Slight
Pairing: Tom Hardy/Joseph Gordon-Levitt/Christian Bale
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: RPF, dirty talk, size/strength kink, rimming
Word count: ~6800
Disclaimer: These are not even close to the real people themselves, I just taped less pretend over their characters than I usually do.
Summary: "Joseph cannot believe how huge and gorgeously muscular Tom's gotten for his role as Bane. ...And then on top of that, he gets to work with Christian Bale and wow, does he ever fill out that Batman suit." (Kink meme prompt here.)
Truth be told, he still dreams about it occasionally, usually the one day toward the end of filming when they went out drinking in their expensive suits and Hardy kept smirking at him. He still can't remember a thing he said; it was probably all embarrassing, probably the emotional nonsense he keeps buttoned up under layers of pretense and propriety. He does remember Hardy getting up from the table, smirking down at him with lips flushed from the tequila, and pausing just a moment too long before heading to the men's room.
Joseph stayed at the bar, head ducked and heart racing, trying not to read into the situation and terrified that he was missing something crucial. Eventually, Hardy came back, with just as much swagger as before, but after that there was no more smirking.
When he dreamed about it, he would always stand-- casual, feigning confidence-- and follow the scent of Hardy's cologne to the men's room in the back. Adrenaline always woke him before he reached the door.
Afterward, something subtle changed between them, perhaps because Joseph's crush on Hardy reached unbearable levels that made it difficult to speak around him; but perhaps he had given offense unwittingly. It gnawed at him that he would never know.
Only lately had it begun to gnaw less.
But now here he stands in the back of the studio, nervous as always on the first day of shooting, checking and rechecking his lines in his mind. He knows Hardy is here, in the building, and it's making him paranoid; he looks around every ten seconds, half expecting to see those deceptively sleek shoulders bunching and releasing under steel-gray brushed wool, or the flicker of sly fingers brushing a stray lock of hair back into place.
Neither of these things are possible. He's seen the costume, even a few shots. Somewhere in this building, Hardy is sweating, shaven-headed, preparing to shoot some inconsequential scene. Joseph can't even picture it. He probably won't even see Hardy for another month.
But he's still jittery and flushed when his turn comes, and he's walking into the sitting room of Wayne Mansion to give Batman a pep talk when he sees an unmistakeable figure off behind the lights. He barely even recognizes the silhouette as belonging to Hardy; there's a shaved head, an incongruous amount of bulk, and it rattles him so badly that he bombs four takes in a row.
After the fourth they pause so that everyone can breathe and have some water; Joseph resists the urge to splash it on his face, to cool the flush that he can feel rising. He's standing at the edge of the set, staring at nothing, rubbing the back of his neck, and he realizes he can still see Hardy's outline in the near-black behind the lights, just watching.
Four takes of mangled lines flash in front of his eyes, and Joseph nearly chokes on his water when a sure hand takes him by the elbow and it's Bale, leaning in to murmur in his ear: steady, Joseph. Casual, amused, just a little knowing; he winks and pulls back, slaps him on the shoulder, and strides back to the set.
Joseph's elbow tingles as he turns to follow, and the next take goes flawlessly. He's pretty sure he's going to be okay.
---
"Okay," as it turns out, is the dumbest thing Joseph has ever predicted, because by the end of the third day of shooting-- with no further sign of Hardy-- he is practically swooning over Bale. They've done two days of chatter shots, trading lines and feeding off each others' energy; now he's shooting with Oldman, and Nolan is being picky.
When at the end of the fifth day Nolan is talking about taking the whole scene out, Bale listens to Joseph's frustrations as they strip off their makeup, and afterward kidnaps him to go out for a couple of beers.
Joseph is too stressed out to be self-conscious at first, but after an hour of listening to Bale's self-deprecatory humor and about three beers, he suddenly remembers the last time he went out drinking with a (fascinating, attractive) cast member, and he feels his mouth drying up even while Bale is pulling up his pants leg to display an impressive bruise from a fight scene. Have I said anything embarrassing yet? Oh god, am I doing anything embarrassing right now?
"You know," says Bale, once he's done discussing how thoroughly he's getting his ass kicked during blocking for these fight scenes, "your buddy Hardy is built as fuck. Was he always like that?"
Joseph doesn't trust his mouth to give a real response. "Probably not before the age of three."
Bale chuckles at that, shaking his head. "I mean, I'm not a small guy, but if he jumped out of a dark alley at me I'd shit myself. He didn't look that big in the other movie."
The other movie, during whose filming Joseph had followed Hardy around dreamy-eyed as a fawn. "How big is he now," he says into his beer, carefully keeping his voice neutral.
"Jesus," says Bale. "Have you not seen him lately? He's a brick shithouse, man, if he wasn't so goddamn nice to everyone we'd all be calling him 'sir'." He laughs, and takes a moment to stretch out his legs under the table; Joseph swallows and tries really hard not to look at the way Bale's muscles shift under his t-shirt as he moves on his seat. "Tell you what," adds Bale. "Next time you have a little downtime, you should come out to the lot, watch him kick my shit in. We're starting night shooting next week."
"Okay," says Joseph, even though he knows that the idea of okay has already betrayed him horribly, and the topic moves on, and he spends the next hour nursing his beer carefully and trying not to adore Bale's laugh and his expressions too much. He already knows he'll be on the lot next week if it kills him. Which it might.
---
He's on the lot early, because he's always early for everything, even when it means (like now) standing around waiting for the important people to arrive. He perks up like a puppy when Bale arrives, and almost forgets the reason he ostensibly came by; Bale waves at him on his way to dressing, affable and not over-familiar, just totally cool like always, and Joseph's wearing a stupid grin even before the goddamn Batman steps out of the dressing room.
It's night and day. Bale is the guy Joseph wants to go out for beers with and quietly stare at with his chin in one hand; Bale in costume is menacing and dark and sexy as hell. Up close, the suit doesn't look like armor; it's practically a frame for Bale's musculature. It moves with him in ways that make Joseph swallow hard.
None of this prepares him even a little for the next thirty seconds. Apparently he wasn't the earliest; he definitely didn't see Hardy go into dressing, but when he steps out the entire room pauses. A high, ringing hum fills the air, or maybe that's just Joseph preparing to pass out.
Hardy's shaven scalp is glistening slightly; his gorgeous eyes don't hide at all behind the mask. And he's massive; he assumes his Bane stance, hands resting at the collar of his coat, legs braced wide. There is so much menace rolling off him that even the cart guys go silent.
Joseph realizes two things at once: one, he is just as gone on Hardy as he has ever been, and probably more so; and two, he is honest-to-god afraid. He is sexually afraid. He is in so, so much trouble.
He has no idea how he makes it through the next two hours; there's a lot of uncomfortable pants-adjusting and strategic standing-behind-things, but fuck if he's going to look away for longer than it takes to blink. So this is what Bale was blocking for last week. It's barely two minutes of footage, unless Joseph misses his guess, and the whole thing consists of Hardy-- no, Bane-- throwing Batman up against a wall and physically menacing him.
There's not a lot of punching, because punching takes stunt work and cut shots, but the forty-fifth time Hardy seizes Bale by that fantastic armor and snarls him into the wall, Bale hitting with a meaty thud and all his flesh contracting and absorbing the blow, Hardy's monstrous arms flexed like a dam about to break-- by that time, Joseph is reeling from lust. He dimly hopes there's enough blood still circulating in his body to keep him conscious and upright if he lets go of the set piece he's white-knuckling.
He wonders if he can somehow arrange to be on the lot for every single scene they have together, and then he wonders if he can sweet-talk Nolan into adding a scene where Hardy beats him up, and then he knows he's going crazy because someone's saying wrap and Hardy is peeling off the mask and then four seconds later he's wrapped in an enormous, muscular, sweaty hug that smells like pancake makeup and wardrobe trailer.
Hardy plants a giant kiss enthusiastically on his face, leaving a greasy makeup smear, and sets him back on his feet (oh, his feet weren't even touching the ground, jesus) so that he can practically shake Joseph senseless in his excitement.
"Oh my god," says Joseph, feeling like this cannot possibly be reality, "you're huge."
"We can't all keep our girlish figures," says Hardy, and with the mask off he's just as beautiful as he ever was, full lips arranged in a rakish smile, crooked eyebrows raised in mischief. If it weren't for the thirty extra pounds of muscle, this could have been a moment from two years ago.
Bale appears out of nowhere and claps him on the shoulder; his mask is off and his black eye makeup is smudged grotesquely, but between Bale's broad shoulders and Hardy's powerful torso and arms, Joseph is having a hard time thinking about faces. He's never felt so small, so slight, in his life. They could crush him easily between them, and to be honest, he could die happy that way.
