fic: "put your circuits in the sea"
I CANNOT STRESS ENOUGH HOW MUCH THIS IS NOT MY FAULT, YOU GUYS. IT'S NOT.
title: put your circuits in the sea
fandom: olympics rpf
pairings/characters: phelps/lochte
word count: ~2,200
rating: light R?
disclaimer: oh, how I wish. D:
summary: He's had friends before; they were never like this.
notes: for smellyleaf , for all the phlail. for harluv_fayl , for not stopping me (I think your exact words were, "No, keep going."). and for isvirgil , because that's just how it is.
put your curcuits in the sea.
Ryan doesn’t really remember where or when he first saw Michael Phelps. Some days it feels like he never met him at all, like he’s just always been on the other end of the phone, a string of grammatically incorrect text messages and scratchy voicemail.
(That’s the problem, of course; Ryan has a relationship with Michael’s voice -- more than half the time he still can’t picture the facial expressions that go along with the words.)
Officially, they met in 2004, at the Olympic Trials, and that’s true, to an extent.
**
Ryan was seventeen, eighteen maybe. He doesn’t really remember; it was, like, a lifetime and a half ago, before the shift in his brain that turned swimming into necessity and not a labor.
He doesn’t remember where the meet was held, there were dozens of them around that time and they all tend to run together. What he does remember is messing around with his friends in the locker room beforehand, one of the guys elbowing him jokingly in the ribcage, snapping each other’s suits, streams of laughter and curses echoing along the tiles.
Ryan’s pretty sure that Michael was in that locker room, too; a lanky sixteen-or-seventeen year-old, in his corner with his headphones in.
(He can’t remember so he substitutes in twenty-three year-old Michael, trying to recall that Michael was younger, shorter than Ryan and softer in the face -- most of the time he gives up before he can finish the picture.)
The truth is that if Michael Phelps had gone to school with Ryan, their rivalry would’ve been completely different. Michael, with his lanky gait and slightly awkward features -- Ryan knows what kind of guy he was in high school, and he knows that they never would’ve been friends.
Of course, if they had gone to school together Ryan would’ve seen Michael swim much earlier, and then nothing else would’ve mattered, which, honestly, would’ve sucked.
**
Anyway, officially Michael Phelps met Ryan Lochte in 2004, at the Olympic trials. They became friends immediately.
That part is actually true, even if Ryan doesn’t totally agree with the word friends.
(He’s had friends before; they were never like this.)
**
The first time Ryan actually speaks to Michael is right after the 400 IM prelims, where Michael beats Ryan by over a second and a half.
They’re both nineteen at the time, and Ryan, with the adrenaline still pushing in his veins, doesn’t think before he reaches across the lane line, grabs Michael into a hug, and yells into his ear, “Dude, that was insane!”
Michael, looking dazed and shell-shocked, gives him a wobbly half-smile in return.
“Yeah,” he pants against Ryan’s neck.
It’s the first time they talk about swimming. They don’t do that much.
**
Three days later, Michael accosts Ryan in the men’s room.
Ryan has spent the last fifteen minutes struggling out of his Speedo and into shorts and a T-shirt. His hair is wet and he needs to piss like a racehorse.
While he’s taking care of that, Michael Phelps comes barging into the restroom, all gangly limbs with none of the grace they have in the water.
Michael sees Ryan and stops. Fidgets.
“Hey.”
“Hey, man,” Ryan replies, zipping himself up. “What’s up?”
Michael fidgets for another minute while Ryan washes his hands and scowls thoughtfully at the paper towel dispenser.
“Oh,” Michael finally says, like a delayed reaction, and Ryan finds that it’s actually endearing rather than annoying. “A bunch of the guys are going out for pizza. You wanna come?”
Ryan blinks at him, watching the way Michael’s mouth shifts into a tentative but friendly smile. He already knows about the pizza, of course, it was practically his idea in the first place.
“Sure,” he says anyway, grinning like a lunatic.
**
They start to text each other after Athens.
