"It's Time I Had Some Time Alone" for exeterlinden
For: exeterlinden
Title: It's Time I Had Some Time Alone
Author: Sage
Fandoms: Last Night/Hard Core Logo
Pairing: Craig Zwiller/Joe Dick
Rating: Adult
Length: 3600~ words
Acknowledgments: Many thanks to petronelle for encouragement and beta.
Warning: ( skip) apocalyptic doppelganger porn. Impending death soonish but not within the span of the fic.
Summary: Joe laughs, because the fucking world is ending and this guy sounds so petulant, so put out. So Billy.
It's a laugh. It's a fucking riot. End of the fucking world and Joe's stuck in fucking Ontario, unable to get a ride back to BC. Not that he has shit left in BC-Billy's in California, supposedly. Or maybe not. Maybe he's gone back to say goodbye to the family-but he sure as shit isn't returning Joe's calls. Fucking Billy.
He's wandering around T.O. looking for a store with some food left in it. Most places look emptied out but not looted like down in the States. In Canada, they've managed not to burn enormous swaths of big cities to the ground, like Los Angeles, which has been burning for over a month.
Joe still doesn't get why Billy chose Hollywood, chose Seymour Stein, chose Sire, over him. Joe doesn't know if Billy's still alive. Maybe he got killed in a riot. Maybe he's hanging with the sell-outs in Fiji. Maybe he's-
That's when Joe's head snaps up-a flash of orange, the distinctive shape of the back of Billy's head. Joe wonders if he's hallucinating. He might be, but he's already across the street, following. The bolts on the door of the liquor store are snapped-they probably were cut or torched weeks ago when the first panic struck. The store's a dark box, dusty light sifting in through the barred front windows. The beer cases are hanging open and empty. The rows of shelves are bare.
The guy-not Billy-almost Billy-the guy who looks more like Billy than Billy's own brother-he's climbing-scaling-the shelves behind the cash register and reaching for a dark box shoved far back against the wall at the very top. It looks like a gift box of Chambord or some shit. Too sickly sweet for Joe's taste. The kind of shit you use to impress a prairie girl who's never seen anything fancier than a bubba keg.
The guy didn't hear Joe come in. Joe just stands there watching him balance halfway up the shelf with one long leg braced on the empty cash register. Joe watches and can't help himself.
"So, if a guy was a complete asshole, he'd interrupt you right now."
"Holy Christ!" the guy yelps. His fingers slip on the box with the liqueur in it and it falls forward. The guy makes a high pleading noise and slaps it back onto the shelf as he half-falls, half-jumps down to the floor.
"Nice," says Joe.
The guy's eyes flash. "What the fuck, dude? You got a problem?"
The guy's eyes are yellow-green in this light-he's not as skinny as Billy. He doesn't have a guitarist's hands. Nice long fingers, yeah, but this guy isn't a musician.
His expression goes hooded, wary. Like he's just getting that he's in a vulnerable spot there, trapped behind the counter.
Joe puts on a fake smile and shrugs. "You looked like someone I know. That's all."
"Well, I'm not," the guy snaps.
Joe laughs, because the fucking world is ending and this guy sounds so petulant, so put out. So Billy. "I'm Joe." He jerks his chin up. "That raspberry shit is gross."
"Craig," Craig says with a glare. "Last bottle in the building."
"Last day on earth," Joe shoots back. "Damn near anything would taste better, though. You check the back room?"
Joe turns away with a flourish, stalks to the back and finds an empty steel display to prop open the storeroom door. There's even less light back here-only what filters through the wire-mesh transom window above the door to the alley. The room's a wreck.
Behind him, Joe hears Craig climbing the shelf again to retrieve the Chambord. Stubborn bitch, Joe thinks, amused.
Then the guy's in the doorway blocking at least half the light. "So, you, uh, find anything back here?"
Joe considers the guy's silhouette. "All I can see are empty boxes. Help me throw this crap out."
Craig holds his precious purple gift box to his chest.
Joe shakes his head in disgust. "Believe me; I won't take your fucking girly swill. Chill out."
After a second, the guy laughs nervously and sets the box on the desk next to the storeroom door. "Yeah, end of the world and-"
Joe throws a box at him. The guy shuts up and tosses it out into the space between two aisles.
Joe would settle for rum. He hates it, but he'd settle. He'd love a good whisky, but a crappy one would be okay. Bourbon or rye, too. Hell, gin would be fine. He's not angry enough for tequila, not anymore. Except when he starts thinking about Billy.
Vodka wouldn’t suck.
He finds a box with weight in it and bends down to pull the flaps open. It's like finding treasure at first, except shit. It turns out to be six bottles of margarita mix; no alcohol content at all. "Fuck," he mutters, and shoves the lot at the guy to clear out.
