the colour caused by the excitement and embarrassment in equal measures from what they've just done. Paul's casual remark about actually liking it doesn't make the situation any better.
While he has some free time on his hands whilst trying to keep up with Paul as they trot through a shady alleyway, Richard's eyes seem to take up the life of their own. They study the petite silhouette in front of him with hungry attention, from the bleached mess of hair on top of Paul's head down to the sloppy ponytail and along his slim neck; over the edgy line of his shoulders clad in a sweater that must be a couple of sizes bigger than strictly necessary; down along one of his arms, the sleeve of the sweater rolled up to his elbow. Helplessly, Richard stares, as if enchanted, at Paul's wrist, ever so thin and delicate. The memory of how fragile it felt in the circle of his fingers is still way too fresh to let him be. No, it makes him want to touch it again, the cool skin, the stringy sinews working underneath it. Another image floods his mind, uninvited, that of Paul bringing a cigarette up to his mouth, then flicking his wrist to shake off the ash, his movements jerky and somewhat nervous, just like his very fidgety self.
Richard blinks, making the vision dissipate and go away. He's got a feeling – somewhere at the back of his mind where his common sense is dozing off quietly – that he's been living through the latest events as if he was in an eerie kind of a delusional dream, but just like it always happens with dreams, it's not in his powers to change its course, so all he can do is go with the flow of it. It is scary, yet, at the same time, it evokes a certain kind of thrill in him, too. And, truth be told, it's not as if he would like to change it. If anything, it just seems a bit too late for that. And there's also another thing, a trait that's always been strong in Richard – his curiosity. He only hopes it's not going to kill him tonight or later, like it did with the unfortunate proverbial cat.
Instead of lingering on Paul's hands with their spider web of veins and thin nervous fingers, his gaze ventures down, over his butt and to his legs. It makes Richard wonder, wonder for a hundredth time or more – now with the only difference that he's not trying to fight it off anymore – what it would feel like to touch him. He got a taste of it back in that stinky bathroom cubicle, but it already starts to seem to him as if it had happened just a couple of moments and probably a couple years ago, to the extent that he's not sure anymore whether it took place at all.
But it must have, right? Here Paul is, walking right in front of him, his steps light and brisk.
The memory of the weird mixture of almost feminine fragility with unmistakably male hardness of Paul's body is still more than fresh. It's so fresh, in fact, that Richard can almost feel Paul's smell even here in the open. He perfectly recalls how eagerly that body yielded to him; he remembers that intense heat radiating off Paul's unexpectedly thick cock as he held it in the palm of his hand, squeezed tightly against his own; he remembers Paul's breath, hushed and so desperate… and he just can't help but wonder. Wonder what it would be like if they--
This moment is exactly when Paul chooses to turn around, hands now stuck into the back pockets of his pants, startling Richard so badly he nearly stumbles over a cobble stone that sticks out of the pavement. What's more, he's painfully aware of the fact that he's getting hard again – not yet a proper boner but kind of on its way to become one – and he feels himself blush even more furiously. He holds Paul's gaze, however, unable to decipher the look in the other man's darkened eyes. There's also that elusive Mona Lisa smile lingering languidly over his lips, and Richard finds himself both intrigued and irritated by it. Intrigued for the obvious reason of it being the Mona Lisa kind of smile; irritated because it looks as if Paul knows something he doesn't, and that he might use that something against him at the very first opportunity.
"That place I was telling you about," Paul says, still facing Richard and thus having to walk backwards.
"Huh?"
Despite all the turmoil inside of him, Richard speculates how long it'll take the man to trip over something and spectacularly land on his butt. He can't say he knows Paul well, but he's known him long enough to understand that he can – and probably likes to – make a klutz out of himself.
"The bar, eh?" Paul shrugs lightly. "It's just a couple of blocks away from here. So, you know, if you still feel that the night's young and all the jazz…" he falls silent, still with that maddening half-smile plastered to his face, then shrugs again and motions his head to the right, apparently in the direction of the place.
"Ah, the bar, right. Sure, why not."
Paul nods, his smile growing a bit more prominent, and, finally – predictably enough, too – his feet trip over each other while he's turning away. Instinctively, Richard reaches out to grasp him precisely by one bare forearm, hearing his own breath hitch as those bones and sinews work against his palm all over again, feeling how a heavy weight plunges down into the pit of his stomach. For a moment, it's almost like being hit by an electric shock, and then it's gone.