There's conversation, most of which goes ringing through Joseph's head in a haze of increasingly painful realization: he is so not over Hardy, and this isn't stopping him from crushing on Bale. When Hardy hugs him again, demonstrative as ever, and tells him to come back next time, Joseph finds himself staggering back to his car, wondering if he can be excused from the next day's shooting on grounds of insanity, because clearly he is insane.
---
As it turns out, in the morning he feels less insane than ashamed, and he's sickeningly relieved that it's another day with Oldman. Nolan axes the scene after a mere four more hours of exhausting takes, and Oldman-- Gary, by now, and that fact is pretty much the highlight of Joseph's acting career-- pulls out a flask from someplace and lets Joseph take a hit of it before draining half the thing in one go. "Fuck," says Gary, succinctly; Joseph shifts uncomfortably in his seat, feeling the burn go down, not entirely happy to be reminded that he himself said "fuck" about a thousand times last night after he got home, and now has some chafing issues because of it.
Fortunately (or maybe not), Nolan can sense their frustration, and he sends them home early. Joseph spends about two hours fitfully sleeping in his featureless hotel room, obsessively fiddles with his smartphone for another three hours, and almost falls off the bed when his phone lights up in the middle of Angry Birds.
It's Bale. "You coming to the next round of blocking?"
Jesus, Bale. Christ. I can't do this.
He's almost five minutes late, but there aren't any costumes today, which is almost worse; Hardy has a fierce laugh, a strange sound to hear when he and Bale are flying at each other over and over, trying to learn to to tackle and fall just the way the choreo guy wants. It just bursts out of him: silence during each bout except for the plastic thwack of the cushioned mats, quiet grunts as their enormous shoulders collide, and then one of them will miss a footing and the whole gym will resonate with Hardy's gorgeous delighted laughter.
There is no way Joseph can deal with this and the insane lust that punches the breath out of him every time Hardy moves his arms.
And afterward, as if by prior arrangement, both of them end up making a beeline straight for him. Hardy wants to demonstrate his latest efforts at constructing a Bane voice (which is like a combination of hate and cellos), and Bale forces them both to examine and acknowledge the giant red mark on his ribs from a mis-aimed kick (which nearly destroys Joseph right there, watching Bale strip halfway out of his shirt). He's flattered and he's terrified. It took him months to develop a real rapport with some of his coworkers on Inception, and here they are-- beautiful, brilliant, goddamn fucking built men, just making a point of being around him.
He must have done something terrible, and this is his punishment. He is turning into a lust elemental, a cartoon of himself with tongue hanging out and hearts in his eyes. Every time Bale claps his shoulder, it staggers him, because next to Bale he's a tiny slip of a man, a dapper silverfish; every time Hardy hugs him, lifting him bodily off the floor and unabashedly rubbing his giant goofy grin into Joseph's hair, he feels those massive arms, those painfully familiar hands, like a stab of regret that he can't quite wrench out.
It's at times like these, traipsing to the parking lot and trying not to feel like a tagalong little brother, that he gives himself a few minutes to imagine what might have happened if he'd followed Hardy into that bathroom. He would have been slimmer, then; he would have been lovely, just as laughing and intense, but perhaps Joseph would have got over him by now, and the swing and ripple of Hardy's back would be an interesting thing to look at instead of a direct drop-kick to the soul.
And Bale, goddammit, Bale isn't helping.
---
He has to quit showing up for blocking. He knows people are wondering why he's here, and he's sure someone will eventually say something; when they do, he'll probably turn six shades of red and sink into the pavement, stuttering.
Bale and Hardy don't always rush him, even one at a time. Sometimes they can't get it right, and Bale leaves with a dark expression and doesn't speak to anyone; sometimes blocking runs so long that Joseph has to get home and sleep before his shoots in the morning.
But he spends the whole month like this, shooting in the morning, resting in the afternoon, and hanging around the lot like a lovesick schoolgirl all evening. On weekends he ends up texting Hardy like an idiot by midmorning: are you guys doing anything interesting today?. He's not sure when they became a unit in his mind, but lately even when he entertains the fantasy that one or both of them might bend his way, all he can picture is Hardy slamming Bale to the mat in a full-body pin, and the way Hardy smirks when he's got the pin perfect.
Hardy smirked at him once, and he let it go. He hopes Bale's a bigger idiot than he was, because he doesn't think he can handle it if they... if they...
Joseph is sitting in a Starbucks on a Sunday morning, clutching his latte and turning red with mortification as his body responds to the mental images he can't help summoning. They would fuck like they fought, violently and without reservation, Hardy's fierce bright laugh ringing out at intervals and Bale grunting and struggling; Hardy would lift Bale by the hips, muscles straining in protest at the weight, and pin him to the wall, riding him--
He can't leave Starbucks for nearly an hour, trapped behind his table with his legs crossed as he tries to distract himself, once again, with Angry Birds. And when he gets up to leave at last, he's still a block from his hotel when Hardy texts him back: beer n telly at my place, come on out, 8.
Joseph resists the urge to ask if Bale will be there, and instead replies: see you there, I'll bring food.
---
He's early, of course. He's so early, in fact, that he ends up sitting in his car for thirty minutes with a giant container of Korean barbecue beef steaming beside him, making him salivate uncontrollably. And this makes him feel like a complete tool when suddenly Bale knocks on his window and says, hey, you going up?
"Yeah," says Joseph, face flaming as he gathers up the food and climbs out of his car. "Just... texting my mom."
It takes him almost five minutes to stop kicking himself over that. Fortunately he spends the entire five minutes following Bale up a narrow flight of stairs to Hardy's studio, and the view distracts him with painful efficiency. He's cursing himself for his inability to stop staring (and mentally comparing Bale's flawless ass with his own skinny backside) when Hardy opens the door, clad in nothing but boxer briefs, beer in hand, and invites them in with a grin and a nod.
Joseph is wearing a suit. He is not going to survive this.
Hardy is the most confident person Joseph has ever seen. He lounges on the sofa with his legs kicked out, perfectly comfortable in his underwear, and if Bale wasn't acting like this was no big thing Joseph would already be looking for excuses to leave before he made a fool of himself.
Hardy is watching soccer, and the three of them tear into the barbecue and beer. It's not ten minutes before they're all three bitching about work: Hardy rants about his mask-shaped tan lines (which are hardly noticeable at this point, Joseph has no idea what he's so upset about) and Joseph is ready to strangle some fake orphans.
After an hour of this and a couple of beers, Joseph is kicked back on the far end of the sofa from Hardy, and Bale is relaxing in the reclining chair. Joseph hasn't said anything too terribly embarrassing, Hardy's boxer briefs really aren't that off-putting, and it seems like things are going to be okay. Which sends off thousands of tiny alarm bells in Joseph's head, especially when Bale gets around to his inevitable brand of bitching about work: showing off bruises. Apparently these bruises require him to remove his entire shirt.
"Oh for fuck's sake," says Joseph, suddenly, irrationally irritated. Is he never going to spend an evening with these guys without getting flustered and turned on? "I was there! I watched him put every one of those bruises on you."
Bale is amused at that, but Hardy frowns a little, tilts his head at Joseph. "You were there," he says, thoughtfully. "I think you show up to more blocking sessions than the camera guys do."
Joseph swallows; his tongue feels huge and dry.
There's a pause, Bale cracking open a fresh beer as Hardy's eyes move from easygoing contentment to quick, intelligent thought, and then the laughter comes back into his face and he adds, "Studying up to put me out of a job, huh?"
"As if I could ever get that big," says Joseph absently, not sure whether to be relieved or terrified, and Bale swigs his beer and starts showing off his bruises anyway, and Joseph averts his eyes from Hardy's unflinching, curious gaze.
Across the sofa, a slow smirk unfurls on Hardy's face.
Within two hours, Joseph had discovered another problem with being a fairly small guy in the company of a pair of enormous men: when they switch from beer to vodka, you're completely screwed. And it's good vodka, which makes it harder for him to say no, but neither Bale nor Hardy is looking particularly drunk yet, and Joseph can already feel his carefully-maintained guise of social acceptability crumbling.
"No," he says, "no seriously, if you guys actually fought, who would win?"
"I dunno," says Hardy charitably, "Chris is pretty quick," but at the same time Bale is chuckling and gesturing emphatically toward Hardy.
"Well," says Joseph, feeling his eyes crinkle up with his own laughter, "if you guys ever do have it out for real, I want a ringside seat."
