FIC: It's a bird, it's a plane, it's…a tattoo? (Adam/Tommy)
Title: It's a bird, it's a plane, it's…a tattoo?
Fandom: Adam Lambert
Pairing: Adam/Tommy
Rating: NC-17
Word count: ~6,400
Notes: This is my help_pakistan story for burkesl17 who was kind and generous to donate to the cause. She gave me the prompt: AU where Adam is still a rockstar but Tommy didn't audition. They meet in some other way, sparks fly and hot sex occurs etc. Big thanks as always to my dear, dear no_detective for brainstorming and beta reading. Please see the end for one more spoilery acknowledgment.
Summary: Tommy is a valet parking lot attendant with a crush and a secret.
It's a bird, it's a plane, it's…a tattoo?
By Lenore
"This one's yours." Matt doesn't look up from his comic book.
"I got the last one," Tommy points out from his spot in the corner, precariously balanced on a tottery three-legged stool, because Matt hogs the only decent chair in the place.
Matt turns a page. "It's the rock star. He always asks for you."
Tommy cranes his neck and spots the familiar black Mustang. This creates something of a quandary, because there's a principle at stake here, damn it, but Adam does always ask for him and-well, Tommy does like it that way.
He lets out a sigh and hauls himself to his feet. "You realize we mostly get paid in tips, right?"
Matt waves him off absently. "Have fun drooling all over His Glambertness."
Tommy hunches his shoulders as he tramps across the scarred pavement, past the faded sign advertising TrustRite Valet Parking. He does not drool. At most, his mouth waters a little-and, anyway, who can blame him? It's Adam-fucking-Lambert.
Adam unfolds his long legs from the driver's seat, the many chains around his neck jingling musically. Tommy catches a whiff of leather, deep and buttery, from the car seats, or maybe it's from the pants Adam's wearing, glove-tight and hot as all fuck. Tommy stares; he just can't help himself.
Adam's smile comes instantly, warm and thrilling. "Hey, Tommy! How's it going?"
"Okay, Mr. Lambert." At the raised eyebrow, he ducks his head and mumbles, "Um. Adam." It's ridiculous, he knows, the giddy rush he gets from saying the name, from being invited to use it. This crush has zoomed right past embarrassing into completely hopeless territory.
"You're looking good," Adam says, and Tommy squirms self-consciously under the weight of that appreciative gaze, too aware of his boring uniform, the serviceable black pants and the button-down white shirt, the black shoes his mom bought for him, practically orthopedic, because as she put it, No one appreciates their arches until it's too late.
Adam is the one who looks-oh God, so much better than good. Tommy licks his lips, but not because he's drooling.
"How the band? How's the record?" The way Adam focuses on Tommy feels a little like being caught in an eclipse with eyes wide open.
"Um, well, it's coming along?" Tommy's voice falters. He hates to lie, but…he'd hate to tell Adam the truth even more.
"I want to hear the demo when it's ready."
"Mm," Tommy says vaguely. "Can I-" He holds out a hand for the keys.
"Take good care of her for me." There's an intimate rumble to the words, and Adam's fingers brush Tommy's palm, sending electricity backing up all the way up to his elbow.
Tommy swallows hard and manages a nod. He watches Adam amble across the lot, the easy sway of his hips, the broad line of his shoulders. Light from the industrial-strength streetlamp catches on the glitter in his hair, making it shimmer. Tommy can't help a wistful sigh as Adam turns the corner and disappears from sight, on his way to one of the clubs tucked away among the abandoned warehouses and the urban decay.
A Mercedes zips into the lot just as Tommy finishes parking the Mustang. The balding investment-banker type behind the wheel makes an impatient face at him. The hot blonde in the passenger sneaks an interested look in his direction. Tommy holds up a hand, making the universally understood signal for "just give me a second." He tries to plaster on a placating customer-service smile, but the corners of his mouth just don't want to cooperate.
He hurries back across the lot and ducks his head into the building. "You're up."
"Dude, do me a favor? Get it for me?" Matt says distractedly, still bent over the comic.
"It's your turn," Tommy insists. His encounters with Adam tend to leave him frustrated and wanting, and Matt is a test of anyone's patience even under the best of circumstances. "It's been your fucking turn for the last five cars!" he snaps.
Matt finally manages to peel his gaze away from the page, blinking at Tommy owlishly. "Dude, I'm at a pivotal moment. Intergalactic Man is just about to swoop in and save Princess Leazora from Voltar's ice fortress on Zenzabar, and she's going to be, like, so grateful, you know?" He waggles his eyebrows.
"Oh my God, what kind of shit are you reading? 'Cause that is so not how that story would go. The dude with the stupid superpower would end up working some dead-end, minimum wage job in a sucky part of town since that's where the crime is, and his friends would be pissed at him all the fucking time, because he's always disappearing on them, and even seriously losery bands would kick him out, since he keeps missing practice to save people, and he would totally not get the girl in the end." Or the guy, Tommy mentally amends, and promptly feels more depressed.
"Dude," Matt says reproachfully. "Lay off Intergalactic Man. It's not his fault you're not getting laid by Glamcock."
Tommy goes speechless, and it doesn't help matters that he can feel snickering coming from the vicinity of his forearm. He trudges off to go take care of the douchebag in the Mercedes, darkly wishing he could punch Michael Myers in the face without giving himself a bruise.
***
The arrivals at the lot tend to taper off around midnight, and people don't usually start leaving until after two, and that two-hour stretch of boredom leaves Tommy way too much time to replay in his head all the crappy shit that's happened in his life lately.
"We're going to have to make a change." That's what Merck Mitchell, the lead singer of Tommy's last band, had said when he'd ditched Tommy's ass. "We need someone who's totally committed to Habitual Eyebrow, you feel me? Not someone who spends all his time on his day job, night job, whatever the hell. And, seriously, what's that shit with you running off whenever you feel like it, not telling anybody where you're going, not even answering your damned phone when we try to track your ass down? Dude. It's called responsibility, you know?"
This from the thirty-one-year-old who still lived above his mother's garage and borrowed money from his grandmother every month when she got her Social Security check. But Tommy hadn't brought up any of that. Really, what was there to say? That the crime rate in the neighborhood around TrustRite had gone down forty-seven percent since Tommy had started working there? It's not like Merck would have understood the relevance.
Matt closes the comic with a deep sigh, takes his glasses off, and gives the lenses a satisfied rub with the tail of his T-shirt.
"So, um, how did Intergalactic Man get his powers again?" Tommy asks as a peace offering.
Matt casts a suspicious look over his shoulder, apparently not trusting Tommy's interest after the earlier tirade. Tommy makes his expression as sincere as he can manage.
"He got caught in a volcanic eruption on Titan X. The ash contained mysterious radiation that altered him on a subatomic level," Matt explains, warming to the subject. "His ability to fly manifested immediately, but it took a little longer for his psychic powers to develop."
"Huh," Tommy says.
In comics, it's always something weird and flashy, a bite from a mutant spider, a mysterious experiment by a mad scientist. Just once, Tommy wants to read a story where somebody ends up with some kind of stupid power just from walking into the wrong tattoo place. He'd really like to believe he's not the only one that's ever happened to.
"Results might be unpredictable for somebody like you," the tattoo artist had said, eying the design Tommy picked out.
Tommy frowned in confusion. "Somebody like me?"
"You know." The guy made a vague gesture that Tommy had no idea how to interpret.
Probably just trying to warn me that sometimes people have second thoughts after they get inked. This was what Tommy had assumed.
Yeah. So much for assuming.
He'd walked back to the bus stop after he'd finally had it finished, buzzing with excitement and leftover adrenaline from the sting of the needles, resisting the urge to mess with the bandage and sneak another look at his newly completed sleeve. He felt it before he heard anything-this jangling sense that something was wrong-and then a scream cracked through the air. Tommy ran toward it on pure instinct. Down a grubby alley he found an asshole, strung out or just plain mean, holding a knife on a terrified girl.
He didn't stop to think up a plan or calculate the odds he could take someone who was almost twice his size; he just rushed the guy, a burst of adrenaline burning through him. He'd always thought that whole thing about challenging a bully to make him back down was the biggest bunch of bullshit ever, but when the asshole saw Tommy charging at him, he let out a startled, high-pitched shriek and legged it down the alley.
