(no subject)
Title: Five Times Ray Kissed Walt and One Time Walt Kissed Him
Author: pembroke
Rating: PG at most for stupid fluff and mild language.
Pairing: Ray/Walt, Wartime Hipsters verse
Fandom: Generation Kill
Word count: 2384
Disclaimer: Not mine. Don't sue. Character are based on the HBO representations, not on the actual people themselves.
Summary: The title kind of says all.
A/N: like in the previous fic, this one is half ray/walt, half love letter to new york city.
1.
Thursdays were Walt’s busiest day as far as classes went. In order to get the day off on Monday and Friday, he had loaded up his schedule in the middle of the week. Usually, the four-day weekend made everything worth it, but somehow every professor decided to plan tests on the same day this week and now all Walt wanted to do was to sit down in Bravo with the first drink on the menu and do nothing for the next few hours.
Being on the subway wasn’t helping. He had his headphones on, but he never liked to turn the music up too loud on the off chance that he missed the stops being called. Now, he was in a car that smelled suspiciously like a homeless person, there was a child screaming at its parents a few people down and he still had to transfer from the A to the G. It was times like this that he really regretted going to school in New York City.
Twenty minutes waiting in the Hoyt-Schermerhorn subway station and ten minutes on the G later, Walt finally found himself stepping into the fresh air (in comparison) of Brooklyn. He inhaled deeply, realizing that he might have been subconsciously breathing as little as possible since he got underground. He stuffed his headphones and iPod into the messenger bag at his side and checked his phone. 8.15 PM. Brad kept the café open until 10 PM Sunday through Monday, so at least he had a little time to relax there before Ray dragged him all over Brooklyn to do God knows what.
When he stepped into Bravo, he made a beeline for the couch that he and Nate usually sat on (he wasn’t sure what Nate was up to tonight, but he didn’t see him around) and started taking his laptop out of his bag. A few minutes into connecting to the wireless (Brad’s was always the fastest in the area) and checking his e-mail, he looked up to see Ray staring down at him expectantly, eyebrows raised, holding out a full mug.
“Ray, I didn’t order anything yet.”
“I know,” he said, gesturing for him to take the mug. “Think of it as a reward for not dying after a hard day of being a college student.”
Walt laughed and took the drink from Ray’s hands. “Thanks.” A tentative sip revealed it to be a chai latte - Walt’s favourite.
“How about a movie tonight? We can order some shitty pizza or whatever.” Ray's hands were in his pockets and he tapped Walt’s shoe with his foot a few times. Walt grinned. “That sounds fucking great, man.”
“Good! I’ll be off around ten, Brad’s closing. “ He pulled his hands from his pockets and blew Walt an exaggerated kiss before heading back to the counter. Walt turned to his computer, sipped his drink and couldn’t seem to wipe the grin off his face.
2.
For all the time he spent on Pratt’s campus, Walt could have been enrolled in classes there. But really, it was just nice to sit around on an actual campus - NYU was right in the middle of Manhattan.
He was sitting with Ray in the middle of the main quad; textbooks, notebooks and his laptop surrounded him while Ray was all but rolling around the grass, clearly tired of doing work and having a difficult time sitting still. He was rambling about something, but Walt didn’t know a time when Ray wasn’t talking.
Walt was halfway through trying to read the same sentence for the fifth time when Ray went quiet. And then, in what might have been trying to be a whisper, “Walt. Walt, give me that sandwich in my bag.”
Walt looked up. Ray was lying on his back, staring upside-down at a small cat that was slowly making its way towards them.
“Ray, come on, don’t feed your dinner to the cats again.” But he pulled the sandwich out anyway and handed it over. “Didn’t that shitty sandwich cost you like seven bucks?”
“Yeah, whatever.” Ray said, ripping off a piece of turkey and holding it out to the cat. It approached him cautiously and took the food, then climbed on his stomach. Ray beamed. “Check it out, I’m like a cat whisperer.”
“You’re an idiot,” Walt said, chuckling. “What’s that one’s name?”