"Won't ever happen," says Bale, and at that exact second Hardy roars out of his seat and tackles Bale halfway out of the recliner. It takes Joseph a few shocked seconds to realize that it's a play fight, that Bale is laughing and the punches are pulled, and by then Bale has rolled out from under Hardy's onslaught and is collapsing in hysterical, rather drunken laughter on the carpet by the television. Hardy flops out flat on his back and gives Joseph a lopsided, breathless grin.
"Is that what you were after," he says, and he just stares at Joseph, who doesn't understand for a few moments that his own mouth is hanging open and his face is flushed.
"It's fine," says Joseph, though almost no voice comes out of his throat, "that was great," and he supposes that's a weird thing to say but all of his words have dried up. Hardy's thighs are bigger each than both of his put together.
He is betraying himself, his face is telling all his secrets, and Hardy is smirking because he knows now. Joseph wonders if there's some way that he can arrange to be killed before the humiliation grows any greater.
Bale is watching him too, now, resting one muscular forearm over his knee, bare chest glistening with sweat. "You all right?" His eyes flicker over to Hardy, an unspoken question hanging in the air, and Joseph can hear himself getting ready to say: I have to get up early, I think I've had too much, I don't feel good, maybe I'm getting sick. He will say these things, and he'll bolt out of the apartment, and he's pretty sure from the way Bale is looking at Hardy and from the easy curve to Hardy's lips that if Joseph leaves they will fuck until they're unconscious, and he'll miss it.
But it's Hardy's lips that decide for him, because he's seen that look before, and he's willing to risk a little more humiliation to discover if it really is an invitation and they really do want him to stay. He doesn't think he can live for another two years without knowing the truth.
"I'm fine," he says, and it's nearly a whisper. "I feel great."
He doesn't even have time to over-analyze his own response, because this time Hardy tackles him, and he's shrieking like a little girl and shielding his face as Hardy pretends to rough him up, swinging punches that barely connect and pinning him (oh god) to the floor with his insane bulk. He scissors, trying to wriggle away; Hardy growls and drags him back, rucking his lapels up under his armpits and crumpling his entire suit horribly.
"Is this what you wanted," growls Hardy, and it sounds like he's got the Bane voice worked out just fine; the sound reverberates through Hardy's entire chest and into Joseph's body, crushed between him and the carpet.
"Actually," retorts Joseph, a little out of breath and hardly believing his own audacity, "I was pretty curious about that sequence where you threw Bale up against the wall," and before the words are fully out of his mouth Hardy is on his feet and lifting him, hauling him off his feet by the fabric of his shirt. Hardy's arms tense with his weight, not nearly as much as they did with Bale but enough to seize Joseph's attention, and there's a blur of movement and a rush of delirious movement and Joseph is crushed again, back to the wall, shoulders aching from the impact and feet kicking uselessly for traction. Hardy's eyes are dark and aggressive, locked onto Joseph's face, and Joseph can feel Bale's eyes following them.
Then Hardy drops him, and the aggression diminishes to a dangerous glint in his eyes, and Joseph says: Jesus, and my god, and other words he no longer knows the meaning of.
"I think I'm wearing the wrong clothes for this," he says, once he can breathe again (who is he kidding, he will never breathe properly again, he is doomed).
"Take them off," says Bale.
There's just enough teasing in his voice that Joseph can't be certain, but Hardy stands back, stretching his hands where they'd twisted into Joseph's suit. Nobody is going to say it. They're just waiting for Joseph, and Joseph will be damned if he's going to miss his chance again, so he shucks off his coat-- a tad defiant, meeting Bale's eyes and then Hardy's-- and then untucks his shirt and starts working on the buttons.
Hardy's lips part. It's the subtlest cue, but it's the only movement they make, and it's enough to steel Joseph as he finishes undoing his shirt and strips out of it, then his belt, then his undershirt.
And now the self-consciousness sets in, because he might be in the best shape of his life, but he's pale and whip-thin, at best wiry, and both Hardy and Bale are so... big. As Joseph is stripping off his socks, Bale gets to his feet; Joseph pauses, standing bare-chested in his slacks, pulse jumping in his slim throat. He hopes this is enough answer to the invitation, because he really doesn't think he can--
But there's a sound, a twin huff of escaping breaths, and they're on him, Bale pulling him further away from the wall and holding him immobile (arms locked under his shoulders and across his chest) while Hardy nearly destroys his slacks in his haste to get rid of them. Joseph struggles a little, but it's useless and besides he doesn't really want to get away, and Hardy sits back on his haunches to view the pale skin he's freed from its cloth confines. His hands grip Joseph's thighs, just below the hips, and he surveys Joseph's body like a predator gloating over its prey, his lips flushed dark and his arms needing almost no effort to hold Joseph still in his grasp.
"I knew it," says Hardy, with grave satisfaction. "I told you, Chris."
"That you did," agrees Bale, affable as always but with an edge of something in his voice like the frustration he carries after a failed shoot, and Joseph shivers all over his skin. If he was ever in any control of this situation, he is out of it now. He is between a rock and a hard place, between two immutable forces, filled with fear and awe and lust raging out of control.
Hardy's scrutiny goes on for long enough that Joseph feels heat flaring into his cheeks, and finds himself twisting to try and deflect Hardy's intense gaze. He freezes a second later, shocked into stillness by two things: first, that Bale shakes him bodily, hard, in warning; and second, that Bale's teeth and lips close gently but implacably on his earlobe.
It almost ruins Joseph. Up until now, he's been handled bodily, he's been restrained, he's even been stripped; but now there are mouths involved, and there's no pretending now that they'll just have a wrestle, a sort of mini-blocking session, and then he'll go home. There's going to be sex, and now he knows it.
This doesn't help much when Hardy hooks his thumbs into the waistband of his briefs and pulls them down, trailing strong fingers in their wake, depressing the flesh under their passage slightly and letting it spring back with goosebumps. Joseph's dick springs out, and it's a relief to be free of the restricting cloth, but now he's completely exposed to Hardy's view, and he's not sure--
Except that now Hardy has his face buried in Joseph's groin, nuzzling and letting his teeth graze the sensitive spots just inside his hipbones, dragging his unbearably soft lips over skin and light hair. Joseph's breathing stutters to a halt; there seems to be no air in the room; Hardy looks up at him, brow wrinkling at the extreme angle, and he says: "I was going to suck you, Joe."
Joseph has no idea what to say to this, so he just gasps and tries to focus on Hardy's words as he continues: "I thought I wasn't being subtle at all, you know? I waited for almost ten minutes." His breath ghosts over Joseph's dick and sets shivers running up and down his spine. "I was so hard, I wanted you so bad, and I guess you didn't get it. Or you didn't want it."
"I did," says Joseph, though his voice grates in his mouth. "I didn't want to-- oh god-- I didn't want to read into it. I'm sorry."
"I'm sorry too," says Hardy, in a rueful half-chuckle. "I was so ready to suck your cock, man."
"I'm not sorry at all," says Bale, in a strained mock-cheerful voice. "In fact I think you should get the fuck after it, Tom."
"Hold him still, then." Joseph thought he was already being held pretty still, but suddenly he's crushed back against Bale's massive chest as Bale's arms shift to curl up over his shoulders, and it's pretty damn effective, as the only thing he can do when Hardy's wicked full lips close over his dick is scream.
And scream he does, and groan, and buck; but Bale practically kicks the feet out from under him, taking away all his leverage and traction, so that he's dangling from Bale's grasp-- and resting hard against the front of Bale's jeans, which are struggling to contain the man's dick-- and Hardy's now completely in charge of this. And he is good at it. The suction is intense and Hardy's tongue moves with rhythmic pressure and every stroke of those lips up and down his shaft feels melting-soft and strong at the same time.
Hardy, too, restrains him, grasping his thighs in his huge powerful hands to keep him immobile; neither of the two men shows the first sign of tiring, even supporting Joseph's full weight and absorbing every weak, desperate attempt he makes at moving. And Bale is even sparing the energy to rub his jean-clad dick into the crack of Joseph's ass, leaving absolutely no question about what he wants from this.
It's over far too soon; Joseph isn't even close to coming, but he feels like his whole body will explode with agony when Hardy sucks his mouth off the end of Joseph's dick with a pop and wipes his mouth, smirking up past him to Bale. "He's so into this," says Hardy, smug. "I know you can't see his face but fuckin 'ell, he's gagging for it."
None of which Joseph can refute; his legs are shaking uncontrollably and he's panting like he's just run a mile.