"Margaritas could be nice," the guy muses softly.
Joe wonders if it's as much an invitation as it sounds. "Does that mean you've got some tequila?" he asks.
The guy shakes his head. "Sorry. Not anymore."
"Everclear?" Joe tries.
"That would be a mean margarita." The guy smirks and his eyes do something almost flirty, definitely sexy, as he says it. "And no."
"Shame." Joe throws another box at him, and the look of surprise on the guy's face is so Billy just then that Joe waits for the automatic "fuck you" or "asshole" or even the old, impatient glare, and waits.
The guy's staring at him hard. "What?"
"Nothing." Joe finds another three empty boxes and kicks them at Billy. No, the guy. Whatever. The fourth has something in it.
Kneeling, Joe pulls out a pile of packing paper. "Oh, that's bullshit," he says as he unearths two five-pack gift sets of 50ml miniature alcohol bottles. The goods range from Jack Daniels to Baileys to cheap spiced rum. Less than two shots per bottle. "Ten of them," he says to the guy, holding up the holiday-embossed packages. Joe slides them over onto the desk next to the Chambord, and then tosses the guy the trash.
"That's something, at least," says the guy.
"It's bullshit," Joe repeats. "Half a liter of assorted crap that doesn't even mix? That's a stomachache waiting to happen."
"Huh." The guy's looking at him curiously now. "So…you said you followed me here because I look like somebody."
"What, you got a problem with me hunting some booze for myself? That's not hypocritical."
"Don't be an asshole," the guy says, and rips open a desk drawer. It's empty. He opens another. "I only meant are you going to tell me who I look like?" He doesn't look at Joe. The guy opens the center drawer. Joe sees some paperclips. Real helpful.
Joe uncovers a keg next. It's past expiration and would take hours to cool down enough to be drinkable. Warm bad beer versus assorted liquor…Joe's going to have to think about it.
A quick glance confirms the other boxes are empty. There's a single column of industrial shelving on the back wall-mostly keg taps, Molson coaster packs, and Budweiser t-shirts. Starting at the bottom shelf, Joe shoves stuff around, hunting hidden treasure. He has to climb up onto the keg to check the top shelf. "Not a goddamned thing," he says to the ceiling.
He doesn't see or hear the guy move, but Joe yells, "Shit!" in sheer terror when he feels a hand settle at the top of his left boot. He pivots around and finds the guy standing right there. For a second, Joe considers kneeing him in his pretty face, but he'd probably fall off the keg if he tried it. Besides, the guy's flashing a smile and shaking his head as he raises his hand to Joe's.
"Don't fall," he says, grinning.
Joe stares at him for a long appraising moment, and then lowers himself to sit on the deep steel rim of the keg. "Doesn't matter," Joe says.
The guy's eyes narrow. "Yeah, you're welcome," he says, and he's taking a half-step backwards. "Maybe I should've let you fall and brain yourself on the floor." He yanks his hand back, but Joe's grip is still firm; he can't seem to let go.
"Didn't mean that," Joe says, taking a breath. "I meant it doesn't matter who you look like; he's gone. And hell, we'll all be dead at midnight." Joe shrugs again, trying to shake off the thought of Billy, the way the touch of this guy's hand reminds him. Still, he lets himself look, and he sees the guy's looking too, and he's letting Joe hold on-more, he's letting Joe touch. He didn't even realize he'd been rubbing his thumb back and forth over the guy's smooth palm, his soft wrist, but he is.
"You wanna?" the guy murmurs. "While there's time?"
Joe's cock twitches and it's pure reflex that he squeezes the guy's hand. But he lets it go: the guy isn't Billy. Billy would never ask like that. Billy would tease with a smile, a wink, a significant bump of shoulders-or else he'd lick a stripe up the back of Joe's neck and tumble him down on the nearest bed/floor/sofa/whatever in a writhing heap of kissing thrusting fucking them.
Joe shuts his brain up. The sun's casting its too-bright light through the lone dirty window, and this guy looks so much like Bill Joe could hit him for it, for leaving, for all the time lost between them. The guy's standing almost between his thighs, where it's easy to slide fingertips down the front of the guy's pants, so he does. Joe traces the curve of a half-hard cock, and then does it again, feeling the way it fills and lengthens under his touch. "What do you do?" Joe asks, like the guy's a groupie or this is an ordinary cruise. Then he sees the brief flash of panic in the guy's eyes and has his answer. "You do chicks. Right."
"I-" the guy starts.
Joe keeps rubbing and squeezing the guy's dick through his thin pants, and the guy grunts something inarticulate. He's got to be painfully hard now, Joe thinks. His cock's about the size of Billy's, but not quite the same shape, a different girth.
