Crossing the Line 5

[xunre]

See Chapter 1 for the summary and the usual perfunctory nod to the IP laws. Thanks to my betas, perryfinch and Tom W who helped me wrestle this thing into submission. I guess I may have got a tad explicit in this, so be warned.

'Ryan, can you wake up now?'

Ryan moves his head and bumps into Seth's chest. 'Wha... How long was I out?'

'Maybe an hour.' Seth shifts on the bed to slide an arm around Ryan's shoulders. 'Way to salt my game. First time you get me in bed and you go to sleep.'

'Sorry.'

'Don't be. It's only the jet lag. At least I like to think it's the jet lag, not me. Hey, I got to hold you. The jet lag wrecks you if you sleep all day. Trust me on this, I do the jet lag worse than anyone I know.'

'I'll get up.'

'We should do something. Like swimming.' Seth moves over to the heavy drapes across the French windows. He grins as he flings the drapes open and let's the sun pour into Ryan's eyes. Ryan groans and buries himself under a pillow.

'Come on, Seth demands, yanking the pillow away, 'We're in Tahiti, dude. You can hide yourself under a pillow when we get home. There's a lagoon to explore and a beach.'

Ryan realises he's suddenly self-conscious changing into trunks in front of Seth. When he heads for the doors leading out to the garden Seth taps him on the shoulder. 'Hey dude, jet lag is forgivable. Forgetting me is not.' Seth grabs Ryan's hand.

'I wasn't forgetting you.' Ryan glances at their joined hands. 'I'm not sure how cool this is here.'

'This isn't Newport. Rangi says being out is very, very okay, here. Lonely Planet says homophobia is unknown in Tahiti.'

'Who's Rangi?'

'Anita's boyfriend. It's a Maori name. Pool or lagoon? I checked stuff out while you left me on my own.'

'Lagoon. I didn't mean...'

'Okay, this way then.' Seth waves his free hand towards the glint of water beyond a line of palm trees.

Ryan's eyes take in the wide lawn and the elaborate gardens. 'Kirsten would love this place, all these flowers.'

'I don't think the parents have ever been here.' Seth wipes his forehead and wonders if tropical sweat is a good look. 'They've been most places.'

Ryan looks up at a shrub with football-sized red flowers trailing to the ground. 'She'd love this. I want to find out what it's called.'

Seth sighs. 'I'm doomed to be such an unsuccessful gay boy.' His free hand waves around on automatic. 'I'm a virgin and I don't know the names of any flowers, well your ordinary flowers like roses and stuff but not these.'

Ryan smirks. 'I can't help you with the flowers.'

'We could ask that guy,' Seth says, pointing at a gardener working on a flower bed in the distance.

'Maybe later, right now I bet I can beat you to the beach.'

Seth yells: 'No way, dude. Not fair. No warning.' Ryan grins over his shoulder and runs on anyway. When Seth catches up Ryan is poking at the sand with his big toe.

'It's black.'

'The pearls are black too. You get used to it.'

'In Newport I dreamed about you standing on a beach smiling at me. I didn't know about this place, but the sand was black in my dream.'

Seth grins. 'I could hum the X-Files theme.'

'This is really weird.' Ryan shakes his head slowly.

'You don't like the humming?'

'It'd be creepy if it wasn't you. I didn't know about the black sand, but you did, and I dreamed it.'

'Where is Ryan Atwood and what have you done with him? That was two whole sentences. One with three clauses.' Seth stops still and stares at Ryan. 'How often do you dream about me?'

'Most nights. More since I left for Chino. Sethness must be contagious.'

'Ry, we're going to do more than just make out tonight, aren't we?

'Sure'.

'Just wanted to get that clear.'

Seth drops his towel in a heap and stares across the lagoon. Ryan waits for the next burst of talking. He rolls his towel and puts it on the black sand.

'Earth to Seth.'

'Yeah?'

'Seth, where'd you go? When you don't say anything for more than thirty seconds I get worried.'

Seth faces him, expression serious. 'Just thinking. This has to work, you and me. I think that means you have to actually talk about Chino some time. Not right now, necessarily, but some time. Maybe some time soon.'

'I'll think about it.'

'So, what do you think of Tahiti, dude?'

'Is it always this hot?'

Seth shakes his head. 'It's the wet season. You get rain storms most afternoons.'

The surface of the lagoon shivers. A patch of dark water moves towards them. 'There's a puff of wind coming. It will cool you down.' The breeze stirs suddenly and blows cool against the sweat on their bodies.

Ryan asks: 'How'd you know that?'

'Sailing stuff.'

'When do you have to leave for home?'

'Two weeks or so. The trade winds have already set in for California.' Seth faces Ryan, eyes anxious 'You will sail home with me, right? I couldn't take another forty days and forty nights without you.'

