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It was one of the first truly warm days in England. A rare April day where the rain had subsided and the sun shone down in all its glory. Even the clouds had stayed away, for now. Gerry was sure it wouldn’t last, but grateful for the day nonetheless. It was perhaps still a touch too cold for a swim, but it was a beautiful day for a walk on the beach.
“I’m surprised Gertrude let us both have the same day off.” Michael says, voice peppy as ever as he walks hand in hand with Gerry. “Not that I’m complaining, of course! It’s a lovely day to be out and about.”
“Well…” Gerry starts, giving a crooked smile as he speaks “She didn’t, technically speaking”
Michael raises an eyebrow at him, mischievous eyes glinting brighter than the sun.
“Ger, what does that mean?”
“She thinks I’m out on “research”. Leitner hunting for her. She’s still trying to track down that bloody demon one.”
A flash of concern crosses Michael’s freckled face.
“Oh, Gerard…you know she’s going to find out you skived off. She knows everything!”
“Love, you know I hate it when you call me that.”
“I know, I know, it’s just…I don’t want you getting into trouble with her again. She already gives you such a hard time. And especially if it’s on my account…”
“Better me than you. I can take it. Besides, she can’t really be cross with you. You’d throw yourself down a flight of stairs for that woman, and she knows it.”
Michael laughs that delightful, lilting laugh of his at that.
“Several flights of stairs, I imagine. Never just one thing with Ms. Robinson. But don’t act like you wouldn’t do the same. I know you care about her just as much, or you wouldn’t be going on those trips with her all the time.”
“Hmm…don’t know if I’d take the stairs on my way out. Seems much too slow a way to go.”
“You’re terrible!”
Gerry flashes a grin and playfully nudges into the blonde's shoulder as they walk.
“Well, lucky for you, I plan on living forever.”
Michael laughs again, shaking his head at him and making his sandy blonde curls bounce in a way that Gerry had come to find quite endearing.
“Well, I certainly hope so.”
Michael squeezes Gerry’s hand three times, their silent signal that means ‘I love you’, and Gerry's heart flutters in his chest. Michael had taught him the gesture as a way to say it without saying it. Not that Gerry had any qualms about telling him out loud, but the less the Magnus Institute rumour mill knew about them, the better. He was glad to be away from there. Away from all the prying eyes and gossip that ran rampant at their workplace. At least here they could blend in with the other beach goers and they could be together more openly. Here, accompanied by the waves and shining golden sand, he could actually hold his boyfriend's hand. The thought nearly made him giddy. He could almost forget about the Institute entirely on a day like this.
“What’s so important about those books anyway, Ger? You’re gone all the time looking for them for her.”
Gerry suppresses the urge to sigh. Well. It was nice while it lasted.
“You worked in artifact storage before you were an assistant, right? You must have heard the others talk about them.”
“Well…maybe a bit? I know they’re spooky or whatever, but that sort of describes the whole job, doesn’t it? And it’s not like the statements are real, right? It’s just archiving.”
Gerry never quite knew how to navigate these kinds of conversations with his boyfriend. How much should he tell him? He was pretty positive Michael didn’t actually know the Fears existed…and Gertrude sure seemed keen on keeping him out of the loop, even if she didn’t know they were together. No…now wasn’t the time. Not today.
“Yeah…well, it’s Trudy’s job to sift through all that musty paper, so I’ll leave the scrutinizing validity up to her.” He says it with as much nonchalance as he can muster.
“Gerry! Don’t call her that.” Michael admonishes, looking around as if the old woman were going to emerge from the very sand to chastise them. Gerry can’t help but laugh at his reaction.
“Relax, love. We’re on a date! Let’s leave the work talk for another day, yeah?”
“Yeah…I suppose you’re right…”
_______________________________
“Ger, we’ve been walking for a while. We’ve gotten away from the main beach area, do you think we should head back now?”
They had followed along the shore away from the other beach goers and near the start of the beachside cliffs. In a moment, they would no longer be able to see where they had started their walk.
“In a bit, love…I’m looking for something.”
“What, like a shell or something? I’m sure we’ve passed by plenty of that stuff.”
“No, not quite…hang on…there!”
Gerry lets go of Michael’s hand and runs ahead towards the cliff to their right. He drops to his knees, clearing the taller grass away from a spot in the rock face.