"Please," the guy rasps out, tearing his orange shirt over his head and easing down his track pants. Joe lets go. He stands up, opens his own ratty jeans, and pulls his dick out. The guy doesn't waste any time. He shoves his pants down several inches, stroking his own cock, with his eyes on Joe's. The look in his eyes is a little wild.
Joe takes him by the wrists. "Get on your knees," he says in a low voice. The guy whimpers. "I'm going to show you this thing before we all die, all right? So keep your hands off your cock, eh?"
The guy braces against Joe's thigh and lowers himself to the dirty concrete floor. There's something avid in his expression, scared and hungry. Joe pushes back a memory of teenaged Billy; then he cups the guy's stubbly cheek and guides the tip of his cock left to right, painting a line of pre-come over his lips. "You've gotten blown plenty, right?" asks Joe.
"Sure," the guy says, and Joe hears the 'duh' behind the whispered syllable. He pushes forward into it.
"And you don't want the world to end without knowing what another guy's cock feels like. Tastes like." Joe pushes deeper. "Come on, man, suck it already. We both know you want it."
And the guy does, apparently. Now he's made up his mind, he's slurping and sliding down like he's sucking a popsicle. "Put a hand here," he says, guiding him to grasp just above his balls. "You don't have to choke yourself, just-that." Tongue, a tight grip, some suction, fuck yeah. The guy makes a pleased-sounding hum that sends a tremor through Joe. He's finding a rhythm, finally, and it's getting better. Joe could even come from this if he concentrated, since even bad head is still head; but he has an idea what would be better.
He pulls the guy off by his spiky blond hair. "Stand up." The guy does, wobbling a little, but his pupils are blown and his mouth is slack. He looks receptive to anything. The elastic waist of his pants is trapped around his thighs; he's still hard, at least. Joe tugs the fabric down further, finally toeing it to the floor. He spits on the guy's hard-on and jerks it fast. The guy puts a hand on Joe's shoulder to steady himself, and Joe sits further back on the keg for better leverage.
The guy's cursing, babbling; he sounds overwhelmed but he isn't protesting. And then the guy's spine flexes hard and he's yelling, "Oh, oh shit." Joe catches all the come in his hands and flashes back to doing this with Billy, maybe a hundred times or more over the years. No lube, or else too many homophobic shitheads around to risk getting caught owning any. The guy's clinging to Joe's shoulder, breathing hard, and saying "Jesus" over and over again. He hasn't caught up with the program.
"Here." Joe gets up and manhandles the guy down, his elbows braced on the top of the steel barrel. He cups the guy's balls with one hand, squeezing gently, and then dips a finger into his handful of jizz. Joe's not as hard anymore, which is a good thing since he's pretty sure he's got a virgin ass on a platter here, and damaging it won't actually bring Billy back. The first finger goes in all right, though. The guy moans like he's happy instead of freaking out, and he feels as soft as wet silk under Joe's fingertip.
Joe says something about getting the guy open wide as he adds fingers and spit and come. The guy moans. He's louder than Billy, and Joe gives it to him a little harder, faster. Maybe he's a natural, maybe he's had kinky girlfriends, maybe he has a thing for phallic vegetables, Joe doesn't care.
He spits into his hand to keep it slick and strips his dick. Billy, he thinks, and he can't wait anymore. He pulls apart the guy's hole with both thumbs and pushes the head of his cock to the opening. "Breathe and push back a little," he remembers to say, because it isn't Billy. Billy would be tugging him balls-deep already, but the guy whines and then gasps. It sounds like pain; it sounds like a guy who has no fucking idea what he's got himself into and doesn't know if he minds, yet. "Not too fast," Joe says, "give it a sec."
It's fucking surreal. It isn't a groupie or someone he cruised in a bar's back room: only a random dude out hunting for booze who decided he wanted to do a guy before the end. Joe eases forward, his thrusts short and as patient as he can make them, given that this is probably his last fuck ever. The back of the guy's neck-golden blond hair is short and soft against Joe's face when he leans forward to nuzzle and lick it. The guy cries out; Joe's all the way in. He didn't mean to go that fast but shit. The shoulders, the neck. "Billy," he says, "oh fuck, Bill." He pulls back and slams in, pulls back and-no, not Billy-there's a wail and more cursing and back-thrusts meeting his cock. His hands fast on the rim of the keg. Strong, flexing arms. A totally wrong tattoo. The smells of sweat, musk, spit, come. Joe's nearly there, nearly. Billy. Fucking Billy Tallent leaving him high and dry, and the world throwing this guy at him in the end. "Billy, I fucking need-" Joe pulls the guy up by the chest, kicks his feet apart and fucks harder, faster, his nose pressed hard against the nape of his neck.
