find you out
graphic by jchalo

Joe has just spent thirty thousand dollars on the transformation of the spare room downstairs into an office.  Writers need a space to work, but no one has bothered to tell him that they do their best work bleary-eyed on the living room floor the night before a deadline, surrounded by clutter.  In his head, his writer-self sits in an office lined with oak shelves, tapping out solid storylines while sipping occasionally at a cup of coffee.  In his vision, the coffee is never cold and the screen never blinks its cursor at him for hours, maddeningly blank. 

 

In reality, the office doesn't make the writer of him he'd hoped.  He remembers writing from before, but there's a difference between a magazine piece and a whole sprawling universe.  At first he plays with different Atlantis scripts until he's bored and restless, and then finally one day on set David strips off his uniform jacket and says, "So, I'm writing this script…" and that's it.

 

Joe knows as soon as he sees it that he wants in.  Unlike the wordy, unwieldy pages of his own project, David's premise is sharp and original.  They spend a few days feeling each other out a bit, throwing around ideas.  Before long, every thought of David's is sparking a fresh idea of his own until they're fitting their ideas together like the tight edges of a puzzle, snap snap snap, and Joe falls in love with the creative process all over again.   

 

He's spent the past couple years with David, months at a stretch where they live practically the same life.  Working together like this is different, however, almost like starting the getting acquainted process all over again, the polite tiptoe of restraint that David seems to sense, too.  The first few times, he greets Joe at the door like company, and then one day Joe shows up and finds him holed up in his office half-crazy with frustration, throwing crumpled paper balls into his wastebasket.  His robe is frayed along the cuffs, and he doesn't bother to change.  "This is how I actually write," he says sheepishly. "The robe is for your benefit." 

 

Thirty thousand dollars on contractors and a sleek, multi-compartmented desk, and Joe finds out what no one told him, that he does his best work in David's makeshift office with shag carpeting, Star Wars posters, and an old couch too ugly for the rest of the house. 

 

***

 

"Have you thought about who we'll cast?" David asks one long afternoon during a two week break.  He's lying across the couch, feet propped up on the end, hands busy with a worn-out Rubix Cube, which leaves Joe stuck at the desk.  It's a lazy day; what he's mostly done so far is create neat borders of plus signs between each scene. 

 

"A little bit.  It does help to have a picture in my head when I'm writing." 

 

"Me too.  And the best thing about writing your own movie, of course, is casting yourself in the starring role." 

 

"Uh-" Joe huffs out a small laugh and swivels in the chair to look at David, just to see if he's serious.  It's hard to tell, sometimes. 

 

"Oh, come on.  Like you weren't thinking the same thing.  Jake?  He's totally you." 

 

"He's not me.  He's kind of an idiot." 

 

"And?"  David smirks for a beat, and dodges the pencil Joe throws in his direction.  "Sharp object!  You could put my eye out, and then what would the fans say?" 

 

"Your fans?  They'd probably develop an eye patch fetish.  And…really?  You think…me?"  Swiveling back toward the computer, he squints at the visible portion of the script, at Jake's naïve mistakes made over and over again, all manipulated by the other main character, Eric.  

 

"I thought maybe," David says thoughtfully.  "Anyway, since you don't quite reach his level of idiocy, you can always try pretending.  What's that called again…?  Oh, acting.  You might be good at it." 

 

"Fuck off," Joe says, but he likes writing his own parts, and he likes that it was David's idea first.  "And you're Eric," he says, only a half-question.  "You've always wanted to play the bad guy." 

 

"He's not inherently evil.  More…a con man with a heart of gold." 

 

"I haven’t seen much of the 'heart of gold' part yet." 

 

"Not yet.  You'll see.  He's not so bad." 

 

"Because you're playing him?" 

 

David snorts loudly.  "Because I'm writing him." 

 

*** 

 

There is a small, modest bar a few blocks from the studio where they take refuge on the days when things go particularly badly on set.  It doesn't happen often, which is good for job security, but on the rare occasions when they do limp into the dim, cozy haven, it feels better than a thousand dead-on takes.  Whether it's the place or the company, Joe thinks the times they spend here are almost worth the frustration of flubbed lines, missed marks, and malfunctioning pyro. 

 

He takes the same spot as always, a seat in the corner, at the end of a cushioned bench seat with a long table, the only place big enough for their party—not that they stay put.  David is rarely in his seat; always in demand, surrounded by a crowd of laughter at the bar, the pool table, even the hallway to the bathroom.  It's been so long since Joe had a regular job, he's forgotten how much camaraderie can develop between people that work together for weeks, months, years at a stretch. 

 

There is a simple pleasure in the predictability of Paul being at David's side, of Jason pestering someone into playing pool with him, and the fact that he will always lose.  Rachel will only dance with people she knows, a rule that provides endless entertainment for the spectators of the group.

 

Across from Joe, there is an empty chair that belongs to David, who left forty-five minutes ago to fetch another beer.  Joe can see him at the bar, talking animatedly with Torri and two women Joe has never seen before.  He's an impossible man to get alone, which makes it all the more surprising when he makes his way over and slides in across from Joe. 

 

"You and bars," he says, amused.  "What is it about this place that turns you into a wallflower?" 

 

Joe shrugs and lifts his glass.  "The beer?  Or maybe the ten hours I just put into running through a field with three weapons and a field pack strapped to my body."

 

"Nah, must be the beer.  Believe me, the last thing you want to do is shatter my illusions about your action-hero abilities.  If you're tired, the rest of us don't have a chance." 

 

Joe smiles and takes a long swig, letting the beer settle heavily into his limbs, a gentle buzz that leaves him loose, comfortably warm and content.  When he stretches out his legs under the table, his foot collides with David's and a playful scuffle ensues before David leaves his seat and comes around to Joe's side, sliding in next to him on the bench seat. 

 

"Every film needs a bar scene," David says matter-of-factly, and it surprises Joe, the way just the mention of it raises a swell of warmth in his chest.  David's sharp chin tips up toward the other side of the room.  "See that guy over there?  He's Tank." 

 

Joe follows his gaze until he runs across a gangly young man slumped in a corner booth, face-down on a table.  Upon closer look, he sees the ashtray wedged between the table and the guy's face.  "Ouch," he says.  "You're right; he's totally Tank." 

 

"I know, right?  And—"  He stops abruptly.  "Do you mind talking about this, now?  There's never any time."

 

"Not at all."  They've agreed not to discuss the script at work, but David is right; there's no time for this during production, and he misses it.  "We could make more time, you know.  If you wanted.  I've got some ideas, but I hate to write stuff down before we've talked about it." 

 

"Me too, me too!" David enthuses.  "I have no way of knowing how stupid some of my ideas are until I've said them out loud." 

 

"You could say them out loud at home."

 

"It's actually your face that reveals the absurdity.  You look something like this."  He turns his face toward Joe and pulls a politely disdainful expression. 

 

"I look like that?  I don't look like that."  The beer feels cold and smooth on his throat; it just might be the best beer in the world.  They ought to have crappy days more often. 

 

"Well, of course I could never achieve an exact duplication, a fact that I'm sure my agent mourns daily.  But you get the idea.  Let's hear what you’ve got." 

 

"Okaaaay."  He hates the goofy smile that he can't suppress in response to the compliment.  "I've been thinking about Jake.  And I don't think he's really the idiot his decisions make him out to be.  You know?  I think he's just a little…" 

 

David leans in close, his eyes bright and interested.  "Obsessed?" 

 

"Yeah."  Joe slumps back in his seat, relieved.  "With Eric.  Is that weird?" 

 

A pause, a dark glimmer where Joe is used to seeing clarity.  "Weird can be good.  The best character development is weird, don't you think?"   Joe is still mulling that over when there is a sudden riot of voices across the room calling for David, who waves and shakes his head until they give up. 

