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You hate the cliche, but he had been one of your students.
-
Okay, not your student, not really, because you had been just a TA. Last year of your PhD, your third fall semester staffing MATH 347 under the watchful eye of Professor Sarkar. All smart kids in your section, usually—senior Engineering majors of all stripes--, if a little socially awkward, rough edges smoothed a fraction from four years of socialization outside of their houses and robotics clubs and D&D groups.
Lochlan had been no exception. Quiet and bright and—you really did usually try to tamp down thoughts like this but in hindsight it’s hard to ignore—very cute. Never put his hand up but always knew the answer in a cold call. Dreamy gaze, soft smile, long pale arm reaching over his desk to point to other students’ laptops, calmly explaining an issue.
Lectures on Tuesdays, TA sessions on Thursdays, and he lingers by your desk after the second to last one of the semester, winter break a tempting green light in everyone’s minds, a printed-out problem set in his hands, asking for help.
“I’ve got to run,” you tell him, shoving your laptop into your backpack, “But if you’re free tomorrow, we could talk about it over coffee.”
Lochlan smiles eagerly at that, his little curls bouncing against his forehead, spotted with light acne that you unfortunately found devastatingly charming.
He’s almost out the door before he stops, and turns, shy little smile playing against his fussy mouth, one hand on the sleek metal door frame.
“Or maybe—maybe over a drink?”
You’re taken aback by the boldness of it. It’s not the first time you’ve been asked out by a student, but it’s the first time your immediate, knee-jerk reaction hasn’t been No. You’ve never been too into the twink thing, not since you yourself were young enough to be considered one, but you’ve always been a sucker for curls.
Last session, last semester. You’ll be miles away from Chapel Hill in a few short months, God willing. And he’s just so goddamn cute. It must’ve taken everything he had to muster up the courage to be so forward.
So, okay.
“Sure, maybe a drink.” you confirm.
Lochlan’s smile splits wide, and it’s then that you notice the dimples, and begin to feel like you might really be in trouble.
-
Outside the bar, Lochlan’s shivering, his thin frame shaking under his light t-shirt. You’re from Ohio—these Southern kids and their bafflement at the cold never fails to amuse you. You think to offer your jacket, but double back. A step too far.
At first, you really just tried to focus on the problem set, but it became clear that he knew exactly how to solve it. You had suspected it was all a pretense, and felt a little flattered. Crossing over into your thirties had been eye-opening, the small ego death that all gay men experienced at one point or another once they transitioned from a hot young thing into something else. It felt good, to have this attention on you, from this handsome, guileless boy.
He kisses you, and you let him. Let yourself live in the Penthouse fantasy of it for a few long moments before pulling away. You hold your hand out for his phone, enter your number and hand it back to him, your fingers brushing as he takes it.
“Give me a call once you’ve graduated.” you tell him, and you feel self satisfied the entire walk home at your restraint.
-
And then, honestly? You forget about him. You successfully defend your thesis and get a quant job in Durham proper, maintaining a trading algorithm for a small firm. You date a bit, get a nicer apartment, take some time off to travel.
But then one day, years later, when the memory of those sharp shivering shoulders and soft, chapped mouth have almost entirely left you, you get a phone call.
-
He’s just as beautiful as you remembered, peering at you over the top of the menu at the mid-scale Italian place you had settled on after several hours of panicking over picking an appropriate venue. You knew about Lochlan’s family, the wealth he had come from, and you were used to being made to feel like a podunk Midwesterner by people just like that.
But Lochlan has none of that—you’d never guess at his family background if you hadn’t already read the WSJ article the day it came out, years ago, before you even knew him. You had re-read it in anticipation of this, this date.
Later that night, as you make out lazily on the couch in your living room, you tease at him.
“Is this a thing for you? Older men?”
Lochlan laughs and colors, blush spreading out across his nose in a way so dainty and unassuming it makes you want to bite it off.
“If I’m being honest?” he worries his lip and smiles, nervous and flirtatious. “Almost exclusively.”
-
There’s this odd thing, the first time you slept together.
You just did side stuff, that first time. You were still mulling it over, if you had it in you to date someone ten years your junior. You had been expecting a decent blowjob, maybe some frantic rutting that ended in Lochlan coming in his pants. There was a part of you that still saw him as a college kid, knobby kneed and fumbling, with his tentative mouth and reaching hands.
So you were surprised how he changed on the navy blue plane of your sheets—his tongue, his hands. Confident and firmly grasping, moving you how he wanted, letting himself be moved in turn.