"Fuck!" Paul curses through a muffled burst of laughter.
"You idiot," Richard chuckles quietly at the same time, and there it is again, that feeling as if laughing together makes it all justified.
There's not much that needs to be justified yet – well, except that little bathroom incident, but never mind it right now – but Richard suspects there's a lot waiting just around the corner.
Well, let it happen then, he thinks and lets Paul's arm slip out of his grasp. They're probably way too far gone to change anything now, he muses as he walks alongside Paul, feeling as if he's being pushed onwards by some inexplicable inevitability.
The bar they end up in is a bit smaller than the one they just left, but the scene doesn't look less lively or less shady because of it. It's practically packed with people, but Paul claims to know the owners, which in its turn apparently ensures they'll get a snug little place. Fortunately, they bump into one of them right at the door, and judging by his reaction, he and Paul must be old acquaintances.
The guy grins at Paul as soon as they come out of the darkness and there's enough light from one dusty lamp above the entrance for him to recognise his face. Once he does, he actually pulls Paul into a tight hug – a bit too tight for his liking, Richard notes to self with a trace of surprise. What follows is a casual sort of chit-chat, Paul introducing them to each other, the owner, whose name turns out to be Jacob something, reaching out to shake Richard's hand and Richard self-consciously stretching his, genuinely hoping against all hope that he managed to wipe it clean enough back there in the bathroom. All of that is happening while some detached part of his brain registers little signs from the aforementioned Jacob, and Richard has little liking for any of them, too. The way he looks at Paul, his grin sly and sickeningly sleek, just like him; the way he jokes and the tone of his voice, murmuring and somehow insinuating; the way his hand lingers way too long on Paul's bony sweater-clad shoulder, the pad of his thumb just a hair breadth away from the bare skin of his throat.
Stop it, Richard chides himself, you're being ridiculous.
And no shit, he absolutely is, but stopping it is easier said than done, god damn his innate sense of possessiveness. Paul's not a girl, and he's not his girl, for fuck's sake, and he surely knows what he's doing, and it's not Richard's business in the first place, fair and square, but he still can't help wishing the sleek bastard would keep his snatchy hands off Paul. The latter doesn't seem to be too vexed about such treatment, however, and just continues to chat and smile his trademark smile, spicing it with an occasional giggle. Richard doesn't know Paul well enough to understand what any of this means, but he has a suspicion he might have got the hang of it. And by god, he doesn't like what he suspects. He doesn't like anyone flirting with Paul on a night when Paul should be all his to flirt with. That is, if Richard dared to grow some balls and at least stopped blushing so furiously.
In the end – and it couldn't come soon enough – the sleek Jacob finally takes his goddamn hand off and personally leads them to the bar counter, through the maze of people, tables, waitresses and cigarette smoke.
"The place's chock-full tonight," he says apologetically, speaking to both of them, but Richard sees he's only got eyes for Paul, "but that's what you'd expect on a Friday night. I'd have kept a table for you had I known you were planning to pop by. Rob! The first drink's on the house for my friends. Have fun!"
With that, he gives Paul another one of his sickeningly sweet smiles, pats him on the shoulder and with a final nod and a glance at Richard, which Richard doesn't particularly like because if feels somehow crawling, he finally saunters off to do whatever job he has in this place. Watching him go, Richard silently prays the man doesn't have any intention of coming back and giving them some company.
"Old friend," Paul says once the Jacob guy is certainly out of the hearing range, his voice sounding as if it should explain everything, and Richard nods, as if it really does, for the time being just relieved that they're left alone.
In the following couple of hours that they spend here, they drink little and talk a lot, thankfully, without the sleek bastard's further interference, and at some point Richard finds, to his slight surprise, that he's all but forgotten about any sexual motives that have actually led him here in the first place. Talking to Paul is good and even despite their quite different views on certain things, they have very similar tastes in many others. It is only after two-hour long discussion into music scene, guitars, punks, girls, cars, football and lots of other stuff that Richard realises that indeed time can fly fast. It's been his first ever proper conversation with Paul, and he finds he's beginning to actually warm up to the guy, in a normal way and not only in terms of that weird physical attraction he's been tormented by over the past few weeks.
