Chapter Text
Giopara keeps watch over Jayce while he sleeps. It’s nice to laze in bed for once, watching the angle of the light change through the curtains. The room is quiet and still, a slice of pale blue peace. There’s a satisfying ache in his legs, and he’s perfectly comfortable in the messy bunch of pillows and sheets wrapped around them. He thought he’d get stir crazy after too long, unaccustomed to doing nothing, but he likes being here next to Jayce. He cards his fingers through Jayce’s soft hair, finger nails scratching slow patterns across the shorn hairs on the back of his head. Jayce doesn’t stir, chest rising in slow, even breaths below the sheet draped over him.
Giopara can’t help the smile that tugs at the corners of his mouth. He was quick to fall asleep after sex, too, but while the quiet of the room could lull him into a doze, he’s perfectly alert, aware that this rare, tender thing blooming between them could disappear if he closes his eyes.
He’s fucked this part up, before. Ruined the fragile intimacy born from mind-blowing orgasms, broke it into ugly pieces because he didn’t know what to do with it. He always assumed sex without feelings was normal, was what everyone wanted. You don’t have to think too hard when you stick your dick into someone. That’s how it was with Viktor for a long time—even the most important person in his life had waited years before admitting any kind of emotional attachment. And hey, how was sex with your alternate dimension self supposed to be touchy-feely, anyway? If Giopara had sex with a younger or older version of himself, it certainly wouldn’t be like this. It would be a novelty, a bucket list item, I fucked my clone and it was hot.
He thought that was all there was going to be to it. They’d finally have sex, and he’d have the satisfaction of getting the thing that was driving him crazy. Once the high was over, it would be out of their systems, and the bigger question of how to send Jayce home would once again take precedence. That’s it; dick wet; back to work.
But he wants more. He thought he scratched the itch, but it’s still there, growing across his skin, burning everything it touches. He wants to do this again, happy to ignore everything and let Jayce sit on his face. Or ride him. Or whatever else he wants; Giopara is happy to oblige.
There’s no way he’s can move on now that he knows how it feels when Jayce clenches down on his cock right before he comes. Even now, the memory stirs a little bit of heat in him. He’s had a taste, and it will never leave his mouth, coating every word he’ll speak to Jayce until he’s gone. He can’t talk about this to anyone else, no chance to spit it out, so Jayce is going to be a part of him forever, probably. He can’t tell whether that’s a curse or a relief.
Why do I want you so much, huh, sweetheart? He thinks as he pets Jayce’s hair. What are you doing to me?
He dreads what comes next from here. When Jayce wakes up and remembers this was a far cry from a casual sexual experiment, he’s going to flip his shit. Leave and pretend it never happened. Jayce has a Viktor to get back to, and that’s what matters. Giopara could try to say something, but he knows it would only come out wrong. He never gets the feelings shit right.
It’s going to hurt like hell, and Giopara really doesn’t have the energy to summon his usual nonchalance, but he’ll find it, anyway. He has years of practice of this with Viktor. Tell him something he doesn’t already fucking know. It’s too much, turning him inside out, so he does what he’s always done—shove it down and forget about it.
He eases himself out of bed, and as his muscles protest, he feels distinctly too old. He showers, then heads to the kitchen to scrounge together whatever he can eat for lunch. Jayce has started keeping some stuff in the fridge, claiming he’s always hungry before bed, and Giopara wipes it clean. He’ll buy more later.
At the kitchen table, he finds Jayce’s notes and corrects them while he eats. He circles the parts he think will work, scratches out the ones that won’t, and jots down the thoughts that come to him. Jayce’s ideas are decent; testing them is the real problem. If they get it wrong, they likely won’t have a chance to try again. Jayce could be sent anywhere, and the thought of him stranded somewhere makes Giopara’s heart squeeze painfully.
A couple hours later, Jayce still hasn’t woken up, so Giopara goes back to the bedroom to rouse him. He ends up laying in bed with Jayce for a little while longer, instead, drawn in by the soft bedding and post-lunch blood sugar drop. Jayce won’t be happy he slept so long, but clearly he needed it.
And besides, Giopara doesn’t want to break this temporary peace between them—clinging to the last moments before it’s ripped away from him. Selfish, he’s selfish, but he can’t stop himself. He closes his eyes and tries to clear his mind. He wants to be present, here, for the first day he’s been genuinely content since…well, since Viktor left him.
