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Surely this isn’t the way everyone does this.
Not that he’d know, one way or the other, this is the only publishing company of any size Arcade has ever worked for, but surely not. The Courier feels so… slipshod. All of it.
For one, is it really a thing for an actual, for-real journalist that gets paid real money to call out of work the day of a big interview they’re supposed to do? Is it a thing to stop the guy— who’s far more at home behind a desk and computer screen researching articles and editing whatever falls into his inbox since that’s what he was hired to do— is it a thing to stop him right when he walks through that creaky glass door with the sunbleached ‘Sorry, we’re dead!’ sign on it and tell him he’s gotta turn back around to go do someone else’s job for them?
It’s not like he can’t do it. Arcade is… uh. Serviceable when it comes to talking to people. He can say all the correct words and ask all the relevant questions, it’s just that people always seem to want more pleasantries and eye contact than he’s willing to force out.
He can do it, but he’s not going to like it. And Cass is absolutely getting an earful the next time she decides to show up. This entire horrible situation sounds like it stemmed from yet another happy-hour-shots-at-the-Stratosphere hangover. Shock and surprise.
And then there’s complaint number two. Arcade takes his eyes off the too bright road rushing up and past them for a moment to look at the silent lump that's currently strapped into the passenger seat and completely engrossed in watching all the nothing pass by the window.
Driving to the place seems like something the camera guy would do, at least. But no, Arcade had already tried that one after they’d been unceremoniously rushed out the door. Boone had looked over with his eyes barely visible through his sunglasses, shrugged almost imperceptibly, and said, “Never got a license.”
“In Vegas?” Arcade had sputtered out. “How the hell do you get around?”
Another shrug. Maybe in response to the question or maybe to settle the huge duffle full of equipment more firmly on his shoulder. “Buses aren’t too bad.”
So Arcade’s got a double feature on things he hates. Not Boone himself— Boone’s alright, if extremely grim and awkward to be around a lot of the time— it’s driving. This is what he gets for being so damn roll-over agreeable all the time, he thinks. If karma was a real thing, surely he’d be due for some kind of divine reward. A pay raise. An attractive assistant who brings him espresso and actually knows when a conversation has run its course. ...He might even be happy with a desk chair with a new cushion at this point.
They’ve been on the road for coming up on two hours by now, long since out of range of what would be considered ‘city’. There’s still dots and splashes of what passes for civilization as they go, but they’re getting further and further apart with more and more sand and scrub and Joshua trees in between. Flat stretches of nothing as far as the eye can see. Just asphalt, sky, and the occasional far-off dust devil.
Arcade stops at a light when they eventually pass through another truck stop town and takes a second to survey the depressing monuments of humanity’s footholds against the encroaching desert. A lonely gas station on the left up ahead, a huge open lot with a few gleaming semis and some gutted, dusty cars tucked in the back corner, a concrete building on the right. Arcade gazes blandly at a ripped carwash banner fluttering wistfully from said building as he waits for the light to change. They’re a long ways away from the land of stripmalls and personal injury lawyer billboards; away from the hordes of people doing their own jobs to keep the city oozing along and the tourists drunk and happy and spending money. Which is, on a much grander scale, nearly as pointless as the two of them being at this empty little blip on the side of the ninety-three.
Makes one really stop and think about this mysterious CARWAS. Was any of us? Really?
Then the green comes and they’re moving on again, leaving the tenth-grade philosophy in the rearview; Boone with his beret tipped down over his forehead and Arcade rigid and uncomfortable with his hands and forearms prickling with an oncoming sunburn. Sand and sky and road flow past with a plume of dust trailing behind them and that’s how it stays until Arcade’s phone buzzes in his pocket about twenty minutes later.
He fumbles it out and brandishes it at Boone, having to poke him once in the arm with it to get him to pay attention. They might be on a huge, wide open highway with almost no one else around but like hell is he going to talk on the phone and drive at the same time. Arcade knows exactly what kind of bad luck his life’s been blessed with and doing that would make the perfect opportunity for it to show its hideous ogre face again.
The phone slips out of his hand and Arcade startles at the feeling of fingertips bumping into his thumb and the side of his palm. Boone glares down at the screen, slides the lock over, and answers with a deadpan, “Yeah.”
Arcade recovers enough to whisper, “Boone, that’s not how you answer a phone, my god.”
Boone ignores him.