This would have been the most totally awesome moment of Tommy's life, except that the girl he'd just rescued took one look at him, and then she started screaming too and promptly ran off. And, okay, so Tommy hadn't expected a reward or anything, but a simple thank you would have been nice.
He trudged back down the alley and headed toward the bus stop, and when he caught a glimpse of his reflection in a store window, he let out a shriek as embarrassingly high-pitched as the thug's had been. He stopped and stared, and Jason from Friday the 13th stared back at him. He tentatively reached up to touch the mask, but his face felt just the same as always. It felt like him, only…what the fuck?
His lungs burned by the time he'd run all the way back to the tattoo place, and in between heaving breaths, he blurted out the whole freakish story, his voice rising hysterically when he asked, "What the fuck, dude?"
The tattoo artist just shrugged. "Unpredictable. Like I said."
To say that Tommy's life had not been the same since was the understatement of the fucking century.
"Man, could this job get any more boring?" Matt complains, head slumped listlessly against his hand. "I should have brought the new issue of High Voltage Girl with me."
Tommy nods absently, going through guitar riffs in his head, resisting the urge to check the time on his phone since it's probably about thirty seconds since the last time he looked. People should start leaving soon, and if Tommy can get home before dawn, maybe he can do some practicing for real before he conks out.
He's interrupted by a familiar white-hot sense of alarm shooting through him. The tattoos start to chitter away, and he leaps to his feet. "I've, uh, got to go take a piss."
"Yeah. Thanks for the update, dude." Matt doesn't raise his head off his hand.
The tattoos urge Tommy into a run, directing him around one corner and then another, and finally down a side street. At the end of it he finds Adam surrounded by skinheads, menacing and mean and demanding his money.
"Yeah, yeah, okay, here, take it." Adam pushes his wallet at them.
"The rings too!" insists one of the more swine-faced thugs.
Adam's mouth drops open. "But they're my favorites!"
"We're not playing, faggot."
"Neither am I!" Adam clutches his accessories protectively.
One of the assholes reaches for Adam, his hands meaty and vicious, and that's so not on. Nobody fucking touches Adam like that, not while Tommy's around. The adrenaline high slams into him, a chemical fire in his veins. He throws on an extra burst of speed, picturing Freddy Krueger, and roars out, "Get your fucking hands off him!"
"What the fucking fuck?" a startled voice cries out.
"Oh, shit, man! I seen this movie. It don't end good."
There's scuffling and chaos, and the thugs practically mow one another over in their hurry to get the hell out of there. In the commotion, Adam somehow ends up on the ground. Tommy resumes his own form and rushes over to him.
"Adam! Are you okay?" He reaches out and helps Adam up, and then can't quite bring himself to let go.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine." Adam checks his outfit for damage, craning his neck and making a face. "I just wish I could say the same for these pants."
Tommy glances around nervously, because even the stupidest morons alive will eventually begin to question whether movie characters can actually come to life. "We should probably get out of here."
Adam nods and falls in beside Tommy. "You're totally my hero, you know that, right?" He slides an arm around Tommy's waist, and Tommy leans in to him, insisting to himself that this is not taking advantage of Adam's gratitude. "It's weird, though," Adam continues thoughtfully. "For a second there, I really could have sworn you turned into Freddy Krueger."
Being inconspicuous when using his powers-Tommy's still working the kinks out of that one. He also hasn't quite mastered the fine art of playing it cool when questioned about it. His shoulders go stiff, and he stammers out, "Um. I guess you must have hit your head harder than we thought."
"I fell on my ass," Adam reminds him dryly.
"That can be disorienting?"
Tommy has never, not once been glad to see Adam drive away, but when the lot comes into sight, he practically pisses himself with relief. They come to stand by Adam's car, awkwardly stalled. Tommy fidgets under the weight of Adam's scrutiny.
"Um," he starts, but doesn't know where to go from there. He certainly can't tell Adam the truth, which he's surprised to find is really fucking disappointing.
Adam bridges the awkwardness by cupping Tommy's cheek in his hand and kissing him very sweetly. "Whatever happened back there, thank you."
Tommy nods, dazed, and Adam smiles and kisses him again, and gets in his car and heads off. Tommy stares, a little stupidly, even after the Mustang has disappeared from sight.
Regan from The Exorcist sighs dreamily, because even demonically possessed chicks who projectile vomit pea soup have a thing for Adam.
***
The irony of the whole superpower thing, or one of them anyway, is that Tommy never dreamed of being a hero when he was a kid. He never dressed up as Superman or Batman for Halloween. When he went trick or treating, it was as Jimmy Paige or Robert Smith or once, not very convincingly, as Jimi Hendrix. All he's ever wanted, from the time he was old enough to have an ambition, was simply to be a musician.
"Hey man, just wanted to follow up about that audition," he reads out loud as he types the words on Ellis McKinney's Facebook wall, making sure it sounds casual, trying to keep his desperation from shining through.
Being a musician without a band is like…Tommy can't even think up an analogy empty enough to describe it. A friend of a friend of a friend put him in touch with Ellis, who's looking for a new guitarist. He'd told Tommy to call to set up an audition, but apparently he never listens to his messages. So Tommy has taken to stalking him online.
YouTube is open in another tab, and Tommy clicks over and watches Adam's most recent video. Adam has feathers in his hair and what looks like body paint and fairy dust all over the rest of him. He swivels his hips in a slow, deliberate tease that makes Tommy stare at the screen mesmerized, and, okay, possibly that is just a teeny-tiny bit of spittle on his chin. Nobody should be able to move like that, but fuck, Tommy's really glad that Adam can.
His phone buzzing in his pocket startles him, and he crankily hits mute on the computer, cutting Adam off mid-falsetto.
"Yeah?"
"Dude, sorry to take so long to get back to you."
It's Ellis, and Tommy sits bolt upright, as if he might be judged on his posture. "Oh, hey, dude. How's it going?"
"Good, good. So you heard our songs on MySpace, right? You got a sense what we're about?" Ellis doesn't wait for an answer, but launches into a long ramble about his artistic vision for the band, managing to work Metallica and West African drum rhythms into the same sentence.
Tommy mm-hmms along and tries to offer up that Depeche Mode is one of his own personal influences, but Ellis doesn't stop for a breath. Adam's video continues to play, soundless but still totally drool-worthy, Adam down on the floor, back arched, mouth open, and…well, Tommy is only human. He leans in closer, staring, Ellis' voice droning on in his ear as Adam slinks around, shaking his ass and flirting with the camera.
It takes Tommy probably longer than it should to realize that there's silence on the other end of the phone.
"Um?" he says helplessly.
"So what do you think?" Ellis prompts, with exaggerated patience, as if he's been waiting for an answer for a while now. "You want to come for an audition tomorrow night?"
"Oh, yeah," Tommy scrambles to say. "Yeah. That would be awesome." He writes down the info and hangs up and lets out his breath.
Great. Just great. Tommy hasn't even met the guy yet and he's already coming across like a flake.
At work that night, Tommy's partnered up with Spence, who's the polar opposite of Matt. He's either a distant relative of the Energizer Bunny, or more likely on something. He leaps up whenever he so much as hears a car engine, dashing out to the lot; half the time he comes trudging back sheepishly, another false alarm. The other guys grumble about Spence hogging the tips, but Tommy figures, whatever, Spence has all that excess energy to burn off and quite possibly a habit to support. Anyway, it gives Tommy more time to concentrate on crime fighting.
Since that night with Adam, Tommy has been waiting to see him again, fidgety and impatient, keeping an eye out for a flash of the black Mustang. He finds the idea that someone kind of, sort of knows about him-and isn't too freaked about it-both nerve-wracking and thrilling. Having a secret superpower can be fucking lonely, a little detail Matt's comic books never bother to mention.