Just when his nerves won’t let him stay still any longer, Jayce wakes up, lashes fluttering as his eyes adjust to the light. He stretches his arms and legs out to tense his body into one, long line before going limp. His tanned skin shines in the late afternoon sun, the brightest color in the room.
“Hey, sweetheart,” Giopara says quietly, rubbing a thumb over his cheekbone. The words come out before he can think twice, and he bites down on the inside of his cheek. Stupid. He braces himself for Jayce’s impending panic.
“Hey,” Jayce’s voice is thick with sleep, and he turns his head to press a kiss to the center of Giopara’s palm. His lips are dry and warm. Giopara wonders if Jayce mistakes him for Viktor, somehow, his brain foggy and still catching up.
Jayce closes his eyes again, like sleep is attempting to pull him under. For a heartbeat, Giopara hopes he’s got more time—and then Jayce’s eyes fly open. He puts the pieces together, plain as day on his face, and jerks back like he’s been burned.
Giopara pulls his hand away and sits up, heart sinking in his chest. Right. Jayce tugs the sheet off him and sits up as well, but keeps his gaze down, fixed on the rumpled bedding in front of him. They’re still body-warmed from the heat that Jayce bleeds in his sleep. His cowlick is sticking up on the top of his head, and Giopara wishes he could fix it for him.
The awkward silence in the room is a physical weight, squeezing him from all sides. It’s been a long while since Giopara has had a one night stand—that’s what this is, functionally—and the words to kick-start this conversation fail him. He curls his hand into a fist and squeezes until his nails bite into his palm, forcing a neutral expression on his face. He’s nervous, for fuck’s sake, heart thumping in his chest. He shouldn’t be.
“How long did I sleep?” Jayce rubs at his eyes.
“All afternoon.”
“Shit,” Jayce says. “Why didn’t you wake me?”
“You were out like a light. I tried to wake you earlier, but you wouldn’t get up,” Giopara lies.
Jayce just grunts in response and shifts to swing his legs off the opposite side of the bed. He catches sight of the magazine that Giopara left on the bedside table and cringes.
“Please tell me you didn’t read it.”
“Ha,” Giopara grins. “It was pretty bad, princess. I can use my real dick much better.”
“Shut up,” Jayce grumbles, looking away. He runs a hand over his face, then clears his throat. His shoulders are pulled up high as he curls in on himself, back turned to Giopara. There’s a long, thick scar cutting across his back, which Giopara missed earlier. It looks freshly healed—and like it hurt. Jayce has never mentioned it, and now’s not the time to ask, but it seems important enough for him to remember.
“I’m gonna, uh, shower,” Jayce says quickly, already making his way there.
“Sure,” Giopara replies as lightly as he can. He sits on the bed and counts to one hundred. That wasn’t so bad, and Giopara is fine. He’s fine.
Jayce stays in the bathroom for longer than he needs to, and Giopara has fuck all to do while he waits. There’s nothing at home to distract him because he’s never here, so he resigns himself to reading over Jayce’s notes again, double checking his work. He doesn’t need to, and it only takes a few minutes. Then he sits on the couch, wishing that the view from his living room window was nicer. By the time Jayce comes out, it’s dusk, the sun fallen behind the row of townhouses across the street from his.
Jayce still won’t meet Giopara’s eyes, and Giopara can’t be here any longer or he’s going to break something, just to get this poisonous mixture of awkwardness and anxiety out of him.
“I’m heading back to the lab. Coming with me?”
“No.” Jayce releases a heavy sigh. “I need to go somewhere and think about anything else right now.”
“Okay.” Giopara considers his options and feels weirdly like he’s being asked to pick a date spot. “Are you hungry? I can tell you where there’s a good place to eat near here.”
“Uh, not really. And I don’t want to go out alone.”
Giopara scoffs. “I’m not getting it for you.” Actually, he would like to, but that’s not how this is.
“That’s fine!” Jayce says quickly. He opens his mouth to say something else, then seemingly thinks better of it and closes it again.
Giopara represses the urge to snap at him. Jayce is clearly struggling, so he tries to think of what he would do when he wants nothing more than to turn his brain off. With Viktor, he would lay on top of Jayce and hold him down until he was aware of nothing but the slide of Viktor’s cock in and out of him.
Now, it’s getting shit-faced, but he feels horrible shoving a bottle into Jayce’s hand to make things better. That’s not a habit he wants him to copy.
“What do you usually do to relax?” Easier to turn the question on him.