“He’s driving,” he says to whoever’s on the line. “The photographer.” A pause. “About forty minutes away.” Then a very long pause. “Oh...”
Boone glances over at Arcade as more tinny chatter comes from the earpiece.
“What?” Arcade hisses at him.
He turns away again. Says, “I’ll call back.” Pauses. “Alright.” And hangs up.
“You have the most amazing phone etiquette,” Arcade says as he takes the aforementioned item back and tucks it under his thigh so it doesn’t escape onto the floor.
It’s not like he expected any different, he guesses. Boone is famously curt with everyone he talks to, no matter who it is. Ronnie, Christine, Raul, even Beatrix when she comes by to gossip or steal Six or Cass away for lunch. Lily’s the funniest since she completely glosses over Boone’s grouchiness and smothers him with endearments and too-big hugs, just like she does to everyone else. And the most awkward is when Six’s weirdly relentless ex-boyfriend tries to drop in. That guy would sermonize to a brick wall, and probably has.
Boone shrugs.
Arcade sighs. Like pulling teeth. “What was that about? Who was it?”
Boone heaves out a breath like speaking more than five syllables at once is some Herculean task. “Veronica. Says the guy we’re supposed to meet at Helios Two can’t make it. Something about scheduling and no one told him it was supposed to be today. He’ll be there tomorrow, but today isn’t going to work.”
Arcade immediately wants to slap his hand on the horn, smush his palm into the hot plastic to hear the stupid blat it’d make but he decides to be the bigger man and tries to strangle the outside edges of the wheel instead.
“Terrific. We’re already well over halfway there,” he grits out.
Boone hums vaguely.
“What does that mean, you ask? It means I’m tired, my eyes are tired, my arms and face are probably already extremely sunburned which I know is my fault for forgetting to put on sunblock this morning thank you yes, and I don’t want to be on the road anymore.”
Arcade tilts his head back for a second to glare at the fuzzy car ceiling and keep all the real vitriol from spilling out. He doesn’t have to put up with this, damnit. This was supposed to be an easy temp job to help chip into his med school loans while he looked for something more A. lucrative and B. pertinent to his skillset. An easy temp job that's suspiciously susceptible to Murphy's law, it seems like.
“God,” he says, “that’s hours wasted and just as many to get back. I hate… I hate. I just hate.”
He eases his foot off the gas and casts his eyes up the road to start watching for a turnout of some kind so they can start the journey back to the city. And again, for probably the fiftieth time in the few months he's been working for The Courier, he thinks, surely, this isn’t the way everyone does this. What the hell kind of ridiculously bad communication is this? Their side and the client, good lord above.
Arcade glances over and Boone’s still slouched there, frowning, though that doesn’t tend to mean anything at all. He’s not making any kind of opinion-based contribution to the situation at hand and it’s… Arcade doesn’t get this either.
“Am I alone in this?” he prods, trying not to let his voice squeak with indignation and only partially succeeding. “I’m the only one who’s surprised or upset? It’s just me? You’ve worked with these people longer than I have, is this a thing that happens?”
“...Could find a motel,” Boone says instead of answering. “Do it tomorrow like the guy said. Could even try for the morning and get some better lighting.”
Arcade blinks. “Really?”
“Yeah. Early sun is softer, it’d be better for what we’re going for.”
“No, that’s... no.” Arcade huffs through his nose and tries to imagine what he did in a past life to be graced with this hellscape circus of a day while being partnered up with a guy who’s so matter of fact he loops back around into being a comedian. “I mean the motel. Staying out here in the... wilderness for the night.” Together, his mind whispers with equal parts glee and dread.
The truth is, Arcade likes Boone fine, as much as he can like a person that he knows so little about. The two of them, much like Boone and every other human alive, don’t talk much and really, that’s fine with Arcade. He likes that Boone doesn’t pry into things and that he’s not an endless fount of words and questions like some people in the office whose name starts with a V and ends with eronica. Lovely, wonderful girl with an arm to rival a silverback’s, but sometimes it’s too much and he has to escape into the bathroom to catch a moment of silence.
He appreciates Boone professionally too. He’s never late to work or to assignments, barely complains, very straightforward to work with. And the man has a good eye, there’s no denying that. His photos are always simple and bold, bordering on stark but he’s got great composition and apparently almost never has to do reshoots. Just magically gets it right on the first try.