But it's been almost a week, and Adam still hasn't shown. Tommy makes up every excuse he can think of. Adam is busy, or Adam's PR people think he'll get better press at some other club, or, hey, Adam might even be out of the country. Although not really, since it's all over everywhere that Adam's going to be in LA for the whole summer working on a new album. Tommy carries around the most likely explanation, heavy and unwanted, a stone in the pit of his stomach-that when the buzz of gratitude cleared, Adam thought better of having anything to do with someone like Tommy.
Tonight's shift proves even more interminable than usual, what with Spence doing all the work and leaving Tommy with nothing to do but mope. By the time they finally close up for the night, he's worn out and more than a little depressed and mentally cataloging the booze he has stowed away in his kitchen cabinet. He plans to drink it all, even the Crème de Menthe that someone gave him as a joke.
He drags himself off to the bus stop, still brooding, distracted enough that he doesn't notice right away that something's off. The awareness slowly sifts into his consciousness, a prickle on the back of his neck, his arm hairs standing on end, the sense that someone is following him. Subtlety will never be one of Tommy's superpowers, and he slams to a stop and whirls around. There's nothing, no one, not even a shadow. The tats aren't agitated in the least, quiet and still, as if they're merely body art, and Tommy lets out his breath slowly.
He has no band. He's probably never going to see Adam again. And now he's apparently losing his mind. Thank God for fucking tequila.
By the time he wakes up the next morning, disoriented, with a slant of late-afternoon sun making him squint, that thought gets whittled down to simply: fucking tequila. His head feels like a block of wood that someone is pounding on, and he's pretty sure something died in his mouth. Yawning makes his head throb even harder, and he gags on the smell of his own morning breath.
The good news is that he has until eight that night to pull himself together for the audition; the bad news is that it's already five and he wants nothing more than to crawl back under the covers and die. Eventually, he stumbles to the shower and stands under the spray, eyes closed, leaning heavily against the chilly tile. He breathes in the steam and thinks about the coffee he's going to have just as soon as he's awake enough to make it. This at least gives him a reason to go on living.
He throws on jeans and a t-shirt and drinks down an entire pot of coffee, black and blistering hot. Just the prospect of food makes his stomach turn, which is probably for the best, since he needs to get a move on if he's going to make the audition on time. Three transfers later, he thumps down off the bus, his hangover pounding away in his temples like a jackhammer, guitar case slung across his shoulder.
It creeps up on him when he's about halfway down the block-the same prickling shiver down his back that he felt the other day, as if there's someone there. When he darts a glance back, though, there's nothing, no one in sight, and just like the other day the tats aren't putting up any kind of fuss.
The audition takes place in a hole-in-the-wall club, wedged in between a Korean grocery store and a fish market, the usual stink of nicotine and stale beer overlaid by a waft of mackerel and kimchee.
"Hey, dude, thanks for coming." Ellis meets Tommy at the door, rumpled and bed-headed and looking possibly even more hungover than Tommy feels, which is strangely heartening. "Let me introduce you to the guys."
Tommy nods along as Ellis reels off the band members' names, although he's too nervous to actually remember any of them. "Hey," he says, trying not to sound like he woke up only three hours ago.
"So, how about we get right to it, huh?" Ellis says, jerking his head toward the rough platform in the back that serves as the stage.
They set up, and it's always a little weird the first time playing with a new group, but by the fourth bar of "Enter Sandman," Tommy feels like he's known these guys forever. Ellis shoots him a sideways smile as he growls out "off to never-neverland," and, okay, maybe Ellis doesn't have the best voice Tommy's ever heard, but whatever. All Tommy wants is the chance to be part of this again.
It's all going so fucking well that Tommy should see it coming, should, because that's just how his luck rolls, but somehow it manages to sneak up on him. Electric-hot awareness shoots through him, and the tats stir to life, sharply alert and bossy as all hell. Tommy ignores them, even though his skin suddenly burns like the ink is made of fire.
The tats squirm insistently, and when Tommy keeps on playing, they take matters into their own hands-or actually Tommy's hand, which jerks violently on the strings, without his permission. An ear-splitting screech pours out of the speakers, and the music lurches to a stop, the rest of the band staring at Tommy with what-the-fuck expressions.
"Um, sorry?" He shifts his weight from one foot to the other. "I, uh, forgot there's something I need to do?"
Ellis stares, as if the words make no sense.
"Sorry," Tommy says again. "Really," he emphasizes as he's unplugging his guitar and packing it into the case. "Maybe we can reschedule?"
The look on Ellis' face says: Seriously, dude?
"Uh. Okay. So…gotta go."
Tommy darts out of the club, breaking into an all-out run the moment his sneakers hit the sidewalk, the guitar case banging against his leg, the tats roiling around on his arm, edgy and urging him to go faster, faster. Two blocks away Tommy finds what's got them all excited, a guy with a gun trying to carjack a woman in a BMW. He channels the monsters and goes roaring toward the car.
"Fucking shit!" the guy with the gun yells out and takes off in the opposite direction.
The woman in the BMW starts screaming too and stomps on the gas, shooting through the intersection. Tommy barely manages to jump out of the way before she plows into him.
"That is getting seriously fucking old," he grumbles to himself.
And then he feels it, again, the sense that someone's there. He whirls around, expecting to see nothing, because that's just how this going crazy thing works. Instead he finds Adam standing there, and, fuck, Tommy seriously has to wonder if he's hallucinating.
"I knew it!" Adam says triumphantly. "I can't believe you tried to convince me that getting knocked on my ass was making me see things!"
"Um." Tommy freezes, his oh-so unhelpful brain going totally blank, unable to offer up even one lame-ass explanation, and then he frowns. "Hey, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you at least have a bodyguard with you? Oh fuck, are you the one who's been following me? What the hell, Adam? Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?"
Improbably, Adam breaks into a smile. "I always knew you were special."
Just like that Tommy is back to stammering.
"Come here." Adam crooks his finger, and Tommy's feet obey, and Adam winds an arm around him. "Hero," he says softly into Tommy's ear, smiling.
Adam walks him down the block and around the corner, where the Mustang is parked. Tommy really isn't sure what's happening here, but Adam is pressed warmly against his side, and he smells fucking amazing, and what the hell. Tommy's always been a go-with-the-flow kind of guy.
He doesn't even think to ask where they're headed, and soon enough they've arrived at a house tucked away behind a wrought-iron fence. The gate opens for them, and Tommy follows Adam into the house, and that's when it finally hits him: somebody knows his secret, and that somebody is Adam Lambert. Oh shit, oh-fucking-shit. Suddenly he can't breathe, and he's not sure how much longer his knees are going to hold him up.
"Hey." Adam brushes a kiss to Tommy's temple, his hand pressed to the small of Tommy's back, warm and reassuring. "I'm going to get us a drink."
Tommy manages to stumble over to the sofa, so at least he doesn't have the indignity of falling on his ass on top of being scared shitless. Adam comes back, sitting close, his thigh warm and solid against Tommy's. He pushes a glass into Tommy's hand, and Tommy tips it back, vodka burning his throat. His stomach turns over, reminding him what a bad idea this is, but fuck that noise. Tommy's been half in love with Adam since-and now Adam knows about him. Shit, shit, shit.
"I see you freaking out over there." The vodka bottle swims into Tommy's line of vision and tilts, and Tommy's glass is full again, just for a second before he slams it back. "So tell me," Adam coaxes.
It's a simple invitation, and apparently that's all Tommy has been waiting for, because the whole story tumbles out of him, what happened and how everything has been fucked up ever since. He even blurts out the truth about his band, former band, and that he didn't want to lie, but he couldn't tell the truth either. Adam doesn't look away once, his eyes focused and interested, and Tommy keeps waiting for that expression to slide away and fucking freak to take its place, but it never does.
Tommy talks himself out of breath and has to gulp down a lungful of air and then another. He kind of wishes he were anywhere else right now, which is totally fucking ironic, since he's thought about being alone with Adam practically every waking moment since they met.
"Hey," Adam says softly, finger under Tommy's chin.
Tommy meets Adam's eye, and Adam smiles at him kindly, and that's maybe even worse than fucking freak. Something breaks open in Tommy, and he starts to babble, desperately, like he needs to defend himself, "I don't know what I am-but fuck, I try-" His voice drops down to practically nothing. "You're the only one I've ever told."