Jayce’s blush is back, and Giopara has a feeling he’s about to learn something new about him.
“Is there a bathhouse around here?”
Giopara takes him to the Clan Ferros bathhouse. He hasn’t bothered to come for years, always forced to make the rounds instead of enjoying himself, but it’s a perk from his dear sponsor, so he might as well use it. As they walk there, the sky turns steadily darker, until only the orange glow of the street lamps lights their way. While the streets are mostly empty, they stay close to the shadows to avoid anyone getting a look at their faces. Neither of them say a word, and Giopara can see the gears turning in Jayce’s head from where h watches him out the corner of his eye.
The bathhouse sits at the edge of the Clan Ferros grounds, separated far enough from the manor that he won’t run into any familiar faces. It’s a massive stone structure surrounded by an iron gate, the clan symbol carved above the heavy wooden doors to the entrance. Jayce looks around like he’s never been here before, taking in the details with wide eyes. All Giopara can see is his sponsor’s obsession with bragging rights—which includes him. He pulls out his key to the grounds and lets them in quietly.
Inside, they are greeted to the Ferros’ taste for grand architecture in all its glory. The main room is dominated by a large, rectangular pool, the water glowing a soft green-blue. The whole building is carved out of white stone, now shaded blue by the water’s reflection. A domed ceiling extends high above them, covered with lines of gold that form concentric gear patterns. Along either side of the pool is a pathway lined by arched columns, leading into the sprawl of rooms further inside.
“Wow,” Jayce whispers, voice echoing off the tile. Giopara smiles to himself.
The bathhouse can fit hundreds of people, meant for hosting large parties and galas, which gives them plenty of space to find a spot where they won’t be bothered. No one here is to party tonight, and the sound of their feet hitting the stone floor seems too loud in the empty space. He leads them down the pathway, looking for a private side pool deep into the building where no one will see them.
They pass by a few people here and there, most of them couples too wrapped up in each other to notice them. They’re swimming or resting on the side of the pool in varying states of undress. You know what to expect when you come here late at night, and while he’s unfazed by the naked bodies he sees, Jayce is not. His modesty is both ridiculous and endearing as he stares resolutely forward, ignoring any bare skin.
After a couple of minutes of walking, Giopara spots an empty pool that looks good enough for them. As soon as they round the corner and the pool comes fully into view, he sees it’s already taken. A couple is pressed into the back corner, one sitting on the edge while the other in the water eats her out, hands gripped on either side of her hips.
Giopara quickly looks away and keeps going. Jayce grabs him by his shirt sleeve and tugs on it.
“I did not want to see that,” he hisses once they’re far enough away not to be heard. “Is everyone here to have sex?”
“They’re here for the same thing we are. To relax.” Giopara smirks at him.
Finally, they reach a small, circular pool tucked away in an alcove. A waterfall flows from a spout built into the wall, filling the space with the sound of rushing water.
“Here will do.” He strips off his shoes and shirt unceremoniously, left in just in his board shorts. Miraculously, he had a second pair to give to Jayce, buried in a bottom drawer he couldn’t remember the last time he opened. Jayce doesn’t skinny-dip, apparently, so he keeps his board shorts on. Shame.
As gracefully as he can without cracking his skull on the floor, he lowers himself to sit at the edge of the pool and slides his body into the water. It’s hot, like a bath, and he lets out a low groan as the heat seeps into his sore muscles.
The water level is waist-high around the edges of the pool, deeper in the middle. He ducks underneath the surface to let the water surround him, keeping his eyes closed. The world goes blissfully quiet, muffled by the water above him. He hovers at the bottom of the pool until his lungs protest.
Once he comes up for air, he notices Jayce is still standing where he was before, fully clothed and staring at him.
“Go fetch me a towel, pool boy,” Giopara says, pushing his wet hair out of his face. Jayce just rolls his eyes at him and takes his clothes off silently. He’s blushing all over, from his cheeks down his neck and chest. Out of reflex, Giopara starts to crack a joke, then lets it die half-formed. Jayce can’t handle it right now.
Instead, Giopara watches him silently while he undresses, muscles shifting underneath his broad back. He’ll never get tired of looking at Jayce, and he does his best not to let his body react to it.
Jayce eases himself into the water opposite of him, and at last, the pinched expression on his face smooths out. He sighs in pleasure, tilting his head back and closing his eyes. Giopara pretends that doesn’t sting.