“The guy in the engine room calls her Henrietta.” He ripped off another piece of turkey from his sandwich and held it out. “She’s fucking badass too, homes. Once I saw one of the dude cats trying to harass her and she fucking chased him across campus.”
“Badass.” Walt repeated, reaching out to scratch behind her ears. Ray smiled up at him. “Don’t go stealing my cat with your farm magic.”
“I won’t Ray, I promise.” But with that, Ray shifted too much for the cat’s liking and she darted off to hide under a bench. Ray just shrugged.
“Oh well, I like puppies more anyway.” He pressed two fingers to his lips, tapped them against Walt’s nose and then stood up. “Want something to drink?”
Walt smirked. “No thanks, idiot.”
3.
Growing up, Walt enjoyed comic books as much as the next kid. He did not, however, enjoy them as much as Ray.
Walt was impressed by exactly how many of them Ray owned - half of them were at Brad’s place, half back in the dorms. When Walt asked, Ray just shrugged and said they were a nice escape from reality when he was a kid. They were also what got him interested in drawing, which he had been doing for as long as he could remember.
When Ray all but begged him to go to comic-con with him, Walt couldn’t bring himself to say no.
The bright green hot pants Ray was trying to get him to wear were another story.
“Ray, I can’t go out in public like this.”
“You’ve got killer legs dude, you should embrace that and be proud of your body.”
“Ray.”
Ray looked up from where he was packing everything he needed for the day into his backpack. He was wearing a black sweatshirt with the Batman logo on it and the hood was fashioned to look like his trademark cowl. A black cape was fastened around his neck.
He looked a little ridiculous, but without the cape people probably wouldn’t give him a second glance. Walt on the other hand was wearing a red polo that Ray tailored to look like Robin’s costume, a bright yellow cape, green sneakers that matched the hot pants and had a mask covering his eyes. He was going to stick out like a sore thumb.
“Oh fine.” Ray said, throwing his hands up in defeat. He walked down the hall to the bathroom, where Walt left his clothes after changing. When he returned, he was holding Walt’s discarded jeans. “You’re lucky these are black.” He said, chucking them at Walt’s head.
“But the cape stays on.” He paused. “And when we’re party hopping on Halloween you’re not wearing the pants.” Walt looked up from putting his pants on and frowned. But Ray’s expression said that he was serious. Walt sighed. “Fine.”
Ray beamed and jumped over to him, pressing a brief kiss to his cheek.
“What was that for?” Walt asked, giving Ray’s shoulder a playful shove.
“We’re Batman and Robin now, homes. Gotta look the part of the ambiguously gay duo.” He shrugged and wandered off to the bathroom again. Walt just shook his head.
“Fine, but I’m not making out with you for comic geeks to take pictures!” He called after him.
4.
For one of his senior projects this semester, Ray had decided to do a series of screenprints. He had already taken one class his previous year and was getting away with calling this an independent study - two classes and he could use the same prints for each. However, it was still as time consuming as it would have been doing two separate studios in the communications design department. It was getting down to the second half of the semester now, and between schoolwork and his job at the café, Ray didn’t have as much time to spend out with Walt. And Walt missed having him around.
Which was why Walt found himself in Pratt’s screenprinting studio, helping a very stressed out Ray work so that he could maybe leave a little earlier than he originally planned. Walt was collecting Ray’s prints from the drying rack and bringing them back to his table when Ray appeared at his side. His arms were covered in coloured ink and he was peeling some drying purple goo off his hands that turned his skin yellow when he wiped it away. He was wearing an apron that went down to his knees and that might have been canvas-coloured when he first bought it, but had since been used to wipe off ink from his hands and whatever he was using to mix colours that day.
“Right,” Ray said, drying his hands on his apron, seeming slightly more relaxed. “My screen’s coated. Now I’ve got about a half hour to mix some ink while it dries.”
“Why does it seem like you spend more time waiting for things to dry than you actually do screenprinting?” Walt said with a smirk.
“Because whoever invented this damn process was a masochist.” Ray muttered back. He had bent down to pull out some jars of ink from a bag under the table. “Oh fuck.”