Like teenage girls, Ryan thinks sometimes, after he gets in the habit of checking his phone at least five times a day, and it’s basically accurate.
He doesn’t think he minds as much as he should.
**
They don’t see each other much, but that’s okay. They still find the time to talk over the phone every few days, dispersed between roughly two thousand texts a week.
Two or three times a year Ryan gets to visit Michael up in Baltimore. Michael has older sisters in swimming too, and Debbie Phelps makes the best food Ryan’s ever had.
Ryan starts looking forward to these visits with probably more enthusiasm than is necessarily appropriate.
(He’s never sure if Michael feels the same way. He doesn’t ask.)
**
The first time Michael sucks him off, Ryan thinks,
Oh, this is how it’s going to be.
He sort of feels sad for a moment, and then he can’t feel anything except Michael’s mouth and the arching of his own back as he comes.
**
It ends up working out pretty well, the thing they have.
Ryan isn’t used to being the proverbial girl of any relationship (if it can be called that), meaning two things. One, Michael is taller than Ryan (which is good, because he has those broad shoulders, you know, and makes all those noises when Ryan grazes his teeth against just the right spot), but Ryan is broader to make up for it, which is kind of a relief, because otherwise Ryan thinks there would be some Issues of Manhood on his end. Which leads to number two.
There are these feelings, okay.
The thing about Michael is that he’s professional. Not just in conducting interviews and managing fifteen thousand sponsors, although he does that too, but in relationships things.
Michael has made it very clear that this thing isn’t a big deal. Just sex, right?
Right.
**
this chick is hot man u need to c
is what Michael texts Ryan just two days after their week-long vacation in Beijing.
(They took turns going down on one another and spent almost no time in the water, except, you know, all those times in the shower--)
what’s her name so i can run her over with my skateboard
is what Ryan would like to respond. He gets to the ‘8’ in ‘skateboard’ before he catches himself, deletes it, and snaps his phone shut.
There’s no obligation, Ryan remembers, for either of them to be, like, exclusive or whatever.
**
The 2007 World Championships in Melbourne start soon, and Ryan’s first event (the 100m Back against Aaron-Fucking-Peirsol) is on a Wednesday.
Ryan is in amazing condition, if he does say so himself. Which he does. Repeatedly, to his parents, his siblings, his friends, and, once, to Michael.
remmber u said that when i kick ur ass
is Michael’s response.
(The again on the end is silent, but Ryan hears it loud and clear.)
i’ll remmbr it when u take silver
Ryan responds with a grin, and jumps back into the pool for ten more laps.
**
By Thursday night, Michael has won three gold medals. Ryan has a single silver, which, yeah, he’s proud of, and his family is proud of, but shit. He feels like he’s hit a mental wall.
He’s kind of pissed off at Aaron, but mostly just frustrated with himself.
Still, it’s understandable that when Ryan rounds a corner and finds Peirsol sandwiched between the wall and Michael Phelps, he stops. Narrows his eyes as his vision bleeds to red.
**
Ryan watches them for a moment, in the seconds before they notice him.
Michael has a hand on Aaron’s arm, a soothing sort of pat that has Peirsol pressed flush against the wall, looking both harassed and kind flattered.
(Peirsol was a rival before; now Ryan wants to see if he can still backstroke so well without his arms.)
“It’s not a big deal, Aaron,” Michael is saying. “Ryan’ll get over it--“
Aaron’s eyes suddenly shift over Michael’s shoulder and lock with Ryan’s. He makes a flustered coughing noise and deftly dodges out from under Michael’s hand, speedwalking his way out of the hallway without a backwards glance.
Ryan lets him pass, eyes locked on Michael’s, searching. There isn’t an apology there.
Something twists, hard, and Ryan swallows the acrid taste in his mouth. He turns on his heel and leaves, ignoring Michael when he calls for him to wait.
Nothing to wait for, Ryan reasons.
**
Ryan knows, when he wakes up the next morning, he’ll lose to Michael in the 200 IM. He does.