Moving away from Jayce, he wades backwards through the water until his legs hit the curved bench built along the inside of pool. He sits and stretches his arms out behind him, lifting his body slightly so his legs float in front of him.
Awkward company aside, this was a pretty good idea. It’s a shame he’ll never be able to come back without thinking of Jayce. He never took Viktor here; he hated the idea of showing his body in public, and Jayce understood why, but Viktor was missing out. This would be perfect if he wasn’t haunted by the strung-out version of himself who’s struggling to accept they fucked. Giopara doesn’t know how to fix it, so he just gives Jayce space for the rain cloud over his head to run dry.
The rush of water in the background feels like a wall between them, occupying the silence so they don’t have to speak to each other. He wonders if that was intentional on Jayce’s part. Jayce is still ignoring him, submerging himself underneath the water for good measure. Giopara wishes that he would just rip the band-aid off—have his freak-out, pin the blame on him, tell him to fuck off. Anything is better than the silent treatment, waiting to be handed down his sentence for crossing the line.
The tentative truce they built is shot to hell. And yet Giopara can’t bring himself to regret what happened.
Since Jayce doesn’t want to talk, he closes his eyes and lets the ambience wash over him. He hears the splash of water from when Jayce comes back up, the movement of the water brushing up against his body. He can feel Jayce’s eyes on him and decides he doesn’t care.
He loses track of how long he stays there, body suspended gently in the water, trying to forget who he is and everything he’s going to have to face tomorrow.
“Thanks,” Jayce’s voice breaks him out of the trance. He almost doesn’t hear the words over the background noise.
Giopara cracks one eye open to look at him. “Huh?”
“Thanks. For taking me here.”
“Oh. No problem.”
Jayce is staring at the water in front of him, but he glances up at the words. He holds eye contact only for a second before he’s looking away, again. Here we go.
“How are you so…okay, about this?”
“I’m not saving myself for marriage.”
Jayce lets out a strained little laugh. “Fuck off. I mean…okay with us having sex.”
Giopara looks up at the ceiling, praying for wisdom he knows he doesn’t have. “We both wanted it, right? It’s okay to let yourself have what you want.” Jayce has no response, so he keeps going, running his mouth without being aware of what’s he’s saying.
“It was like that with Viktor, for me. We had chemistry, it made sense to fall into bed with each other. You don’t have to think too hard about it.” Which was true until it got messy, endorphins spiraling into feelings neither of them knew how to communicate.
Giopara doesn’t need to explain to Jayce how important Viktor is to them. Their connection—partnership, relationship, whatever you want to call it—is unlike anything else they could have with another person. Viktor was the only person in the world who understood him, and that translated to sex. Despite all their bickering, hot one day and cold the next, whenever he was with Viktor, it felt right.
Physical chemistry is simple to understand and to act on. This should be even more simple. They aren’t together; Jayce is not in love with him, and frankly he should not be this hung up over it. Has he never had a one-night stand? Maybe he feels bad for sleeping with someone other than Viktor, but Giopara knows that his Viktor would just be disappointed he wasn’t there to participate.
“I just…don’t know what I’m doing.”
That makes two of us, Giopara thinks. “You’re swimming,” is what he says out loud.
Jayce groans in frustration. “I meant…if this is going to change things, between us.”
“It doesn’t have to.” Yeah, he can pretend. That’s what they’re doing now. It feels like getting stomped on the pavement, but this wasn’t going to end any other way.
Still, he’s never been able to deny himself the things he wants. “If you don’t want it to,” he adds after a pause.
Jayce trails his hand through the water for a long moment before swallowing hard. “I still want us to be able to work together. I need to get home.”
“Of course. That’s not a question,” Giopara can say that earnestly.
“And I’m sure you want me gone,” Jayce shakes his head ruefully. “Out of your hair, so you can go back to normal.”
Giopara hums. Two days ago, he did want that. He imagines Jayce walking through the finished portal, the flash of blue light that ends this bizarre interruption in his life. He’ll have the lab all to himself, time for his projects again, left to work in peace. The only person he has to think about is Viktor, and only on the opposite side of the Mercury Hammer. They’ll go through the regular routine of fight, fuck, leave the other one behind, and then lick their wounds until they can contrive the next chance to hurt each other. Or until Viktor kills him.
