PSL: Never Say Lie

[radicalliars]

He's letting that sink in, that Cal would have fired him if he'd taken the check, shifting the blame away from the electronics company, onto a father that was just trying to get to his daughter that slipped on the ice. There's something that catches his breath about this, the way that Cal switches in one beat from yelling at him for losing the

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[radicalliars]

This is too close, too much, and there's nowhere to run. He'd always thought that he'd want to be one of the riddles that Cal chases with such insatiable curiosity, but he'd never thought it would be about this, about the one thing he'd always tried to hide. He's not good at hiding things, but this is desperate.

The timbre of Cal's voice is almost seductive, the way his finger still touches against hi, pushing until he has to lean into it, to keep Cal from pushing him further back over his own desk. Then suddenly, the pressure is gone, and he's tipping forward, stumbling toward Cal because that's all there is. He's trying to hide his face, to keep focused on not reacting because he knows that if his expression changes, that Cal will see it in the moment between.

The one thing he can't tell him, can't let him see. He catches himself, hands on his coat, but he can't quite manage to move away. Not when Cal has him pressed against the edge, fingers under the edges of what passes for resistance. He's not sure if he saw or not, and it's stupid, and he looks away as soon as he catches himself, but there's that moment when he looks into his hazel eyes, tries to see if he saw anything.

[facs_lightman]

Something. Something was there, he knows because now Eli's searching to see if Cal had seen it. Eli knows he let it slip but he still won't say what he's hiding, what that look is about. His lip curls in frustration and he brings his hands up to get Eli's hands off of him, forearms catching Eli's wrists in a burst of force that gets them away, and then he gives another push, one that threatens to knock him back over the desk, but it's not hard so much as it's sudden.

"I can see it… there," he points, swirling his finger, searching through the air, grand motions as he does. Not seconds after he's said it, Eli's looking away, and Cal sighs loudly and claps a hand against his cheek and draws his face back to center and holds it between his hands so he can't look away. "What are you hiding?"

What if it's nothing? What if it's nothing to do with what he thinks it is, just something mundane, and Cal just wants it to be something more, something between them? Eli's not the only one in a vulnerable position here.

[radicalliars]

It's too much, the see-sawing, the way that Cal just keeps pressing, knocking his hands away, shoving him. He can see it, but doesn't know what it means, he's got hands against Eli's face, holding him so that he can't move. Asking what he's hiding, and it's too much, he breaks under the strain. He doesn't even think about it, because Cal's pulled away everything, for just that moment.

He leans forward in his hands, enough to press their lips together. It's soft, sweet, sentimental. It's not fast or hard or rough or deep like it would be if what he was hiding was just sexual, just the desire that he's almost certain Cal has caught once or twice. Certain signs are involuntary; dilated pupils, heart rate, warmed skin. He lingers for a moment, close, their lips just barely touching, and then it all catches up to him, hits him so hard he loses his breath.

His eyes go wide, and there's a flicker of fear that builds until it's too much, until he's jerking away, trying to get away. Out of the office, anywhere.

[facs_lightman]

The kiss caught him off guard. He really wasn't expecting that. He'd been expecting… he wasn't sure. Maybe something more about the case, something he'd been keeping to himself, something that might make him take back what he'd said about this being his contribution to the firm, the closest thing to a compliment he'd given Eli in a long time. The attraction… that was clear enough, here and there when he caught it, but it wasn't enough to go by. He saw it in Torres, too, in Gillian at times. It happened to everyone sometimes, and it had happened to Cal, too.

Still, he'd wanted it to be true, those few times he recognized what he saw as attraction. He'd wanted it to be more than a passing thing, and it seemed that it was, because this isn't the kind of kiss that happens when it's just attraction, when it's just the desire to roll in the hay for the hell of it. This is sentimental. Cal's grip on his face loosens suddenly, but his hands don't move away. As Eli lingers, their lips barely touching, he strokes a thumb over Eli's cheek in what happens to be the last second before Eli pulls away, all wide eyed terrified and running.

He manages to break away and get out of the room, and it takes Cal that long to recover enough to go after him. Then he's on his tail, chasing after where he was going. "Oy! Get back here," he calls.

