Work Text:
Summer. Or at least, what should be summer. In Dema, it’s always gray.
Josh and Tyler are lying in a bed that’s more of a cot, in Tyler’s shitty living quarters, shoulder-to-shoulder and silent. It’s chilly. Not humid. Cotton drapes rustle with the breeze.
Tyler turns his head to look at him and speaks after a long moment. He’s naked-they both are, and the room is thick with tension of a non-sexual manner. "I wish we could run away," Tyler says, his voice a murmur, “I don’t…want to do this anymore.”
“Play music?” Josh asks dumbly, as if he doesn’t know exactly what Tyler’s talking about.
“No,” Tyler answers. Silence falls again.
“I know,” Josh finally says with a sigh.
“I just wish it wasn't so wrong," Tyler says quietly. He’s just thinking out loud. There’s nothing that can change this. It’s unfortunate, sure, but it’s the life he has to live.
Josh intertwines his fingers into his. “Just let us have this,” he says gently, “right now. Just be with me.” As if purely existing with each other might solve the world’s issues.
Tyler knows Josh will have to leave soon. He’ll leave and will be forced to admire from afar because they could never show their faces together anywhere but in the privacy of this bedroom. Even then, they’re pushing it. Nothing is ever private in Dema. He wraps his arms around Josh and draws him closer.
Josh’s forehead rests against his. "I want this. I just want you,” he murmurs. “I don’t need anything else.” Tyler feels his face screw up with emotion. Josh continues.
“More than anything. More than anything I’ve ever wanted.”
“Why do we keep hurting ourselves like this?” Tyler blurts out, voice wobbling, “chasing a life we’ll never have?” He looks over finally. "I can't stop myself from wanting you," he continues. "I hate myself for it.”
Josh squeezes his hand.
“They find out about us and we’re both as good as dead,” he croaks.
"I wouldn’t mind dying next to you," Josh says absentmindedly.
“Don’t say shit like that,” Tyler snaps immediately, and then his voice softens. “Please.” He pulls away. Sits up, hugging himself. The mere thought of him being the reason Josh dies terrifies him. He doesn’t care if it’s romantic. This isn’t Romeo and Juliet. This isn’t a love story. It’s reality.
"Do you think I'm terrible?" He asks warily. “Am I a bad person?”
Josh reaches up and squeezes his shoulder. Tucks his face into the crook of his neck and his stubble scratches his skin.
“I think you’re terribly human,” Josh tells him. “Just like me. Just like everyone. You can’t help it. No one can. You’re not a bad person for falling in love.”
"And I AM so terribly in love with you," Tyler whispers, his breath hitching, eyes unseeing, staring into nothing. "I want you more than anything I have ever wanted."
A pause.
"Do you love me?"
“I want you.”
“But do you love me?” Tyler presses.
Josh hesitates. Picking his words wisely. “Loving and wanting are practically the same thing, are they not?”
“Just answer,” Tyler rasps.
“I’ve always loved you,” Josh breathes, his eyes drinking in Tyler’s silhouette. “If I were allowed I’d feel a lot more things about you, Tyler. You know that.”
Tyler rubs a hand over his face. He lays down again, head resting in Josh’s lap. A warm hand cards through his hair.
He's hiding something.
"What is it," Josh says.
“I can’t come back this time,” he says, in that same pained tone. Still staring up, his eyes glazing over. “They’re getting suspicious. I’ll send you a letter when I’m ready. But only then.”
“When will that be?”
“I don’t know,” he says simply, and it hangs in the air. “Does it matter?”
“This is our final goodbye, isn’t it?”
He grits his teeth, wanting to snap. How dare Josh be right. The words sting, even if he's known that the truth all along. But it hurts now, the reality of it.
"...what am I going to do with myself?” He asks to no one in particular. "I don't want it to be," he whispers, "I don’t want it to be our last goodbye. I hate that I'm just a footnote in your life-that I'm just a passing fling for you. I’m going to die and you’re going to live and find someone new.” His brow furrows. His heart aches. "I'll miss you. So fucking much,” he says it and his voice cracks. Like it’s a secret. A horrible confession, one he never ever wanted.
“You’ve never been just a footnote,” Josh replies, almost immediately, swallowing the lump in his throat. “You have no idea, Tyler. They’ll drag me out kicking and screaming before I forget you.”
Their eyes lock onto each other.
And then suddenly, he's straddling Josh. His movements are loving and tender. His lips are warm and soft and he kisses his neck, his cheeks, his lips. His breath catches in his throat.
"Let me take you," Josh mumbles hurriedly against his skin. "Just one last time, before I go."
“Anything,” Tyler murmurs, “I’m yours. Always been yours.” He’s so vulnerable. He’s open. Naked. Splayed before Josh like his last meal. A tender hand finds its way between his legs. It’s so fucking gentle he almost tears up. His breathing quickens, forehead resting on Josh’s shoulder, watching it all. He grinds his hips into the touch, wanting, silently begging for more.
His mouth comes back to Josh’s and there is no holding back for either of them. No secrets, no regrets. It's not like this is right, and to think so is foolish, they’re here and now, and the only thing that matters is each other.
Time blurs together, feelings are all-encompassing, the future does not matter. All the past, good or bad, is put aside. It’s almost selfish, but who cares?
Josh’s fingers pause inside of him. Tyler pants, open-mouthed, splotches of red covering his body. He’s never felt so hot before. So encompassed. So embodied by love. He feels himself ache. His body, his mind, his heart. Steady, sturdy.
“When is your sermon?” Josh asks casually.
Tyler glances back at the clock on his wall. “Two hours from now,” he replies, and wishes he could change that. He is struggling to remain strong and not fall apart at the seams. He will not cry, he will not cry. Josh is leaving him, leaving him in two hours, and soon he will be alone again.