'You know I don't like boats, but planes suck as well, and I'd miss you.'

'I can laugh at the seagulls on the voyage home. This is so cool, we've got all Tahiti to ourselves. Angst-free time, dude.'

'What were you going to do if I didn't come?'

'I don't know. There was the go home and find you in Chino and say what I had to say plan and the get a job as a sailing bum and stay out here forever plan. I told Anita about the sailing bum plan. She didn't approve. "Didn't approve" would be a rare case of a Seth Cohen understatement.'

'You and Anita talk a lot.'

'She invaded my boat two days after I tied up. She and Rangi dragged me ashore and got me drunk. She made me her project. She's a main player in the worldwide get Seth and Ryan together movement.'

'What's Rangi like?'

'Complete opposite of Anita. Think The Rock only like, more so. He makes me look short and you look...' Seth's voice trails off as his eyes flick across Ryan's muscles.

Ryan likes being checked out. 'My boyfriend is hanging out with an escapee from The Mummy.'

'You used the b-word. You've never used the b-word before. If Anita was here, she'd so whistle again. You know my parents are probably thinking right now about the ad in the Orange County Register?'

'What ad?' Ryan demands.

'Just the usual stuff, man, you know: "Sanford and Kirsten Cohen are happy to announce..." Something like that.'

Ryan fixes wide eyes on Seth. 'They wouldn't. Would they?'

'Joking, dude. Totally joking. We're weird in the OC, but not that weird.'

Ryan hooks a leg around Seth's ankle and pushes him into the water. Seth comes up spluttering and lunges for Ryan, who gets away and splashes salt water into Seth's face. Somehow they end up lying in the water with arms round each other. Seth decides Ryan's eyes are the same colour as Tahiti's sky, but hotter.

Ryan runs finger along Seth's jaw, leaving a trail of shivery nerves firing way too much information into Seth's brain. And elsewhere. 'What do we do for the rest of the day?'

'Think of all the Seth/Ryan time we've got now.'

'Different hemisphere.' The corners of Ryan's mouth curl slightly. 'Ryan/Seth time.'

'Man, that is so unfair. You've got a whole yacht named after you and now you want to rename Seth/Ryan time as well. You've got so in charge since this whole gay thing happened.'

'Seth, the whole gay thing happened the first day we met.'

'Have you ever? I mean am I...'

'You're the first guy.'

'The fish sex with Summer was totally not one of my better moments. I think we should avoid the fish sex. I got some books in Catalina. I am prepared. A year of intense fantasising. I am deeply prepared. I know exactly what I want.'

'Your parents are going to be surprised by some of the cable charges from the last three days.'

'God, Ryan. What if they say something? I mean...'

'Don't worry, it's cool.'

'That was revenge for the OC Register ad, right?' Seth eyes the dark clouds building up fast overhead. 'Maybe the swimming is not our first priority. Maybe we should go back to the room.'

'Maybe.' The clouds burst and the heaviest rain Ryan has ever felt blasts the lagoon's surface into white water. 'You keep changing your mind about our afternoon.'

'The room would definitely be good. We could get dry. Being dry is good.'

Trees whip almost sideways in the sudden wind. Both boys dash for shelter. When they reach their room, Ryan starts drying himself with a towel, but Seth flings himself on the bed, rolls on his back, grabs Ryan and pulls him down. Lightning scars the sky outside and Ryan turns into a black and white image for a second.

'You look serious, ' Ryan yells over the continuous thunder.

'I have to say something and it's serious, Ryan, so hear me out. Marissa was a train wreck. You tried to help her for almost a year and she's still a train wreck. You tried to help Theresa and that didn't work out. Promise me...

'Seth...'

'Listen to me, no more saving, except people who want to be saved. Like me. I would be a good person to save.

'Sometimes I...'

'Ry? No more saving. I hated seeing you lied to and not knowing what I could do about it. I hated not knowing how you were. I hated it more than being on my own. I can't do it, not ever again. I just totally can't. I'm sorry if that makes me stupid or needy or weird or selfish but...'

'Okay.'

'I'm serious, Ryan. I... What?'

'Is it cool to save you from being alone?'

Seth rolls over suddenly and turns his back to Ryan. 'I'm not used to this. You're Ryan. You get me, you just get me and I get you and we know we're on the same page, but everything's changed and I'm scared I'll push too hard or something.'

Ryan reaches over Seth's back to brush his hand across Seth's cheek. It comes away wet. 'What's this, Seth?'

'We just ran through a tropical downpour. It may mean that I am wet. Tropical downpours, they often have that effect on people. Or it could be that this is the superconfident Seth strategy going down like the Titanic.'

'Chino was bad.' Ryan rubs a thumb across Seth's cheek. 'Give it a couple of days. I'll talk about it. I won't get angry.'