And then he imagines what would happen if the portal never works. They keep trying, over and over again, but they always fail, and at some point they’re forced to decide to give up or hurt themselves by pushing too hard. Jayce would be stuck here, permanently, until his Viktor manages to come get him. Jayce is left with Giopara indefinitely, to accept his fate and carve out a place for him in this world where he doesn’t belong.
He knows Jayce doesn’t want that. He loves his Viktor, wants his life back, too. And Giopara will honor that. He’ll do everything in his power to help, and they’ll succeed. They’re the smartest people in Piltover, for fuck’s sake.
And he hates to see Jayce torn up about it. He can sympathize all too well with the pain of not being able to get something to work—as rare as it was—because he’s angry at himself for not coming up with a solution to this problem already, too. He has the advantage of being in his home dimension, more years and resources to work on Hextech than Jayce had, and quite literally the ability to clone himself. There’s no reason why they can’t make it work, but it's where they’re at. Uncharted waters, as Viktor would say. He loved a good metaphor.
Maybe it’s not so bad, having someone to share the lab with again. If Jayce never managed to leave, Giopara wouldn’t mind him staying. That makes him selfish, for stealing Jayce from Viktor, taking what isn’t his. A Jayce separated from a Viktor is miserable; he would know. He’s selfish, and he can blame it on years of resentment towards Viktor, years of bone-deep loneliness. Or he can blame the magnetic force Jayce has exerted on him from the moment he arrived, drawing positive to negative until they’re joined together, unable to be pulled apart.
“Jayce, I’m not kicking you out. You can stay for as long as you need. We’ll get you home, I promise.” Whatever you want. I’ll make it happen.
That gets Jayce to perk up, a hopeful expression spreading across his features. But it’s gone too soon. “Sorry it’s taking so long. I didn’t think it would be this difficult. Viktor and I invented the Hexgates from scratch, but I’m still way out of my depth.”
“Yeah, me too. Inter-dimensional travel wasn’t on my list of commissions.”
“You do commissions?” Jayce questions. “Like people pay you to make them stuff?”
“Yeah.” Giopara raises an eyebrow. “That’s how the apprenta system works, here. The rights to your work are bid on by the clans. Whoever bids the highest is who you work for, and you work on whatever they want you to. Do you not have that in your world?”
“No,” Jayce shakes his head. “I work as part of the Academy. The Council sponsored our Hexgates research. Now that they’re finished, we’ve been trying to get them to fund our other projects. Hextech wasn’t supposed to be a commercial venture. We wanted to bring magic into the life of the common man.”
Jayce’s expression comes to life as he talks. “We created gemstones that could power tools, to make work easier in the Undercity. But Heimerdinger told us we needed to test them for years before we could distribute them. Said they weren’t safe, even though we found a way to strengthen the crystals so they wouldn’t explode under pressure.”
Interesting. So he and Viktor had actually managed to work together with a crystal, for a good cause. He’s intensely grateful Jayce was spared from his own timeline’s events. Giopara will never be able to unsee the mangled corpses he found in Viktor’s laboratory in Zaun.
“Just do it anyway,” Giopara cocks his head. “Heimer’s always been a pushover. He’ll come around.”
Jayce grimaces, his earlier passion slipping away. “We never got the chance. Viktor…Viktor died, and—”
“He died?” Giopara sits up suddenly, splashing the water around him.
“Yeah, he and I were in the Council Chambers when they were bombed. The explosion killed him.”
That never happened here. He assumes there’s a connection with Jayce being a Councilor, maybe with the scar on his back, too, but all Giopara’s brain can process is Viktor died. He reigns in the panic threatening to claw out of his throat and wills his voice to stay even.
“So he’s…gone?”
Jayce only looks more miserable. “No. I was able to use the Hexcore to heal his body. We were studying it to see if could be the key to saving Viktor’s life before his illness…killed him, and it was the only thing I could think of to save him. It fused with his body, and he was in a coma for a while. When he woke up, he was a different person. He left me. Said our paths diverged, then disappeared.”
“Where’d he go? Zaun?”
“He started some kind of Arcane cult, way out on the fringes of the Undercity. I went looking for him, found out that he was taking cores from the Hexgates’ failsafe to sustain whatever magic he was using. I was trying to make him see reason, that it wasn’t our vision for Hextech. But we were interrupted by a wild rune, and it sent me here.”
Goddamn. For the second time in one day, Giopara is at a loss for words. He was banking on some false assumptions, apparently. Nearly everything in their pasts is different; related more by name than life events. Jayce really kept him in the dark, and while he can’t fault him for not wanting to spill his life story, he feels caught on the back foot. There’s a new layer to Jayce’s moods and his desperation to get home, and his mind races back to all their previous conversations.