"Sofa," says Bale, and he literally carries Joseph unprotesting to the couch, where he lies back against the rear cushions of the sofa with Joseph more or less in his lap. It's a weird position and Joseph feels like he might slide off onto the floor, but then Bale lets Joseph's shoulders go and hooks his arms under Joseph's knees and draws them up until he's spread wide open for Hardy's hungry gaze.
This position seems to be a little more difficult for Bale to hold him in, judging from the tension in Bale's chest and abdomen, but Joseph can't imagine being powerful enough to hold a grown man like this, and furthermore Bale seems perfectly able a few seconds later to lift him up and raise his ass off the sofa so that Hardy can do his jeans-shucking thing. Leaving Bale's naked dick, rock-hard and leaking at the tip, nestled firmly just above Joseph's ass.
Just above, he realizes, because Bale is tilting his ass up, because Hardy is kneeling down to lick it.
It's not something that he's used to; the necessities of a public career have forced him to be fairly careful in his dalliances, which is probably why he's such a terrified sensitive kid hiding behind a mask of pretention half the time, and he's pretty sure he was too drunk to sit up straight the first-- and last-- time someone tried to lick his asshole.
This is totally different. Hardy licks him like he's been dipped in chocolate: lazy, hungry strokes that leave him gasping and clutching, nips and quick darting flicks that set his belly trembling. Bale hisses in his ear, offering encouragement and lewd observations; when Joseph can't control his voice and begs for mercy, Bale kisses him and suckles his tongue, swallowing his cries. It goes on for longer than he knows how to deal with, and by the time Hardy's opening him up with his fingers, Joseph is out of his mind with pleasure and helplessness.
"Good enough," says Hardy at last, wiping his mouth again. "He needs to be fucked, man, and my mouth is getting tired."
Joseph is a shuddering wreck. He can't imagine anything making Hardy tired.
Bale doesn't need much encouragement; he's been rocking up against Joseph with increasingly desperate motions, and Joseph's pretty sure that in all Hardy's licking and fingering he made time to do some obscene things to Bale too. He breaches Joseph's ass with an urgency that would be uncomfortable if Hardy hadn't done such a thorough job of opening him up, and with a groan of combined longing and relief he pushes deep inside.
Christ, it's good. Joseph sobs for breath, completely impaled, unable to move at all, and there's a tense moment during which he suspects Bale is trying really hard not to come, and in front of them Hardy rises to his feet and easily, purposefully jacks his own dick until it's even harder.
"Fuck, if you could see yourself," says Hardy; his body is towering, massive, a sexual nightmare. Joseph blinks, eyes half-focused and jaw hanging open, trying to come to terms with how full and stretched open he is and how impossible it is that this bear of a man just ate his asshole and he is still alive.
But Hardy's still talking. "Do you suck cock as well as you take it," he says, and without waiting for an answer he climbs up on the sofa over them, kneeling so that his heavy dick brushes Joseph's face and his enormous thighs are pinning both of them to the cushions. "Open," he adds, and Joseph opens, because there's nothing else he can do.
Like the rest of him, Hardy's dick is huge-- uncut and delicious and almost too much for him to handle. Fortunately, Joseph's sexual experience in the last decade has mostly been limited to blowjobs anyway, so this is something he can do pretty well, especially since it's not like Bale can thrust--
With a growl, Bale lets his legs go entirely and takes him by the ribcage-- not even the waist, but by his sides just under his nipples-- and lifts him easily, sliding him upward on the length of his dick, before pushing him back down. Joseph finds himself forced to grip Hardy's hips with his hands to keep his head still enough to suck.
It wouldn't work at all if all three of them had been thin, delicate types like Joseph, but with Bale lifting him and slamming him back down and Hardy gripping his shoulders to guide him perfectly onto Bale's dick, the three of them rock and thrust and groan like a machine, Joseph helpless and overwhelmed between them.
"You're so fucking hot, you look so hot with my cock down your throat." Hardy has a mouth that could dirty a bar of soap, and he doesn't even try to restrain it. "Open up and suck it, go on, eat it up like your mouth was made for it, god you're good at this."
Bale is clutching at his sides like a vise and Hardy is spewing a steady stream of filth and Joseph feels fragile, like he could snap in an instant if either of them let go their full power. He knows Hardy is holding back; he could be riding both of them at once, pounding Joseph's mouth so hard he's utterly crushed into Bale's chest, but he's letting Joseph's mouth do the work, and from the sound of things he's enjoying it. And Joseph is halfway terrified that Bale's holding back too, because from the incredible ache and fullness of his gut, Joseph doesn't think he could take a more relentless pounding.
It's not long at all before Hardy can't speak, tightening his hands on Joseph's shoulders. Hardy tries to warn him, tries to push him away, but Joseph struggles after him, keeping his lips locked around Hardy's shaft, and sucks, hard, and swallows down the pulse and liquid heat of Hardy coming down his throat like a drowning man reaching air at last.
For just a moment, Joseph feels incredibly powerful; he has reduced this man, this immense confident gorgeous man, to a shuddering, reeling mess, and he smiles as Hardy draws his still-hard dick back from Joseph's mouth, dragging it across his battered lower lip.
"Good fucking god," says Hardy. "Stop moving, Chris, I'm gonna make this kid explode."
Bale complains at that, scarcely verbal, but he drags himself back under control and halts the rhythm of his thrusts so that Hardy can slide-- all muscle and bone and sweating skin-- down the length of Joseph's body, just a little sticky with spilled come, and sink his perfect mouth onto Joseph's dick.
This time Joseph can barely take it; his dick has swollen almost purple and is so hard that, when he flexes the base of his abdomen from the unexpected heat of Hardy's mouth, his whole pelvis aches. He can feel himself losing control, his whole body is shaking with exhaustion and twinges of stabbing bliss run through him like electric shocks. When Hardy finds a swirling movement of his tongue over the sensitive under-crown of his dick and just rides it relentlessly, he feels himself twitching inside, feels his asshole contracting and spasming with the imminence of orgasm, and it seems to push Bale over the edge of his control.
And Bale was definitely holding back, before, because now he's pounding into Joseph's ass with unbridled ferocity and there's the beginnings of pain, but it's not enough to hold Joseph back, and he cries out like a wounded animal as his knees buckle and his toes curl back and he feels himself coming, unbearably hard, into the implacable, demanding motion of Hardy's mouth.
He's only just begun to shoot when he feels Bale stiffen under him, feels Bale's dick jump and spasm inside him, and god damn if it doesn't make the whole thing worse, greater, more helpless. Joseph comes until he's wrung out, his seed propelled by Hardy's wet and swollen mouth and by Bale's all-out pounding, and when it's over he collapses like a doll losing its stuffing, sprawling out onto Bale's chest and ears ringing so hard he almost misses Hardy's laugh, as bright and confident as it ever is on the blocking mats.
"Sweet Christ," says Joseph; it's really all he can find the breath to say for another five minutes, while aftershocks and lassitude run through him and weigh him down. Bale slides out of him, and in the aftermath Joseph realizes the upholstery is going to have to be laundered and they all three need showers and he just does not give a fuck. Because now Hardy is crawling up onto the sofa to collapse beside him, and they all three lie in a heap, heaving for air and unable to move.
Hardy's shoulder is digging into Joseph's chest, but he turns his head to give Joseph a wonderfully fucked-out smile. "Now I'm kind of glad you didn't follow me," he says, and the excess of Joseph's relief and giddiness spills out into laughter, and while he's laughing Hardy kisses him, long and lazily, tasting Joseph's palate and drawing his lower lip into his mouth to suckle gently.
It's been two years of second-guessing, of worrying about the consequences of his crushing and the unwitting slight given to Hardy all that time ago. But everything really is going to be okay now, thinks Joseph, lost in that kiss.
Author's Notes:
You might notice that the protagonist of this piece (lol, fancy words for porn) has an internal monologue that doesn't quite match the public persona of Joseph Gordon-Levitt. I really struggle with fic about JGL, as he's said some offensively stupid and pretentious shit, including the old "women can't be pretty and funny" line that makes me want to punch a bitch. I might be arrogant, but I consider myself to be both pretty hot and pretty fuckin' funny, and I hope he had some lady friend close by to slap the shit out of him after that show.
For the sake of my ladyboners, though, I'm gonna pretend that it's a mask he uses to hide some serious social anxiety; I like to imagine he's just awkward as fuck and repeats things he's heard the "cool kids" say because he's terrified of sounding like the nerd kid he is. And also I'm not going to feel an ounce of conscience-weight when I objectify his fine, fine, slender ass in fic.
