NEW FIC! Bob/Brian, because the world needs more of it!!
By All Ambitious Thoughts
Bob Bryar x Brian Schechter
NC17
authornote: This was written for bandomficathon. The whole thing wasn't finished by the due date, hence the reason it's taken me so long to get it posted. It's kind of incredibly cheesy, but I hope you enjoy it anyway. ♥
“Brian!” Bob yells over his shoulder as he digs through a pile of dirty laundry. “Dude, where’s my shirt?”
From across the New York apartment that the two share, Brian responds, his voice muted by the walls between them, “I don’t fucking know! What shirt are you talking about?”
Bob rolls his eyes at his laundry and stands, grabbing his still damp towel from the corner of his bed and rubbing it vigorously over his shaggy blond hair as he goes. He can’t see when he steps out into the short hallway separating his bedroom from the main living area, but it doesn’t matter. He’s navigated this apartment enough times that by now he can find everything with his eyes closed. Except his damn shirt, of course.
Strolling into the kitchen where Brian is sitting at the circular table, eating an omelet and poring over some history text, Bob clarifies, “I’m looking for the nice one, with the pattern, you know?”
Brian arches an eyebrow at Bob and shoots him a scathing look from behind his glasses. “That really helps me narrow it down, thanks,” he says, wry smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.
Bob grabs a piece of Brian’s toast and jams the whole thing into his mouth, ignoring his roommate’s pained expression as he replies, mouth full, “The green one. Long sleeves.”
Sighing, Brian pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose and cants his head at Bob. “You have an interview today?”
Bob nods and considers stealing Brian’s other slice of toast - he doesn’t know why Brian insists on making it when he rarely eats more than a few bites - but decides that a better course of action is to dig through the cabinet over the microwave until he finds a bagel that’s not completely stale.
“You don’t want to wear the green one to an interview. Wear the blue, it looks better,” Brian states, his attention back on the book before him. He leans over, jotting down some random side-thought in one of his myriad notebooks before digging into his omelet again.
Pouring himself a glass of orange juice, Bob takes a sip and stuffs his bagel into the little toaster in the corner of the counter. He arches an eyebrow at Brian and asks, “The blue? Really? It makes my torso look short.” For a split second, he’s appalled that he actually said that aloud, but he figures that over a year of living in close quarters with Brian and spending time with Gerard who lives across the hall could have rubbed off on him in more embarrassing ways.
Brian waves a hand vaguely in his direction and mutters off-handedly, “No, just leave a couple of top buttons undone.” Bob makes a thoughtful sound into his juice and retreats to his bedroom once more, throwing the brilliant blue shirt on and buttoning it per Brian’s instructions. He glances at himself in the mirror, debates trading his black slacks for a pair of pinstriped gray ones, and then gives up on his appearance when he hears the toaster pop.
He spends a couple of minutes messing with his hair to make it lay in a manner that’s at least semi-appropriate for a business interview and goes to retrieve his breakfast.
Brian is either too polite or too interested in his reading to look smug about Bob’s choice of attire. Bob would bet that it’s the latter, because Brian rarely passes up an opportunity to lord it over Bob when Bob takes his advice.
Portfolio tucked underneath his arm, Bob spreads cream cheese over his bagel and then pauses to pull on his coat.
“All right,” he says, half the bagel hanging out of his mouth, “wish me luck.”
“G’luck,” Brian replies immediately, around a mouthful of egg and toast. Bob rolls his eyes again and steps out the door, hoping he makes it on time.
*
Bob is lying on the couch, the blue shirt from that morning strewn haphazardly over the cushions at his back, when Brian comes trundling into the apartment. He mumbles something and Bob glances up, grinning when he sees that Brian’s trying to talk around one of his gloves, which is clenched between his teeth.
Smirking, Bob walks over and takes the plastic bags from Brian who sends him a grateful look and yanks the glove from his mouth, tossing it down onto the table. Bob peers into the bags, grin widening when he sees that it’s takeout from the Thai restaurant down the street that they both love.
“Awesome,” he says, nodding his approval while he sets the food down on the counter, digging around for cutlery and plates. “So, today was your lunch date with Frank’s friend from the bio department, right?”
Brian snorts and glances over from where he’s studying their mail. “Yeah, the one who was ‘totally perfect for me in every way,’ according to that little shit.” He mutters a few things about bills and tosses out the junk mail, setting a manila envelope aside for Bob. “It wasn’t a great date,” he mutters.
Bob snorts and starts dishing out a heaping pile of spicy noodles. “I figured,” he retorts with an arched eyebrow, “or else I doubt you’d be here eating Thai with me.”
Brian laughs and replies, “Good point, you’re not exactly date material, there, Bryar.”
Glancing over from where he’s standing at the fridge, one noodle still dangling out of his mouth while he grabs himself a beer, Bob says primly, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Brian laughs again and shakes his head, patting Bob on the shoulder while he pokes around in the takeout cartons. “I take it your interview went better than my date?” Brian inquires, sitting down at the table while Bob takes the seat across from him. Bob slides a beer over and Brian nods his thanks, helping himself to a deep swig.
“Yeah, it was pretty good, “ Bob confirms, twirling some of the pasta around his fork. “Turns out that the syndication company is actually really interested in my writing. They want to do a couple more meetings, though, before they decide who gets the slot.”
Brian sends an appropriately impressed look Bob’s way and smiles, “Nice! You’re moving up in the world, huh?” He smirks when Bob rolls his eyes, downing what’s left of his beer.
“Well, you know, we can’t all stay in school for our whole damn lives,” Bob shoots back. Brian laughs so hard that he gets the hiccups, and they spend the next few hours playing cutthroat Halo with half the dudes that live on their floor.
*
Tuesday morning rolls around quicker than Bob had expected, and of course it has to be the one day when everything goes wrong. Bob’s stuck behind a semi-truck that had apparently been transporting chickens from one side of the nation to the other, if the birds dancing all across the street are anything to go by. He glances at his rearview mirror, gritting his teeth when he sees that traffic is in a gridlock in both directions, city employees scrambling around and trying to round the chickens up while they move the out-of-commission truck.
“Fuck,” Bob hisses when he sees the time. The interviewer will be there in half an hour and there’s no way Bob will be back by then. He’s debating calling and cancelling, but he knows that this is an opportunity he isn’t likely to get twice, so he really can’t afford to do so.
“Shit,” he mutters to himself, pressing one of his speed dial buttons and worrying his lower lip as traffic slowly creeps forward.
“This is Brian,” Brian announces from the other line, and Bob lets out a breath.
“Hey, man, when do you have class today?” Bob blurts immediately. He can picture Brian on the other end, probably flopped out on his bed and painstakingly combing through some text that Bob would find mind-numbingly boring.
“Oh, uh, I don’t,” he responds. “I was just going to hit the library and work on my thesis while you’re here. Why, you need me out now? I can leave early, no problem.”
“No!” Bob barks immediately. “No, don’t leave yet. I actually wondered if you could stay for a little while. I’m stuck in traffic so I’m going to be a few minutes late -” He trails off and lets Brian connect the dots.
“I, what? Bob, I can’t like, do your interview for you, dude,” Brian says, tiny hint of exasperation tugging at his tone.
“And I’m not asking you to. Just, I’ll call and let them know I’m going to be late, you just have to let her in and stall for me for five minutes, ten tops.” After he’s finished, Brian is silent on the other end of the phone. Bob waits for a few seconds before continuing, “C’mon, man, you can’t leave me hanging like this. I’ll buy you dinner and a twenty-four pack of Heineken, whatever you want!”
Bob doesn’t beg. Brian knows this. Therefore, the fact that Bob is practically on his knees pleading should clue Brian in to the severity of the situation. Bob can almost hear the gears cranking around in Brian’s mind, and he lets out a long, relieved sigh when Brian mutters, “Fine. But I’m getting dessert too.”
“Thank you,” Bob breathes, and knows that if Brain were there he’d be flapping a hand in Bob’s direction and making an annoyed face.
“Whatever, you’re paying your dues,” Brian shoots back. He pauses before asking, “So, what am I supposed to say to this chick anyway?”
“I don’t know, man, just talk to her! I’d say to offer her a drink or something, but I went out specifically so that we’d have shit to put out.”
“Where are you anyway?” Brian inquires, and Bob grinds his teeth a little, following a cop’s instructions to take a wide detour around a group of caged chickens.
“I’m stuck in traffic on the highway,” he says blandly. Brian must have been watching the news because he starts laughing hysterically. Bob reaches up and pinches at the bridge of his nose.
“Shut up,” he barks, and Brian just laughs harder.
“I’m sorry,” Brian wheezes, “I’m sorry, but, dude, chickens, for real?”
Bob sighs and debates the pros and cons of laying on his horn so that the woman in front of him with all the PETA stickers will stop going fifteen miles an hour when the zone is pretty clearly chicken free. “For real,” he responds, adding a thank you before hanging up while Brian continues laughing to himself.
*
Bob ends up only being about two minutes late, and he comes in through the door balancing a few bags of groceries to find Brian sitting and chatting amicably over coffee with a dark-haired woman.
“Hey,” he greets, setting the grocery bags down, “I’m so sorry that I’m late.” He strides over to the woman, who turns her warm grin on him, and shakes her hand gently.
“It’s all right. I doubt anyone could’ve predicted a chicken-related catastrophe,” she says with a wink. Brian chuckles to himself and takes a sip of his mostly full coffee cup, rising to his feet. Bob’s pleased to note that he put on something nice, even though he had no real reason to.
“Sophia, it was a pleasure meeting you,” Brian nods at the woman and sets his cup down on the counter next to the sink. “I’ll just get out of your way, now,” he adds, glancing from Bob back to Sophia, who shakes her head and waves a hand in Brian’s direction.
“Nonsense!” she replies happily. “Sit down, finish your coffee! We can start with you here, assuming that isn’t a problem for you Mister Bryar?” She turns her wide eyes on Bob, who smiles and shrugs.
“No problem at all. And please, call me Bob.” Brian arches an eyebrow quizzically in Bob’s direction while Sophia’s back is turned, grabbing his cup and leaning against the counter. Bob just shrugs in response, because he’s not really sure why Sophia wants Brian to stick around either. He has half a mind to ask what Brian said, specifically, but he knows that Brian’s not a moron, so it’s doubtful that Brian mentioned anything that could get Bob into trouble.
