“The things…” Leonidas paused and picked at his back molar with the tip of his tongue. This wasn’t a conversation he’d had with anyone before. He’d talked about likes and dislikes and limits and safewords, but something about this… “The things we did, in France.”
It looked like a wave of awareness washed over Andy, and he held tight to the arms of the chair. Leonidas could see him trying to play it cool, and he wondered if Andy was this transparent to everyone else or if it was a gift for Leonidas that Andy didn’t even know he was giving.
“What about them?” Andy rasped.
“I like that.”
“I know.” Andy’s lashes fluttered.
“I mean all the time, or more of the time.”
Andy tilted his head to the side and gave him a sad kind of smile.
“You’re too freewheeling for that kind of thing.”
“I like my freedoms,” he agreed. “I like being able to travel and go and do the things I want. But when I’m here, or…when I’m with a person.”
He let out a rough breath that puffed out his lips and shook his head, dropping it down so he stared at his lap. This was going all wrong, and he’d never admitted out loud to anyone that he felt best on his knees, that he got hard when he served and he got hard when his hardness was ignored. It had always been cute at first, but then his partners always grew tired and weary of it. No one had ever been able, or had even tried to find ways to make those things work in their daily life. It had been years since he’d suggested it, since he’d tried.
“I’ve never done it,” Andy said. “More than the way we’ve done it.”
“Maybe that’s better.” A smile pulled at the edges of his mouth. “I can tell you how to tell me what to do.”
“I think that defeats the purpose.”
“I think it could be fun.”
Andy pulled the beanie off his head again and tangled his fingers into his hair, giving it a little tug before dropping his hands back into his lap. He looked like he was in pain, his mouth angled into a twisted expression that read as part smile, part grimace, and the lines were back around his eyes.
“I want that with you,” Andy said with a squint. “I wantyou. But I want it to be more than just sex between us.”
“It is,” Leonidas quickly agreed. “I mean, kneeling. That kind of thing for me. It’s not all sex.”
That had always been the hardest part of the whole thing. It had taken so long for him to understand his own needs, to have to turn around and explain them to someone else coherently was often more struggle than it was worth. It was easy to find fleeting partners who let him kneel for a minute…for a moment, but no one wanted it when they got home from work and just wanted to relax and unwind.
Leonidas had known from a young age he was work, and he didn’t see that changing. He’d been desperate for clarity when he decided to do the camino, hoping he’d meet someone or find a sign along the way that made everything easier for him, but he didn’t. Instead, he found out things he already knew. That he loved his family, that he didn’t want to settle down, that he saw Andy existing in his future in ways he didn’t understand.
How could he understand it?
Long-term partners were not a thing he’d ever had, and he didn’t know how Andy, or anyone, could exist in his orbit when his direction was always changing.
“I don’t completely know what it means to you.” Andy tapped his fingers against his knee, and Leonidas’s chest collapsed. “But I want to understand.”
He looked up, eyes wide and his mouth slightly agape.
“So make me a list or make some notes or something.” Andy stood up and Leonidas saw the bulge between his legs. Andy didn’t try to hide himself. He looked proud, and it was a sharp reminder of what had drawn Leonidas to him in the first place. The way he’d looked so stoic in his observations of the world around him. It was appealing then, and now.
“I can try that,” he agreed.
“Can I try something?” Andy asked.
“Yes.”
“Kneel,” Andy croaked.
Leonidas slipped off the edge of the bed, his knees banging into the thin carpet. He blinked up at Andy, blood coursing through his body like electric currents that lit every nerve ending aflame.
“This feels sexual to me.” Andy grazed his fingertips over the erection tenting his skinny jeans.