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: RPF, dirty talk, size/strength kink, rimming
Word count: ~6800
Disclaimer: These are not even close to the real people themselves, I just taped less pretend over their characters than I usually do.
Summary: "Joseph cannot believe how huge and gorgeously muscular Tom's gotten for his role as Bane. ...And then on top of that, he gets to work with Christian Bale and wow, does he ever fill out that Batman suit." (Kink meme prompt here.)
Truth be told, he still dreams about it occasionally, usually the one day toward the end of filming when they went out drinking in their expensive suits and Hardy kept smirking at him. He still can't remember a thing he said; it was probably all embarrassing, probably the emotional nonsense he keeps buttoned up under layers of pretense and propriety. He does remember Hardy getting up from the table, smirking down at him with lips flushed from the tequila, and pausing just a moment too long before heading to the men's room.
Joseph stayed at the bar, head ducked and heart racing, trying not to read into the situation and terrified that he was missing something crucial. Eventually, Hardy came back, with just as much swagger as before, but after that there was no more smirking.
When he dreamed about it, he would always stand-- casual, feigning confidence-- and follow the scent of Hardy's cologne to the men's room in the back. Adrenaline always woke him before he reached the door.
Afterward, something subtle changed between them, perhaps because Joseph's crush on Hardy reached unbearable levels that made it difficult to speak around him; but perhaps he had given offense unwittingly. It gnawed at him that he would never know.
Only lately had it begun to gnaw less.
But now here he stands in the back of the studio, nervous as always on the first day of shooting, checking and rechecking his lines in his mind. He knows Hardy is here, in the building, and it's making him paranoid; he looks around every ten seconds, half expecting to see those deceptively sleek shoulders bunching and releasing under steel-gray brushed wool, or the flicker of sly fingers brushing a stray lock of hair back into place.
Neither of these things are possible. He's seen the costume, even a few shots. Somewhere in this building, Hardy is sweating, shaven-headed, preparing to shoot some inconsequential scene. Joseph can't even picture it. He probably won't even see Hardy for another month.
But he's still jittery and flushed when his turn comes, and he's walking into the sitting room of Wayne Mansion to give Batman a pep talk when he sees an unmistakeable figure off behind the lights. He barely even recognizes the silhouette as belonging to Hardy; there's a shaved head, an incongruous amount of bulk, and it rattles him so badly that he bombs four takes in a row.
After the fourth they pause so that everyone can breathe and have some water; Joseph resists the urge to splash it on his face, to cool the flush that he can feel rising. He's standing at the edge of the set, staring at nothing, rubbing the back of his neck, and he realizes he can still see Hardy's outline in the near-black behind the lights, just watching.
Four takes of mangled lines flash in front of his eyes, and Joseph nearly chokes on his water when a sure hand takes him by the elbow and it's Bale, leaning in to murmur in his ear: steady, Joseph. Casual, amused, just a little knowing; he winks and pulls back, slaps him on the shoulder, and strides back to the set.
Joseph's elbow tingles as he turns to follow, and the next take goes flawlessly. He's pretty sure he's going to be okay.
---
"Okay," as it turns out, is the dumbest thing Joseph has ever predicted, because by the end of the third day of shooting-- with no further sign of Hardy-- he is practically swooning over Bale. They've done two days of chatter shots, trading lines and feeding off each others' energy; now he's shooting with Oldman, and Nolan is being picky.
When at the end of the fifth day Nolan is talking about taking the whole scene out, Bale listens to Joseph's frustrations as they strip off their makeup, and afterward kidnaps him to go out for a couple of beers.
Joseph is too stressed out to be self-conscious at first, but after an hour of listening to Bale's self-deprecatory humor and about three beers, he suddenly remembers the last time he went out drinking with a (fascinating, attractive) cast member, and he feels his mouth drying up even while Bale is pulling up his pants leg to display an impressive bruise from a fight scene. Have I said anything embarrassing yet? Oh god, am I doing anything embarrassing right now?
"You know," says Bale, once he's done discussing how thoroughly he's getting his ass kicked during blocking for these fight scenes, "your buddy Hardy is built as fuck. Was he always like that?"
Joseph doesn't trust his mouth to give a real response. "Probably not before the age of three."
Bale chuckles at that, shaking his head. "I mean, I'm not a small guy, but if he jumped out of a dark alley at me I'd shit myself. He didn't look that big in the other movie."
The other movie, during whose filming Joseph had followed Hardy around dreamy-eyed as a fawn. "How big is he now," he says into his beer, carefully keeping his voice neutral.
"Jesus," says Bale. "Have you not seen him lately? He's a brick shithouse, man, if he wasn't so goddamn nice to everyone we'd all be calling him 'sir'." He laughs, and takes a moment to stretch out his legs under the table; Joseph swallows and tries really hard not to look at the way Bale's muscles shift under his t-shirt as he moves on his seat. "Tell you what," adds Bale. "Next time you have a little downtime, you should come out to the lot, watch him kick my shit in. We're starting night shooting next week."
"Okay," says Joseph, even though he knows that the idea of okay has already betrayed him horribly, and the topic moves on, and he spends the next hour nursing his beer carefully and trying not to adore Bale's laugh and his expressions too much. He already knows he'll be on the lot next week if it kills him. Which it might.
---
He's on the lot early, because he's always early for everything, even when it means (like now) standing around waiting for the important people to arrive. He perks up like a puppy when Bale arrives, and almost forgets the reason he ostensibly came by; Bale waves at him on his way to dressing, affable and not over-familiar, just totally cool like always, and Joseph's wearing a stupid grin even before the goddamn Batman steps out of the dressing room.
It's night and day. Bale is the guy Joseph wants to go out for beers with and quietly stare at with his chin in one hand; Bale in costume is menacing and dark and sexy as hell. Up close, the suit doesn't look like armor; it's practically a frame for Bale's musculature. It moves with him in ways that make Joseph swallow hard.
None of this prepares him even a little for the next thirty seconds. Apparently he wasn't the earliest; he definitely didn't see Hardy go into dressing, but when he steps out the entire room pauses. A high, ringing hum fills the air, or maybe that's just Joseph preparing to pass out.
Hardy's shaven scalp is glistening slightly; his gorgeous eyes don't hide at all behind the mask. And he's massive; he assumes his Bane stance, hands resting at the collar of his coat, legs braced wide. There is so much menace rolling off him that even the cart guys go silent.
Joseph realizes two things at once: one, he is just as gone on Hardy as he has ever been, and probably more so; and two, he is honest-to-god afraid. He is sexually afraid. He is in so, so much trouble.
He has no idea how he makes it through the next two hours; there's a lot of uncomfortable pants-adjusting and strategic standing-behind-things, but fuck if he's going to look away for longer than it takes to blink. So this is what Bale was blocking for last week. It's barely two minutes of footage, unless Joseph misses his guess, and the whole thing consists of Hardy-- no, Bane-- throwing Batman up against a wall and physically menacing him.
There's not a lot of punching, because punching takes stunt work and cut shots, but the forty-fifth time Hardy seizes Bale by that fantastic armor and snarls him into the wall, Bale hitting with a meaty thud and all his flesh contracting and absorbing the blow, Hardy's monstrous arms flexed like a dam about to break-- by that time, Joseph is reeling from lust. He dimly hopes there's enough blood still circulating in his body to keep him conscious and upright if he lets go of the set piece he's white-knuckling.
He wonders if he can somehow arrange to be on the lot for every single scene they have together, and then he wonders if he can sweet-talk Nolan into adding a scene where Hardy beats him up, and then he knows he's going crazy because someone's saying wrap and Hardy is peeling off the mask and then four seconds later he's wrapped in an enormous, muscular, sweaty hug that smells like pancake makeup and wardrobe trailer.
Hardy plants a giant kiss enthusiastically on his face, leaving a greasy makeup smear, and sets him back on his feet (oh, his feet weren't even touching the ground, jesus) so that he can practically shake Joseph senseless in his excitement.
"Oh my god," says Joseph, feeling like this cannot possibly be reality, "you're huge."
"We can't all keep our girlish figures," says Hardy, and with the mask off he's just as beautiful as he ever was, full lips arranged in a rakish smile, crooked eyebrows raised in mischief. If it weren't for the thirty extra pounds of muscle, this could have been a moment from two years ago.
Bale appears out of nowhere and claps him on the shoulder; his mask is off and his black eye makeup is smudged grotesquely, but between Bale's broad shoulders and Hardy's powerful torso and arms, Joseph is having a hard time thinking about faces. He's never felt so small, so slight, in his life. They could crush him easily between them, and to be honest, he could die happy that way.
