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Notes: Contribution Fic #4
kita0610 asked for the continuation of the JM/VK RPS debacle that I started in my LJ a while back. And since today is apparently ros_fod's birthday (happy birthday, Ros!), it seemed like a good day to knock out the rest of this one. The specification was for JM/VK, all the way. Remember, kids: this is for charity. Unbetaed, unedited.
The Full Goods
Sweet Jesus, woman. Um, yeah. Okay. My brain screeches to a halt and I have no scenario to offer, but man, okay, let's just say Jim drops by to pick Vince up because Vince's car is in the shop, they're all going to, I don't know, where the hell do jailbait-chasing celebrities have their birthdays? The Viper Lounge. They're all going to the Viper for drinks and pool and cake and possibly strippers, and Jim gets buzzed up and heads up the stairs to Vince's apartment, raps a couple times on the door and stands there waiting, sorting through the shit in his wallet, he's double-parked, there's a mechanical bull at the bar and apparently one of the strippers has this cowgirl thing she does, he's thinking mainly about that--and the door swings open and he looks up in time to get a glimpse of a skinny white wrist, a leather cuff, fingernails--his brain hooks on that a second, because they're dark red. A girlfriend, maybe--but he can hear Vince, it's Vince's voice talking distractedly into a cell phone he can't see, and the door's ajar and empty, so he pushes it open and puts his head in. Hey. You ready, man? It's dark inside, the only light's down the hall in the bathroom, and he can see Vince walking back down that way in silhouette, the phone cradled between his shoulder and ear. He's wearing leather trousers, a striped luxe-looking shirt that he's buttoning as he walks. He looks back over his shoulder, nodding, and the light from the bathroom falls on his face and Jim blinks. Vince is wearing makeup. Black eyes, vampire eyes, glittering like micah. Dark lips. Jesus. He's wearing lipstick. He looks like he's been rained on, like he's soaked to the skin under his clothes, like his eyes take up half his face. Not really like Vince. Maybe like some kid--some girl--that Vince is letting crash here for a couple of days. Someone thin and hungry and assessing. And stoned. Hey. You ready, man? It's dark inside, the only light's down the hall in the bathroom, and he can see Vince walking back down that way in silhouette, the phone cradled between his shoulder and ear. He's wearing leather trousers, a striped luxe-looking shirt that he's buttoning as he walks. He looks back over his shoulder, nodding, and the light from the bathroom falls on his face and Jim blinks. Vince is wearing makeup. Black eyes, vampire eyes, glittering like micah. Dark lips. Jesus. He's wearing lipstick. He looks like he's been rained on, like he's soaked to the skin under his clothes, like his eyes take up half his face. Not really like Vince. Maybe like some kid--some girl--that Vince is letting crash here for a couple of days. Someone thin and hungry and assessing. And stoned.
What the hell, Jim says, still holding a sheaf of receipts between finger and thumb. Vince gives him a slow, smoky blink and disappears into the bathroom. Jim cranes his neck. What the hell are you doing, man?
I gotta go, Vince says to whoever's on the other end of the line. Yeah. No. Okay, yeah, I gotta go now. The phone clacks on the counter. There's the rasp and flick of a lighter, a long inhale that smells, even from the doorway, like pot. Happy birthday, man. Vincent Kartheiser is fucked up.
Jim stands there a couple of seconds longer, his brain moving fast, his eyes vaguely on the rain running down the living room window. Then he jams his wallet back into his coat pocket, shrugs his coat to the floor, and starts down the hall with a smile on his face.
The hell, he says when he gets to the bathroom door and looks inside. It's a hotbox in there. Eye-watering smoke and the red glow of the heat lamp, a Daffy Duck nightlight plugged into the outlet, casting a small warm light over the junk on the counter. Girl junk mostly--nail polish, eyeshadow, cotton balls pressed damp and tight, color-smudged. A razor, looking self-important and male and out of place, on the edge of the sink. What the hell are you doing, Kartheiser?
Getting dressed, Vince says, through the joint clamped between his teeth. He's smoking it like a cigarette, like it's just tobacco, letting ash fall shake off all over the floor. He's been smoking for a while, by the look of it. Sitting on the closed toilet seat, struggling to get his boots on and laced, and swaying like he's going to fall overboard. Jim watches him for a minute, trying to figure out whether this is hilarious or weird. Either way, he's getting a warm feeling in his belly and in the backs of his legs that has nothing to do with the secondary high he's breathing.