 

"I guess.  He can't say no to Eric.  He sees the train wreck coming, but he does it anyway.  It's sick."  Not that he disapproves.  It's a movie, after all, and with some of the stuff they've talked about, it's already bound for an R rating.  "So I was thinking…" 

 

Thirty eight years old and he can't say it, can't even risk the disapproval that he knows would never come from an artist like David.  Stalling, he takes another swallow of beer, and wow, it's the last one, warm and fizzy in his mouth.  Another drink miraculously appears near his elbow and he lets the waitress slide it in front of him, disappearing the empty, smudged glass too quickly to even thank her. 

 

"You were saying?" 

 

When he shrugs, his shoulder bumps David's, but he doesn't move away.  They must look annoyingly secretive huddled here in the back, but they don't want anyone to overhear, although he's pretty sure David tells Paul everything. 

 

"I just think Jake is kind of headed, um.  That he would do anything for Eric, and that it's not very healthy.  The things he would do." 

 

"No, you're right, it's not.  But that's what gets him to the point where we need him, I think.  Where he's involved in Eric's mess, in his, uh—the scams he's pulling, and he can't get out.  His codependency helps get him there." 

 

"Yeah."  It's almost what he'd meant.  What he'd wanted to say is this: Jake wants Eric in ways that will destroy him.  For every scene they've written, Jake has gotten further entangled in his own misplaced infatuation with a character completely unworthy of that trust. 

 

He lets it go for now.  It's bound to come up again.  Right now, he is content to sit pressed into this corner booth with David's constant stream of conversation in his ear and his friends' happy sounds all around him.  It's so easy to just let it all wash over him.

 

"We have that day off this weekend," David is saying, and he tries to pay attention.  "What do you say we try and write some action sequences?" 

 

Joe snorts lightly; sequences plural seems a bit ambitious considering how much time they spend going over every detail, but sudden bursts of productivity have been known to happen. 

 

"Is that a no?"  Smirking, David sweeps Joe's car keys up from the table and pockets them. 

 

"No, I want to.  Sounds good."  He's been storing up Jake's words for weeks, now, and he's more than ready to get them out and see what David makes of them.  "What are you doing?" 

 

"Driving you home." 

 

"Oh."  He does feel a bit blurred around the edges, buzzed enough that when he slides his arm around David's shoulders and says "Thanks," he leaves it there for a few moments and squeezes hard, just once, before he lets go and calls for his check.

 

***

 

Joe has never collaborated creatively, not in the way he's doing with David.  He's been allowed to play in the Stargate sandbox, but this thing he's doing now is different in ways that aren't always comfortable. 

 

For example, he can't stop dwelling on Jake.  Ten times a day he stops and scribbles down something Jake might say, something he might do, and behind each idea there are ten justifications for every thought and action.  It gets to the point where he doesn't even get ideas for Eric anymore, he's so busy shaping Jake out of small, fragile pieces of himself.

 

Not that David minds; if he finds anything odd about Joe's pages and pages of character notes on Jake, he doesn't say anything.  There are a couple pages that Joe keeps toward the bottom of the stack--not hiding them, exactly, because David is supposed to have access to everything, all in the name of the creative process.  Technically, everything is right there for the taking, including Joe's formerly private thoughts that seem to bubble up and out of him, spilling into the script until there's so much of himself in it that he wonders how he's going to be able to look anyone in the eye after they see the final product.  This tiny, nagging worry is the thing that keeps him from being able to completely let go. 

 

David laughs when Joe shows up the next day, touches his own unshaven face and smirks at Joe's hopeless bedhead and threadbare track pants.  He's still wearing plaid pajama bottoms and a coffee-stained t-shirt, so he doesn't change, and instead they share the couch, passing hard copies of their latest work back and forth between them.  

 

Joe is brought up short when he looks at what David has been working on, a lot of plot-tightening notes along with a scene where David has written Eric with a sensitivity Joe hadn't even known he'd possessed, and in the process finally given Eric more depth than the bastard he's seemed to be up until now. 

 

"This is good," he says, and runs his eyes over the words again, his pulse quickening with the never-old sensation of perfect creative synchronism.  "This is exactly how Jake sees Eric.  Already," he adds, just in case David doesn't get it.  "I mean, yeah." 

 

David's smile goes all the way to his eyes.  "It's all coming together."  The happiness on his face reflects Joe's own, which makes it easier to hand over the page he's been holding back.    

 

"I wrote this last week," he says casually.  "I think it fits yours."  He waves David's scene with one hand and then smoothes it out, reads it over again while he's waiting. 

 

This is the worst part.  David is a fast reader; he's got a quick mind, period, but it takes an eternity for him to read over Joe's messy scribbles. 

 

While he waits, he gets up and goes to David's desk, rummages around in the top drawer until he comes up with a handful of paper clips.  Head down, hands nervous, he hooks them together, unable to stop thinking of what David is looking at, the part where he couldn't keep the complicated undertones of Jake's feelings for Eric from bleeding into his words.

 

Finally, David clears his throat and Joe forces himself to make eye contact.  He recognizes David's expression from the bar, the intense appraisal that looks an awful lot like approval. 

 

"This is what you think about them?" he asks, his eyebrows high, and Joe nods, hand clenched around his paper clip chain.

 

"I know we didn't talk about it, but I think it's-" 

 

"No, no, it's there," David hurries to assure him.  "It's like what we talked about last night.  Jake is hung up on Eric and I think you really…capture that, in all its dimensions."    

 

Joe feels flushed all the way down his neck; pleased and mildly embarrassed all at once.  "Then why do you look so surprised?"

 

"Surprised?"  David flops back onto the couch, his arms crossing his chest, hands tucked beneath his underarms.  "Not surprised, just extremely impressed.  We work well together," he says smugly.  "I like what we're doing." 

 

"I like what we're doing, too," he says slowly.  There must be something on his face, something that shows too much, because David gives him a long, measuring look before declaring it lunchtime and producing a Chinese takeout menu from nowhere.  Joe breathes, and just like that, finds out what it's like to leave himself completely unguarded to another person, after all.  

 

***

 

Sometimes, they don't write.  Sometimes the only way they can keep their sanity is to stop for a while, and today is one of those times.  It's been a long week at work and they probably shouldn't have even tried, but Joe agreed to it more because he wants to hang with David than any motivation to work. 

 

"Do you want to just go do something else?"  Joe pulls off the glasses he never lets anyone see him wear and throws down his pen, which is mostly symbolic at this point.  An hour ago, David had made scorecards out of index cards and a highlighter and has begun holding them up every time Joe voices a new idea.  The last eight have scored 3.0 or less. 

 

"You and me?"

 

Joe pauses.  He hadn’t exactly meant that, but when he thinks about it, he doesn’t want David to leave.  “Yeah.” 

 

“What do you have in mind?” 

 

"I need to get out of here."  It’s more than that, but if David senses this, he doesn’t say so.

 

"That sounds…absolutely necessary, at this point.  If we stay here much longer you'll be forced down to amateur status," David agrees.  "Did you have something in mind?"

 

"I just want to go, drive down the coast, maybe.  It's pretty bad when your own house is making you claustrophobic."

 

The best thing about David is that he doesn't ask why.  He just shuts his laptop, stands up, and rubs his hands together, waiting for instruction, something Joe never sees on set.  Everyone is always looking to David to see what's next, to entertain them, to lead them in whatever direction he deems best, and he happily—obliviously, some would say, but Joe knows better—obliges. 

 

But more and more, Joe has noticed that David defers to him, letting him take up the reins not just creatively, but for other things as well.  This seems to include how they spend their free time, because Joe has a feeling he could have suggested anything and David would have agreed. 

 

They drive all afternoon, talking about everything, and stopping every so often at points of interest.  There's a map in the glove box, which they'll need for the trip home, but for now he just needs to drive and listen to the radio.  He also needs for David to pretend there isn't something strange about the way he's acting, which he thankfully does.    

 

I’m taking this project in the wrong direction, he almost says a hundred times.  I have no clue what I’m doing.  But David never gives him the chance, and by the time it’s late enough for that kind of conversation, they’re so far from their eighty pages of potential disaster that it no longer seems to matter.

 

***

 

“We should just make a weekend of it,” David says, just after dark.  There are sheets of rain coming at them from every direction, and the frantic efforts of the windshield wipers are barely enough to keep Joe on the road. 

