Title: New York
Author: cgb (luberluber@yahoo.com.au)
Fandom: Nip/ Tuck
Category: Sean/ Christian
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Maybe Christian is already asleep and
baiting Sean in his dreams.
Author’s notes: Very much set after the threesome in
“Rose & Raven Rosenberg.” Any other fandom and there would be a whole
plethora of fic set after this episode.
For Epicanthus for her birthday.
*
In any moment of clarity there is a super-fine line
between the realisation of truth and the effectiveness of self-deception. Lies
are prettier than the truth and often more compelling, but lies can also be
complex and involved, containing the kind of depth one expects from reality. A
good lie is a truth in the end.
So it could be the drugs, the alcohol, or the
endorphins constructing a whole new reality for him, or it could be the
realization of something he’s always known, something real. It doesn’t matter
of course. It’s there. That’s the point.
He’s turned away from Christian but they’re separated
by less than three feet of floor space so he can still hear Christian
breathing. The room is dull-grey dark, lit from streetlights ghosting through
the window. Sean can make out the pattern on the curtains.
Christian breaks the silence. "Was it good for
you too, sweetheart?" But maybe that part is a lie. Maybe Christian is
already asleep and baiting Sean in his dreams. In Sean’s dreams Christian never
lies. He walks through walls, morphs into a vamprire, asks Sean for his
pharmacology notes but never, never lies.
If he’s dreaming then this is where it starts. "I
gave you the opportunity," Sean says. "Why didn’t you take it?"
There’s a long pause. The breathing goes quiet.
"What are you talking about?" Christian says eventually.
Sean rolls onto his back. "There was Julia, of
course," he says. "But there was always Julia."
"Go to sleep, Sean."
But they’re already asleep. If he closes his eyes
he’ll wake up and he’ll be living in suburbia with a beautiful wife and two
children who look just like him.
"Why didn't you fuck me, Christian?"
"Excuse me?"
"Isn't that what you wanted?"
There's another pregnant silence, and then Christian
laughs. "We get naked once in eighteen years and suddenly we’re gay? I
hate to break it to you Sean but I really did have sex with all those women and
enjoyed every minute. I suppose you think that’s over-compensating?”
“People aren’t labels, Christian.” Not husband, not
father, not doctor, not best-friend, not mid-life crisis victim.
“Well, thank Christ for that because you sure as hell
sound like a lunatic right now.”
Sean pushes his blanket down around his hips. It's
warm in their hotel room. All that body heat. "I'm not talking about being
gay. I'm talking about you and me. We never..." They never said it out
loud. Saying it out loud makes it real – something less than it is. "We don't
talk about us."
"Sean..."
"Oh, screw the straight act, Christian. I was there in college. I saw
Billy Ellison coming out of our room more times than I can count on one hand,
and he wasn't there to smoke weed." He never asked Christian why he
screwed girls in their dorm room when he knew Sean had nowhere else to go. He
never asked why the room smelled of pot when Sean returned from a weekend with
his parents or a night out with Julia.
"That was college," Christian says.
"What the fuck does it matter?" Sean says.
He wonders when they started pretending with each other. If it’s something they
do because they always did.
"You're not that fucking simple, Christian. You never have been.”
“It doesn’t mean anything,” Christian says.
“It means everything.” Sean raises himself up on his
elbows. Across the room Christian is lying on his back, fingers interlaced on
his torso. “You think about it.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I do too.”
Christian rolls onto his side, looks at Sean with big
eyes, wide open. It's not new. Christian's always looked at him like that. “You
want to fuck?” Christian says quietly. “Is that what you want?"
Sean meets Christian’s eyes. Words can’t describe what
Sean wants.
Christian throws his blanket back, gets out of bed,
naked and purposeful. He looms large at the end of Sean's bed, half-erect and
lips parted. This is what Christian
does, takes charge in the bedroom the way he never takes charge in the surgery.
Sean is an intern, and this is graduation day.
Christian leans forward, rests his closed fists on the
bed, and crawls toward Sean. Christian is half wolf, half cat, and sometimes
human. He has animalistic appeal and knows it.
He works his way up Sean's body, hands either side of
Sean’s hips, Sean’s chest. He stops when he's inches from Sean's face.
"You want this?" he says.
From very far away Sean hears himself say,
"yes."
Christian kisses him. It's hard, punishing. Not kind.
Christian is making a point, leaving an impression. Sean opens his mouth,
kisses Christian back. It’s all he can do.