There's conversation, most of which goes ringing through Joseph's head in a haze of increasingly painful realization: he is so not over Hardy, and this isn't stopping him from crushing on Bale. When Hardy hugs him again, demonstrative as ever, and tells him to come back next time, Joseph finds himself staggering back to his car, wondering if he can be excused from the next day's shooting on grounds of insanity, because clearly he is insane.
---
As it turns out, in the morning he feels less insane than ashamed, and he's sickeningly relieved that it's another day with Oldman. Nolan axes the scene after a mere four more hours of exhausting takes, and Oldman-- Gary, by now, and that fact is pretty much the highlight of Joseph's acting career-- pulls out a flask from someplace and lets Joseph take a hit of it before draining half the thing in one go. "Fuck," says Gary, succinctly; Joseph shifts uncomfortably in his seat, feeling the burn go down, not entirely happy to be reminded that he himself said "fuck" about a thousand times last night after he got home, and now has some chafing issues because of it.
Fortunately (or maybe not), Nolan can sense their frustration, and he sends them home early. Joseph spends about two hours fitfully sleeping in his featureless hotel room, obsessively fiddles with his smartphone for another three hours, and almost falls off the bed when his phone lights up in the middle of Angry Birds.
It's Bale. "You coming to the next round of blocking?"
Jesus, Bale. Christ. I can't do this.
He's almost five minutes late, but there aren't any costumes today, which is almost worse; Hardy has a fierce laugh, a strange sound to hear when he and Bale are flying at each other over and over, trying to learn to to tackle and fall just the way the choreo guy wants. It just bursts out of him: silence during each bout except for the plastic thwack of the cushioned mats, quiet grunts as their enormous shoulders collide, and then one of them will miss a footing and the whole gym will resonate with Hardy's gorgeous delighted laughter.
There is no way Joseph can deal with this and the insane lust that punches the breath out of him every time Hardy moves his arms.
And afterward, as if by prior arrangement, both of them end up making a beeline straight for him. Hardy wants to demonstrate his latest efforts at constructing a Bane voice (which is like a combination of hate and cellos), and Bale forces them both to examine and acknowledge the giant red mark on his ribs from a mis-aimed kick (which nearly destroys Joseph right there, watching Bale strip halfway out of his shirt). He's flattered and he's terrified. It took him months to develop a real rapport with some of his coworkers on Inception, and here they are-- beautiful, brilliant, goddamn fucking built men, just making a point of being around him.
He must have done something terrible, and this is his punishment. He is turning into a lust elemental, a cartoon of himself with tongue hanging out and hearts in his eyes. Every time Bale claps his shoulder, it staggers him, because next to Bale he's a tiny slip of a man, a dapper silverfish; every time Hardy hugs him, lifting him bodily off the floor and unabashedly rubbing his giant goofy grin into Joseph's hair, he feels those massive arms, those painfully familiar hands, like a stab of regret that he can't quite wrench out.
It's at times like these, traipsing to the parking lot and trying not to feel like a tagalong little brother, that he gives himself a few minutes to imagine what might have happened if he'd followed Hardy into that bathroom. He would have been slimmer, then; he would have been lovely, just as laughing and intense, but perhaps Joseph would have got over him by now, and the swing and ripple of Hardy's back would be an interesting thing to look at instead of a direct drop-kick to the soul.
And Bale, goddammit, Bale isn't helping.
---
He has to quit showing up for blocking. He knows people are wondering why he's here, and he's sure someone will eventually say something; when they do, he'll probably turn six shades of red and sink into the pavement, stuttering.
Bale and Hardy don't always rush him, even one at a time. Sometimes they can't get it right, and Bale leaves with a dark expression and doesn't speak to anyone; sometimes blocking runs so long that Joseph has to get home and sleep before his shoots in the morning.
But he spends the whole month like this, shooting in the morning, resting in the afternoon, and hanging around the lot like a lovesick schoolgirl all evening. On weekends he ends up texting Hardy like an idiot by midmorning: are you guys doing anything interesting today?. He's not sure when they became a unit in his mind, but lately even when he entertains the fantasy that one or both of them might bend his way, all he can picture is Hardy slamming Bale to the mat in a full-body pin, and the way Hardy smirks when he's got the pin perfect.
Hardy smirked at him once, and he let it go. He hopes Bale's a bigger idiot than he was, because he doesn't think he can handle it if they... if they...
Joseph is sitting in a Starbucks on a Sunday morning, clutching his latte and turning red with mortification as his body responds to the mental images he can't help summoning. They would fuck like they fought, violently and without reservation, Hardy's fierce bright laugh ringing out at intervals and Bale grunting and struggling; Hardy would lift Bale by the hips, muscles straining in protest at the weight, and pin him to the wall, riding him--
He can't leave Starbucks for nearly an hour, trapped behind his table with his legs crossed as he tries to distract himself, once again, with Angry Birds. And when he gets up to leave at last, he's still a block from his hotel when Hardy texts him back: beer n telly at my place, come on out, 8.
Joseph resists the urge to ask if Bale will be there, and instead replies: see you there, I'll bring food.
---
He's early, of course. He's so early, in fact, that he ends up sitting in his car for thirty minutes with a giant container of Korean barbecue beef steaming beside him, making him salivate uncontrollably. And this makes him feel like a complete tool when suddenly Bale knocks on his window and says, hey, you going up?
"Yeah," says Joseph, face flaming as he gathers up the food and climbs out of his car. "Just... texting my mom."
It takes him almost five minutes to stop kicking himself over that. Fortunately he spends the entire five minutes following Bale up a narrow flight of stairs to Hardy's studio, and the view distracts him with painful efficiency. He's cursing himself for his inability to stop staring (and mentally comparing Bale's flawless ass with his own skinny backside) when Hardy opens the door, clad in nothing but boxer briefs, beer in hand, and invites them in with a grin and a nod.
Joseph is wearing a suit. He is not going to survive this.
Hardy is the most confident person Joseph has ever seen. He lounges on the sofa with his legs kicked out, perfectly comfortable in his underwear, and if Bale wasn't acting like this was no big thing Joseph would already be looking for excuses to leave before he made a fool of himself.
Hardy is watching soccer, and the three of them tear into the barbecue and beer. It's not ten minutes before they're all three bitching about work: Hardy rants about his mask-shaped tan lines (which are hardly noticeable at this point, Joseph has no idea what he's so upset about) and Joseph is ready to strangle some fake orphans.
After an hour of this and a couple of beers, Joseph is kicked back on the far end of the sofa from Hardy, and Bale is relaxing in the reclining chair. Joseph hasn't said anything too terribly embarrassing, Hardy's boxer briefs really aren't that off-putting, and it seems like things are going to be okay. Which sends off thousands of tiny alarm bells in Joseph's head, especially when Bale gets around to his inevitable brand of bitching about work: showing off bruises. Apparently these bruises require him to remove his entire shirt.
"Oh for fuck's sake," says Joseph, suddenly, irrationally irritated. Is he never going to spend an evening with these guys without getting flustered and turned on? "I was there! I watched him put every one of those bruises on you."
Bale is amused at that, but Hardy frowns a little, tilts his head at Joseph. "You were there," he says, thoughtfully. "I think you show up to more blocking sessions than the camera guys do."
Joseph swallows; his tongue feels huge and dry.
There's a pause, Bale cracking open a fresh beer as Hardy's eyes move from easygoing contentment to quick, intelligent thought, and then the laughter comes back into his face and he adds, "Studying up to put me out of a job, huh?"
"As if I could ever get that big," says Joseph absently, not sure whether to be relieved or terrified, and Bale swigs his beer and starts showing off his bruises anyway, and Joseph averts his eyes from Hardy's unflinching, curious gaze.
Across the sofa, a slow smirk unfurls on Hardy's face.
Within two hours, Joseph had discovered another problem with being a fairly small guy in the company of a pair of enormous men: when they switch from beer to vodka, you're completely screwed. And it's good vodka, which makes it harder for him to say no, but neither Bale nor Hardy is looking particularly drunk yet, and Joseph can already feel his carefully-maintained guise of social acceptability crumbling.
"No," he says, "no seriously, if you guys actually fought, who would win?"
"I dunno," says Hardy charitably, "Chris is pretty quick," but at the same time Bale is chuckling and gesturing emphatically toward Hardy.
"Well," says Joseph, feeling his eyes crinkle up with his own laughter, "if you guys ever do have it out for real, I want a ringside seat."