Gimme that, he says, stepping into the pot sauna and reaching for the joint. It comes away hot and damp, and he gets the bonus sensation of Vince's lip brushing his finger. Soft, wet, stoned lip. There's lipstick on the joint. You're gonna burn this place down, man. Jesus.
Vince lets out a soft snuh of laughter and keeps fighting his laces. His hair is shaggy, lank, almost auburn under the heat lamp. His shirt's unbuttoned enough that Jim can see down it, into the warm dark space between the silk and his skin. God, how old is Vincent again? And does he wax, or what?
So, you hoping to get lucky at the Viper tonight? Jim asks, taking his due off the spliff. It hits his lungs hot and hard, and he thinks, Fuck, he's been smoking this how long? Judging by the bunny ears he can't quite hold onto, a good while now.
Vince abandons the laces, slumps back against the toilet tank, and lets his legs sprawl out, boneless. His chest is a white triangle in the collar of his shirt, his cheeks are flushed. His mascara's smudged. Something like that, he says, smiling. Letting his hands fall into his lap. Innocent little hands, with whore nails.
Jim laughs automatically, and stops when he hears how nervous he sounds. Shit. He drags off the joint again, holds the smoke, and reaches out to pick up the bottle of nail polish. Rubylicious. He has a vague memory of some girl, some night, some kind of sex, and nails just like that. Rubylicious. Well, fuck.
Well... he says, and puts the bottle carefully back down. He's grinning, he can't help it. Okay, well. Huh. You want to go, then?
Vince just sits there with his eyes half-shut, his hair in his face, his hands between his legs. Looking like--aw, fuck. Jim takes another quick drag.
Okay then, he says, and then he can't take it anymore. Holy shit, man, you look totally insane--
Vince cracks up at that, for no apparent reason, and then they're both laughing hysterically, coughing and smacking each other, and Vince's feet are up off the floor, his boots dangling free, his arms clutching his belly. Jim's doubled over against the wall, still holding onto the joint. You look like a girl I fucked in New Orleans-- he's choking, and Vince is crying black tears and croaking, I look like a girl I fucked in New Orleans! And one of his boots falls off, which makes them both just about die.
It lets up the way it usually does, a little bit at a time, lots of repetition and relapse. Until Jim's just together enough to let Vince take the joint back in his red-tipped fingers, and Vince is just together enough to spark it up again with the lighter. To take a long, heartfelt drag, and to let the smoke curl white out of his lips, up toward the ceiling.
Seriously, man, Jim says, from where he's slid down against the baseboard. You look hot.
Yeah? Vince has that shy smile, the one where he looks like he doesn't really believe what you've told him, but he's going along because he wants to. You think so?
Hell yeah. He wipes tears off his face and feels the hysteria rising up again. I'd fuck you.
Yeah? Vince's smile has grown a bit. Maybe it's not shy. Maybe it's kind of...assessing. Jim tries for suave, metrosexual, secure.
Sure. You're a hot little number.</em> His throat is dry, and he has a feeling he's getting into dangerous territory. But Vince is, what, twenty-five? Not even? Harmless.
It's on the tip of Jim's tongue to say what comes next, which is Shit, man, I'm double-parked down there, grab your purse and let's go-- But he doesn't get to say it. Because harmless Vincent Kartheiser, twenty-five years old and unable to make bunny ears, slides down a little lower on the toilet seat and rubs his bare foot up Jim's thigh to his crotch. Which is, holy shit.
Yeah? Vince says again, the tip of his tongue sliding between his lips, his eyes shining black and excited. Like he's taking a dare. A dare he's pretty sure is going to turn out okay for him.
Jim opens his mouth to say something, to protest or make a joke or whatfuckingever, but the only thing that comes out is the stupid nervous laugh, the one that says for him, Yeah. The one that doesn't give him any choice.
Okay, Vince says. Cool.
What follows is a long pause, while Vince fingers the joint and toes Jim’s dick, apparently not finding either of those things weird in the slightest. Jim realizes he has a choice, here. Well, a few choices. He can lift his knee, shift a little to the left, and without saying a word, stop momentum. Nobody’s feelings have to get hurt. Vince is a good kid, he’s stoned, he probably doesn’t know what he’s saying. Probably just fooling around anyway.