“Gerry, what are you doing?! You’re not secretly book hunting on our date, are you?”
“Just come over here, will you?”
Michael sighs, but treks the rest of his way to the cliff wall where Gerry had run off to, prepared to chastise his boyfriend, but his words fall short when he sees what’s in front of them.
“Honestly, Ger…what are you- oh…”
Set into the rock in front of them is the entrance to a cave. The opening is small enough that it had been hidden by the tall grass, but it was still big enough for a grown man to crawl inside now that Gerry had uncovered it.
“Oh…whoa…”
“Dad used to bring me to this beach when I was a kid. I haven’t been here in decades, but I remembered this was here. Always been big on exploring, I suppose. It’s far enough from the main beach that no one really seems to know it’s here. I wanted to show it to you. A little piece of childhood.”
“You want to go in there?” Michael stares in disbelief.
Gerry holds out a hand, beckoning Michael closer.
“Come on, love, it’s perfectly safe. Besides, I’ll go first.”
Michael watches as Gerry crawls headfirst into the dark opening, green swim trunks disappearing from view in a matter of seconds. After an agonizingly long moment, he hears Gerry give the all clear to follow him inside.
“Goddamnit, Gerard…”
Michael grumbles, but crawls into the dark tunnel after his boyfriend. He emerges into a large, surprisingly well-lit open space. A small hole near the cave ceiling lets light stream into the natural room, casting the place in a bluish hue. It was strangely beautiful.
“Wow…” Michael's voice bounces off the cave walls, echoing in the space.
“See? Told you it was safe. It’s not terribly big for a cave. Not like you see in movies. But when I was little, I thought it was enormous. It’s just the one, though. No other tunnels to speak of.”
Gerry gives him a triumphant smile from where he sits cross legged in the middle of his secret hideaway.
“Gerry, you said yourself you haven’t been here in decades. How do you know this whole place won’t come crashing down on our heads?”
“Aw, come on. It’s been here this long. It’s highly unlikely that we’ll be unlucky enough for it to cave in now.”
“Hmm…”
“Besides, if it does cave in, some lucky future archaeologists will find our poor tragic lovers' skeletons buried here one day. Just like Shakespeare would have wanted. I choose to see that as a win either way.”
“How romantic.”
Michael crosses his arms over his chest and wanders around the cave, nervously looking for any signs of falling rock.
Gerry gets up from his spot on the cave floor and crosses the distance between them to wrap his arms around Michael from behind.
“Hey…listen. I wouldn’t have brought you here if I didn’t think it was safe. I just thought it was a cool way for us to have some privacy. You know I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”
Michael lets out a sigh and leans his head back to rest on Gerry’s shoulder.
“I know, Ger…just can’t help but worry about things, you know?”
They stay like that for a long moment. Reveling in the feeling of each other and breathing in the scent of the others sun-kissed skin.
“You know…we have the room to ourselves. Anything I could do to help put you at ease?”
Gerry trails his hand down the front of Michael’s purple tank top and slips it underneath to splay his hand across the sensitive skin of his stomach. He noses through Michael’s sandy curls to plant a kiss right where his neck meets his shoulder and that earns him a shiver that he knows has nothing to do with the temperature.
“H-hey…!”
Michael spins around, breaking out of Gerry’s hold and putting his hands on his hips.
“Gerard Keay, is that why you wanted to bring me here? So you could seduce me in your evil lair? You complete scoundrel!”
Gerry can’t help but laugh out loud at his boyfriend's theatrics. He holds up his hands in mock surrender.
“Caught me red handed. You can’t tell me it’s any worse than the evil office closet we’ve hooked up in at the Institute though…probably cleaner too.”
Michael crinkles his nose in disgust, an action that Gerry finds utterly adorable.
“God, I don’t even want to think about that closet…”
“Right there with you.”
Gerry steps forward and places his hands on either side of Michael's face, bringing their lips close together but not kissing him just yet. He hears Michael’s breath hitch in his throat and feels his hands wrap lightly around Gerry’s wrists.
“I think we have much better things we could be doing with our time…don’t you think, love?”
He gets a shaky “Yes” in response before their lips are crashing together.