Ushering Sophia into the living room, Bob takes a seat next to Brian and rubs his palms against his thighs to quell his nerves. Sophia digs through the chic little briefcase she brought with her, slipping on a pair of glasses and pulling out a file folder of what Bob recognizes as his article samples.
“Before we look at your work, I wondered if you might mind me asking a few personal questions.” Sophia inquires politely, still smiling. Bob shakes his head.
“Not at all, go right ahead,” he says, glancing over to Brian, who sips his coffee and sinks back into the sofa, clearly uncomfortable.
“You graduated from NYU, correct?” Sophia asks, making a note to herself when Bob affirms her question. “And how long have you been living here?”
Bob glances over at Brian, caught slightly off-guard at the question. “Oh,” he says, eloquently, “uh-”
Luckily, Brian cuts in for him and responds, “We’ve lived here for about two and a half years now.” Sophia sends them both a beaming smile, which makes the corners of Bob’s mouth turn down while Brian simply continues to grin placidly from behind his cup of coffee.
“That’s wonderful!” Sophia states happily, asking a few more blasé questions regarding Bob’s various educational and professional accomplishments.
After a long moment, Brian clears his throat and rises to his feet, saying hesitantly, “Uh, sorry if I’m interrupting but I should really get going. Work to do, you know.”
Sophia nods while Brian shakes her hand and reiterates what a pleasure it was to meet her. As he’s on his way out the door, a few books tucked under his arm, glasses perched on his nose, Bob calls, “Don’t forget to text me what you want for dinner!”
He feels rather than sees Brian roll his eyes, but he ignores it. If Bob doesn’t remind him, Brian will stay at the library until all hours, forgetting to eat because he’s so caught up in his work. Bob, for one, is in no hurry to re-visit the week when Brian almost got pneumonia because he’d ignored a cold and foregone food in favor of working on his thesis.
“You two seem to care a lot about one another,” Sophia says quietly, smiling fondly at Bob and leaning forward. Bob tugs at his collar and shifts in his seat.
“Oh, well, he’s my best friend, you know?” he responds gruffly, reaching up to rub at the back of his neck. Sophia nods and bites her lip while she ducks her head to look at Bob’s file once more. Bob has the sneaking suspicion that if this weren’t a professional setting she’d be cooing at him. It’s more than a little unsettling, but Bob figures that if this is the worst he has to deal with in the face of possible syndication, his life is pretty damn good.
*
It doesn’t really click until three days later, when Sophia leaves Bob a voicemail while he’s in the shower that morning. He’s listening to it while he cleans up the kitchen, nodding along with the meter of her voice. It’s a lengthy diatribe about how Bob’s credentials are excellent, but they’re also looking for people who fill certain demographics to make sure that they have the most diverse team possible. Bob frowns for a few seconds when he hears this, because he’s pretty much the average Caucasian male, a statistical group that’s fairly readily spoken for. He’s surprised when Sophia mentions how excited she is at the prospect of getting Bob to join their staff, and then she says it.
“It was wonderful to meet you and Brian, and I hope to see you both at the art gala you’ll be reviewing as a freelance sample. Your invitation is in the mail, and it’s to you plus one so that Brian can come along as well. We’re an equal opportunity employer so you don’t have to worry about anything. If you have any questions or concerns, go ahead and drop me a line, okay?”
Bob’s stomach plummets and he hangs up his phone, letting it clatter to the counter. He stands there, staring at the dishes for a long time, wondering why everything he touches always has to get so fucked up.
*
He doesn’t say anything to Brian because he doesn’t think that Brian needs to know. Sure, it’s kind of hilarious that Sophia seems to think they’re together, but for some odd reason it eats at the very bottom of Bob’s stomach, gnawing at the lining and unleashing hordes of tiny insects. It’s not that Bob has a problem with people thinking he’s gay - hell, he dated Quinn for a year back in college so that’s not the issue at all - but Brian is his best friend. They’ve been through shit together that a lot of people don’t understand.
Brian was there to drive Bob to the hospital in the middle of the night when he broke his wrist doing some work around his dorm room, and Bob doesn’t think he’ll ever forget the day Brian got out of rehab and called Bob first.
So, it’s not that he wants to keep it a secret exactly, he just doesn’t want there to be any reason for things to get weird between them. He deliberately doesn’t think about the fact that if it were Frankie or Gee, he’d be crowing at them and laughing in a heartbeat, because it’s in the wake of those thoughts that Bob’s feebly constructed excuse starts to dissolve.
*
The gala is that weekend, and when Brian asks Bob who he’s taking as his date - complete with fluttering eyelashes, which may or may not make Bob’s stomach lurch a little, not that Bob would know - Bob just shrugs and says around his toothbrush, “I owe you dinner. Might as well kill two birds with one stone.” Brian makes a face at his toothpaste covered tongue and Bob grins, sticks it out, and then spits into the kitchen sink.
“Nasty, dude,” Brian mutters with a smirk, and Bob shrugs.
“Besides,” he adds, “Sophia likes you for some weird reason.”
Brian rolls his eyes and goes back to highlighting something in his notes, commenting off-handedly, “Oh yeah, because I’m totally unlikeable.”
Bob swallows and turns his back to Brian, grabbing at one of the sofa cushions and chucking it at Brian’s head while he replies, “Whatever. Put on something pretty, bitch.”
Brian squawks with surprise when the pillow hits him in the face and stomps off to change. By the time Bob emerges from his own bedroom, across the apartment from Brian’s, the latter is seated primly on the sofa, clicking through their billion satellite channels and looking severely bored. Bob pauses in the shadows of the hallway and sucks in a quiet breath. He’s always known Brian was attractive on some level, but now that Sophia’s put the idea of Brian as a potential significant other into his head, Bob can’t quite stop himself from lingering on the quirk of Brian’s mouth, his eyes and the slight hint of shadow hiding just beneath his skin even when he’s clean shaven.
“You clean up pretty well,” Bob jokes, hoping Brian doesn’t notice that his voice sounds dry. Brian snorts and rises to his feet, arching an eyebrow at Bob. If it were anyone else, Bob would think that the lavender shirt and slate grey tie looked ridiculous, but Brian is somehow making it work in his favor. He’s not wearing his glasses tonight, and as much as Bob likes his glasses, he’s relieved to know that he won’t have to break through any barriers to catch Brian’s eye if he needs.
“You revisiting your Goth phase?” Brian smiles, slipping his hands into his pockets. Bob glances down at himself, smoothes out the front of his shirt.
“What?” he asks, slightly incredulous at Brian’s question. “Black is classic!”
“You’re wearing jeans,” Brian points out. Bob rolls the cuffs of his shirt up to his elbows and heads over to the kitchen counter to collect his wallet and phone.
“They’re designer jeans,” he mumbles, making sure that his phone is on vibrate - if he doesn’t do it now, he’ll forget completely and he absolutely needs whatever absurd ringtone Brian has programmed into it this week to go off during an interview with one of the gallery spectators.
“You own designer jeans?” Brian asks, pulling the door open and following Bob out into the hall. Bob shrugs.
“I wanted something semi-casual that I could wear for an interview,” he states, hunching his shoulders a little bit, defensively. Brian holds his hands up in a mild gesture of mercy and strolls along beside Bob, shaking his head.
“Whatever man, all I’m saying is that you have officially usurped me as the gay one in the apartment,” he grins, stepping onto the elevator. Bob glares. Once the door has shifted closed, he leans against the wall and glances at Brian out of the corner of his eye.
“You sure about that?” he inquires with mock-innocence. “You’re the one with a pair of Dolce & Gabana loafers.”
He snickers when he feels Brian’s eyes burning into his back as he steps out into the lobby. Brian mutters, “You asshole, I told you never to mention that,” and for a few minutes, at least, Bob can pretend that he hasn’t been half-wondering what it would take to get into Brian’s pants for the last four days.
*
The gala is nice enough, although a little bit stuffy for Bob’s personal taste. He prefers to do concert reviews, which Sophia knows, but there aren’t any upcoming shows in the area that meet the company’s criteria, so Bob’s stuck. It’s not that he doesn’t like galleries - after all, it’s impossible to be friends with the Ways and not spend at least a few hours a month viewing various exhibitions - but there are things he’d rather be doing with his time. For example, he knows that Blade Runner is on tonight, and every time he glances at some of the darker new wave work he can’t help but think of how much more fun it would be to have a beer, kick back with Brian, and watch TV until the wee hours of the morning.
He and Brian are milling around, trying to look deeply engaged in a conversation so that other people leave them alone. They stopped floundering around in Sophia’s shadow after about a half an hour of schmoozing, when she kept sending them these fond gazes that made Bob blush and seemed to simply confuse Brian.
They’re doing bad British accents and making snide comments - quietly of course - about the painting in front of them, when Brian glances over Bob’s shoulder, suddenly going ashen.
“Well fuck,” Brian states dully, the smile falling from his face. Bob turns slightly, searching the crowd and not finding anything too out of the ordinary. He gives Brian a concerned frown, and Brian shrugs, barely meeting Bob’s eyes and hunching in on himself in a very un-Brian-like manner.
“Rick’s here,” he mutters. Bob’s eyes widen and a wave of rage surges up through his abdomen. Rick and Brian dated for just shy of two years, half of which the bastard spent fucking some twink behind Brian’s back until a mutual friend found out and let Brian know. It’s been a long time since Rick, but if the look on Brian’s face is anything to go by it hasn’t been nearly long enough.
“You want to leave?” Bob asks, nudging Brian’s shoulder. Brian worries the ring in his lower lip for a long moment before shrugging and shaking his head.
“No, I mean, he might not even see me.” He turns a weak smile on Bob and half-hearted jokes, “Besides, don’t want to rain on your once in a lifetime parade, Bryar.”
Bob’s about to assure Brian that they won’t be missing out on anything, seriously, they can go, when who should pop up at Bob’s elbow but Sophia.
“Hey, Brian,” Sophia greets, looking positively bubbly despite the black cocktail dress she’s wearing, “mind if I steal your boy for a minute?” Bob feels himself go red and hopes that Brian doesn’t notice.
Brian shifts his weight and looks thoroughly confused, but he smiles at Sophia anyway and says, “No, uh, no problem at all.”