“What is it?”
Ray stood up and held out an open plastic container that Walt had no idea what it was. “I’m almost out of medium.” The stressed out tone was creeping back into his voice. “I’ll get maybe one or two colours tops out of this. Fuck. Running to the Pratt Store now will just take up time that I really can’t afford.” He placed the jar down on the table and ran his fingers nervously through his hair; his eyes were trained on the clock. “And I needed to get out of here early so I could print something at the lab before it closes and-“
Walt grabbed his wrist in an attempt to stop him talking. “Ray, I’ll just go buy it for you.”
“Oh fuck Walt, thank you.” Ray grabbed either side of his face and placed a quick kiss to his forehead. “You’re a fucking golden sunshine godsend.” Walt scrunched up his face in mock embarrassment and brushed him away. “Yeah yeah, now what am I buying?”
Ray bent back down to get his wallet from his backpack and handed it up to him. “Golden brand acrylic medium. The biggest size.” He stood up. “There’s a help desk towards the center of the store, it should be right next to that.”
“Got it.” He smiled. “Do I have shit from your hands on my face now?”
“Maybe a little bit. It brings out your eyes.” Walt shoved him and started for the door.
“Thanks again, puppy.” Ray called out. Walt ducked his head and smiled.
5.
Walt had spent so many mornings waking up next to Ray on Brad’s couch that sleeping by himself in his own bed back in Manhattan felt weird. It wasn’t that the couch was even very comfortable or big for that matter - you’d think being a giant would make Brad buy a bigger couch - Walt just liked Ray.
Anyone could tell that their relationship was headed down the direction of “more than just friends,” but it wasn’t something that they really talked about. They just let it happen.
It was early morning on a day they both had off. Ray was already awake, Walt could tell that even though he wasn’t entirely conscious yet, and he was absentmindedly running his thumb along the sliver of exposed skin on Walt’s abdomen from where his shirt rode up during the night. He smiled against Ray’s shoulder.
Which was apparently enough for Ray to realize Walt was awake.
“Hey,” he said softly into Walt’s hair. Walt just hummed in response and stretched out as well as he could on the small couch. “What time is it?”
“Like 10.30, I think.” Ray shifted so he was propped up on one elbow. “Let’s get breakfast, I’ve been waiting for your ass to wake up for forty-five minutes.”
“You could have gotten up,” Walt mumbled, still not quite awake. He rubbed a hand over his eyes. “You probably wouldn’t have woken me.”
“Nah.” Ray said, pressing a soft, lingering kiss above Walt’s brow. “Now come on. Breakfast.” He gave Walt a firm pat on the thigh twice before he slid off the couch and started down the hall to the bathroom.
+1.
It took about a week and a half of Walt coming into the café before he agreed to hang out with Ray after hours. It took one party for the two to become damn near inseparable.
By the time they left, it was 3 AM and they were both very drunk. Ray didn’t want to go home, and he definitely didn’t want Walt to leave, so they went to Pratt’s campus. Ray led him around to his favourite part of the sculpture garden where they dropped down into the grass, still wet from the campus sprinklers and dew - neither of them were sober enough to bring themselves to care.
They lay together in the grass, shoulder pressed against shoulder, and talked about everything and anything. An hour passed, and then another and another. Neither had any desire to move.
After those few hours, it was really just Ray talking and Walt listening as the chill in the air was sobering them both up. Walt kept his eyes trained on Ray’s face, watching as he animatedly told a story about the first time Brad agreed to go out with him and how they nearly got arrested. Halfway through the story he turned his head and noticed Walt’s gaze.
“You still in there, dude?” He raised an eyebrow and smirked. In response, Walt leaned forward and tentatively kissed him on the lips. When he pulled away Ray was just staring at him, an amused look on his face. “This all seems a little too chick flick for my tastes.”
Walt was about to stammer out an apology, saying that the alcohol must not have worked its way out of his system yet when Ray beamed and reached out to ruffle his hair. “I like you sunshine, I think I’ll keep you around.”
