Look After Your Brother ch 16
Chapter 16
They went to Doc's, the morning that their house burned down. Doc had a houseguest, a niece or something from the old country, but they were too tired to think about it. The brothers crashed on the couch, their heads on opposite arm-rests. Connor woke in the afternoon with one of Murph's knees in his crotch and the other foot in his face.
It was stinky and painful and still he had to fight to not get turned on. Fucken Murphy.
It took them about a week to find a new place to stay. They ended up with a little basement apartment--small, but at least it was clean and came with two beds already.
They went to visit the old lady whose house burned, but she'd had a stroke or three since they'd seen her last and Connor left thinking that she didn’t know who they were or that she ever had a house.
Murphy waited until they were settled into the new place before he started going out in search of company again.
Somehow it became Connor's habit to go too, taking the train after Murphy's to the same stop. It wasn’t that he wanted to do something there; it was just that he needed to know, to understand.
If he thought it was just about sex, then it would have been easy to keep up with Murphy, to experience what he felt. But it wasn't. It was about something Murphy had to fill in his heart or his head and Connor didn't feel that void. He couldn’t experience it, so he tried to learn about it.
He started buying books again, so he could read outside and smoke. The Idiot's Guide to Gay Sex, Chicken Soup for the Gay Soul, queer travel guides, pop psychology and pages of deep philosophical discussion--he read everything he could get his hands on.
He never brought a bit of it home. He left a book at the diner once, and Marc asked him about it the next time he was in. Connor just shrugged. "I was done with it. Keep it if y'like." He suspected at one point that Marc must have quite a shelf full of books Connor'd bought.
Sometimes Marc played tour-guide, letting him know about some event or party or bit of strangeness he hadn’t seen yet. He'd go to anything that didn’t sound evil. Some of it left him wanting to puke. Other stuff got him hard. He found his release in his own hand. Always. Being with someone else that way would have just felt wrong, like he was working or they were, and the thought had no appeal at all.
To his annoyance, he got his fair share of attention.
"The butch and mysterious thing works for you," Marc would tease him in those days.
He was shooting pool with a stranger when Murphy caught him for the first time. Connor had been listening for a while, to a voice that sounded like his brother's, but he hadn’t turned. The accent had been wrong--not Irish, not Bostonian or the local dialect of poof. It was something...other.
"Connor!" He'd turned without thinking and the illusion was shattered. It was Murphy after all. He even sounded like himself again, accent and everything.
"Hey, what about our game?" His opponent protested. A strong hand came down on his forearm but Connor shrugged it off. He never looked away from Murphy's questioning eyes.
"I forfeit." He left his money on the table and led Murphy outside.
"What th' fuck're ya doin' down here, Conn?" His blue eyes were full of worry, and he reached to touch Connor's waist, as if making sure he was still breathing.
Connor twisted away from those graceful fingers, not quite sure how to answer that question, not quite sure of his own reasons. "I wanted to see it. Where you're choosing t' be."
"It's not the first time you've been here," Murphy gnawed at the side of his thumb. "You weren't lookin' like a fucken tourist there."
Connor fought a grin. "There's a lot t' see, Murph."
It didn’t seem to help his brother's worry. Dark brows pinched together. "Conn...You're not...doin' something against your nature now, are ya? Just b'cause I am?"
He shook his head. "No, Murph, swear t' Christ."
That did help, and Murphy nodded towards the door. "Come meet somebody?"
The guy's name was Kevin, and he thought of himself as poet. He worked in a green apron, selling four-bucks-a-cup coffee. When Murph headed off to the bathroom Connor gave Kevin the same talk he'd given Marc, once upon a time.
Connor was sitting alone at the table when his brother got back. The grin he gave Murphy was sheepish. "I thought you were datin' men," he teased. "Shouldn't he have had some fucken bullocks?"
Murphy laughed, shrugged. He didn’t need it spelled out to him where Kevin had gone or why. He didn’t seem to mind that he'd lost his company for the night. "Fuck's sake, Conn. How fast do ya think I move?"
They stayed and drank and shot some pool. They were home well before dawn.