 

“Some weekend,” Joe says, but he likes the rain and he knows David does, too. 

 

“Room service,” David coaxes.  “Hot tubs.” 

 

“You had me at room service,” Joe says.  “I think there’s a map in the glove box, see if you can find-“ he stops short when the engine clangs loudly and begins to clatter rhythmically, ominously, as they lose momentum.  He exchanges a solemn look with David before popping the hood and sighing in resignation.  “I’m going to check it out,” he says, as though there’s the slightest chance that his looking under the hood will do any good whatsoever. 

 

"It's bad," he says when he gets back in the car, water streaming all over his leather interior.  "The belt must've gotten hung up on something." 

 

"Can we fix it?"  David is wet, too; Joe had seen him out inspecting the contents of the trunk.

 

"It's shredded.  It could snap any second."

 

"Fuck.  I found this flashlight in the trunk.  We could use it to flag down the next car." 

 

Joe scratches his cold, prickly thighs through heavy wet denim.  "Or we could try to make it to that motel, call a tow truck and worry about it tomorrow."  He points at the brightly-lit sign a ways up the road. 

 

"Even better."  Another yes, of course it's fine—does David ever say no? 

 

"You don't have to do this, you know." 

 

"What?"  David wipes at his dripping face with the back of his hand. 

 

"This!  This- this accommodation.  Saying yes all the time, letting me—letting me fuck things up like I'm doing.  Like I'm about to do," he adds angrily. 

 

"What the hell are you talking about?  Just get the car started and let's get somewhere warm." 

 

"Fine," he says, and revs the engine furiously, producing a cloud of steam from beneath the hood.  They drive the remaining thousand meters in silence, and when the car stutters to a stop, it's near enough the motel's office to make a run for it.  Neither of them move. 

 

"What do you mean, do this?" David asks quietly.  His hair is utterly drenched, dark with rain above his ears and along his hairline. 

 

This isn't the place for this conversation, but Joe is tired and pissed off and sick of questioning everything.  "This whole thing.  You have a good thing going with Paul; why did you even ask me?" 

 

David doesn't say anything, and for a long time it's just the sound of rain pelting the windows all around them.  It's getting chilly; Joe's clothes are soaked, clammy and itchy against his skin.  He refuses to fidget, though, just stares steadfastly at the steering wheel until David finally speaks. 

 

"You've heard people talking," he says evenly, as though he's figured everything out.  "This isn't even about me." 

 

Of course it's about you, Joe thinks, and it's so depressing, because what isn't about David lately?  But he's right; he's heard the talk from day one.  David Hewlett is working with who? And why?   Sometimes, he dreads the moment people actually see their script, because it's not funny, not in the way they'll expect.  Instead, it's dark and twisting and blood-sharp, and they're going to look at Joe and wonder what he's done to him. 

 

"I don't care what people say," Joe says automatically.  You're not supposed to care.  If there's ever been a time in his life where he hasn't needed to care, this is it. 

 

David nods, or maybe it's a shudder, because he's as soaked as Joe.  "What did you think?" he asks, his eyes narrowed on Joe's face.  "That I was going to run the whole show?  Tell you what to write, what to think?"

 

Joe shrugs.  "Maybe." 

 

An offended sound, then a dry little laugh.  "I'm not…whatever you think I am.  If I could do this on my own, I would.  But you have things we need to make this as good as it's going to be.  I knew you had it, and you do.  So I don't see the problem, other than your being a completely self-centered jackass." 

 

"Oh." 

 

"So can we please go inside?"   

 

"Yeah."  The rain hasn't let up at all, so he braces himself against the cold and gets out of the car.  His socks have remained the one relatively dry item of clothing up until now, but the parking lot is a lake, and he can hear David sloshing along behind him.  When they get to the office, his pants are soaked up to the knees, a heavy weight on his belt. 

 

As far as roadside motels go, it's not that bad.  It's clean and modern, with cozy rooms that look as though they were decorated by Joe's grandmother.  While David is in the shower, Joe peels off his freezing clothes and cranks up the heat so he can sit on the high, well-cushioned bed and make the call. 

 

"Oh, nice," David says when he emerges from the bathroom, pink-faced and freshly scrubbed.  His arms fall away from where they'd been wrapped around his torso, bracing against the cold air he'd expected.  "You know your way around a thermostat; I knew you weren't just a pretty face." 

 

Joe ignores the comment and looks away from David’s pale, broad shoulders; he'd learned to ignore any remark with the word "pretty" in it by the time he'd reached high school.  "They'll be here to tow the car in thirty minutes, and they'll call in the morning to let me know whatever." 

 

"Good.  So…food?" 

 

Joe rolls onto his stomach and eyes his wet pile of clothes with resignation.  The only place to get food is the café on the other side of the motel, and David is already washed and warm.  "You owe me," he groans. 

 

"I’m good for it." 

 

Grudgingly, he gets up and with some effort, works his ice-cold jeans up over his legs.  "Any requests?" 

 

"Just food.  Lots of it," David adds.  He crawls onto his bed and points the remote at the television while Joe dashes out into the rain. 

 

***

 

David meets him at the door, where he takes the plastic bags from Joe's hands while he puddles all over the doorway.  He's on the phone, not a surprise.  David's phone is this endless ringing annoyance, a hundred people clamoring to tell him their every thought.   Every time Joe picks up the phone to call David he thinks of the people he might be bothering with the interruption, but they're probably the same people calling and interrupting him, so he always goes ahead and dials anyway, only with a vengeful sense of satisfaction.

 

He strips again, flinging his wet clothes into the sink while David unloads the bags, making appreciative sounds with every container he unwraps.  A glance in the mirror reveals blue-tinged lips, so Joe ducks into the bathroom for a hot shower before joining David at the table. 

 

"What's that?"  David points at the package on the bed, double-wrapped in plastic bags. 

 

Tugging at the knot of plastic, Joe unties the bag and pulls out a stack of clothing, blissfully warm and soft against his palm.  "The front desk lady took pity on me when I went in for toothbrushes.  They're from the lost and found, which—"   He laughs at David's appalled expression.  "—I know, but she promised that she washed them herself, and at this point it's either this or my naked ass." 

 

"And mine."  David is still wearing his towel.  "What've we got?" 

 

Joe unfolds what appears to be a plain gray t-shirt and two pair of black sweatpants.  "Not bad," he says, and then stops short when he sees the other shirt, a faded blue t-shirt that reads: I Believe In Angels.  A few silver sparkles cling to the outline of a large winged angel, which had apparently at one time been composed of glitter. 

 

"No," David says.  He grabs for the gray t-shirt, but Joe holds it just out of reach. 

 

"Nuh-uh," he says.  The t-shirt falls onto the bed.  "I can't wear that." 

 

"I can't, either." 

 

"Come on, you believe in angels." 

 

"If it means wearing this, then I'm willing to rethink my entire belief system." 

 

"It's just the two of us, here.  No one has to know." 

 

"Sorry.  Unfortunately for you, that looks like a woman's small.  There's no way it's fitting me, and since we're in an emergency survival situation here, that's what it comes down to."  David holds out his hand and Joe reluctantly hands it over, only because David is right, and even with the heat cranked up, he can see the way David's arms are covered with goose bumps, his nipples pebbled as though he can't get warm.

 

"I’m not a woman’s small,” he says sourly, but takes the shirt anyhow.  It figures that David would choose now to start saying no.

 

Fashion offenses aside, the clothes feel so good that Joe doesn't really mind, so long as he doesn't look down at the front of his shirt.  And the food is good; soup, sandwiches, macaroni and pie, which they eat at the small table, smiling triumphantly, as though they're not stranded in a crappy wet motel, sans underwear. 

 

***

"I was just thinking that this is something Jake and Eric would do.  Somewhere they might stay.”

 

"Yeah.  But they'd be staying here because some thug was trying to kill them." 

