Now and Again (33/??)
Title: Now and Again
Author: alissablue
Rating: PG-13/R, will be NC-17 eventually.
Characters/Pairings: Luke/Reid, Noah, other Oakdale characters and an OC here or there.
Category: Fix it-fic, AU
Summary: “If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences.”- W.I. Thomas
Warnings: Angsty Angst, some mindfuckery
Disclaimer: Do not own. Wish I did, though. I could make them do all sorts of kinky stuff.
A/N: Keywords for this fic are ‘patience’ and ‘payoff’. Title credit goes to my epically awesome beta slayerkitty, who deserves a round of applause for sitting through my long rants, freak outs, smut-related giggles and posting hesitation.
A/N: Me + comments is like... Reid + Sandwiches<3.
Prologue / 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17 / 18 / 19 / 20 /
21 / 22 / 23 / 24 / 25 / 26 / 27 / 28 / 29 / 30 / 31 / 32 /
Chapter 33: You’re hardly that intimidating, Luciano
It took Luke four more days to crack.
He’d left Noah four days ago, finally hearing the apology he’d wanted and needed to hear for months. He now felt relieved of the pain, the constant weight of the world on his back and the claws sunken deeply into his skin. He felt free as a bird and clean, as though a curse had been lifted, as though the rain had stopped after a night of thunder and as though he was finally cured of a disease, an illness, the sickness that had broken his bones and had strained his aching muscles and flesh. He’d gotten back the parts of Luke Snyder taken from him and for the first time in years, he felt strong and empowered.
Four. Days. And then, Luke cracked.
But for all the strength he’d gained, it still took him four days to crack. Because, while he’d let go of Noah, his mind still seemed balls deep in Reid. He still couldn’t stop thinking about Reid, even though Reid had shut him out. And after all that had happened with Noah, Luke didn’t want to do it anymore, a push and pull of another guy toying with his feelings and controlling his every move. But he couldn’t stop thinking about Reid, about the split second during which Reid’s defense had faltered and how contradictory that split second of Reid leaning into his touch like he couldn’t resist even a mere moment of Luke’s skin against his, had been to the rest of their encounter.
After four days, Luke cracked.
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Reid, meanwhile, was balls deep in something else. Paperwork. Calls. Bureaucracy. He was fine during the day, fine and content and mostly Luke free. He spent his days with patients and calls to old colleagues and possible investors with no such luck and Noah Mayer who was getting better each day. Noah never once mentioned Luke, as though Luke had disappeared from the face of the Earth and while Reid told himself it was better that way, with Luke out of the picture, without hearing Luke’s name or seeing him at Memorial, he couldn’t help but miss him. He’d shut him out himself, had pushed him away to protect himself, but he missed him anyway.
And in contrast to the days, like one giant, fat, cosmic joke, the nights were filled with Luke, hurting like hell like a prison he couldn’t escape or a maze with no way out. At night, he dreamed of Luke and woke up in a pool of sweat, sick to his stomach and crying out in pain, the pressure on his chest too much to take.
After four days of agony without Luke, as his fibers ached for Luke’s presence and as he fought a battle with himself to go on and stay away from him, the doorbell rang four times. He answered and was met with brown eyes staring back at him.
Luke, Luke, Luke.
“What are you doing here?” Reid asked, surprised when it didn’t really surprise him at all. Luke had pushed and prodded and poked him since he’d met him and he had no reason whatsoever, no theory or data to believe that this would be an exception, when Luke himself was the exception to every rule.
Luke angrily brushed past him into the apartment, the strands of dirty blond hair still damp as if he’d come straight out of the shower and his eyes dark and wild. Luke’s eyes darted across the room, as though he was looking for clues to tell him if they were alone and apparently satisfied, he turned to face Reid and his expression changed instantly, softened when he laid eyes on Reid and he stared at him in a way that made Reid feel unsettled and shook him to the core.
Luke sighed, as his shoulders hung as if they carried the weight of the world. “Are you avoiding me?,” he blurted out, before swallowing thickly and pulling his bottom lip between his teeth. Reid’s jaw clenched at the question and he defensively crossed his arms over his chest and Luke, whose eyes took in Reid’s every move, had his answer right there.
“You know, Noah said that you’d told him I was at Memorial every day. And I spent the past few days going over it, how you’d possibly know that. I mean, why would you watch me, see me standing there every day, yet not talk to me at all? You’re avoiding me, shutting me out. Why?”
“I think you’re giving yourself too much credit. I’m a doctor, not just any doctor, I’m a neurosurgeon. It’s a demanding job, saving lives and the like and- You know what, I don’t have time to hold your hand every five minutes and cater to your every need.”