On a shallower and more worrisome note, Boone may not be exactly handsome, too flat-featured and bland to make it much past average, but the aloof, almost Eastwood-esque air of brooding machismo does something for him. And it’s extremely difficult not to notice all the muscle squeezed onto that short, broad-shouldered frame. Deus me salvet.
It’s… hell. Complicated. Arcade’s not really sure what his deal is with Boone. He’s in that odd category where a person might not be especially attractive or they might be Off Limits but they’re such a constant, insidious presence that your deep dark id brain tries to imagine how they’d fuck or what kinds of noises they’d make pushed up against a wall with your mouth on their throat and hands up their shirt... and it won’t let it go. And that’s where he is. Has been. Will be for the foreseeable future.
Which is awful because Boone gives the impression of being the kind of guy who notices everything.
Boone shrugs. “I’m free.”
So is Arcade, honestly. And he can’t make up a good enough pressing-thing-he-must-attend-to on the fly like this without sputtering and instantly outing himself as a liar.
“Neither of us have a change of clothes or anything else,” he says weakly.
“Hnh. Well, I’m not photographing us,” Boone says. Arcade can’t tell if he’s rolling his eyes but it definitely sounds like it. “We don’t need to look nice. Room’ll probably have an iron for our shirts; can grab whatever else we need from a gas station.” When Arcade doesn’t answer, Boone adds, “Didn’t think you wanted to drive more.”
“But... what…” Arcade starts. And then stops. It’s not like he can’t keep his thoughts and eyes to himself. As many jokes as there are about it, man is not ruled by his nether-regions. He can stay civil, platonic, perfectly co-worker friendly. Boone certainly isn’t having any of these crises, so he won’t either. That’s all there is to it. It’ll be fine. This is fine.
And he’s right.
“You’re right,” Arcade says, completely unconvinced by his own silent pep talk. “Fine. Onward, then.” He digs his phone out again and forces a smile as he holds it out to Boone. “Find us some place sort of near the plant, would you please? Guess it’s camp out time.”
Boone snorts and there’s some actual amusement when he mutters, “This is nothing like camping.” But he takes the phone and starts the search.
---
“I suppose I’ll call back and let the shop know what we decided. You go…” Arcade flaps a hand at Boone, “...charm the front desk and I’ll be there in a minute.”
“Yeah.”
They’re idling in front of a very worn-down and dust-choked manager’s office. Fake flowers spring eerily out of two pots by the door, a broken plastic wind chime sways from a crumpled awning, and the proverbial neon NO VACANCY sign is off in the afternoon glare, but Arcade suspects it'll be missing a few unintentional letters come sundown.
Boone gets out and closes the car door but doesn’t move off yet while Arcade taps around in his phone for The Courier's front desk number. If he can catch Ronnie again he’s slightly less likely to get a lecture, which isn't really something he wants to deal with right now. She’ll probably think this is hilarious, actually. Raul would just exude that grandfatherly weariness at him and use his mean, mean words to let Arcade know how foolish they’re being, wasting company money; the usual, passive aggressive ‘ay por favor, mijo, where do you think our funds come from’ spiel.
The door reopens, letting in another stifling blast of furnace temperature air.
“One room?”
Arcade taps the green dial button and scrunches up his face as he brings it to his ear, squinting hard at Boone against the sun off the asphalt and the hot breeze blowing in.
“It’s going to have to be. I don’t think Six’ll reimburse us for two, we’re going to get nagged enough for this. So get the one, I guess. Whatever they have. I’m too fed up right now to be picky, just make sure there’s something to sleep on and something to take a shower in, no matter how unironically seventies it looks.”
Boone grunts what sounds like an agreement as someone picks up on the other end. And the fates have been kind.
“Hey!” Arcade says as he hunches inward around the phone, reaching out absently to fiddle with the AC vents. “There’s my favorite lunch thief. So, unusual turn of events here.”
The door thumps shut again. Arcade gets on with the explanation and surreptitiously watches Boone meander off to deliver his curt negotiations to whatever poor shmuck works here.
---
And unironically seventies was right.
Arcade isn’t entirely sure what city they’re in, or if it even is one at all. This place is lost to time, lost to good taste, and has that surreal, in-between feel like it’s also somehow lost to the rest of the world. But at the heart of it, at least motel and hotel rooms are always kind of the same no matter where you go or how nice they are. There’s a basic formula to them that doesn’t get messed with too much; a standard equation that equals modular living for a human away from home.