**
After Ryan accepts his medal, wearing his Grill because he needs prop to keep up appearances, he makes a beeline for the locker rooms in the hope that he can grab his stuff and sneak out. He has a wonderful plan for the rest of his night that involves hiding out in his hotel room, and possibly getting completely trashed.
Michael, apparently, does not agree with The Plan, and he all but tackles Ryan into a shower stall.
“Nice grillz,” he says, and the attempted sarcasm falls flat.
Ryan is pressed awkwardly against tacky tiling. It’s late; he’s wet, tired, hungry, and still pretty pissed off.
“What’s with you and cornering people, Mike?” Ryan asks. He’s kind of stupidly proud of the dry edge his voice takes on.
“Apparently no one will talk to me otherwise,” Michael responds easily, and shifts so that their bodies are lined hip to hip. He slides one of his legs between Ryan’s and leans so that he can rest his chin on Ryan’s shoulder. “You’re mad at me.”
Ryan wants to hit him, he honestly does. He probably would, if his arms weren’t currently pinned against the wall. (His hand is in a glob of something Ryan hopes is shampoo. He wiggles his fingers a bit and it lathers. Pantene, he thinks.)
“No duh,” is Ryan’s reply. It’s one of those phrases he used a lot in high school and never dropped.
Michael takes a deep breath (it’s all the prep he needs, before a race or a fight, and those big meals that he supposedly eats every day). “Look--”
“No, shut up,” Ryan says, because he suddenly doesn’t want to have this conversation, okay, they’re dangerously close to the edge of something Ryan doesn’t understand.
(He just. He doesn’t want to understand, okay, this isn’t, and they’re not.)
Ryan lunges forward and attaches his mouth to Michael’s mouth.
**
They’ve kissed before, it should be mentioned. Not very often, but.
Anyway, there’re much better ways to use one’s mouth; that was the unspoken agreement. But every once in a while, like, after, Michael would kind of lazily drag his lips up to Ryan’s and they’d make out quietly for a minute before one or both of them would slump away and fall asleep.
So yeah, they’ve kissed before, on the lips, yeah.
But not like this.
**
Ryan is sort of frozen for a minute, shocked into stillness at the intensity. He doesn’t notice that Michael is, too, until the second before Michael shifts back and starts to kiss him in earnest.
There isn’t any groping, but Michael’s leg does kind of press a bit harder, a bit closer, if that’s possible. Ryan’s still sort of pinned, both by Michael’s body and his own shock, but his eyes flicker a few times and fall shut then Michael’s hand runs up the length of his arm and settles at the back of his neck, rubbing smooth circles.
Okay, Ryan thinks, I like this.
**
“Peirsol thought you were mad at him,” Michael says, when they surface for air several minutes later. He nuzzles his face into Ryan’s neck, and Ryan shivers when Michael nips gently at a spot behind his ear.
Ryan is, like, drunk off of Michael, so it takes about a minute before he even tries to comprehend what Michael has said.
“What,” he says, because mentioning Peirsol is kind of a complete turn-off at the moment, and, honestly, Ryan can’t even be bothered to remember what the guy looks like.
“Peirsol,” Michael repeats. “You were walking around all moody after your race the other day and Aaron thought you were pissed because he beat you--”
“I wasn’t!” Ryan protests, because, if anything, he likes to be the epitome of sportsmanship, even if, okay, he was sort of avoiding Peirsol in the locker rooms.
“I know,” Michael soothes, and he’s, like, really good at that, at calming Ryan down on the rare occasions he gets worked up about anything.
(Ryan thinks maybe it works the other way around, too, for Michael.)
Then Ryan says, “Oh,” because obviously he’s a complete girl.
Michael smiles a bit and his eyes crinkle up in the corners. “Jeah?”
Ryan tilts his head back to rest against the tiles. “Jeah,” he laughs, and feels Michael’s eyelashes blinking against his skin.
**
Twenty-four hours later, Ryan beats Aaron Peirsol and the World Record all at once.
He surfaces, shakes the water from his face. Looks up, sees Michael in the front of the stands, yelling like a maniac.