[radicalliars]

His heart is pounding, and god, there's a part of him that wants to stop, wants to kiss him again, because soft and brief as it was, Eli's still tingling from the feel of it. His body feels hot, his face is flushed, his eyes glassy and he has to get out, get outside, away from this. He almost feels lightheaded from it, but he can't believe he was that stupid, that he actually kissed him. He's in love with him, and he had accepted that was his dirty little secret, but know Cal knows and Eli doesn't know how to deal with that.

Panic, unfortunately, has him running the same path he takes every day- to the elevators- and that's a dead end. He jams on the button, his shoulders curling in as he stares at the smooth polished elevator doors as if he can glare them into opening, getting him out of this place. Away from Cal. He can't even think about tomorrow, coming to work, unsure if he can even look him in the eye.

He's trembling, vulnerable, because this is the one thing when it comes to Cal that has always mattered to much. Eli is at least above hiding in an office and locking the door.

[facs_lightman]

Cal catches up to him at the elevator. Eli's got none of his things, maybe has his keys in his pocket if that, and he's standing with shoulders hunched, laying into the 'down' button.

"Hey," he says as he comes up behind him, long strides bringing him close fast. "I said get back here, not run off like a bloody coward…" he's leaning on offensive because he feels like he hasn't quite got control of the situation. Eli clearly doesn't have it, but Cal definitely doesn't, either. Eli kissed him. He liked it. Liked it and was following him. Why was he following him? He didn't need to know why, because that seemed obvious enough, especially given his reaction, flight. He was following him because he wanted a do-over.

And because he wanted to call him out on it now that he knew, now that Eli had given himself away.

[radicalliars]

He's caught, knew he was caught when he came to those silver elevator doors, but those footsteps, the sound of his voice cements it. The edge of offensive it actually reassuring, because it's so familiar. It's usual, could have been anything else that had made him run off, not because he's kissed him, because he was in love with Cal. He takes a breath, blinks his eyes and slowly turns, his blue eyes looking into Cal's hazels. He's nervous, afraid, biting his bottom lip as he looks at him.

"Didn't know what else to do," he admits softly, actually honest as he stands there. The elevator dings, slides open, but Eli ignores it until the doors slip closed again. He was committed since Cal caught him, since he turned around. There's a flutter of his eyelashes, things running behind his eyes that he's not saying. He's exposed, vulnerable, and he doesn't know what to say.

[facs_lightman]

"Well, you certainly had some idea what to do back there," he says, but it's not quite so hard, so on the offense as he has been up until now. Eli looks vulnerable, but he's still hiding, there's a look there like he's trying so hard to conceal... something more, like there are things he's not saying. Something deeper than just a kiss that said I don't just want to fuck you, I want to stay the night, I want to know you. And it did say all of that, and where the kiss failed the look in his eyes said the rest.

The door opens and closes, and Cal doesn't pay it any mind because his eyes are trained on Eli's face, because he knows he's desperate to hide again, desperate to shut this down and slip away and try to pretend it didn't happen.

Cal has questions. Like, how long has Eli wanted this? If he had to guess, since they met. Since before then. If so, why did it never come up? He'd endured all of those months of so-called radical honesty and he'd never said a word about this. He'd said everything else under the sun, things that came into his head, the reasons he didn't want to be at work, that there was no one at work to fantasize about, that he wanted to sleep with Torres. But not this. Not even once. Had the radical honesty been a cover, a way to throw him off, another way to lie? If that's true, he's not sure if he's impressed or not, not sure if it actually irks him.

"What do you want?" he asks, and it's open, it's not aggressive, it's just a question, an open-ended question and Cal's watching his face, desperate to see the truth leak through. 

[radicalliars]

"I shouldn't have-"

But he stops there, because there's a question that follows after, that's not aggressive, open-ended, and he looks at Cal, lips parted faintly in surprise. He takes a half-step in closer, so he can touch fingers against his jacket. Blue eyes looking into hazel as he tries to find words, an answer. The answer is there, on the tip of his tongue, so obvious it hurts.

"I want you."

It had been a lie, a smoke screen, to an extent, the radical-honest. He talked about not having anyone to fantasize about because there was. He talked about sex, because he was under-sexed, because he wanted more than sex. But he's had that so-called-truth stripped away for a while now, even if he has his paycheck back (some of it, anyway). And that makes it harder to lie here, now, when Cal is looking at him like he can see the pieces to the puzzle on his face.