That’s option A. Option B is to keep the flirtation going, without letting it coalesce. Jim’s good at flirting. Jim can flirt with a tin of tuna if he has to. God knows he’s charmed half a million hopeful women into parting with their hard-earned dollars (and occasionally more than that) on the strength of nothing more than the signature smile, the frank look, the bleach job. Flirtation has paid Jim’s mortgage and his car insurance, it’s financed his da Vinci veneers and his personal trainer, it’s kept him afloat in a city where thousands and thousands have drowned. Most of the time he likes doing it. He’s particularly motivated to keep the ralley going when the person on the other side of the net is a friend, and a curiosity, and also, frankly, hot.
Which leads to option C. Option C is to tip his head back against the wall, close his eyes, and pretend he has no responsibility for any of this. For whatever Vincent Kartheiser decides is supposed to come next in this weird little morality play, The Seduction of Marsters. Or maybe, Giant Joints I Have Smoked. Is it likely, or even possible, that Kartheiser has ever kissed another guy? Jim thinks about this for .05 seconds before deciding that yes, it’s possible. Likely, even. Kids these days. Plus, wasn’t he in that Larry Clark movie?
Option C is tempting, but problematic. If Vince were a girl, it would just be tempting, and Jim’s not much good at resisting temptation, so he knows how it would probably go. Vince is not a girl. He looks like one, sort of… Jim lifts a hand to massage his temples, and squints at Vince from beneath it. Smooth skin, strong jaw, black-mascara eyes. Loose, damp hair swinging into his face. Red lips. It’s a good color on him, some part of Jim’s mind observes. Dark but not too dark. It makes his lips look like petals. Like girl lips. He’s not un-girl-like. Maybe if Jim keeps squinting and smoking, this can be simple after all.
Option B is the default, though, and before he knows it he’s opened his mouth and said, You going to molest me?
Vince raises his eyebrows, smiles, and says, like his reasoning is transparent: You’re the birthday boy.
Then I gotta say, I don’t really love foot jobs.
No? For a second Vince looks concerned, a little hurt, and Jim thinks he’s said the wrong thing. Then Vince leans forward on the toilet seat, his hair swinging forward over his face, his breath a sweet, warm cloud of THC. Me neither. I’m more a blowjob kind of guy, myself.
Uh-- For a second Jim’s off balance, staring into those black-rimmed eyes. Oh yeah? I never would’ve guessed—
Vince leans farther forward, and Jim’s brain stutters and panics and can’t make option B work anymore. Kissing is option C. Definitely option C. You shouldn’t kiss people you work with. Never goes well. Rarely. Rarely goes well. Listen, I--
Vince’s fingers touch his, hot and moist. It’s electric, just their fingers brushing, the knowledge that Vince’s fingernails are ruby-red and wrong, running over Jim’s knuckles, soft as a woman’s touch, and maybe his whole body feels that smooth and warm and—
Hey, Jim says.
What? Vince leans back against the toilet tank, the joint in his own fingers now. You were totally bogarting it, man.
Jim sits watching while Vincent lights up and drags soggy, crackling pot into his lungs. An expression of supreme casual disregard on his face, his eyes on nothing but the tip of the joint. He’s Cleopatra, smoking a doobie. And he’s something else, Jim realizes for the first time: he’s Jim’s equal. Vincent Kartheiser, twenty-five-year-old Minnesotan with his shirts too big and his hair in his face, his fingernails bitten down to stubs, his bent big toes, can flirt as well as Jim can. It’s a minor revelation, and not a very happy one.
We should get going, Jim says a little sourly, watching the joint fizzle down almost to Vince’s lips. Gotta go turn twenty-nine again.
You’re twenty-nine? Vince gives him a lopsided, dazed-looking smile. Man, that’s like…ancient. Then he cracks up.
Jim rolls his eyes and pushes himself to standing, his back against the wall. There’s enough pot in his veins that he needs a minute to equalize. Fuck you, Doogie. His eyes are swimming. Shit, maybe he shouldn’t drive. The last thing he needs is a Matthew Perry-style encounter with someone’s front porch. What the hell is in that thing, anyway?
Opium. Vince slides off the toilet seat to his knees, hitting the lino with his feet splayed out, the dirty bare soles pointing up. Before Jim knows what’s going on, Vince’s forehead is resting against his hip, and Vince’s white fingers are running up the inside of his thigh.
Holy shit. If he weren’t so stoned, if he didn’t have the wall at his back, he’d have jumped away. Jesus Christ, man-- Then some part of his brain catches up to what Vince just said, and even as he’s trying to figure out what to do about the palm on his leg, he says, Opium? Seriously?
Vince nods. Jim can feel the movement against his hip. Jesus.