It comes as a surprise, Adam's mouth sliding against his, warm and sweet. It drags a startled moan out of Tommy, and then instinct takes over, and he throws his arms around Adam's neck and kisses back, frantically, like there's no time.
"I didn't-"
"What? You didn't think a pretty musician-superhero would be my type?" Adam's smile is soft and a little teasing.
"Oh, thank God!" Tommy blurts out and reaches for Adam, grabby-handed.
Before long he's flat on his back, Adam pressing him into the cushions, kissing and working a hand beneath Tommy's T-shirt. Tommy shivers and moans against Adam's mouth, and the thing is: he has superpowers, and he's making out with Adam Lambert. Maybe those old platitudes from elementary school are actually true. Maybe anything is possible.
Unfortunately, it's as if his mental soundtrack has a direct connection to the universe's most bitter sense of humor, because the moment that thought flits through his head, Adam pulls away, stands up, taking all his warmth with him. Tommy stares up at him, breathing heavily. Oh fuck, what has he done wrong now?
"Come on, baby." Adam hauls him up. "I want you in my bed."
Thank fucking Christ. Tommy's not sure if he says that out loud, but it doesn't matter, because Adam has a hand pressed tight to the small of Tommy's back, moving him to the bedroom. He brushes his lips against Tommy's ear, hot and shivery. "I'm going to put my mouth all over you."
A sound comes out of Tommy. Possibly it's a whimper.
Adam backs Tommy over to the bed, pulling his clothes off in a flurry, putting his hands on Tommy's newly bared skin, his lips working up the line of Tommy's neck. He tips Tommy back onto the mattress, gets himself naked, and crawls on top.
Tommy breathes out, "Adam." He doesn't mean to beg, but he just can't help it.
Adam runs a hand up Tommy's body, ankle to thigh to hip to arm. His touch grows lighter, more curious as it travels over the tattoo, finger tracing the inky lines. "How does it feel when it happens?"
"Um, kind of like being struck by lightning? Like something's wrong, and I get sort of pissed off. Or actually, way pissed off. Like, like-I'm all burning up inside, you know? And I just have to do something,"
"How long does it last?"
Tommy shrugs. "Just until I've taken care of-whatever. The pissed off feeling kind of burns off after that, and I can make myself go back to normal."
Adam beams at him, as if Tommy is something amazing, and presses a kiss to the tattoo almost reverently. Tommy's not prepared for the sharp-hot sensation that arcs through him. He sucks in his breath, eyes popping open wide. Adam bends his head and traces the curve of Regan's cheek with his tongue, hums under his breath as he licks down the buttons on Bela Lugosi's shirt.
"Oh, fuck." Tommy's toes curl, and his cock bounces wetly against his belly, and fuck, does that make him a freak? He hasn't had sex since the whole tattoo thing. No one else has ever touched his ink, and he never imagined that it would be such a turn on.
Too much of a turn on actually, because there's that wild rush of adrenaline making Tommy's insides sizzle, and it doesn't seem to matter that it has nothing to do with danger. He can feel the odd flickering sensation he gets before he turns, and he tries to hold on to his own shape, but if the wide-eyed look on Adam's face is any indication, he doesn't quite manage it.
"I'm sorry-" Tommy starts, but Adam beats him to the punch with, "Wow, that really shouldn't be hot at all."
Tommy tries to choke back a whimper, but fuck. Just-fuck. He gulps down some air, and starts to feel steadier, and pulls back his control, firming up the outlines of his self. Adam grins and dips a kiss to his belly and keeps heading south. "For the record," he says between kisses, "I wouldn't mind blowing Dracula, but you're way sexier."
"Adam," Tommy says desperately, slotting his fingers into Adam's hair. "Please." He can't seem to stop begging.
Adam rubs his hands over Tommy's thighs and does tricky things with his tongue to Tommy's cock.
The urge to confess wells up out of nowhere-sex always makes him babble-and before Tommy can clap a hand over his big, stupid mouth, he's admitting in a shaky voice, "If I could get rid of it, I would. Even if it meant-if people ended up being-"
"Oh, baby," Adam murmurs with a sympathetic look. He kisses Tommy's belly and goes back down even more energetically, as if he's trying to make it all better with his mouth, and oh fuck, Tommy feels positively consoled.
He's never been slutty-well, not too slutty anyway-but he spreads his legs, wide, wider, practically begging for Adam's cock.
"Mm, yeah. I'm going to open you up, and put my dick in you, and you're going to take it like a superhero."
"Fuck, fuck." Tommy's voice is a rasp in the back of his throat, turning to a high whine when Adam pushes his thighs apart and slides his hands beneath his ass and pulls him up so he can lick a line from Tommy's balls to his hole.
Tommy arches his back sharply. "Oh, fuck!"
Apparently Adam approves of this reaction, because he pushes his tongue inside, no warning, no teasing, just oh, shit. Tommy lets out a wet-sounding sob as Adam wiggles a finger in alongside his tongue. Tommy has to bite his lip, hard, not to come right then, just from that. It's been way too long since anyone touched him.
"That feel good?" Adam sounds honestly curious, so Tommy tries to tell him, but all that comes out is this sound, tortured and greedy and fucking embarrassing, if Tommy could care about anything other than what Adam is doing to him.
"You ready for me, baby?" Adam strokes his hand up and down his own dick, which is big and hard and gorgeous, like he's showing Tommy what he has to look forward to.
Tommy nods his head emphatically, and, okay, it's possible that maybe he is kind of drooling, but he'd have to be fucking dead not to drool over a cock like that. Adam's hand slides between Tommy's legs, slick and purposeful, and Tommy pushes up on his elbows, bearing down, trying to ride. "Please, please!"
"I've got you," Adam croons to him, and he goes right on doing what he's doing, turning Tommy's body inside out with his fingers.
Fuck, Tommy's already impossibly hard and getting harder. "Please," he says again, brokenly.
"Yeah, yeah," Adam murmurs, a slur of impatience. Tommy's not the only one who's desperate here, and that's fucking hot.
Adam reaches for Tommy, lifting him bodily, hauling him onto his lap, Tommy's knees braced on the mattress. Tommy sinks down and down, until he has Adam up to the hilt. It's-oh fuck, Adam is so big, and Tommy is so tight around him, and his eyes practically roll back in his head it feels so good.
"Fucking gorgeous," Adam slurs out, his hands settling onto Tommy's hips.
Tommy pushes himself up and down, thighs trembling, muscles burning with the effort, and Adam moves with him, his dick so deep that Tommy will still feel him next week. Adam smiles up at him, bright-eyed and conspiratorial, his hands stroking affectionately over Tommy's back. Tommy can hear his own pulse thundering in his ear, and he can smell Adam on his own skin, and if this is what he gets for being stuck with the world's freakiest superpower, then it's all totally fucking worth it. That's what he's thinking right before he comes-and then Adam hits that place inside him, just the right way, and Tommy can't think about anything at all.
He drifts afterward, curled against Adam's side, trying to memorize how this feels, since he has no idea if it will ever happen again.
Adam strokes his fingers through Tommy's hair. "You good, baby?"
"Mm." Tommy's too fucked out to form actual words.
"You know," Adam says in this deliberately casual tone, his fingers stilling for a moment, before starting to stroke again, "my bassist split on me in the middle of working on the record. Got back together with his old band. It's not the guitar, but-"
"I can learn," Tommy says quickly, instantly awake, and then the whole sad history with his last band flashes before his eyes, and he backpedals, "Um, except-I mean, I already got kicked out because shit happens and I have to-"
"They didn't know, and I do, and I happen to like having a superhero around." Tommy can hear the smile in Adam's voice.
He snuggles closer, and Adam brushes a kiss to the top of his head, and there's this full feeling in Tommy's chest, straining at his ribs. If he were any happier, he'd probably burst from it. He closes his eyes, and as he's drifting off, he hears Regan giggle, and possibly that's a dreamy sigh from Freddy Krueger.
Additional author's note:
When I got this prompt, my first thought was: Valet parking attendant! And then I thought…but wait, Tommy should also be a superhero! I told no_detective this idea, and she said, "I know what his superpower should be!" And it was the most brilliant thing ever. Thank you, my dear!