Door with peephole and chainlock.
Huge window that only opens an inch with a double layer blackout curtain on a noisy, ratcheting curtain rod.
Table with an establishment branded pen and stationery covered in the ghostly imprints of the scribbly, overlapping words of visitors past.
An oddly-shaped armchair that’s extremely difficult to stand up from.
Nightstand with lamp, phone cradle, poorly spellchecked ad fliers for local pizza shops, and the true, eternal calling card of nomadic living: the drawer containing one (1) Gideon bible.
Other minor things— a ten year old television that usually only plays the TV guide channel, no-steal hangers in the closet, inoffensively soulless artwork on one wall, the duvet runner that would probably be classed as a biohazard based on how many times it doesn’t get washed —and it’s like you’ve been there a million times before by way of a million different places.
It’s small, is the first thing besides the usual details that hits Arcade after they trudge up to the second floor walkway and Boone unlocks the door, brushes past him, and flicks the light on. A small room right on the cusp of being cramped, beige on beige on beige color scheme, and the air conditioning unit is so old it legitimately has plastic woodgrain paneling on it. As a design choice. But it looks clean enough and doesn’t smell weird. No dead bodies slumping out of the shallow closet. The familiarity of it all is comforting.
The bed situation is another story.
“Ah,” Arcade says. “Hm.”
Boone drops his gear in the far corner and glances around to see what Arcade’s fumbling over.
“They only had singles available,” Boone says once he’s assessed the problem. He turns back to his bags and starts unzipping things and pulling battery packs and reflectors and expensive-looking black plastic accessories out to examine them. Arcade pointedly does not look at the lines of his back shifting under his shirt as he crouches and leans forward to grab things. “Said they’re cleaning all the bigger rooms. Figured you’d rather this since there’s not really anything else nearby. Didn’t think you’d mind.” He almost phrases that last as a question.
It’s not that Arcade minds per se, it’s that he’d thought Boone would. Like a lot.
Then again, if office talk can be believed and if the hat he always wears isn’t just a bizarre fashion statement, Boone is ex-military. Maybe he doesn’t care about falling asleep half a foot away from unfamiliar men. Stretched out under the same sheet. Almost touching. Close enough to feel the additional body heat.
Warmth starts creeping up Arcade’s neck and he’s still staring unfocused at the damn bed. The overnight was already going to be difficult, this is far more alarming.
“I don’t mind,” he finally gets out.
Confirmed at 4:46 pm: Vegas dimwit headed for unmitigated disaster.
“Alright,” Boone says, not sounding fooled at all but having the good grace, or maybe just complete lack of interest, to say nothing about it. “Gonna clean my kit.”
“Fine.” Arcade’s still lingering by the door, unwilling to fully enter and really commit to the whole thing yet. Might as well see what kind of sad gas station fare there is and let Boone have his space while it’s available. Rationalize it all you want, fraidy-cat, he thinks. You’re fleeing. “Guess I'll go forage. I’ll ah, be back.”
Boone silently waves him off, looking as unconcerned as always.
---
Arcade stays out as long as he can before it would be considered worrisome. He comes back armed with toothpaste, two cheap toothbrushes, a stick of deodorant that doesn’t smell too much like a pine tree air freshener, some jerky and a few plastic-wrapped items that were being sold as “food”, and a travel-size tube of SPF 30 that’s several hours too late and several dollars too expensive.
He takes the swaying concrete and steel staircase back up to the second floor walkway and immediately sees Boone. He’s sitting on the chunk of hall slash balcony directly in front of their open room door, legs poked out through the leaning metal structure that serves as a guard rail with a lit cigarette tucked between his fingers. Music spills out from the room, some kind of oldies probably from the alarm clock radio that was on the nightstand. He doesn’t turn or look up as Arcade approaches, but Arcade gets the impression he’s being tracked the entire time anyway.
After sidling through their door and dumping his bag of dubious plunder by the bed, he makes a full circuit of the room, deems it ugly but adequate, and then doesn’t know what to do with himself. This was supposed to be a drive there, get in, get out, drive back sort of assignment; no need to bring a book or the charger for his phone or any of those other little things that keep one’s brain occupied with more words, more info, more noise.