Seth turns his face to Ryan, eyes huge. 'Promise?'

'I'm going to hate telling you about it. But you're not on your own anymore.' Ryan presses a kiss to Seth's mouth. 'I guess some things need saying.'

'I feel totally alone, Ryan, like right now. Like overwhelmingly so. Maybe you need to do something to break down my aloneness.'

'Like this?' Ryan's teeth and tongue find their way to Seth's neck. His hand starts working on the wet shorts Seth is wearing.

'This is good,' Seth whispers, lifting his hips so Ryan can slide the pants down his legs. 'This works for me.'

Their fingers intertwine and Ryan turns Seth's head to kiss him. Ryan whispers: 'Okay then. How about this? '

'Oh yeah, man, definitely a lot more of this.' Seth didn't notice Ryan take his own shorts off but he's sure as hell noticing that Ryan's naked and they seem to be pressed together along the whole length of their bodies. 'Oh man...' Seth whispers.

Ryan puts his hand over Seth's mouth. 'How long is it since the last time I said you talk too much?'

Seth licks Ryan's palm and mutters through his fingers: 'You totally love me anyway.'

'You were talking about fantasies. Should I worry about getting a black eye out of this?'

'I'm prepared. You're not Summer. No black eyes. Even though with a black eye you'd look, oh shit, sorry...'

'The fantasies, Seth?' Ryan demands.

'You're inside me. In, um, my fantasies.'

'Uhuh.'

Seth catches the flash in Ryan's eyes when lightning splits the sky outside. 'It's an issue. I thought we should get it out of the way. This is totally weird. It's not like it felt with Summer at all.'

Ryan tracks his tongue down Seth's abs to just above the cluster of dark hair. Ryan's teeth are on Seth's skin just above his cock, and Ryan's sucking hard and Seth's half hurting and half wondering if his heart rate can possibly go any higher than this or if anything's is ever going to feel better than this.

The corners of Ryan's eyes crinkle before he licks the tip of Seth's cock and then pulls back to admire the red mark he's just left on Seth's stomach.
'Because Summer's not blond?'

'The broody indirection thing is majorly attractive but you can so overdo it at times. You left a mark. On me. A big mark.'

'Ya think?'

Seth dives for Ryan's cock and takes it into his mouth. His nose is full of Ryan's scent and his mouth is full of Ryan's cock and Ryan's fingers are in his hair.

'God, Seth.' Ryan bucks suddenly pushing himself deeper in Seth's mouth.

'You okay, Ry?

Ryan nods, eyes closed. 'Hey, I'm getting close.'

Seth gropes into his backpack until he finds a condom and tries to tear the packet open with his teeth. Hell, Seth's seen Queer as Folk and it looks sexy when Brian does it. Somehow it doesn't work. Seth tugs hard at the packet and it slips out of his teeth. It's a relief when Ryan takes it out of his hand. Seth is unsurprised when Ryan has the packet open immediately. Seth grabs the condom and unrolls it onto Ryan's cock.

Ryan hands him the lube. His eyes are bright. 'You sure you want me to...'

'Yeah. Very. A lot. A whole year of fantasies where you do it to me. I know what I want. Ryan, please, soon or now even.'

Ryan smirks as he rolls onto his back and lies there, blue eyes fixed on Seth. Seth cannot make any words come out of his mouth. Seth cannot do much at all. Seth has an ache the size of Tahiti inside him and a fair idea that only Ryan's cock can make it go away. Several dozen lines, some clever, some plain incoherent flash through Seth's head while he crouches over Ryan and then spears himself down onto Ryan's cock. A wash of pain shoots through him. Seth's sure he's forgotten something from all the sex manuals he read on the boat and while he thinks about that he suddenly realises that nothing hurts any more and someone has connected his spine to a power outlet and his skin's on fire and Ryan is moving inside him and Seth thinks briefly he might die if he doesn't lean down and touch as much of Ryan as he can.

'How's this feel?'

'Weird,' Seth gasps. 'Really weird, but weird in a good way. Do you feel good?' Seth remembers something from his vast intake of gay sex manuals and tightens muscle around Ryan to find out. A low rough sound escapes from the back of Ryan's throat.

'Dude, you just growled at me.'

'You moaned. It's because you belong to me.'

'Do you always growl at people?'

'You're my first.'

'My brain shuts down every time you touch me. Hey, it shuts down most times when you look at me. The growling is...'

'Like this?' Ryan lifts his groin upwards, his cock lifting Seth above the bed. Something like a hard walnut brushes against Ryan's cock and Seth's arse convulses round him.

'Oh man, major shutdown happening.'

'Don't go all Shermanator on me.'

'You're comparing me with the Shermanator? That, dude, is so totally low.'

'I guess. You still belong to me.'

'When did that happen?'