Ryan laughs, ‘cause fuck, it feels good.
**
title: put your circuits in the sea
fandom: olympics rpf
pairings/characters: phelps/lochte
word count: ~2,200
rating: light R?
disclaimer: oh, how I wish. D:
summary: He's had friends before; they were never like this.
notes: for smellyleaf , for all the phlail. for harluv_fayl , for not stopping me (I think your exact words were, "No, keep going."). and for isvirgil , because that's just how it is.
put your curcuits in the sea.
Ryan doesn’t really remember where or when he first saw Michael Phelps. Some days it feels like he never met him at all, like he’s just always been on the other end of the phone, a string of grammatically incorrect text messages and scratchy voicemail.
(That’s the problem, of course; Ryan has a relationship with Michael’s voice -- more than half the time he still can’t picture the facial expressions that go along with the words.)
Officially, they met in 2004, at the Olympic Trials, and that’s true, to an extent.
**
Ryan was seventeen, eighteen maybe. He doesn’t really remember; it was, like, a lifetime and a half ago, before the shift in his brain that turned swimming into necessity and not a labor.
He doesn’t remember where the meet was held, there were dozens of them around that time and they all tend to run together. What he does remember is messing around with his friends in the locker room beforehand, one of the guys elbowing him jokingly in the ribcage, snapping each other’s suits, streams of laughter and curses echoing along the tiles.
Ryan’s pretty sure that Michael was in that locker room, too; a lanky sixteen-or-seventeen year-old, in his corner with his headphones in.
(He can’t remember so he substitutes in twenty-three year-old Michael, trying to recall that Michael was younger, shorter than Ryan and softer in the face -- most of the time he gives up before he can finish the picture.)
The truth is that if Michael Phelps had gone to school with Ryan, their rivalry would’ve been completely different. Michael, with his lanky gait and slightly awkward features -- Ryan knows what kind of guy he was in high school, and he knows that they never would’ve been friends.
Of course, if they had gone to school together Ryan would’ve seen Michael swim much earlier, and then nothing else would’ve mattered, which, honestly, would’ve sucked.
**
Anyway, officially Michael Phelps met Ryan Lochte in 2004, at the Olympic trials. They became friends immediately.
That part is actually true, even if Ryan doesn’t totally agree with the word friends.
(He’s had friends before; they were never like this.)
**
The first time Ryan actually speaks to Michael is right after the 400 IM prelims, where Michael beats Ryan by over a second and a half.
They’re both nineteen at the time, and Ryan, with the adrenaline still pushing in his veins, doesn’t think before he reaches across the lane line, grabs Michael into a hug, and yells into his ear, “Dude, that was insane!”
Michael, looking dazed and shell-shocked, gives him a wobbly half-smile in return.
“Yeah,” he pants against Ryan’s neck.
It’s the first time they talk about swimming. They don’t do that much.
**
Three days later, Michael accosts Ryan in the men’s room.
Ryan has spent the last fifteen minutes struggling out of his Speedo and into shorts and a T-shirt. His hair is wet and he needs to piss like a racehorse.
While he’s taking care of that, Michael Phelps comes barging into the restroom, all gangly limbs with none of the grace they have in the water.
Michael sees Ryan and stops. Fidgets.
“Hey.”
“Hey, man,” Ryan replies, zipping himself up. “What’s up?”
Michael fidgets for another minute while Ryan washes his hands and scowls thoughtfully at the paper towel dispenser.
“Oh,” Michael finally says, like a delayed reaction, and Ryan finds that it’s actually endearing rather than annoying. “A bunch of the guys are going out for pizza. You wanna come?”
Ryan blinks at him, watching the way Michael’s mouth shifts into a tentative but friendly smile. He already knows about the pizza, of course, it was practically his idea in the first place.
“Sure,” he says anyway, grinning like a lunatic.
**
They start to text each other after Athens.
Like teenage girls, Ryan thinks sometimes, after he gets in the habit of checking his phone at least five times a day, and it’s basically accurate.