"...I'm in love with you."

His gaze drops, a flutter of eyelashes, shy and timid and scared and it's not who he usually is, but this means too much. Has always meant too much.

[facs_lightman]

Cal's watching him, head just slightly tilted to the side and he's drinking it all in, watching his face and the surprise there, and how it turns to an answer so obvious that the pieces fall into place. This. It's been there the whole time, looks like this. Cal's seen them as they're drawn away, shut down, concealed from across the room or through the glass, the way Eli looks away when he sees that Cal can feel him watching. I'm in love with you isn't new, it's been on the back burner, quietly simmering, unnoticed because it was overshadowed by the radical honesty stunt.

"Really," he says, and it's not a question, it's a statement, almost a threat as he moves in closer, edging Eli back towards the now closed elevator doors. "So what was all of that radical honesty bullshit you pulled around here? Because that's not new," he says, swishing his finger in a roughly circular motion towards Eli's face, indicating that look he'd seen, the one Eli always hides. "Didja figure if you said enough stream of consciousness malarky that I wouldn't notice something flying in under the radar?"

That's one theory. He's looking to see if it sticks. Another theory is that it was a mix, a jumble of truth and lies intended to scramble the signals. He'll rework theories until one rings true, because Eli hasn't just realized his feelings, this has been ongoing and Cal can't leave that part of it alone. That it was here, under his nose, and all that time Cal had been left wondering if he was projecting. Eli got one by him. Just barely. Maybe.

He moved closer again, until Eli had nothing to do but let his back press to the cool metal doors, and he stared up into his face, expectant.

[radicalliars]

Eli steps back, his hands still lightly brushing against Cal's jacket, not quite letting go now that Cal's pulled this from him, this admittance, real honesty. Cal's agitated, and it makes his breath catch, because there's a part of him that likes this. Likes Cal when he's all sharp edges, and hawk-eyed gazes, pushing, pointing fingers. He's in his space, talking, and it's sharp, a little biting, and Eli's trying not to let on how much this gets to him.

It was a little bit what Cal was accusing him of, that if he kept talking enough, said everything that came to mind, he might not see the one thing that Eli couldn't let him read. But, it was more than that, too. Because not everything that came out of his mouth all stream of consciousness was true. Cal was the best; that was why he'd adored him at first, all wide-eyed hero worship.

"Part of it," he admitted, soft and quiet, and Cal's pushing him up against the door, and his heart is pounding in his chest, his face flushed as he looks at him. "Not everything I said stream of consciousness was actually true."

And Loker is scared, because this is what got him in trouble with Cal the first time; lying to him. But, this is different. It was personal. It was something he couldn't let Foster or Cal or anyone see, and with Cal the only way to have a chance was to dress it up so he wouldn't be properly looking. He couldn't risk that a stray arch of an eyebrow, a shift of a glance would give him away.

With Torres, natural that she was, it became even more important to keep her from seeing the truth. So he lied harder; pretended to be interested in sex she wouldn't give, because preening ego was the easiest way to miss something.

[facs_lightman]

That irks him, but at the same time he is impressed. Eli has a lot of balls to stand here like this, chin up and admitting that he lied. Admitting that he'd planned to lie, put thought into a way to do so that would cover the leaks. He understands a lie like this, a lie to protect himself, because in a place like this where everyone can see that you're hiding something in the look on your face, it's self-preservation. Cal does it. Evasion is a way of life here. So is willful ignorance. Letting some things slide because not everything is fair game, no one needs to have every minute truth of their life thrown in their face. But Eli had gone to extremes to hide this, and Cal wanted to say that he'd have purposefully ignored it if he had realized it was more than a passing fancy, but standing here with Eli's hands still on his lapels, he wasn't quite sure.

What would have happened if he had seen the depth of this back then? Could he have let it go, or would it have caught his breath and held his attention and nagged at him until he rattled all the layers away to find out just what exactly it looked like?