 

Joe nods his agreement, his imagination flooded with a dozen images of Jake and Eric in this same scenario; desperate, tense, a little angry.  Eric possesses an edge of anger at all times, unlike David, who is so many things: forward and gregarious, intuitive and always focused.  That's where Jake comes in.  He takes Eric's anger, gathers up his damaged baggage and absorbs it with his own endless need. 

 

If Eric and Jake were in this motel room, Jake would be stuck wearing the angel t-shirt and would probably let Eric strip him of it beneath one of those soft, quilted bedspreads. 

 

He stares at the dark ceiling and curls his fingers around a handful of that bedspread.  "But no one kills them," he says, belatedly catching something in David's tone. 

 

"It's just something I was thinking about."

 

"Why not Eric?" 

 

"You think Eric should die?"

 

"You think Jake should die?" 

 

"No!  I mean.  Maybe. All things considering, it might be the right thing to do.  A fitting punishment for Eric." 

 

Joe pauses.  "Punishment?" he asks softly.  Asking is almost like telling a lie, because he knows—he knows what David means, but it's still a surprise every time he's reminded of how closely their thoughts run together. 

 

***

***

 

After their talk in the car, Joe doesn’t feel as inclined to give up, so they go back to plodding along with the script, which is over half finished. 

 

"Things need to come to a head with Jake and Eric,” David says for the third time that evening.  He is anything but subtle. 

 

"Mmm.  Maybe they could get, um, stuck in an elevator with a therapist.”  He’s only half joking.  It could work. 

 

"Oh-“ David groans in frustration.  “Is that all you've got?  Why don't we just make an after-school special?" 

 

Joe doesn’t know why, but David is deliberately leaving this part to him, as though it’s his personal responsibility, as if the idea is already clearly defined and he’s just waiting for Joe to find it.  “Okay,” he says, and breathes deeply.  It’s not like he doesn’t have a dozen scenes rattling around in his head.  One, in particular, that he’s refined in his head until every detail is almost a tactile memory, and hell, maybe this is the one that David is waiting for. 

 

"Fine.  What if Eric showed up when Jake was still tied up from when they came looking for Eric?” 

 

“Yeah?”  Only mild interest, which sparks a bit of annoyance.  This isn’t easy, and why can’t David ever be the one with misgivings about the contents of his own head?    

 

“Eric finds him.  And he’s been there for a long time, all bound up and kind of scared, and at first Eric is about to untie him, but then he starts getting all edgy about it, kind of playing with him.  And he leans in like he’s going to untie him, but then he just—doesn’t.” 

 

“Yeah?”  This time, definite interest.

 

“And Jake starts to get nervous.  He doesn’t know if he’s about to be betrayed—Eric could kill him right there, you know—but he also doesn’t know if, ah, if Eric is going to- it seems like he might kiss.  Kiss Jake.  Because he’s just there, bent over him, breathing and staring and not saying a word.  And no one knows Eric’s real intentions, so it’s a little scary but also a little…”  Hot, because he can’t think of it without feeling a strange thrill of arousal, but he chickens out at the last minute and says, “Tense.” 

 

When he finishes, he gives David a shrug and waits, half-proud and half-embarrassed about what he’s just suggested.  At first, David doesn’t give him a lot to go on.  Instead of replying, he just sits on the couch and looks at Joe as though he’s never seen him before. 

 

“What?” he demands.  It’s a good idea; more true to their script than half the stuff he’s offered up so far. 

 

“Nothing.”  David blinks a few more times and rubs his hands on his thighs, what he always does when he’s excited, or thinking, or both.  “You just—I was so right about you, about this whole thing.  It’s like you keep all these amazing ideas buried way down where nobody can see them.” 

 

The disconcerting thing is that the ideas David consider Joe’s best are the ones he’s the most unsure about, the ones he spends the most time turning over and over in his mind, examining them until he’s completely lost perspective.  But he can’t seem to hide anything from David, who knows they’re there and is willing to dig for them, to push Joe until he reluctantly offers them up. 

 

“What else have you got in there?” David asks, just the barest curve of a smile on his lips.  And if Joe’s stomach does a slow winding flip, it’s only because it’s how Jake would respond. 

 

***

 

He ought to have known it would be a bad idea to suggest a read-through, but Joe has done enough of them in his career that it doesn’t seem like it would be a big deal. It's a spur of the moment decision, just an idea that comes while they're watching reality television under the premise of taking a break.  "Want to try a read-through?" he asks, and yes, David says, predictably.  The script isn't finished, but pieces of it are solid enough to play with this way, and it's exciting that they've come this far.  

 

Easing into a character other than Sheppard is like trying on another skin; it's been such a long time.  But he is intimately familiar with Jake in ways he isn't with John Sheppard, so when he falls into it, the lines come up and out of him as though he's never been anyone else.  The most unnerving part of it is David’s ability to disappear completely into his character.  Joe notices it when he's turning the first page, a spare glance at David's face that floors him completely, and it's his turn, his line, but Joe is left uneasy, his heart thudding startlingly in his chest. 

 

"I didn't think you were coming back," he says from memory, unable to stop staring.  "I fed your cats." 

 

The eyes that look back at him are hard, unrecognizable, yet a part of him responds to being looked at this way, a slow bending of his will.  No, not him—Jake responds to it. 

 

"You have to keep feeding them a while longer.  I can't go back yet.  Let me crash here tonight and I'll tell you about where I've been."

 

This is not David's amiable openness, nor is it Rodney's harmless, abrasive honesty.  Of course it isn't, he reminds himself, annoyed.  They're actors, it's what they do. 

 

"Do you want to start over?  Is it- That line reads a little clumsily."  David is suddenly himself again, all business, squinting critically at the lines.  "Keep going?  We can fix it later."

 

Joe shakes his head, unsure of what exactly needs fixing.  Maybe everyone is right; maybe this partnership is an uneven match.  Paul has probably seen all these sides of David and never once lost track of who he's supposed to be. 

 

"I've never done this before,” he blurts.

 

David draws in a breath, then pauses as though he's decided against saying whatever he'd intended to say.  “You’ve done this,” he says finally.  “We do it every day.” 

 

But he hasn’t.  He’s performed all the mechanics of this job, but has never found himself in a place where his character’s feelings have bled so unnervingly into his own.  There’s no other explanation for the way he’s started feeling when he’s near David, his feelings of friendship and admiration all tangled up with Jake’s longsuffering infatuation.  Even right now, just sitting next to David on the sofa has him on edge, a hum of awareness under his skin with no real explanation. 

 

He needs an explanation.  In fact, he’s not sure he can move forward without one. 

 

“How about…”  He takes a sidelong glance at David, who is facing him with open posture, leaning slightly forward, arm laid out across the back of the sofa.  “How about we try that scene with the kiss?”   

 

“Ah, the almost kiss.” 

 

“Is that cool?”

 

“Sure.  I think I’ve got some rope in my desk drawer.” 

 

“Funny.”

 

David tilts his head toward the desk.  “No?” 

 

“Oh, are you-  Really?” 

 

“If you want.” 

 

Nights like these, when they’ve been holed up for so long that the garbage can is overflowing with empty takeout containers and beer bottles, nothing seems weird.  It’s how they ended up with the now-deleted subplot of a character resurrected as a zombie, and it’s why in this unguarded state, letting David tie him up so they can act out the scene Joe had penned himself seems like a perfectly good idea.  In fact, it sounds like a great idea, something he really wants to do. 

 

“Sure,” he says easily, watches David climb off the couch and retrieve a length of coiled rope from the bottom drawer.  “Should I ask why you had that in there?” 

 

“Unfortunately, it’s not nearly as interesting as what you’re thinking.”  David kneels on the sofa cushion, facing Joe and twisting the rope between his hands.  “Turn around.” 

 

He obeys simply because he doesn’t know what else to say, turns around and puts his hands behind his back so that David can wrap his wrists with the smooth, heavy rope.  The position feels awkward and unfamiliar when he turns back around, his shoulders sharp and prominent where they push against his t-shirt.  If he waits too long, he might start to rethink the whole thing, so he launches right into the dialogue that he’s been over so many times he knows it cold.  “Where the hell have you been?  I’ve been stuck here for hours, and I’ve spent the past two debating whether or not to piss my pants.”  