Joe knows he'll never see Bill again, but he has this. He has this now. The guy says, "God-yeah," when Joe bites down, and Joe comes, squeezes the guy's hips hard so he won't fall over, but…fuck. "So fucking good," Joe slurs. Then he loses his balance and has to pull out. Not ready. Never ready. The guy grunts, pain again. Joe knows that sound, that feeling, but Joe's falling backwards, crashing into an empty box, flattening it under his ass. "Sorry," Joe says, and, "Ow."
The guy-not Billy-the guy with Joe's come inside him-starts laughing. "Graceful."
"Fuck you," Joe says automatically.
"You just did."
"Came my fucking brains out, too." Joe squints up at the guy and tries to remember his name. Greg, maybe? Or Craig. Yeah, that was it, he's pretty sure. "You okay?"
Craig shrugs. "That was intense."
Joe raises his eyebrows, wonders if there's an insult on the way. Craig shakes his head, shakes out his body like a dog getting dry. "Good intense?" Joe says, making it sound like a foregone conclusion.
Craig grins down at him. "Yeah, thanks."
Joe snorts. "Real hardship, can't you tell?"
"Hey, can I?" Craig's on his knees again. His pants are pulled up but hanging low on his hips, and he's crawling over to straddle Joe's legs. Joe should put his dick back in his pants, he thinks, but the guy's leaning in, taking a kiss, taking Joe by surprise.
It's a soft, affectionate kiss, long, and it says a lot in its gentle insistence, with the searching tongue and the hand in his hair. It says a lot in its sadness, too, and in-maybe in understanding some of what Joe has lost.
Or maybe that's load of bullshit. A flagrant act of wishful thinking, a lot like mistaking a guy on a street in Toronto for-
"I have to get back," Craig says after a minute, his lips against Joe's cheek. Joe nods dumbly, and then lets Craig heave him to his feet so they can both find their clothes and brush off the dust.
Joe won't say goodbye; he can't. He says, "Have a drink with me?" and opens one of the mini bottle gift packs. Joe takes vodka. Craig takes rum. Joe stifles a sigh for Craig's lack of taste, but at least it means one less bottle of shit he can't stand in his jumbled collection. They twist off the tops and pour the contents down their throats.
Craig's throat, swallowing, reminds him of Billy.
There's nothing else to say. The last kiss tastes disgusting, despite being almost chaste.
Joe watches Craig take his box of raspberry liqueur and pass through the storeroom door without looking back. Billy would, if desperate enough, absolutely stoop to Chambord. He hears the front door scrape open and shut.
"Fuck," Joe whispers to the empty room.
Maybe now he'll go find a phone and check his messages. He can pretend for another minute that the day isn't the very definition of futility.
Except, well, Billy. He thinks about the tight, slip-slick grip of Craig's ass around his cock. That was, what, fifteen minutes ago? And what the fuck is he supposed to do now, alone in the back room of a deserted liquor store? There are only a few more hours to kill. He should find a guitar, a phone, a fucking sandwich.
Joe gathers his bottles: eight left. With any luck it'll be enough to take the edge off the horror that this is the way the world ends, and he's here to see it.
He has to at least look. He has to. So he wanders out into the main room of the store and finds a telephone behind the counter. He lifts the receiver and, to his surprise, gets a dial tone; then he dials the number to his answering machine and mashes in the code to play messages. The machine beeps and clicks, the tape whirs, and finally the mechanical voice intones, "There are no new messages."
Fucking Billy. Joe's stomach growls. He grabs a plastic shopping bag from under the counter and goes back to the storeroom to retrieve his eight remaining bottles.
The sunlight pouring in the dingy transom window has grown impossibly brighter, and it stops Joe at the desk, where he slumps, barely able to breathe. He imagines the leaden weight of the sun crushing him. Them. Everyone. He knows in his heart that it's over: Billy would've found him, would've called him back by now, if only to joke that he'd look for him later, in hell, heh.
Joe should find a notebook and pen, a radio, a better place to kick the bucket. He should get up off of this desk. He bags his little bottles, thinks they're like little soldiers all in a row. A few bars of "Something's Gonna Die Tonight" mumble-hum from his mouth, but the irony isn't funny now. It should be, but all he can think of are Billy's callused fingers, firm and sure, on the strings of his guitar and in Joe's mouth.
The thought occurs that if he goes outside, he'll get rolled for the little soldiers, and fuck that. He's cool with where he is, at least until he's halfway to plastered. Eight more shots might get him there, might get him close. Then, then, he can go. Joe chooses a small clear bottle at random and unscrews the cap.