“Great!” Sophia chirps, linking arms with Bob and pulling him in the direction of a group of elderly women in evening gowns. “Play nice, Bryar, these kindly old matrons fund a good portion of the company.”
Bob almost groans, but he bites it back at the last second and hopes that his smile doesn’t look too much like a grimace.
*
Bob is just taking a final statement from Molly, one of the half-drunk old women who he and Sophia have been chatting up for the past twenty minutes, when he glances over and sees Brian talking to two men, one of whom Bob recognizes immediately as Rick. From the way that Brian has his hand cupped around the back of his neck and seems to be looking for the nearest escape route, Bob would guess that it isn’t going so well.
“Ladies, if you’ll please forgive me, I have some important business to attend to,” he says, excusing himself as graciously as possible. He kisses Eva’s hand before he goes, which earns him major points if the flustered sounds and Sophia’s not-so-subtle thumbs up are anything to go by, and starts to head placidly in Brian’s direction. When he draws up closer, he can hear Rick and the fop-like brunette that Rick brought as arm candy making thinly veiled comments about how strange it is to see Brian here alone. The brunette says, “Well, with a tie like that are you really surprised?” and they both start laughing uproariously. Something protective and furious rises in Bob’s chest, and Brian catches his eye over Rick’s shoulder.
Bob mouths ‘play along’ and hopes that Brian understands when all he gets is a bemused quirk of Brian’s mouth in response. Taking a deep breath and ignoring the fact that this could all end disastrously, Bob sidles up next to Brian, smiling as affectionately as he can and sliding his arm around Brian’s waist.
Brian starts at first, but then he catches on and sends Bob a half-amused, half-exasperated look when Bob greets, “Hey, didn’t mean to keep you waiting.”
Rick and his boy-toy are pretty clearly sizing Bob up, which both Bob and Brian apparently find hilarious because Bob feels Brian twitch a little beside him. Brian casually lets his hand rest on Bob’s shoulder, and Bob tries to send mental ‘high-five’ vibes in Brian’s direction.
“And you are?” Rick asks with a fake smile, extending his hand.
“Bob,” Bob says, adding, “I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” and giving the other two men a pointed look that conveys just how much he really doesn’t mean that. Brian snickers and Bob nudges his side. Brian squeezes Bob’s shoulder, just a barely there convulsion of his palm, but it makes Bob’s heart jump nonetheless.
“So,” Rick’s pretty-boy says, “how do you two know one another exactly?”
“Oh, well, we -” Brian starts, but Bob leans up on his toes like he sees someone over the heads of the men standing before them. He fakes a nod in the direction that Sophia’s in and then smiles a big, fake grin at Rick and his fanboy.
“Sorry, babe, Sophia’s calling,” Bob says, “I’ll be right back.” And then, on a total whim that doesn’t have anything at all to do with the slightly panicked, semi-betrayed look that Brian gives him no matter what later accounts may suggest, Bob leans in and presses his mouth to Brian’s. Brian freezes for a split second, and then he’s kissing back, tip of his tongue poking out where his lips were ever-so-slightly parted when Bob closed the distance between them. It’s all that Bob can do not to sink into Brian’s mouth, coax it open. He pulls back a little, plants another, smaller kiss on the corner of Brian’s half-grin before smiling giddily at the two morons before him, and then walking over to Sophia, watching over his shoulder as he goes.
Brian’s cheeks are flushed, but he’s standing taller and Rick makes some overdramatic excuse to flounce away with his eye-candy in tow. After they’re gone, Brian glances up to where Bob is standing making arbitrary small talk with Sophia at the refreshment table and catches Bob’s eye. Bob flushes, smiles, and ducks his head, because his stomach is doing that weird rolling thing again.
Somewhere in the last tiny, desperate part of his mind, he absently hopes it was the Mexican they had before the gala and not the barely-there pink tinge to Brian’s mouth.
*
They excuse themselves shortly after the Rick confrontation and duck out the back door. Brian rests his palm gently against the small of Bob’s back when Bob squeezes out the door that Brian’s holding open, and Bob’s throat goes dry. He doesn’t know if that’s something that Brian has always done, and he’s only just noticing it, or if it’s something to do with the kiss.
Wrinkling his nose a little at the thought, which makes him sound like some lovesick teeny bopper, Bob digs into his pocket for the keys to his old Saturn.
Neither of them says anything until they’re tucked securely into the car, Brian absently fiddling with the radio station while Bob needlessly adjusts his rearview mirror. Bob’s about to turn the key in the ignition when Brian clears his throat awkwardly and says, “Thank you.”
Bob glances over at him and smiles, barely a quirk of his lips. “No problem, dude,” he assures, and some of the tension seeps from his shoulders. He doesn’t tack on the ‘anything for you’ that’s hanging off the tip of his tongue because he’s pretty sure that’s crossing a line that he isn’t supposed to even know exists.
Instead, he just cranks the key in the ignition and focuses on not hitting anyone while he backs out.
*
Bob spends approximately forty minutes after they get back to the apartment freaking out about his actions and the consequences they might have. Brian is either so secure in their relationship that he’s taking this a billion times better than Bob, or he’s just some kind of secret Zen master when it comes to keeping up a happy façade. He grabs two beers from the fridge and plops down on the couch next to Bob, handing one of the bottles over. He doesn’t really sit any closer or further away from Bob than he normally would, but it’s like Bob is suddenly hyperaware of every molecule that is - and isn’t - between them.
He does his best to pay attention to Scrubs, and after an episode and a half of J.D.’s absurd mental tangents and Elliot’s nigh-incoherent psycho babble, Bob finds himself relaxing into the sofa, sock-covered feet up on the coffee table despite how he knows Brian hates it. They both laugh at something the janitor does, and just like that the tension breaks completely. Brian almost snorts beer out his nose and Bob laughs so hard that he gets the hiccups.
*
Things are fine until a few days later, when Sophia invites Bob out to lunch that weekend as congratulations for officially being hired, and to finish filling out a little bit of paperwork. She and a few other people from the office are going to be there, and she implies with a not-so-successful attempt at discretion that he can tow Brian along as well, if he’d like. Bob glances over at Brian out of the corner of his eye, where Brian’s on X-box Live with Ray from the next floor down, and clears his throat.
“I uh, yeah, I’ll maybe bring him,” Bob says, wincing as he completely butchers his own sentence. He bites back a groan, but only barely, because Bob doesn’t do this. He doesn’t get all flustered and tongue-tied. He never really has, so he doesn’t see why his body and mind have apparently decided to gang up on his baser consciousness and start now.
He and Sophia say their goodbyes and Bob sighs, shuffling out to the living room area and flopping down on one of the armchairs. Brian glances at him curiously for a moment, but Bob makes a show of opening up one of the books he left laying on the coffee table the other day and leaning back to read. After a few seconds, Brian bursts out laughing at something that Ray said, and Bob feels Brian’s gaze shift back to the television.
*
Bob intended to ask Brian to come along with him to lunch. He did, honestly, but he still hadn’t built up the courage by the time he was ready to head out the door, so he’d given it up as a lost cause. Sophia smiling sympathetically at him and patting his hand while he filled out his paperwork didn’t much help, and when Bob finally storms up to the apartment that afternoon, he’s in a sour mood.
Brian is at class and won’t be back until around eight, so Bob mopes around the little space by himself for awhile before huffing exasperatedly and heading across the hall. It’s a good bet that Gerard will be home, since he rarely goes out unless he needs groceries or if Frank somehow manages to wheedle him outdoors. Bob knocks at the door a few times, raptly, and can’t suppress a grin when there’s the thud of something falling over and then a string of muffled cursing.
When Gerard opens the door, he’s got paint smeared all across his cheek and his sunglasses are on. He smiles widely at Bob and greets, “If it isn’t the elusive Robert Bryar!” He ushers Bob inside and says, “Where’ve you been, man? You and Brian go through a second honeymoon phase or something?”
Bob’s amusement at Gerard’s absentmindedness vanishes instantly, replaced by a sort of grudging acceptance. Apparently the entire world is determined to make sure that the only thing he can think about is himself and Brian.
“No,” Bob growls. “We never had a first honeymoon phase.”
Gerard laughs and takes up his position behind a wooden easel in the corner, staring at the canvas therein while he talks.
“Whatever dude, I’ve seen you guys making cow eyes at each other too many times to believe that,” Gerard says, pursing his lips and dipping a brush in a cupful of filthy water. Bob frowns and flops down on Gerard’s sofa, kicking his feet up and not bothering to take his jacket off.
“We don’t make cow eyes,” Bob insists, wrinkling his nose. Gerard laughs and points his paintbrush at Bob.
“Oh, I’m sorry, should I have said you did eyelash flutters of manly love and devotion?” he jokes. Bob grimaces and runs a hand over his face and turns a glare on Gerard, who remains unperturbed and continues painting.
“That’s it,” Bob mutters, closing his eyes, “I’m not letting you hang out with Frank anymore.”
*
Two and a half hours, some serious conversation, and a few rounds of cutthroat Halo later, Bob heads back to his and Brian’s apartment, brow furrowed in concentration as he goes. What Gerard said didn’t really help him clear anything up. If anything, it muddled the picture even further, because apparently ninety percent of the people Bob knows have thought he and Brian were dating for the past two years, at least.
If he sits around doing nothing, he’s bound to over-think everything, the way that he generally tends to do, so instead Bob decides that he’ll clean the apartment. It’s not all that dirty to start with, but it’s been awhile since they last bleached the bathroom or the kitchen counter, and with all the cooking Brian’s been doing lately in his efforts to live a healthier life that shit can’t be sanitary. He’s scrubbing the tub in a pair of ratty old sweatpants and a band t-shirt from back in the day when he used to sound at some of the little clubs nearby in order to pay his bills when Brian walks through the door and shouts, “Yo Bryar, I brought pizza!”
Bob huffs a sigh and wipes his forearm over his hairline, where he’s starting to sweat a little bit. He rises to his feet and wanders out into the hall and stops because. Well, because Brian is right there. And Bob sees Brian every day, so it’s nothing new, and it’s not really even particularly artistic because Brian’s hair is all fucked up from walking around in the wind and he apparently spilled something on the shirt he’d worn to class that morning, but he’s smiling and shrugging out of his jacket and that same thing that’s been fluttering around in Bob’s stomach for the past few weeks hums to life. Bob mutters, “Fuck,” and is about to retreat back to his bedroom for a few minutes to gather himself when Brian catches his eye.