 

With one hand on the center of his chest, David pushes him gently until he’s fully reclined, the sofa arm digging into his back.  The discomfort is good; he works with it, struggles a bit for effect.  “C’mon, untie me.”

 

“Who did this?” David’s—no, Eric’s—eyes roam over his body, a flicker of anger that briefly flares into something else, and he’s good, because for a second, Joe senses the vaguest hint of a threat. 

 

“Eddie was looking for you.  He had some friends.” 

 

“He can’t—“  David does turmoil beautifully; he always has.  His hand drops to Joe’s cheek, soft fingertips curled protectively around Joe’s plentiful evening stubble.  “He shouldn’t have done this.  I’ll talk to him later.” 

 

“Aren’t you going to ask what he took?” 

 

“What did you let him take?”

 

“Nothing, I swear.”  It’s not difficult to sound breathless; his body isn’t used to this position and David’s focus is nerve-wracking.  Exciting. 

 

“What did you tell him?”  Oh, God, David is doing it, leaning down just the way Joe wrote it, and he’d imagined it so vividly at the time—too vividly, with his notebook fixed firmly across his lap—but that had been nothing like actually being here, David breathing his air and looking as though he could flay him alive and then lick the bones. 

 

“Nothing.” 

 

David’s expression darkens when he hears the catch in Joe’s voice.  Maybe he’s impressed, but it looks more like Eric reacting to Jake’s weakness, and they decided weeks ago that Eric gets off on that, he’s a sadistic bastard who still wants-

 

-this.  Joe’s thighs between his own as he kneels over him, and the way he flinches away when David leans down and down, so close that Joe is suddenly terrified that David will shift his eyes to Joe’s and see that he’s broken character. 

 

And he has broken away.  By the time David’s cheek brushes his own, he’s stumbling through his lines, and any sense of authenticity on his part is gone because he is precariously close to being in ruins.  Trapped, yes; the heart of him is exposed with no cover, but in that confinement is freedom, and he feels himself loosening, lifting, unfolding. 

 

It’s all in the script, but he can’t take David’s hard stare, the one that’s supposed to make the audience wonder if Eric is a danger to Jake.  Under the weight of it, Joe’s eyes fall shut and he lets his head roll to the side.  “Cut the ropes,” he says softly, suppressing a shiver that ripples through him when David’s thumb smoothes over the small patch of bare skin on his upper arm.     

 

“I will.”  Even with his eyes closed, he can feel David leaning in closer.

 

“Now,” Joe says, and he’s not entirely sure whether it’s him or Jake that’s asking. 

 

“What’s the hurry?  Jake,” he adds pointedly, and that isn’t in the script. 

 

Joe freezes, his pulse beating a frantic rhythm in his throat.  Is it supposed to be some kind of reminder?  For long, tense moments they hold their positions, his fists pressed up into the small of his back.  Finally, David makes a soft, agonized sound and a heartbeat later Joe feels the hot, tender press of David’s mouth on his neck. 

 

That’s not exactly in accordance with the script, either.  A kiss on the corner of the mouth, a barely-there, maybe mostly imaginary kiss had been the plan, but Joe is the one who had turned away, and David has always been good at improvisation. 

 

But this isn’t a sound stage.  They’re doing this in David’s office, on his sofa, and Joe’s wrists are bound behind his back while he struggles with the aftermath of that—kiss, of David’s mouth on a place that is devastatingly more intimate than what they’d originally planned. 

 

He forces himself upright suddenly, dislodging David, twisting and thrusting his wrists out behind him.  “Uh, if you don’t mind, these are really starting to chafe,” he says, and waits to be cut loose.

 

***

***

 

David is eating a donut with one hand and gesturing widely with the other when Joe finishes up in makeup and joins the others. 

 

“…and that’s how you let a Buddhist nun down easy,” David says, while everyone around him falls to pieces and Paul shouts “That is NOT true!” over the chaos. 

 

“Jealousy,” David says breezily, winks at Joe, then goes back to eating.  There is a dusting of sugar on the front of his Atlantis jacket. 

 

“Sheppard, Weir, and McKay in the jumper bay.  Five minutes!” someone says loudly, and the group disperses. 

 

They make their way to the jumper bay, Joe making small talk with Torri, and David uncharacteristically quiet.  The scene should be an easy take; just a lot of dialogue, not much action.  Joe figures they’ll finish in thirty minutes.  If he remembers correctly, Rachel and David are up next to tape a complicated sequence, which should leave him time to talk to David, make sure things are cool between them.  Not that there’s any reason they wouldn’t be, unless they’re the type of people who allow trivial things affect their friendship, such as one of them letting the other tie him up and kiss him on the neck.

 

“Cut!  Start from the top, but this time, Flanigan—a little less Ronon, a little more Sheppard.”  There are a few titters from around the room, and Joe nods tensely.  He hadn’t realized how hard he’d been frowning, but his temples feel tight, like he’s working on a headache.

 

They do the lines again, Torri exits, and then it’s just David and Joe left for their exchange, a few minutes of bonding.  David gets to go off on a bit of a rant, today, and Joe watches him work, his eyes drawn to David’s mouth as he talks.  It’s a residual effect from contemplating Jake: Joe imagines that Jake would spend a great deal of time studying the expressive movement of Eric’s mouth, that he would take pleasure in its soft curve of humor and flinch away when it is thinned with anger.

 

This isn’t the time, he tells himself, but it’s too late.  David has lost steam mid-rant and is absently touching his fingers to his own mouth, looking at Joe as though he’s just caught him doing exactly what he’s been doing.  They’re all pros here, but David can’t seem to find his bearings and Joe crouches in the jumper bay next to David, unable to look away from the way David is blinking at him, startled and curious. 

 

“Cut!  For crying out loud, guys.  Everybody take five, and you two--come talk to me.” 

 

Breathing shallowly, Joe tears his eyes away from David’s and gets to his feet.  David is behind him the whole way, but there’s no way to ask him anything with all these people around, especially when Martin incredulously tells them that subtext is one thing, but they’re taking Sheppard and McKay in a direction no one wants them to go, if they know what he means.  The worst part is that Joe knows exactly what he means. 

 

“It’s the thigh holsters,” David says apologetically, while Joe silently dies of mortification.  “They’re so damn sexy, they get everyone all confused.  As far as I’m concerned, we ought to carry muskets instead.  Less chance of illicit love triangles, STDs, that sort of thing.” 

 

Martin tries to hold his stern expression, but he’s got a soft spot for David—who doesn’t?—and he laughs before he waves them both away and tells them to get back to work.  

 

***

 

No one can say it’s not been a bad day.  Joe can’t remember the last time he had trouble staying focused, and it’s like his and David’s distraction is catching, spreading to every cast member until Martin is still and sullen in his seat, throwing up his hands at every new infraction.  No one even asks if they’re going to the bar; it’s a given.   When work is over, they pack up their stuff and head numbly toward the parking lot.  David, back in his street clothes, grabs Joe’s elbow on his way out. 

 

“Stay a minute?” he asks. 

 

 Joe lets David lead him to a small dressing room where no one can interrupt, and then he just waits for David to say something, to just put an end to this miserable uncertainty already. 

 

“We should talk about what happened,” David says. 

 

Joe sinks down onto a chair.  These kinds of talks never end well. 

 

“But I’m not quite sure what to say.  We’re letting our other project interfere with work, and I never thought that would happen,” David says awkwardly.  “Did you?” 

 

“No,” he sighs, his stomach in knots.  He hadn’t thought a lot of things before this all started.  He hadn’t ever thought he’d get to the point where the most casual touch from David is a shot of warmth that goes straight through him, but he doesn’t know how to make it stop. 

 

“It is the other project, right?”  David shifts from foot to foot, as uncomfortable as Joe for once. 

 

“I think so.  I was thinking of Eric when I lost my train of thought.” 

 

“Eric?”

 

Joe goes cold all over.  “Er.  I mean, Jake.” 