“That- That’s what you think we’re doing here? Really?! You think… I thought- I thought we were starting something here. You… I kissed you. Not just that, you kissed me back and you can’t seriously stand there and tell me you only did that, because I’m the one who needed it.”
“A kiss is just a kiss.”
“Yeah, keep telling yourself that.”
“No need to make it something it’s not.” Except that it was everything, the alpha and omega and the moment that divided his life into ‘before kissing Luke Snyder’ and ‘after kissing Luke Snyder’. And the ‘after’, every time he breathed or blinked or moved in the ‘after’, that was filled with images of Luke hovering over him with his blood on his lips, begging him to stay.
“Me avoiding you or shutting you out, as you like to call it, would be assuming you mean more to me than you do. And soon, that kiss and this little whatever you think is going on between us is gonna be nothing but a distant memory, just a blip on my radar.” His voice sounded so harsh that even he -Rude, cold and rude Dr. Oliver- didn’t recognize it and hurtful, about as much as being around Luke seemed to hurt and as much as the knowledge that the ache he couldn’t get rid of would be ignited as soon as Luke left.
“Well, if I’m a blip…” Like the iceberg that made the Titanic sink. “Then what about that night at the farm? That was just you comforting me, ‘holding my hand and catering to my every need’? Like I was the only one holding on and-”
“You just see what you want to see.”
“So this is how it’s gonna go?”
“This is just the way it’s always been. Do you need me to spell it out for you?”
“No, I’ve got it.” The tone in his voice and the sadness in his eyes revealed enough, making the room colder and paving the way for the dull ache in Reid’s chest. “I just don’t know why I ever thought it would be any different.”
“Good. Look, I’m quite busy right now and we have nothing to discuss anymore, so if you’d just go, then you can go on and find someone else to bother with your incessant chatter.”
Reid kept his arms crossed over his chest, waiting for Luke to be the first one to break and leave him alone. Luke studied him instead and stayed quiet, as quiet as Reid had seen him so far and after seconds or minutes or what felt like hours or decades or eternities, Luke inhaled a deep breath, as if it was the last one before sinking in a deep pool of water, as some sort of realization dawned upon him.
“Oh my God… You’re scared.”
“No, I’m not.” Reid stepped back and made a face in disgust, the suggestion even being too much to take. But his curiosity got the best of him. “Scared of what exactly?”
“Me. This, whatever this is that’s going on between us.”
“You’re hardly that intimidating, Luciano.” Luke raised his eyebrows in surprise and Reid rolled his eyes. “Katie.”
“Oh, I think- I think I scare the hell out of you. Just look at you, you can’t even be alone with me, without trying to stay at the opposite end of the room.”
“That’s ridiculous…”
“Is it? Because judging by the look on your face, the way you avoid having to look at me, the way you keep looking for the fastest way out- you know exactly what I’m talking about.”
“Tell me, Mr. Snyder, do you always come up with these outrageous accusations-”
“Don’t-”
“Or are they reserved specifically for me?”
“Reid, don’t-”
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have something more important to do, so if you’d just leave...” He turned around and walked over to the door. When he opened it, Luke didn’t make a move to walk out, as if he couldn’t even do it if he tried.
“I’m scared, too, Reid. Terrified, actually.”
Reid pinched the bridge of his nose, as his other hand formed a fist around the doorknob and he could barely stifle a frustrated groan. Luke moved closer to him and invaded his personal space again and Reid felt utterly and completely helpless, as Luke continued to break down his walls, one layer of cement at a time, one red brick after another. “Where do you get off saying the things that you do? You barge in here like you own this goddamn place and you-” Luke stood right next to him, close enough for Reid to feel his warm breaths and Luke covered his hand on the doorknob with his own and made him let go. When Reid sighed and complied, Luke softly closed the door and took a step toward Reid, who stepped back and flinched. “What are you doing?! Stop.”
“What am I supposed to do? Whenever I step forward, you step back. And now you’re this pompous ass after kissing me and making me feel like-”
“Like, what?” Damn that curiosity. “Making you feel like what?”
“Everything. Like this could be everything…”
“You barely know me.”
“But I feel like… Like I know the important parts…”
“You don’t know anything.”
“See, that’s where you’re wrong. You come off as this arrogant, pompous ass, who doesn’t care, and while that’s a part of you- The way you came to find me to tell me about Noah- I know you care too much….”
“Luke…”
“And I know you want me as much as I want you and I know I scare the shit out of you, because you’ve felt alone and aching for a long time-”
“Luke, stop-”
“Perhaps as long as I have and the thought- the knowledge of me being exactly what you need to make that go away, is too much and too real for you to handle. I know you better than you-”
“Mr. Snyder, that’s enough.”