He looks confused, if happy, and asks, “Are you cleaning?” Bob glances down at himself and realizes that he’s still wearing the elbow-high yellow rubber gloves he’d bought ages ago.
“Oh, yeah.” Bob smiles sheepishly and shrugs. “It’s been awhile,” he offers, by way of explanation, but Brian isn’t having any of it.
“You only clean when you’re upset, Bryar,” Brian points out and Bob shifts his weight a little because this is seriously not the conversation that he wants to be having right now.
“No, my shower was gross,” Bob says pointedly. Brian, being Brian, doesn’t pick up on the subtle hint and frowns, beckoning Bob over.
“Seriously dude, I know you hate talking about your feelings, but what’s up?” Brian asks, and he looks so damn sincere that Bob can’t just blow him off and disappear for an hour and a half, which is what he would normally do if he felt like avoiding a situation.
Bob sighs and peels the gloves of, tossing them into the sink. “I swear, it’s nothing,” he assures, taking a seat at their little dining table. “Just, don’t worry about it, okay?”
Brian smirks a little and says, “Kind of hard not to when you look like the weight of the world is on your shoulders, Bryar.” Bob rolls his eyes.
“Whatever, just, let it go,” he mutters, and Brian frowns, holds his hands up a little.
“No need to get fucking hostile there, dude,” he replies and Bob’s eyes narrow because all this shit is Brian’s fault anyway. Because if he hadn’t been there, standing in front of Bob all the time and being fucking awesome, Bob wouldn’t even have this problem. And yeah, maybe that’s a little bit unfair, but Bob doesn’t really give a shit at the moment, because all he wants is to not lose his best friend over something stupid like not being able to stop thinking about him romantically.
It’s only when he registers Brian’s wide eyes and half-open mouth that Bob realizes there’s a good possibility that he said all of that out loud. He closes his eyes and runs his hands over his face before standing and turning toward his bedroom without a word. Brian’s chair screeches as he stands and Bob sighs, fully anticipating Brian’s hand on his shoulder. He braces himself for what he’s expecting to be a right hook to the nose, but ends up actually being Brian’s mouth pressing hard against his.
Bob opens his eyes, shocked, and a tiny smile flits over his features.
“Fuck you, Bryar,” Brian growls, “you don’t get to make declarations like that and walk away.”
He winds his hands in Bob’s hair and pulls Bob down. Bob opens his mouth at the insistence of Brian’s tongue, one of his hands curling around Brian’s waist while he curls the other around the nape of Brian’s neck. After a few long, blissful moments, Brian pulls back a little, his thumb brushing over Bob’s lower lip. His gaze is trained on Bob’s mouth as he speaks, “Dude, I’ve been waiting for this for like, years now.”
Bob chuckles a little and slips two of his fingers under the hem of Brian’s shirt, a shiver running down his spine at the barely-there hitch in Brian’s breath when he does so.
“I’m a little slow on the uptake,” Bob apologizes. Brian laughs, soft, his breath warm against Bob’s cheek.
“Yeah, you kind of are,” he agrees, and Bob leans down to kiss him again. It doesn’t feel like coming home, or fireworks, or anything, but Brian’s a damn good kisser, and Bob really wouldn’t rather be anywhere but right here, right now, in their cramped hallway with Brian’s tongue in his mouth. He shifts a little and slides one of his legs slightly between Brian’s and Brian moans. Something surges inside Bob and he pushes until Brian is up against the wall, pinned between Bob and the plaster. Brian’s panting a bit, and Bob would be if he wasn’t so busy mouthing gently at the line of Brian’s jaw, his neck. His lips drag against the rough grain of Brian’s five o’clock shadow and Bob smiles because it has been way too long.
“Bob,” Brian groans, and pushes his hips forward. Bob’s sweatpants leave very little to the imagination in situations such as these, and Brian’s dress pants aren’t much better. Bob doesn’t answer, but he digs his fingers gently into Brian’s hips, pulls him as close as he can get. He delves into Brian’s mouth again and part of him wants to pull Brian up so that he’s straddling Bob’s waist right there in the hall, but Bob isn’t as young as he used to be, and Brian’s older than he is, even, so it’s probably ill advised. Instead, he maneuvers one hand around so that he’s gripping Brian’s ass while his other remains splayed across the small of Brian’s back. Brian bites his lower lip and Bob groans way back in his throat because, fuck, Brian knows he loves that. Brian’s smirking when Bob pulls back and Bob grins back.
“Bedroom?” he asks. Brian licks his reddened mouth and it would be pathetic how Bob’s eyes follow his tongue if it wasn’t so fucking hot.
“Probably a good idea,” Brian breathes, hooking a thumb under the hem of Bob’s sweats. “Mine or yours?”
Bob glances to his right. “Mine’s closer,” he says, and Brian nods and then pushes off from the wall, kissing Bob again and taking a few stumbling steps in the direction of the door to Bob’s room. Bob makes a face when his back hits the doorknob, and he pulls Brian inside and spins him around so that his knees hit the edge of Bob’s mattress when he backs up.
“Fuck,” Brian says, struggling with the buttons on his shirt. Bob helps him and after a few seconds of fumbling, Brian shrugs it off and tosses it over the side of the bed. He’s lying there, with Bob straddling his hips, propped up on his elbows all shirtless and breathing deep and Bob commits the image to memory before leaning in to lick a stripe down the center of Brian’s chest, pressing his lips to the soft skin therein and letting his teeth drag delicately over one of Brian’s nipples. Brian bites back a noise and rolls his hips upward, Bob pushing his down to meet halfway. Brian is tugging insistently at Bob’s shirt, so Bob yanks it off over his head and throws it over his shoulder. Brian runs his hands over the planes of Bob’s chest, down his stomach, and then lets them dip under Bob’s shorts, just barely brushing the cuts of Bob’s hips.
Bob makes an unintelligible noise in the back of his throat and pulls Brian up so they can kiss again. He reaches between them to undo Brian’s fly and starts to pull Brian’s pants down. Brian catches on after a second and shimmies out of them as well as he can with Bob’s legs on either side of his own, kicking them off and being careful not to catch Bob anywhere unfortunate at the same time.
When he’d changed earlier, Bob had decided not to wear boxers underneath his sweatpants for some arbitrary reason that he can’t even remember now. All he knows is that it was definitely a good idea, because when Brian tugs his pants down and Bob kicks them off, all that’s separating him and Brian is this tiny, thin layer of fabric. Bob ruts against Brian, hissing a breath at the friction, and Brian arches up underneath him, biting at Bob’s collarbone and muttering, “Fuck, Bob,” as he does so. Bob slides Brian’s boxer-briefs off and leans down to bite Brian’s hip, lick the head of Brian’s cock. Brian gasps when Bob’s mouth closes around him and Bob can feel the telltale twitch of Brian’s hips that suggests he’s trying not to buck into Bob’s mouth. The mental image that conjures is really, really hot, and Bob thinks that maybe they’ll have to try that next time. Right now, they’re way too keyed up for anything slow.
“How do you want to do this?” Bob murmurs against the shell of Brian’s ear, kissing Brian’s cheek and continuing around to press his mouth over Brian’s and lick at the seam of Brian’s mouth. Brian kisses him, hard and desperate and grips Bob’s hips hard enough that there might be bruises there later.
“Fuck me,” he says against Bob’s mouth, and it shoots straight down Bob’s spine to his dick.
“Okay,” he whispers, kisses Brian once more before leaning over and digging around in his nightstand for a condom and lube.
He reaches down and works Brian open, and fucked if the noises that Brian makes while he’s writhing around Bob’s fingers aren’t just obscene. After a few minutes, Brian hooks his ankles around Bob’s legs and tries to pull him forward, groaning, “C’mon, fuck,” as he does so.
Bob obliges, angling himself and pushing in slow, reveling in the breaths that Brian takes as he relaxes around Bob until he’s all the way in. Bob pulls out, slowly, almost all the way before driving forward again, with a bit more force than last time. It takes a few thrusts but they establish a rhythm, steady and perfectly balanced, and Bob bites at the juncture where Brian’s shoulder becomes his neck while Brian moans and pulls at Bob’s hair, pushing back against Bob’s cock while Bob rolls his hips forward.
“Fuck,” Brian says, reaches down to wrap his own fist around his cock when Bob’s pacing starts to get erratic. “Fuck, c’mon, baby.” He’s muttering nonsense and groaning, but it’s still ridiculously hot from where Bob’s sitting. Bob reaches up to wrap his hand around Brian’s, their fingers intertwined as they both bring Brian off between them. He makes a keening noise that he tries to bite back and arches up, digging his heels into Bob’s thighs while Bob groans and topples over the edge alongside him. They lay there, breathing heavy and kissing slow, for a few long moments before Bob pulls out and makes a face, tying the condom off and tossing it into the trash basket in the corner of the room.
“Shit,” Brian says, burying his face against Bob’s neck, one of his legs between Bob’s. His arm is slung haphazardly over Bob’s waist, and Bob is absently carding his fingers through Brian’s short hair. “Awesome.”
Bob snorts and presses a kiss to Brian’s forehead. Now that everything is said and done, Bob is actually kind of appalled that this didn’t happen sooner. He feels like a huge tool for not realizing his and Brian’s relationship back when everyone else did, but he guesses he can’t feel too bad since Brian doesn’t seem to mind, so long as he picked up on it eventually.
“Hey,” he says, pulling Brian even closer and talking into Brian’s hair, “I need a date for a show next weekend. You busy?”
Brian huffs a laugh against Bob’s shoulder and responds drowsily, “I’ll have to check my schedule but I think I’ve got you covered.”
Bob smiles and closes his eyes and wonders how, as an investigative journalist, he managed to ignore all the clues leading to this point. Brian’s breathing deep and even next to him, he vows that he’ll pay more attention from now on.
“Get up,” Brian murmurs, gently prodding at Bob’s side. “’m hungry.”
Bob laughs and watches as Brian stands, stretches, and wanders out into the kitchen. He’s basking in the moment, just for now since it’s something he doesn’t do often, when Brian’s voice rings out down the hall, “You’ve kept me waiting long enough, Bryar. Don’t test my patience again.”