"Won't ever happen," says Bale, and at that exact second Hardy roars out of his seat and tackles Bale halfway out of the recliner. It takes Joseph a few shocked seconds to realize that it's a play fight, that Bale is laughing and the punches are pulled, and by then Bale has rolled out from under Hardy's onslaught and is collapsing in hysterical, rather drunken laughter on the carpet by the television. Hardy flops out flat on his back and gives Joseph a lopsided, breathless grin.
"Is that what you were after," he says, and he just stares at Joseph, who doesn't understand for a few moments that his own mouth is hanging open and his face is flushed.
"It's fine," says Joseph, though almost no voice comes out of his throat, "that was great," and he supposes that's a weird thing to say but all of his words have dried up. Hardy's thighs are bigger each than both of his put together.
He is betraying himself, his face is telling all his secrets, and Hardy is smirking because he knows now. Joseph wonders if there's some way that he can arrange to be killed before the humiliation grows any greater.
Bale is watching him too, now, resting one muscular forearm over his knee, bare chest glistening with sweat. "You all right?" His eyes flicker over to Hardy, an unspoken question hanging in the air, and Joseph can hear himself getting ready to say: I have to get up early, I think I've had too much, I don't feel good, maybe I'm getting sick. He will say these things, and he'll bolt out of the apartment, and he's pretty sure from the way Bale is looking at Hardy and from the easy curve to Hardy's lips that if Joseph leaves they will fuck until they're unconscious, and he'll miss it.
But it's Hardy's lips that decide for him, because he's seen that look before, and he's willing to risk a little more humiliation to discover if it really is an invitation and they really do want him to stay. He doesn't think he can live for another two years without knowing the truth.
"I'm fine," he says, and it's nearly a whisper. "I feel great."
He doesn't even have time to over-analyze his own response, because this time Hardy tackles him, and he's shrieking like a little girl and shielding his face as Hardy pretends to rough him up, swinging punches that barely connect and pinning him (oh god) to the floor with his insane bulk. He scissors, trying to wriggle away; Hardy growls and drags him back, rucking his lapels up under his armpits and crumpling his entire suit horribly.
"Is this what you wanted," growls Hardy, and it sounds like he's got the Bane voice worked out just fine; the sound reverberates through Hardy's entire chest and into Joseph's body, crushed between him and the carpet.
"Actually," retorts Joseph, a little out of breath and hardly believing his own audacity, "I was pretty curious about that sequence where you threw Bale up against the wall," and before the words are fully out of his mouth Hardy is on his feet and lifting him, hauling him off his feet by the fabric of his shirt. Hardy's arms tense with his weight, not nearly as much as they did with Bale but enough to seize Joseph's attention, and there's a blur of movement and a rush of delirious movement and Joseph is crushed again, back to the wall, shoulders aching from the impact and feet kicking uselessly for traction. Hardy's eyes are dark and aggressive, locked onto Joseph's face, and Joseph can feel Bale's eyes following them.
Then Hardy drops him, and the aggression diminishes to a dangerous glint in his eyes, and Joseph says: Jesus, and my god, and other words he no longer knows the meaning of.
"I think I'm wearing the wrong clothes for this," he says, once he can breathe again (who is he kidding, he will never breathe properly again, he is doomed).
"Take them off," says Bale.
There's just enough teasing in his voice that Joseph can't be certain, but Hardy stands back, stretching his hands where they'd twisted into Joseph's suit. Nobody is going to say it. They're just waiting for Joseph, and Joseph will be damned if he's going to miss his chance again, so he shucks off his coat-- a tad defiant, meeting Bale's eyes and then Hardy's-- and then untucks his shirt and starts working on the buttons.
Hardy's lips part. It's the subtlest cue, but it's the only movement they make, and it's enough to steel Joseph as he finishes undoing his shirt and strips out of it, then his belt, then his undershirt.
And now the self-consciousness sets in, because he might be in the best shape of his life, but he's pale and whip-thin, at best wiry, and both Hardy and Bale are so... big. As Joseph is stripping off his socks, Bale gets to his feet; Joseph pauses, standing bare-chested in his slacks, pulse jumping in his slim throat. He hopes this is enough answer to the invitation, because he really doesn't think he can--
But there's a sound, a twin huff of escaping breaths, and they're on him, Bale pulling him further away from the wall and holding him immobile (arms locked under his shoulders and across his chest) while Hardy nearly destroys his slacks in his haste to get rid of them. Joseph struggles a little, but it's useless and besides he doesn't really want to get away, and Hardy sits back on his haunches to view the pale skin he's freed from its cloth confines. His hands grip Joseph's thighs, just below the hips, and he surveys Joseph's body like a predator gloating over its prey, his lips flushed dark and his arms needing almost no effort to hold Joseph still in his grasp.
"I knew it," says Hardy, with grave satisfaction. "I told you, Chris."
"That you did," agrees Bale, affable as always but with an edge of something in his voice like the frustration he carries after a failed shoot, and Joseph shivers all over his skin. If he was ever in any control of this situation, he is out of it now. He is between a rock and a hard place, between two immutable forces, filled with fear and awe and lust raging out of control.
Hardy's scrutiny goes on for long enough that Joseph feels heat flaring into his cheeks, and finds himself twisting to try and deflect Hardy's intense gaze. He freezes a second later, shocked into stillness by two things: first, that Bale shakes him bodily, hard, in warning; and second, that Bale's teeth and lips close gently but implacably on his earlobe.
It almost ruins Joseph. Up until now, he's been handled bodily, he's been restrained, he's even been stripped; but now there are mouths involved, and there's no pretending now that they'll just have a wrestle, a sort of mini-blocking session, and then he'll go home. There's going to be sex, and now he knows it.
This doesn't help much when Hardy hooks his thumbs into the waistband of his briefs and pulls them down, trailing strong fingers in their wake, depressing the flesh under their passage slightly and letting it spring back with goosebumps. Joseph's dick springs out, and it's a relief to be free of the restricting cloth, but now he's completely exposed to Hardy's view, and he's not sure--
Except that now Hardy has his face buried in Joseph's groin, nuzzling and letting his teeth graze the sensitive spots just inside his hipbones, dragging his unbearably soft lips over skin and light hair. Joseph's breathing stutters to a halt; there seems to be no air in the room; Hardy looks up at him, brow wrinkling at the extreme angle, and he says: "I was going to suck you, Joe."
Joseph has no idea what to say to this, so he just gasps and tries to focus on Hardy's words as he continues: "I thought I wasn't being subtle at all, you know? I waited for almost ten minutes." His breath ghosts over Joseph's dick and sets shivers running up and down his spine. "I was so hard, I wanted you so bad, and I guess you didn't get it. Or you didn't want it."
"I did," says Joseph, though his voice grates in his mouth. "I didn't want to-- oh god-- I didn't want to read into it. I'm sorry."
"I'm sorry too," says Hardy, in a rueful half-chuckle. "I was so ready to suck your cock, man."
"I'm not sorry at all," says Bale, in a strained mock-cheerful voice. "In fact I think you should get the fuck after it, Tom."
"Hold him still, then." Joseph thought he was already being held pretty still, but suddenly he's crushed back against Bale's massive chest as Bale's arms shift to curl up over his shoulders, and it's pretty damn effective, as the only thing he can do when Hardy's wicked full lips close over his dick is scream.
And scream he does, and groan, and buck; but Bale practically kicks the feet out from under him, taking away all his leverage and traction, so that he's dangling from Bale's grasp-- and resting hard against the front of Bale's jeans, which are struggling to contain the man's dick-- and Hardy's now completely in charge of this. And he is good at it. The suction is intense and Hardy's tongue moves with rhythmic pressure and every stroke of those lips up and down his shaft feels melting-soft and strong at the same time.
Hardy, too, restrains him, grasping his thighs in his huge powerful hands to keep him immobile; neither of the two men shows the first sign of tiring, even supporting Joseph's full weight and absorbing every weak, desperate attempt he makes at moving. And Bale is even sparing the energy to rub his jean-clad dick into the crack of Joseph's ass, leaving absolutely no question about what he wants from this.
It's over far too soon; Joseph isn't even close to coming, but he feels like his whole body will explode with agony when Hardy sucks his mouth off the end of Joseph's dick with a pop and wipes his mouth, smirking up past him to Bale. "He's so into this," says Hardy, smug. "I know you can't see his face but fuckin 'ell, he's gagging for it."
None of which Joseph can refute; his legs are shaking uncontrollably and he's panting like he's just run a mile.