 

David steps forward.  “No.  I think…it was Eric, wasn’t it?” 

 

“David, please.”  He wishes David would sit down already, or better yet, laugh this whole thing off the way he’s so good at doing. 

 

“No, why do you do that?  You’re always…hiding, like you’re ashamed of your ideas, or whatever you’re thinking.  If it was Eric, that’s fine!”

 

"I know, but you are Eric.  I mean, you influence who he is.  You made him."

 

"I'm not saying I didn't.  Far from it.  Look, I don't understand what we're arguing about." 

 

"It's just…I don't know anymore."  He bends his head and burrows his hands into his hair, fingers pressing into his scalp.  "I don't get how all this works.  If you have that much influence over Eric, and by default Jake, then it's like you have this…" Power.  He doesn't say it; he can't.  It doesn't make sense.  “I told you I would fuck this up.  I told you.”

 

David drops into a crouch in front of him.  “You’renot,” he says. 

 

He’s close enough that Joe can smell the soap they use in makeup and surprisingly, the faint traces of cigarette smoke.  David had been upset earlier, then.  Because of this.  The last time Joe had seen him smoke had been when Jane had moved all her stuff out and said that she wanted to see other people.  He just shakes his head again.  “We need to stop,” he says suddenly.  “Take a break,” he adds, and when he lifts his head to see David’s reaction, it is Eric’s cold anger he sees. 

 

***

 

“As you know, I notice everything,” Torri says, sliding in next to Joe in his usual corner table.  “And don’t think I haven’t noticed you and David for the past two weeks, not back here whispering like you’ve got some secret too big for the rest of us.” 

 

“We don’t,” he says smoothly, and smiles at her like he’s the happiest guy in the world.  Why wouldn’t he be?  He’s got a hell of a lot more free time, now.  And Torri is right; he’s been neglecting his other friends.  “Now, why don’t I buy you a drink.  Still drinking those cranberry vodkas?”    

 

“I shouldn’t,” she says, glancing down at her empty glass, then shrugs.  “Why not?” 

 

The floor sways beneath him when he rises.  He recovers quickly enough and makes his way to the bar, where he orders Torri’s drink plus another for himself.  Off to the side, David is playing darts with Paul; Joe knows exactly where he’s at without looking.  It’s bad enough that he can hear David’s voice over the crowd, sometimes amiable, sometimes mocking, but always carving out a hollow place inside of him.   

 

It wasn’t meant to go on this long.  A break, he had said, time for Joe to take his character’s feelings and lock them into a place where they can’t touch him personally.  And yet, whenever he finds himself sleeping alone—more and more often, these days—he thinks of Jake, hand slipping down into his underwear, imagining Eric’s avaricious hands and how they would mercilessly take what Eric already considers to be his. 

 

Not to say that Joe is completely oblivious.  He’s well aware that Eric’s hands, his mouth, even his voice, all belong to David, and it’s not Eric’s number that Joe wants to call ten times a day. 

 

If anything, it’s worse than when they were working together.  At least when he’d been welcome in David’s office, on his sofa, he’d gotten to spend time with David, however frustrating it may have been.  These days, he doesn’t get anything more than a nod of acknowledgment and the distinct sense of being judged.   Anything would be better than this, even the confusion.  Even being found out.

 

His jaw clenched, Joe scoops some peanuts from a bowl on the bar and adds another drink to his order. 

 

***

***

 

Joe has a key, but it seems like bad form to let yourself into the house of someone who hasn’t spoken to you in two weeks.  

 

“I’m sorry,” Joe says when David answers the door, and hands over a new part of the script, a major revision, a peace offering.  For that, David allows him inside, though he is scarily silent all the way down the hall and into the familiar office. 

 

He’s missed this place.  Everything looks exactly the same, and he says so, just to break the silence.

 

David just makes a noncommittal sound and takes the script to the couch.  He skims quickly this time, and then brings the script down hard on his knees, his eyebrows drawn together in some bewildered emotion.  “Two weeks of avoiding me at every opportunity, and this is what you come up with?  You make no sense.  In fact, you are, at this moment, the most fucked up person I know.” 

 

“I know it.”  He sits down next to David and shrugs off his coat.  “Are you busy?  Because I really want to run through it,” and he hadn’t meant to sound so desperate, is a little appalled by the urgency in his own voice, but there is it, right out there in the open. 

 

“Give me a minute to get these lines,” David says slowly.  He turns back to the pages Joe had typed out the night before, and reads through a few times.  “Are you sure about this?” 

 

“Yes,” he says firmly.  This he is sure about.  He knows it changes everything, changes the entire film, but Jake wants so much, and Joe just wants to give it to him.  David is probably right.  He reallyis the most fucked up person ever. 

 

“Do you want the rope again?” 

 

“Yes.”

 

This time, it doesn’t seem as funny as it had before.  Wordlessly, David retrieves the rope again and binds him in exactly the same way, guides him into the same position, and then kneels up over him, knees sinking deeply into the sofa cushions.  “You don’t have to prove anything, you know,” he says, but his words are shadowed by doubt, and he’s looking down at Joe as though he’s the most fascinating thing he’s ever seen.

 

Of course, he may be merely getting into character, and Joe is thrown up against the same brick wall of not knowing, never knowing, and always refusing to ask.   

 

Brimming with frustration, Joe settles into the sofa, testing his bonds.  He begins before he can think better of it.  “Where the hell have you been?  I’ve been stuck here for hours, and I’ve spent the past two debating whether or not to piss my pants.” 

 

Joe makes it numbly through the next several lines.  He knows what’s coming; he’s shaking with it, he can feel the sweat gathering on his neck and in the small of his back.  Jake wants this so badly.  “Cut the ropes.” 

 

“I will.” 

 

“Now.”

 

“What’s the hurry?”  David asks again.  His lips are wet, as though he’s just licked them.  Teetering somewhere between anticipation and panic, Joe turns away from the sight, eyes shut.  Blind is the only way he can accept David’s mouth, which slowly descends to bury itself in Joe’s neck, a chaos of tongue and hot breath, until he aches all over from the strain of rigid self-containment.

 

“I’d untie you if you wanted me to,” David whispers roughly against his ear, and in the part of his brain that isn’t shuddering with sensation, Joe knows what’s coming next, so he braces himself for the weight of David’s body pressing down against his own. 

 

He’d written it just like this, Eric on top of him, taking what Jake—or Joe—would never ask for.  There’s a name for what he’s doing, but he’s not sure if it would be called art, manipulation or supplication.  With his hands bound at his back, it must be the latter.

 

“Kiss me,” David says, so cruel it has to be Eric, and his fingers close hard around Joe’s jaw, bringing their mouths together for a kiss, a real kiss that sends relief spiraling through him.  Only, it can’t be relief because relief has never felt this dizzying and deep, like a tidal pull that tugs him further and further into David, into the ruthless demand of his mouth.  Just a few minutes ago he and David hadn’t even been on speaking terms, and now David’s tongue is curling into his mouth, taking his helpless, stuttering gasps and swallowing them down. 

 

Distantly, he knows you don’t kiss like this in film, or hell, maybe David does.  He hopes he doesn’t, though, hopes that when David’s teeth scrape across his lip and chin, it means something other than work. 

 

Lines, there are lines to be said.  Somehow, Joe wrenches away from the kiss so they can exchange the last few lines that take their characters past the point of no return, and David all the while with a surprisingly unconvincing smirk.

 

When they stop, they’re both taking rapid, shallow breaths, eyeing one another from the distance of just a few inches.  “Look,” David says, his hand still a careful pressure on Joe’s neck.  “If there’s anything you wanted to tell me…”  He raises an eyebrow and waits, but Joe just shakes his head, as though he isn’t struggling not to rub himself against the inside of David’s thigh.  They’re two grown men, here; he can’t do that, not if he wants to be able to look David in the eye when they’re finished. 

 

“Nothing,” he says, forcing his voice steady.   

 

David sighs, a warm puff of breath against the side of his face.  “Then I think we’ve got this scene down, don’t you?” 