And now there's more bait. There's the dangling hook of more lies, the insinuation that the stream of consciousness during the radical honesty was an elaborate game of two truths and a lie. How much of it, then, was true? Cal remembers some of the things that Eli said back then, but not all of them. "What wasn't true?" he pushed, both for the truth and into Eli's space further, if that was possible. Eli's hands couldn't still just brush his lapel, he'd have no choice but to press them to his chest or move them to his sides because there wasn't room, because Cal was crowding him, using the interest that was clearly deeper than sex to shake him.

[radicalliars]

Cal's pressing further into his space, has his back to the elevator doors, and he's so close that Eli's hands slip from the lapels of his jacket to more genuinely touch against his chest. Peeling back the layers, and there's still the part of him that wants to run, because the truth is personal and timid and he wants him. They're so close, and there's a shiver that runs through him from the feel of it, because he wants this, wants more, wants everything he can't have.

"I was never attracted to Torres," Eli admits softly. "Not actually attracted to women." Shy, quiet, a bite of teeth at his bottom lip, because that had been elaborate, careful. There were more layers to Eli than he'd let on, and truth he'd hidden so very carefully, woven with just enough truth. There were other things too, things about his family, and like this, he couldn't lie.

"I didn't put myself through college because my parents couldn't afford it. I put myself through college because I hated what they stood for and refused to take their money." Softly voiced little secrets breathed into the scant space between them, wide blue eyes looking at Cal, his breath coming fast from their proximity.

[facs_lightman]

There's more than that, too. There has to be. These things are big enough that Cal's actually impressed. The lies about his family, about his sexuality. He's gay and Cal never knew. He imagines he must have spent years telling that same lie, not just verbally, but with his face, with his eyes. Dating women he could never want, controlling where he looked and for how long so no one would notice what really caught his attention.

There were times when he'd made jokes about Eli being gay. Stemmed from moments when he had a feeling, when he caught something that seemed to suggest he wasn't quite so straight as he made it seem. Still, he hadn't known the half of it, and the fact that it was coming out that Eli was more of a challenge than he realized had him more interested than before. And he had been interested before. Cal glanced down between them, at the hands against his chest, and then back up.

Then he was kissing Eli again, but it wasn't like the last one, in the lab, slow and sentimental. This one was fierce, it was hard and passionate, like a desire to crawl inside his skin, to be so close. His hand came up again to Eli's cheek, traced along his jaw and his thumb brushes his cheek again, soft like the first time, and the kiss changes. He half comes up for air but doesn't leave, and it's slower and more searching. Like he can kiss answers out of him. 

[radicalliars]

The silence, the quiet moment between those confessions and the way that Cal looks him over has him nervous, because he's not sure what it means. Where do they go from here, what does Cal think of it all? Is this the moment where Cal revokes that hard-earned praise, tosses him back to being an unpaid intern- again- or worse, fires him? With how hard Cal is pressing, that unflinching weight of scathing interest, he can't lie, and so his lies are laid bare.

Then there's no space between them, because Cal's lips are hard against Loker's own. He kisses him back, meeting the passion, the desire, because it's not just sentiment, there's raw, hot want twined up as surely with the love he feels for him. His fingers curl softly in Cal's shirt, holding onto him as he tilts into the feeling of fingers against his jaw, thumb dragging over his cheek. He kisses Cal soft, in between trying to catch his breath.

He doesn't know what this means, but he wants this.

[facs_lightman]

This excites him, Eli's hands on him like this. Touching his shirt, holding on as he leans into his touch. He wants this, but more than that, he wants it like this. Stolen and pressed to the wall, always pushing for more, harder, but an edge of sentimentality, a softness that tempers it.

He pulls back from the kiss, hand skimming forward along his jaw lightly and then it pulls away and hovers there, like he's caught himself, like he realizes suddenly that he's yielding too much.

This can't happen. It's happening, it's clearly too late to decide it can't, but the reality of it is catching up to him, crashing down around him. Eli's shown his hand, they can't keep kissing against the elevator if Cal is keeping his cards to his chest. Sooner or later, he's going to have to lay them down, and he's not ready for that yet. His plan isn't working, his plan to shake Eli and see what fell from the cracks he created. What's happening is that Cal is getting shaken, too, and he's got to cut his losses.

"Don't you ever lie to me again. Ever. Do you understand me?" he asks, catching Eli in his gaze and fixing him with a look that threatens consequences if he does it again.