“I won’t,” Bob grins, following the sound of Brian’s voice. “I won’t.”
Bob Bryar x Brian Schechter
NC17
authornote: This was written for bandomficathon. The whole thing wasn't finished by the due date, hence the reason it's taken me so long to get it posted. It's kind of incredibly cheesy, but I hope you enjoy it anyway. ♥
“Brian!” Bob yells over his shoulder as he digs through a pile of dirty laundry. “Dude, where’s my shirt?”
From across the New York apartment that the two share, Brian responds, his voice muted by the walls between them, “I don’t fucking know! What shirt are you talking about?”
Bob rolls his eyes at his laundry and stands, grabbing his still damp towel from the corner of his bed and rubbing it vigorously over his shaggy blond hair as he goes. He can’t see when he steps out into the short hallway separating his bedroom from the main living area, but it doesn’t matter. He’s navigated this apartment enough times that by now he can find everything with his eyes closed. Except his damn shirt, of course.
Strolling into the kitchen where Brian is sitting at the circular table, eating an omelet and poring over some history text, Bob clarifies, “I’m looking for the nice one, with the pattern, you know?”
Brian arches an eyebrow at Bob and shoots him a scathing look from behind his glasses. “That really helps me narrow it down, thanks,” he says, wry smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.
Bob grabs a piece of Brian’s toast and jams the whole thing into his mouth, ignoring his roommate’s pained expression as he replies, mouth full, “The green one. Long sleeves.”
Sighing, Brian pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose and cants his head at Bob. “You have an interview today?”
Bob nods and considers stealing Brian’s other slice of toast - he doesn’t know why Brian insists on making it when he rarely eats more than a few bites - but decides that a better course of action is to dig through the cabinet over the microwave until he finds a bagel that’s not completely stale.
“You don’t want to wear the green one to an interview. Wear the blue, it looks better,” Brian states, his attention back on the book before him. He leans over, jotting down some random side-thought in one of his myriad notebooks before digging into his omelet again.
Pouring himself a glass of orange juice, Bob takes a sip and stuffs his bagel into the little toaster in the corner of the counter. He arches an eyebrow at Brian and asks, “The blue? Really? It makes my torso look short.” For a split second, he’s appalled that he actually said that aloud, but he figures that over a year of living in close quarters with Brian and spending time with Gerard who lives across the hall could have rubbed off on him in more embarrassing ways.
Brian waves a hand vaguely in his direction and mutters off-handedly, “No, just leave a couple of top buttons undone.” Bob makes a thoughtful sound into his juice and retreats to his bedroom once more, throwing the brilliant blue shirt on and buttoning it per Brian’s instructions. He glances at himself in the mirror, debates trading his black slacks for a pair of pinstriped gray ones, and then gives up on his appearance when he hears the toaster pop.
He spends a couple of minutes messing with his hair to make it lay in a manner that’s at least semi-appropriate for a business interview and goes to retrieve his breakfast.
Brian is either too polite or too interested in his reading to look smug about Bob’s choice of attire. Bob would bet that it’s the latter, because Brian rarely passes up an opportunity to lord it over Bob when Bob takes his advice.
Portfolio tucked underneath his arm, Bob spreads cream cheese over his bagel and then pauses to pull on his coat.
“All right,” he says, half the bagel hanging out of his mouth, “wish me luck.”
“G’luck,” Brian replies immediately, around a mouthful of egg and toast. Bob rolls his eyes again and steps out the door, hoping he makes it on time.
*
Bob is lying on the couch, the blue shirt from that morning strewn haphazardly over the cushions at his back, when Brian comes trundling into the apartment. He mumbles something and Bob glances up, grinning when he sees that Brian’s trying to talk around one of his gloves, which is clenched between his teeth.
Smirking, Bob walks over and takes the plastic bags from Brian who sends him a grateful look and yanks the glove from his mouth, tossing it down onto the table. Bob peers into the bags, grin widening when he sees that it’s takeout from the Thai restaurant down the street that they both love.
“Awesome,” he says, nodding his approval while he sets the food down on the counter, digging around for cutlery and plates. “So, today was your lunch date with Frank’s friend from the bio department, right?”
Brian snorts and glances over from where he’s studying their mail. “Yeah, the one who was ‘totally perfect for me in every way,’ according to that little shit.” He mutters a few things about bills and tosses out the junk mail, setting a manila envelope aside for Bob. “It wasn’t a great date,” he mutters.
Bob snorts and starts dishing out a heaping pile of spicy noodles. “I figured,” he retorts with an arched eyebrow, “or else I doubt you’d be here eating Thai with me.”
Brian laughs and replies, “Good point, you’re not exactly date material, there, Bryar.”
Glancing over from where he’s standing at the fridge, one noodle still dangling out of his mouth while he grabs himself a beer, Bob says primly, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Brian laughs again and shakes his head, patting Bob on the shoulder while he pokes around in the takeout cartons. “I take it your interview went better than my date?” Brian inquires, sitting down at the table while Bob takes the seat across from him. Bob slides a beer over and Brian nods his thanks, helping himself to a deep swig.
“Yeah, it was pretty good, “ Bob confirms, twirling some of the pasta around his fork. “Turns out that the syndication company is actually really interested in my writing. They want to do a couple more meetings, though, before they decide who gets the slot.”
Brian sends an appropriately impressed look Bob’s way and smiles, “Nice! You’re moving up in the world, huh?” He smirks when Bob rolls his eyes, downing what’s left of his beer.
“Well, you know, we can’t all stay in school for our whole damn lives,” Bob shoots back. Brian laughs so hard that he gets the hiccups, and they spend the next few hours playing cutthroat Halo with half the dudes that live on their floor.
*
Tuesday morning rolls around quicker than Bob had expected, and of course it has to be the one day when everything goes wrong. Bob’s stuck behind a semi-truck that had apparently been transporting chickens from one side of the nation to the other, if the birds dancing all across the street are anything to go by. He glances at his rearview mirror, gritting his teeth when he sees that traffic is in a gridlock in both directions, city employees scrambling around and trying to round the chickens up while they move the out-of-commission truck.
“Fuck,” Bob hisses when he sees the time. The interviewer will be there in half an hour and there’s no way Bob will be back by then. He’s debating calling and cancelling, but he knows that this is an opportunity he isn’t likely to get twice, so he really can’t afford to do so.
“Shit,” he mutters to himself, pressing one of his speed dial buttons and worrying his lower lip as traffic slowly creeps forward.
“This is Brian,” Brian announces from the other line, and Bob lets out a breath.
“Hey, man, when do you have class today?” Bob blurts immediately. He can picture Brian on the other end, probably flopped out on his bed and painstakingly combing through some text that Bob would find mind-numbingly boring.
“Oh, uh, I don’t,” he responds. “I was just going to hit the library and work on my thesis while you’re here. Why, you need me out now? I can leave early, no problem.”
“No!” Bob barks immediately. “No, don’t leave yet. I actually wondered if you could stay for a little while. I’m stuck in traffic so I’m going to be a few minutes late -” He trails off and lets Brian connect the dots.
“I, what? Bob, I can’t like, do your interview for you, dude,” Brian says, tiny hint of exasperation tugging at his tone.
“And I’m not asking you to. Just, I’ll call and let them know I’m going to be late, you just have to let her in and stall for me for five minutes, ten tops.” After he’s finished, Brian is silent on the other end of the phone. Bob waits for a few seconds before continuing, “C’mon, man, you can’t leave me hanging like this. I’ll buy you dinner and a twenty-four pack of Heineken, whatever you want!”
Bob doesn’t beg. Brian knows this. Therefore, the fact that Bob is practically on his knees pleading should clue Brian in to the severity of the situation. Bob can almost hear the gears cranking around in Brian’s mind, and he lets out a long, relieved sigh when Brian mutters, “Fine. But I’m getting dessert too.”
“Thank you,” Bob breathes, and knows that if Brain were there he’d be flapping a hand in Bob’s direction and making an annoyed face.
“Whatever, you’re paying your dues,” Brian shoots back. He pauses before asking, “So, what am I supposed to say to this chick anyway?”
“I don’t know, man, just talk to her! I’d say to offer her a drink or something, but I went out specifically so that we’d have shit to put out.”
“Where are you anyway?” Brian inquires, and Bob grinds his teeth a little, following a cop’s instructions to take a wide detour around a group of caged chickens.
“I’m stuck in traffic on the highway,” he says blandly. Brian must have been watching the news because he starts laughing hysterically. Bob reaches up and pinches at the bridge of his nose.
“Shut up,” he barks, and Brian just laughs harder.
“I’m sorry,” Brian wheezes, “I’m sorry, but, dude, chickens, for real?”
Bob sighs and debates the pros and cons of laying on his horn so that the woman in front of him with all the PETA stickers will stop going fifteen miles an hour when the zone is pretty clearly chicken free. “For real,” he responds, adding a thank you before hanging up while Brian continues laughing to himself.
*
Bob ends up only being about two minutes late, and he comes in through the door balancing a few bags of groceries to find Brian sitting and chatting amicably over coffee with a dark-haired woman.
“Hey,” he greets, setting the grocery bags down, “I’m so sorry that I’m late.” He strides over to the woman, who turns her warm grin on him, and shakes her hand gently.
“It’s all right. I doubt anyone could’ve predicted a chicken-related catastrophe,” she says with a wink. Brian chuckles to himself and takes a sip of his mostly full coffee cup, rising to his feet. Bob’s pleased to note that he put on something nice, even though he had no real reason to.
“Sophia, it was a pleasure meeting you,” Brian nods at the woman and sets his cup down on the counter next to the sink. “I’ll just get out of your way, now,” he adds, glancing from Bob back to Sophia, who shakes her head and waves a hand in Brian’s direction.
“Nonsense!” she replies happily. “Sit down, finish your coffee! We can start with you here, assuming that isn’t a problem for you Mister Bryar?” She turns her wide eyes on Bob, who smiles and shrugs.
“No problem at all. And please, call me Bob.” Brian arches an eyebrow quizzically in Bob’s direction while Sophia’s back is turned, grabbing his cup and leaning against the counter. Bob just shrugs in response, because he’s not really sure why Sophia wants Brian to stick around either. He has half a mind to ask what Brian said, specifically, but he knows that Brian’s not a moron, so it’s doubtful that Brian mentioned anything that could get Bob into trouble.