He's almost starting to have second thoughts about that compulsive desire he had just recently because this easy-going, animated banter they have right now seems so awfully unrelated to what took place between them earlier tonight. Richard doesn't really know what he expected to happen when they came here, but it wasn't this. The atmosphere is so carefree and relaxed that it makes him think that they might actually become mates one day. Maybe even good mates. Richard's in the midst of a somewhat tipsy daydream – or maybe that's a Friday-night dream, or rather an early-Saturday-morning dream, considering the time – of actually getting Paul to play in his band when a sharp clink of a glass over the wooden counter pulls him back into reality.
He looks up at Paul, but the latter is staring right in front of himself, at his hands that are holding his empty beer glass, and for the first time since that bathroom incident he looks… What? Richard muses. Uncertain? Anxious? Excited? All of it? He can't say for sure, of course, but he reckons that if Paul let the beer glass go, his hands would probably be shaking. As of now, his thumbs keep nervously polishing its smooth surface, leaving smudges of moisture in their stead. Nevertheless, there's still a trace of that elusive half-smile playing on his lips, and all of a sudden Richard remembers, remembers in every tiny detail, just exactly how those lips felt against his own – the pressure and the wetness and the eagerness – and just like that, all thoughts of ever getting to play with Paul, of guitars and contemporary music scene and whatnot are gone as if they'd never been there in the first place. All that is left is the old familiar wriggling knot of snakes in the pit of his stomach which echoes with a pleasant, pulling heaviness in his testicles.
"Whaddya say if we leave this stinking excuse for a bar and head for my place?" Paul asks in a low voice, and once the last syllable is out of his mouth, its corner lifts up in a smirk.
Then he turns his head, just a little, and gives Richard a sideway look, one eyebrow raised quizzically.
He's apparently waiting for a reply, but currently Richard can hardly say anything at all. He can hardly think, to be more precise. All he can do is stare back at Paul and be contented that there's no trail of spit drooling down his chin, at least he very much hopes so. That cheeky smile, that goddamn cheeky smile, doubtlessly somewhat anxious but looking no less cocksure because of it. And those delicate wrists, damn them. And the gentle hollows created by his collar bones. And… but there are too many other and's – it seems like every little thing about Paul, his every feature, his every movement, his every glance tonight have an outstanding ability to communicate straight to Richard's cock.
"I'd say, why not?" he hears himself say after a good while, his throat dry as sandpaper. "You lured me into that bathroom, I guess there's no point in resisting you luring me into your flat."
This bravery on his part is mostly due to the sudden excitement caused by the realisation that that sleek-arsed Jacob never had and never will have one chance in a million if this is how Paul chooses to flirt. He may giggle as much as he likes and be all sunshine and smiles, but it's this dark look in his eyes, this damned provocative look that got Richard up from his sofa and made him follow Paul into the bathroom earlier tonight.
"Gotta finish the night accordingly," he grins, hoping against all hope that it looks bold enough.
He's feeling anything but bold, though – excited like a fucking puppy, nervous like a 21-year-old virgin getting laid for the first time, both scared to death and way too ignorant of the subtleties of how it should work between two blokes. But if Paul notices the state he's in, he doesn't show it in any way. He just laughs out quietly and looks away, and Richard can swear this laughter lights up his whole face. Simultaneously, it lights up something else, a whole inferno, one that's raging in the depths of Richard's groin; the inferno which doesn't seem to have any intention of subsiding. For the first time Richard wonders what it is exactly that Paul feels, what it is that is leading him, personally, into this. Does he want Richard just as badly in return? Has he been thinking of him as if possessed over the course of the past few weeks? Has he noticed Richard's glances and interpreted them the right way? Is he gay? Is he straight? Does he swing both ways? Does he have any idea of what the fucking hell they're doing at all?
But there are way too many questions, and Richard's mind isn't fit enough to answer any of them right now.
As they leave the bar – thankfully missing the chance to say good-bye to their sleek bastard of a new friend – Richard continues to contemplate Paul's possible motives. He's got plenty of time now because, as opposed to the earlier, both of them are keeping unusually quiet. Paul is briskly walking at a little distance in front of him again, leading the way through the deserted streets paved with cobble stone and overshadowed by lush summer greenery. The air feels more than a little fresh now, making Richard wonder what time it is; it must be coming on morning already, and there's a soft breeze blowing over his face and ruffling his hair. Both the coolness and the wind, however, do absolutely nothing to either soothe his need or alleviate his anxiety.
"People back there in the club must be wondering where the hell we've disappeared," Paul suddenly says, a trace of a smile in his voice.