Fandom: Adam Lambert
Pairing: Adam/Tommy
Rating: NC-17
Word count: ~6,400
Notes: This is my help_pakistan story for burkesl17 who was kind and generous to donate to the cause. She gave me the prompt: AU where Adam is still a rockstar but Tommy didn't audition. They meet in some other way, sparks fly and hot sex occurs etc. Big thanks as always to my dear, dear no_detective for brainstorming and beta reading. Please see the end for one more spoilery acknowledgment.
Summary: Tommy is a valet parking lot attendant with a crush and a secret.
It's a bird, it's a plane, it's…a tattoo?
By Lenore
"This one's yours." Matt doesn't look up from his comic book.
"I got the last one," Tommy points out from his spot in the corner, precariously balanced on a tottery three-legged stool, because Matt hogs the only decent chair in the place.
Matt turns a page. "It's the rock star. He always asks for you."
Tommy cranes his neck and spots the familiar black Mustang. This creates something of a quandary, because there's a principle at stake here, damn it, but Adam does always ask for him and-well, Tommy does like it that way.
He lets out a sigh and hauls himself to his feet. "You realize we mostly get paid in tips, right?"
Matt waves him off absently. "Have fun drooling all over His Glambertness."
Tommy hunches his shoulders as he tramps across the scarred pavement, past the faded sign advertising TrustRite Valet Parking. He does not drool. At most, his mouth waters a little-and, anyway, who can blame him? It's Adam-fucking-Lambert.
Adam unfolds his long legs from the driver's seat, the many chains around his neck jingling musically. Tommy catches a whiff of leather, deep and buttery, from the car seats, or maybe it's from the pants Adam's wearing, glove-tight and hot as all fuck. Tommy stares; he just can't help himself.
Adam's smile comes instantly, warm and thrilling. "Hey, Tommy! How's it going?"
"Okay, Mr. Lambert." At the raised eyebrow, he ducks his head and mumbles, "Um. Adam." It's ridiculous, he knows, the giddy rush he gets from saying the name, from being invited to use it. This crush has zoomed right past embarrassing into completely hopeless territory.
"You're looking good," Adam says, and Tommy squirms self-consciously under the weight of that appreciative gaze, too aware of his boring uniform, the serviceable black pants and the button-down white shirt, the black shoes his mom bought for him, practically orthopedic, because as she put it, No one appreciates their arches until it's too late.
Adam is the one who looks-oh God, so much better than good. Tommy licks his lips, but not because he's drooling.
"How the band? How's the record?" The way Adam focuses on Tommy feels a little like being caught in an eclipse with eyes wide open.
"Um, well, it's coming along?" Tommy's voice falters. He hates to lie, but…he'd hate to tell Adam the truth even more.
"I want to hear the demo when it's ready."
"Mm," Tommy says vaguely. "Can I-" He holds out a hand for the keys.
"Take good care of her for me." There's an intimate rumble to the words, and Adam's fingers brush Tommy's palm, sending electricity backing up all the way up to his elbow.
Tommy swallows hard and manages a nod. He watches Adam amble across the lot, the easy sway of his hips, the broad line of his shoulders. Light from the industrial-strength streetlamp catches on the glitter in his hair, making it shimmer. Tommy can't help a wistful sigh as Adam turns the corner and disappears from sight, on his way to one of the clubs tucked away among the abandoned warehouses and the urban decay.
A Mercedes zips into the lot just as Tommy finishes parking the Mustang. The balding investment-banker type behind the wheel makes an impatient face at him. The hot blonde in the passenger sneaks an interested look in his direction. Tommy holds up a hand, making the universally understood signal for "just give me a second." He tries to plaster on a placating customer-service smile, but the corners of his mouth just don't want to cooperate.
He hurries back across the lot and ducks his head into the building. "You're up."
"Dude, do me a favor? Get it for me?" Matt says distractedly, still bent over the comic.
"It's your turn," Tommy insists. His encounters with Adam tend to leave him frustrated and wanting, and Matt is a test of anyone's patience even under the best of circumstances. "It's been your fucking turn for the last five cars!" he snaps.
Matt finally manages to peel his gaze away from the page, blinking at Tommy owlishly. "Dude, I'm at a pivotal moment. Intergalactic Man is just about to swoop in and save Princess Leazora from Voltar's ice fortress on Zenzabar, and she's going to be, like, so grateful, you know?" He waggles his eyebrows.
"Oh my God, what kind of shit are you reading? 'Cause that is so not how that story would go. The dude with the stupid superpower would end up working some dead-end, minimum wage job in a sucky part of town since that's where the crime is, and his friends would be pissed at him all the fucking time, because he's always disappearing on them, and even seriously losery bands would kick him out, since he keeps missing practice to save people, and he would totally not get the girl in the end." Or the guy, Tommy mentally amends, and promptly feels more depressed.
"Dude," Matt says reproachfully. "Lay off Intergalactic Man. It's not his fault you're not getting laid by Glamcock."
Tommy goes speechless, and it doesn't help matters that he can feel snickering coming from the vicinity of his forearm. He trudges off to go take care of the douchebag in the Mercedes, darkly wishing he could punch Michael Myers in the face without giving himself a bruise.
***
The arrivals at the lot tend to taper off around midnight, and people don't usually start leaving until after two, and that two-hour stretch of boredom leaves Tommy way too much time to replay in his head all the crappy shit that's happened in his life lately.
"We're going to have to make a change." That's what Merck Mitchell, the lead singer of Tommy's last band, had said when he'd ditched Tommy's ass. "We need someone who's totally committed to Habitual Eyebrow, you feel me? Not someone who spends all his time on his day job, night job, whatever the hell. And, seriously, what's that shit with you running off whenever you feel like it, not telling anybody where you're going, not even answering your damned phone when we try to track your ass down? Dude. It's called responsibility, you know?"
This from the thirty-one-year-old who still lived above his mother's garage and borrowed money from his grandmother every month when she got her Social Security check. But Tommy hadn't brought up any of that. Really, what was there to say? That the crime rate in the neighborhood around TrustRite had gone down forty-seven percent since Tommy had started working there? It's not like Merck would have understood the relevance.
Matt closes the comic with a deep sigh, takes his glasses off, and gives the lenses a satisfied rub with the tail of his T-shirt.
"So, um, how did Intergalactic Man get his powers again?" Tommy asks as a peace offering.
Matt casts a suspicious look over his shoulder, apparently not trusting Tommy's interest after the earlier tirade. Tommy makes his expression as sincere as he can manage.
"He got caught in a volcanic eruption on Titan X. The ash contained mysterious radiation that altered him on a subatomic level," Matt explains, warming to the subject. "His ability to fly manifested immediately, but it took a little longer for his psychic powers to develop."
"Huh," Tommy says.
In comics, it's always something weird and flashy, a bite from a mutant spider, a mysterious experiment by a mad scientist. Just once, Tommy wants to read a story where somebody ends up with some kind of stupid power just from walking into the wrong tattoo place. He'd really like to believe he's not the only one that's ever happened to.
"Results might be unpredictable for somebody like you," the tattoo artist had said, eying the design Tommy picked out.
Tommy frowned in confusion. "Somebody like me?"
"You know." The guy made a vague gesture that Tommy had no idea how to interpret.
Probably just trying to warn me that sometimes people have second thoughts after they get inked. This was what Tommy had assumed.
Yeah. So much for assuming.
He'd walked back to the bus stop after he'd finally had it finished, buzzing with excitement and leftover adrenaline from the sting of the needles, resisting the urge to mess with the bandage and sneak another look at his newly completed sleeve. He felt it before he heard anything-this jangling sense that something was wrong-and then a scream cracked through the air. Tommy ran toward it on pure instinct. Down a grubby alley he found an asshole, strung out or just plain mean, holding a knife on a terrified girl.
He didn't stop to think up a plan or calculate the odds he could take someone who was almost twice his size; he just rushed the guy, a burst of adrenaline burning through him. He'd always thought that whole thing about challenging a bully to make him back down was the biggest bunch of bullshit ever, but when the asshole saw Tommy charging at him, he let out a startled, high-pitched shriek and legged it down the alley.