'When you hugged me, that first day.'

Seth rotates himself a little around the axis of Ryan's cock and Ryan wonders if his brain is about to go the way of Seth's. But he doesn't tell Seth. He grabs Seth by the shoulders and pulls his glistening torso down so they can kiss. He gets his hand tight around Seth's cock and starts pumping him.

Seth suddenly starts bucking up and down and his muscles are hot around Ryan's cock, The burn starts at the base of Ryan's spine and spreads through his body.

Seth buries his face in Ryan's neck. 'I'm gonna...'

'Me too.'

'Love you.'

Ryan tightens his hand round Seth's cock. 'You too.'

Seth gasps and starts shooting over Ryan's chest. Seth's gives a string of little groans mixed with 'Ryan' and 'Fuck' and words so low Ryan's doesn't know what they are. Ryan's on fire and the climax makes him feel his whole core bleeding into Seth.

'Seth?'

'Yeah?'

'Do you like my ear?'

'Yeah. All of you, dude. Everything, you're...'

'Then loosen your teeth before I start bleeding.'

'Sorry.'

'Shhhhhh... ' Ryan runs his hands through Seth's hair and wonders how Seth has managed to do without oxygen for so long. 'Breathe, Seth, it's good for you. You good?'

'Awesome.'

'Awesome,' Ryan smirks. 'Not like a fish out of water at all.'

Seth kisses Ryan's shoulder. 'Awesome, but messy. We could use a shower.'

'Fine.'

Ryan keeps the shower water cooler than Seth likes, but right now Seth doesn't care. Seth traces a long finger across Ryan's abs. 'We have to deal with the closet.'

'I haven't unpacked.'

'Dude, you are being totally evasive here. Why do I have to make all the plans? This is unfair in a major, major way.'

'That closet, huh?'

'Yeah, that one. Actually, when you think about it, this one. So are we in or out?

Ryan shrugs and turns off the shower. 'Wherever you want us to be.'

'Dude, you're like dumping everything on me.'

Ryan pulls Seth into a wet hug before he starts towelling him dry.

Seth shakes his head. 'On the other hand, I was seriously talking to seagulls while you had a lot on your mind in Chino.' Water from wet curls flies all over Ryan. 'If I'm suddenly queer the school jocks go back to making my life hell and then you're going to start protecting me. And that totally leads to madness.'

'I'm not going to let anyone...'

'Ry, you can't get into any more fights while you're on probation. I so don't want to spend my time baking cakes with files in them to help you bust out of juvie.'

'Your cooking's as bad as Kirsten's.'

'Worse, trust me, but it'd be for the file, not the eating. Maybe we come out to the pod people of Newport when your probation's done.'

Somehow they've found their way back to the bed and Ryan's stretched himself out on top of Seth. 'You've been thinking a lot.'

'Thank the seagulls. No-one else to talk to. You had all that other stuff to think about at the time.'

'I came here because I had to see you. I hate what all this is costing your parents.'

'They're parents. I've told you, they work for us. We'll pay it forward to someone else some time when we can.'

'Like who?'

'I'm only speaking generically. Maybe. I'm still working out the whole family thing.'

Ryan lifts his head above Seth's and their eyes lock. 'I went with Theresa because I wanted a family that made sense.'

'Ry, sorry, that is majorly insane.' Seth waits for the glare, but the softest look comes into Ryan's eyes.

'I thought you were straight. I felt like a bomb waiting to explode. Newport was all about other people deciding what happened to me. Back in Chino I'd get to decide.'

'Except Theresa made your decision by lying to you about the paternity test. You and I make sense. The 'rental units love you. I love you, but totally not in the same sense as the parents, believe me. And we don't lie to you.'

'I didn't know. I thought you'd miss me, but you'd get over it. I thought I could take charge of my life back in Chino.'

'Oh sure, that's why you were dreaming about me. Anyway, we do make sense. We majorly have stuff in common. You boosted a car, I boosted a yacht. We're unstoppable. Ry?'

'Yeah?'

'Don't go away for a long time.'

'How long?'

'Forever would be good.'

'We can work on forever if you're sure.'

Seth's hands are on each side of Ryan's face while he kisses him hard.

'What was that for?' Ryan asks, smiling.

'Because you're Ryan.'

'So you are sure?'

The rain's drumbeat on the roof stops and the sky is already clearing beyond the French windows. 'About forever being good? I'm sure. So. Sailing, huh? We have to get you up to speed. I'll borrow Anita's Lazer. We can sail over to Moorea tomorrow, you know, the island across from the airport.' Seth points out to sea through the glass wall. 'You can see it from here.'

'How far?'

'About ten miles. We'll sail over there, do lunch, make out, sail back. You'll learn the ropes. We'll get to kiss a lot.'

'Sounds like a plan.'

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