Ushering Sophia into the living room, Bob takes a seat next to Brian and rubs his palms against his thighs to quell his nerves. Sophia digs through the chic little briefcase she brought with her, slipping on a pair of glasses and pulling out a file folder of what Bob recognizes as his article samples.
“Before we look at your work, I wondered if you might mind me asking a few personal questions.” Sophia inquires politely, still smiling. Bob shakes his head.
“Not at all, go right ahead,” he says, glancing over to Brian, who sips his coffee and sinks back into the sofa, clearly uncomfortable.
“You graduated from NYU, correct?” Sophia asks, making a note to herself when Bob affirms her question. “And how long have you been living here?”
Bob glances over at Brian, caught slightly off-guard at the question. “Oh,” he says, eloquently, “uh-”
Luckily, Brian cuts in for him and responds, “We’ve lived here for about two and a half years now.” Sophia sends them both a beaming smile, which makes the corners of Bob’s mouth turn down while Brian simply continues to grin placidly from behind his cup of coffee.
“That’s wonderful!” Sophia states happily, asking a few more blasé questions regarding Bob’s various educational and professional accomplishments.
After a long moment, Brian clears his throat and rises to his feet, saying hesitantly, “Uh, sorry if I’m interrupting but I should really get going. Work to do, you know.”
Sophia nods while Brian shakes her hand and reiterates what a pleasure it was to meet her. As he’s on his way out the door, a few books tucked under his arm, glasses perched on his nose, Bob calls, “Don’t forget to text me what you want for dinner!”
He feels rather than sees Brian roll his eyes, but he ignores it. If Bob doesn’t remind him, Brian will stay at the library until all hours, forgetting to eat because he’s so caught up in his work. Bob, for one, is in no hurry to re-visit the week when Brian almost got pneumonia because he’d ignored a cold and foregone food in favor of working on his thesis.
“You two seem to care a lot about one another,” Sophia says quietly, smiling fondly at Bob and leaning forward. Bob tugs at his collar and shifts in his seat.
“Oh, well, he’s my best friend, you know?” he responds gruffly, reaching up to rub at the back of his neck. Sophia nods and bites her lip while she ducks her head to look at Bob’s file once more. Bob has the sneaking suspicion that if this weren’t a professional setting she’d be cooing at him. It’s more than a little unsettling, but Bob figures that if this is the worst he has to deal with in the face of possible syndication, his life is pretty damn good.
*
It doesn’t really click until three days later, when Sophia leaves Bob a voicemail while he’s in the shower that morning. He’s listening to it while he cleans up the kitchen, nodding along with the meter of her voice. It’s a lengthy diatribe about how Bob’s credentials are excellent, but they’re also looking for people who fill certain demographics to make sure that they have the most diverse team possible. Bob frowns for a few seconds when he hears this, because he’s pretty much the average Caucasian male, a statistical group that’s fairly readily spoken for. He’s surprised when Sophia mentions how excited she is at the prospect of getting Bob to join their staff, and then she says it.
“It was wonderful to meet you and Brian, and I hope to see you both at the art gala you’ll be reviewing as a freelance sample. Your invitation is in the mail, and it’s to you plus one so that Brian can come along as well. We’re an equal opportunity employer so you don’t have to worry about anything. If you have any questions or concerns, go ahead and drop me a line, okay?”
Bob’s stomach plummets and he hangs up his phone, letting it clatter to the counter. He stands there, staring at the dishes for a long time, wondering why everything he touches always has to get so fucked up.
*
He doesn’t say anything to Brian because he doesn’t think that Brian needs to know. Sure, it’s kind of hilarious that Sophia seems to think they’re together, but for some odd reason it eats at the very bottom of Bob’s stomach, gnawing at the lining and unleashing hordes of tiny insects. It’s not that Bob has a problem with people thinking he’s gay - hell, he dated Quinn for a year back in college so that’s not the issue at all - but Brian is his best friend. They’ve been through shit together that a lot of people don’t understand.
Brian was there to drive Bob to the hospital in the middle of the night when he broke his wrist doing some work around his dorm room, and Bob doesn’t think he’ll ever forget the day Brian got out of rehab and called Bob first.
So, it’s not that he wants to keep it a secret exactly, he just doesn’t want there to be any reason for things to get weird between them. He deliberately doesn’t think about the fact that if it were Frankie or Gee, he’d be crowing at them and laughing in a heartbeat, because it’s in the wake of those thoughts that Bob’s feebly constructed excuse starts to dissolve.
*
The gala is that weekend, and when Brian asks Bob who he’s taking as his date - complete with fluttering eyelashes, which may or may not make Bob’s stomach lurch a little, not that Bob would know - Bob just shrugs and says around his toothbrush, “I owe you dinner. Might as well kill two birds with one stone.” Brian makes a face at his toothpaste covered tongue and Bob grins, sticks it out, and then spits into the kitchen sink.
“Nasty, dude,” Brian mutters with a smirk, and Bob shrugs.
“Besides,” he adds, “Sophia likes you for some weird reason.”
Brian rolls his eyes and goes back to highlighting something in his notes, commenting off-handedly, “Oh yeah, because I’m totally unlikeable.”
Bob swallows and turns his back to Brian, grabbing at one of the sofa cushions and chucking it at Brian’s head while he replies, “Whatever. Put on something pretty, bitch.”
Brian squawks with surprise when the pillow hits him in the face and stomps off to change. By the time Bob emerges from his own bedroom, across the apartment from Brian’s, the latter is seated primly on the sofa, clicking through their billion satellite channels and looking severely bored. Bob pauses in the shadows of the hallway and sucks in a quiet breath. He’s always known Brian was attractive on some level, but now that Sophia’s put the idea of Brian as a potential significant other into his head, Bob can’t quite stop himself from lingering on the quirk of Brian’s mouth, his eyes and the slight hint of shadow hiding just beneath his skin even when he’s clean shaven.
“You clean up pretty well,” Bob jokes, hoping Brian doesn’t notice that his voice sounds dry. Brian snorts and rises to his feet, arching an eyebrow at Bob. If it were anyone else, Bob would think that the lavender shirt and slate grey tie looked ridiculous, but Brian is somehow making it work in his favor. He’s not wearing his glasses tonight, and as much as Bob likes his glasses, he’s relieved to know that he won’t have to break through any barriers to catch Brian’s eye if he needs.
“You revisiting your Goth phase?” Brian smiles, slipping his hands into his pockets. Bob glances down at himself, smoothes out the front of his shirt.
“What?” he asks, slightly incredulous at Brian’s question. “Black is classic!”
“You’re wearing jeans,” Brian points out. Bob rolls the cuffs of his shirt up to his elbows and heads over to the kitchen counter to collect his wallet and phone.
“They’re designer jeans,” he mumbles, making sure that his phone is on vibrate - if he doesn’t do it now, he’ll forget completely and he absolutely needs whatever absurd ringtone Brian has programmed into it this week to go off during an interview with one of the gallery spectators.
“You own designer jeans?” Brian asks, pulling the door open and following Bob out into the hall. Bob shrugs.
“I wanted something semi-casual that I could wear for an interview,” he states, hunching his shoulders a little bit, defensively. Brian holds his hands up in a mild gesture of mercy and strolls along beside Bob, shaking his head.
“Whatever man, all I’m saying is that you have officially usurped me as the gay one in the apartment,” he grins, stepping onto the elevator. Bob glares. Once the door has shifted closed, he leans against the wall and glances at Brian out of the corner of his eye.
“You sure about that?” he inquires with mock-innocence. “You’re the one with a pair of Dolce & Gabana loafers.”
He snickers when he feels Brian’s eyes burning into his back as he steps out into the lobby. Brian mutters, “You asshole, I told you never to mention that,” and for a few minutes, at least, Bob can pretend that he hasn’t been half-wondering what it would take to get into Brian’s pants for the last four days.
*
The gala is nice enough, although a little bit stuffy for Bob’s personal taste. He prefers to do concert reviews, which Sophia knows, but there aren’t any upcoming shows in the area that meet the company’s criteria, so Bob’s stuck. It’s not that he doesn’t like galleries - after all, it’s impossible to be friends with the Ways and not spend at least a few hours a month viewing various exhibitions - but there are things he’d rather be doing with his time. For example, he knows that Blade Runner is on tonight, and every time he glances at some of the darker new wave work he can’t help but think of how much more fun it would be to have a beer, kick back with Brian, and watch TV until the wee hours of the morning.
He and Brian are milling around, trying to look deeply engaged in a conversation so that other people leave them alone. They stopped floundering around in Sophia’s shadow after about a half an hour of schmoozing, when she kept sending them these fond gazes that made Bob blush and seemed to simply confuse Brian.
They’re doing bad British accents and making snide comments - quietly of course - about the painting in front of them, when Brian glances over Bob’s shoulder, suddenly going ashen.
“Well fuck,” Brian states dully, the smile falling from his face. Bob turns slightly, searching the crowd and not finding anything too out of the ordinary. He gives Brian a concerned frown, and Brian shrugs, barely meeting Bob’s eyes and hunching in on himself in a very un-Brian-like manner.
“Rick’s here,” he mutters. Bob’s eyes widen and a wave of rage surges up through his abdomen. Rick and Brian dated for just shy of two years, half of which the bastard spent fucking some twink behind Brian’s back until a mutual friend found out and let Brian know. It’s been a long time since Rick, but if the look on Brian’s face is anything to go by it hasn’t been nearly long enough.
“You want to leave?” Bob asks, nudging Brian’s shoulder. Brian worries the ring in his lower lip for a long moment before shrugging and shaking his head.
“No, I mean, he might not even see me.” He turns a weak smile on Bob and half-hearted jokes, “Besides, don’t want to rain on your once in a lifetime parade, Bryar.”
Bob’s about to assure Brian that they won’t be missing out on anything, seriously, they can go, when who should pop up at Bob’s elbow but Sophia.
“Hey, Brian,” Sophia greets, looking positively bubbly despite the black cocktail dress she’s wearing, “mind if I steal your boy for a minute?” Bob feels himself go red and hopes that Brian doesn’t notice.
Brian shifts his weight and looks thoroughly confused, but he smiles at Sophia anyway and says, “No, uh, no problem at all.”