He lets Josh lay him down, tangled in scratchy grey sheets. It’s easy access between his legs, and if there was one thing Josh always prided himself on, it was his tongue. His damned tongue. Quick and witty and able to make Tyler fall apart so easily. He pulls at Josh’s hair, bucks against his face like there was some way of keeping him here forever, like he could freeze time and make this last.
"Maybe I deserve it," he ponders aloud, his tone full of self-loathing when Josh’s fingers crook up and make his stomach jolt. "Maybe I deserve to be alone. Everything I’ve done has been for my best interests. I’ve been selfish."
“You don’t deserve anything,” Josh mumbles, “and neither do I. We broke rules. We deserve to be punished, but somehow we still live to see another day. Guess we’re just that lucky.”
“Lucky is an overstatement,” Tyler says, and his breath hitches when he feels Josh’s cock press into him. "I don't want our story to end here,” he gasps, “I don't want to be apart from you.” And he means it. He should just shut up right now though.
Josh fucks him. He makes love to him, worships him and uses him all in the same sentence. Thighs twitching, eyes rolling back. Calloused hands twisting into the sheets. He’s naked beneath Josh, sprawled on the bed like a sinner beneath a saint.
“You’re a good man,” Tyler pants, “I don't deserve you.” And he's telling the truth; he has no idea how he came to be with someone like Josh, someone so smart, loving, caring. Someone who could be everything and nothing all at once. Tyler is selfish. Manipulative. Conniving.
"I should never have met you. I wish I hadn't," he mumbles to himself, "because now there's no way I can let go of you. You’re too important now. It's not fair. I should’ve never dragged you into this.”
“Tyler,” Josh warns.
“And yet nothing is fair,” Tyler rambles on, laughing dryly. “We met because of fate. Stupid fate.” He pauses. “Very despicable of us.”
“That’s enough.” Josh smiles, but he’s not happy. Leans over and presses their lips together. "Not despicable,” he murmurs, “It's not our fault that fate decided to play with our lives. I just-“ he groans, “-wish we had a little bit more time."
“You’ve never hurt me,” Tyler blurts out. He captures Josh, arms around his neck. “Anything I’ve been pained with has been of my own accord. I want you to know that. I don’t blame you for anything.”
Josh hides his face in the crook of his neck.
God dammit, Josh, look at me.
"But I am destroying your life. I am not a good person for you." Tyler’s fingernails dig into Josh’s shoulders. He scratches down his back. Leaves marks that will still be there in two hours.
“You are poison,” Josh breathes.
“I know,” Tyler says. “God. I know.”
Josh’s eyebrows furrow. “I'm not a romantic. I don't know what I'm doing,” he admits, “but I love you, and I never want to be without you.”
He pauses. “Isn’t that terrible?”
Tyler scoffs.
“Not a romantic?” He says breathlessly, laughing. “You’re an idiot is what you are.”Arching his back, he bites back a whine. "I’m not a romantic. I don't do...this. I've never had a relationship before. How could I, being who I am? I don't know what it means to love somebody. I-I don't feel it."
Josh rolls his hips and his skin is hot.
"But-I do now," Tyler says under his breath. "I do now."
He doesn’t want to look at Josh because he knows he’ll fucking cry. He doesn’t want to cry. It’s not fair to cry, even if he’s sad.
Josh fucks into Tyler like he was meant to do. Teeth dig into his neck. Sweat rolls between their bodies. Everything hits them all at once. They kiss to fill the silence, keeping their mouths too busy to focus on the rambling soliloquies they want to cry into each others’ arms.
“I’m cumming,” Tyler says between grit teeth, and they hold each other so tight one would think they were going to disappear. Josh eats up his whimpers and sobs with open-mouthed kisses. Teeth and tongue.
Tyler wants to cry so bad. He wants to bury his face into Josh’s chest and cry, but instead he sobs dryly and writhes. Arches his back and tries his best to roll his hips back in time with Josh’s thrusts. He so badly wants this to be some quick fuck. Something that they’ll say “I’ll see you later,” to afterwards.
But it’s not. It’ll never be that. They’ve said too much, too many things that had been brewing for too long.
“You’re so beautiful,” Josh tells him. He covers his face to hide the blush creeping up his cheeks.
“Stop,” he says firmly. Josh pulls his hand away and kisses him.
“I’m close,” Josh mumbles, “where do you want it?”
“Inside,” Tyler answers immediately. What was once seen as an inconvenience becomes a craving. A feeling of fullness and connection that he needs so fucking bad. Something only lovers do.
Josh is loud when he cums. He grunts into Tyler’s skin, pushing against him hard. Fast. Deep. Buries himself in as far as he can go, as if this locked position might just save them from their destined fate.
“I love you,” he pants, chest heaving. “Fuck. I love you, Tyler. I promise.”
Legs bracketed around Josh’s waist, Tyler finally meets his wet gaze. “I know,” he replies.
“I don’t think you do,” Josh says back.
“I do.”
“You don’t,” Josh argues. “Say it back.”
Tyler finally breaks down and cries. He cries and curls up in Josh’s arms and says I love you I love you I love you over and over and over again, just because he can. Just because he won’t ever say it again.
“I’m sorry,” Josh thinks aloud.
“Shut up,” Tyler rasps. And they kiss. It would have been sweet. It could have been a lot of things. It should have been different, for the both of them. Maybe then they wouldn’t be doing this.
“Please don’t forget me,” he says thickly. Josh gets up and redresses. “Please. Josh. Promise.”
A kiss to his forehead. A gentle, caressing touch that signals this goodbye.
“Promise,” he murmurs.
Promise.