Walt could feel the blush spreading over his face, but he couldn’t help but smile back.
Author: pembroke
Rating: PG at most for stupid fluff and mild language.
Pairing: Ray/Walt, Wartime Hipsters verse
Fandom: Generation Kill
Word count: 2384
Disclaimer: Not mine. Don't sue. Character are based on the HBO representations, not on the actual people themselves.
Summary: The title kind of says all.
A/N: like in the previous fic, this one is half ray/walt, half love letter to new york city.
1.
Thursdays were Walt’s busiest day as far as classes went. In order to get the day off on Monday and Friday, he had loaded up his schedule in the middle of the week. Usually, the four-day weekend made everything worth it, but somehow every professor decided to plan tests on the same day this week and now all Walt wanted to do was to sit down in Bravo with the first drink on the menu and do nothing for the next few hours.
Being on the subway wasn’t helping. He had his headphones on, but he never liked to turn the music up too loud on the off chance that he missed the stops being called. Now, he was in a car that smelled suspiciously like a homeless person, there was a child screaming at its parents a few people down and he still had to transfer from the A to the G. It was times like this that he really regretted going to school in New York City.
Twenty minutes waiting in the Hoyt-Schermerhorn subway station and ten minutes on the G later, Walt finally found himself stepping into the fresh air (in comparison) of Brooklyn. He inhaled deeply, realizing that he might have been subconsciously breathing as little as possible since he got underground. He stuffed his headphones and iPod into the messenger bag at his side and checked his phone. 8.15 PM. Brad kept the café open until 10 PM Sunday through Monday, so at least he had a little time to relax there before Ray dragged him all over Brooklyn to do God knows what.
When he stepped into Bravo, he made a beeline for the couch that he and Nate usually sat on (he wasn’t sure what Nate was up to tonight, but he didn’t see him around) and started taking his laptop out of his bag. A few minutes into connecting to the wireless (Brad’s was always the fastest in the area) and checking his e-mail, he looked up to see Ray staring down at him expectantly, eyebrows raised, holding out a full mug.
“Ray, I didn’t order anything yet.”
“I know,” he said, gesturing for him to take the mug. “Think of it as a reward for not dying after a hard day of being a college student.”
Walt laughed and took the drink from Ray’s hands. “Thanks.” A tentative sip revealed it to be a chai latte - Walt’s favourite.
“How about a movie tonight? We can order some shitty pizza or whatever.” Ray's hands were in his pockets and he tapped Walt’s shoe with his foot a few times. Walt grinned. “That sounds fucking great, man.”
“Good! I’ll be off around ten, Brad’s closing. “ He pulled his hands from his pockets and blew Walt an exaggerated kiss before heading back to the counter. Walt turned to his computer, sipped his drink and couldn’t seem to wipe the grin off his face.
2.
For all the time he spent on Pratt’s campus, Walt could have been enrolled in classes there. But really, it was just nice to sit around on an actual campus - NYU was right in the middle of Manhattan.
He was sitting with Ray in the middle of the main quad; textbooks, notebooks and his laptop surrounded him while Ray was all but rolling around the grass, clearly tired of doing work and having a difficult time sitting still. He was rambling about something, but Walt didn’t know a time when Ray wasn’t talking.
Walt was halfway through trying to read the same sentence for the fifth time when Ray went quiet. And then, in what might have been trying to be a whisper, “Walt. Walt, give me that sandwich in my bag.”
Walt looked up. Ray was lying on his back, staring upside-down at a small cat that was slowly making its way towards them.
“Ray, come on, don’t feed your dinner to the cats again.” But he pulled the sandwich out anyway and handed it over. “Didn’t that shitty sandwich cost you like seven bucks?”
“Yeah, whatever.” Ray said, ripping off a piece of turkey and holding it out to the cat. It approached him cautiously and took the food, then climbed on his stomach. Ray beamed. “Check it out, I’m like a cat whisperer.”
“You’re an idiot,” Walt said, chuckling. “What’s that one’s name?”