Gerry has kissed his fair share of people in his life. Some he remembered, some were a blur of sensation from his failed uni days, and he’s sure there were plenty he was forgetting. Most of them, he had to admit, were not very good at it. Memorable kissers were usually not a good thing, in his experience. Michael Shelley, however, was very fucking good at kissing. Michael kissed him like his life depended on it. A symphony of tongue and breath that left him both gasping for air and begging for more all at the same time. It made his head spin…and yet, Gerry was the supposed scoundrel. Michael’s tongue swirled around his, fingernails dug into his back, and Gerry moaned into his mouth.
Intoxicated with each other as they were, the pair had begun to move toward the wall of the cave without realizing it and Gerry now had Michael pinned with his back to the wall. Gerry presses his knee in between Michael’s legs and feels the quickly hardening bulge waiting for him there, causing Michael to gasp in response.
“Ah~ Gerry…”
Gerry kisses a line from Michael’s mouth, along his jaw, and down his neck. Forcing himself to take his time, despite the burning desire growing in his gut. He wants to drink in every delicious sound he elicits from his boyfriend’s mouth.
He slips his hands under Michael’s shirt and pulls it off of him in one fluid motion, miraculously not snagging his long hair in the process. With that obstacle out of the way, he resumes his attack on Michael’s tragically unmarked skin. A canvas waiting to be painted in blues and purples. Gerry would make sure he went home with a masterpiece.
He slowly leaves a trail of sucking kisses on Michael’s skin. Working his way down and down until he’s on his knees, eye-level with the waistband of the matching purple swim trunks Michael still had on. He looks up to lock eyes with him as they catch their breath, dark brown meeting bright blue.
“You look like you could use some help, love.”
“Gerry…”
Gerry runs a finger beneath the waistband of Michael’s shorts, tugging slightly in a teasing move but going no further. Michael’s hips jerk forward involuntarily.
“I need to hear you say it.” Gerry lets his voice slip into the commanding tone he knew Michael liked so much.
“Fucking hell…you’re a menace, Ger, you know that?”
Gerry grins up at him dangerously and moves his face closer to his target. He mouths at the bulge over the fabric, getting him as wet as he possibly can before pulling back again. Michael moans desperately for him.
“Ah~ Fuck…Gerry, please..”
“Please, what, love?”
“Christ…please…I want to feel your mouth on me, please.”
“There we are.”
Gerry hooks his thumbs into Michael’s waistband and pulls, relieving him of the final barrier between them. Gerry takes a moment to run his eyes over Michael’s body. Savoring the sight of his bruising handiwork already blooming across his skin.
“God, you’re beautiful, love. I could just stare at you like this forever.”
“Ger…”
“I think I have some work to attend to, however.”
With that, he licks a wet stripe from the tip of Michael’s cock to the base of him. Earning a loud gasp amplified by the acoustics around them.
“Hmm…” Gerry muses, “Bit echoey in here, isn’t it?”
He swallows the full length of him in one swift motion, getting a deliciously loud moan in return before pulling back off with a small pop. Michael throws a hand over his mouth in embarrassment.
“Scream for me, love. Let’s see how loud we can get in here.”
He swallows Michael down to the root once more, sucking in earnest. They’d been together long enough now that Gerry knew exactly what he liked, and he was hell bent on turning his boyfriend into a shaking mess above him. He pulls back again, swirling his tongue around the length lazily and suckling at the head of him.
“Fuck~ Ger…if you keep up like that, I’m not going to last at all.”
“Good. I want you to come for me, love.”
Gerry swallows him once more, hollowing his cheeks and bobbing his head to take him fully into his throat. Michael had long since stopped trying to keep quiet. His long fingers now tangled into Gerry’s dark, silky hair. Gerry quickens his pace, feeling Michael’s thighs begin to quiver beneath his hands.
“Oh…Fuck, Ger…I’m gonna…Ah!~”
Gerry pulls back one final time as he comes, catching as much of the spill as he can on his tongue and letting the rest paint his face.
“Fuck…Ger…you’re amazing. I love you so much.”
Michael’s words come between panting breaths and Gerry can’t help the satisfied smirk that crosses his face.
“I love you too”
“What about you? Do you want me to…?”
“Don’t worry about me, love. You can make it up to me when we get back to yours, if you like.”
“I think I would, actually. Christ, we’re a mess…”
“Well, it’ll be easy to clean off at least. Fancy a very cold swim?”