Opium’s serious shit. Maybe it’s time for a PSA, Jim thinks, staring down at the top of Vince’s head. Shiny smooth hair, practically shoulder-length, practically red under the heat lamp. It can really mess you up, man.
And Spanish fly. Vince laughs and rubs his cheek against Jim’s thigh. And…what’s that stuff?
Jim says nothing. Vince looks up at him. Wide-mouthed smile, black slave-boy eyes. In the nineteenth century? Baudelaire?
Absinthe?
Laudanum. Vince goes back to rubbing his cheek against Jim’s leg. A little bit of laudanum. And crack.
Jim relaxes back against the wall. Okay, so the opium thing was a joke. He’s beginning to have the unpleasant suspicion that Vincent Kartheiser is not only better at flirting, he may also be smarter. Uh-huh. Anything else?
Loooove, Vince croons, then presses his face to Jim’s leg and convulses with giggles.
Jim stands there waiting for him to get over it. Without thinking, he drops one hand and smooths Vince’s hair. It feels like a friendly gesture, a big-brother gesture. Dickhead, he thinks. Out loud, he says, Do you realize you’re on your knees for me?
That stops the giggles; Vince’s hands tighten on Jim’s thigh, and he looks up abruptly. He’s cried more mascara down his cheeks. Fuck yeah, I know that. His eyes are intense, coal-black laser beams. You have some kind of problem with that?
Off balance for the millionth time, Jim backpedals. You’re kind of stoned.
So are you.
Right. So I’m thinking, maybe we should just get going.
Maybe. Vince breaks eye contact, goes back to rolling his forehead against Jim’s hip.
Or you could just go to bed and sleep it off--
I could. Vince’s fingers are tracing the inseam of Jim’s jeans, higher and higher. He’s pressing his lips to the denim over Jim’s thigh in a series of soundless, open kisses.
Or… Vince’s hair is silky and hot, too fascinating not to touch.
Yeah. His fingers skim higher, touch the sweet sensitive join of inner hip, then skate right and it’s not flirting anymore, it’s sex now. At the same time he kisses just to the right of Jim’s fly, sex there too, and Jim realizes he’s hard. Has been for a while now. Ever since he stepped over the threshold and saw Vincent’s red lips and black eyes, his long legs in the leather trousers. Crazy-looking, like some kind of mythological faun boy, the kind they kept around for fucking.
God…maybe-- It’s not a good idea, he knows that, but he can’t make himself say it. Still, Vince stops kissing and for a minute they look at each other. Vince’s lips are bleeding color, puffy and raw-looking. His eyes are thief-black and jagged. Jim stares helplessly down at him, one hand still lightly touching his hair. God. Vince wants to do this, he can see that much. The dope’s just an excuse for tomorrow.
You’re pretty, Vince says, and goes back to mouthing Jim’s dick.
They make it out of the bathroom in each other’s arms, stumbling and kicking off layers of clothing. Vince’s mouth tastes like pot and lipstick and his own breath, which is always a new and exciting thing to learn. He’s breathing fast, alternately grinning and getting dead serious while he shoves his dick against Jim’s belly. It’s confusing—he’s soft and warm, he’s leaving makeup on Jim’s shirt, but his biological imperative is the same as Jim’s: to give is better than to receive. They’re both sawing against each other, grappling on the couch and then the floor, each of them trying to pin the other down, get friction against a leg or belly, and get off first.
At least, that’s how it works for a few minutes. Then, suddenly, instead of grabbing Jim’s shoulder and trying to twist him into the underdog position, Vince just drops out of frame. Jim’s propped on his elbows and knees, mid-thrust, thinking, Wha--? He looks down. Vince has squirmed down and he’s fumbling with Jim’s jeans, which are undone but still around his hips.
Jesus, fuck-- Vince wrestles them a few inches down, then gives a loud sigh and bites Jim’s hipbone. Tight enough? Jesus Christ.
Realizing he’s about to get a blowjob, Jim reaches down in a hurry and helps out.
Vince’s mouth is…Jim can’t think of any decent analogies. His brain hiccups out a few: those commercials for ice cream, where they show ribbons of hot caramel dissolving into each other. A picture of a flower he saw once, pink and lush and layered, wet with dew, about to shed its petals. Sex he’s had with girls. Lots and lots of them. Hot and wet and happy, legs around his waist, but this time there’s no condom, he can feel Vince’s tongue exploring, he can feel spit and teeth. He can hear Vince whuffling for air between thrusts.