Title: It's Time I Had Some Time Alone
Author: Sage
Fandoms: Last Night/Hard Core Logo
Pairing: Craig Zwiller/Joe Dick
Rating: Adult
Length: 3600~ words
Acknowledgments: Many thanks to petronelle for encouragement and beta.
Warning: ( skip) apocalyptic doppelganger porn. Impending death soonish but not within the span of the fic.
Summary: Joe laughs, because the fucking world is ending and this guy sounds so petulant, so put out. So Billy.
It's a laugh. It's a fucking riot. End of the fucking world and Joe's stuck in fucking Ontario, unable to get a ride back to BC. Not that he has shit left in BC-Billy's in California, supposedly. Or maybe not. Maybe he's gone back to say goodbye to the family-but he sure as shit isn't returning Joe's calls. Fucking Billy.
He's wandering around T.O. looking for a store with some food left in it. Most places look emptied out but not looted like down in the States. In Canada, they've managed not to burn enormous swaths of big cities to the ground, like Los Angeles, which has been burning for over a month.
Joe still doesn't get why Billy chose Hollywood, chose Seymour Stein, chose Sire, over him. Joe doesn't know if Billy's still alive. Maybe he got killed in a riot. Maybe he's hanging with the sell-outs in Fiji. Maybe he's-
That's when Joe's head snaps up-a flash of orange, the distinctive shape of the back of Billy's head. Joe wonders if he's hallucinating. He might be, but he's already across the street, following. The bolts on the door of the liquor store are snapped-they probably were cut or torched weeks ago when the first panic struck. The store's a dark box, dusty light sifting in through the barred front windows. The beer cases are hanging open and empty. The rows of shelves are bare.
The guy-not Billy-almost Billy-the guy who looks more like Billy than Billy's own brother-he's climbing-scaling-the shelves behind the cash register and reaching for a dark box shoved far back against the wall at the very top. It looks like a gift box of Chambord or some shit. Too sickly sweet for Joe's taste. The kind of shit you use to impress a prairie girl who's never seen anything fancier than a bubba keg.
The guy didn't hear Joe come in. Joe just stands there watching him balance halfway up the shelf with one long leg braced on the empty cash register. Joe watches and can't help himself.
"So, if a guy was a complete asshole, he'd interrupt you right now."
"Holy Christ!" the guy yelps. His fingers slip on the box with the liqueur in it and it falls forward. The guy makes a high pleading noise and slaps it back onto the shelf as he half-falls, half-jumps down to the floor.
"Nice," says Joe.
The guy's eyes flash. "What the fuck, dude? You got a problem?"
The guy's eyes are yellow-green in this light-he's not as skinny as Billy. He doesn't have a guitarist's hands. Nice long fingers, yeah, but this guy isn't a musician.
His expression goes hooded, wary. Like he's just getting that he's in a vulnerable spot there, trapped behind the counter.
Joe puts on a fake smile and shrugs. "You looked like someone I know. That's all."
"Well, I'm not," the guy snaps.
Joe laughs, because the fucking world is ending and this guy sounds so petulant, so put out. So Billy. "I'm Joe." He jerks his chin up. "That raspberry shit is gross."
"Craig," Craig says with a glare. "Last bottle in the building."
"Last day on earth," Joe shoots back. "Damn near anything would taste better, though. You check the back room?"
Joe turns away with a flourish, stalks to the back and finds an empty steel display to prop open the storeroom door. There's even less light back here-only what filters through the wire-mesh transom window above the door to the alley. The room's a wreck.
Behind him, Joe hears Craig climbing the shelf again to retrieve the Chambord. Stubborn bitch, Joe thinks, amused.
Then the guy's in the doorway blocking at least half the light. "So, you, uh, find anything back here?"
Joe considers the guy's silhouette. "All I can see are empty boxes. Help me throw this crap out."
Craig holds his precious purple gift box to his chest.
Joe shakes his head in disgust. "Believe me; I won't take your fucking girly swill. Chill out."
After a second, the guy laughs nervously and sets the box on the desk next to the storeroom door. "Yeah, end of the world and-"
Joe throws a box at him. The guy shuts up and tosses it out into the space between two aisles.
Joe would settle for rum. He hates it, but he'd settle. He'd love a good whisky, but a crappy one would be okay. Bourbon or rye, too. Hell, gin would be fine. He's not angry enough for tequila, not anymore. Except when he starts thinking about Billy.
Vodka wouldn’t suck.
He finds a box with weight in it and bends down to pull the flaps open. It's like finding treasure at first, except shit. It turns out to be six bottles of margarita mix; no alcohol content at all. "Fuck," he mutters, and shoves the lot at the guy to clear out.