So it’s back out into the hot evening air. Arcade stands on the threshold for a moment and then takes the step and a half to stand next to Boone, keeping a respectful enough distance and leaning forward to fold his arms on top of the rail. They’re both fairly private and unsocial people, so neither of them make an attempt at small talk, thankfully. Easier to zone out to the radio and stare mindlessly at the environs.
It’s about as featureless and generic a place as you can get. A cracked parking lot sits in front of them, the trunk of Arcade’s car visible below and to the left, a sun faded vending machine holding an overzealous mix of brands off to the right, a streetlamp trying to flicker on out past the rental office, the access road lined with ragged palm trees and then the wide strip of highway past that. Not at all where he’d expected to be on a Friday night but sic vita est. He gets about five minutes to watch one car drive by in the distance and ruminate on the minor injustices of the world before something tugs at his pant cuff. He doesn’t choke on the sharp inhale he takes but it’s a close thing.
Arcade looks down to see Boone peering up at him. From this angle he can see the usually hidden curve of eye and browbone, a sliver of dark iris and short, stubby lashes.
"You're too tall," Boone says, turning away again. "Sit."
Every undisturbed outside surface in the entire Mojave region is covered with a fine layer of dust, but here Boone is, seemingly trying to be nice, inviting him to stick around instead of saying something like ‘get lost, you’re bugging me.’ So Arcade shuffles around and creaks down into an awkward sit without making too many old man noises about it and then promptly starts sweating and overthinking every interaction they’ve ever had.
He’s not usually such a worried ball of nerves about anyone, let alone a coworker he’s known and been around for months. It’s just the events of the day being turned on their head, this stupid situation they’re in, he decides, that’s what’s got him all wired and jumpy. Wondering if he’s actually annoying the crap out of Boone just by being near him. If he’s keeping his metaphorical distance well enough without seeming like he is. Arcade tilts forward and leans his forehead on the flaky metal rail in front of him, staring down at the cracks in the lot below. Wonders if Boone knows that he’s gay or not, and that’s why he’s being so flippant about spending a night together. Because he doesn’t know. It’s not something Arcade advertises, but it’s also not exactly a secret. He frowns and blows a slow breath through his nose.
He just doesn’t want to do anything to ruin the tentative bit of camaraderie he’s being shown. Not worth the atmosphere for the rest of this job if something goes sideways, not worth the potential awkwardness or hostility back at the office, not worth the broken nose and orbital socket if it happens to turn out that Boone is the sort of guy to react like that. Arcade hopes he’s not. Partly… okay, a lot for his own safety and partly so the image he has of Boone as a quiet and reserved but ultimately decent guy doesn’t get shattered right here on a shitty motel balcony with unsafely spaced guardrails in Nowhere Dust Hole, Nevada.
“Want one?”
Arcade looks over to see Boone holding his still-smouldering cigarette out. More on autopilot than anything else, he says, “Those things are terrible for you.”
Boone lifts his hand and takes a deep, pointed drag, the corner of his lips barely pulling up as he does.
“Not what I asked,” he says after a few seconds, smoke spilling from his mouth and vanishing into the air.
“I suppose not.” Arcade can’t help but mirror Boone’s almost smile. “No. But thank you.”
Boone shrugs. They sit on the sun-baked concrete and watch the day slip away over the horizon.
---
1:17
Nine heartbeats later the red segments of the alarm clock face reconfigure themselves again. Arcade blinks in the dark and waits around for the next one, face crushed into the pillow, overstarched sheet pulled up under his chin, and the air conditioning humming intermittently on the other side of the room. The old girl’s making a valiant effort, but she’s far past her prime with her cooling abilities.
Boone is behind him. When the lights went off he was laid flat down on his back, one arm tucked under his head and he’s been almost completely motionless since then so that’s probably how he still is. Right there. Inches away.
It’s been hours.
1:26
“Gannon.”
Boone’s voice is quiet, the blunt rasp of it made even more subdued by how late it is. The sound still makes Arcade flinch. His own throat is as dry as his lips as he sighs and whispers back. No use pretending not to hear.
“Yeah?”
“You can’t sleep.”
Another one of those question statements that’s not really one or the other.
“I… no.” Arcade sighs and tries to force the petulance out of his voice. He can’t sleep and it’s making him mad that he can’t which is keeping him up even longer. “How’d you know?”
Boone shifts around, sheet rustling and the bed dips behind him. “The way you’re breathing,” he says. “Moving.”