“Good, Christian, that’s so good.” he whispered to you in the dark, his long fingers working your cock and making you cry out while he pinned you down at the sternum with his other hand. “You’re so hot. I wanna make you come so bad.”
And then he was fumbling in your nightstand without asking, slicking up his fingers and pushing into you with steady, incredible strokes. Those bright eyes on your face, watching, cataloging every cry, every moan, and then working to bring them out of you, more and harder.
Your mind was racing, trying to square the image of soft, timid Lochlan at the bar, at the restaurant, in your classroom a few years before, with the kid in front of you now.
No, not a kid, not anymore.
Afterwards, both of you sated, you probed.
“I wasn’t expecting you to be so—experienced.” You said, trying to make the question less leering, less gross, but you’ve always been endlessly curious.
He giggled like he does, his face nestled in the crook of your shoulder going hot against your skin. He shrugged, one hand coming up to pet self-consciously at his curls. He opened his mouth. Started to speak, stopped, sighed. Started again.
And that’s when you learned about John.
-
You pride yourself on being generally pretty cool about this stuff. Wasn’t the first time it had happened to you, and definitely wouldn’t be the last.
You have your own situation that’s not—not quite the same as what ever the hell is going on with your—with your boyfriend, as Lochlan is now—but close enough.
Darren says nothing as you explain it to him, laying in the sticky sheets of his bed with afternoon sun coming in through the windows. You had come over on your lunch break.
“Christian.” he says when you’re done, shaking his head in exaggerated disappointment. “You are such a fucking idiot.”
“It’s fine.” you cover quickly, defensively. “I prefer being open, honestly.”
“Yeah…” Darren gives, teeth in a grimace. “But whatever this kid has going on—that’s different. That’s messy.”
You had always been straight laced, wound a little tight. So what if you wanted messy? So what if there was something thrilling about it, the dysfunction, the inherent drama?
My boyfriend has a boyfriend who won’t ever acknowledge him so instead he has me.
Darren tsks, rolling out of bed to pull a shirt on.
“Well, that’s you, I guess. Always a glutton for punishment.”
-
John is not a punishment. John is a nothing, a nobody, only existing for the one weekend a month Lochlan leaves to see him, and disappearing from your lives the minute Lochlan steps back through your apartment door.
The real punishment? Is the family.
Piper’s fine, you suppose. Can hold a conversation that doesn’t center firmly around her for more than fifteen minutes, which is more than you can say for the rest of them. You even hang out with her one-on-one sometimes, going to pretentious art house movies and orchestra concerts that the rest of them have no interest in, even Lochlan.
Tim is different than you expected, when you meet him shortly after he gets out of prison. He’s soft spoken, a little spacey, eyes glazing past people’s faces when they talk to him and going somewhere in the middle distance. Not the cutting, aggressive executive boardroom shark you pictured while reading every article about Sho-Kel you could get your hands on from outside a paywall.
You ask Lochlan if his father is different now, from what he was when he went in four years ago. He doesn’t like that question.
Victoria is your favorite, in a National Geographic, “observe the disgraced heiress in her natural habitat” kind of way. You’ve perfected your impression of her, and your friends beg to hear it, making you pull it out at every dinner party and happy hour where Lochlan isn’t at your side.
You come from the kind of cheerful, threadbare, lower middle class upbringing that these people would probably call “nothing”, and the expectant gazes they give you sometimes infuriate you. Like they’re waiting for your gratitude, your praise. Like they expect you to be impressed by them.
Hard work impresses you. Resourcefulness impresses you. These out of touch, wilted, obsolete aristocrats? They do not impress you.
-
And the brother. Jesus Christ, the brother.
Lochlan had tried to warn you, you’ll give him that.
“He’s...prickly.” your boyfriend had told you as you stood side by side in front of your bathroom mirror, petting yourselves into place before leaving for dinner, where you were going to meet all of them for the first time.
“He’s protective of me.” Lochlan clarified, fingers worrying along the collar of his quarter zip sweater.
“Does he hate all your boyfriends?” you asked, teasing, one hand coming up to smooth Lochlan’s collar down, then the cowlick at the side of his head.
“He might.” Lochlan said, smiling in that shy, sexy way that made you want to melt. “You’re the first one I’ve ever brought home, actually.”
And just when you thought you had sped run through every pathetic, heady teenage emotion, he goes and says something like that.
-
With Saxon, it’s mutual hate at first sight. You hate his obnoxious laugh, his teeth that are too big for his face, the way he talks with his mouth full, spitting all over the table.