"Margaritas could be nice," the guy muses softly.
Joe wonders if it's as much an invitation as it sounds. "Does that mean you've got some tequila?" he asks.
The guy shakes his head. "Sorry. Not anymore."
"Everclear?" Joe tries.
"That would be a mean margarita." The guy smirks and his eyes do something almost flirty, definitely sexy, as he says it. "And no."
"Shame." Joe throws another box at him, and the look of surprise on the guy's face is so Billy just then that Joe waits for the automatic "fuck you" or "asshole" or even the old, impatient glare, and waits.
The guy's staring at him hard. "What?"
"Nothing." Joe finds another three empty boxes and kicks them at Billy. No, the guy. Whatever. The fourth has something in it.
Kneeling, Joe pulls out a pile of packing paper. "Oh, that's bullshit," he says as he unearths two five-pack gift sets of 50ml miniature alcohol bottles. The goods range from Jack Daniels to Baileys to cheap spiced rum. Less than two shots per bottle. "Ten of them," he says to the guy, holding up the holiday-embossed packages. Joe slides them over onto the desk next to the Chambord, and then tosses the guy the trash.
"That's something, at least," says the guy.
"It's bullshit," Joe repeats. "Half a liter of assorted crap that doesn't even mix? That's a stomachache waiting to happen."
"Huh." The guy's looking at him curiously now. "So…you said you followed me here because I look like somebody."
"What, you got a problem with me hunting some booze for myself? That's not hypocritical."
"Don't be an asshole," the guy says, and rips open a desk drawer. It's empty. He opens another. "I only meant are you going to tell me who I look like?" He doesn't look at Joe. The guy opens the center drawer. Joe sees some paperclips. Real helpful.
Joe uncovers a keg next. It's past expiration and would take hours to cool down enough to be drinkable. Warm bad beer versus assorted liquor…Joe's going to have to think about it.
A quick glance confirms the other boxes are empty. There's a single column of industrial shelving on the back wall-mostly keg taps, Molson coaster packs, and Budweiser t-shirts. Starting at the bottom shelf, Joe shoves stuff around, hunting hidden treasure. He has to climb up onto the keg to check the top shelf. "Not a goddamned thing," he says to the ceiling.
He doesn't see or hear the guy move, but Joe yells, "Shit!" in sheer terror when he feels a hand settle at the top of his left boot. He pivots around and finds the guy standing right there. For a second, Joe considers kneeing him in his pretty face, but he'd probably fall off the keg if he tried it. Besides, the guy's flashing a smile and shaking his head as he raises his hand to Joe's.
"Don't fall," he says, grinning.
Joe stares at him for a long appraising moment, and then lowers himself to sit on the deep steel rim of the keg. "Doesn't matter," Joe says.
The guy's eyes narrow. "Yeah, you're welcome," he says, and he's taking a half-step backwards. "Maybe I should've let you fall and brain yourself on the floor." He yanks his hand back, but Joe's grip is still firm; he can't seem to let go.
"Didn't mean that," Joe says, taking a breath. "I meant it doesn't matter who you look like; he's gone. And hell, we'll all be dead at midnight." Joe shrugs again, trying to shake off the thought of Billy, the way the touch of this guy's hand reminds him. Still, he lets himself look, and he sees the guy's looking too, and he's letting Joe hold on-more, he's letting Joe touch. He didn't even realize he'd been rubbing his thumb back and forth over the guy's smooth palm, his soft wrist, but he is.
"You wanna?" the guy murmurs. "While there's time?"
Joe's cock twitches and it's pure reflex that he squeezes the guy's hand. But he lets it go: the guy isn't Billy. Billy would never ask like that. Billy would tease with a smile, a wink, a significant bump of shoulders-or else he'd lick a stripe up the back of Joe's neck and tumble him down on the nearest bed/floor/sofa/whatever in a writhing heap of kissing thrusting fucking them.
Joe shuts his brain up. The sun's casting its too-bright light through the lone dirty window, and this guy looks so much like Bill Joe could hit him for it, for leaving, for all the time lost between them. The guy's standing almost between his thighs, where it's easy to slide fingertips down the front of the guy's pants, so he does. Joe traces the curve of a half-hard cock, and then does it again, feeling the way it fills and lengthens under his touch. "What do you do?" Joe asks, like the guy's a groupie or this is an ordinary cruise. Then he sees the brief flash of panic in the guy's eyes and has his answer. "You do chicks. Right."
"I-" the guy starts.
Joe keeps rubbing and squeezing the guy's dick through his thin pants, and the guy grunts something inarticulate. He's got to be painfully hard now, Joe thinks. His cock's about the size of Billy's, but not quite the same shape, a different girth.