He doesn’t think he minds as much as he should.
**
They don’t see each other much, but that’s okay. They still find the time to talk over the phone every few days, dispersed between roughly two thousand texts a week.
Two or three times a year Ryan gets to visit Michael up in Baltimore. Michael has older sisters in swimming too, and Debbie Phelps makes the best food Ryan’s ever had.
Ryan starts looking forward to these visits with probably more enthusiasm than is necessarily appropriate.
(He’s never sure if Michael feels the same way. He doesn’t ask.)
**
The first time Michael sucks him off, Ryan thinks,
Oh, this is how it’s going to be.
He sort of feels sad for a moment, and then he can’t feel anything except Michael’s mouth and the arching of his own back as he comes.
**
It ends up working out pretty well, the thing they have.
Ryan isn’t used to being the proverbial girl of any relationship (if it can be called that), meaning two things. One, Michael is taller than Ryan (which is good, because he has those broad shoulders, you know, and makes all those noises when Ryan grazes his teeth against just the right spot), but Ryan is broader to make up for it, which is kind of a relief, because otherwise Ryan thinks there would be some Issues of Manhood on his end. Which leads to number two.
There are these feelings, okay.
The thing about Michael is that he’s professional. Not just in conducting interviews and managing fifteen thousand sponsors, although he does that too, but in relationships things.
Michael has made it very clear that this thing isn’t a big deal. Just sex, right?
Right.
**
this chick is hot man u need to c
is what Michael texts Ryan just two days after their week-long vacation in Beijing.
(They took turns going down on one another and spent almost no time in the water, except, you know, all those times in the shower--)
what’s her name so i can run her over with my skateboard
is what Ryan would like to respond. He gets to the ‘8’ in ‘skateboard’ before he catches himself, deletes it, and snaps his phone shut.
There’s no obligation, Ryan remembers, for either of them to be, like, exclusive or whatever.
**
The 2007 World Championships in Melbourne start soon, and Ryan’s first event (the 100m Back against Aaron-Fucking-Peirsol) is on a Wednesday.
Ryan is in amazing condition, if he does say so himself. Which he does. Repeatedly, to his parents, his siblings, his friends, and, once, to Michael.
remmber u said that when i kick ur ass
is Michael’s response.
(The again on the end is silent, but Ryan hears it loud and clear.)
i’ll remmbr it when u take silver
Ryan responds with a grin, and jumps back into the pool for ten more laps.
**
By Thursday night, Michael has won three gold medals. Ryan has a single silver, which, yeah, he’s proud of, and his family is proud of, but shit. He feels like he’s hit a mental wall.
He’s kind of pissed off at Aaron, but mostly just frustrated with himself.
Still, it’s understandable that when Ryan rounds a corner and finds Peirsol sandwiched between the wall and Michael Phelps, he stops. Narrows his eyes as his vision bleeds to red.
**
Ryan watches them for a moment, in the seconds before they notice him.
Michael has a hand on Aaron’s arm, a soothing sort of pat that has Peirsol pressed flush against the wall, looking both harassed and kind flattered.
(Peirsol was a rival before; now Ryan wants to see if he can still backstroke so well without his arms.)
“It’s not a big deal, Aaron,” Michael is saying. “Ryan’ll get over it--“
Aaron’s eyes suddenly shift over Michael’s shoulder and lock with Ryan’s. He makes a flustered coughing noise and deftly dodges out from under Michael’s hand, speedwalking his way out of the hallway without a backwards glance.
Ryan lets him pass, eyes locked on Michael’s, searching. There isn’t an apology there.
Something twists, hard, and Ryan swallows the acrid taste in his mouth. He turns on his heel and leaves, ignoring Michael when he calls for him to wait.
Nothing to wait for, Ryan reasons.
**
Ryan knows, when he wakes up the next morning, he’ll lose to Michael in the 200 IM. He does.
**
After Ryan accepts his medal, wearing his Grill because he needs prop to keep up appearances, he makes a beeline for the locker rooms in the hope that he can grab his stuff and sneak out. He has a wonderful plan for the rest of his night that involves hiding out in his hotel room, and possibly getting completely trashed.