You hate his stories, the way he kisses Tim’s ass, the way he throws Lochlan and Piper under the bus at a moment’s notice for jokes that aren’t even worth it. He’s unbelievably rude to you, and you know it’s because he sees you as less than him. Partially because you’re an outsider, and poor by their standards, but even more so because you are gay. He thinks he can do anything to you, treat you however he wants, and it doesn’t matter, because you’re less of a man than him.
You and Saxon, you’re nearly the same age. You went to a Catholic all boys high school, and it was obvious from the moment that you hit puberty that you were gay. Whatever he thinks he can throw at you, you can take it. He might be physically bigger, but you’re hardened by something different, something stronger.
He catches your eye over the dinner table at Piper’s 28th birthday and sneers. You put an arm around the back of Lochlan’s chair and tip your glass to him, smiling.
-
You bring it up, just once. Lochlan’s face turns towards you, mouth in a twist, teeth clenched.
“Don’t talk about Saxon like that.” he spits, and turns his back to you in bed, curled in tight to himself. God, these people and their fucking families.
So, whatever. You don’t.
-
In bed, one night close to your year anniversary, your hands are between Lochlan’s thighs. He’s panting against you, slim chest bowing, sweating, and you’ve never seen him this submissive, this compliant.
It turns you on, that he tops you. You’re not Saxon-sized, but you’re certainly bigger than Lochlan, and it gets you hard, watching it, watching this slip of a boy hover over you, push into you, make you something small and pleading and wet.
But sometimes—sometimes you want. Want things differently. Even though you know Lochlan doesn’t like it, says he rarely ever bottoms.
“Can I?” you mumble against his mouth, your spit-slick fingers going lower, past his balls, grazing lightly against his hole.
He moans like you’ve never heard, head tipping back, panting. Which—oh. Okay. You expected having to plead, to beg, to bribe. But Lochlan’s legs open up for you like he’s been waiting for it, one hand coming up to fist in your hair.
“Please, yes, please—” he pants, chest heaving. You wet your fingers again and push in, feeling him unwind underneath you, limbs shaking. He’s got his eyes closed, screwed tight, face red and broken in on itself as he fucks back onto your fingers.
Lube out of the nightstand, slicked up, bracing yourself over him and staring down at that beautiful, open face as he moans.
“God, Lochlan, let me have you, baby.” you mutter against his jawline. “Let me take you.” And he’s clenching his teeth, his head thrashing, but he nods, gets a hand on your hip and pulls you closer.
Around you, he opens up, taking you in. All Lochlan, everywhere around you. You don’t usually want it this way but just now, just this once, fuck fuck fuck. He hadn’t needed much prep, weirdly, didn’t cry out or shake or grimace at the press but--no, no, you don’t need to think about things that hard.
Because suddenly his hands are on you, pushing at your shoulders, his cries moving quickly from erotic to pained in an instant.
“Christian, Christian, no, no—”
You pull out so fast it makes him groan, curling up in on himself. Your head is spinning, it all changed so fast. What did you do wrong?
“Are you okay? Lochlan, are you--?”
You pull him into your arms, feeling like a piece of shit. He had said yes, he had opened up for you so easily, you’re not that kind of guy--
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry—I thought you said—”
“I did, I did, I’m sorry, I thought—I thought I might like it.”
He quiets in your embrace, face buried scalding hot in the crook of your neck. You’re wide eyed, panting, feeling like a rapist, feeling like a creep. But he had said—he had said--
Once he calms down, he presses a kiss to your cheek, one long arm coming to wrap around your waist.
“It’s okay, it’s okay.” he soothes, and you clench your teeth. He shouldn’t be the one soothing. You fucked up.
“I’m sorry. I thought you wanted it.”
His curls tickling your skin, his little body wound around you, clutching, holding. His hand on your waist drifts, fingers dragging long, slow current against your side.
“I did. I thought I did but—I’m sorry.”
You kiss the top of his head. You love him, despite yourself. Despite the mess of it all. Maybe because of it.
“Thank you for telling me, Lochy. I don’t ever want to hurt you.” you breathe against his hair. His hand stalls, his breath hitching.
“I don’t—” he mutters, his strange little form for a moment so alien at your side. “I don’t really like that nickname.”
Another thing to apologize for. Another moment of tenderness pulled to whiplash, to hurt. You don’t understand this man. Maybe that’s what keeps you coming back. You are a mathematician, after all. Always searching for the solution to a problem. Always looking for a problem to solve.