"Please," the guy rasps out, tearing his orange shirt over his head and easing down his track pants. Joe lets go. He stands up, opens his own ratty jeans, and pulls his dick out. The guy doesn't waste any time. He shoves his pants down several inches, stroking his own cock, with his eyes on Joe's. The look in his eyes is a little wild.
Joe takes him by the wrists. "Get on your knees," he says in a low voice. The guy whimpers. "I'm going to show you this thing before we all die, all right? So keep your hands off your cock, eh?"
The guy braces against Joe's thigh and lowers himself to the dirty concrete floor. There's something avid in his expression, scared and hungry. Joe pushes back a memory of teenaged Billy; then he cups the guy's stubbly cheek and guides the tip of his cock left to right, painting a line of pre-come over his lips. "You've gotten blown plenty, right?" asks Joe.
"Sure," the guy says, and Joe hears the 'duh' behind the whispered syllable. He pushes forward into it.
"And you don't want the world to end without knowing what another guy's cock feels like. Tastes like." Joe pushes deeper. "Come on, man, suck it already. We both know you want it."
And the guy does, apparently. Now he's made up his mind, he's slurping and sliding down like he's sucking a popsicle. "Put a hand here," he says, guiding him to grasp just above his balls. "You don't have to choke yourself, just-that." Tongue, a tight grip, some suction, fuck yeah. The guy makes a pleased-sounding hum that sends a tremor through Joe. He's finding a rhythm, finally, and it's getting better. Joe could even come from this if he concentrated, since even bad head is still head; but he has an idea what would be better.
He pulls the guy off by his spiky blond hair. "Stand up." The guy does, wobbling a little, but his pupils are blown and his mouth is slack. He looks receptive to anything. The elastic waist of his pants is trapped around his thighs; he's still hard, at least. Joe tugs the fabric down further, finally toeing it to the floor. He spits on the guy's hard-on and jerks it fast. The guy puts a hand on Joe's shoulder to steady himself, and Joe sits further back on the keg for better leverage.
The guy's cursing, babbling; he sounds overwhelmed but he isn't protesting. And then the guy's spine flexes hard and he's yelling, "Oh, oh shit." Joe catches all the come in his hands and flashes back to doing this with Billy, maybe a hundred times or more over the years. No lube, or else too many homophobic shitheads around to risk getting caught owning any. The guy's clinging to Joe's shoulder, breathing hard, and saying "Jesus" over and over again. He hasn't caught up with the program.
"Here." Joe gets up and manhandles the guy down, his elbows braced on the top of the steel barrel. He cups the guy's balls with one hand, squeezing gently, and then dips a finger into his handful of jizz. Joe's not as hard anymore, which is a good thing since he's pretty sure he's got a virgin ass on a platter here, and damaging it won't actually bring Billy back. The first finger goes in all right, though. The guy moans like he's happy instead of freaking out, and he feels as soft as wet silk under Joe's fingertip.
Joe says something about getting the guy open wide as he adds fingers and spit and come. The guy moans. He's louder than Billy, and Joe gives it to him a little harder, faster. Maybe he's a natural, maybe he's had kinky girlfriends, maybe he has a thing for phallic vegetables, Joe doesn't care.
He spits into his hand to keep it slick and strips his dick. Billy, he thinks, and he can't wait anymore. He pulls apart the guy's hole with both thumbs and pushes the head of his cock to the opening. "Breathe and push back a little," he remembers to say, because it isn't Billy. Billy would be tugging him balls-deep already, but the guy whines and then gasps. It sounds like pain; it sounds like a guy who has no fucking idea what he's got himself into and doesn't know if he minds, yet. "Not too fast," Joe says, "give it a sec."
It's fucking surreal. It isn't a groupie or someone he cruised in a bar's back room: only a random dude out hunting for booze who decided he wanted to do a guy before the end. Joe eases forward, his thrusts short and as patient as he can make them, given that this is probably his last fuck ever. The back of the guy's neck-golden blond hair is short and soft against Joe's face when he leans forward to nuzzle and lick it. The guy cries out; Joe's all the way in. He didn't mean to go that fast but shit. The shoulders, the neck. "Billy," he says, "oh fuck, Bill." He pulls back and slams in, pulls back and-no, not Billy-there's a wail and more cursing and back-thrusts meeting his cock. His hands fast on the rim of the keg. Strong, flexing arms. A totally wrong tattoo. The smells of sweat, musk, spit, come. Joe's nearly there, nearly. Billy. Fucking Billy Tallent leaving him high and dry, and the world throwing this guy at him in the end. "Billy, I fucking need-" Joe pulls the guy up by the chest, kicks his feet apart and fucks harder, faster, his nose pressed hard against the nape of his neck.