This would have been the most totally awesome moment of Tommy's life, except that the girl he'd just rescued took one look at him, and then she started screaming too and promptly ran off. And, okay, so Tommy hadn't expected a reward or anything, but a simple thank you would have been nice.
He trudged back down the alley and headed toward the bus stop, and when he caught a glimpse of his reflection in a store window, he let out a shriek as embarrassingly high-pitched as the thug's had been. He stopped and stared, and Jason from Friday the 13th stared back at him. He tentatively reached up to touch the mask, but his face felt just the same as always. It felt like him, only…what the fuck?
His lungs burned by the time he'd run all the way back to the tattoo place, and in between heaving breaths, he blurted out the whole freakish story, his voice rising hysterically when he asked, "What the fuck, dude?"
The tattoo artist just shrugged. "Unpredictable. Like I said."
To say that Tommy's life had not been the same since was the understatement of the fucking century.
"Man, could this job get any more boring?" Matt complains, head slumped listlessly against his hand. "I should have brought the new issue of High Voltage Girl with me."
Tommy nods absently, going through guitar riffs in his head, resisting the urge to check the time on his phone since it's probably about thirty seconds since the last time he looked. People should start leaving soon, and if Tommy can get home before dawn, maybe he can do some practicing for real before he conks out.
He's interrupted by a familiar white-hot sense of alarm shooting through him. The tattoos start to chitter away, and he leaps to his feet. "I've, uh, got to go take a piss."
"Yeah. Thanks for the update, dude." Matt doesn't raise his head off his hand.
The tattoos urge Tommy into a run, directing him around one corner and then another, and finally down a side street. At the end of it he finds Adam surrounded by skinheads, menacing and mean and demanding his money.
"Yeah, yeah, okay, here, take it." Adam pushes his wallet at them.
"The rings too!" insists one of the more swine-faced thugs.
Adam's mouth drops open. "But they're my favorites!"
"We're not playing, faggot."
"Neither am I!" Adam clutches his accessories protectively.
One of the assholes reaches for Adam, his hands meaty and vicious, and that's so not on. Nobody fucking touches Adam like that, not while Tommy's around. The adrenaline high slams into him, a chemical fire in his veins. He throws on an extra burst of speed, picturing Freddy Krueger, and roars out, "Get your fucking hands off him!"
"What the fucking fuck?" a startled voice cries out.
"Oh, shit, man! I seen this movie. It don't end good."
There's scuffling and chaos, and the thugs practically mow one another over in their hurry to get the hell out of there. In the commotion, Adam somehow ends up on the ground. Tommy resumes his own form and rushes over to him.
"Adam! Are you okay?" He reaches out and helps Adam up, and then can't quite bring himself to let go.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine." Adam checks his outfit for damage, craning his neck and making a face. "I just wish I could say the same for these pants."
Tommy glances around nervously, because even the stupidest morons alive will eventually begin to question whether movie characters can actually come to life. "We should probably get out of here."
Adam nods and falls in beside Tommy. "You're totally my hero, you know that, right?" He slides an arm around Tommy's waist, and Tommy leans in to him, insisting to himself that this is not taking advantage of Adam's gratitude. "It's weird, though," Adam continues thoughtfully. "For a second there, I really could have sworn you turned into Freddy Krueger."
Being inconspicuous when using his powers-Tommy's still working the kinks out of that one. He also hasn't quite mastered the fine art of playing it cool when questioned about it. His shoulders go stiff, and he stammers out, "Um. I guess you must have hit your head harder than we thought."
"I fell on my ass," Adam reminds him dryly.
"That can be disorienting?"
Tommy has never, not once been glad to see Adam drive away, but when the lot comes into sight, he practically pisses himself with relief. They come to stand by Adam's car, awkwardly stalled. Tommy fidgets under the weight of Adam's scrutiny.
"Um," he starts, but doesn't know where to go from there. He certainly can't tell Adam the truth, which he's surprised to find is really fucking disappointing.
Adam bridges the awkwardness by cupping Tommy's cheek in his hand and kissing him very sweetly. "Whatever happened back there, thank you."
Tommy nods, dazed, and Adam smiles and kisses him again, and gets in his car and heads off. Tommy stares, a little stupidly, even after the Mustang has disappeared from sight.
Regan from The Exorcist sighs dreamily, because even demonically possessed chicks who projectile vomit pea soup have a thing for Adam.
***
The irony of the whole superpower thing, or one of them anyway, is that Tommy never dreamed of being a hero when he was a kid. He never dressed up as Superman or Batman for Halloween. When he went trick or treating, it was as Jimmy Paige or Robert Smith or once, not very convincingly, as Jimi Hendrix. All he's ever wanted, from the time he was old enough to have an ambition, was simply to be a musician.
"Hey man, just wanted to follow up about that audition," he reads out loud as he types the words on Ellis McKinney's Facebook wall, making sure it sounds casual, trying to keep his desperation from shining through.
Being a musician without a band is like…Tommy can't even think up an analogy empty enough to describe it. A friend of a friend of a friend put him in touch with Ellis, who's looking for a new guitarist. He'd told Tommy to call to set up an audition, but apparently he never listens to his messages. So Tommy has taken to stalking him online.
YouTube is open in another tab, and Tommy clicks over and watches Adam's most recent video. Adam has feathers in his hair and what looks like body paint and fairy dust all over the rest of him. He swivels his hips in a slow, deliberate tease that makes Tommy stare at the screen mesmerized, and, okay, possibly that is just a teeny-tiny bit of spittle on his chin. Nobody should be able to move like that, but fuck, Tommy's really glad that Adam can.
His phone buzzing in his pocket startles him, and he crankily hits mute on the computer, cutting Adam off mid-falsetto.
"Yeah?"
"Dude, sorry to take so long to get back to you."
It's Ellis, and Tommy sits bolt upright, as if he might be judged on his posture. "Oh, hey, dude. How's it going?"
"Good, good. So you heard our songs on MySpace, right? You got a sense what we're about?" Ellis doesn't wait for an answer, but launches into a long ramble about his artistic vision for the band, managing to work Metallica and West African drum rhythms into the same sentence.
Tommy mm-hmms along and tries to offer up that Depeche Mode is one of his own personal influences, but Ellis doesn't stop for a breath. Adam's video continues to play, soundless but still totally drool-worthy, Adam down on the floor, back arched, mouth open, and…well, Tommy is only human. He leans in closer, staring, Ellis' voice droning on in his ear as Adam slinks around, shaking his ass and flirting with the camera.
It takes Tommy probably longer than it should to realize that there's silence on the other end of the phone.
"Um?" he says helplessly.
"So what do you think?" Ellis prompts, with exaggerated patience, as if he's been waiting for an answer for a while now. "You want to come for an audition tomorrow night?"
"Oh, yeah," Tommy scrambles to say. "Yeah. That would be awesome." He writes down the info and hangs up and lets out his breath.
Great. Just great. Tommy hasn't even met the guy yet and he's already coming across like a flake.
At work that night, Tommy's partnered up with Spence, who's the polar opposite of Matt. He's either a distant relative of the Energizer Bunny, or more likely on something. He leaps up whenever he so much as hears a car engine, dashing out to the lot; half the time he comes trudging back sheepishly, another false alarm. The other guys grumble about Spence hogging the tips, but Tommy figures, whatever, Spence has all that excess energy to burn off and quite possibly a habit to support. Anyway, it gives Tommy more time to concentrate on crime fighting.
Since that night with Adam, Tommy has been waiting to see him again, fidgety and impatient, keeping an eye out for a flash of the black Mustang. He finds the idea that someone kind of, sort of knows about him-and isn't too freaked about it-both nerve-wracking and thrilling. Having a secret superpower can be fucking lonely, a little detail Matt's comic books never bother to mention.
But it's been almost a week, and Adam still hasn't shown. Tommy makes up every excuse he can think of. Adam is busy, or Adam's PR people think he'll get better press at some other club, or, hey, Adam might even be out of the country. Although not really, since it's all over everywhere that Adam's going to be in LA for the whole summer working on a new album. Tommy carries around the most likely explanation, heavy and unwanted, a stone in the pit of his stomach-that when the buzz of gratitude cleared, Adam thought better of having anything to do with someone like Tommy.
