“Sure.”
For a few moments, as he grabbed the cans and sat beside Marc on the couch, nothing but the roaring of the bus’s engine could be heard. The night was pitch-black and calm outside, the complete opposite of the world inside his chest, where his heart was hammering furiously and his lungs were struggling to function normally.
It was ridiculous that he was this nervous just because they were alone, as if they hadn’t been in this situation before. Problem was that this time he had to bring up a topic that his friend would try to escape at all costs.
He hated it. Everything was going more than great, and although Chris still didn’t want to or couldn’t acknowledge it—maybe he wasn’t conscious of it—there was a spark between them. Something genuine and unique. That was why their proximity, all the times they had shared like that, had felt so good and intense. Why, no matter how strong his idiotic stubbornness was, Marc had realized that deep down there could be more for the guitarist to want to keep these dynamics going.
It was either that or he was losing his mind, because the way his friend had unabashedly stared at his dick the night before wasn’t the way an uninterested person would have looked at it.
The bassist took a swig of his beer and sucked in a hefty breath to encourage himself to break the awkwardness, but surprisingly, Chris beat him to it.
“We should go to bed or we’re gonna be dead tomorrow.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m not tired at all, though…”
“Me neither.”
Staring down, Marc couldn’t help but notice their thighs together. Chris’s leg was completely covered in tattoos, just like seventy percent of his skin, the ink disappearing up into his sweat shorts.
He bit his bottom lip when his eyes landed on his friend’s crotch. He’d fucking loved the way they’d indirectly rubbed against each other the night before. Wished he could have done a lot more. Kiss. Bite. Actually, fuck him. The way Chris looked when having sex was a sin, and he was more than ready to go to Hell.
“Everything okay?” the guitarist asked, scrutinizing his face as he sipped from his drink.
“Yeah. Why wouldn’t it be?” Marc glanced at the door where Erik had just disappeared a minute before.
Chris shrugged. “I have the impression you’ve been avoiding me most of the day.”
“I…” The bassist glanced at him, thinking twice before going on with what he wanted to say. Then chuckled. “I’ve just been in my head a lot because I wanted to talk to you about something, but didn’t know how.”
“Okay, that sounds awful. Should I be scared? What have I done now?” Chris laughed.
“Nothing really. It’s more about…” Lowering his tone, his next words came out like a whisper. “You’d tell me if I ever did anything that makes you uncomfortable in the slightest, right?”
“Of course.” The guitarist raised a questioning brow.
“I mean, while we’regetting downtogether.”
“I know what you meant.” He shifted in his seat, turning towards Marc, an elbow propped on the back of the couch. “Is there something bothering you?”
“Not really.” Marc gnawed the inside of his cheek. “How about you?”
“Are you referring to when you touched my balls and cock?”
Silence fell heavily between them for a few seconds. Out of all the possible ways this conversation could go, this was not one the bassist had considered. He was baffled.
“Yeah,” he finally said.
“No. Sure, it surprised me at first. I wasn’t expecting it. But I’m fine with it.”
“Fine.” Marc snorted.
Something in the way he said that word felt like a punch. The nonchalance in his attitude, as if it weren’t that big of a deal while for the bassist it was close to his perdition, was exasperating. Maybe he was just turning molehills into mountains since for Chris it had probably just been sex and that little contact was within the acceptable.
“With any other man, it would have been weird as fuck, but it’s us, dude. We’ve done some pretty crazy shit. A little touching is not gonna rattle my world.”
Another fucking punch.