And god fucking damn him, that peculiar Berliner accent of his also seems to communicate directly with Richard's genitals. He's got a suspicion that if Paul continues to talk – and, anyway, is there anyone who could shut Paul up when the man chooses to be vocal about something – he'll soon give Richard certain troubles walking.
"You think it's gonna raise questions?" Richard asks, trying to sound casual. In reality, he's way too aroused to care about what anyone will possibly think of them.
"What questions?" Paul huffs, turning around to glance back at Richard. "Whether or not we've sodded off to fuck each other?"
For a moment Richard's so taken aback by Paul's outstanding way with words that he nearly stops dead in his tracks. It's not the unexpectedness of his statement – after all, that's precisely what they're doing, going to Paul's with the intention of having sex – but the mere sound of it being articulated out loud makes his heart drop and then somersault heavily somewhere in the region of his solar plexus. His breath hitches, too. His eyes hold Paul's glance, and what he sees in it is pure madness, probably his own being reflected in the sparkling depths of the smaller man's eyes. He can also see how heavy Paul's breath is, as if they've been running instead of walking, his chest heaving underneath his sweater, lips parted in that half-teasing, half-frightened grin. And Richard realises he can't really stand it anymore. Nah, not a single millisecond longer.
What he finds himself doing next is reaching out for Paul, and it's a weird feeling as if his common sense or his logical, down-to-earth, self or whatnot is actually lagging a couple of steps behind his body, thus reduced to the role of a mere spectator in tonight's events. His hands grab Paul's upper arms, his muscles strained as coils of a live wire beneath his fingers, and he pushes the man against the wall of the nearby house. In the blink of an eye his body is flush against Paul's, his groin pushed against Paul's groin, and oh does he feel it, does he feel the tension in his pants, does he feel how Paul's hips push forward to meet his as if by their own will because, for a fraction of a second, all he can see in Paul's eyes is, unexpectedly, uncovered fear.
"D'you even know what a filthy mouth you've got, Paul?" Richard hisses into the said mouth, not a bit less tempting because of it, though. He can't help it; he sticks his tongue out and draws its tip across Paul's lips, moaning something utterly unintelligible because of just how intoxicatingly good it feels. "It's so fucking filthy I want to lick it all over right here."
Paul gulps, then lets out a shaky groan, and Richard feels his hands grab his arse as they pull him even closer. His fingers squeeze Richard's buttocks hard, and there's a thought flashing through his hazy mind that those are doubtlessly a guitarist's fingers, strong and firm.
"Fuck," Paul says – gasps, really, since the noises they let out can be characterised as speech with only great reserve – and thrusts his hips against Richard's. His eyelids flutter shut, a darker shade than the rest of his skin, his eyelashes sun-faded on their tips, and there are also a few freckles scattered across Paul's nose. "Fuck."
"Fuck indeed, mate," Richard whispers unsteadily as he rubs himself against Paul's crotch, and damn him, he can feel – he can almost see before his mind's eye – the shape of Paul's cock beneath the thin layers of their clothes.
Richard lowers his head until his lips come to rest against the underside of Paul's chin, his skin warm and a little scratchy with a day's stubble, his pulse hammering underneath at a maddening pace. Screw Paul's place, screw everything, he's going to do it right here, take Paul's cock out, get on to his knees and take him in. He wants it, wants it so badly, and the surprise at the actual fact of wanting to take another man's genitalia into his mouth is being completely outshone by his needy, greedy desire for physical contact. He would be doing just that, his hands already clawing at the fly of Paul's pants, if at that very moment a very sleepy and a very mad voice from somewhere above them didn't stop him dead in his tracks.
"You fags, get the hell out of here! Get out this very moment or I'll call the police!" the voice practically shrieks, sounding as if its owner was on the brink of a tantrum.
For a heartbeat, all they do is stare at each other, eyes wide-open, and then, when the initial shock passes, they take off and run, Richard starting in one direction, Paul hissing at him through a fit of utterly ill-timed giggles, "Not there, you idiot, the other way!"
Paul's hand squeezes his so tightly as if he thought that everything would be completely lost if he let go, and in spite of himself, Richard starts to laugh, too. It's useless to even try to fight it off – Paul's giggles sound way too contagious for that.
The house they're heading for is indeed just a little way away, thank heaven for small mercies, and when they finally break in through the front door like a hurricane, winding up the stairs a few steps at a time and bursting into Paul's flat at last, Richard is practically choking, both from laughter and oxygen deprivation.