Tonight's shift proves even more interminable than usual, what with Spence doing all the work and leaving Tommy with nothing to do but mope. By the time they finally close up for the night, he's worn out and more than a little depressed and mentally cataloging the booze he has stowed away in his kitchen cabinet. He plans to drink it all, even the Crème de Menthe that someone gave him as a joke.
He drags himself off to the bus stop, still brooding, distracted enough that he doesn't notice right away that something's off. The awareness slowly sifts into his consciousness, a prickle on the back of his neck, his arm hairs standing on end, the sense that someone is following him. Subtlety will never be one of Tommy's superpowers, and he slams to a stop and whirls around. There's nothing, no one, not even a shadow. The tats aren't agitated in the least, quiet and still, as if they're merely body art, and Tommy lets out his breath slowly.
He has no band. He's probably never going to see Adam again. And now he's apparently losing his mind. Thank God for fucking tequila.
By the time he wakes up the next morning, disoriented, with a slant of late-afternoon sun making him squint, that thought gets whittled down to simply: fucking tequila. His head feels like a block of wood that someone is pounding on, and he's pretty sure something died in his mouth. Yawning makes his head throb even harder, and he gags on the smell of his own morning breath.
The good news is that he has until eight that night to pull himself together for the audition; the bad news is that it's already five and he wants nothing more than to crawl back under the covers and die. Eventually, he stumbles to the shower and stands under the spray, eyes closed, leaning heavily against the chilly tile. He breathes in the steam and thinks about the coffee he's going to have just as soon as he's awake enough to make it. This at least gives him a reason to go on living.
He throws on jeans and a t-shirt and drinks down an entire pot of coffee, black and blistering hot. Just the prospect of food makes his stomach turn, which is probably for the best, since he needs to get a move on if he's going to make the audition on time. Three transfers later, he thumps down off the bus, his hangover pounding away in his temples like a jackhammer, guitar case slung across his shoulder.
It creeps up on him when he's about halfway down the block-the same prickling shiver down his back that he felt the other day, as if there's someone there. When he darts a glance back, though, there's nothing, no one in sight, and just like the other day the tats aren't putting up any kind of fuss.
The audition takes place in a hole-in-the-wall club, wedged in between a Korean grocery store and a fish market, the usual stink of nicotine and stale beer overlaid by a waft of mackerel and kimchee.
"Hey, dude, thanks for coming." Ellis meets Tommy at the door, rumpled and bed-headed and looking possibly even more hungover than Tommy feels, which is strangely heartening. "Let me introduce you to the guys."
Tommy nods along as Ellis reels off the band members' names, although he's too nervous to actually remember any of them. "Hey," he says, trying not to sound like he woke up only three hours ago.
"So, how about we get right to it, huh?" Ellis says, jerking his head toward the rough platform in the back that serves as the stage.
They set up, and it's always a little weird the first time playing with a new group, but by the fourth bar of "Enter Sandman," Tommy feels like he's known these guys forever. Ellis shoots him a sideways smile as he growls out "off to never-neverland," and, okay, maybe Ellis doesn't have the best voice Tommy's ever heard, but whatever. All Tommy wants is the chance to be part of this again.
It's all going so fucking well that Tommy should see it coming, should, because that's just how his luck rolls, but somehow it manages to sneak up on him. Electric-hot awareness shoots through him, and the tats stir to life, sharply alert and bossy as all hell. Tommy ignores them, even though his skin suddenly burns like the ink is made of fire.
The tats squirm insistently, and when Tommy keeps on playing, they take matters into their own hands-or actually Tommy's hand, which jerks violently on the strings, without his permission. An ear-splitting screech pours out of the speakers, and the music lurches to a stop, the rest of the band staring at Tommy with what-the-fuck expressions.
"Um, sorry?" He shifts his weight from one foot to the other. "I, uh, forgot there's something I need to do?"
Ellis stares, as if the words make no sense.
"Sorry," Tommy says again. "Really," he emphasizes as he's unplugging his guitar and packing it into the case. "Maybe we can reschedule?"
The look on Ellis' face says: Seriously, dude?
"Uh. Okay. So…gotta go."
Tommy darts out of the club, breaking into an all-out run the moment his sneakers hit the sidewalk, the guitar case banging against his leg, the tats roiling around on his arm, edgy and urging him to go faster, faster. Two blocks away Tommy finds what's got them all excited, a guy with a gun trying to carjack a woman in a BMW. He channels the monsters and goes roaring toward the car.
"Fucking shit!" the guy with the gun yells out and takes off in the opposite direction.
The woman in the BMW starts screaming too and stomps on the gas, shooting through the intersection. Tommy barely manages to jump out of the way before she plows into him.
"That is getting seriously fucking old," he grumbles to himself.
And then he feels it, again, the sense that someone's there. He whirls around, expecting to see nothing, because that's just how this going crazy thing works. Instead he finds Adam standing there, and, fuck, Tommy seriously has to wonder if he's hallucinating.
"I knew it!" Adam says triumphantly. "I can't believe you tried to convince me that getting knocked on my ass was making me see things!"
"Um." Tommy freezes, his oh-so unhelpful brain going totally blank, unable to offer up even one lame-ass explanation, and then he frowns. "Hey, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you at least have a bodyguard with you? Oh fuck, are you the one who's been following me? What the hell, Adam? Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?"
Improbably, Adam breaks into a smile. "I always knew you were special."
Just like that Tommy is back to stammering.
"Come here." Adam crooks his finger, and Tommy's feet obey, and Adam winds an arm around him. "Hero," he says softly into Tommy's ear, smiling.
Adam walks him down the block and around the corner, where the Mustang is parked. Tommy really isn't sure what's happening here, but Adam is pressed warmly against his side, and he smells fucking amazing, and what the hell. Tommy's always been a go-with-the-flow kind of guy.
He doesn't even think to ask where they're headed, and soon enough they've arrived at a house tucked away behind a wrought-iron fence. The gate opens for them, and Tommy follows Adam into the house, and that's when it finally hits him: somebody knows his secret, and that somebody is Adam Lambert. Oh shit, oh-fucking-shit. Suddenly he can't breathe, and he's not sure how much longer his knees are going to hold him up.
"Hey." Adam brushes a kiss to Tommy's temple, his hand pressed to the small of Tommy's back, warm and reassuring. "I'm going to get us a drink."
Tommy manages to stumble over to the sofa, so at least he doesn't have the indignity of falling on his ass on top of being scared shitless. Adam comes back, sitting close, his thigh warm and solid against Tommy's. He pushes a glass into Tommy's hand, and Tommy tips it back, vodka burning his throat. His stomach turns over, reminding him what a bad idea this is, but fuck that noise. Tommy's been half in love with Adam since-and now Adam knows about him. Shit, shit, shit.
"I see you freaking out over there." The vodka bottle swims into Tommy's line of vision and tilts, and Tommy's glass is full again, just for a second before he slams it back. "So tell me," Adam coaxes.
It's a simple invitation, and apparently that's all Tommy has been waiting for, because the whole story tumbles out of him, what happened and how everything has been fucked up ever since. He even blurts out the truth about his band, former band, and that he didn't want to lie, but he couldn't tell the truth either. Adam doesn't look away once, his eyes focused and interested, and Tommy keeps waiting for that expression to slide away and fucking freak to take its place, but it never does.
Tommy talks himself out of breath and has to gulp down a lungful of air and then another. He kind of wishes he were anywhere else right now, which is totally fucking ironic, since he's thought about being alone with Adam practically every waking moment since they met.
"Hey," Adam says softly, finger under Tommy's chin.
Tommy meets Adam's eye, and Adam smiles at him kindly, and that's maybe even worse than fucking freak. Something breaks open in Tommy, and he starts to babble, desperately, like he needs to defend himself, "I don't know what I am-but fuck, I try-" His voice drops down to practically nothing. "You're the only one I've ever told."