Joe knows he'll never see Bill again, but he has this. He has this now. The guy says, "God-yeah," when Joe bites down, and Joe comes, squeezes the guy's hips hard so he won't fall over, but…fuck. "So fucking good," Joe slurs. Then he loses his balance and has to pull out. Not ready. Never ready. The guy grunts, pain again. Joe knows that sound, that feeling, but Joe's falling backwards, crashing into an empty box, flattening it under his ass. "Sorry," Joe says, and, "Ow."
The guy-not Billy-the guy with Joe's come inside him-starts laughing. "Graceful."
"Fuck you," Joe says automatically.
"You just did."
"Came my fucking brains out, too." Joe squints up at the guy and tries to remember his name. Greg, maybe? Or Craig. Yeah, that was it, he's pretty sure. "You okay?"
Craig shrugs. "That was intense."
Joe raises his eyebrows, wonders if there's an insult on the way. Craig shakes his head, shakes out his body like a dog getting dry. "Good intense?" Joe says, making it sound like a foregone conclusion.
Craig grins down at him. "Yeah, thanks."
Joe snorts. "Real hardship, can't you tell?"
"Hey, can I?" Craig's on his knees again. His pants are pulled up but hanging low on his hips, and he's crawling over to straddle Joe's legs. Joe should put his dick back in his pants, he thinks, but the guy's leaning in, taking a kiss, taking Joe by surprise.
It's a soft, affectionate kiss, long, and it says a lot in its gentle insistence, with the searching tongue and the hand in his hair. It says a lot in its sadness, too, and in-maybe in understanding some of what Joe has lost.
Or maybe that's load of bullshit. A flagrant act of wishful thinking, a lot like mistaking a guy on a street in Toronto for-
"I have to get back," Craig says after a minute, his lips against Joe's cheek. Joe nods dumbly, and then lets Craig heave him to his feet so they can both find their clothes and brush off the dust.
Joe won't say goodbye; he can't. He says, "Have a drink with me?" and opens one of the mini bottle gift packs. Joe takes vodka. Craig takes rum. Joe stifles a sigh for Craig's lack of taste, but at least it means one less bottle of shit he can't stand in his jumbled collection. They twist off the tops and pour the contents down their throats.
Craig's throat, swallowing, reminds him of Billy.
There's nothing else to say. The last kiss tastes disgusting, despite being almost chaste.
Joe watches Craig take his box of raspberry liqueur and pass through the storeroom door without looking back. Billy would, if desperate enough, absolutely stoop to Chambord. He hears the front door scrape open and shut.
"Fuck," Joe whispers to the empty room.
Maybe now he'll go find a phone and check his messages. He can pretend for another minute that the day isn't the very definition of futility.
Except, well, Billy. He thinks about the tight, slip-slick grip of Craig's ass around his cock. That was, what, fifteen minutes ago? And what the fuck is he supposed to do now, alone in the back room of a deserted liquor store? There are only a few more hours to kill. He should find a guitar, a phone, a fucking sandwich.
Joe gathers his bottles: eight left. With any luck it'll be enough to take the edge off the horror that this is the way the world ends, and he's here to see it.
He has to at least look. He has to. So he wanders out into the main room of the store and finds a telephone behind the counter. He lifts the receiver and, to his surprise, gets a dial tone; then he dials the number to his answering machine and mashes in the code to play messages. The machine beeps and clicks, the tape whirs, and finally the mechanical voice intones, "There are no new messages."
Fucking Billy. Joe's stomach growls. He grabs a plastic shopping bag from under the counter and goes back to the storeroom to retrieve his eight remaining bottles.
The sunlight pouring in the dingy transom window has grown impossibly brighter, and it stops Joe at the desk, where he slumps, barely able to breathe. He imagines the leaden weight of the sun crushing him. Them. Everyone. He knows in his heart that it's over: Billy would've found him, would've called him back by now, if only to joke that he'd look for him later, in hell, heh.
Joe should find a notebook and pen, a radio, a better place to kick the bucket. He should get up off of this desk. He bags his little bottles, thinks they're like little soldiers all in a row. A few bars of "Something's Gonna Die Tonight" mumble-hum from his mouth, but the irony isn't funny now. It should be, but all he can think of are Billy's callused fingers, firm and sure, on the strings of his guitar and in Joe's mouth.
The thought occurs that if he goes outside, he'll get rolled for the little soldiers, and fuck that. He's cool with where he is, at least until he's halfway to plastered. Eight more shots might get him there, might get him close. Then, then, he can go. Joe chooses a small clear bottle at random and unscrews the cap.