"Sofa," says Bale, and he literally carries Joseph unprotesting to the couch, where he lies back against the rear cushions of the sofa with Joseph more or less in his lap. It's a weird position and Joseph feels like he might slide off onto the floor, but then Bale lets Joseph's shoulders go and hooks his arms under Joseph's knees and draws them up until he's spread wide open for Hardy's hungry gaze.
This position seems to be a little more difficult for Bale to hold him in, judging from the tension in Bale's chest and abdomen, but Joseph can't imagine being powerful enough to hold a grown man like this, and furthermore Bale seems perfectly able a few seconds later to lift him up and raise his ass off the sofa so that Hardy can do his jeans-shucking thing. Leaving Bale's naked dick, rock-hard and leaking at the tip, nestled firmly just above Joseph's ass.
Just above, he realizes, because Bale is tilting his ass up, because Hardy is kneeling down to lick it.
It's not something that he's used to; the necessities of a public career have forced him to be fairly careful in his dalliances, which is probably why he's such a terrified sensitive kid hiding behind a mask of pretention half the time, and he's pretty sure he was too drunk to sit up straight the first-- and last-- time someone tried to lick his asshole.
This is totally different. Hardy licks him like he's been dipped in chocolate: lazy, hungry strokes that leave him gasping and clutching, nips and quick darting flicks that set his belly trembling. Bale hisses in his ear, offering encouragement and lewd observations; when Joseph can't control his voice and begs for mercy, Bale kisses him and suckles his tongue, swallowing his cries. It goes on for longer than he knows how to deal with, and by the time Hardy's opening him up with his fingers, Joseph is out of his mind with pleasure and helplessness.
"Good enough," says Hardy at last, wiping his mouth again. "He needs to be fucked, man, and my mouth is getting tired."
Joseph is a shuddering wreck. He can't imagine anything making Hardy tired.
Bale doesn't need much encouragement; he's been rocking up against Joseph with increasingly desperate motions, and Joseph's pretty sure that in all Hardy's licking and fingering he made time to do some obscene things to Bale too. He breaches Joseph's ass with an urgency that would be uncomfortable if Hardy hadn't done such a thorough job of opening him up, and with a groan of combined longing and relief he pushes deep inside.
Christ, it's good. Joseph sobs for breath, completely impaled, unable to move at all, and there's a tense moment during which he suspects Bale is trying really hard not to come, and in front of them Hardy rises to his feet and easily, purposefully jacks his own dick until it's even harder.
"Fuck, if you could see yourself," says Hardy; his body is towering, massive, a sexual nightmare. Joseph blinks, eyes half-focused and jaw hanging open, trying to come to terms with how full and stretched open he is and how impossible it is that this bear of a man just ate his asshole and he is still alive.
But Hardy's still talking. "Do you suck cock as well as you take it," he says, and without waiting for an answer he climbs up on the sofa over them, kneeling so that his heavy dick brushes Joseph's face and his enormous thighs are pinning both of them to the cushions. "Open," he adds, and Joseph opens, because there's nothing else he can do.
Like the rest of him, Hardy's dick is huge-- uncut and delicious and almost too much for him to handle. Fortunately, Joseph's sexual experience in the last decade has mostly been limited to blowjobs anyway, so this is something he can do pretty well, especially since it's not like Bale can thrust--
With a growl, Bale lets his legs go entirely and takes him by the ribcage-- not even the waist, but by his sides just under his nipples-- and lifts him easily, sliding him upward on the length of his dick, before pushing him back down. Joseph finds himself forced to grip Hardy's hips with his hands to keep his head still enough to suck.
It wouldn't work at all if all three of them had been thin, delicate types like Joseph, but with Bale lifting him and slamming him back down and Hardy gripping his shoulders to guide him perfectly onto Bale's dick, the three of them rock and thrust and groan like a machine, Joseph helpless and overwhelmed between them.
"You're so fucking hot, you look so hot with my cock down your throat." Hardy has a mouth that could dirty a bar of soap, and he doesn't even try to restrain it. "Open up and suck it, go on, eat it up like your mouth was made for it, god you're good at this."
Bale is clutching at his sides like a vise and Hardy is spewing a steady stream of filth and Joseph feels fragile, like he could snap in an instant if either of them let go their full power. He knows Hardy is holding back; he could be riding both of them at once, pounding Joseph's mouth so hard he's utterly crushed into Bale's chest, but he's letting Joseph's mouth do the work, and from the sound of things he's enjoying it. And Joseph is halfway terrified that Bale's holding back too, because from the incredible ache and fullness of his gut, Joseph doesn't think he could take a more relentless pounding.
It's not long at all before Hardy can't speak, tightening his hands on Joseph's shoulders. Hardy tries to warn him, tries to push him away, but Joseph struggles after him, keeping his lips locked around Hardy's shaft, and sucks, hard, and swallows down the pulse and liquid heat of Hardy coming down his throat like a drowning man reaching air at last.
For just a moment, Joseph feels incredibly powerful; he has reduced this man, this immense confident gorgeous man, to a shuddering, reeling mess, and he smiles as Hardy draws his still-hard dick back from Joseph's mouth, dragging it across his battered lower lip.
"Good fucking god," says Hardy. "Stop moving, Chris, I'm gonna make this kid explode."
Bale complains at that, scarcely verbal, but he drags himself back under control and halts the rhythm of his thrusts so that Hardy can slide-- all muscle and bone and sweating skin-- down the length of Joseph's body, just a little sticky with spilled come, and sink his perfect mouth onto Joseph's dick.
This time Joseph can barely take it; his dick has swollen almost purple and is so hard that, when he flexes the base of his abdomen from the unexpected heat of Hardy's mouth, his whole pelvis aches. He can feel himself losing control, his whole body is shaking with exhaustion and twinges of stabbing bliss run through him like electric shocks. When Hardy finds a swirling movement of his tongue over the sensitive under-crown of his dick and just rides it relentlessly, he feels himself twitching inside, feels his asshole contracting and spasming with the imminence of orgasm, and it seems to push Bale over the edge of his control.
And Bale was definitely holding back, before, because now he's pounding into Joseph's ass with unbridled ferocity and there's the beginnings of pain, but it's not enough to hold Joseph back, and he cries out like a wounded animal as his knees buckle and his toes curl back and he feels himself coming, unbearably hard, into the implacable, demanding motion of Hardy's mouth.
He's only just begun to shoot when he feels Bale stiffen under him, feels Bale's dick jump and spasm inside him, and god damn if it doesn't make the whole thing worse, greater, more helpless. Joseph comes until he's wrung out, his seed propelled by Hardy's wet and swollen mouth and by Bale's all-out pounding, and when it's over he collapses like a doll losing its stuffing, sprawling out onto Bale's chest and ears ringing so hard he almost misses Hardy's laugh, as bright and confident as it ever is on the blocking mats.
"Sweet Christ," says Joseph; it's really all he can find the breath to say for another five minutes, while aftershocks and lassitude run through him and weigh him down. Bale slides out of him, and in the aftermath Joseph realizes the upholstery is going to have to be laundered and they all three need showers and he just does not give a fuck. Because now Hardy is crawling up onto the sofa to collapse beside him, and they all three lie in a heap, heaving for air and unable to move.
Hardy's shoulder is digging into Joseph's chest, but he turns his head to give Joseph a wonderfully fucked-out smile. "Now I'm kind of glad you didn't follow me," he says, and the excess of Joseph's relief and giddiness spills out into laughter, and while he's laughing Hardy kisses him, long and lazily, tasting Joseph's palate and drawing his lower lip into his mouth to suckle gently.
It's been two years of second-guessing, of worrying about the consequences of his crushing and the unwitting slight given to Hardy all that time ago. But everything really is going to be okay now, thinks Joseph, lost in that kiss.
Author's Notes:
You might notice that the protagonist of this piece (lol, fancy words for porn) has an internal monologue that doesn't quite match the public persona of Joseph Gordon-Levitt. I really struggle with fic about JGL, as he's said some offensively stupid and pretentious shit, including the old "women can't be pretty and funny" line that makes me want to punch a bitch. I might be arrogant, but I consider myself to be both pretty hot and pretty fuckin' funny, and I hope he had some lady friend close by to slap the shit out of him after that show.
For the sake of my ladyboners, though, I'm gonna pretend that it's a mask he uses to hide some serious social anxiety; I like to imagine he's just awkward as fuck and repeats things he's heard the "cool kids" say because he's terrified of sounding like the nerd kid he is. And also I'm not going to feel an ounce of conscience-weight when I objectify his fine, fine, slender ass in fic.