Christian moves down, teeth against Sean’s collar
bone, his rib cage, his thigh. His tongue follows the line from Sean’s hip to
his groin, stops when he’s reaches the smattering of hair below the navel. He
says, "Is this your first time?" and doesn’t wait for a response.
"Don't worry, sweetheart - I'll be gentle." He touches Sean, one
finger on the tip of Sean’s cock, sliding all the way down to the base. “Just
relax.”
He has lube in his overnight bag and Sean thinks,
'Christian has lube?' before thinking 'of course, Christian has lube.'
Christian expects sex.
Christian touches Sean with lubed hands and it's slick
and smooth and effortless, leaving a sheen on Sean’s skin where Christian’s
hands have been. And then Christian is
parting his knees, settling between them, and there are fingers between Sean's
legs, trailing across the skin beneath his balls, skimming the sensitive area
between his cheeks.
Then the fingers are inside him and it's not like
Sean's never fingered his own ass before because boys experiment, particularly
boys who go to med school. He studied proctology and learned the tissue
surrounding the glands and stroma contain sensitive nerve endings which respond
to massage and friction. And maybe his lecturer never meant to promote anal sex
as a viable alternative to vaginal intercourse but he gave Sean a reason to
stick a finger up his ass to see if he liked it.
He liked it a lot. He would have said so to Julia but
there are some things you never ask of the mother of your children.
Christian extracts his fingers puts his hands under
Sean's knees, raising his legs up. He nudges Sean's ass and Sean tenses.
"I can stop if you want," Christian says. It's a dare.
"Not a chance."
"Are you sure?" Christian says. "I'm
bigger than most, you know." He touches himself so Sean can see.
"I know," Sean says. "I saw." He
was watching. He’s watched before. Christian knows this too.
Christian edges in. He's slow and careful but Sean
feels it like its tearing him apart. He presses his head back into the pillow,
breathes carefully, counting each breath out: one, one-two-three-four, two
one-two-three-four…
"Sean?" Sean raises his head, and there's
Christian, mouth partly open, eyes glassed and deep. He's got Sean by the ass,
holding him in place, hard up against Christian’s hips. Christian moves oh-so
slowly and it's better, much better. It’s dirty and deep and Sean feels it
everywhere.
Sean breathes out. "Ohhhh..."
And just like that Christian's face falls, like
something inside him breaks.
"Oh god... oh god Sean." His hand
reaches out, splays across Sean's thigh, and they're fucking - they're really
fucking - and there's no Julia, no stand-in, just them: limbs and skin and
breath and blood and every moment of their lives that brought them here and
now.
"Yes." Sean reaches out for Christian's
hand, grasps it hard, like he's hanging on for dear life. "Yes, Christian
– fuck me."
And they fuck with eyes open, hands held.
Later, Christian collapses onto the bed beside Sean,
his body curled against Sean's and his face against Sean's hair. He puts his
hand on Sean's chest and whispers, "Sorry, sorry..." against Sean's
ear.
Sean doesn't ask him what he means. He reaches for
Christian's face, the back of his hand resting against Christian's cheek.
"It's okay," he says. "It's all right."
*
On the flight home Christian flirts with the
stewardess. Sean doesn’t pay attention. He's seen it before. He dozes, head
against the headrest, leaning to the side. He woke up alone this morning.
Christian was awake, showered and packing. They didn’t talk about it.
They say things are different in the harsh light of
day and what happens in New York stays in York, but the night has its own
distinction and whose to say the bright light of New York are more distracting
than the swaying palms of Miami? Real life is being careful, being predictable,
reliable. Real life is pretending you have purpose without ever actually
reaching it. Maybe it was never supposed to be that way?
Christian orders scotch and his arm touches Sean’s on
the armrest between them. He call feel Christian’s warmth radiating through the
sleeve of his jacket and into Sean’s wrist. He thinks of them naked, sweat
drenched bodies lying uncovered in the cool early morning. He has this at
least.
One day, maybe years later, maybe next year, they’ll
talk about it and it will go like this:
Sean will say, “Remember that time we…”
And Christian will say, “I don’t want to talk about
it.”
Sean will smile, wonder why it is that Christian’s
overt sexuality is in so much need of protection. He’ll say, “I never felt like
that before… not with Julia, not with Meghan, not with anyone,” and he won’t
look at Christian when he says it.
And Christian won’t answer but Sean will know. There
was never anyone else. There will never be anyone else. This is how it is, and
there’s nothing left to say.
End.