 

Not yet.  It's over, but it doesn't feel over.  He can still feel the shape of Jake's words on his tongue, and with them all of Jake's relentless, convoluted feelings for Eric that sit pitilessly inside his chest, a hollow ache. 

 

“Yeah.” 

 

“Hurry and let me untie you, then,” David says roughly.  “I need a fucking cigarette.”

 

***

 

He knows, now, the difference between David and Eric, which is that while Eric gives nothing, David will give anything at all.  He’s known this all along, but it is suddenly, alarmingly clear how far this accommodation would extend, if Joe were to ask. 

 

For this reason, he doesn’t ask. 

 

***

 

The day they finish the script, David makes noises about a small get-together with beer and pizza.  By the weekend, Joe is lugging five bags of ice up David’s front steps and down into his den, where the bar is lined with enough bottles for everyone Joe knows, and then some.

 

“How many people are coming, exactly?” he asks David, who leans against the bar, supervising, looking crisp and fresh in a blue button down shirt while Joe gets sweaty from all the lifting. 

 

“A lot,” David says happily.  “It snowballed a little, but I think we’re due some down time.  Oh, push that couch over to that wall, will you?  After a few of those bottles disappear, I guarantee there will be people wanting to bust a move.” 

 

“Bust a move,” Joe mutters, but obeys.  “Tell me something, is your sister coming?” 

.

“Which one is that?” 

 

“You know which one.  The one that looks at me like I just got out on parole.” 

 

David just smiles and crosses his arms over his chest, amused.  “She likes you.” 

 

“She- no, she doesn’t.  It’s like she…”  It’s like she can see right through him, and doesn’t like what she sees.

 

“You’re crazy.  Here, I’ll make you a drink.” 

 

Joe watches while David goes behind the bar and painstakingly creates a green drink with red swirls.  It looks a bit iffy, but then David pours in a generous amount of vodka, and he supposes it would be rude to refuse a drink from his host, the man who has never denied him anything.

 

“It’s good,” he says after a sip, licking the sweet, sticky moisture from his lips.

 

“I spent a couple years bartending off and on.” 

 

“Me too.  The money was good, but…” 

 

“I bet.  The guys like you always made a killing.”  His hands move skillfully over the bottles, mixing another drink for himself. 

 

Joe swallows down a mouthful.  “Guys like me?  You mean actor/writers?”

 

“Yeah,” David snorts.  “That’s exactly what I meant.”  While Joe is deciding on the best response, David raises his gaze from his glass and looks Joe over with unbearable slowness, before one side of his mouth lifts into an indecipherable smile. 

 

Something in his belly takes a sudden plummet, and he covers it by taking another sip, ignoring the heat that winds its way up his neck.  “If I remember correctly,” he ventures, his heart like a wild bird in his chest, “guys like you didn’t do so badly, either.” 

 

This time it’s a full-fledged smile he receives, filled with humor, but also a measure of appreciation.  “I guess not,” David says warmly, just as the first wave of guests come down the stairs.

 

***

 

David’s parties are always good, and this one is great, right up until about midnight, when he climbs the stairs toward the kitchen to see what’s left of the food. 

 

“Joe Flanigan,” he hears from behind, and he turns with the most polite smile he can muster.  David’s sister; no one else says his name that way, as though it’s some huge joke. 

 

“How’s it going?”

 

She smiles and gestures at the chaos around her.  “It’s a party!  What have you been up to?”

 

“Not much.  Work.”  He glances around for an escape, but he doesn’t recognize anyone up here, and she’s blocking his path. 

 

“Congratulations on the screenplay,” she says.  How anyone so small can be so intimidating, he has no idea.  “A gay movie, eh?” 

 

“What?”  He steps back, shocked, and bumps into the wall.  “It’s not a- It’s not.” 

 

She cocks her head and narrows her eyes at him as though he’s just insulted her entire family.  “Really,” she says dryly.  “I must have misunderstood, then.” 

 

Oh.  So she’d been talking to David.  Still…she’s got no clue what she’s talking about.  “I guess so,” he says, and can feel the chill of her gaze as he walks away. 

 

A gay movie—Jesus.  Is that what David thinks?  A complicated history and a little sexual tension between two people doesn’t necessarily meangay.  Jake and Eric are so much more than that; it seems cheap to put their feelings into a neat category so that everyone can better judge them. 

 

He finds himself in front of David’s office, the door shut for the party.  David is an enormously generous person, but his office is his most private space, which is why Joe expects the room to be empty.  He doesn’t expect, when he opens the door, to find David and Paul on the familiar sofa that still bears the stains from the strawberry cheesecake they had shared earlier that day. 

 

“Hi,” Joe says cautiously, his hand still on the doorknob.  There’s something about the way they’re looking at him—not David, but Paul’s expression, chagrined and apologetic, his mouth half-open in surprise.  Caught.  “What’s, uh.  Going on?” 

 

Between them on the sofa, on David’s lap, in Paul’s hands, are pages of the script. 

 

“Nothing,” Paul blurts, “David was just showing me your screenplay.  It’s quite good, actually.” 

 

“Shut the door.”  David’s cheeks are pink, his eyes shining with pride and liquor.  “C’mon, come in.” 

 

“Had a bit to drink?” Joe asks easily, and shuts the door behind him.  There’s room on the other side of David, though not much.  He doesn’t mind sitting close. 

 

“A bit,” David says, sounding very pleased with himself.  “It’s the best way to approach this project, don’t you think?  The—the intricacies of our story are best played out with a strong bottle of…something.” 

 

Paul coughs into his hand.  “Speaking of which, I think I’m ready for another.” 

 

“Good luck,” David calls after him.  “Last I saw, Torri was fucking around with her boyfriend on the ice cooler.” 

 

“Yeah?” 

 

“His hand was all the way up her top.  She wasn’t wearing a bra.” 

 

“Wow.” 

 

“Yep.  Nothing like a peep show in your living room to remind you of how long it’s been since you got laid,” David adds with a laugh. 

 

“Oh.  I didn’t interrupt…”  Joe motions toward the door where Paul had let himself out. 

 

“Are you kidding?”  David lets his head fall onto the back of the couch, pinning Joe with his half-lidded gaze.  “You’re fucking insane.” 

 

“I’m insane?  I’m not the thirty-six year old that’s going to be cleaning up puke, beer bottles and used condoms in the morning,” Joe reminds him. 

 

“Right.  Well, you weren’t interrupting anything.  We were just talking.” 

 

“About me?” 

 

“About the script.”  David pauses.  “And about you.” 

 

Now that Paul’s gone there is plenty of room, but David hasn’t moved away.  Joe doesn’t want him to.  He wants to know what they’d been saying about him, but his stomach bottoms out when he thinks about what they might have said.

 

As if he doesn’t already know.

 

“Better get back to the party,” he says uneasily, when what he wants is to stay and stay. 

 

“Sure.  I’ll just put this away,” David says, and gathers the pages into a tidy, harmless stack of paper. 

 

***

 

“I hear my lovely sister had a chat with you at the party,” David says a few days later, on their way off set. 

 

Joe grimaces and says nothing.  There’s no point. 

 

“She just likes to give you a hard time, you know.  She does it to everyone.  I can’t count the times she’s told the story about how my mom caught me jerking off in the garage when I was fifteen.  I mean, that’s her idea of dinner conversation.”

 

“She told me that story,” Joe admits.  “Pretty detailed, actually.”   

 

David groans and shakes his head as they reach his car.  He unlocks the trunk and throws his stuff inside.  “Please, I don’t want to know.  You coming over?” 

 

“I’ve got the house to myself for the next week, so…yeah.” 

 

“Staying over?” David asks lightly. 

 

Joe hesitates because there’s something in David’s tone that crawls up the back of his neck and leaves him a little breathless.  There used to be a time when he actually listened to his instincts, but the self-preserving voice telling him no is trounced once again by the greedy, reckless part of him that is preoccupied with David to a fault. 

 

He says yes. 

 

***

 

They go to David’s and retreat to the den with a couple of beers and the same odd tension between them. 