“The guy in the engine room calls her Henrietta.” He ripped off another piece of turkey from his sandwich and held it out. “She’s fucking badass too, homes. Once I saw one of the dude cats trying to harass her and she fucking chased him across campus.”
“Badass.” Walt repeated, reaching out to scratch behind her ears. Ray smiled up at him. “Don’t go stealing my cat with your farm magic.”
“I won’t Ray, I promise.” But with that, Ray shifted too much for the cat’s liking and she darted off to hide under a bench. Ray just shrugged.
“Oh well, I like puppies more anyway.” He pressed two fingers to his lips, tapped them against Walt’s nose and then stood up. “Want something to drink?”
Walt smirked. “No thanks, idiot.”
3.
Growing up, Walt enjoyed comic books as much as the next kid. He did not, however, enjoy them as much as Ray.
Walt was impressed by exactly how many of them Ray owned - half of them were at Brad’s place, half back in the dorms. When Walt asked, Ray just shrugged and said they were a nice escape from reality when he was a kid. They were also what got him interested in drawing, which he had been doing for as long as he could remember.
When Ray all but begged him to go to comic-con with him, Walt couldn’t bring himself to say no.
The bright green hot pants Ray was trying to get him to wear were another story.
“Ray, I can’t go out in public like this.”
“You’ve got killer legs dude, you should embrace that and be proud of your body.”
“Ray.”
Ray looked up from where he was packing everything he needed for the day into his backpack. He was wearing a black sweatshirt with the Batman logo on it and the hood was fashioned to look like his trademark cowl. A black cape was fastened around his neck.
He looked a little ridiculous, but without the cape people probably wouldn’t give him a second glance. Walt on the other hand was wearing a red polo that Ray tailored to look like Robin’s costume, a bright yellow cape, green sneakers that matched the hot pants and had a mask covering his eyes. He was going to stick out like a sore thumb.
“Oh fine.” Ray said, throwing his hands up in defeat. He walked down the hall to the bathroom, where Walt left his clothes after changing. When he returned, he was holding Walt’s discarded jeans. “You’re lucky these are black.” He said, chucking them at Walt’s head.
“But the cape stays on.” He paused. “And when we’re party hopping on Halloween you’re not wearing the pants.” Walt looked up from putting his pants on and frowned. But Ray’s expression said that he was serious. Walt sighed. “Fine.”
Ray beamed and jumped over to him, pressing a brief kiss to his cheek.
“What was that for?” Walt asked, giving Ray’s shoulder a playful shove.
“We’re Batman and Robin now, homes. Gotta look the part of the ambiguously gay duo.” He shrugged and wandered off to the bathroom again. Walt just shook his head.
“Fine, but I’m not making out with you for comic geeks to take pictures!” He called after him.
4.
For one of his senior projects this semester, Ray had decided to do a series of screenprints. He had already taken one class his previous year and was getting away with calling this an independent study - two classes and he could use the same prints for each. However, it was still as time consuming as it would have been doing two separate studios in the communications design department. It was getting down to the second half of the semester now, and between schoolwork and his job at the café, Ray didn’t have as much time to spend out with Walt. And Walt missed having him around.
Which was why Walt found himself in Pratt’s screenprinting studio, helping a very stressed out Ray work so that he could maybe leave a little earlier than he originally planned. Walt was collecting Ray’s prints from the drying rack and bringing them back to his table when Ray appeared at his side. His arms were covered in coloured ink and he was peeling some drying purple goo off his hands that turned his skin yellow when he wiped it away. He was wearing an apron that went down to his knees and that might have been canvas-coloured when he first bought it, but had since been used to wipe off ink from his hands and whatever he was using to mix colours that day.
“Right,” Ray said, drying his hands on his apron, seeming slightly more relaxed. “My screen’s coated. Now I’ve got about a half hour to mix some ink while it dries.”
“Why does it seem like you spend more time waiting for things to dry than you actually do screenprinting?” Walt said with a smirk.
“Because whoever invented this damn process was a masochist.” Ray muttered back. He had bent down to pull out some jars of ink from a bag under the table. “Oh fuck.”
“What is it?”