It comes as a surprise, Adam's mouth sliding against his, warm and sweet. It drags a startled moan out of Tommy, and then instinct takes over, and he throws his arms around Adam's neck and kisses back, frantically, like there's no time.
"I didn't-"
"What? You didn't think a pretty musician-superhero would be my type?" Adam's smile is soft and a little teasing.
"Oh, thank God!" Tommy blurts out and reaches for Adam, grabby-handed.
Before long he's flat on his back, Adam pressing him into the cushions, kissing and working a hand beneath Tommy's T-shirt. Tommy shivers and moans against Adam's mouth, and the thing is: he has superpowers, and he's making out with Adam Lambert. Maybe those old platitudes from elementary school are actually true. Maybe anything is possible.
Unfortunately, it's as if his mental soundtrack has a direct connection to the universe's most bitter sense of humor, because the moment that thought flits through his head, Adam pulls away, stands up, taking all his warmth with him. Tommy stares up at him, breathing heavily. Oh fuck, what has he done wrong now?
"Come on, baby." Adam hauls him up. "I want you in my bed."
Thank fucking Christ. Tommy's not sure if he says that out loud, but it doesn't matter, because Adam has a hand pressed tight to the small of Tommy's back, moving him to the bedroom. He brushes his lips against Tommy's ear, hot and shivery. "I'm going to put my mouth all over you."
A sound comes out of Tommy. Possibly it's a whimper.
Adam backs Tommy over to the bed, pulling his clothes off in a flurry, putting his hands on Tommy's newly bared skin, his lips working up the line of Tommy's neck. He tips Tommy back onto the mattress, gets himself naked, and crawls on top.
Tommy breathes out, "Adam." He doesn't mean to beg, but he just can't help it.
Adam runs a hand up Tommy's body, ankle to thigh to hip to arm. His touch grows lighter, more curious as it travels over the tattoo, finger tracing the inky lines. "How does it feel when it happens?"
"Um, kind of like being struck by lightning? Like something's wrong, and I get sort of pissed off. Or actually, way pissed off. Like, like-I'm all burning up inside, you know? And I just have to do something,"
"How long does it last?"
Tommy shrugs. "Just until I've taken care of-whatever. The pissed off feeling kind of burns off after that, and I can make myself go back to normal."
Adam beams at him, as if Tommy is something amazing, and presses a kiss to the tattoo almost reverently. Tommy's not prepared for the sharp-hot sensation that arcs through him. He sucks in his breath, eyes popping open wide. Adam bends his head and traces the curve of Regan's cheek with his tongue, hums under his breath as he licks down the buttons on Bela Lugosi's shirt.
"Oh, fuck." Tommy's toes curl, and his cock bounces wetly against his belly, and fuck, does that make him a freak? He hasn't had sex since the whole tattoo thing. No one else has ever touched his ink, and he never imagined that it would be such a turn on.
Too much of a turn on actually, because there's that wild rush of adrenaline making Tommy's insides sizzle, and it doesn't seem to matter that it has nothing to do with danger. He can feel the odd flickering sensation he gets before he turns, and he tries to hold on to his own shape, but if the wide-eyed look on Adam's face is any indication, he doesn't quite manage it.
"I'm sorry-" Tommy starts, but Adam beats him to the punch with, "Wow, that really shouldn't be hot at all."
Tommy tries to choke back a whimper, but fuck. Just-fuck. He gulps down some air, and starts to feel steadier, and pulls back his control, firming up the outlines of his self. Adam grins and dips a kiss to his belly and keeps heading south. "For the record," he says between kisses, "I wouldn't mind blowing Dracula, but you're way sexier."
"Adam," Tommy says desperately, slotting his fingers into Adam's hair. "Please." He can't seem to stop begging.
Adam rubs his hands over Tommy's thighs and does tricky things with his tongue to Tommy's cock.
The urge to confess wells up out of nowhere-sex always makes him babble-and before Tommy can clap a hand over his big, stupid mouth, he's admitting in a shaky voice, "If I could get rid of it, I would. Even if it meant-if people ended up being-"
"Oh, baby," Adam murmurs with a sympathetic look. He kisses Tommy's belly and goes back down even more energetically, as if he's trying to make it all better with his mouth, and oh fuck, Tommy feels positively consoled.
He's never been slutty-well, not too slutty anyway-but he spreads his legs, wide, wider, practically begging for Adam's cock.
"Mm, yeah. I'm going to open you up, and put my dick in you, and you're going to take it like a superhero."
"Fuck, fuck." Tommy's voice is a rasp in the back of his throat, turning to a high whine when Adam pushes his thighs apart and slides his hands beneath his ass and pulls him up so he can lick a line from Tommy's balls to his hole.
Tommy arches his back sharply. "Oh, fuck!"
Apparently Adam approves of this reaction, because he pushes his tongue inside, no warning, no teasing, just oh, shit. Tommy lets out a wet-sounding sob as Adam wiggles a finger in alongside his tongue. Tommy has to bite his lip, hard, not to come right then, just from that. It's been way too long since anyone touched him.
"That feel good?" Adam sounds honestly curious, so Tommy tries to tell him, but all that comes out is this sound, tortured and greedy and fucking embarrassing, if Tommy could care about anything other than what Adam is doing to him.
"You ready for me, baby?" Adam strokes his hand up and down his own dick, which is big and hard and gorgeous, like he's showing Tommy what he has to look forward to.
Tommy nods his head emphatically, and, okay, it's possible that maybe he is kind of drooling, but he'd have to be fucking dead not to drool over a cock like that. Adam's hand slides between Tommy's legs, slick and purposeful, and Tommy pushes up on his elbows, bearing down, trying to ride. "Please, please!"
"I've got you," Adam croons to him, and he goes right on doing what he's doing, turning Tommy's body inside out with his fingers.
Fuck, Tommy's already impossibly hard and getting harder. "Please," he says again, brokenly.
"Yeah, yeah," Adam murmurs, a slur of impatience. Tommy's not the only one who's desperate here, and that's fucking hot.
Adam reaches for Tommy, lifting him bodily, hauling him onto his lap, Tommy's knees braced on the mattress. Tommy sinks down and down, until he has Adam up to the hilt. It's-oh fuck, Adam is so big, and Tommy is so tight around him, and his eyes practically roll back in his head it feels so good.
"Fucking gorgeous," Adam slurs out, his hands settling onto Tommy's hips.
Tommy pushes himself up and down, thighs trembling, muscles burning with the effort, and Adam moves with him, his dick so deep that Tommy will still feel him next week. Adam smiles up at him, bright-eyed and conspiratorial, his hands stroking affectionately over Tommy's back. Tommy can hear his own pulse thundering in his ear, and he can smell Adam on his own skin, and if this is what he gets for being stuck with the world's freakiest superpower, then it's all totally fucking worth it. That's what he's thinking right before he comes-and then Adam hits that place inside him, just the right way, and Tommy can't think about anything at all.
He drifts afterward, curled against Adam's side, trying to memorize how this feels, since he has no idea if it will ever happen again.
Adam strokes his fingers through Tommy's hair. "You good, baby?"
"Mm." Tommy's too fucked out to form actual words.
"You know," Adam says in this deliberately casual tone, his fingers stilling for a moment, before starting to stroke again, "my bassist split on me in the middle of working on the record. Got back together with his old band. It's not the guitar, but-"
"I can learn," Tommy says quickly, instantly awake, and then the whole sad history with his last band flashes before his eyes, and he backpedals, "Um, except-I mean, I already got kicked out because shit happens and I have to-"
"They didn't know, and I do, and I happen to like having a superhero around." Tommy can hear the smile in Adam's voice.
He snuggles closer, and Adam brushes a kiss to the top of his head, and there's this full feeling in Tommy's chest, straining at his ribs. If he were any happier, he'd probably burst from it. He closes his eyes, and as he's drifting off, he hears Regan giggle, and possibly that's a dreamy sigh from Freddy Krueger.
Additional author's note:
When I got this prompt, my first thought was: Valet parking attendant! And then I thought…but wait, Tommy should also be a superhero! I told no_detective this idea, and she said, "I know what his superpower should be!" And it was the most brilliant thing ever. Thank you, my dear!