 

“So, what did Paul think of the script?” 

 

David kicks his shoes off onto the floor and stretches his legs out onto the coffee table.  “He was…”  He flexes his feet while he thinks.  There is a hole in the toe of his left sock.  “Confused,” he says.  “Surprised.  I had to show him which parts were yours and which were mine, which is a good thing.  Seamlessness, and all that.” 

 

“Well, you did edit the fuck out of everything I wrote.” 

 

“You did the same to mine.”  David shrugs.  He keeps picking at the hem of his t-shirt, a nervous habit, completely unlike him.  They’re sitting too close on the couch, but neither of them moves. 

 

“Maybe, uh…maybe I didn’t do that good of a job,” he says suddenly.  “If Paul is that confused.  I mean, maybe we should…” 

 

Hopefully, he reaches for his bag where he keeps a copy of the script.  David seems to anticipate what he’s about to do—and he is about to do it, foolishly, even though he had promised himself he wouldn’t.  It’s the only way he knows how to get what he wants.

 

In a swift intervention, David plucks the bag from his hand and tosses it onto the carpet. 

 

“No,” he says, his eyes soft and pleading; a little sad.  “Joe, no.”  David's articulate hands reach for him, one palm coming to rest on his chest and the other curving around his bicep.  "Right now," David says, as Joe’s belly tightens uncomfortably, bracing for what’s coming. "Starting over, from here. No script. Just us. Just this." 

 

For a moment he's tempted to deny everything; to break the mood with a smile even though his face is suddenly bloodless, numb.  But that wouldn’t be fair to David, not when Joe is the one who’d started this entire thing. 

 

"I don't even know what 'this' is,” he says with a broken laugh. 

 

“I don’t, either.  But it is something, right?” 

 

He nods silently, willing his heart to slow down beneath David’s hand.  He’s giving himself away.  He’d always known he would, eventually.

 

“I-I’m not…”  But he is; he’s everything; there’s nothing left that he can say he’s not. 

 

“You are.  And I’m sick of watching you hide behind our characters-“

 

“-what?  You…”

 

“-like some kind of tease or something, only I know you’re genuinely freaked out, which is the only reason I’ve let you lead me around with the biggest case of blue balls ever known to man.  So please,” David says, his hand tightening in Joe’s shirt, “Talk to me about this.” 

 

The last thing Joe wants is for it to be this easy.  But that’s David; so warm and appealing that being with him is the easiest thing in the world, and pulling away from him is the hardest.  “I can’t.”  It emerges as a whisper, a hoarse confession.  “I really, really need for you to say no.” 

 

“To you?  No fucking way,” he says, and Joe crumbles, but not all the way, because he only has nerve enough to lurch forward, wrap his arms around David’s waist and bury his face in his friend’s neck. 

 

David’s arms close around him tightly, holding him.  They both hold on fiercely, no space at all between them, while Joe tries to settle the soaring dizziness of finally finally not needing to pretend.  It’s as good as he’d known it would be, with David’s fingers rubbing at the nape of his neck, a gentle scratching rhythm that trickles seductively down his spine. 

 

It’s going to happen; Joe knows it’s just a matter of time.  Already, his lips are pressed against David’s neck, just breathing and tasting the warm skin.  David, he notices, is barely breathing, but when he finally does, the sound is a ragged exhalation that goes right through him.  He’s never known David to be this shaken. 

 

He pulls back from the embrace so quickly that David’s mouth is still partly open when he takes it, intending to start with something soft, but the second he feels the familiar slant of David’s mouth, he pushes his way inside with a low moan that would have been embarrassing if David weren’t holding on so tightly that it almost hurts. 

 

They kiss forever, until Joe’s lips are as wet as the inside of David’s mouth, and his skin is damp beneath his t-shirt, prickling with heat.  David’s stubble scratches at his face until his lips are raw with it, the bruising pressure, and the taste of something new and dark in his mouth.   They kiss until he’s aching all over from holding back, but he doesn’t know what else to do or how to get there.  This is further than he’d ever thought he would go. 

 

He can’t remember the last time he kissed someone for so long, or the last time he’s been this hard for so long without touching himself, not even the slightest amount of friction for the part of him that pulses with sensation with every introduction of David’s tongue to his own. 

 

“Here,” David says between kisses, and reclines onto the cushions.  Joe lets himself be guided down on top of David, unable to let go completely in spite of how much he wants this.  If he settles in any more then he’ll be pressed right up against David where it counts, and he wants it so badly, but what they’re doing now, mere kissing, seems tenfold more dangerous than being tied up and helpless on another man’s couch. 

 

He’s never done this before.  It’s something he would never admit to David, because David has done everything, and always with unrestrained zeal.  With a hand in the small of Joe’s back, he coaxes Joe’s hips down against him, welcoming him in between his sturdy thighs and eliminating the problem of Joe’s troublesome erection by pressing up into it at the same time he presses Joe down. 

 

“Wait, wait,” he gasps, not ready for the sensation that rips through him.  He’s too close. 

 

“Okay,” David says, but his hands slide underneath Joe’s shirt, a rake of fingers that feels like sex even though they’re both fully clothed. 

 

He buries his hands in the couch cushions and tries to hold himself up, to only rub himself against David when he absolutely needs to, but he needsto, needs to keep going, to grind down against David’s flexing, shifting thigh. 

 

He needs to stop; to get up and cool off, but it feels too good to even think about stopping—not that he can think, anyway, with David’s mouth working hotly at his ear, neck, everywhere he can get to—and suddenly Joe is there, balanced right on the edge, so close to coming that he freezes, because it’s going to happen if he doesn’t stop right now. 

 

But he’s beyond stopping.  His hips won’t stop twitching forward, his throat producing frantic unfamiliar sounds, and the pleasure that has wound its way between his legs, down the backs of his thighs and through his belly suddenly breaks wide open when he realizes that David is working with him for this, the deliberate strain of his leg up against Joe’s erection. 

 

His arms give out and he curls into David, moaning into his friend’s t-shirt while he jerks against him, everything flooding outward like an unexpected plunge into a warm bath. 

 

Beneath him, David is completely still.  Blood is still thundering through Joe’s head, his chest, with generous aftershocks of pleasure in his cock.  He can feel the same—hear it, even—in David's ragged breathing, like he’s just sprinted two hundred yards.  “Oh God,” David says softly, shakily, a gust of breath at Joe’s temple.  “Did you-“ 

 

Carefully, he raises up enough to see David’s face; red, damp, lust-dazed.  “I…” 

 

The best thing would be to offer some explanation for his lack of self-control; for already having orgasmed when David hadn’t done more than invite him to make out on the sofa.  Some of what he’s thinking must be apparent on his face, because David is already shaking his head as if in denial. “It’s okay,” David says, “It’s good.  Look.  It’s- me too,” he says, and wraps his fingers around Joe’s wrist, guides his hand down between them so that Joe can feel the thick, hot shape of him through the front of his jeans. 

 

There is a vast space between knowing that David wants him and feeling the proof of it in his hand; between being allowed into his private life and being allowed to watch the naked play of emotions across his face while he pushes into Joe’s hand.  It only takes a few times before he’s coming, with two rapid thrusts and a half-sobbed exhalation of relief.  Joe cups his hand between David’s legs long enough to gain the impression of dampness, and then climbs off awkwardly, his legs too shaky to trust. 

 

This answers all of his questions, he supposes; he can barely remember who Jake and Eric are.  There is only David, sprawled across half the sofa, and watching Joe with heavy eyes.  “Is this what you wanted?” he asks quietly. 

 

Joe shrugs tightly, already drawn back to David’s arms, but not quite ready to return.  “More like what I didn’t want.” 

 

“Aren’t they the same thing?” 

 

“Yes.”  At least David has a full understanding of what goes on in his head.  It’s a little spooky, really.  “People are going to-“

 

“-Fuck people,” David says.  His face twists with scorn. “They don’t matter.  Just this.” 

 

“Just this,” Joe repeats, like he believes it. 

 

“Just this,” David says.  “Come here.” 

 

Joe goes.