“It made me think,” he says, eyes not quite holding mine. “What it would feel like…to be on the receiving end.”
A short breath out through his nose, like he’s trying to reset.
“Not like I’m going to do anything about it soon,” he adds quickly. “Just… it’s been there.”
He gives a small, awkward shrug. Color creeps up his cheeks, more like embarrassment. But when he looks at me again, there’s something sharp under it. Heat, threaded straight through the discomfort. Lance is still fucking Lance underneath all that vulnerability.
I nod slowly, keeping my voice low and steady even though my pulse is hammering. “You mean you think you might want to bottom?”
Lance holds my stare for a long beat, then gives the smallest nod. “Yeah… that.”
“Mm,” I let out, heat hitting fast at the thought of him like that. I shove the image down hard. This moment is about him, not the way my body is reacting.
I’m trying to figure out why my first reaction is pure relief. Relief that I’m not the only one unraveling after everything that happened. It’s followed immediately by a sharp spike of panic, because he downloaded that goddamn app and tried to figure this out with strangers. The idea of some other man touching him, guiding him through this… it makes me want to put my fist through a wall.
So I say the only thing that actually makes sense. To me, at least.
“What if you figure it out with me?”
Lance turns to look at me, his eyes wide. “What?”
“You want to…know these things, see how you do with your attraction to men.” I swallow hard. “I’m a man.”
A beat passes and he just stares at me, completely still, like he’s trying to work out if I’ve fucking lost it completely.
“Uh-huh,” he manages to say, his gaze dragging over me, assessing, then comes back to my face like I’ve just proposed we rob a bank. “You want to help me to….explore.”
“We trust each other,” I say. I’m already in it now, so there’s no backing out. Nothing wrong with people using apps for that. It’s just not for him. I sure feel something else that spells along the lines of ‘never again’ and ‘not on my fucking watch’.
“And do what instead? Experiment with my bestfriend?”
“Why not?”
He laughs, but it’s the slightly hysterical, unhinged kind. “Because that’s insane? What if it becomes weird and we can’t come back from it?”
I turn fully toward him, voice low. “I’d rather risk that than watch you hand yourself over to strangers who don’t know you, don’t care enough to make it good or safe.”
Lance studies me, one eyebrow raised, but there’s a new edge of nervousness under the fire. “What do you get out of this?” His voice drops. “What’s in it for you?”
I can’t really answer that with something he can process tonight.
“I get to make sure you’re not stuck with some guy who thinks ‘discreet’ means he can do whatever the hell he wants.”
Lance’s face shifts from skepticism to a mix of confusion and reluctant amusement, like he’s fighting the urge to roll his eyes or smile.
“So if you’re going to figure out what you want with men,” I say, and this time I turn into him, shifting on the couch. My splinted hand comes up behind him, braced against the backrest as I lean in, boxing him in without touching him. “Do it with me. Not some stranger named Elliot.”
Our faces end up too close for this to pass as casual. I’m looking straight at him, holding it there, not giving him a way out of it.
Lance stills, his mouth parts slightly like he forgot to close it. Breath catching low in his throat. Tongue flicking out, dragging over his bottom lip before he seems to remember himself. It’s subtle, but I see it. I feel it.
He shifts on the couch like he’s just trying to get comfortable. But he leans back into the cushions at the same time, chest angling open, throat exposed for a second too long before he tilts his head and drags a hand through his hair. One leg moves, crossing over the other, bringing him just a fraction closer instead of away.
“Fuck,” he mutters under his breath, like the word belongs there more than anything else does right now.
It does something to the space between us. Tightens it without either of us moving properly.
Then, because he’s Lance, he ruins it.