The entire time, Jayce has talked about Viktor like they’re together, like he has someone to get back to. Not that their partnership went up in flames, in somehow even worse fashion than Giopara and the Machine Herald’s. The idea of his Viktor starting a magical cult is so absurd he has to hold back a bark of laughter. It makes him wonder if all four of them aren’t so similar to each other, after all.
“I just…want my partner back,” Jayce finishes, blinking back tears. Yeah, so do I.
“Wow. Uh, that’s a lot,” Giopara offers when he’s been silent for too long, trying to come up with something emotionally sensitive. “None of that happened to me.”
“Good,” Jayce offers a small smile, a real one.
Is that it? Giopara thinks. No bitter rant, no kicking and screaming, no reaching for something strong enough to make him forget about how fucked up his life has become? Giopara has done all of those, in order, too many times to admit. Jayce should be furious, making it everyone’s problem, starting with Viktor himself. Instead, he’s just…determined to get back and fix things.
Like he has hope.
And that’s what makes Jayce truly different from him. Despite going through near-death explosions, being tossed aside by the person he loves, then teleported to another dimension, he hasn’t changed. He believes he can turn things around. Convince Viktor to take him back. Make the world a better place, together.
He can verbalize it, too. Unstick the matted, choking clump of feelings in his chest and lay them bare in all their ugliness. He feels so much more than Giopara—who’d rather not feel anything at all—and despite that, Jayce opens up anyway. The weight should crush him, but he makes it look so easy.
If they really are the same person, then everything in Jayce must be in Giopara, or at some point was. Maybe he used to be Jayce, a long, long time ago. If he ever was, he can’t remember it well. He always prided himself on being unaffected. It makes him more efficient and driven than other people, got him where he wanted to be faster, a worthy trade for accomplishing his dreams. He gained more than he lost.
He grieves that vulnerability, now, for the love he could’ve saved by keeping it.
Mixed in is a sense of admiration for Jayce, a word that’s taken him a long time to put his finger on. He has all the good things about Giopara—the few ones he still has and all the ones he’s lost. In spite of every shitty and unfortunate thing he’s been subjected to, Jayce has managed to preserve the best version of themselves. He’s naive, sure, in a way that’s going to bite him in the ass. It already has and will again.
But Jayce has fought to stay himself. Held onto what he believed in at the cost of personal sacrifice. He’s brave and strong and full of passion.
And Viktor is a fucking idiot for walking away from him. Jayce didn’t let go of Viktor intentionally, didn’t put his pride over their partnership. Walking away from Giopara is understandable: he was always going to break things, one way or another, because he let the soft parts of him be excised instead of nurtured. But this Jayce hasn’t made those mistakes—and won’t.
He hopes Jayce gets to keep his dreams and his Viktor. He dreams of keeping Jayce.
Giopara is so zoned out that it takes him an embarrassing amount of time to notice that Jayce looks shy, a little wide-eyed as he waits for Giopara to respond. “You’re staring.”
“Sorry,” Giopara shakes his head once to snap out of it. “Don’t worry about it. You’ll get Viktor back.”
“I hope,” Jayce says, though he looks unsure. “Sometimes I wonder if he’ll ever forgive me. For bringing him back, even though he told me to destroy the Hexcore. For making him something…inhuman.”
“I’d still save him, too.” Giopara knows that with absolute certainty. He would do anything to keep Viktor, in whatever form that meant—magical or machine. Giopara will never be able to give him up, will never stop crawling back to him. Even if it’s pathetic, if Viktor doesn’t want him any more. He can’t let go and he hates himself for it. He’s learned that well over these past years.
“Really?” Jayce looks at him with hope for absolution, so earnest it takes him aback for a moment. It makes Giopara feel even worse to know that Jayce has doubted himself, carried this fear alone.
One day, he’ll tell Jayce everything that happened between him and his Viktor. He knows that, now; that Jayce can handle the truth, has trusted Giopara with his own. But later. Right now, he’s in a more important conversation.
“Yeah, sweetheart.” Then he adds the words he was looking for earlier: “I’m proud of you.”
Whatever Jayce sees in his expression sends a wave of realization, then relief, over his face. Without warning, he cuts through the water to embrace him, arms squeezing around his waist. His fingers dig into his sides like he’s afraid of letting go.
