"Second door on the right," he said. "The room that was always mine when I stayed here."
We raced up the rest of the stairs and down the hall.
The room was smaller than I expected—a narrow bed pushed against the far wall, a worn dresser with an oval mirror, and a quilt stitched in faded blues and silvers that caught the glow from the bedside lamp. Honey-warm light spread across everything.
Broadway posters lined the walls. Sondheim, Porter, Bernstein—names I recognized from cast recordings Alex's grandmother used to hum along with during my repair visits. Iimagined a teenage Alex taping those up with care, planning an escape route that would take fifteen years to lead him back here.
He stood at the foot of the bed, watching me look around the room. Vulnerable in a way he hadn't been even during the hospital visits.
"I never brought anyone here," he said.
"Yes."
I crossed to him slowly, giving him time to change his mind, pull back, and remember all the reasons we might be going too fast. He didn't move. Just watched me.
When I reached him, I stepped between his knees where he'd sunk onto the mattress edge. His hands rested on my hips, fingers curling into the denim.
"We don't have to—"
"I want to." His thumbs pressed more firmly into my hip bones, sending sparks along my nerve endings. "I want all of it. With you."
I bent and kissed him, cradling his jaw in both hands. He sighed into my mouth and fell backward, pulling me down with him onto the narrow bed and its constellation quilt.
What came next surprised us both, I think.
Not the desire—that had been building for days, a slow accumulation of almost-touches and interrupted moments. What surprised me was the laughter. Alex fumbled with the buttons on my flannel, got one stuck in the buttonhole, and, instead of frustration, dissolved into giggles against my throat, his whole body shaking with it. I started laughing too, forehead pressed to his shoulder, and for a long moment we lay there, tangled together, laughing while the old bed creaked beneath us.
"Very smooth," he managed. "Very seductive."
"Shut up and help me with this."
He did, finally freeing the button and pushing the shirt off my shoulders. His laughter faded as his hands spread acrossmy chest, fingers tracing the lines of muscle. When he looked up at me, the humor had transformed into something more deliberate.
"You're gorgeous," he said. "You know that, right? All this time in your workshop, sawdust in your hair, looking like some lumberjack fantasy, and I kept thinking—" He shook his head. "I kept thinking I didn't deserve this."
"And now?"
"Now I'm going to take what I want."
He flipped us.
I hadn't expected that either—the sudden shift, his thighs straddling mine, his weight settling against my hips in a way that made my vision blur at the edges. He pulled his henley over his head in one fluid motion, and the lamp bathed him in gold and shadow: the flat stomach, the definition in his arms from years of dance, and the faint trail of hair leading down from his navel.
"Alex—"
"Shhh." He leaned down and kissed me, slow and thorough, while his hands worked at my belt. "Let me."
I didn't interrupt.
He undressed me—unhurried, absorbing every response. When he wrapped his hand around my cock, I made a sound halfway between a groan and a plea. His answering smile held an edge of wonder, like he couldn't quite believe he was allowed to touch me that way.
"I want—" His voice caught. He tried again. "I want to feel you. Inside me. Can we—"
"Yes." The word came out ragged. "God, yes."
The next few minutes were a blur of logistics—supplies retrieved from the nightstand (he'd planned this, I realized, or at least hoped for it), and the careful work of preparation, sheathing a cock, that he insisted on directing.
"Slower," he breathed at one point as I began to thrust, his back arching off the mattress. "Just—there.There."