“No, I’m not finished-”
Before Luke ever got around to finishing whatever he’d wanted to say, Reid lunged forward, his right hand seeking out the spot on the nape of Luke’s neck he’d become familiar with the last time and crashing into him and claiming his lips for his own.
Reid crashed into him with a force that made Luke stumble a bit, almost losing his balance. Reid’s left hand quickly moved around him, finding its place on the small of Luke’s back, pressing and holding him flush against him as if Luke would shatter to pieces if he didn’t. Reid demanded the entrance the hunger and thirst and ache told him he damn well deserved and Luke granted it, his resistance paper-thin, parting his pouty lips to still his hunger and accommodate his own unbearable desire.
Any chance he’d had of resisting, of maintaining any of the resilience he’d thought he had, was gone the second Reid’s lips had met his and as he returned the kiss, deepened it as though he wanted to devour every particle or atom or molecule or simply every piece of him, he felt possessed and consumed by the taste. The taste of Reid he wanted to absorb and cherish and build a fucking shrine to in all its addictive sweetness. He couldn’t hold it in anymore, couldn’t stop the craving from taking over and couldn’t stop himself from pushing back and taking control.
Luke pushed back hard and stepped forward, regaining his balance and causing Reid to lose his and Luke continued to move, his lips still on Reid’s and his hands on Reid’s shoulders, as he pushed and Reid pulled until the back of his knees hit the edge of the couch behind him and he fell back onto it with an oomph, losing the entrance, control and Luke’s warm lips. Before he could comment on it or release the heavy pants that were challenging his lungs, Luke leaned down, straddled him, his knees on the outsides of Reid’s thighs, fisted his maroon shirt and pulled him closer to him, so much closer, infinitely closer until the heat surrounding their bodies fused and merged as one.
When their lips parted, Reid shut his eyes and rested his forehead against Luke’s, needing oxygen in his lungs and coherency and clinical, doctoral thoughts to invade his brain, but instead, he discovered that his arousal clouded everything, as he inhaled Luke’s exhalations like a drug, as if Luke itself was the oxygen, the coherency and the only thoughts he would ever have or need. His lips met Luke’s once more and he sucked on Luke’s swollen bottom lip, before not too gently biting down and Luke’s hips jerked forward, applying pressure and causing a friction that made them both gasp, as Luke felt the fabric of his denims grinding against Reid’s groin, still imprisoned by his tight black jeans.
Reid felt his cock twitch at the overwhelming contact and as Luke stilled his movements right against his hardening, throbbing member, he released no sound but that of his heavy breathing for a few seconds in complete and utter peace, the same limbo they’d discovered after their first kiss, the crossroads, the in between, caught between what they felt and knew and what they wanted to know. Reid opened his eyes again and stared right into Luke’s and he saw nothing but clouded, darkened arousal and unresolved ache and a famished man not unlike himself.
But it didn’t last long and Luke was the first to move.
Within the blink on an eye, he hungrily attacked Reid’s mouth, his movement increasing the friction and heat and adding to Reid’s descent into madness, and Reid all but groaned in his mouth, violating whatever peace they’d had a moment ago, as Luke kissed him and his hands blindly found the top button of Reid’s maroon shirt.
Their tongues slid against each other in their attempt to ravish one another, challenge each other to the brink of insanity, as Luke frantically fiddled with the buttons and as Reid’s arms encircled Luke’s waist, one hand cupping his ass and the other snaking underneath his shirt, brushing past the scar on Luke’s side and grazing Luke’s spine with his fingernails down until he reached Luke’s denims. His fingers teased the waistband of Luke’s boxers underneath, not just yet dipping in the cleft of Luke’s ass and Luke broke the kiss with a choked sound and a hitch in his breath. The torturously soft grazes made the tiny blond hairs on the back of his neck stand up and hardened his cock even more and he buried his face in the crook of Reid’s neck.
If just kissing Reid had felt familiar, then this… This felt like home.
Luke’s hands revealed inches of Reid’s skin, of the hard, well defined muscles gracing Reid’s wired torso. He traced the lines of Reid’s muscles, his fingers slightly scratching and clawing Reid’s exposed skin and Reid’s muscles contracted at the touch. “I want you,” Luke murmured into his neck, as he planted kisses on Reid’s collarbone and Reid sighed, his own resistance as paper-thin as Luke’s had been. Luke continued to explore the lines and curves of Reid’s bare chest, tracing the lines all the way to the downward line of thin auburn hair, before lifting his hand and laying it over Reid’s heart, feeling the unsteady, rapid beats underneath his fingertips.
And it was then that Reid froze.
NEXT
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A/N: So, uhm, I'm off to bed... Please don't throw rocks at me? Thank you for reading!