Giopara hugs him back, resting his chin on Jayce’s shoulder. He smells like chlorine and Giopara’s shampoo. Feeling Jayce cling to him like a lifeline, he wishes he could say exactly what Jayce needs to hear. That he was a better version of himself to match Jayce.
Jayce heaves out a strangled, wet sob, and that self-pity flies out the window.
Once the tears start, Jayce can’t seem to stop them. Uneven, shuddering cries that sound ripped out from his lungs, shaking his chest with the force of them. Giopara’s collarbone grows steadily wet, droplets running down to mix with the water around them. He just holds Jayce, rubbing a hand over his back in slow circles.
“’S okay, baby,” he murmurs. “I got you. It’s just us.”
It hits him that it really is just them. Here in this pool, in this timeline. Both Jayces without their Viktors, treading water in a rip current that threatens to pull them under. He won’t let it, though.
He can give Jayce what he needs, right now. It just requires him to think about what he would need—forcing him to cut through the scar tissue he built over the memories of Viktor taking care of him. It’s painful, and for anyone else, he wouldn’t even consider it. But he’ll do it for Jayce.
He gives himself permission, and the words flow out of him, whisper-soft.
You did well. I’m so proud of you. It’s not your fault.
You’ll find him. I know he’s looking for you, too. He loves you.
It’s gonna be okay. We’ll get you home. I promise.
Eventually, Jayce’s cries turn into hiccups, then small breaths. Giopara waits patiently as Jayce comes back to himself. He never stops the motions of his hand, a grounding touch he can cling to. Once Jayce has been calm and silent for a full minute, he checks in. “You okay, angel?”
“Yeah.” Jayce’s voice is hoarse. “‘M sorry for crying.”
“Don’t be,” Giopara hushes him.
In response, Jayce shifts his head to press a lingering kiss on Giopara’s neck. Chaste, barely there. He repeats it with a little more pressure, sending a shiver up Giopara’s spine.
“What are you doing?” He asks breathlessly.
Jayce doesn’t say anything at first, just keeps trailing kisses across the side of his neck wherever he can reach.
“I want you,” he confesses, his breath warm on the shell of his ear.
“You have me, baby,” Giopara assures him.
Jayce pulls back to face him. There are those big doe eyes, again. They’re a little glossy, his eyelashes dried into points from the tears. He stares at Giopara with a world of emotion, intense as a source of light.
Without thinking, Giopara slides his hands up to cradle the sides of Jayce’s face. He squeezes gently, holding Jayce there.
“You have me,” he repeats, as honest and true as he can convey.
The words are barely out of his mouth before Jayce is crashing his lips onto his. He kisses messy, graceless, like he’s trying to meld them together. Giopara draws him even closer, parting Jayce’s lips with the press of his tongue and licking into his mouth, tasting salt. He swallows the little moans Jayce releases, chasing them to the source. When Jayce has to break for air, panting, Giopara turns his attention to a spot underneath his jaw. He hardly gets one kiss in before Jayce is hauling him back up with a firm hand on the back of his neck, demanding his attention with tongue and teeth.
He has no idea how long they kiss, purely overwhelmed by the slick, plush sensation of Jayce’s mouth. Nothing else exists but the two of them. He could stay here forever, suspended in a single moment of bliss.
At some point, Jayce’s hands move down to grip his ass. They squeeze possessively, then curve down to where his thigh starts. One hand pushes his left leg up to slide in between Jayce’s thighs. Through the haze of pleasure, Giopara still has the mind to keep his hands by Jayce’s face, conscious of Jayce’s earlier misgivings. He apparently has none now, though, as he grinds forward into Giopara’s cock.
“Hey,” he stops them. “There are other people here, still.” Embarrassment flits across Jayce’s face, and Giopara hurries to finish what he was going to say. “I want you, too. I just want you to be comfortable. Do you want to go home?”
Jayce bites down on his lip, watching Giopara closely.
“I’m okay here, if you are,” and fuck, if that isn’t a challenge Giopara will take him up on.
“Yeah, okay, kitten. What do you want?”
“I want you to…uh, like we saw before.”
Giopara’s brain takes a second to catch what Jayce is referring to. “You want me to eat you out?”
He nods, pupils blown out.
“Gotta stay quiet, then, sweetheart. It echoes in here.”