Michael, apparently, does not agree with The Plan, and he all but tackles Ryan into a shower stall.
“Nice grillz,” he says, and the attempted sarcasm falls flat.
Ryan is pressed awkwardly against tacky tiling. It’s late; he’s wet, tired, hungry, and still pretty pissed off.
“What’s with you and cornering people, Mike?” Ryan asks. He’s kind of stupidly proud of the dry edge his voice takes on.
“Apparently no one will talk to me otherwise,” Michael responds easily, and shifts so that their bodies are lined hip to hip. He slides one of his legs between Ryan’s and leans so that he can rest his chin on Ryan’s shoulder. “You’re mad at me.”
Ryan wants to hit him, he honestly does. He probably would, if his arms weren’t currently pinned against the wall. (His hand is in a glob of something Ryan hopes is shampoo. He wiggles his fingers a bit and it lathers. Pantene, he thinks.)
“No duh,” is Ryan’s reply. It’s one of those phrases he used a lot in high school and never dropped.
Michael takes a deep breath (it’s all the prep he needs, before a race or a fight, and those big meals that he supposedly eats every day). “Look--”
“No, shut up,” Ryan says, because he suddenly doesn’t want to have this conversation, okay, they’re dangerously close to the edge of something Ryan doesn’t understand.
(He just. He doesn’t want to understand, okay, this isn’t, and they’re not.)
Ryan lunges forward and attaches his mouth to Michael’s mouth.
**
They’ve kissed before, it should be mentioned. Not very often, but.
Anyway, there’re much better ways to use one’s mouth; that was the unspoken agreement. But every once in a while, like, after, Michael would kind of lazily drag his lips up to Ryan’s and they’d make out quietly for a minute before one or both of them would slump away and fall asleep.
So yeah, they’ve kissed before, on the lips, yeah.
But not like this.
**
Ryan is sort of frozen for a minute, shocked into stillness at the intensity. He doesn’t notice that Michael is, too, until the second before Michael shifts back and starts to kiss him in earnest.
There isn’t any groping, but Michael’s leg does kind of press a bit harder, a bit closer, if that’s possible. Ryan’s still sort of pinned, both by Michael’s body and his own shock, but his eyes flicker a few times and fall shut then Michael’s hand runs up the length of his arm and settles at the back of his neck, rubbing smooth circles.
Okay, Ryan thinks, I like this.
**
“Peirsol thought you were mad at him,” Michael says, when they surface for air several minutes later. He nuzzles his face into Ryan’s neck, and Ryan shivers when Michael nips gently at a spot behind his ear.
Ryan is, like, drunk off of Michael, so it takes about a minute before he even tries to comprehend what Michael has said.
“What,” he says, because mentioning Peirsol is kind of a complete turn-off at the moment, and, honestly, Ryan can’t even be bothered to remember what the guy looks like.
“Peirsol,” Michael repeats. “You were walking around all moody after your race the other day and Aaron thought you were pissed because he beat you--”
“I wasn’t!” Ryan protests, because, if anything, he likes to be the epitome of sportsmanship, even if, okay, he was sort of avoiding Peirsol in the locker rooms.
“I know,” Michael soothes, and he’s, like, really good at that, at calming Ryan down on the rare occasions he gets worked up about anything.
(Ryan thinks maybe it works the other way around, too, for Michael.)
Then Ryan says, “Oh,” because obviously he’s a complete girl.
Michael smiles a bit and his eyes crinkle up in the corners. “Jeah?”
Ryan tilts his head back to rest against the tiles. “Jeah,” he laughs, and feels Michael’s eyelashes blinking against his skin.
**
Twenty-four hours later, Ryan beats Aaron Peirsol and the World Record all at once.
He surfaces, shakes the water from his face. Looks up, sees Michael in the front of the stands, yelling like a maniac.
Ryan laughs, ‘cause fuck, it feels good.
**