Ray stood up and held out an open plastic container that Walt had no idea what it was. “I’m almost out of medium.” The stressed out tone was creeping back into his voice. “I’ll get maybe one or two colours tops out of this. Fuck. Running to the Pratt Store now will just take up time that I really can’t afford.” He placed the jar down on the table and ran his fingers nervously through his hair; his eyes were trained on the clock. “And I needed to get out of here early so I could print something at the lab before it closes and-“
Walt grabbed his wrist in an attempt to stop him talking. “Ray, I’ll just go buy it for you.”
“Oh fuck Walt, thank you.” Ray grabbed either side of his face and placed a quick kiss to his forehead. “You’re a fucking golden sunshine godsend.” Walt scrunched up his face in mock embarrassment and brushed him away. “Yeah yeah, now what am I buying?”
Ray bent back down to get his wallet from his backpack and handed it up to him. “Golden brand acrylic medium. The biggest size.” He stood up. “There’s a help desk towards the center of the store, it should be right next to that.”
“Got it.” He smiled. “Do I have shit from your hands on my face now?”
“Maybe a little bit. It brings out your eyes.” Walt shoved him and started for the door.
“Thanks again, puppy.” Ray called out. Walt ducked his head and smiled.
5.
Walt had spent so many mornings waking up next to Ray on Brad’s couch that sleeping by himself in his own bed back in Manhattan felt weird. It wasn’t that the couch was even very comfortable or big for that matter - you’d think being a giant would make Brad buy a bigger couch - Walt just liked Ray.
Anyone could tell that their relationship was headed down the direction of “more than just friends,” but it wasn’t something that they really talked about. They just let it happen.
It was early morning on a day they both had off. Ray was already awake, Walt could tell that even though he wasn’t entirely conscious yet, and he was absentmindedly running his thumb along the sliver of exposed skin on Walt’s abdomen from where his shirt rode up during the night. He smiled against Ray’s shoulder.
Which was apparently enough for Ray to realize Walt was awake.
“Hey,” he said softly into Walt’s hair. Walt just hummed in response and stretched out as well as he could on the small couch. “What time is it?”
“Like 10.30, I think.” Ray shifted so he was propped up on one elbow. “Let’s get breakfast, I’ve been waiting for your ass to wake up for forty-five minutes.”
“You could have gotten up,” Walt mumbled, still not quite awake. He rubbed a hand over his eyes. “You probably wouldn’t have woken me.”
“Nah.” Ray said, pressing a soft, lingering kiss above Walt’s brow. “Now come on. Breakfast.” He gave Walt a firm pat on the thigh twice before he slid off the couch and started down the hall to the bathroom.
+1.
It took about a week and a half of Walt coming into the café before he agreed to hang out with Ray after hours. It took one party for the two to become damn near inseparable.
By the time they left, it was 3 AM and they were both very drunk. Ray didn’t want to go home, and he definitely didn’t want Walt to leave, so they went to Pratt’s campus. Ray led him around to his favourite part of the sculpture garden where they dropped down into the grass, still wet from the campus sprinklers and dew - neither of them were sober enough to bring themselves to care.
They lay together in the grass, shoulder pressed against shoulder, and talked about everything and anything. An hour passed, and then another and another. Neither had any desire to move.
After those few hours, it was really just Ray talking and Walt listening as the chill in the air was sobering them both up. Walt kept his eyes trained on Ray’s face, watching as he animatedly told a story about the first time Brad agreed to go out with him and how they nearly got arrested. Halfway through the story he turned his head and noticed Walt’s gaze.
“You still in there, dude?” He raised an eyebrow and smirked. In response, Walt leaned forward and tentatively kissed him on the lips. When he pulled away Ray was just staring at him, an amused look on his face. “This all seems a little too chick flick for my tastes.”
Walt was about to stammer out an apology, saying that the alcohol must not have worked its way out of his system yet when Ray beamed and reached out to ruffle his hair. “I like you sunshine, I think I’ll keep you around.”
Walt could feel the blush spreading over his face, but he couldn’t help but smile back.