Arcade shivers at the disturbing implications there.
“No, I can’t.”
Boone grunts.
“Is it me? I can sleep on the floor if you’re bothered.”
“No. It’s… don’t do that. It’s,” Arcade swallows and feels an unwanted grin creeping up on him, “not you, it’s me.”
“Nervous about interviewing that guy,” Boone says after another minute passes.
Arcade’s barely even thought about it since he’d gotten off the phone with Veronica, honestly. Completely slipped his mind. Too busy panicking and trying to do the ‘I don’t want to stare or act too familiar and also not get too distant so you think something’s up’ dance. He chuckles humorlessly.
“That must be it.”
Boone makes another noise and Arcade is dully surprised at how long this conversation has lasted. New record easily. And all you had to do was get him into bed, his mind helpfully adds. The low buzz of quiet, recycled air spins out between them and Arcade’s eyes slip to the glare of the clock again.
1:40
“If you’re tense,” Boone says, “jerking off helps sometimes.”
And Arcade is back to being very, very wide awake.
“Jesus... Boone!” he hisses, scalp prickling hot. “You can’t just say that kind of thing.”
“Why not? It does.”
Completely guileless. Like there’s nothing insanely weird about this whole situation. Arcade digs the heel of his palm into his eye, briefly rubs it there for the grounding pressure and the whorls and rockets of color that explode behind his eyelid.
“Maybe, but that’s neither here nor there, is it.”
“I don’t mind.”
“Yeah? Well I mind, okay!?” Arcade snaps. “I am not going t— What the hell! All day I’ve been as professional as I can be and trying not to ruin the whole coworker thing and we’re in a bed together and I’ve been trying not to even accidentally look at you too much and here you are talking about... that like it’s totally fine… and… Oh.” He finally runs out of steam and curls a hand over his mouth when there’s no response and he realizes what he just implied. “God, I’m. Really sorry. You didn’t need to hear that. I don’t… god damnit. Sorry. I’ll go—”
He doesn’t know where he’s going or what he’ll do once he gets there but he needs to get away from this trainwreck as soon as possible. He already has the blanket thrown back and one foot brushing the nubby carpet before Boone’s voice stops him.
“...you want me to do it for you?”
Arcade makes a choked wheezing noise he doesn’t recognize and tries to find some kind of help in the steady red glow of the clock. That can’t be what he meant. Why would, what?
What?
“Do you?” Boone says, quieter.
“I g—” Arcade croaks, mouth dry and heart pounding too fast and too hard. He has no idea what the right answer is here. Too dark to check what Boone is thinking from body language or facial expression, no clue in the barely audible rumble of his voice.
It has to be a trap.
“I. Wouldn’t mind,” he forces out anyway. “Hypothetically.”
He hears Boone breathe out a short huff of air and has no idea what it means. His body is frozen and his mind is scrabbling around at worrisome speeds trying to delineate worst and best possible outcome before anything actually happens. Then there’s another rustle of sheets and fingers gently bump into his side and wrap around his hip. That one touch of Boone’s very hot and very big hand and it feels like the room is squeezing in on him.
“Oh,” he says. Very suave and intelligent.
He’s drawn back into bed and Boone snugs up behind him, back to chest with Arcade’s ass tight against Boone’s hips. Boone is in his underwear; Arcade’d kept his undershirt on as well when they’d undressed for sleep (Boone just stripped down right there while Arcade pretended not to notice and then scurried into the bathroom as soon as it was feasible). Leaving the shirt was some completely useless talismanic safeguard against any untoward urges or bodily reactions, he guesses. All it’d done is make him sweatier. He lets out a low, shuddery breath and tries to relax enough to move with Boone, let himself be rearranged to where he wants him.
And isn’t that funny. Where Boone wants him. As far as he knows, Boone isn’t interested in anyone, let alone men. Let alone older, socially-awkward, near-sighted men who study folk medicine, dead languages, and the histories of ancient civilizations in their spare time. What even is this, what are they doing?
“Stay still,” Boone murmurs distractedly against the back of his neck. Arcade fights the urge to moan and tip his head back into him. Being pressed thigh to shoulder against a furnace like Boone isn’t helping how warm it already is but oh, god, fuck, he wants to be as close as possible. “Quit fussing.”
“I’m not—” his voice hitches as Boone works his shirt up to right under his chest, “I’m not fussing.”
