Work Text
“Like kissing my brother,” Adam says, the tension practically steaming off his shoulders, and Chris thinks: well, shit.*He has sex with Rachel. It’s not great.“Psychological factors are responsible for ten to twenty percent of erectile dysfunction,” Nick enlightens him.“There was no dysfuckingfunction,” Chris snaps. He empties the pitcher into his glass a little too violently, and glares at the skyrocketing foam. “It went fine. Just... fine wasn’t what I was going for, y’know?”“This is why you gotta fuck the really hot chicks right away,” says Ortu. “If you let your expectations build up too much, you’re gonna be disappointed no matter what.”Adam shakes his head. “I gotta say, having this asshole around really hammers it home how far you two have come,” he tells Chris and Nick.“This is why you gotta fuck the really hot people right away,” Ortu amends. “You know what I’m saying, though? You live the, like, the ideal scenario in your head over and over, and then reality doesn’t stand a chance.”Chris remembers the soft shape of Adam’s lips, smushed against his for an awkward half-second. “I dunno,” he says, watching the line between beer and foam gradually rise up his glass. “Sometimes reality throws you a whole different ideal scenario.”Ortu points a threatening finger at him. “You better not be thinking about settling for bad sex just ‘cause you like her or some shit,” he warns. “I will hold you an intervention here and now.”Adam is smiling at his phone. Probably texting the douche with the Prius. Who the hell just carries kayaks around with them, like, all the time? What, like he thinks there’s going to be some kind of emergency flood situation?God, Chris is an idiot.*Rachel dumps him for Dorothy Cuda. He can’t even blame her. He should have known Adam was gay years ago, because no one with even the slightest appreciation for the female form passes up a shot at Dorothy Cuda.They did have some good sex before she cut and ran, so he still has a shred of pride left. He’s not confident that he’ll be hanging onto it much longer, not with those skinny jeans Adam has started tentatively wearing, but for the moment he can show his face in public.He’s taking wrist shots at his garage door when he finds out Prius-douche is out of the picture. Adam wanders out with a two-liter of Coke dangling from his hand and announces, “I’m never dating anyone with a printed personal manifesto about artificial sweeteners ever again,” and then he glugs down a quarter of the bottle without taking a breath, and Chris accidentally takes out the front porch lightbulb with his next shot.“I thought you liked him,” he says, putting down his stick before the property damage exceeds his sad little excuse for a savings account.Adam shrugs. “I liked his face,” he says. “I liked his dick. But we didn’t really have anything in common.” He picks up the stick and starts flipping a street puck on the blade. “You catch the game last night? I yelled so loud at that interception Martha busted through my door with a first aid kit.”“Yeah, I think I heard you all the way over here.” Chris takes a swig of the Coke. “Mmmm, tasty chemical goodness.”“If he saw me drink soda, he wouldn’t kiss me for the entire day,” Adam moans. “Never let me date a yuppie like that again, okay?”Chris licks a drop of Coke off his lip and imagines Adam’s tongue doing it instead. “I’ll body-check you outta the way if I have to,” he says, and tries to remember the last time he called Adam “bro.”*They’re watching TV late at night, sitting next to each other on Adam’s couch with Ortu and Nick fast asleep in the other room, and Chris blurts out, “I wasn’t going for my phone.”Adam glances at him. “Huh?”Chris stares straight ahead, not taking his eyes off the screen. “When you thought I was trying to kiss you,” he says. “I was. I chickened out.”Adam is silent for a long time before he says, “Why would you tell me that?”Chris doesn’t know. Something about honesty. Clearing the air. He always felt like shit for letting Adam beat himself up over it. Maybe he thought this would make him feel better.It doesn’t. “Sorry,” he mumbles.It’s at least another twenty minutes before Adam says, “God damn it, Chris. I was over you.”Something trembles in Chris’s chest. “You said it felt like kissing your brother.”Adam laughs, short and sharp. “Of course I fucking did. If you’d wanted me to like it, you would’ve actually made an effort, not laid down a smooch like my mouth was your niece’s forehead.”Ortu snores through the long silence.Chris turns off the TV, leaving them sitting there in the dark. He reaches out to where he knows Adam’s shoulder is, runs his hand along the familiar curve of his neck, and whispers, “Can I try again?”He can feel Adam’s throat vibrate when he says, “You’re an asshole.”“A gigantic asshole,” Chris agrees. “I’m sorry. I’m trying to suck less, I really am.”“Don’t do that to me,” Adam complains. “I’m having a serious crisis here, don’t hand me a dumb ‘suck’ joke on a silver platter like that.”“I’m emotionally stunted, it’s how I show affection.” Chris touches Adam’s temple gently.“Fucking kiss me, douchenugget,” Adam whispers, and Chris finds out what an ideal scenario is like.*“Sexually transmitted infections can be contracted through oral sex by both the giver and the receiver,” Nick announces right into Chris’s ear.Chris tries to roll away and falls off the couch. “Fucking--shit, what the--” He stares up at Nick’s upside-down face. “What the fuck?”“You fell asleep with your fly open,” Nick says. “And Adam was drooling on your stomach. I inferred.”“Wait, what?” says Ortu from the doorway.Chris reaches up and sticks his hand in Nick’s pocket, pulling out his wallet and extracting his library card from it. “I’m confiscating this,” he says. “Go away.”Adam blinks awake. “‘S goin’ on?” he asks groggily.“Kick these chucklefucks out of your house so we can bone,” says Chris, and Adam smiles so wide Chris has to climb on top of him no matter who’s still in the room.“We’re going, we’re going, pause button, PAUSE BUTTON!” Ortu hollers, and the screen door slams behind them a second later.“I,” Chris says, grinding his hips against Adam’s, “am gonna make you scream like it’s the playoffs.”“Hearing a lot of talk,” Adam says, nuzzling his nose.“Oh, challenge!” Chris grins down at him. “You know what I’m gonna do with that challenge? I’m gonna rise to it. Get it, rise, I’m gonna rise--”“Yeah, I love you too, bro,” Adam says, and tugs off Chris’s shirt.