“Great!” Sophia chirps, linking arms with Bob and pulling him in the direction of a group of elderly women in evening gowns. “Play nice, Bryar, these kindly old matrons fund a good portion of the company.”
Bob almost groans, but he bites it back at the last second and hopes that his smile doesn’t look too much like a grimace.
*
Bob is just taking a final statement from Molly, one of the half-drunk old women who he and Sophia have been chatting up for the past twenty minutes, when he glances over and sees Brian talking to two men, one of whom Bob recognizes immediately as Rick. From the way that Brian has his hand cupped around the back of his neck and seems to be looking for the nearest escape route, Bob would guess that it isn’t going so well.
“Ladies, if you’ll please forgive me, I have some important business to attend to,” he says, excusing himself as graciously as possible. He kisses Eva’s hand before he goes, which earns him major points if the flustered sounds and Sophia’s not-so-subtle thumbs up are anything to go by, and starts to head placidly in Brian’s direction. When he draws up closer, he can hear Rick and the fop-like brunette that Rick brought as arm candy making thinly veiled comments about how strange it is to see Brian here alone. The brunette says, “Well, with a tie like that are you really surprised?” and they both start laughing uproariously. Something protective and furious rises in Bob’s chest, and Brian catches his eye over Rick’s shoulder.
Bob mouths ‘play along’ and hopes that Brian understands when all he gets is a bemused quirk of Brian’s mouth in response. Taking a deep breath and ignoring the fact that this could all end disastrously, Bob sidles up next to Brian, smiling as affectionately as he can and sliding his arm around Brian’s waist.
Brian starts at first, but then he catches on and sends Bob a half-amused, half-exasperated look when Bob greets, “Hey, didn’t mean to keep you waiting.”
Rick and his boy-toy are pretty clearly sizing Bob up, which both Bob and Brian apparently find hilarious because Bob feels Brian twitch a little beside him. Brian casually lets his hand rest on Bob’s shoulder, and Bob tries to send mental ‘high-five’ vibes in Brian’s direction.
“And you are?” Rick asks with a fake smile, extending his hand.
“Bob,” Bob says, adding, “I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” and giving the other two men a pointed look that conveys just how much he really doesn’t mean that. Brian snickers and Bob nudges his side. Brian squeezes Bob’s shoulder, just a barely there convulsion of his palm, but it makes Bob’s heart jump nonetheless.
“So,” Rick’s pretty-boy says, “how do you two know one another exactly?”
“Oh, well, we -” Brian starts, but Bob leans up on his toes like he sees someone over the heads of the men standing before them. He fakes a nod in the direction that Sophia’s in and then smiles a big, fake grin at Rick and his fanboy.
“Sorry, babe, Sophia’s calling,” Bob says, “I’ll be right back.” And then, on a total whim that doesn’t have anything at all to do with the slightly panicked, semi-betrayed look that Brian gives him no matter what later accounts may suggest, Bob leans in and presses his mouth to Brian’s. Brian freezes for a split second, and then he’s kissing back, tip of his tongue poking out where his lips were ever-so-slightly parted when Bob closed the distance between them. It’s all that Bob can do not to sink into Brian’s mouth, coax it open. He pulls back a little, plants another, smaller kiss on the corner of Brian’s half-grin before smiling giddily at the two morons before him, and then walking over to Sophia, watching over his shoulder as he goes.
Brian’s cheeks are flushed, but he’s standing taller and Rick makes some overdramatic excuse to flounce away with his eye-candy in tow. After they’re gone, Brian glances up to where Bob is standing making arbitrary small talk with Sophia at the refreshment table and catches Bob’s eye. Bob flushes, smiles, and ducks his head, because his stomach is doing that weird rolling thing again.
Somewhere in the last tiny, desperate part of his mind, he absently hopes it was the Mexican they had before the gala and not the barely-there pink tinge to Brian’s mouth.
*
They excuse themselves shortly after the Rick confrontation and duck out the back door. Brian rests his palm gently against the small of Bob’s back when Bob squeezes out the door that Brian’s holding open, and Bob’s throat goes dry. He doesn’t know if that’s something that Brian has always done, and he’s only just noticing it, or if it’s something to do with the kiss.
Wrinkling his nose a little at the thought, which makes him sound like some lovesick teeny bopper, Bob digs into his pocket for the keys to his old Saturn.
Neither of them says anything until they’re tucked securely into the car, Brian absently fiddling with the radio station while Bob needlessly adjusts his rearview mirror. Bob’s about to turn the key in the ignition when Brian clears his throat awkwardly and says, “Thank you.”
Bob glances over at him and smiles, barely a quirk of his lips. “No problem, dude,” he assures, and some of the tension seeps from his shoulders. He doesn’t tack on the ‘anything for you’ that’s hanging off the tip of his tongue because he’s pretty sure that’s crossing a line that he isn’t supposed to even know exists.
Instead, he just cranks the key in the ignition and focuses on not hitting anyone while he backs out.
*
Bob spends approximately forty minutes after they get back to the apartment freaking out about his actions and the consequences they might have. Brian is either so secure in their relationship that he’s taking this a billion times better than Bob, or he’s just some kind of secret Zen master when it comes to keeping up a happy façade. He grabs two beers from the fridge and plops down on the couch next to Bob, handing one of the bottles over. He doesn’t really sit any closer or further away from Bob than he normally would, but it’s like Bob is suddenly hyperaware of every molecule that is - and isn’t - between them.
He does his best to pay attention to Scrubs, and after an episode and a half of J.D.’s absurd mental tangents and Elliot’s nigh-incoherent psycho babble, Bob finds himself relaxing into the sofa, sock-covered feet up on the coffee table despite how he knows Brian hates it. They both laugh at something the janitor does, and just like that the tension breaks completely. Brian almost snorts beer out his nose and Bob laughs so hard that he gets the hiccups.
*
Things are fine until a few days later, when Sophia invites Bob out to lunch that weekend as congratulations for officially being hired, and to finish filling out a little bit of paperwork. She and a few other people from the office are going to be there, and she implies with a not-so-successful attempt at discretion that he can tow Brian along as well, if he’d like. Bob glances over at Brian out of the corner of his eye, where Brian’s on X-box Live with Ray from the next floor down, and clears his throat.
“I uh, yeah, I’ll maybe bring him,” Bob says, wincing as he completely butchers his own sentence. He bites back a groan, but only barely, because Bob doesn’t do this. He doesn’t get all flustered and tongue-tied. He never really has, so he doesn’t see why his body and mind have apparently decided to gang up on his baser consciousness and start now.
He and Sophia say their goodbyes and Bob sighs, shuffling out to the living room area and flopping down on one of the armchairs. Brian glances at him curiously for a moment, but Bob makes a show of opening up one of the books he left laying on the coffee table the other day and leaning back to read. After a few seconds, Brian bursts out laughing at something that Ray said, and Bob feels Brian’s gaze shift back to the television.
*
Bob intended to ask Brian to come along with him to lunch. He did, honestly, but he still hadn’t built up the courage by the time he was ready to head out the door, so he’d given it up as a lost cause. Sophia smiling sympathetically at him and patting his hand while he filled out his paperwork didn’t much help, and when Bob finally storms up to the apartment that afternoon, he’s in a sour mood.
Brian is at class and won’t be back until around eight, so Bob mopes around the little space by himself for awhile before huffing exasperatedly and heading across the hall. It’s a good bet that Gerard will be home, since he rarely goes out unless he needs groceries or if Frank somehow manages to wheedle him outdoors. Bob knocks at the door a few times, raptly, and can’t suppress a grin when there’s the thud of something falling over and then a string of muffled cursing.
When Gerard opens the door, he’s got paint smeared all across his cheek and his sunglasses are on. He smiles widely at Bob and greets, “If it isn’t the elusive Robert Bryar!” He ushers Bob inside and says, “Where’ve you been, man? You and Brian go through a second honeymoon phase or something?”
Bob’s amusement at Gerard’s absentmindedness vanishes instantly, replaced by a sort of grudging acceptance. Apparently the entire world is determined to make sure that the only thing he can think about is himself and Brian.
“No,” Bob growls. “We never had a first honeymoon phase.”
Gerard laughs and takes up his position behind a wooden easel in the corner, staring at the canvas therein while he talks.
“Whatever dude, I’ve seen you guys making cow eyes at each other too many times to believe that,” Gerard says, pursing his lips and dipping a brush in a cupful of filthy water. Bob frowns and flops down on Gerard’s sofa, kicking his feet up and not bothering to take his jacket off.
“We don’t make cow eyes,” Bob insists, wrinkling his nose. Gerard laughs and points his paintbrush at Bob.
“Oh, I’m sorry, should I have said you did eyelash flutters of manly love and devotion?” he jokes. Bob grimaces and runs a hand over his face and turns a glare on Gerard, who remains unperturbed and continues painting.
“That’s it,” Bob mutters, closing his eyes, “I’m not letting you hang out with Frank anymore.”
*
Two and a half hours, some serious conversation, and a few rounds of cutthroat Halo later, Bob heads back to his and Brian’s apartment, brow furrowed in concentration as he goes. What Gerard said didn’t really help him clear anything up. If anything, it muddled the picture even further, because apparently ninety percent of the people Bob knows have thought he and Brian were dating for the past two years, at least.
If he sits around doing nothing, he’s bound to over-think everything, the way that he generally tends to do, so instead Bob decides that he’ll clean the apartment. It’s not all that dirty to start with, but it’s been awhile since they last bleached the bathroom or the kitchen counter, and with all the cooking Brian’s been doing lately in his efforts to live a healthier life that shit can’t be sanitary. He’s scrubbing the tub in a pair of ratty old sweatpants and a band t-shirt from back in the day when he used to sound at some of the little clubs nearby in order to pay his bills when Brian walks through the door and shouts, “Yo Bryar, I brought pizza!”
Bob huffs a sigh and wipes his forearm over his hairline, where he’s starting to sweat a little bit. He rises to his feet and wanders out into the hall and stops because. Well, because Brian is right there. And Bob sees Brian every day, so it’s nothing new, and it’s not really even particularly artistic because Brian’s hair is all fucked up from walking around in the wind and he apparently spilled something on the shirt he’d worn to class that morning, but he’s smiling and shrugging out of his jacket and that same thing that’s been fluttering around in Bob’s stomach for the past few weeks hums to life. Bob mutters, “Fuck,” and is about to retreat back to his bedroom for a few minutes to gather himself when Brian catches his eye.