“Hmh. You’re always fussing about something.”
“Well, considering what’s… hhh— wow, okay.”
Boone slips his hand down the curve of Arcade’s belly and into his underwear, rough fingers combing past curls of hair to fully cup him and rub a thumb firmly over his cock. He’s only halfway hard, body still on the unsure side, but Arcade jerks forward into Boone’s palm, breathless and seeking out more friction and pressure. Boone squeezes him and glides his fingertips up once before he moves again and gets a better grip, strokes Arcade a few times and makes him gasp. Then he draws back and hooks his thumb into Arcade’s waistband and pulls his underwear halfway down his thighs. Enough to expose him completely but keep his legs trapped together, unable to spread his knees.
God, it’s killing him. Everything about this is contributing to Arcade Gannon’s early demise. Boone’s evenly paced breath tickling the nape of his neck, how it’s so dark he can’t even look down and see the hand wrapped around him, his inability to brace his feet against something and fuck up into Boone’s fist. The… fuck. The quick movement of Boone drawing his hand up to his mouth and the wet sound of saliva being smeared across his fingers. The feeling of his foreskin being drawn back a little and then cool slickness being worked over his cock, smoothing each stroke. Arcade is breathing hard and there’s a whine in every exhale, some barely aspirated betrayal of how sickeningly good his extremely surly, extremely straight coworker’s hand feels. Half that and half stagnant fear that Boone is going to come back to himself and things will be irrevocably, critically damaged between them.
Boone shuffles around and repositions himself, ending up with his face nearly resting against the side of Arcade’s head. Greedy maybe, but he wishes Boone would actually do something to him with that thin, sullen mouth. Arcade sighs out a loud breath and inches his hand back to clench it over the outside of Boone’s thigh. Not daring to urge him forward at all, but needing some kind of anchor so he doesn’t go right to hyperventilating. And Boone lets him.
Maybe it’s fine. There’s already no coming back from this, he guesses. Whatever happens, happens, and he’s along for it.
Boone laughs quietly; hot, damp puffs of air tickle against hair that feels like it’s already plastered to his skin with sweat. The grip on him changes, tighter and pulling each stroke up slow and deliberate and making him moan through grit teeth.
“You were really thinking hard about this, huh.”
“No,” Arcade lies. He doesn’t know if Boone’s taunting him or trying to dirty talk or just genuinely curious. Doesn’t really matter, the feel of Boone whispering against his neck hits him anyway, skin flushing hot and cock getting absurdly harder. He feels Boone laughing again. Arcade groans and claws his hand down harder into his skin. “I wasn’t.”
Boone hums noncommittally, shifts again, and drags Arcade along with him. Shoulders back, chest and stomach one long curve, legs still pinned and tangled up next to Boone’s in the sheets. Exposed and strung back tight like a bow and it’s almost disappointing how unaffected Boone seems to be by all this— breathing normally, still soft where he’s pushed up against Arcade, steady movements— but it’s not like he expected anything else. This is already so far out of the realm of what he thought Boone would ever do that more would be insane.
He can feel it, his nerves and this whole bizarre situation driving him down recklessly fast. Arcade closes his eyes and feels every muscle of his body tightening, feels himself trying to roll his hips with Boone as he strokes him slowly - incidentally rubbing up over his lap. Feels Boone’s long breaths on his ear and cheek and the flex of his arm and chest. The calloused, deceptively gentle fingers twisting tight around his dick, slipping over the remnants of Boone’s spit and his own wetness.
“Come on,” Boone murmurs, lips touching the corner of his jaw.
He does; he can’t help it after that. Everything builds to a hot, shuddery peak and Arcade comes, dick pulsing in Boone’s hand with his skin on fire and sucking in fluttery breaths when he can manage one. He squeezes his handful of Boone’s thigh again and whispers, “God, Boone, fuck.”
He almost doesn’t notice it amidst the mindfuck of an orgasm he’s having but here, finally, Boone has some kind of reaction to what they’re doing. A quicker intake of breath that’s barely audible and the muscles of his chest tighten, body stiffening for a split second like he’s been struck. Then he loosens up again and slowly slides his hand up Arcade’s cock one last time, making him shiver and twitch before he lets go and wipes his fingers off on the edge of the bed.