Holy fuck, he says, his forearms trembling. Looking down his own body, seeing his own tight belly and Vince’s head bobbing below, is explosive. Holy fuck, I’m going to--
Magic words. Vince pulls off, wipes his lips, and gives Jim a stern upside-down look. If you come on my face I’ll kick your ass.
Jim bites his lip and clamps a hand around the base of his dick. Vince smiles, then shoves him off and rolls away.
Where are you--?
Vince is already up, yanking his shirt off over his head in one smooth, fluid, beautiful-damn-him movement as he walks back to the bathroom. Hold that thought, man.
Jim hesitates, then rolls onto his back with a sigh and stares at the ceiling. Vince’s back is skinny, pale, muscled. It’s the back Jim wanted to build for himself, the one he almost got to a couple of years ago, except he’s not twenty-five anymore and there’s only so much Hydroxy-Cut can do. He feels a strange kind of sadness, almost like nostalgia, and he’s not sure what it’s for. Vincent Kartheiser’s beautiful, underweight body, or his own agonized efforts to get one just like it? Doesn’t matter, really—he’ll never get either one again.
You pitch or catch? Vince walks back in, matter-of-fact in leather pants with his dick poking out, no shirt, smeared mascara. In his hands he has a couple of condoms and a little white bottle. The backs of Jim’s legs tighten.
Um… Fatal hesitation—he’s not focussed, he should be more focussed, but he’s stoned, he can’t help it—and Vince smirks. It’s not a cruel smirk, just a knowing one. He drops to his knees overtop of Jim, and lets the stuff scatter in a non-judgmental way.
You’re the birthday boy, he says, and starts sucking the head of Jim’s dick.
Jim blanks out briefly, just hands himself over to the God of Blowjobs, who isn’t Vince Kartheiser but an amorphous, androgynous composite of every good blowjobber past, who swallows him down happily and strokes his thighs and ass and dances him along the edge until his limbs all feel jellied and his brain is full of trains and rockets and oil rigs erupting.
Don’t come, Vince says finally, leaning away. Jim opens his eyes to see Vince rolling a condom onto his own dick. There’s already a condom on Jim. Apparently Vincent has talents beyond the ordinary.
That was…smooth, Jim says, meaning the condom. Vince quirks an eyebrow at him, then sits back on his ass and works his trousers off. The muscles in his legs stand out. He has big feet.
So…? He’s sitting with his knees up and apart, his elbows on them casually, as if they were running lines before a shoot, as if he didn’t have a hard, curved, and ready dick standing up between his legs. You a tab or a slot?
Maybe Jim’s neither—in a sane world he’s definitely neither—but now isn’t the time to quibble over semantics. That, he says, pushing up onto his elbows and then forward onto his knees, is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard you say.
Vince smiles as Jim leans further forward, crawls up his body, kisses him, then shoves him down onto his back. A finger under his hip flips him over. He’s fine with this, apparently. Still, Jim hesitates for a minute, staring down at the smooth skin at the base of Vince’s spine. He seems…small.
You cool with this? Jim asks, fingertips just touching Vince’s skin.
Wordlessly, Vince hands the lube back over his shoulder.
Okay, then. Jim slicks his fingers and runs them down Vince’s plumbline, feeling heat and unexpected softness and also the rough brush of a little hair. Not a kid. Okay. Vince arches up into the touch, too, with a girlish little moan that’s confusing and exciting, that makes Jim press a little more firmly, a little more, until he’s suddenly inside. Hot and smooth, and Vince says, Fuck—God-- and pushes back harder.
They set up a brief rhythm, a tango for two, Jim teasing with his fingers and then with the head of his cock, intervals of lube, counterpoint of moaning and grunting and animal encouragement. The center of Vince’s back flushes, like rosy wings opening from his spine. Jim’s breath is hard and fast, his heart skips a beat at one point, and he thinks vaguely, This would be a bad time for a stroke. It would, but there’s no time to think about that when he’s bumping the head of his dick against Vince’s ass and Vince pushes back unexpectedly so that he’s suddenly inside, holy of holies, Dome of the Rock, Mona Lisa, Corvette amen. Sweet Jesus.
Sweet…Jesus, he gasps, trying not to thrust.
Vincent laughs, his fingers digging into the carpet, his back flexing muscle like a superhero. Fuck yeah, he gasps back. Jim hears a whole understory of pleasure in that, and it’s synaesthetic, it’s like he gets both the give and take at the same time, because he knows what Vince is feeling right now, he knows how good it is when someone does it right. If he’d had more balls and spine he’d be where Vince is right now, on the bottom. Vince let him choose, after all. Dammit.
