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The motel room smelled like mildew and ozone. Grainy, backlit images on the shitty old box TV cast flickering images across the set of twin beds and turned the shadows of the two men lying upon them upside down, bleaching out their features and giving them an unnerving, otherworldly aura.
Michael stared at Ryan’s back, watching neon colors dance upon the leather stretched across his broad shoulders. His breathing was deceptively slow, misleadingly steady- to anyone who didn’t know him, they might think he was asleep. Michael knew better.
Ryan’s eyes were trained on the doorknob, occasionally glancing to the window when he thought he saw a shadow pass through the orange light.
Today had, objectively, gone pretty well. Small heist (Procopio was in literal Bum Fuck Nowhere) gone fine, getaway gone not-so-fine-but-still-fine. Sure, they hadn’t exactly stuck to the plan- Jack and Geoff would be here if they had, but the redheaded woman had promised through the comm that they would be fine, and if Michael and Ryan didn't “Get the fuck out right this second, I swear to fucking God, I’ll mow you down myself.”
The whole crew had long ago learned the hard way that if Jack didn’t get her way… Well, if mama ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.
So they sped the fuck out of there, a duffel bag full of Benjamin Franklin’s scowling faces bouncing around in the backseat of some poor son of a bitch’s car that Michael managed to hotwire under heavy fire (Jeremy and Gavin took their getaway car because their bike had been fucking stolen- go figure), Ryan pressing close to 120mph and Michael blindly firing out of the passenger window.
They finally lost the tiny town’s PD just south of Paleto Bay, when Ryan took a hard right and swerved onto the mountain pass through the Chiliad foothills, en route to the shitty motel in Sandy Shores where they were currently breathing in a concerning amount of mold spores to wait out their LSPD criminal watch.
And Michael was staring at Ryan’s back, one arm dangling off the bed, the other wrapped around his own stomach.
Their burner cells were sitting, frighteningly silent, on the scraped-up, Holy-Bible-containing bedside table between their beds. Michael’s skin crawled where the plasticky-smooth floral bedspread touched it.
They didn’t know if Jack (or Geoff or Gavin or Jeremy) were okay and Michael was staring at Ryan’s back, watching him breathe and unabashedly wanting. He was always, always wanting; it wasn’t a secret.
Michael was stripped down to his boxers and undershirt (it smelled like gunpowder and the black grease he’d wiped on it after securing their ride) and Ryan was fully clothed. He had his damn boots on.
The light flickered across his back. His arm moved and pulled off the mask, dropping it next to him. The skull was stark against the bedspread’s cheerful pink flowers. His hair fell across the pillow, stringy with dried sweat, and he stared at the door.
“Ryan,” Michael croaked, voice raw from screaming yet dull from disuse. Ryan moved. The bedspread crinkled against itself and leather.
“Mmm,” he replied, disinterested but always knowing.
“I-“ Michael realized he didn’t actually have anything to say.
“I-“ he sat up and ignored the black dancing at the edges of his vision and the faint ringing in his ears.
He stood. His right ankle cracked (again). He shuffled the distance between their beds, dirty socks on dirtier carpet.
He swung one leg over Ryan’s hip, and Ryan twisted to accommodate him, blue eyes stark against inky black paint. Ryan’s hands moved up to grasp at the small of Michael’s back, and Michael stared at Ryan’s eyes. In Ryan’s eyes. Something about Ryan’s eyes.
The paint was smudged- the lines at his lips looked less like lines and more like a Hitler-‘stache-goatee combo. Michael touched his lower lip, swiped at it with his thumb, and smeared the black across the white of his cheek.
“They’re fine,” Ryan said.
“I know,” Michael replied. He streaked black across Ryan’s other cheek. Ryan blinked up at Michael.
“I love you,” Michael blurted. Ryan was silent. Michael hated himself a little bit more.
“I know,” Ryan murmured.
Michael kissed him stupid and immediately, immediately had to hold back a groan. Ryan’s lips tasted like minerals, like makeup, a taste that Michael never thought he would be able to enjoy on a man until his lips first (finally) found Ryan’s (back before It happened).
Michael pulled back slightly, lips ghosting across Ryan’s when he said, “God, you’re so fucking-“ Ryan’s lips met his again and he swallowed the words Michael hadn’t even formed. He pulled back, soft, soft, and whispered
“I know.”
“I know, I know,” his left hand traced up Michael’s back and settled in the curls at the base of his neck; his right hand slipped underneath the undershirt and settled into the curve at the base of Michael’s spine. Michael arched into the contact, eyes slipping shut and lips seeking Ryan’s again, more, more. Ryan’s tongue lapped at Michael’s lower lip and a ball of warmth shot down his chest, pooling in his belly as he pressed against the man beneath him and opened his mouth willingly, easily.
Their tongues slid together and Ryan let out a heavy sigh. The pads of his fingers grasped at Michael’s back. Michael slid his hands down Ryan’s sides (he shifted- his ribs were so sensitive, no. one. must. know) beneath the jacket and tugged insistently at his- tucked-in, Jesus- shirt.
“Christ, are you fucking forty?” Michael snickered, sitting back on the balls of his feet to watch as Ryan sat up, shrugged off his jacket, and pulled the soft, somehow-unsullied cotton shirt over his head.
“Close enough to it,” he replied, eyebrows popping up as he gave Michael That Look.