He guides Jayce to sit on the edge of the pool, as hidden from view as possible. He removes Jayce’s board shorts—fuck, he loves Jayce’s tight little ass—and shoves them underneath him as a cushion from the hard, cold stone. Once Jayce is comfortable, Giopara steps back slightly to take in the sight of Jayce fully on display. His skin is flushed a warm pink, sprinkled with water droplets that catch the light. Giopara can see the bruises he left on his hips, before, and fits his fingers over them now. Pride flickers through him as he admires the marks. Jayce exhales a little puff of air at the pressure, squirming slightly.
“You’re gorgeous,” he says in a low voice. “So pretty, all for me.”
“For you,” Jayce agrees, but there’s self-consciousness in his posture. Giopara crowds into Jayce, covering him with his body. He lingers there, letting him get used to being exposed before they go any further. He trusts Jayce to tell him when he’s ready, and he does, gently pushing Giopara back.
Giopara goes easily, assessing how to position Jayce best. He decides on kneeling on the bench in the water and Jayce laying on his back, a little further away from the edge. Like this, he can lean over and curl his hands around Jayce’s thighs for balance.
It’s a shame he can’t talk Jayce through it, so he gets straight to the point. With a broad, slow stroke, he laves his tongue over Jayce’s hole. Jayce clenches at the first contact, hips jerking on reflex, then wills himself to relax.
“Good boy,” Giopara praises, knowing exactly what effect those words will have. Jayce’s whole body goes loose, sinking into a warm, fuzzy space. His half-hard cock twitches on his stomach.
Giopara is patient, coaxing Jayce’s body to work with him, not against him. He uses obscene amounts of spit, dripping down his chin and all over Jayce’s hole. The slick, filthy noises are masked by the ripples in the water as Giopara shifts his weight every so often. Between washes of his tongue, he presses it gently into Jayce, fucking him open bit by bit. He tries not to tease, though it’s incredibly tempting. He could spend hours here, buried in between Jayce’s thighs, letting him take what he wants, suffocating him.
Once he finds the right pace, he reaches up to take Jayce’s cock in hand. He’s fully hard, now, and gasps loudly at the squeeze of Giopara’s fist around him. The sound is quickly cut off by Jayce clapping a hand over his mouth to stifle it, but it still echoes around them. A wave of arousal rushes through Giopara. His dick is straining in his board shorts, but he ignores it.
Between the drag of his hand on his cock and the steady press of his tongue, Jayce is close. He rocks his hips forward in little thrusts, seeking more friction. The pleasure builds higher and higher until Jayce is tightening around his tongue, then coming over his hand in warm, sticky pulses. Giopara works him steadily through it, relenting only when Jayce pushes weakly at his forehead.
With a last, open-mouthed kiss to Jayce’s hole, Giopara drops his head to rest on the inside of Jayce’s thigh. Staring up at him—naked and perfect and framing Giopara’s broad shoulders—he hopes he’s chased every bit of worry out of Jayce’s mind.
Gradually, he’s aware of the pain in his knees from kneeling on the pool surface, so he straightens up. Jayce hasn’t moved, one arm thrown over his eyes, the other spread out like a starfish. Satisfaction curls through Giopara, warm and heady.
“Well done, baby,” he smiles. “You did so good for me. Such a good boy.” Jayce moans sweetly, quiet enough for only him to hear.
He washes off his dirty hand in the water, wholly unconcerned about the mess. Once clean, he rubs his hands soothingly over Jayce’s thighs, letting the cool water regulate his overheated body.
He expects Jayce to need a break to calm down, but it’s after only a few touches that Jayce is rolling onto his side, then lifting himself to sit up.
“Your turn,” he says, eyes bright. “Where do you want my mouth?”
The words send the remaining blood in Giopara’s head all the way down to his cock. He stutters for a moment, then hears himself say, “Can you suck me off?”
Jayce needs no further instruction, sending a splash of water around them as he enthusiastically swaps their positions. It makes them laugh a little, an awkward, playful moment so much lighter than the mood before.
Giopara lasts embarrassingly short, the threads of his self-control unraveling under Jayce’s expert use of his mouth. No surprise, really, and Jayce looks smug when he pulls off the head of Giopara’s cock. He opens his mouth to comment on it, probably, but Giopara cuts him off by shoving his tongue down his throat, mixing the taste of them together.
When they part for air, the look of unguarded happiness on Jayce’s face makes everything seem so simple. Maybe Giopara is good at this, after all.
“Take me home, Jayce.”