And Arcade can’t move. He’s breathing loud and deep, heart still slamming and skin still tingling. Even as Boone slowly starts pulling away, shuffling backwards again until they’re no longer entwined, Arcade’s only motion is to dazedly release his grip on Boone’s leg. He drops his hand back down onto his own and sighs, sinking down into the mattress as he lets his muscles relax again. Relief, weariness, disbelief are very present. Unease trying to creep back up despite the endorphins cruising through him.
“Alright?” Boone asks.
...Are you? Arcade wants to ask. Are we?
“I’m…” He licks his lips. “Yeah. Thank you.”
“Not a problem. Feel any better?”
Arcade has to fight down a hysterical bray of laughter because in a lot of ways, yes, yes he does. But holy hell has this added an odd wrinkle to their already very unclear friendship. God, he’s never going to be able to look at Boone again without remembering him breathing against his neck with his hand wrapped around his dick.
And Veronica’s gonna know something happened as soon as she sees them back in the office together. She has the damn second sight about things like that. Jeez, it might’ve been worth it though.
“A little bit better, yeah.”
Boone grunts and pats him on the hip before rolling away again and it feels… benign. Like maybe there’s nothing wrong.
“Go to sleep.”
Arcade tries.
---
He’s lying there again, more relaxed now but still unable to drift off. He’s rolled onto his back like Boone with one hand draped over his chest and he can’t see the clock anymore but it has to’ve been twenty, thirty minutes since. Thinking about the thing at Helios in a very vague sense, anticipating the long drive back, excited to get back to his own little apartment, and wondering if what just happened really did or if his pillow’s full of weird mold spores that gave him a really, really vivid hallucination. Or he would be if he couldn’t reach over a few inches and feel where the sheet is stiff from where Boone wiped his fingers. What the hell.
“...Still can’t, huh,” Boone rumbles quietly from beside him. “Tough crowd.”
Arcade can hear the amusement underneath the annoyed words and he can’t stop himself from smiling about being caught out this time.
“Can’t help it. I’m a demanding sort of guy, I guess,” Arcade says. "High standards."
Boone snorts. “You want me to kiss you goodnight now or something?”
And that gets him. He laughs, too loud and too hard in such a small, quiet room but it feels good. Some final release of leftover pressure. Worrying and overthinking are what he’s the absolute best at, but maybe it’s time to stop for a few hours. They both have a job to do in the morning, Boone seems more than fine, it’s late.
“I wouldn’t mind,” he says again, mostly joking.
“Hypothetically.”
“Hypothetically,” he agrees, eyes already closing again.
It comes as at least a small surprise, though with everything that’s happened today he feels like he should probably give that up, when about five seconds after that, Boone rolls over to face him. His hand comes up and touches Arcade's chin and jaw, gently turning him.
Arcade stays completely still, barely able to see Boone’s features in the darkness and just waiting for whatever he’s about to do. Heartbeat lurching up to speed again, but out of anticipation this time, not fear.
Boone’s lips press against his; they’re warm and firm and somewhat wind-chapped and Boone smells like the toothpaste and cheap body wash they’d both used earlier. It’s not a romantic, tongue-filled fireworks-inducing kiss by any means, but it feels like a lot more than a friendly peck. He pushes in slowly, thumb holding Arcade’s chin with his fingers fanned out along his jaw and neck, and kisses him softly with his mouth barely open. Arcade shivers and relaxes into it, reaching over to put his hand on Boone’s forearm.
Then Boone does it one more time, breathing over his cheek and letting Arcade deepen the kiss for a split second before they both pull back. Boone huffs through his nose like he didn’t really expect himself to do any of that, but he slides his hand down Arcade’s neck and squeezes his shoulder like they just had a friendly chat, their faces still inches apart.
“Night, Gannon.”
Arcade feels a giddy smile coming on, but tries to keep his cool. It might’ve meant nothing to Boone, just a very... very odd favor to a teammate or colleague or whatever they are, but it was still extremely enjoyable. If also terrifying. And something he’s really not going to be able to forget soon; that second kiss is already replaying in his mind and it hasn’t even been ten seconds. Christ, the things people get up to when they’re in a dark room far from home.
If Boone wakes up and wants to pretend this never happened… maybe a little disappointing in a way, but probably for the best. Hopefully they’ll still get along like they always have: dryly amicable with blessedly little small talk. But time will tell, for better or worse. He squeezes Boone’s arm and lets him go.