“Stop with your cradle robbing guilt trip bullshit and fucking-“ Michael yanked his shirt over his head and it caught, painfully, on his glasses, “-shitfuck,” the shirt and glasses went sailing to the floor and Michael fixed Blurry Ryan with the Other Look.
“I’m not laughing!” Ryan said, eyes wide and hands splayed at his shoulders like he was fucking getting arrested. No, bad image there. Bad. Boner killer.
“You’re not touching me, either, so c’mere,” Michael pressed himself to Ryan and sighed as their skin met. Michael’s nipples scraped against Ryan’s and he let out a tiny gasp. Ryan smiled. His teeth were gleaming white against the paint. Michael tangled his hands into Ryan’s hair and rolled his hips- just there- and groaned when he felt Ryan’s hardening dick press between his own length and his thigh.
He tucked his head into Ryan’s shoulder, mouth just slightly open as he licked and nibbled at the broad man’s shoulder. Ryan barely rocked against Michael, reaching behind to grab at the redhead’s ass and to run his hands up the bare expanse of his freckled back. Michael leaned back and met Ryan’s gaze, brown eyes hazy and pupils blown wide. Michael ground down a little harder and scraped his hands down Ryan’s front, scratching at his nipples and letting his hands slide to press against his sides.
He stared at Ryan, mesmerized, as the man’s breath caught and- Jesus- he felt his dick twitch. Michael leaned in, captured Ryan’s lips, and when the taller man moaned, he moaned right back. He reached for the fly on Ryan’s jeans and fumbled with the button. He pulled back.
“Fuckin’-“ He clambered off of Ryan and demanded, “Off,” gesturing to the garment that was currently obstructing his fun. Ryan’s lips twitched into a smile and Michael’s heart might have leapt into his throat a little bit. He slid out of his pants and underwear with the grace of a trained assassin, then reached over, hooked his fingers in Michael’s boxers, and pulled the redhead closer. His dick pressed against Michael’s still-clothed (why) member; Michael made a choked noise and his hips jerked forward at the contact.
“Ryan,” he hissed. He scooted back, away from Ryan (regrettable), folded his knees, and quickly yanked off his boxers. He practically rolled his body up Ryan’s entirety, and when their dicks touched, his eyes slipped shut. Ryan hummed, reached around to Michael’s ass, and pulled him closer. The TV lights flickered against their forms, legs tangled, messily thrusting and kissing and sighing and wanting.
Michael reached for their cocks and wrapped a fist around them, holding them together and pumping. Ryan sucked in a breath and choked out a, “Michael.”
“God, Ryan,” Michael nipped at the curve of Ryan’s neck and let go, kissing his way down his front and pushing at his hip to get him to roll onto his back. He folded his knees underneath himself and gripped his dick in one hand, pumping in earnest at the sight of Ryan, unapologetic, spread out in front of him.
He bent down, grasped the base of Ryan’s dick, and lapped at the precome beading at the top.
Ryan hissed. Michael’s mouth watered at his taste.
He closed his lips around the tip of Ryan’s cock and pushed his fist up from the base. He let his hand fall and slowly, slowly, took Ryan in his entirety. When his nose met shaved skin, he choked a bit and sucked his way back up, fluttering his tongue against Ryan and relishing the unsteady breaths that were heaving in and out of Ryan.
He swallowed around Ryan once, twice, and then thrice, then dropped down again. He looked up at Ryan and saw the face of a man who thought he’d hung the moon. He hollowed his cheeks and flattened his tongue against the head.
Ryan’s eyes closed, his head fell back, his mouth in an “o”, and Michael wanted that image, that sound, to play over and over in his mind forever. He dropped again, swallowed, and it was over- Ryan’s come was hot down his throat, and he pulled up, jerking Ryan and lapping at the head until the man choked out a fucked-out “Too much, a-ah-“
Michael pulled off, looking much too pleased with himself, and crawled up Ryan’s body. The older man grabbed the back of Michael’s head and crashed their lips together, licking into his mouth, drinking in Michael like he would die without this, without Michael Jones’ mouth on his.
His fist closed around Michael’s cock. Michael choked. “Jesus-“ Ryan’s thumb collected precome, smeared it up and down Michael’s length, then, suddenly, he let go and flipped them, somehow managing to look graceful while he dumped Michael on his freckly ass.
“Fuckin’ warn a guy, mayb- fuck, shit, yes,” Ryan was lapping at his balls, dragging his hand up and down Michael’s cock, pressing a thumb into his perineum. Ryan was everywhere,
“God, fuck, fuck, Ryan,” Michael moaned, then came with a wordless cry, his lean body tensing, toes flexing and pointing as Ryan lapped his come from his cockhead.
Michael's eyes slipped closed.
The plasticky floral fabric crinkled. Ryan’s weight was gone.
Michael’s heart sank.
He heard the sink start, some splashing, a swear, and the distinct sound of a towel being dragged over skin.
Crinkle.
The mattress sagged on the left side. Michael rolled over and opened his eyes to meet the gaze of one Ryan Haywood; not the Mad King, not the Vagabond, but Ryan Haywood, the man with the blue eyes who needed to shave. He clambered under the covers and was delighted to find that Ryan was still completely unclothed.
He tangled his legs with Ryan’s and looked up at the older man to find him fondly looking down at Michael. He stretched up and pressed his lips to Ryan’s- chaste, short. He pulled back and closed his eyes.
“I love you,” Ryan whispered.
Michael opened his eyes. Steady blue. Half of Ryan’s face was lit up, florescent, dancing.
The TV hummed.
“I know.”