He looks confused, if happy, and asks, “Are you cleaning?” Bob glances down at himself and realizes that he’s still wearing the elbow-high yellow rubber gloves he’d bought ages ago.
“Oh, yeah.” Bob smiles sheepishly and shrugs. “It’s been awhile,” he offers, by way of explanation, but Brian isn’t having any of it.
“You only clean when you’re upset, Bryar,” Brian points out and Bob shifts his weight a little because this is seriously not the conversation that he wants to be having right now.
“No, my shower was gross,” Bob says pointedly. Brian, being Brian, doesn’t pick up on the subtle hint and frowns, beckoning Bob over.
“Seriously dude, I know you hate talking about your feelings, but what’s up?” Brian asks, and he looks so damn sincere that Bob can’t just blow him off and disappear for an hour and a half, which is what he would normally do if he felt like avoiding a situation.
Bob sighs and peels the gloves of, tossing them into the sink. “I swear, it’s nothing,” he assures, taking a seat at their little dining table. “Just, don’t worry about it, okay?”
Brian smirks a little and says, “Kind of hard not to when you look like the weight of the world is on your shoulders, Bryar.” Bob rolls his eyes.
“Whatever, just, let it go,” he mutters, and Brian frowns, holds his hands up a little.
“No need to get fucking hostile there, dude,” he replies and Bob’s eyes narrow because all this shit is Brian’s fault anyway. Because if he hadn’t been there, standing in front of Bob all the time and being fucking awesome, Bob wouldn’t even have this problem. And yeah, maybe that’s a little bit unfair, but Bob doesn’t really give a shit at the moment, because all he wants is to not lose his best friend over something stupid like not being able to stop thinking about him romantically.
It’s only when he registers Brian’s wide eyes and half-open mouth that Bob realizes there’s a good possibility that he said all of that out loud. He closes his eyes and runs his hands over his face before standing and turning toward his bedroom without a word. Brian’s chair screeches as he stands and Bob sighs, fully anticipating Brian’s hand on his shoulder. He braces himself for what he’s expecting to be a right hook to the nose, but ends up actually being Brian’s mouth pressing hard against his.
Bob opens his eyes, shocked, and a tiny smile flits over his features.
“Fuck you, Bryar,” Brian growls, “you don’t get to make declarations like that and walk away.”
He winds his hands in Bob’s hair and pulls Bob down. Bob opens his mouth at the insistence of Brian’s tongue, one of his hands curling around Brian’s waist while he curls the other around the nape of Brian’s neck. After a few long, blissful moments, Brian pulls back a little, his thumb brushing over Bob’s lower lip. His gaze is trained on Bob’s mouth as he speaks, “Dude, I’ve been waiting for this for like, years now.”
Bob chuckles a little and slips two of his fingers under the hem of Brian’s shirt, a shiver running down his spine at the barely-there hitch in Brian’s breath when he does so.
“I’m a little slow on the uptake,” Bob apologizes. Brian laughs, soft, his breath warm against Bob’s cheek.
“Yeah, you kind of are,” he agrees, and Bob leans down to kiss him again. It doesn’t feel like coming home, or fireworks, or anything, but Brian’s a damn good kisser, and Bob really wouldn’t rather be anywhere but right here, right now, in their cramped hallway with Brian’s tongue in his mouth. He shifts a little and slides one of his legs slightly between Brian’s and Brian moans. Something surges inside Bob and he pushes until Brian is up against the wall, pinned between Bob and the plaster. Brian’s panting a bit, and Bob would be if he wasn’t so busy mouthing gently at the line of Brian’s jaw, his neck. His lips drag against the rough grain of Brian’s five o’clock shadow and Bob smiles because it has been way too long.
“Bob,” Brian groans, and pushes his hips forward. Bob’s sweatpants leave very little to the imagination in situations such as these, and Brian’s dress pants aren’t much better. Bob doesn’t answer, but he digs his fingers gently into Brian’s hips, pulls him as close as he can get. He delves into Brian’s mouth again and part of him wants to pull Brian up so that he’s straddling Bob’s waist right there in the hall, but Bob isn’t as young as he used to be, and Brian’s older than he is, even, so it’s probably ill advised. Instead, he maneuvers one hand around so that he’s gripping Brian’s ass while his other remains splayed across the small of Brian’s back. Brian bites his lower lip and Bob groans way back in his throat because, fuck, Brian knows he loves that. Brian’s smirking when Bob pulls back and Bob grins back.
“Bedroom?” he asks. Brian licks his reddened mouth and it would be pathetic how Bob’s eyes follow his tongue if it wasn’t so fucking hot.
“Probably a good idea,” Brian breathes, hooking a thumb under the hem of Bob’s sweats. “Mine or yours?”
Bob glances to his right. “Mine’s closer,” he says, and Brian nods and then pushes off from the wall, kissing Bob again and taking a few stumbling steps in the direction of the door to Bob’s room. Bob makes a face when his back hits the doorknob, and he pulls Brian inside and spins him around so that his knees hit the edge of Bob’s mattress when he backs up.
“Fuck,” Brian says, struggling with the buttons on his shirt. Bob helps him and after a few seconds of fumbling, Brian shrugs it off and tosses it over the side of the bed. He’s lying there, with Bob straddling his hips, propped up on his elbows all shirtless and breathing deep and Bob commits the image to memory before leaning in to lick a stripe down the center of Brian’s chest, pressing his lips to the soft skin therein and letting his teeth drag delicately over one of Brian’s nipples. Brian bites back a noise and rolls his hips upward, Bob pushing his down to meet halfway. Brian is tugging insistently at Bob’s shirt, so Bob yanks it off over his head and throws it over his shoulder. Brian runs his hands over the planes of Bob’s chest, down his stomach, and then lets them dip under Bob’s shorts, just barely brushing the cuts of Bob’s hips.
Bob makes an unintelligible noise in the back of his throat and pulls Brian up so they can kiss again. He reaches between them to undo Brian’s fly and starts to pull Brian’s pants down. Brian catches on after a second and shimmies out of them as well as he can with Bob’s legs on either side of his own, kicking them off and being careful not to catch Bob anywhere unfortunate at the same time.
When he’d changed earlier, Bob had decided not to wear boxers underneath his sweatpants for some arbitrary reason that he can’t even remember now. All he knows is that it was definitely a good idea, because when Brian tugs his pants down and Bob kicks them off, all that’s separating him and Brian is this tiny, thin layer of fabric. Bob ruts against Brian, hissing a breath at the friction, and Brian arches up underneath him, biting at Bob’s collarbone and muttering, “Fuck, Bob,” as he does so. Bob slides Brian’s boxer-briefs off and leans down to bite Brian’s hip, lick the head of Brian’s cock. Brian gasps when Bob’s mouth closes around him and Bob can feel the telltale twitch of Brian’s hips that suggests he’s trying not to buck into Bob’s mouth. The mental image that conjures is really, really hot, and Bob thinks that maybe they’ll have to try that next time. Right now, they’re way too keyed up for anything slow.
“How do you want to do this?” Bob murmurs against the shell of Brian’s ear, kissing Brian’s cheek and continuing around to press his mouth over Brian’s and lick at the seam of Brian’s mouth. Brian kisses him, hard and desperate and grips Bob’s hips hard enough that there might be bruises there later.
“Fuck me,” he says against Bob’s mouth, and it shoots straight down Bob’s spine to his dick.
“Okay,” he whispers, kisses Brian once more before leaning over and digging around in his nightstand for a condom and lube.
He reaches down and works Brian open, and fucked if the noises that Brian makes while he’s writhing around Bob’s fingers aren’t just obscene. After a few minutes, Brian hooks his ankles around Bob’s legs and tries to pull him forward, groaning, “C’mon, fuck,” as he does so.
Bob obliges, angling himself and pushing in slow, reveling in the breaths that Brian takes as he relaxes around Bob until he’s all the way in. Bob pulls out, slowly, almost all the way before driving forward again, with a bit more force than last time. It takes a few thrusts but they establish a rhythm, steady and perfectly balanced, and Bob bites at the juncture where Brian’s shoulder becomes his neck while Brian moans and pulls at Bob’s hair, pushing back against Bob’s cock while Bob rolls his hips forward.
“Fuck,” Brian says, reaches down to wrap his own fist around his cock when Bob’s pacing starts to get erratic. “Fuck, c’mon, baby.” He’s muttering nonsense and groaning, but it’s still ridiculously hot from where Bob’s sitting. Bob reaches up to wrap his hand around Brian’s, their fingers intertwined as they both bring Brian off between them. He makes a keening noise that he tries to bite back and arches up, digging his heels into Bob’s thighs while Bob groans and topples over the edge alongside him. They lay there, breathing heavy and kissing slow, for a few long moments before Bob pulls out and makes a face, tying the condom off and tossing it into the trash basket in the corner of the room.
“Shit,” Brian says, burying his face against Bob’s neck, one of his legs between Bob’s. His arm is slung haphazardly over Bob’s waist, and Bob is absently carding his fingers through Brian’s short hair. “Awesome.”
Bob snorts and presses a kiss to Brian’s forehead. Now that everything is said and done, Bob is actually kind of appalled that this didn’t happen sooner. He feels like a huge tool for not realizing his and Brian’s relationship back when everyone else did, but he guesses he can’t feel too bad since Brian doesn’t seem to mind, so long as he picked up on it eventually.
“Hey,” he says, pulling Brian even closer and talking into Brian’s hair, “I need a date for a show next weekend. You busy?”
Brian huffs a laugh against Bob’s shoulder and responds drowsily, “I’ll have to check my schedule but I think I’ve got you covered.”
Bob smiles and closes his eyes and wonders how, as an investigative journalist, he managed to ignore all the clues leading to this point. Brian’s breathing deep and even next to him, he vows that he’ll pay more attention from now on.
“Get up,” Brian murmurs, gently prodding at Bob’s side. “’m hungry.”
Bob laughs and watches as Brian stands, stretches, and wanders out into the kitchen. He’s basking in the moment, just for now since it’s something he doesn’t do often, when Brian’s voice rings out down the hall, “You’ve kept me waiting long enough, Bryar. Don’t test my patience again.”
“I won’t,” Bob grins, following the sound of Brian’s voice. “I won’t.”