Can I? he asks, his hips rocking forward to add the footnote: Can I do this?
Vince doesn’t even bother with text; he’s all subtext at this point, head down, lats popping, thrusting back hard. Jim closes his eyes and grabs Vince’s hips, lets himself surge forward. He’s not going to last, he can tell. Might as well make the most of it.
They last about two minutes, actually fucking. It’s not a world’s record or anything, it’s kind of pathetic really, but for Jim there’s some satisfaction in the fact that when he finally comes, Vince already has. That means that next time the kid rags him for being ancient, he can point out who popped first. Or…not.
He comes back to earth with an almost audible thunk, wakes up with his hands on Vincent Kartheiser’s back, his dick in Vincent Kartheiser’s ass, both of them filmed with sweat and shaking. Slowly, Jim eases back. Vince flops forward. There’s an oasis.
Finally, dragging his forearm over his mouth, Jim wakes up enough to say, I’m gonna get towed.
Vince stirs, blinks, gives him an uncomprehending look.
My car, Jim says. I’m double-parked.
Vince studies him a minute, then starts to laugh. Laughing, he rolls the condom off his dick, stands up, and staggers off to the bathroom. There’s a smear of red and black on the carpet where he was lying.
Jim lies where he is, reaching blindly for his clothes and turning them right-side-out when he finds them. The water runs in the bathroom. After a few minutes, Vince comes back out. He’s naked, and he’s washed his face. He looks normal again. Like a guy.
Jim thumps down to a further subbasement of reality, watching Vincent find his shirt and trousers and pull them on in a desultory way. Yawning, scratching. Still stoned, still sleepy. In Jim’s belly, the dope has firmed into black bugs of anxiety.
So, uh… He sits up awkwardly, rolls the goddamn condom off, ties it off, palms it. You mind if I use your bathroom?
Vince gives him a look like he’s crazy, waves a hand, and shuffles to the couch. Jim goes to the bathroom.
It’s still a dope jungle in there, smoky and red and hot, makeup all over the place, Vince’s boots still sprawled on either side of the toilet. It’s a little disconcerting. In the mirror, Jim sees lipstick all over his own mouth. He looks like he’s just had a French whore. He smells like…he takes a quick sniff under one arm, and thinks he smells okay. He was clean, he was going out. For his birthday. Fuck, he still has to make it to the Viper.
He takes care of business quickly, writing the script in his head. He’ll go out, yank his clothes on, ask Kartheiser if he still wants a ride. Casual, normal. Like they do this all the time, like it’s no big deal. The secret is not to let on that it’s weird. What if Kartheiser thinks this is the start of something bigger? What if Kartheiser’s gay? He had a girlfriend before, though. What if he’s a blackmailer? What if he was just legging up for a bigger part on the show? What if he tells Joss?
Nerved up and clammy, Jim goes back out to the living room. Vince is face-down in the couch, a raggedy blanket dragged down over his shoulders but not his ass, looking dearly departed. He’s snoring a little. Jim pauses, then yanks his clothes on according to the script. Pats his pockets for his keys, and starts for the door. Halfway there, he thinks, Fuck fuck fuck fuck, and turns back around.
Vince’s hair is still soft and silky, even though he’s a guy. Jim pats it carefully, not sure what he’s afraid of, but ready to jump back if he has to. All that happens is that Vince turns his head and blinks at him sleepily.
Hey.
Vince works his mouth, squints, and says, Hey.
I’m heading out. You…still want to come?
Vince thinks about it. Nah. I’m good here.
Okay. Jim’s not a writer; that’s the end of the script. He flounders. Okay, so I guess I’ll see you on the set.
Vince smiles and nods. Yeah.
Okay, then. Jim stands up, and barely restrains himself from giving Vince a little wave. Don’t sleep too late.
Vince is giving him a sleepy-cat smile, a knowing smile, a smile that says, I am twenty-five years old or possibly not even that, and I am not only as sexy as you are, but I’m more okay with this.
We cool? Jim asks, because he’s a dork like that, he can’t just let things go.
We’re cool. Vince turns his face back into the couch, and scratches behind one ear. His fingernails are still red. Happy birthday, man.
You too, Jim says automatically. Vince laughs into the pillow. Fuck off.
He leans over and smacks Vince’s ass, because he’s secure enough to do that, then hustles out of there.
There’s a ticket on his windshield, but he hasn’t been towed. At the club, Dave notices lipstick on his collar, and he gets teased for the rest of the night about his new girlfriend, whoever she is.
